Page:The lives of celebrated travellers (Volume 1).djvu/90

 tasted of much pleasure, he returned to Mohammed Uzbek, whose bounty enabled him to pursue his journey towards the east in a very superior style. The country to which his desires now pointed was Khavāresm, the road thither traversing, during the greater part of the way, a barren desert, where little water and a very scanty herbage were to be found. Crossing this waste in a carriage drawn by camels, he arrived at Khavāresm, the largest city at that period possessed by the Turks. Here he found the people friendly towards strangers, liberal, and well-bred,—and no wonder; for in every mosque a whip was hung up, with which every person who absented himself from church was soundly flogged by the priest, besides being fined in five dinars. This practice, which Ibn Batūta thought highly commendable, no doubt contributed greatly towards rendering the people liberal and well-bred. Next to the refinement of the people, the most remarkable thing he observed at Khavāresm was a species of melon, green on the outside, and red within, which, being cut into thin oblong slices and dried, was packed up in cases like figs, and exported to India and China. Thus preserved, the Khavāresm melon was thought equal to the best dried fruits in the world, and regarded as a present worthy of kings.

From hence Ibn Batūta departed for Bokhāra, a city renowned throughout the east for the learning and refinement of its inhabitants, but at this period so reduced and impoverished by the long wars of Genghis Khan and his successors, that not one man was to be found in it who understood any thing of science. Leaving this ancient seat of oriental learning, he proceeded to Māwarā El Nahr, the sultan of which was a just and powerful prince, who received him hospitably, and furnished him with funds to pursue his wanderings. He next visited Samarkand, Balkh, and Herat, in Khorāsān; and scaling the