CHAPTER VIII.

HOW THE GREAT KAAN GAVE THEM A TABLET OF GOLD, BEARING HIS

ORDERS IN THEIR BEHALF.

When the Prince had charged them with all his commission, he caused to

be given them a Tablet of Gold, on which was inscribed that the three

Ambassadors should be supplied with everything needful in all the

countries through which they should pass—with horses, with escorts,

and, in short, with whatever they should require. And when they had

made all needful preparations, the three Ambassadors took their leave

of the Emperor and set out.

When they had travelled I know not how many days, the Tartar Baron

fell sick, so that he could not ride, and being very ill, and unable

to proceed further, he halted at a certain city. So the Two Brothers

judged it best that they should leave him behind and proceed to carry

out their commission; and, as he was well content that they should

do so, they continued their journey. And I can assure you, that

whithersoever they went they were honourably provided with whatever

they stood in need of, or chose to command. And this was owing to that

Tablet of Authority from the Lord which they carried with them.{1}

So they travelled on and on until they arrived at Layas in Hermenia,

a journey which occupied them, I assure you, for three years.{2} It

took them so long because they could not always proceed, being stopped

sometimes by snow, or by heavy rains falling, or by great torrents

which they found in an impassable state.

NOTE 1.—On these Tablets, see a note under Bk. II. ch. vii.

NOTE 2.—AYAS, called also Ayacio, Aiazzo, Giazza, Glaza, La Jazza,

and _Layas_, occupied the site of ancient Aegae, and was the chief

port of Cilician Armenia, on the Gulf of Scanderoon. _Aegae_ had

been in the 5th century a place of trade with the West, and the

seat of a bishopric, as we learn from the romantic but incomplete

story of Mary, the noble slave-girl, told by Gibbon (ch. 33). As

Ayas it became in the latter part of the 13th century one of the

chief places for the shipment of Asiatic wares arriving through

Tabriz, and was much frequented by the vessels of the Italian

Republics. The Venetians had a _Bailo_ resident there.

[Illustration: Castle of Ayas.]

Ayas is the _Leyes_ of Chaucer’s Knight,—

(“At LEYES was he and at Satalie”)—

and the Layas of Froissart. (Bk. III. ch. xxii.) The Gulf of Layas

is described in the xix. Canto of Ariosto, where Mafisa and Astolfo

find on its shores a country of barbarous Amazons:—

“Fatto è ’l porto a sembranza d’una luna,” etc.

Marino Sanuto says of it: “Laiacio has a haven, and a shoal in

front of it that we might rather call a reef, and to this shoal

the hawsers of vessels are moored whilst the anchors are laid out

towards the land.” (II. IV. ch. xxvi.)

The present Ayas is a wretched village of some 15 huts, occupied

by about 600 Turkmans, and standing inside the ruined walls of the

castle. This castle, which is still in good condition, was built

by the Armenian kings, and restored by Sultan Suleiman; it was

constructed from the remains of the ancient city; fragments of

old columns are embedded in its walls of cut stone. It formerly

communicated by a causeway with an advanced work on an island

before the harbour. The ruins of the city occupy a large space.

(_Langlois, V. en Cilicie_, pp. 429–31; see also _Beaufort’s

Karamania_, near the end.) A plan of Ayas will be found at the

beginning of Bk. I.—H. Y. and H. C.