_ 142 _ knew me, approached me and pointed out the difficulty of embarking in Tripoli because there were many Turks on the shore in Tripoli who collected the dues, and that not even a fly would escape their attention. If they found the slave, they would immediately make a Turk of him and this would cost me a great deal, because he was circumcised, something about him I did not know. I had a letter of enfranchisement written for him by the chancellor of the consul and I handed him over to my Armenian companion who was returning to India, with seven cruzados for his expenses, so that he should take him back and he should not stay in Turkish lands. We left Aleppo on 10 February 1566; the caravan consisted of about a hundred loads of silk, spices and other merchandise and many people. On account of the news that there were thieves, small caravans dared not travel. In this caravan were travelling four or five Venetian gentlemen. We travelled across flat well-cultivated plains and put up at a fine caravanserai near a place called Serakib, inhabited by Arab peasants. Here we encountered a hundred camels loaded with gunpowder and munitions going to Tripoli for the Turk’s fleet, which had been badly damaged in the siege of Malta.
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