B. Departure and Return to the Empire.
Although I could have no doubts about my master’s wishes, yet, mindful that in the entourage of a prince there are never lacking persons ready to blacken the services of others, however distinguished, especially if they be foreigners, I resolved that, as far as was practicable, everything should be reserved as free as possible for his decision. And so in my negotiations with Ali I managed to point out that, although the proposed conditions did not entirely conform with the Emperor’s expectations, yet I was sure that he would accept them, provided that some one were sent with me who could explain anything in them which was obscure or could in any other way give rise to discussion. I suggested that for this purpose Ibrahim would be the most suitable person, since it was through him that the Pashas themselves knew how anxious the Emperor was for peace. He was easily induced to accept this proposal, and so the finishing touch was put to our long negotiations.
It is customary for the Pashas to invite an ambassador, who leaves Constantinople in good odour, to dinner in the Divan. But since I wished that everything should seem to be in suspense and undecided until a reply was brought from my master, this honour was not paid me, a loss which I bore with equanimity.
It was my wish to take back with me some fine horses, and so I instructed my servants to attend the market frequently in hopes of finding what I required. Hearing of this, Ali himself had a splendid thoroughbred of his own exposed in the market as though for sale. My men hurried to the spot and bid for it, and, when 120 ducats was asked, offered eighty, not knowing who the owner was; but the men in charge of the horse would not sell it at that price. A day or two afterwards, the same horse, with two others equally well bred, was sent me by Ali Pasha as a gift. One of them was a beautiful Arab riding horse. When I thanked him for his gift, the Pasha asked whether I did not think that the horse, which my men had wished to buy in the market for 80 ducats, was worth a good deal more. ‘Much more,’ I replied, ‘but they had been instructed by me not to exceed that price, for fear lest I might lose heavily (as sometimes happens) by their purchasing, without knowing it, a horse which had hidden defects.’ He then advised me about the feeding of Turkish horses at the beginning of a journey, namely, that they ought to be kept on small rations at first, and that I ought to travel by short stages until they had become accustomed to the work; and he recommended me to spread the journey to Adrianople over nine or ten days instead of the usual five. He also gave me a really beautiful robe interwoven with gold and a box full of antidote to poison of the finest quality from Alexandria, and lastly a glass vessel full of balm, which he praised very highly. ‘The other gifts which he had given me he did not,’ he said, ‘value very greatly, because they could be bought with money, but this was a rare present, than which his master could give nothing more precious to a friendly or allied prince. He had been Governor of Egypt for some years, and so had had the opportunity of acquiring it.’ Two kinds of juice are produced from this plant: one is extracted from the oil of the leaves, which are boiled down, and is black and cheap; the other, which is yellow, is distilled from an incision in the bark, and is the genuine article, some of which he presented to me.
He expressed a wish for certain gifts from me in return: a coat of mail of a size to fit his tall and stout frame, a sturdy charger to which he could trust himself without fear of a fall (for he has difficulty in finding a horse which is equal to his great weight), and, lastly, some bird’s-eye maple, or similar wood, such as we use for inlaying tables.
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