_ 332 _ On the day we arrived in this city, our lady-companion who was afflicted by the plague died. She first made her will by my hand, leaving the Armenian as her executor, because I did not wish to be implicated. She left him about two hundred cruzados which she was carrying in a small bag in the form of pearls. I handed this over by my own hand, so that he could sell them in Aleppo and use all the money for the Santa Casa in Jerusalem, for masses and alms for the poor, for her soul and that of her husband. Her death caused us a good deal of trouble, for we did not wish it to be discovered. On the following day at midnight the Armenian placed her on a hired beast which another [person] brought to him, and they travelled ahead to bury her in a valley at a distance from the city. We paid all the hire to the Armenian, and gave him all her dresses and clothes (for the people of these parts wear them without any fear, and do not flee or attach any importance to the plague, as if they had three lives; and it seems to me that this is born in them because they are so accustomed to it, and it is always among them), so that she could go and not appear any more in the caravan. I told our companion, the Armenian Simão Fermandes, to go on and wait for us in Carahemite, which is four or five days’ journey farther on. I gave the people in the caravan
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