The trade routes Ibn Battuta traversed north of the Caspian were less busy than those across Afghanistan and Iran. Nonetheless, amber came down this way from the Baltic Sea to China via Moscow and the Volga. (He claims to have made an abortive attempt to journey up the Volga to the capital of the Bulgar state, but scholars doubt his veracity on this.) There is little doubt that he did indeed make a lengthy side trip to Christian Constantinople. He traveled there in the company of Princess Bayalun, the daughter of the Byzantine emperor Andronicus in who had been married, for political and economic reasons, to the Muslim Ozbeg, Khan of the Golden Horde, as his third wife; she was now returning to Constantinople for the birth of her child. Ibn Battuta reports that she wept "with pity and compassion" when he told her of his travels. Perhaps, unlike him, she was homesick. After his return to the steppes from Constantinople, Ibn Battuta relates descriptions of the route's continuation along the Silk Road and its cities. Near Samarkand Ibn Battuta spent 54 days with Tarmashirin, the Chagatay khan who had only recently converted to Islam and was interested in what a worldly-wise qadi might tell him. Although Tarmashirin "never failed to attend the dawn and evening prayers with the congregation," he was overthrown by a nephew soon thereafter. Ibn Battuta's exact path through Afghanistan and the Hindu Kush is uncertain because he does not make it clear where along the Indus he came out. But once on the hot plains, he headed for Multan, the sultan's westward customs outpost, which lay 40 days' march from Delhi "through continuously inhabited country." The traveler's pen waxed prolix as he noted the new foods, spices, trees, fruits and customs of this land where the ruling Muslims were the minority among the majority Hindu population. Ibn Battuta's intention was to impress Sultan Muhammad ibn Tughluq sufficiently to win a sinecure—which we might justly call the Mo  roccan jurist-vagabond's first steady job. When he reached Multan he presented his credentials, including, in effect, the economic and social implications of his train and entourage, to the governor, who dispatched a courier to the sultan. It was very important to make a good first impression, for no one in Delhi was likely to know anything about the new arrival'sbackground or lineage. When Ibn Battuta was finally told to proceed to court, he was also informed that it was the custom of the sultan to reward every gift with a much greater one. So Ibn Battuta struck a deal with a merchant who offered to advance him a sizable stake of dinars, camels, and goods in exchange for a fat cut of the proceeds when the sultan's reward was duly given. The merchant, clearly an early venture capitalist, also turned out to be a fair-weather friend, for he "made an enormous profit from me and became one of the principal merchants. I met him many years later at Aleppo after the infidels had robbed me of everything I possessed, but he gave me no assistance." Ibn Battuta's long stays in Baghdad andDamascus, studying the law and discussing fiqh, or legal interpretation, with fellow jurists, served him well in Delhi. He impressed Sultan Muhammad ibn Tughluq, who appointed him qadi in Delhi with the handsome compensation of 12,000 silver dinars per year, plus a "signing bonus" of 12,000 dinars for agreeing to reside there permanently. Ibn Tughluq's largesse, however, was out of proportion to the stability of his reign. His taxes beggared the countryside, yet in the cities his extravagance was mind-boggling. This was immediately apparent to Ibn Battuta, who observed: This king is of all men the most addicted to the making of gifts and the shedding of blood. His gate is never without some poor man enriched or some living man executed.... For all that, he is of all men the most humble and the readiest to show equity and to acknowledge the right....