183 Champa Heading further on from Borneo towards the kingdom of Siam and China lies a very large gentile island called Champa, which has a gentile king and its own language. There are many elephants which are taken from here to a variety of places. A lot of agarwood grows here, which the Indians call aguila calambua, the fine kind is highly valued by Indians and Mouros and a pound of it is worth thirty to forty pardaus in Calicut. They want it to mix it with sandalwood; musk, and rose-water to anoint themselves with it. Among these and other gentile islands on this coast, there is one whose name I do not know, where many diamonds are found. The locals gather them and sell them abroad, but they are not as hard as those from Vijayanagara. The Very Great Kingdom of China Leaving these infinite islands, which one does not the name of, be they inhabited or deserted, I come back to the coast that runs from Malacca towards the Chinese, about whom I do not have any information, only that beyond the kingdom of Siam and many others lies the kingdom of China, which is said to be an enormous country, ruling on the mainland and along the sea-coast and is also inhabited by gentiles. Its king is gentile, they worship idols a lot, he is always in the interior, he has manyfine, large cities. No foreigner may enter the interior, only the seaports to do business and the islands. Should the ambassador of another kingdom arrivefirstly by sea and wish to go there, theyfirst of all inform the king that he is bringing letters; embassies and gifts; then the king summons him to wherever he is. The kingdom’s inhabitants are great merchants, they are white men and good-humoured. Their women havefinefigures, both the men and they have small eyes, three or four whiskers in their beard, no more, for
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