130 will they do anything. They also believe in omens: if a cat crosses their path when they are about to do something, they will not do it. If they leave home to deal with some business and they come across a crow with a twig in its beak, they turn back; if when about to leave some people’s company, one of them should sneeze, the one who was about to leave sits down again and does not leave so soon. They worship the sun and the moon, the oil-lamp and cows, and respect them a great deal. They believe very quickly that someone may be bedevilled, they say that it is their god who possesses them and that the devil makes them say these extraordinary things which they fully believe and makes them cut themselves. Whatever they say to the king, he does without reflection, and the devil, in order to make them believe in him, does terrible things. They believe that after his death a man will be born again to another woman with the same moles on his skin. There is another caste of people in this kingdom of Malabar, called Brabars, who are native Indian merchants, and already were before foreign peoples started sailing to India. They deal in all sorts of merchandise, both in the sea ports and in the interior, where most of their trade is conducted. They gather all the pepper and ginger from the nairs and farmers, and they often purchase the new crop before it is harvested in exchange for cotton cloths and other goods that can be found at the seaports and they then re-sell them at a sizeable profit. They enjoy such freedom that the king of the realm where they live cannot sentence them to death; should the king hear that one of them has committed some foul deed for which he must be punished, he makes it known to the others. They assemble a council of the leadingfigures, who spear and stab the miscreant to death and then they inform the king of the justice that they have served on him. They are very rich men who inherit a lot of land which has been owned for many generations. They take just one wife like we do, their
RkJQdWJsaXNoZXIy OTg0NzAy