Chapter 1 of 114

Preface

[Illustration: H. Yule

_T. B. Wirgman, del. et. sc._ _Walker & Cockerell, ph. sc._]

THE TRAVELS OF MARCO POLO

THE COMPLETE YULE-CORDIER EDITION

Including the unabridged third edition (1903) of Henry Yule’s annotated translation, as revised by Henri Cordier; together with Cordier’s later volume of notes and addenda (1920)

IN TWO VOLUMES

VOLUME I

_Containing the first volume of the 1903 edition_

DEDICATION.

TO THE MEMORY OF SIR RODERICK I. MURCHISON, BART., K.C.B., G.C.ST.A., G.C.ST.S., ETC. THE PERFECT FRIEND WHO FIRST BROUGHT HENRY YULE AND JOHN MURRAY TOGETHER (HE ENTERED INTO REST, OCTOBER 22ND, 1871,) AND TO THAT OF HIS MUCH LOVED NIECE, HARRIET ISABELLA MURCHISON, WIFE OF KENNETH ROBERT MURCHISON, D.L., J.P., (SHE ENTERED INTO REST, AUGUST 9TH, 1902,) UNDER WHOSE EVER HOSPITABLE ROOF MANY OF THE PROOF SHEETS OF THIS EDITION WERE READ BY ME, I DEDICATE THESE VOLUMES FROM THE OLD MURCHISON HOME, IN THANKFUL REMEMBRANCE OF ALL I OWE TO THE ABIDING AFFECTION, SYMPATHY, AND EXAMPLE OF BOTH.

TARADALE, AMY FRANCES YULE. ROSS-SHIRE, SEPTEMBER 11TH, 1902. SCOTLAND.

* * * * Ed è da noi sì strano, Che quando ne ragiono I’ non trovo nessuno, Che l’abbia navicato, * * * * Le parti del Levante, Là dove sono tante Gemme di gran valute E di molta salute: E sono in quello giro Balsamo, e ambra, e tiro, E lo pepe, e lo legno Aloe, ch’è sì degno, E spigo, e cardamomo, Giengiovo, e cennamomo; E altre molte spezie, Ciascuna in sua spezie, E migliore, e più fina, E sana in medicina. Appresso in questo loco Mise in assetto loco Li tigri, e li grifoni, Leofanti, e leoni Cammelli, e dragomene, Badalischi, e gene, E pantere, e castoro, Le formiche dell’oro, E tanti altri animali, Ch’io non so ben dir quali, Che son sì divisati, E sì dissomigliati Di corpo e di fazione, Di sì fera ragione, E di sì strana taglia, Ch’io non credo san faglia, Ch’alcun uomo vivente Potesse veramente Per lingua, o per scritture Recitar le figure Delle bestie, e gli uccelli....

—From _Il Tesoretto di Ser Brunetto Latini_ (_circa_ MDCCLX.). (_Florence_, 1824, pp. 83 _seqq._)

[Illustration]

Ἂνδρα μοι ἔννεπε, Μοῦσα, πολύτροπον, ὃς μάλα πολλὰ Πλάγχθη . . . . . . . Πολλῶν δ᾽ ἀνθρώπων ἴδεν ἄστεα καὶ νόον ἔγνω.

_Odyssey_, I.

————“I AM BECOME A NAME; FOR ALWAYS ROAMING WITH A HUNGRY HEART MUCH HAVE I SEEN AND KNOWN; CITIES OF MEN, AND MANNERS, CLIMATES, COUNCILS, GOVERNMENTS, MYSELF NOT LEAST, BUT HONOURED OF THEM ALL.”

TENNYSON.

“_A SEDER CI PONEMMO IVI AMBODUI VÔLTI A LEVANTE, OND’ERAVAM SALITI; CHÈ SUOLE A RIGUARDAR GIOVARE ALTRUI._”

DANTE, _Purgatory_, IV.

[Illustration: Messer Marco Polo, with Messer Nicolo and Messer Maffeo, returned from xxvi years’ sojourn in the Orient, is denied entrance to the Ca’ Polo. (See _Int._ p. _4_)]

CONTENTS OF VOL. I.

page DEDICATION iii

NOTE BY MISS YULE v

PREFACE TO THIRD EDITION vii

PREFACE TO SECOND EDITION xi

ORIGINAL PREFACE xxi

ORIGINAL DEDICATION xxv

MEMOIR OF SIR HENRY YULE BY AMY FRANCES YULE, L.A.SOC. ANT. SCOT. xxvii

A BIBLIOGRAPHY OF SIR HENRY YULE’S WRITINGS lxxv

SYNOPSIS OF CONTENTS lxxxiii

EXPLANATORY LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS TO VOL. I. xcvii

INTRODUCTORY NOTICES _1–144_

THE BOOK OF MARCO POLO.

NOTE BY MISS YULE.

I desire to take this opportunity of recording my grateful sense of the unsparing labour, learning, and devotion, with which my father’s valued friend, Professor Henri Cordier, has performed the difficult and delicate task which I entrusted to his loyal friendship.

Apart from Professor Cordier’s very special qualifications for the work, I feel sure that no other Editor could have been more entirely acceptable to my father. I can give him no higher praise than to say that he has laboured in Yule’s own spirit.

The slight Memoir which I have contributed (for which I accept all responsibility), attempts no more than a rough sketch of my father’s character and career, but it will, I hope, serve to recall pleasantly his remarkable individuality to the few remaining who knew him in his prime, whilst it may also afford some idea of the man, and his work and environment, to those who had not that advantage.

No one can be more conscious than myself of its many shortcomings, which I will not attempt to excuse. I can, however, honestly say that these have not been due to negligence, but are rather the blemishes almost inseparable from the fulfilment under the gloom of bereavement and amidst the pressure of other duties, of a task undertaken in more favourable circumstances.

Nevertheless, in spite of all defects, I believe this sketch to be such a record as my father would himself have approved, and I know also that he would have chosen my hand to write it.

In conclusion, I may note that the first edition of this work was dedicated to that very noble lady, the Queen (then Crown Princess) Margherita of Italy. In the second edition the Dedication was reproduced within brackets (as also the original preface), but not renewed. That precedent is again followed.

I have, therefore, felt at liberty to associate the present edition of my father’s work with the Name MURCHISON, which for more than a generation was the name most generally representative of British Science in Foreign Lands, as of Foreign Science in Britain.

A. F. YULE.

PREFACE TO THIRD EDITION.

Little did I think, some thirty years ago, when I received a copy of the first edition of this grand work, that I should be one day entrusted with the difficult but glorious task of supervising the third edition. When the first edition of the _Book of Ser Marco Polo_ reached “Far Cathay,” it created quite a stir in the small circle of the learned foreigners, who then resided there, and became a starting-point for many researches, of which the results have been made use of partly in the second edition, and partly in the present. The Archimandrite PALLADIUS and Dr. E. BRETSCHNEIDER, at Peking, ALEX. WYLIE, at Shang-hai—friends of mine who have, alas! passed away, with the exception of the Right Rev. Bishop G. E. MOULE, of Hang-chau, the only survivor of this little group of hard-working scholars,—were the first to explore the Chinese sources of information which were to yield a rich harvest into their hands.

When I returned home from China in 1876, I was introduced to Colonel HENRY YULE, at the India Office, by our common friend, Dr. REINHOLD ROST, and from that time we met frequently and kept up a correspondence which terminated only with the life of the great geographer, whose friend I had become. A new edition of the travels of Friar Odoric of Pordenone, our “mutual friend,” in which Yule had taken the greatest interest, was dedicated by me to his memory. I knew that Yule contemplated a third edition of his _Marco Polo_, and all will regret that time was not allowed to him to complete this labour of love, to see it published. If the duty of bringing out the new edition of _Marco Polo_ has fallen on one who considers himself but an unworthy successor of the first illustrious commentator, it is fair to add that the work could not have been entrusted to a more respectful disciple. Many of our tastes were similar; we had the same desire to seek the truth, the same earnest wish to be exact, perhaps the same sense of humour, and, what is necessary when writing on Marco Polo, certainly the same love for Venice and its history. Not only am I, with the late CHARLES SCHEFER, the founder and the editor of the _Recueil de Voyages et de Documents pour servir à l’Histoire de la Géographie depuis le XIIIᵉ jusqu’à la fin du XVIᵉ siècle_, but I am also the successor, at the École des langues Orientales Vivantes, of G. PAUTHIER, whose book on the Venetian Traveller is still valuable, so the mantle of the last two editors fell upon my shoulders.

I therefore, gladly and thankfully, accepted Miss AMY FRANCIS YULE’S kind proposal to undertake the editorship of the third edition of the _Book of Ser Marco Polo_, and I wish to express here my gratitude to her for the great honour she has thus done me.[1]

Unfortunately for his successor, Sir Henry Yule, evidently trusting to his own good memory, left but few notes. These are contained in an interleaved copy obligingly placed at my disposal by Miss Yule, but I luckily found assistance from various other quarters. The following works have proved of the greatest assistance to me:—The articles of General HOUTUM-SCHINDLER in the _Journal of the Royal Asiatic Society_, and the excellent books of Lord CURZON and of Major P. MOLESWORTH SYKES on Persia, M. GRENARD’S account of DUTREUIL de RHINS’ Mission to Central Asia, BRETSCHNEIDER’S and PALLADIUS’ remarkable papers on Mediæval Travellers and Geography, and above all, the valuable books of the Hon. W. W. ROCKHILL on Tibet and Rubruck, to which the distinguished diplomatist, traveller, and scholar kindly added a list of notes of the greatest importance to me, for which I offer him my hearty thanks.

My thanks are also due to H.H. Prince ROLAND BONAPARTE, who kindly gave me permission to reproduce some of the plates of his _Recueil de Documents de l’Époque Mongole_, to M. LÉOPOLD DELISLE, the learned Principal Librarian of the Bibliothèque Nationale, who gave me the opportunity to study the inventory made after the death of the Doge Marino Faliero, to the Count de SEMALLÉ, formerly French Chargé d’Affaires at Peking, who gave me for reproduction a number of photographs from his valuable personal collection, and last, not least, my old friend Comm. NICOLÒ BAROZZI, who continued to lend me the assistance which he had formerly rendered to Sir Henry Yule at Venice.

Since the last edition was published, more than twenty-five years ago, Persia has been more thoroughly studied; new routes have been explored in Central Asia, Karakorum has been fully described, and Western and South-Western China have been opened up to our knowledge in many directions. The results of these investigations form the main features of this new edition of _Marco Polo_. I have suppressed hardly any of Sir Henry Yule’s notes and altered but few, doing so only when the light of recent information has proved him to be in error, but I have supplemented them by what, I hope, will be found useful, new information.[2]

Before I take leave of the kind reader, I wish to thank sincerely Mr. JOHN MURRAY for the courtesy and the care he has displayed while this edition was going through the press.

HENRI CORDIER. PARIS, _1st of October, 1902_.

---------------------------------------------------------------------- [1] Miss Yule has written the Memoir of her father and the new Dedication.

[2] Paragraphs which have been altered are marked thus ✛; my own additions are placed between brackets [ ].—H. C.

[Illustration:

“=Now strike your Sailes yee jolly Mariners, For we be come into a quiet Rode=”....

—THE FAERIE QUEENE, I. xii. 42.]

PREFACE TO SECOND EDITION.

The unexpected amount of favour bestowed on the former edition of this Work has been a great encouragement to the Editor in preparing this second one.

Not a few of the kind friends and correspondents who lent their aid before have continued it to the present revision. The contributions of Mr. A. WYLIE of Shang-hai, whether as regards the amount of labour which they must have cost him, or the value of the result, demand above all others a grateful record here. Nor can I omit to name again with hearty acknowledgment Signor Comm. G. BERCHET of Venice, the Rev. Dr. CALDWELL, Colonel (now Major-General) R. MACLAGAN, R.E., Mr. D. HANBURY, F.R.S., Mr. EDWARD THOMAS, F.R.S. (Corresponding Member of the Institute), and Mr. R. H. MAJOR.

But besides these old names, not a few new ones claim my thanks.

The Baron F. VON RICHTHOFEN, now President of the Geographical Society of Berlin, a traveller who not only has trodden many hundreds of miles in the footsteps of our Marco, but has perhaps travelled over more of the Interior of China than Marco ever did, and who carried to that survey high scientific accomplishments of which the Venetian had not even a rudimentary conception, has spontaneously opened his bountiful stores of new knowledge in my behalf. Mr. NEY ELIAS, who in 1872 traversed and mapped a line of upwards of 2000 miles through the almost unknown tracts of Western Mongolia, from the Gate in the Great Wall at Kalghan to the Russian frontier in the Altai, has done likewise.[1] To the Rev. G. MOULE, of the Church Mission at Hang-chau, I owe a mass of interesting matter regarding that once great and splendid city, the KINSAY of our Traveller, which has enabled me, I trust, to effect great improvement both in the Notes and in the Map, which illustrate that subject. And to the Rev. CARSTAIRS DOUGLAS, LL.D., of the English Presbyterian Mission at Amoy, I am scarcely less indebted. The learned Professor BRUUN, of Odessa, whom I never have seen, and have little likelihood of ever seeing in this world, has aided me with zeal and cordiality like that of old friendship. To Mr. ARTHUR BURNELL, Ph.D., of the Madras Civil Service, I am grateful for many valuable notes bearing on these and other geographical studies, and particularly for his generous communication of the drawing and photograph of the ancient Cross at St. Thomas’s Mount, long before any publication of that subject was made on his own account. My brother officer, Major OLIVER ST. JOHN, R.E., has favoured me with a variety of interesting remarks regarding the Persian chapters, and has assisted me with new data, very materially correcting the Itinerary Map in Kerman.

Mr. BLOCHMANN of the Calcutta Madrasa, Sir DOUGLAS FORSYTH, C.B., lately Envoy to Kashgar, M. de MAS LATRIE, the Historian of Cyprus, Mr. ARTHUR GROTE, Mr. EUGENE SCHUYLER of the U.S. Legation at St. Petersburg, Dr. BUSHELL and Mr. W. F. MAYERS, of H.M.’s Legation at Peking, Mr. G. PHILLIPS of Fuchau, Madame OLGA FEDTCHENKO, the widow of a great traveller too early lost to the world, Colonel KEATINGE, V.C., C.S.I., Major-General KEYES, C.B., Dr. GEORGE BIRDWOOD, Mr. BURGESS, of Bombay, my old and valued friend Colonel W. H. GREATHED, C.B., and the Master of Mediæval Geography, M. D’AVEZAC himself, with others besides, have kindly lent assistance of one kind or another, several of them spontaneously, and the rest in prompt answer to my requests.

Having always attached much importance to the matter of illustrations,[2] I feel greatly indebted to the liberal action of Mr. Murray in enabling me largely to increase their number in this edition. Though many are original, we have also borrowed a good many;[3] a proceeding which seems to me entirely unobjectionable when the engravings are truly illustrative of the text, and not hackneyed.

I regret the augmented bulk of the volumes. There has been some excision, but the additions visibly and palpably preponderate. The truth is that since the completion of the first edition, just four years ago, large additions have been made to the stock of our knowledge bearing on the subjects of this Book; and how these additions have continued to come in up to the last moment, may be seen in Appendix L,[4] which has had to undergo repeated interpolation after being put in type. KARAKORUM, for a brief space the seat of the widest empire the world has known, has been visited; the ruins of SHANG-TU, the “Xanadu of Cublay Khan,” have been explored; PAMIR and TANGUT have been penetrated from side to side; the famous mountain Road of SHEN-SI has been traversed and described; the mysterious CAINDU has been unveiled; the publication of my lamented friend Lieutenant Garnier’s great work on the French Exploration of Indo-China has provided a mass of illustration of that YUN-NAN for which but the other day Marco Polo was well-nigh the most recent authority. Nay, the last two years have thrown a promise of light even on what seemed the wildest of Marco’s stories, and the bones of a veritable RUC from New Zealand lie on the table of Professor Owen’s Cabinet!

M. VIVIEN de St. MARTIN, during the interval of which we have been speaking, has published a History of Geography. In treating of Marco Polo, he alludes to the first edition of this work, most evidently with no intention of disparagement, but speaks of it as merely a revision of Marsden’s Book. The last thing I should allow myself to do would be to apply to a Geographer, whose works I hold in so much esteem, the disrespectful definition which the adage quoted in my former Preface[5] gives of the _vir qui docet quod non sapit_; but I feel bound to say that on this occasion M. Vivien de St. Martin has permitted himself to pronounce on a matter with which he had not made himself acquainted; for the perusal of the very first lines of the Preface (I will say nothing of the Book) would have shown him that such a notion was utterly unfounded.

In concluding these “forewords” I am probably taking leave of Marco Polo,[6] the companion of many pleasant and some laborious hours, whilst I have been contemplating with him (“_vôlti a levante_”) that Orient in which I also had spent years not a few.

• • • • •

And as the writer lingered over this conclusion, his thoughts wandered back in reverie to those many venerable libraries in which he had formerly made search for mediæval copies of the Traveller’s story; and it seemed to him as if he sate in a recess of one of these with a manuscript before him which had never till then been examined with any care, and which he found with delight to contain passages that appear in no version of the Book hitherto known. It was written in clear Gothic text, and in the Old French tongue of the early 14th century. Was it possible that he had lighted on the long-lost original of Ramusio’s Version? No; it proved to be different. Instead of the tedious story of the northern wars, which occupies much of our Fourth Book, there were passages occurring in the later history of Ser Marco, some years after his release from the Genoese captivity. They appeared to contain strange anachronisms certainly; but we have often had occasion to remark on puzzles in the chronology of Marco’s story![7] And in some respects they tended to justify our intimated suspicion that he was a man of deeper feelings and wider sympathies than the book of Rusticiano had allowed to appear.[8] Perhaps this time the Traveller had found an amanuensis whose faculties had not been stiffened by fifteen years of Malapaga?[9] One of the most important passages ran thus:—

_“Si se partist de |Venisse| et chevaucha aux parties d’occident. Et demoura mainz jours es contrées de |Provence| et de |France| et puys fist passaige aux Ysles de la tremontaingne et s’en retourna par |la Magne|, si comme vous orrez cy-après. Et fist-il escripre son voiage atout les devisements les contrées; mes de la France n’y parloit mie grantment pour ce que maintes genz la scevent apertement. Et pour ce en lairons atant, et commencerons d’autres choses, assavoir, de |BRETAINGNE LA GRANT|._

=Cy devyse dou roiaume de Bretaingne la grant.=

_“Et sachiés que quand l’en se part de |Calés|, et l’en nage |XX| ou |XXX| milles à trop grant mesaise, si treuve l’en une grandisme Ysle qui s’appelle |Bretaingne la Grant|. Elle est à une grant royne et n’en fait treuage à nulluy. Et ensevelissent lor mors, et ont monnoye de chartres et d’or et d’argent, et ardent pierres noyres, et vivent de marchandises et d’ars, et ont toutes choses de vivre en grant habondance mais non pas à bon marchié. Et c’est une Ysle de trop grant richesce, et li marinier de celle partie dient que c’est li plus riches royaumes qui soit ou monde, et qu’il y a li mieudre marinier dou monde et li mieudre coursier et li mieudre chevalier (ains ne chevauchent mais lonc com François). Ausi ont-il trop bons homes d’armes et vaillans durement (bien que maint n’y ait), et les dames et damoseles bonnes et loialles, et belles com lys souef florant. Et quoi vous en diroie-je? Il y a citez et chasteau assez, et tant de marchéanz et si riches qui font venir tant d’avoir-de-poiz et de toute espece de marchandise qu’il n’est hons qui la verité en sceust dire. Font venir |d’Ynde| et d’autres parties coton a grant planté, et font venir soye de |Manzi| et de |Bangala|, et font venir laine des ysles de la Mer Occeane et de toutes parties. Et si labourent maintz bouquerans et touailles et autres draps de coton et de laine et de soye. Encores sachiés que ont vaines d’acier assez, et si en labourent trop soubtivement de tous hernois de chevalier, et de toutes choses besoignables à ost; ce sont espées et glaive et esperon et heaume et haches, et toute espèce d’arteillerie et de coutelerie, et en font grant gaaigne et grant marchandise. Et en font si grant habondance que tout li mondes en y puet avoir et à bon marchié._

=Encores cy devise dou dyt roiaume, et de ce qu’en dist Messires Marcs.=

_“Et sachiés que tient icelle Royne la seigneurie de l’|Ynde majeure| et de |Mutfili| et de |Bangala|, et d’une moitié de |Mien|. Et moult est saige et noble dame et pourvéans, si que est elle amée de chascun. Et avoit jadis mari; et depuys qu’il mourut bien |XIV| ans avoit; adonc la royne sa fame l’ama tant que oncques puis ne se voult marier a nullui, pour l’amour le prince son baron, ançois moult maine quoye vie. Et tient son royaume ausi bien ou miex que oncques le tindrent li roy si aioul. Mes ores en ce royaume li roy n’ont guieres pooir, ains la poissance commence a trespasser à la menue gent. Et distrent aucun marinier de celes parties à |Monseignour Marc| que hui-et-le jour li royaumes soit auques abastardi come je vous diroy. Car bien est voirs que ci-arrières estoit ciz pueple de |Bretaingne la Grant| bonne et granz et loialle gent qui servoit Diex moult volontiers selonc lor usaige; et tuit li labour qu’il labouroient et portoient a vendre estoient honnestement labouré, et dou greigneur vaillance, et chose pardurable; et se vendoient à jouste pris sanz barguignier. En tant que se aucuns labours portoit l’estanpille |Bretaingne la Grant| c’estoit regardei com pleges de bonne estoffe. Mes orendroit li labours n’est mie tousjourz si bons; et quand l’en achate pour un quintal pesant de toiles de coton, adonc, par trop souvent, si treuve l’en de chascun |C| pois de coton, bien |XXX| ou |XL| pois de plastre de gifs, ou de blanc d’Espaigne, ou de choses semblables. Et se l’en achate de cammeloz ou de tireteinne ou d’autre dras de laine, cist ne durent mie, ains sont plain d’empoise, ou de glu et de balieures._

_“Et bien qu’il est voirs que chascuns hons egalement doit de son cors servir son seigneur ou sa commune, pour aler en ost en tens de besoingne; et bien que trestuit li autre royaume d’occident tieingnent ce pour ordenance, ciz pueple de |Bretaingne la Grant| n’en veult nullement, ains si dient: ‘Veez-là: n’avons nous pas la |Manche| pour fossé de nostre pourpris, et pourquoy nous penerons-nous pour nous faire homes d’armes, en lessiant nos gaaignes et nos soulaz? Cela lairons aus soudaiers.’ Or li preudhome entre eulx moult scevent bien com tiex paroles sont nyaises; mes si ont paour de lour en dire la verité pour ce que cuident desplaire as bourjois et à la menue gent._

_“Ore vous lairons à conter de ceste matière et retournerons à parler de la Loy des genz de |Bretaingne la Grant|._

=Cy devise des diverses créances de la gent Bretaingne la Grant et de ce qu’en cuidoit Messires Marcs.=

_“Il est voirs que li pueples est Crestiens, mes non pour le plus selonc la foy de l’Apostoille Rommain, ains tiennent le en mautalent assez. Seulement il y en a aucun qui sont féoil du dit Apostoille et encore plus forment que li nostre prudhome de |Venisse|. Car quand dit li Papes: ‘Telle ou telle chose est noyre,’ toute ladite gent si en jure: ‘Noyre est com poivre.’ Et puis se dira li Papes de la dite chose: ‘Elle est blanche,’ si en jurera toute ladite gent: ‘Il est voirs qu’elle est blanche; blanche est com noifs.’ Et dist |Messires Marc Pol|: ‘Nous n’avons nullement tant de foy à |Venyse|, ne li prudhome de |Florence| non plus, com l’en puet savoir bien apertement dou livre Monseignour |Dantès Aldiguiere|, que j’ay congneu a |Padoe| le meisme an que Messires |Thibault de Cepoy| à |Venisse| estoit.[13] Mes c’est joustement ce que j’ay veu autre foiz près le Grant |Bacsi| qui est com li Papes des Ydres.’_

_“Encore y a une autre manière de gent; ce sont de celz qui s’appellent filsoufes;[14] et si il disent: ‘S’il y a Diex n’en scavons nul, mes il est voirs qu’il est une certeinne courance des choses laquex court devers le bien.’ Et fist |Messires Marcs|: ‘Encore la créance des |Bacsi| qui dysent que n’y a ne Diex Eternel ne Juge des homes, ains il est une certeinne chose laquex s’appelle |Kerma|.’[15]_

_“Une autre foiz avint que disoit un des filsoufes à |Monseignour Marc|: ‘Diex n’existe mie jeusqu’ores, ainçois il se fait desorendroit.’ Et fist encore |Messires Marcs|: ‘Veez-là, une autre foiz la créance des ydres, car dient que li seuz Diex est icil hons qui par force de ses vertuz et de son savoir tant pourchace que d’home il se face Diex presentement. Et li Tartar l’appelent |Borcan|. Tiex Diex |Sagamoni Borcan| estoit, dou quel parle li livres Maistre |Rusticien|.’[16]_

_“Encore ont une autre manière de filsoufes, et dient-il: ‘Il n’est mie ne Diex ne |Kerma| ne courance vers le bien, ne Providence, ne Créerres, ne Sauvours, ne sainteté ne pechiés ne conscience de pechié, ne proyère ne response à proyère, il n’est nulle riens fors que trop minime grain ou paillettes qui ont à nom |atosmes|, et de tiex grains devient chose qui vive, et chose qui vive devient une certeinne creature qui demoure au rivaige de la Mer: et ceste creature devient poissons, et poissons devient lezars, et lezars devient blayriaus, et blayriaus devient gat-maimons, et gat-maimons devient hons sauvaiges qui menjue char d’homes, et hons sauvaiges devient hons crestien.’_

_“Et dist |Messires Marc|: ‘Encore une foiz, biaus sires, li |Bacsi| de |Tebet| et de |Kescemir| et li prestre de |Seilan|, qui si dient que l’arme vivant doie trespasser par tous cez changes de vestemens; si com se treuve escript ou livre |Maistre Rusticien| que |Sagamoni Borcan| mourut iiij vint et iiij foiz et tousjourz resuscita, et à chascune foiz d’une diverse manière de beste, et à la derreniere foyz mourut hons et devint diex, selonc ce qu’il dient.’[17] Et fist encore |Messires Marc|: ‘A moy pert-il trop estrange chose se juesques à toutes les créances des ydolastres deust dechéoir ceste grantz et saige nation. Ainsi peuent jouer Misire li filsoufe atout lour propre perte, mes à l’ore quand tiex fantaisies se respanderont es joenes bacheliers et parmy la menue gent, celz averont pour toute Loy =manducemus et bibamus, cras enim moriemur=; et trop isnellement l’en raccomencera la descente de l’eschiele, et d’home crestien deviendra hons sauvaiges, et d’home sauvaige gat-maimons, et de gat-maimon blayriaus.’ Et fist encores |Messires Marc|: ‘Maintes contrées et provinces et ysles et citéz je |Marc Pol| ay veues et de maintes genz de maintes manières ay les condicionz congneues, et je croy bien que il est plus assez dedens l’univers que ce que li nostre prestre n’y songent. Et puet bien estre, biaus sires, que li mondes n’a estés creés à tous poinz com nous creiens, ains d’une sorte encore plus merveillouse. Mes cil n’amenuise nullement nostre pensée de Diex et de sa majesté, ains la fait greingnour. Et contrée n’ay veue ou Dame Diex ne manifeste apertement les granz euvres de sa tout-poissante saigesse; gent n’ay congneue esquiex ne se fait sentir li fardels de pechié, et la besoingne de Phisicien des maladies de l’arme tiex com est nostre Seignours Ihesus Crist, Beni soyt son Non. Pensez doncques à cel qu’a dit uns de ses Apostres: =Nolite esse prudentes apud vosmet ipsos=; et uns autres: =Quoniam multi pseudo-prophetae exierint=; et uns autres: =Quod venient in novissimis diebus illusores ... dicentes, Ubi est promissio?= et encores aus parolles que dist li Signours meismes: =Vide ergo ne lumen quod in te est tenebrae sint=._

=Commant Messires Marcs se partist de l’ysle de Bretaingne et de la proyère que fist=.

_“Et pourquoy vous en feroie-je lonc conte? Si print nef |Messires Marcs| et se partist en nageant vers la terre ferme. Or |Messires Marc Pol| moult ama cel roiaume de |Bretaingne la grant| pour son viex renon et s’ancienne franchise, et pour sa saige et bonne Royne (que Diex gart), et pour les mainz homes de vaillance et bons chaceours et les maintes bonnes et honnestes dames qui y estoient. Et sachiés tout voirement que en estant delez le bort la nef, et en esgardant aus roches blanches que l’en par dariere-li lessoit, |Messires Marc| prieoit Diex, et disoit-il: ‘Ha Sires Diex ay merci de cestuy vieix et noble royaume; fay-en pardurable forteresse de liberté et de joustice, et garde-le de tout meschief de dedens et de dehors; donne à sa gent droit esprit pour ne pas Diex guerroyer de ses dons, ne de richesce ne de savoir; et conforte-les fermement en ta foy’ ...”_

A loud _Amen_ seemed to peal from without, and the awakened reader started to his feet. And lo! it was the thunder of the winter-storm crashing among the many-tinted crags of Monte Pellegrino,—with the wind raging as it knows how to rage here in sight of the Isles of Æolus, and the rain dashing on the glass as ruthlessly as it well could have done, if, instead of Æolic Isles and many-tinted crags, the window had fronted a dearer shore beneath a northern sky, and looked across the grey Firth to the rain-blurred outline of the Lomond Hills.

But I end, saying to Messer Marco’s prayer, Amen.

PALERMO, _31st December, 1874_.

---------------------------------------------------------------------- [1] It would be ingratitude if this Preface contained no acknowledgment of the medals awarded to the writer, mainly for this work, by the Royal Geographical Society, and by the Geographical Society of Italy, the former under the Presidence of Sir Henry Rawlinson, the latter under that of the Commendatore C. Negri. Strongly as I feel the too generous appreciation of these labours implied in such awards, I confess to have been yet more deeply touched and gratified by practical evidence of the approval of the two distinguished Travellers mentioned above; as shown by Baron von Richthofen in his spontaneous proposal to publish a German version of the book under his own immediate supervision (a project in abeyance, owing to circumstances beyond his or my control); by Mr. Ney Elias in the fact of his having carried these ponderous volumes with him on his solitary journey across the Mongolian wilds!

[2] I am grateful to Mr. de Khanikoff for his especial recognition of these in a kindly review of the first edition in the _Academy_.

[3] Especially from Lieutenant Garnier’s book, mentioned further on; the only existing source of illustration for many chapters of Polo.

[4] [Merged into the notes of the present edition.—H. C.]

[5] See page xxix.

[6] Writing in Italy, perhaps I ought to write, according to too prevalent modern Italian custom, _Polo Marco_. I have already _seen_, and in the work of a writer of reputation, the Alexandrian geographer styled _Tolomeo Claudio_! and if this preposterous fashion should continue to spread, we shall in time have _Tasso Torquato_, _Jonson Ben_, Africa explored by _Park Mungo_, Asia conquered by _Lane Tamer_, Copperfield David by _Dickens Charles_, Homer Englished by _Pope Alexander_, and the Roman history done into French from the original of _Live Tite_!

[7] Introduction p. _24_, and _passim_ in the notes.

[8] _Ibid._, p. _112_.

[9] See Introduction, pp. _51_, _57_.

[10] See Title of present volumes.

[11] Which quite agrees with the story of the document quoted at p. _77_ of Introduction.

[12] Vol. i. p. 64, and p. 67.

[13] _I.e._ 1306; see Introduction, pp. _68–69_.

[14] The form which Marco gives to this word was probably a reminiscence of the Oriental corruption _failsúf_. It recalls to my mind a Hindu who was very fond of the word, and especially of applying it to certain of his fellow-servants. But as he used it, _bara failsúf_,—“great philosopher”—meant exactly the same as the modern slang “_Artful Dodger_”!

[15] See for the explanation of _Karma_, “the power that controls the universe,” in the doctrine of atheistic Buddhism, Hardy’s _Eastern Monachism_, p. 5.

[16] Vol. ii. p. 316 (see also i. 348).

[17] Vol. ii. pp. 318–319.

ORIGINAL PREFACE.

The amount of appropriate material, and of acquaintance with the mediæval geography of some parts of Asia, which was acquired during the compilation of a work of kindred character for the Hakluyt Society,[1] could hardly fail to suggest as a fresh labour in the same field the preparation of a new English edition of Marco Polo. Indeed one kindly critic (in the _Examiner_) laid it upon the writer as a duty to undertake that task.

Though at least one respectable English edition has appeared since Marsden’s,[2] the latter has continued to be the standard edition, and maintains not only its reputation but its market value. It is indeed the work of a sagacious, learned, and right-minded man, which can never be spoken of otherwise than with respect. But since Marsden published his quarto (1818) vast stores of new knowledge have become available in elucidation both of the contents of Marco Polo’s book and of its literary history. The works of writers such as Klaproth, Abel Rémusat, D’Avezac, Reinaud, Quatremère, Julien, I. J. Schmidt, Gildemeister, Ritter, Hammer-Purgstall, Erdmann, D’Ohsson, Defrémery, Elliot, Erskine, and many more, which throw light directly or incidentally on Marco Polo, have, for the most part, appeared since then. Nor, as regards the literary history of the book, were any just views possible at a time when what may be called the _Fontal_ MSS. (in French) were unpublished and unexamined.

Besides the works which have thus occasionally or incidentally thrown light upon the Traveller’s book, various editions of the book itself have since Marsden’s time been published in foreign countries, accompanied by comments of more or less value. All have contributed something to the illustration of the book or its history; the last and most learned of the editors, M. Pauthier, has so contributed in large measure. I had occasion some years ago[3] to speak freely my opinion of the merits and demerits of M. Pauthier’s work; and to the latter at least I have no desire to recur here.

Another of his critics, a much more accomplished as well as more favourable one,[4] seems to intimate the opinion that there would scarcely be room in future for new commentaries. Something of the kind was said of Marsden’s at the time of its publication. I imagine, however, that whilst our libraries endure the _Iliad_ will continue to find new translators, and Marco Polo—though one hopes not so plentifully—new editors.

The justification of the book’s existence must however be looked for, and it is hoped may be found, in the book itself, and not in the Preface. The work claims to be judged as a whole, but it may be allowable, in these days of scanty leisure, to indicate below a few instances of what is believed to be new matter in an edition of Marco Polo; by which however it is by no means intended that all such matter is claimed by the editor as his own.[5]

From the commencement of the work it was felt that the task was one which no man, though he were far better equipped and much more conveniently situated than the present writer, could satisfactorily accomplish from his own resources, and help was sought on special points wherever it seemed likely to be found. In scarcely any quarter was the application made in vain. Some who have aided most materially are indeed very old and valued friends; but to many others who have done the same the applicant was unknown; and some of these again, with whom the editor began correspondence on this subject as a stranger, he is happy to think that he may now call friends.

To none am I more indebted than to the Comm. GUGLIELMO BERCHET, of Venice, for his ample, accurate, and generous assistance in furnishing me with Venetian documents, and in many other ways. Especial thanks are also due to Dr. WILLIAM LOCKHART, who has supplied the materials for some of the most valuable illustrations; to Lieutenant FRANCIS GARNIER, of the French Navy, the gallant and accomplished leader (after the death of Captain Doudart de la Grée) of the memorable expedition up the Mekong to Yun-nan; to the Rev. Dr. CALDWELL, of the S. P. G. Mission in Tinnevelly, for copious and valuable notes on Southern India; to my friends Colonel ROBERT MACLAGAN, R.E., Sir ARTHUR PHAYRE, and Colonel HENRY MAN, for very valuable notes and other aid; to Professor A. SCHIEFNER, of St. Petersburg, for his courteous communication of very interesting illustrations not otherwise accessible; to Major-General ALEXANDER CUNNINGHAM, of my own corps, for several valuable letters; to my friends Dr. THOMAS OLDHAM, Director of the Geological Survey of India, Mr. DANIEL HANBURY, F.R.S., Mr. EDWARD THOMAS, Mr. JAMES FERGUSSON, F.R.S., Sir BARTLE FRERE, and Dr. HUGH CLEGHORN, for constant interest in the work and readiness to assist its progress; to Mr. A. WYLIE, the learned Agent of the B. and F. Bible Society at Shang-hai, for valuable help; to the Hon. G. P. MARSH, U.S. Minister at the Court of Italy, for untiring kindness in the communication of his ample stores of knowledge, and of books. I have also to express my obligations to Comm. NICOLÒ BAROZZI, Director of the City Museum at Venice, and to Professor A. S. MINOTTO, of the same city; to Professor ARMINIUS VÁMBÉRY, the eminent traveller; to Professor FLÜCKIGER of Bern; to the Rev. H. A. JAESCHKE, of the Moravian Mission in British Tibet; to Colonel LEWIS PELLY, British Resident in the Persian Gulf; to Pandit MANPHUL, C.S.I. (for a most interesting communication on Badakhshan); to my brother officer, Major T. G. MONTGOMERIE, R.E., of the Indian Trigonometrical Survey; to Commendatore NEGRI the indefatigable President of the Italian Geographical Society; to Dr. ZOTENBERG, of the Great Paris Library, and to M. CH. MAUNOIR, Secretary-General of the Société de Géographie; to Professor HENRY GIGLIOLI, at Florence; to my old friend Major-General ALBERT FYTCHE, Chief Commissioner of British Burma; to Dr. ROST and Dr. FORBES-WATSON, of the India Office Library and Museum; to Mr. R. H. MAJOR, and Mr. R. K. DOUGLAS, of the British Museum; to Mr. N. B. DENNYS, of Hong-kong; and to Mr. C. GARDNER, of the Consular Establishment in China. There are not a few others to whom my thanks are equally due; but it is feared that the number of names already mentioned may seem ridiculous, compared with the result, to those who do not appreciate from how many quarters the facts needful for a work which in its course intersects so many fields required to be collected, one by one. I must not, however, omit acknowledgments to the present Earl of DERBY for his courteous permission, when at the head of the Foreign Office, to inspect Mr. Abbott’s valuable unpublished Report upon some of the Interior Provinces of Persia; and to Mr. T. T. COOPER, one of the most adventurous travellers of modern times, for leave to quote some passages from his unpublished diary.

PALERMO, _31st December, 1870_.

[_Original Dedication._]

TO HER ROYAL HIGHNESS, MARGHERITA, _Princess of Piedmont_, THIS ENDEAVOUR TO ILLUSTRATE THE LIFE AND WORK OF A RENOWNED ITALIAN IS BY HER ROYAL HIGHNESS’S GRACIOUS PERMISSION =Dedicated= WITH THE DEEPEST RESPECT BY H. YULE.

---------------------------------------------------------------------- [1] _Cathay and The Way Thither, being a Collection of Minor Medieval Notices of China_. London, 1866. The necessities of the case have required the repetition in the present work of the substance of some notes already printed (but hardly published) in the other.

[2] Viz. Mr. Hugh Murray’s. I mean no disrespect to Mr. T. Wright’s edition, but it is, and professes to be, scarcely other than a reproduction of Marsden’s, with abridgment of his notes.

[3] In the _Quarterly Review_ for July, 1868.

[4] M. Nicolas Khanikoff.

[5] In the Preliminary Notices will be found new matter on the Personal and Family History of the Traveller, illustrated by Documents; and a more elaborate attempt than I have seen elsewhere to classify and account for the different texts of the work, and to trace their mutual relation.

As regards geographical elucidations, I may point to the explanation of the name _Gheluchelan_ (i. p. 58), to the discussion of the route from Kerman to Hormuz, and the identification of the sites of Old Hormuz, of _Cobinan_ and _Dogana_, the establishment of the position and continued existence of _Keshm_, the note on _Pein_ and _Charchan_, on _Gog_ and _Magog_, on the geography of the route from _Sindafu_ to _Carajan_, on _Anin_ and _Coloman_, on _Mutafili_, _Cail_, and _Ely_.

As regards historical illustrations, I would cite the notes regarding the Queens _Bolgana_ and _Cocachin_, on the _Karaunahs_, etc., on the title of King of _Bengal_ applied to the K. of Burma, and those bearing upon the Malay and Abyssinian chronologies.

In the interpretation of outlandish phrases, I may refer to the notes on _Ondanique_, _Nono_, _Barguerlac_, _Argon_, _Sensin_, _Keshican_, _Toscaol_, _Bularguchi_, _Gat-paul_, etc.

Among miscellaneous elucidations, to the disquisition on the _Arbre Sol_ or _Sec_ in vol. i., and to that on Mediæval Military Engines in vol. ii.

In a variety of cases it has been necessary to refer to Eastern languages for pertinent elucidations or etymologies. The editor would, however, be sorry to fall under the ban of the mediæval adage:

“_Vir qui docet quod non sapit Definitur Bestia!_”

and may as well reprint here what was written in the Preface to _Cathay_:

“I am painfully sensible that in regard to many subjects dealt with in the following pages, nothing can make up for the want of genuine Oriental learning. A fair familiarity with Hindustani for many years, and some reminiscences of elementary Persian, have been useful in their degree; but it is probable that they may sometimes also have led me astray, as such slender lights are apt to do.”

[Illustration]

TO HENRY YULE.

Until you raised dead monarchs from the mould And built again the domes of Xanadu, I lay in evil case, and never knew The glamour of that ancient story told By good Ser Marco in his prison-hold. But now I sit upon a throne and view The Orient at my feet, and take of you And Marco tribute from the realms of old.

If I am joyous, deem me not o’er bold; If I am grateful, deem me not untrue; For you have given me beauties to behold, Delight to win, and fancies to pursue, Fairer than all the jewelry and gold Of Kublaï on his throne in Cambalu.

E. C. BABER.

_20th July, 1884._

MEMOIR OF SIR HENRY YULE.

Henry Yule was the youngest son of Major William Yule, by his first wife, Elizabeth Paterson, and was born at Inveresk, in Midlothian, on 1st May, 1820. He was named after an _aunt_ who, like Miss Ferrier’s immortal heroine, owned a man’s name.

On his father’s side he came of a hardy agricultural stock,[1] improved by a graft from that highly-cultured tree, Rose of Kilravock.[2] Through his mother, a somewhat prosaic person herself, he inherited strains from Huguenot and Highland ancestry. There were recognisable traces of all these elements in Henry Yule, and as was well said by one of his oldest friends: “He was one of those curious racial compounds one finds on the east side of Scotland, in whom the hard Teutonic grit is sweetened by the artistic spirit of the more genial Celt.”[3] His father, an officer of the Bengal army (born 1764, died 1839), was a man of cultivated tastes and enlightened mind, a good Persian and Arabic scholar, and possessed of much miscellaneous Oriental learning. During the latter years of his career in India, he served successively as Assistant Resident at the (then independent) courts of Lucknow[4] and Delhi. In the latter office his chief was the noble Ouchterlony. William Yule, together with his younger brother Udny,[5] returned home in 1806. “A recollection of their voyage was that they hailed an outward bound ship, somewhere off the Cape, through the trumpet: ‘What news?’ Answer: ‘The King’s mad, and Humfrey’s beat Mendoza’ (two celebrated prize-fighters and often matched). ‘Nothing more?’ ‘Yes, Bonapart_y_’s made his _Mother_ King of Holland!’

“Before his retirement, William Yule was offered the Lieut.-Governorship of St. Helena. Two of the detailed privileges of the office were residence at Longwood (afterwards the house of Napoleon), and the use of a certain number of the Company’s slaves. Major Yule, who was a strong supporter of the anti-slavery cause till its triumph in 1834, often recalled both of these offers with amusement.”[6]

William Yule was a man of generous chivalrous nature, who took large views of life, apt to be unfairly stigmatised as Radical in the narrow Tory reaction that prevailed in Scotland during the early years of the 19th century.[7] Devoid of literary ambition, he wrote much for his private pleasure, and his knowledge and library (rich in Persian and Arabic MSS.) were always placed freely at the service of his friends and correspondents, some of whom, such as Major C. Stewart and Mr. William Erskine, were more given to publication than himself. He never travelled without a little 8vo MS. of Hafiz, which often lay under his pillow. Major Yule’s only printed work was a lithographed edition of the _Apothegms_ of ’Ali, the son of Abu Talib, in the Arabic, with an old Persian version and an English translation interpolated by himself. “This was privately issued in 1832, when the Duchesse d’Angoulême was living at Edinburgh, and the little work was inscribed to her, with whom an accident of neighbourhood and her kindness to the Major’s youngest child had brought him into relations of goodwill.”[8]

Henry Yule’s childhood was mainly spent at Inveresk. He used to say that his earliest recollection was sitting with the little cousin, who long after became his wife, on the doorstep of her father’s house in George Street, Edinburgh (now the Northern Club), listening to the performance of a passing piper. There was another episode which he recalled with humorous satisfaction. Fired by his father’s tales of the jungle, Yule (then about six years old) proceeded to improvise an elephant pit in the back garden, only too successfully, for soon, with mingled terror and delight, he saw his uncle John[9] fall headlong into the snare. He lost his mother before he was eight, and almost his only remembrance of her was the circumstance of her having given him a little lantern to light him home on winter nights from his first school. On Sundays it was the Major’s custom to lend his children, as a picture-book, a folio Arabic translation of the Four Gospels, printed at Rome in 1591, which contained excellent illustrations from Italian originals.[10] Of the pictures in this volume Yule seems never to have tired. The last page bore a MS. note in Latin to the effect that the volume had been read in the Chaldæan Desert by _Georgius Strachanus_, _Milnensis_, _Scotus_, who long remained unidentified, not to say mythical, in Yule’s mind. But George Strachan never passed from his memory, and having ultimately run him to earth, Yule, sixty years later, published the results in an interesting article.[11]

Two or three years after his wife’s death, Major Yule removed to Edinburgh, and established himself in Regent’s Terrace, on the face of the Calton Hill.[12] This continued to be Yule’s home until his father’s death, shortly before he went to India. “Here he learned to love the wide scenes of sea and land spread out around that hill—a love he never lost, at home or far away. And long years after, with beautiful Sicilian hills before him and a lovely sea, he writes words of fond recollection of the bleak Fife hills, and the grey Firth of Forth.”[13]

Yule now followed his elder brother, Robert, to the famous High School, and in the summer holidays the two made expeditions to the West Highlands, the Lakes of Cumberland, and elsewhere. Major Yule chose his boys to have every reasonable indulgence and advantage, and when the British Association, in 1834, held its first Edinburgh meeting, Henry received a member’s ticket. So, too, when the passing of the Reform Bill was celebrated in the same year by a great banquet, at which Lord Grey and other prominent politicians were present, Henry was sent to the dinner, probably the youngest guest there.[14]

At this time the intention was that Henry should go to Cambridge (where his name was, indeed, entered), and after taking his degree study for the Bar. With this view he was, in 1833, sent to Waith, near Ripon, to be coached by the Rev. H. P. Hamilton, author of a well-known treatise, _On Conic Sections_, and afterwards Dean of Salisbury. At his tutor’s hospitable rectory Yule met many notabilities of the day. One of them was Professor Sedgwick.

There was rumoured at this time the discovery of the first known (?) fossil monkey, but its tail was missing. “Depend upon it, Daniel O’Conell’s got hold of it!” said ‘Adam’ briskly.[15] Yule was very happy with Mr. Hamilton and his kind wife, but on his tutor’s removal to Cambridge other arrangements became necessary, and in 1835 he was transferred to the care of the Rev. James Challis, rector of Papworth St. Everard, a place which “had little to recommend it except a dulness which made reading almost a necessity.”[16] Mr. Challis had at this time two other resident pupils, who both, in most diverse ways, attained distinction in the Church. These were John Mason Neale, the future eminent ecclesiologist and founder of the devoted Anglican Sisterhood of St. Margaret, and Harvey Goodwin, long afterwards the studious and large-minded Bishop of Carlisle. With the latter, Yule remained on terms of cordial friendship to the end of his life. Looking back through more than fifty years to these boyish days, Bishop Goodwin wrote that Yule then “showed much more liking for Greek plays and for German than for mathematics, though he had considerable geometrical ingenuity.”[17] On one occasion, having solved a problem that puzzled Goodwin, Yule thus discriminated the attainments of the three pupils: “The difference between you and me is this: You like it and can’t do it; I don’t like it and can do it. Neale neither likes it nor can do it.” Not bad criticism for a boy of fifteen.[18]

On Mr. Challis being appointed Plumerian Professor at Cambridge, in the spring of 1836, Yule had to leave him, owing to want of room at the Observatory, and he became for a time, a most dreary time, he said, a student at University College, London.

By this time Yule had made up his mind that not London and the Law, but India and the Army should be his choice, and accordingly in Feb. 1837 he joined the East India Company’s Military College at Addiscombe. From Addiscombe he passed out, in December 1838, at the head of the cadets of his term (taking the prize sword[19]), and having been duly appointed to the Bengal Engineers, proceeded early in 1839 to the Headquarters of the Royal Engineers at Chatham, where, according to custom, he was enrolled as a “local and temporary Ensign.” For such was then the invidious designation at Chatham of the young Engineer officers of the Indian army, who ranked as full lieutenants in their own Service, from the time of leaving Addiscombe.[20] Yule once audaciously tackled the formidable Pasley on this very grievance. The venerable Director, after a minute’s pondering, replied: “Well, I don’t remember what the reason was, but I have _no_ doubt (_staccato_) it ... was ... a very ... _good_ reason.”[21]

“When Yule appeared among us at Chatham in 1839,” said his friend Collinson, “he at once took a prominent place in our little Society by his slightly advanced age [he was then 18½], but more by his strong character.... His earlier education ... gave him a better classical knowledge than most of us possessed; then he had the reserve and self-possession characteristic of his race; but though he took small part in the games and other recreations of our time, his knowledge, his native humour, and his good comradeship, and especially his strong sense of right and wrong, made him both admired and respected.... Yule was not a scientific engineer, though he had a good general knowledge of the different branches of his profession; his natural capacity lay rather in varied knowledge, combined with a strong understanding and an excellent memory, and also a peculiar power as a draughtsman, which proved of great value in after life.... Those were nearly the last days of the old _régime_, of the orthodox double sap and cylindrical pontoons, when Pasley’s genius had been leading to new ideas, and when Lintorn Simmons’ power, G. Leach’s energy, W. Jervois’ skill, and R. Tylden’s talent were developing under the wise example of Henry Harness.”[22]

In the Royal Engineer mess of those days (the present anteroom), the portrait of Henry Yule now faces that of his first chief, Sir Henry Harness. General Collinson said that the pictures appeared to eye each other as if the subjects were continuing one of those friendly disputes in which they so often engaged.[23]

It was in this room that Yule, Becher, Collinson, and other young R.E.’s, profiting by the temporary absence of the austere Colonel Pasley, acted some plays, including _Pizarro_. Yule bore the humble part of one of the Peruvian Mob in this performance, of which he has left a droll account.[24]

On the completion of his year at Chatham, Yule prepared to sail for India, but first went to take leave of his relative, General White. An accident prolonged his stay, and before he left he had proposed to and been refused by his cousin Annie. This occurrence, his first check, seems to have cast rather a gloom over his start for India. He went by the then newly-opened Overland Route, visiting Portugal, stopping at Gibraltar to see his cousin, Major (afterwards General) Patrick Yule, R.E.[25] He was under orders “to stop at Aden (then recently acquired), to report on the water supply, and to deliver a set of meteorological and magnetic instruments for starting an observatory there. The overland journey then really meant so; tramping across the desert to Suez with camels and Arabs, a proceeding not conducive to the preservation of delicate instruments; and on arriving at Aden he found that the intended observer was dead, the observatory not commenced, and the instruments all broken. There was thus nothing left for him but to go on at once” to Calcutta,[26] where he arrived at the end of 1840.

His first service lay in the then wild Khasia Hills, whither he was detached for the purpose of devising means for the transport of the local coal to the plains. In spite of the depressing character of the climate (Cherrapunjee boasts the highest rainfall on record), Yule thoroughly enjoyed himself, and always looked back with special pleasure on the time he spent here. He was unsuccessful in the object of his mission, the obstacles to cheap transport offered by the dense forests and mighty precipices proving insurmountable, but he gathered a wealth of interesting observations on the country and people, a very primitive Mongolian race, which he subsequently embodied in two excellent and most interesting papers (the first he ever published).[27]

In the following year, 1842, Yule was transferred to the irrigation canals of the north-west with head-quarters at Kurnaul. Here he had for chief Captain (afterwards General Sir William) Baker, who became his dearest and most steadfast friend. Early in 1843 Yule had his first experience of field service. The death without heir of the Khytul Rajah, followed by the refusal of his family to surrender the place to the native troops sent to receive it, obliged Government to send a larger force against it, and the canal officers were ordered to join this. Yule was detailed to serve under Captain Robert Napier (afterwards F.-M. Lord Napier of Magdala). Their immediate duty was to mark out the route for a night march of the troops, barring access to all side roads, and neither officer having then had any experience of war, they performed the duty “with all the elaborate care of novices.” Suddenly there was an alarm, a light detected, and a night attack awaited, when the danger resolved itself into Clerk Sahib’s _khansamah_ with welcome hot coffee![28] Their hopes were disappointed, there was no fighting, and the Fort of Khytul was found deserted by the enemy. It “was a strange scene of confusion—all the paraphernalia and accumulation of odds and ends of a wealthy native family lying about and inviting loot. I remember one beautiful crutch-stick of ebony with two rams’ heads in jade. I took it and sent it in to the political authority, intending to buy it when sold. There was a sale, but my stick never appeared. Somebody had a more developed taste in jade.... Amid the general rummage that was going on, an officer of British Infantry had been put over a part of the palace supposed to contain treasure, and they—officers and all—were helping themselves. Henry Lawrence was one of the politicals under George Clerk. When the news of this affair came to him I was present. It was in a white marble loggia in the palace, where was a white marble chair or throne on a basement. Lawrence was sitting on this throne in great excitement. He wore an Afghan _choga_, a sort of dressing-gown garment, and this, and his thin locks, and thin beard were streaming in the wind. He always dwells in my memory as a sort of pythoness on her tripod under the afflatus.”[29]

During his Indian service, Yule had renewed and continued by letters his suit to Miss White, and persistency prevailing at last, he soon after the conclusion of the Khytul affair applied for leave to go home to be married. He sailed from Bombay in May, 1843, and in September of the same year was married, at Bath, to the gifted and large-hearted woman who, to the end, remained the strongest and happiest influence in his life.[30]

Yule sailed for India with his wife in November 1843. The next two years were employed chiefly in irrigation work, and do not call for special note. They were very happy years, except in the one circumstance that the climate having seriously affected his wife’s health, and she having been brought to death’s door, partly by illness, but still more by the drastic medical treatment of those days, she was imperatively ordered back to England by the doctors, who forbade her return to India.

Having seen her on board ship, Yule returned to duty on the canals. The close of that year, December, 1845, brought some variety to his work, as the outbreak of the first Sikh War called nearly all the canal officers into the field. “They went up to the front by long marches, passing through no stations, and quite unable to obtain any news of what had occurred, though on the 21st December the guns of Ferozshah were distinctly heard in their camp at Pehoa, at a distance of 115 miles south-east from the field, and some days later they came successively on the fields of Moodkee and of Ferozshah itself, with all the recent traces of battle. When the party of irrigation officers reached head-quarters, the arrangements for attacking the Sikh army in its entrenchments at Sobraon were beginning (though suspended till weeks later for the arrival of the tardy siege guns), and the opposed forces were lying in sight of each other.”[31]

Yule’s share in this campaign was limited to the sufficiently arduous task of bridging the Sutlej for the advance of the British army. It is characteristic of the man that for this reason he always abstained from wearing his medal for the Sutlej campaign.

His elder brother, Robert Yule, then in the 16th Lancers, took part in that magnificent charge of his regiment at the battle of Aliwal (Jan. 28, 1846) which the Great Duke is said to have pronounced unsurpassed in history. From particulars gleaned from his brother and others present in the action, Henry Yule prepared a spirited sketch of the episode, which was afterwards published as a coloured lithograph by M‘Lean (Haymarket).

At the close of the war, Yule succeeded his friend Strachey as Executive Engineer of the northern division of the Ganges Canal, with his head-quarters at Roorkee, “the division which, being nearest the hills and crossed by intermittent torrents of great breadth and great volume when in flood, includes the most important and interesting engineering works.”[32]

At Roorkee were the extensive engineering workshops connected with the canal. Yule soon became so accustomed to the din as to be undisturbed by the noise, but the unpunctuality and carelessness of the native workmen sorely tried his patience, of which Nature had endowed him with but a small reserve. Vexed with himself for letting temper so often get the better of him, Yule’s conscientious mind devised a characteristic remedy. Each time that he lost his temper, he transferred a fine of two rupees (then about five shillings) from his right to his left pocket. When about to leave Roorkee, he devoted this accumulation of self-imposed fines to the erection of a sun-dial, to teach the natives the value of time. The late Sir James Caird, who told this legend of Roorkee as he heard it there in 1880, used to add, with a humorous twinkle of his kindly eyes, “It was a _very_ handsome dial.”[33]

From September, 1845, to March, 1847, Yule was much occupied intermittently, in addition to his professional work, by service on a Committee appointed by Government “to investigate the causes of the unhealthiness which has existed at Kurnal, and other portions of the country along the line of the Delhi Canal,” and further, to report “whether an injurious effect on the health of the people of the Doab is, or is not, likely to be produced by the contemplated Ganges Canal.”

“A very elaborate investigation was made by the Committee, directed principally to ascertaining what relation subsisted between certain physical conditions of the different districts, and the liability of their inhabitants to miasmatic fevers.” The principal conclusion of the Committee was, “that in the extensive epidemic of 1843, when Kurnaul suffered so seriously ... the greater part of the evils observed had not been the necessary and unavoidable results of canal irrigation, but were due to interference with the natural drainage of the country, to the saturation of stiff and retentive soils, and to natural disadvantages of site, enhanced by excess of moisture. As regarded the Ganges Canal, they were of opinion that, with due attention to drainage, improvement rather than injury to the general health might be expected to follow the introduction of canal irrigation.”[34] In an unpublished note written about 1889, Yule records his ultimate opinion as follows: “At this day, and after the large experience afforded by the Ganges Canal, I feel sure that a verdict so favourable to the sanitary results of canal irrigation would not be given.” Still the fact remains that the Ganges Canal has been the source of unspeakable blessings to an immense population.

The Second Sikh War saw Yule again with the army in the field, and on 13th Jan. 1849, he was present at the dismal ‘Victory’ of Chillianwallah, of which his most vivid recollection seemed to be the sudden apparition of Henry Lawrence, fresh from London, but still clad in the legendary Afghan cloak.

On the conclusion of the Punjab campaign, Yule, whose health had suffered, took furlough and went home to his wife. For the next three years they resided chiefly in Scotland, though paying occasional visits to the Continent, and about 1850 Yule bought a house in Edinburgh. There he wrote “The African Squadron vindicated” (a pamphlet which was afterwards re-published in French), translated Schiller’s _Kampf mit dem Drachen_ into English verse, delivered Lectures on Fortification at the, now long defunct, Scottish Naval and Military Academy, wrote on Tibet for his friend Blackwood’s Magazine, attended the 1850 Edinburgh Meeting of the British Association, wrote his excellent lines, “On the Loss of the _Birkenhead_,” and commenced his first serious study of Marco Polo (by whose wondrous tale, however, he had already been captivated as a boy in his father’s library—in Marsden’s edition probably). But the most noteworthy literary result of these happy years was that really fascinating volume, entitled _Fortification for Officers of the Army and Students of Military History_, a work that has remained unique of its kind. This was published by Blackwood in 1851, and seven years later received the honour of (unauthorised) translation into French. Yule also occupied himself a good deal at this time with the practice of photography, a pursuit to which he never after reverted.

In the spring of 1852, Yule made an interesting little semi-professional tour in company with a brother officer, his accomplished friend, Major R. B. Smith. Beginning with Kelso, “the only one of the Teviotdale Abbeys which I had not as yet seen,” they made their way leisurely through the north of England, examining with impartial care abbeys and cathedrals, factories, brick-yards, foundries, timber-yards, docks, and railway works. On this occasion Yule, contrary to his custom, kept a journal, and a few excerpts may be given here, as affording some notion of his casual talk to those who did not know him.

At Berwick-on-Tweed he notes the old ramparts of the town: “These, erected in Elizabeth’s time, are interesting as being, I believe, the only existing sample in England of the bastioned system of the 16th century.... The outline of the works seems perfect enough, though both earth and stone work are in great disrepair. The bastions are large with obtuse angles, square orillons, and double flanks originally casemated, and most of them crowned with cavaliers.” On the way to Durham, “much amused by the discussions of two passengers, one a smooth-spoken, semi-clerical looking person; the other a brusque well-to-do attorney with a Northumbrian burr. Subject, among others, Protection. The Attorney all for ‘cheap bread’— ‘You wouldn’t rob the poor man of his loaf,’ and so forth. ‘You must go with the _stgheam_, sir, you must go with the stgheam.’ ‘I never did, Mr. Thompson, and I never will,’ said the other in an oily manner, singularly inconsistent with the sentiment.” At Durham they dined with a dignitary of the Church, and Yule was roasted by being placed with his back to an enormous fire. “Coals are cheap at Durham,” he notes feelingly, adding, “The party we found as heavy as any Edinburgh one. Smith, indeed, evidently has had little experience of really stupid Edinburgh parties, for he had never met with anything approaching to this before.” (Happy Smith!) But thanks to the kindness and hospitality of the astronomer, Mr. Chevalier, and his gifted daughter, they had a delightful visit to beautiful Durham, and came away full of admiration for the (then newly established) University, and its grand _locale_. They went on to stay with an uncle by marriage of Yule’s, in Yorkshire. At dinner he was asked by his host to explain Foucault’s pendulum experiment. “I endeavoured to explain it somewhat, I hope, to the satisfaction of his doubts, but not at all to that of Mr. G. M., who most resolutely declined to take in _any_ elucidation, coming at last to the conclusion that he entirely differed with me as to what North meant, and that it was useless to argue until we could agree about that!” They went next to Leeds, to visit Kirkstall Abbey, “a mediæval fossil, curiously embedded among the squalid brickwork and chimney stalks of a manufacturing suburb. Having established ourselves at the hotel, we went to deliver a letter to Mr. Hope, the official assignee, a very handsome, aristocratic-looking gentleman, who seemed as much out of place at Leeds as the Abbey.” At Leeds they visited the flax mills of Messrs. Marshall, “a firm noted for the conscientious care they take of their workpeople.... We mounted on the roof of the building, which is covered with grass, and formerly was actually grazed by a few sheep, until the repeated inconvenience of their tumbling through the glass domes put a stop to this.” They next visited some tile and brickworks on land belonging to a friend. “The owner of the tile works, a well-to-do burgher, and the apparent model of a West Riding Radical, received us in rather a dubious way: ‘There are a many people has come and brought introductions, and looked at all my works, and then gone and set up for themselves close by. Now des you mean to say that you be really come all the way from Beng_u_l?’ ‘Yes, indeed we have, and we are going all the way back again, though we didn’t exactly come from there to look at your brickworks.’ ‘Then you’re not in the brick-making line, are you?’ ‘Why we’ve had a good deal to do with making bricks, and may have again; but we’ll engage that if we set up for ourselves, it shall be ten thousand miles from you.’ This seemed in some degree to set his mind at rest....”

“A dismal day, with occasional showers, prevented our seeing Sheffield to advantage. On the whole, however, it is more cheerful and has more of a country-town look than Leeds—a place utterly without beauty of aspect. At Leeds you have vast barrack-like factories, with their usual suburbs of squalid rows of brick cottages, and everywhere the tall spiracles of the steam, which seems the pervading power of the place. Everything there is machinery—the machine is the intelligent agent, it would seem, the man its slave, standing by to tend it and pick up a broken thread now and then. At Sheffield ... you might go through most of the streets without knowing anything of the kind was going on. And steam here, instead of being a ruler, is a drudge, turning a grindstone or rolling out a bar of steel, but all the accuracy and skill of hand is the Man’s. And consequently there was, we thought, a healthier aspect about the men engaged. None of the Rodgers remain who founded the firm in my father’s time. I saw some pairs of his scissors in the show-room still kept under the name of _Persian_ scissors.”[35]

From Sheffield Yule and his friend proceeded to Boston, “where there is the most exquisite church tower I have ever seen,” and thence to Lincoln, Peterborough, and Ely, ending their tour at Cambridge, where Yule spent a few delightful days.

In the autumn the great Duke of Wellington died, and Yule witnessed the historic pageant of his funeral. His furlough was now nearly expired, and early in December he again embarked for India, leaving his wife and only child, of a few weeks old, behind him. Some verses dated “Christmas Day near the Equator,” show how much he felt the separation.

Shortly after his return to Bengal, Yule received orders to proceed to Aracan, and to examine and report upon the passes between Aracan and Burma, as also to improve communications and select suitable sites for fortified posts to hold the same. These orders came to Yule quite unexpectedly late one Saturday evening, but he completed all preparations and started at daybreak on the following Monday, 24th Jan. 1853.

From Calcutta to Khyook Phyoo, Yule proceeded by steamer, and thence up the river in the _Tickler_ gunboat to Krenggyuen. “Our course lay through a wilderness of wooded islands (50 to 200 feet high) and bays, sailing when we could, anchoring when neither wind nor tide served ... slow progress up the river. More and more like the creeks and lagoons of the Niger or a Guiana river rather than anything I looked for in India. The densest tree jungle covers the shore down into the water. For miles no sign of human habitation, but now and then at rare intervals one sees a patch of hillside rudely cleared, with the bare stems of the burnt trees still standing.... Sometimes, too, a dark tunnel-like creek runs back beneath the thick vault of jungle, and from it silently steals out a slim canoe, manned by two or three wild-looking Mugs or Kyens (people of the Hills), driving it rapidly along with their short paddles held vertically, exactly like those of the Red men on the American rivers.”

At the military post of Bokhyong, near Krenggyuen, he notes (5th Feb.) that “Captain Munro, the adjutant, can scarcely believe that I was present at the Duke of Wellington’s funeral, of which he read but a few days ago in the newspapers, and here am I, one of the spectators, a guest in this wild spot among the mountains—2½ months since I left England.”

Yule’s journal of his arduous wanderings in these border wilds is full of interest, but want of space forbids further quotation. From a note on the fly-leaf it appears that from the time of quitting the gun-boat at Krenggyuen to his arrival at Toungoop he covered about 240 miles on foot, and that under immense difficulties, even as to food. He commemorated his tribulations in some cheery humorous verse, but ultimately fell seriously ill of the local fever, aided doubtless by previous exposure and privation. His servants successively fell ill, some died and others had to be sent back, food supplies failed, and the route through those dense forests was uncertain; yet under all difficulties he seems never to have grumbled or lost heart. And when things were nearly at the worst, Yule restored the spirits of his local escort by improvising a wappenshaw, with a Sheffield gardener’s knife, which he happened to have with him, for prize! When at last Yule emerged from the wilds and on 25th March marched into Prome, he was taken for his own ghost! “Found Fraser (of the Engineers) in a rambling phoongyee house, just under the great gilt pagoda. I went up to him announcing myself, and his astonishment was so great that he would scarcely shake hands!” It was on this occasion at Prome that Yule first met his future chief Captain Phayre—“a very young-looking man—very cordial,” a description no less applicable to General Sir Arthur Phayre at the age of seventy!

After some further wanderings, Yule embarked at Sandong, and returned by water, touching at Kyook Phyoo and Akyab, to Calcutta, which he reached on 1st May—his birthday.

The next four months were spent in hard work at Calcutta. In August, Yule received orders to proceed to Singapore, and embarked on the 29th. His duty was to report on the defences of the Straits Settlements, with a view to their improvement. Yule’s recommendations were sanctioned by Government, but his journal bears witness to the prevalence then, as since, of the penny-wise-pound-foolish system in our administration. On all sides he was met by difficulties in obtaining sites for batteries, etc., for which heavy compensation was demanded, when by the exercise of reasonable foresight, the same might have been secured earlier at a nominal price.

Yule’s journal contains a very bright and pleasing picture of Singapore, where he found that the majority of the European population “were evidently, from their tongues, from benorth the Tweed, a circumstance which seems to be true of four-fifths of the Singaporeans. Indeed, if I taught geography, I should be inclined to class Edinburgh, Glasgow, Dundee, and Singapore together as the four chief towns of Scotland.”

Work on the defences kept Yule in Singapore and its neighbourhood until the end of November, when he embarked for Bengal. On his return to Calcutta, Yule was appointed Deputy Consulting Engineer for Railways at Head-quarters. In this post he had for chief his old friend Baker, who had in 1851 been appointed by the Governor-General, Lord Dalhousie, Consulting Engineer for Railways to Government. The office owed its existence to the recently initiated great experiment of railway construction under Government guarantee.

The subject was new to Yule, “and therefore called for hard and anxious labour. He, however, turned his strong sense and unbiased view to the general question of railway communication in India, with the result that he became a vigorous supporter of the idea of narrow gauge and cheap lines in the parts of that country outside of the main trunk lines of traffic.”[36]

The influence of Yule, and that of his intimate friends and ultimate successors in office, Colonels R. Strachey and Dickens, led to the adoption of the narrow (metre) gauge over a great part of India. Of this matter more will be said further on; it is sufficient at this stage to note that it was occupying Yule’s thoughts, and that he had already taken up the position in this question that he thereafter maintained through life. The office of Consulting Engineer to Government for Railways ultimately developed into the great Department of Public Works.

As related by Yule, whilst Baker “held this appointment, Lord Dalhousie was in the habit of making use of his advice in a great variety of matters connected with Public Works projects and questions, but which had nothing to do with guaranteed railways, there being at that time no officer attached to the Government of India, whose proper duty it was to deal with such questions. In August, 1854, the Government of India sent home to the Court of Directors a despatch and a series of minutes by the Governor-General and his Council, in which the constitution of the Public Works Department as a separate branch of administration, both in the local governments and the government of India itself, was urged on a detailed plan.”

In this communication Lord Dalhousie stated his desire to appoint Major Baker to the projected office of Secretary for the Department of Public Works. In the spring of 1855 these recommendations were carried out by the creation of the Department, with Baker as Secretary and Yule as Under Secretary for Public Works.

Meanwhile Yule’s services were called to a very different field, but without his vacating his new appointment, which he was allowed to retain. Not long after the conclusion of the second Burmese War, the King of Burma sent a friendly mission to the Governor-General, and in 1855 a return Embassy was despatched to the Court of Ava, under Colonel Arthur Phayre, with Henry Yule as Secretary, an appointment the latter owed as much to Lord Dalhousie’s personal wish as to Phayre’s good-will. The result of this employment was Yule’s first geographical book, a large volume entitled _Mission to the Court of Ava in 1855_, originally printed in India, but subsequently re-issued in an embellished form at home (see over leaf). To the end of his life, Yule looked back to this “social progress up the Irawady, with its many quaint and pleasant memories, as to a bright and joyous holiday.”[37] It was a delight to him to work under Phayre, whose noble and lovable character he had already learned to appreciate two years before in Pegu. Then, too, Yule has spoken of the intense relief it was to escape from the monotonous scenery and depressing conditions of official life in Bengal (Resort to Simla was the exception, not the rule, in these days!) to the cheerfulness and unconstraint of Burma, with its fine landscapes and merry-hearted population. “It was such a relief to find natives who would laugh at a joke,” he once remarked in the writer’s presence to the lamented E. C. Baber, who replied that he had experienced exactly the same sense of relief in passing from India to China.

Yule’s work on Burma was largely illustrated by his own sketches. One of these represents the King’s reception of the Embassy, and another, the King on his throne. The originals were executed by Yule’s ready pencil, surreptitiously within his cocked hat, during the audience.

From the latter sketch Yule had a small oil-painting executed under his direction by a German artist, then resident in Calcutta, which he gave to Lord Dalhousie.[38]

The Government of India marked their approval of the Embassy by an unusual concession. Each of the members of the mission received a souvenir of the expedition. To Yule was given a very beautiful and elaborately chased small bowl, of nearly pure gold, bearing the signs of the Zodiac in relief.[39]

On his return to Calcutta, Yule threw himself heart and soul into the work of his new appointment in the Public Works Department. The nature of his work, the novelty and variety of the projects and problems with which this new branch of the service had to deal, brought Yule into constant, and eventually very intimate association with Lord Dalhousie, whom he accompanied on some of his tours of inspection. The two men thoroughly appreciated each other, and, from first to last, Yule experienced the greatest kindness from Lord Dalhousie. In this intimacy, no doubt the fact of being what French soldiers call _pays_ added something to the warmth of their mutual regard: their forefathers came from the same _airt_, and neither was unmindful of the circumstance. It is much to be regretted that Yule preserved no sketch of Lord Dalhousie, nor written record of his intercourse with him, but the following lines show some part of what he thought:

“At this time [1849] there appears upon the scene that vigorous and masterful spirit, whose arrival to take up the government of India had been greeted by events so inauspicious. No doubt from the beginning the Governor-General was desirous to let it be understood that although new to India he was, and meant to be, master; ... Lord Dalhousie was by no means averse to frank dissent, provided _in the manner_ it was never forgotten that he was Governor-General. Like his great predecessor Lord Wellesley, he was jealous of all familiarity and resented it.... The general sentiment of those who worked under that ἄναξ ανδρῶν was one of strong and admiring affection ... and we doubt if a Governor-General ever embarked on the Hoogly amid deeper feeling than attended him who, shattered by sorrow and physical suffering, but erect and undaunted, quitted Calcutta on the 6th March 1856.”[40]

His successor was Lord Canning, whose confidence in Yule and personal regard for him became as marked as his predecessor’s.

In the autumn of 1856, Yule took leave and came home. Much of his time while in England was occupied with making arrangements for the production of an improved edition of his book on Burma, which so far had been a mere government report. These were completed to his satisfaction, and on the eve of returning to India, he wrote to his publishers[41] that the correction of the proof sheets and general supervision of the publication had been undertaken by his friend the Rev. W. D. Maclagan, formerly an officer of the Madras army (and now Archbishop of York).

Whilst in England, Yule had renewed his intimacy with his old friend Colonel Robert Napier, then also on furlough, a visitor whose kindly sympathetic presence always brought special pleasure also to Yule’s wife and child. One result of this intercourse was that the friends decided to return together to India. Accordingly they sailed from Marseilles towards the end of April, and at Aden were met by the astounding news of the outbreak of the Mutiny.

On his arrival in Calcutta Yule, who retained his appointment of Under Secretary to Government, found his work indefinitely increased. Every available officer was called into the field, and Yule’s principal centre of activity was shifted to the great fortress of Allahabad, forming the principal base of operations against the rebels. Not only had he to strengthen or create defences at Allahabad and elsewhere, but on Yule devolved the principal burden of improvising accommodation for the European troops then pouring into India, which ultimately meant providing for an army of 100,000 men. His task was made the more difficult by the long-standing chronic friction, then and long after, existing between the officers of the Queen’s and the Company’s services. But in a far more important matter he was always fortunate. As he subsequently recorded in a Note for Government: “Through all consciousness of mistakes and shortcomings, I have felt that I had the confidence of those whom I served, a feeling which has lightened many a weight.”

It was at Allahabad that Yule, in the intervals of more serious work, put the last touches to his Burma book. The preface of the English edition is dated, “Fortress of Allahabad, Oct. 3, 1857,” and contains a passage instinct with the emotions of the time. After recalling the “joyous holiday” on the Irawady, he goes on: “But for ourselves, standing here on the margin of these rivers, which a few weeks ago were red with the blood of our murdered brothers and sisters, and straining the ear to catch the echo of our avenging artillery, it is difficult to turn the mind to what seem dreams of past days of peace and security; and memory itself grows dim in the attempt to repass the gulf which the last few months has interposed between the present and the time to which this narrative refers.”[42]

When he wrote these lines, the first relief had just taken place, and the second defence of Lucknow was beginning. The end of the month saw Sir Colin Campbell’s advance to the second—the real—relief of Lucknow. Of Sir Colin, Yule wrote and spoke with warm regard: “Sir Colin was delightful, and when in a good humour and at his best, always reminded me very much, both in manner and talk, of the General (_i.e._ General White, his wife’s father). The voice was just the same and the quiet gentle manner, with its underlying keen dry humour. But then if you did happen to offend Sir Colin, it was like treading on crackers, which was not our General’s way.”

When Lucknow had been relieved, besieged, reduced, and finally remodelled by the grand Roads and Demolitions Scheme of his friend Napier, the latter came down to Allahabad, and he and Yule sought diversion in playing quoits and skittles, the only occasion on which either of them is known to have evinced any liking for games.

Before this time Yule had succeeded his friend Baker as _de facto_ Secretary to Government for Public Works, and on Baker’s retirement in 1858, Yule was formally appointed his successor.[43] Baker and Yule had, throughout their association, worked in perfect unison, and the very differences in their characters enhanced the value of their co-operation; the special qualities of each friend mutually strengthened and completed each other. Yule’s was by far the more original and creative mind, Baker’s the more precise and, at least in a professional sense, the more highly-trained organ. In chivalrous sense of honour, devotion to duty, and natural generosity, the men stood equal; but while Yule was by nature impatient and irritable, and liable, until long past middle age, to occasional sudden bursts of uncontrollable anger, generally followed by periods of black depression and almost absolute silence,[44] Baker was the very reverse. Partly by natural temperament, but also certainly by severe self-discipline, his manner was invincibly placid and his temper imperturbable.[45] Yet none was more tenacious in maintaining whatever he judged right.

Baker, whilst large-minded in great matters, was extremely conventional in small ones, and Yule must sometimes have tried his feelings in this respect. The particulars of one such tragic occurrence have survived. Yule, who was colour-blind,[46] and in early life whimsically obstinate in maintaining his own view of colours, had selected some cloth for trousers undeterred by his tailor’s timid remonstrance of “Not _quite_ your usual taste, sir.” The result was that the Under-Secretary to Government startled official Calcutta by appearing in brilliant claret-coloured raiment. Baker remonstrated: “Claret-colour! Nonsense, my trousers are silver grey,” said Yule, and entirely declined to be convinced. “I think I _did_ convince him at last,” said Baker with some pride, when long after telling the story to the present writer. “And _then_ he gave them up?” “Oh, no,” said Sir William ruefully, “he wore those claret-coloured trousers to the very end.” That episode probably belonged to the Dalhousie period.

When Yule resumed work in the Secretariat at Calcutta at the close of the Mutiny, the inevitable arrears of work were enormous. This may be the proper place to notice more fully his action with respect to the choice of gauge for Indian railways already adverted to in brief. As we have seen, his own convictions led to the adoption of the metre gauge over a great part of India. This policy had great disadvantages not at first foreseen, and has since been greatly modified. In justice to Yule, however, it should be remembered that the conditions and requirements of India have largely altered, alike through the extraordinary growth of the Indian export, especially the grain, trade, and the development of new necessities for Imperial defence. These new features, however, did but accentuate defects inherent in the system, but which only prolonged practical experience made fully apparent.

At the outset the supporters of the narrow gauge seemed to have the stronger position, as they were able to show that the cost was much less, the rails employed being only about ⅔rds the weight of those required by the broad gauge, and many other subsidiary expenses also proportionally less. On the other hand, as time passed and practical experience was gained, its opponents were able to make an even stronger case against the narrow gauge. The initial expenses were undoubtedly less, but the durability was also less. Thus much of the original saving was lost in the greater cost of maintenance, whilst the small carrying capacity of the rolling stock and loss of time and labour in shifting goods at every break of gauge, were further serious causes of waste, which the internal commercial development of India daily made more apparent. Strategic needs also were clamant against the dangers of the narrow gauge in any general scheme of Indian defence. Yule’s connection with the Public Works Department had long ceased ere the question of the gauges reached its most acute stage, but his interest and indirect participation in the conflict survived. In this matter a certain parental tenderness for a scheme which he had helped to originate, combined with his warm friendship for some of the principal supporters of the narrow gauge, seem to have influenced his views more than he himself was aware. Certainly his judgment in this matter was not impartial, although, as always in his case, it was absolutely sincere and not consciously biased.

In reference to Yule’s services in the period following the Mutiny, Lord Canning’s subsequent Minute of 1862 may here be fitly quoted. In this the Governor-General writes: “I have long ago recorded my opinion of the value of his services in 1858 and 1859, when with a crippled and overtaxed staff of Engineer officers, many of them young and inexperienced, the G.-G. had to provide rapidly for the accommodation of a vast English army, often in districts hitherto little known, and in which the authority of the Government was barely established, and always under circumstances of difficulty and urgency. I desire to repeat that the Queen’s army in India was then greatly indebted to Lieut.-Colonel Yule’s judgment, earnestness, and ability; and this to an extent very imperfectly understood by many of the officers who held commands in that army.

“Of the manner in which the more usual duties of his office have been discharged it is unnecessary for me to speak. It is, I believe, known and appreciated as well by the Home Government as by the Governor-General in Council.”

In the spring of 1859 Yule felt the urgent need of a rest, and took the, at that time, most unusual step of coming home on three months’ leave, which as the voyage then occupied a month each way, left him only one month at home. He was accompanied by his elder brother George, who had not been out of India for thirty years. The visit home of the two brothers was as bright and pleasant as it was brief, but does not call for further notice.

In 1860, Yule’s health having again suffered, he took short leave to Java. His journal of this tour is very interesting, but space does not admit of quotation here. He embodied some of the results of his observations in a lecture he delivered on his return to Calcutta.

During these latter years of his service in India, Yule owed much happiness to the appreciative friendship of Lord Canning and the ready sympathy of Lady Canning. If he shared their tours in an official capacity, the intercourse was much more than official. The noble character of Lady Canning won from Yule such wholehearted chivalrous devotion as, probably, he felt for no other friend save, perhaps in after days, Sir Bartle Frere. And when her health failed, it was to Yule’s special care that Lord Canning entrusted his wife during a tour in the Hills. Lady Canning was known to be very homesick, and one day as the party came in sight of some ilexes (the evergreen oak), Yule sought to cheer her by calling out pleasantly: “Look, Lady Canning! There are _oaks_!” “No, no, Yule, _not_ oaks,” cried Sir C. B. “They are (solemnly) IBEXES.” “No, _not_ Ibexes, Sir C., you mean SILEXES,” cried Capt. ——, the A.D.C.; Lady Canning and Yule the while almost choking with laughter.

On another and later occasion, when the Governor-General’s camp was peculiarly dull and stagnant, every one yawning and grumbling, Yule effected a temporary diversion by pretending to tap the telegraph wires, and circulating through camp, what purported to be, the usual telegraphic abstract of news brought to Bombay by the latest English mail. The news was of the most astounding character, with just enough air of probability, in minor details, to pass muster with a dull reader. The effect was all he could wish—or rather more—and there was a general flutter in the camp. Of course the Governor-General and one or two others were in the secret, and mightily relished the diversion. But this pleasant and cheering intercourse was drawing to its mournful close. On her way back from Darjeeling, in November, 1861, Lady Canning (not then in Yule’s care) was unavoidably exposed to the malaria of a specially unhealthy season. A few days’ illness followed, and on 18th November, 1861, she passed calmly to

“That remaining rest where night and tears are o’er.”[47]

It was to Yule that Lord Canning turned in the first anguish of his loss, and on this faithful friend devolved the sad privilege of preparing her last resting-place. This may be told in the touching words of Lord Canning’s letter to his only sister, written on the day of Lady Canning’s burial, in the private garden at Barrackpoor[48]:—

“The funeral is over, and my own darling lies buried in a spot which I am sure she would have chosen of all others.... From the grave can be seen the embanked walk leading from the house to the river’s edge, which she made as a landing-place three years ago, and from within 3 or 4 paces of the grave there is a glimpse of the terrace-garden and its balustrades, which she made near the house, and of the part of the grounds with which she most occupied herself.... I left Calcutta yesterday ... and on arriving here, went to look at the precise spot chosen for the grave. I could see by the clear full moon ... that it was exactly right. Yule was there superintending the workmen, and before daylight this morning a solid masonry vault had been completely finished.

“Bowie [Military Secretary] and Yule have done all this for me. It has all been settled since my poor darling died. She liked Yule. They used to discuss together her projects of improvement for this place, architecture, gardening, the Cawnpore monument, etc., and they generally agreed. He knew her tastes well....”

The coffin, brought on a gun-carriage from Calcutta, “was carried by twelve soldiers of the 6th Regiment (Queen’s), the A.D.C.’s bearing the pall. There were no hired men or ordinary funeral attendants of any kind at any part of the ceremony, and no lookers-on.... Yule was the only person not of the household staff. Had others who had asked” to attend “been allowed to do so, the numbers would have been far too large.

“On coming near the end of the terrace walk I saw that the turf between the walk and the grave, and for several yards all round the grave, was strewed thick with palm branches and bright fresh-gathered flowers—quite a thick carpet. It was a little matter, but so exactly what she would have thought of.”[49]

And, therefore, Yule thought of this for her! He also recorded the scene two days later in some graceful and touching lines, privately printed, from which the following may be quoted:

“When night lowered black, and the circling shroud Of storm rolled near, and stout hearts learned dismay; Not Hers! To her tried Lord a Light and Stay Even in the Earthquake and the palpable cloud Of those dark months; and when a fickle crowd Panted for blood and pelted wrath and scorn On him she loved, her courage never stooped: But when the clouds were driven, and the day Poured Hope and glorious Sunshine, she who had borne, The night with such strong Heart, withered and drooped, Our queenly lily, and smiling passed away. Now! let no fouling touch profane her clay, Nor odious pomps and funeral tinsels mar Our grief. But from our England’s cannon car Let England’s soldiers bear her to the tomb Prepared by loving hands. Before her bier Scatter victorious palms; let Rose’s bloom Carpet its passage....”

Yule’s deep sympathy in this time of sorrow strengthened the friendship Lord Canning had long felt for him, and when the time approached for the Governor-General to vacate his high office, he invited Yule, who was very weary of India, to accompany him home, where his influence would secure Yule congenial employment. Yule’s weariness of India at this time was extreme. Moreover, after serving under such leaders as Lord Dalhousie and Lord Canning, and winning their full confidence and friendship, it was almost repugnant to him to begin afresh with new men and probably new measures, with which he might not be in accord. Indeed, some little clouds were already visible on the horizon. In these circumstances, it is not surprising that Yule, under an impulse of lassitude and impatience, when accepting Lord Canning’s offer, also ‘burnt his boats’ by sending in his resignation of the service. This decision Yule took against the earnest advice of his anxious and devoted wife, and for a time the results justified all her misgivings. She knew well, from past experience, how soon Yule wearied in the absence of compulsory employment. And in the event of the life in England not suiting him, for even Lord Canning’s good-will might not secure perfectly congenial employment for his talents, she knew well that his health and spirits would be seriously affected. She, therefore, with affectionate solicitude, urged that he should adopt the course previously followed by his friend Baker, that is, come home on furlough, and only send in his resignation after he saw clearly what his prospects of home employment were, and what he himself wished in the matter.

Lord Canning and Yule left Calcutta late in March, 1862; at Malta they parted never to meet again in this world. Lord Canning proceeded to England, and Yule joined his wife and child in Rome. Only a few weeks later, at Florence, came as a thunderclap the announcement of Lord Canning’s unexpected death in London, on 17th June. Well does the present writer remember the day that fatal news came, and Yule’s deep anguish, not assuredly for the loss of his prospects, but for the loss of a most noble and magnanimous friend, a statesman whose true greatness was, both then and since, most imperfectly realised by the country for which he had worn himself out.[50] Shortly after Yule went to England,[51] where he was cordially received by Lord Canning’s representatives, who gave him a touching remembrance of his lost friend, in the shape of the silver travelling candlesticks, which had habitually stood on Lord Canning’s writing-table.[52] But his offer to write Lord Canning’s _Life_ had no result, as the relatives, following the then recent example of the Hastings family, in the case of another great Governor-General, refused to revive discussion by the publication of any Memoir.

Nor did Yule find any suitable opening for employment in England, so after two or three months spent in visiting old friends, he rejoined his family in the Black Forest, where he sought occupation in renewing his knowledge of German. But it must be confessed that his mood both then and for long after was neither happy nor wholesome. The winter of 1862 was spent somewhat listlessly, partly in Germany and partly at the Hôtel des Bergues, Geneva, where his old acquaintance Colonel Tronchin was hospitably ready to open all doors. The picturesque figure of John Ruskin also flits across the scene at this time. But Yule was unoccupied and restless, and could neither enjoy Mr. Ruskin’s criticism of his sketches nor the kindly hospitality of his Genevan hosts. Early in 1863 he made another fruitless visit to London, where he remained four or five months, but found no opening. Though unproductive of work, this year brought Yule official recognition of his services in the shape of the C.B., for which Lord Canning had long before recommended him.[53]

On rejoining his wife and child at Mornex in Savoy, Yule found the health of the former seriously impaired. During his absence, the kind and able English Doctor at Geneva had felt obliged to inform Mrs. Yule that she was suffering from disease of the heart, and that her life might end suddenly at any moment. Unwilling to add to Yule’s anxieties, she made all necessary arrangements, but did not communicate this intelligence until he had done all he wished and returned, when she broke it to him very gently. Up to this year Mrs. Yule, though not strong and often ailing, had not allowed herself to be considered an invalid, but from this date doctor’s orders left her no choice in the matter.[54]

About this time, Yule took in hand the first of his studies of mediæval travellers. His translation of the _Travels of Friar Jordanus_ was probably commenced earlier; it was completed during the leisurely journey by carriage between Chambéry and Turin, and the Dedication to Sir Bartle Frere written during a brief halt at Genoa, from which place it is dated. Travelling slowly and pleasantly by _vetturino_ along the Riviera di Levante, the family came to Spezzia, then little more than a quiet village. A chance encounter with agreeable residents disposed Yule favourably towards the place, and a few days later he opened negotiations for land to build a house! Most fortunately for himself and all concerned these fell through, and the family continued their journey to Tuscany, and settled for the winter in a long rambling house, with pleasant garden, at Pisa, where Yule was able to continue with advantage his researches into mediæval travel in the East. He paid frequent visits to Florence, where he had many pleasant acquaintances, not least among them Charles Lever (“Harry Lorrequer”), with whom acquaintance ripened into warm and enduring friendship. At Florence he also made the acquaintance of the celebrated Marchese Gino Capponi, and of many other Italian men of letters. To this winter of 1863–64 belongs also the commencement of a lasting friendship with the illustrious Italian historian, Villari, at that time holding an appointment at Pisa. Another agreeable acquaintance, though less intimate, was formed with John Ball, the well-known President of the Alpine Club, then resident at Pisa, and with many others, among whom the name of a very cultivated German scholar, H. Meyer, specially recurs to memory.

In the spring of 1864, Yule took a spacious and delightful old villa, situated in the highest part of the Bagni di Lucca,[55] and commanding lovely views over the surrounding chestnut-clad hills and winding river.

Here he wrote much of what ultimately took form in _Cathay and the Way Thither_. It was this summer, too, that Yule commenced his investigations among the Venetian archives, and also visited the province of Friuli in pursuit of materials for the history of one of his old travellers, the _Beato Odorico_. At Verona—then still Austrian—he had the amusing experience of being arrested for sketching too near the fortifications. However, his captors had all the usual Austrian _bonhomie_ and courtesy, and Yule experienced no real inconvenience. He was much more disturbed when, a day or two later, the old mother of one of his Venetian acquaintances insisted on embracing him on account of his supposed likeness to Garibaldi!

As winter approached, a warmer climate became necessary for Mrs. Yule, and the family proceeded to Sicily, landing at Messina in October, 1864. From this point, Yule made a very interesting excursion to the then little known group of the Lipari Islands, in the company of that eminent geologist, the late Robert Mallet, F.R.S., a most agreeable companion.

On Martinmas Day, the Yules reached the beautiful capital of Sicily, Palermo, which, though they knew it not, was to be their home—a very happy one—for nearly eleven years.

During the ensuing winter and spring, Yule continued the preparation of _Cathay_, but his appetite for work not being satisfied by this, he, when in London in 1865, volunteered to make an Index to the third decade of the _Journal of the Royal Geographical Society_, in exchange for a set of such volumes as he did not possess. That was long before any Index Society existed; but Yule had special and very strong views of his own as to what an Index should be, and he spared no labour to realise his ideal.[56] This proved a heavier task than he had anticipated, and he got very weary before the Index was completed.

In the spring of 1866, _Cathay and the Way Thither_ appeared, and at once took the high place which it has ever since retained. In the autumn of the same year Yule’s attention was momentarily turned in a very different direction by a local insurrection, followed by severe reprisals, and the bombardment of Palermo by the Italian Fleet. His sick wife was for some time under rifle as well as shell fire; but cheerfully remarking that “every bullet has its billet,” she remained perfectly serene and undisturbed. It was the year of the last war with Austria, and also of the suppression of the Monastic Orders in Sicily; two events which probably helped to produce the outbreak, of which Yule contributed an account to _The Times_, and subsequently a more detailed one to the _Quarterly Review_.[57]

Yule had no more predilection for the Monastic Orders than most of his countrymen, but his sense of justice was shocked by the cruel incidence of the measure in many cases, and also by the harshness with which both it and the punishment of suspected insurgents was carried out. Cholera was prevalent in Italy that year, but Sicily, which had maintained stringent quarantine, entirely escaped until large bodies of troops were landed to quell the insurrection, when a devastating epidemic immediately ensued, and re-appeared in 1867. In after years, when serving on the Army Sanitary Committee at the India Office, Yule more than once quoted this experience as indicating that quarantine restrictions may, in some cases, have more value than British medical authority is usually willing to admit.

In 1867, on his return from London, Yule commenced systematic work on his long projected new edition of the _Travels of Marco Polo_. It was apparently in this year that the scheme first took definite form, but it had long been latent in his mind. The Public Libraries of Palermo afforded him much good material, whilst occasional visits to the Libraries of Venice, Florence, Paris, and London, opened other sources. But his most important channel of supply came from his very extensive private correspondence, extending to nearly all parts of Europe and many centres in Asia. His work brought him many new and valued friends, indeed too many to mention, but amongst whom, as belonging specially to this period, three honoured names must be recalled here: Commendatore (afterwards Baron) CRISTOFORO NEGRI, the large-hearted Founder and First President of the Geographical Society of Italy, from whom Yule received his first public recognition as a geographer, Commendatore GUGLIELMO BERCHET (affectionately nicknamed _il Bello e Buono_), ever generous in learned help, who became a most dear and honoured friend, and the Hon. GEORGE P. MARSH, U.S. Envoy to the Court of Italy, a man, both as scholar and friend, unequalled in his nation, perhaps almost unique anywhere.

Those who only knew Yule in later years, may like some account of his daily life at this time. It was his custom to rise fairly early; in summer he sometimes went to bathe in the sea,[58] or for a walk before breakfast; more usually he would write until breakfast, which he preferred to have alone. After breakfast he looked through his notebooks, and before ten o’clock was usually walking rapidly to the library where his work lay. He would work there until two or three o’clock, when he returned home, read the _Times_, answered letters, received or paid visits, and then resumed work on his book, which he often continued long after the rest of the household were sleeping. Of course his family saw but little of him under these circumstances, but when he had got a chapter of _Marco_ into shape, or struck out some new discovery of interest, he would carry it to his wife to read. She always took great interest in his work, and he had great faith in her literary instinct as a sound as well as sympathetic critic.

The first fruits of Yule’s Polo studies took the form of a review of Pauthier’s edition of _Marco Polo_, contributed to the _Quarterly Review_ in 1868.

In 1870 the great work itself appeared, and received prompt generous recognition by the grant of the very beautiful gold medal of the Geographical Society of Italy,[59] followed in 1872 by the award of the Founder’s Medal of the Royal Geographical Society, while the Geographical and Asiatic Societies of Paris, the Geographical Societies of Italy and Berlin, the Academy of Bologna, and other learned bodies, enrolled him as an Honorary Member.

Reverting to 1869, we may note that Yule, when passing through Paris early in the spring, became acquainted, through his friend M. Charles Maunoir, with the admirable work of exploration lately performed by Lieut. Francis Garnier of the French Navy. It was a time of much political excitement in France, the eve of the famous _Plébiscite_, and the importance of Garnier’s work was not then recognised by his countrymen. Yule saw its value, and on arrival in London went straight to Sir Roderick Murchison, laid the facts before him, and suggested that no other traveller of the year had so good a claim to one of the two gold medals of the R.G.S. as this French naval Lieutenant. Sir Roderick was propitious, and accordingly in May the Patron’s medal was assigned to Garnier, who was touchingly grateful to Yule; whilst the French Minister of Marine marked his appreciation of Yule’s good offices by presenting him with the magnificent volumes commemorating the expedition.[60]

Yule was in Paris in 1871, immediately after the suppression of the Commune, and his letters gave interesting accounts of the extraordinary state of affairs then prevailing. In August, he served as President of the Geographical Section of the British Association at its Edinburgh meeting.

On his return to Palermo, he devoted himself specially to the geography of the Oxus region, and the result appeared next year in his introduction and notes to Wood’s _Journey_. Soon after his return to Palermo, he became greatly interested in the plans, about which he was consulted, of an English church, the gift to the English community of two of its oldest members, Messrs Ingham and Whitaker. Yule’s share in the enterprise gradually expanded, until he became a sort of volunteer clerk of the works, to the great benefit of his health, as this occupation during the next three years, whilst adding to his interests, also kept him longer in the open air than would otherwise have been the case. It was a real misfortune to Yule (and one of which he was himself at times conscious) that he had no taste for any out-of-door pursuits, neither for any form of natural science, nor for gardening, nor for any kind of sport nor games. Nor did he willingly ride.[61] He was always restless away from his books. There can be no doubt that want of sufficient air and exercise, reacting on an impaired liver, had much to do with Yule’s unsatisfactory state of health and frequent extreme depression. There was no lack of agreeable and intelligent society at Palermo (society that the present writer recalls with cordial regard), to which every winter brought pleasant temporary additions, both English and foreign, the best of whom generally sought Yule’s acquaintance. Old friends too were not wanting; many found their way to Palermo, and when such came, he was willing to show them hospitality and to take them excursions, and occasionally enjoyed these. But though the beautiful city and surrounding country were full of charm and interest, Yule was too much pre-occupied by his own special engrossing pursuits ever really to get the good of his surroundings, of which indeed he often seemed only half conscious.

By this time Yule had obtained, without ever having sought it, a distinct and, in some respects, quite unique position in geographical science. Although his _Essay on the Geography of the Oxus Region_ (1872) received comparatively little public attention at home, it had yet made its mark once for all,[62] and from this time, if not earlier, Yule’s high authority in all questions of Central Asian geography was generally recognised. He had long ere this, almost unconsciously, laid the broad foundations of that “Yule method,” of which Baron von Richthofen has written so eloquently, declaring that not only in his own land, “but also in the literatures of France, Italy, Germany, and other countries, the powerful stimulating influence of the Yule method is visible.”[63] More than one writer has indeed boldly compared Central Asia before Yule to Central Africa before Livingstone!

Yule had wrought from sheer love of the work and without expectation of public recognition, and it was therefore a great surprise as well as gratification to him, to find that the demand for his _Marco Polo_ was such as to justify the appearance of a second edition only a few years after the first. The preparation of this enlarged edition, with much other miscellaneous work (see subjoined bibliography), and the superintendence of the building of the church already named, kept him fully occupied for the next three years.

Amongst the parerga and miscellaneous occupations of Yule’s leisure hours in the period 1869–74, may be mentioned an interesting correspondence with Professor W. W. Skeat on the subject of _William of Palerne_ and Sicilian examples of the Werwolf; the skilful analysis and exposure of Klaproth’s false geography;[64] the purchase and despatch of Sicilian seeds and young trees for use in the Punjab, at the request of the Indian Forestry Department; translations (prepared for friends) of tracts on the cultivation of Sumach and the collection of Manna as practised in Sicily; also a number of small services rendered to the South Kensington Museum, at the request of the late Sir Henry Cole. These latter included obtaining Italian and Sicilian bibliographic contributions to the Science and Art Department’s _Catalogue of Books on Art_, selecting architectural subjects to be photographed;[65] negotiating the purchase of the original drawings illustrative of Padre B. Gravina’s great work on the Cathedral of Monreale; and superintending the execution of a copy in mosaic of the large mosaic picture (in the Norman Palatine Chapel, Palermo,) of the Entry of our Lord into Jerusalem.

In the spring of 1875, just after the publication of the second edition of _Marco Polo_, Yule had to mourn the loss of his noble wife. He was absent from Sicily at the time, but returned a few hours after her death on 30th April. She had suffered for many years from a severe form of heart disease, but her end was perfect peace. She was laid to rest, amid touching tokens of both public and private sympathy, in the beautiful camposanto on Monte Pellegrino. What her loss was to Yule only his oldest and closest friends were in a position to realise. Long years of suffering had impaired neither the soundness of her judgment nor the sweetness, and even gaiety, of her happy, unselfish disposition. And in spirit, as even in appearance, she retained to the very last much of the radiance of her youth. Nor were her intellectual gifts less remarkable. Few who had once conversed with her ever forgot her, and certainly no one who had once known her intimately ever ceased to love her.[66]

Shortly after this calamity, Yule removed to London, and on the retirement of his old friend, Sir William Baker, from the India Council early that autumn, Lord Salisbury at once selected him for the vacant seat. Nothing would ever have made him a party-man, but he always followed Lord Salisbury with conviction, and worked under him with steady confidence.

In 1877 Yule married, as his second wife, the daughter of an old friend,[67] a very amiable woman twenty years his junior, who made him very happy until her untimely death in 1881. From the time of his joining the India Council, his duties at the India Office of course occupied a great part of his time, but he also continued to do an immense amount of miscellaneous literary work, as may be seen by reference to the subjoined bibliography, (itself probably incomplete). In Council he invariably “showed his strong determination to endeavour to deal with questions on their own merits and not only by custom and precedent.”[68] Amongst subjects in which he took a strong line of his own in the discussions of the Council, may be specially instanced his action in the matter of the cotton duties (in which he defended native Indian manufactures as against hostile Manchester interests); the Vernacular Press Act, the necessity for which he fully recognised; and the retention of Kandahar, for which he recorded his vote in a strong minute. In all these three cases, which are typical of many others, his opinion was overruled, but having been carefully and deliberately formed, it remained unaffected by defeat.

In all matters connected with Central Asian affairs, Yule’s opinion always carried great weight; some of his most competent colleagues indeed preferred his authority in this field to that of even Sir Henry Rawlinson, possibly for the reason given by Sir M. Grant Duff, who has epigrammatically described the latter as good in Council but dangerous in counsel.[69]

Yule’s courageous independence and habit of looking at all public questions by the simple light of what appeared to him right, yet without fads or doctrinairism, earned for him the respect of the successive Secretaries of State under whom he served, and the warm regard and confidence of his other colleagues. The value attached to his services in Council was sufficiently shown by the fact that when the period of ten years (for which members are usually appointed), was about to expire, Lord Hartington (now Duke of Devonshire), caused Yule’s appointment to be renewed for life, under a special Act of Parliament passed for this purpose in 1885.

His work as a member of the Army Sanitary Committee, brought him into communication with Miss Florence Nightingale, a privilege which he greatly valued and enjoyed, though he used to say: “She is worse than a Royal Commission to answer, and, in the most gracious charming manner possible, immediately finds out all I don’t know!” Indeed his devotion to the “Lady-in-Chief” was scarcely less complete than Kinglake’s.

In 1880, Yule was appointed to the Board of Visitors of the Government Indian Engineering College at Cooper’s Hill, a post which added to his sphere of interests without materially increasing his work. In 1882, he was much gratified by being named an Honorary Fellow of the Society of Antiquaries of Scotland, more especially as it was to fill one of the two vacancies created by the deaths of Thomas Carlyle and Dean Stanley.

Yule had been President of the Hakluyt Society from 1877, and in 1885 was elected President also of the Royal Asiatic Society. He would probably also have been President of the Royal Geographical Society, but for an untoward incident. Mention has already been made of his constant determination to judge all questions by the simple touchstone of what he believed to be right, irrespective of personal considerations. It was in pursuance of these principles that, at the cost of great pain to himself and some misrepresentation, he in 1878 sundered his long connection with the Royal Geographical Society, by resigning his seat on their Council, solely in consequence of their adoption of what he considered a wrong policy. This severance occurred just when it was intended to propose him as President. Some years later, at the personal request of the late Lord Aberdare, a President in all respects worthy of the best traditions of that great Society, Yule consented to rejoin the Council, which he re-entered as a Vice-President.

In 1883, the University of Edinburgh celebrated its Tercentenary, when Yule was selected as one of the recipients of the honorary degree of LL.D. His letters from Edinburgh, on this occasion, give a very pleasant and amusing account of the festivity and of the celebrities he met. Nor did he omit to chronicle the envious glances cast, as he alleged, by some British men of science on the splendours of foreign Academic attire, on the yellow robes of the Sorbonne, and the Palms of the Institute of France! Pasteur was, he wrote, the one most enthusiastically acclaimed of all who received degrees.

I think it was about the same time that M. Renan was in England, and called upon Sir Henry Maine, Yule, and others at the India Office. On meeting just after, the colleagues compared notes as to their distinguished but unwieldy visitor. “It seems that _le style n’est pas l’homme même_ in _this_ instance,” quoth “Ancient Law” to “Marco Polo.” And here it may be remarked that Yule so completely identified himself with his favourite traveller that he frequently signed contributions to the public press as MARCUS PAULUS VENETUS or M.P.V. His more intimate friends also gave him the same _sobriquet_, and once, when calling on his old friend, Dr. John Brown (the beloved chronicler of _Rab and his Friends_), he was introduced by Dr. John to some lion-hunting American visitors as “our Marco Polo.” The visitors evidently took the statement in a literal sense, and scrutinised Yule closely.[70]

In 1886 Yule published his delightful _Anglo-Indian Glossary_, with the whimsical but felicitous sub-title of _Hobson-Jobson_ (the name given by the rank and file of the British Army in India to the religious festival in celebration of Hassan and Husaïn).

This _Glossary_ was an abiding interest to both Yule and the present writer. Contributions of illustrative quotations came from most diverse and unexpected sources, and the arrival of each new word or happy quotation was quite an event, and gave such pleasure to the recipients as can only be fully understood by those who have shared in such pursuits. The volume was dedicated in affecting terms to his elder brother, Sir George Yule, who, unhappily, did not survive to see it completed.

In July 1885, the two brothers had taken the last of many happy journeys together, proceeding to Cornwall and the Scilly Isles. A few months later, on 13th January 1886, the end came suddenly to the elder, from the effects of an accident at his own door.[71]

It may be doubted if Yule ever really got over the shock of this loss, though he went on with his work as usual, and served that year as a Royal Commissioner on the occasion of the Indian and Colonial Exhibition of 1886.

From 1878, when an accidental chill laid the foundations of an exhausting, though happily quite painless, malady, Yule’s strength had gradually failed, although for several years longer his general health and energies still appeared unimpaired to a casual observer. The condition of public affairs also, in some degree, affected his health injuriously. The general trend of political events from 1880 to 1886 caused him deep anxiety and distress, and his righteous wrath at what he considered the betrayal of his country’s honour in the cases of Frere, of Gordon, and of Ireland, found strong, and, in a noble sense, passionate expression in both prose and verse. He was never in any sense a party man, but he often called himself “one of Mr. Gladstone’s converts,” _i.e._ one whom Gladstonian methods had compelled to break with liberal tradition and prepossessions.

Nothing better expresses Yule’s feeling in the period referred to than the following letter, written in reference to the R. E. Gordon Memorial,[72] but of much wider application: “Will you allow me an inch or two of space to say to my brother officers, ‘Have nothing to do with the proposed Gordon Memorial.’

“That glorious memory is in no danger of perishing and needs no memorial. Sackcloth and silence are what it suggests to those who have guided the action of England; and Englishmen must bear the responsibility for that action and share its shame. It is too early for atoning memorials; nor is it possible for those who take part in them to dissociate themselves from a repulsive hypocrisy.

“Let every one who would fain bestow something in honour of the great victim, do, in silence, some act of help to our soldiers or their families, or to others who are poor and suffering.

“In later days our survivors or successors may look back with softened sorrow and pride to the part which men of our corps have played in these passing events, and Charles Gordon far in the front of all; and then they may set up our little tablets, or what not—not to preserve the memory of our heroes, but to maintain the integrity of our own record of the illustrious dead.”

Happily Yule lived to see the beginning of better times for his country. One of the first indications of that national awakening was the right spirit in which the public, for the most part, received Lord Wolseley’s stirring appeal at the close of 1888, and Yule was so much struck by the parallelism between Lord Wolseley’s warning and some words of his own contained in the pseudo-Polo fragment (see above, end of Preface), that he sent Lord Wolseley the very last copy of the 1875 edition of _Marco Polo_, with a vigorous expression of his sentiments.

That was probably Yule’s last utterance on a public question. The sands of life were now running low, and in the spring of 1889, he felt it right to resign his seat on the India Council, to which he had been appointed for life. On this occasion Lord Cross, then Secretary of State for India, successfully urged his acceptance of the K.C.S.I., which Yule had refused several years before.

In the House of Lords, Viscount Cross subsequently referred to his resignation in the following terms. He said: “A vacancy on the Council had unfortunately occurred through the resignation from ill-health of Sir Henry Yule, whose presence on the Council had been of enormous advantage to the natives of the country. A man of more kindly disposition, thorough intelligence, high-minded, upright, honourable character, he believed did not exist; and he would like to bear testimony to the estimation in which he was held, and to the services which he had rendered in the office he had so long filled.”[73]

This year the Hakluyt Society published the concluding volume of Yule’s last work of importance, the _Diary of Sir William Hedges_. He had for several years been collecting materials for a full memoir of his great predecessor in the domain of historical geography, the illustrious Rennell.[74] This work was well advanced as to preliminaries, but was not sufficiently developed for early publication at the time of Yule’s death, and ere it could be completed its place had been taken by a later enterprise.

During the summer of 1889, Yule occupied much of his leisure by collecting and revising for re-issue many of his miscellaneous writings. Although not able to do much at a time, this desultory work kept him occupied and interested, and gave him much pleasure during many months. It was, however, never completed. Yule went to the seaside for a few weeks in the early summer, and subsequently many pleasant days were spent by him among the Surrey hills, as the guest of his old friends Sir Joseph and Lady Hooker. Of their constant and unwearied kindness, he always spoke with most affectionate gratitude. That autumn he took a great dislike to the English climate; he hankered after sunshine, and formed many plans, eager though indefinite, for wintering at Cintra, a place whose perfect beauty had fascinated him in early youth. But increasing weakness made a journey to Portugal, or even the South of France, an alternative of which he also spoke, very inexpedient, if not absolutely impracticable. Moreover, he would certainly have missed abroad the many friends and multifarious interests which still surrounded him at home. He continued to take drives, and occasionally called on friends, up to the end of November, and it was not until the middle of December that increasing weakness obliged him to take to his bed. He was still, however, able to enjoy seeing his friends—some to the very end, and he had a constant stream of visitors, mostly old friends, but also a few newer ones, who were scarcely less welcome. He also kept up his correspondence to the last, three attached brother R.E.’s, General Collinson, General Maclagan, and Major W. Broadfoot, taking it in turn with the present writer to act as his amanuensis.

On Friday, 27th December, Yule received a telegram from Paris, announcing his nomination that day as Corresponding Member of the Institute of France (Académie des Inscriptions), one of the few distinctions of any kind of which it can still be said that it has at no time lost any of its exalted dignity.

An honour of a different kind that came about the same time, and was scarcely less prized by him, was a very beautiful letter of farewell and benediction from Miss Florence Nightingale,[75] which he kept under his pillow and read many times. On the 28th, he dictated to the present writer his acknowledgment, also by telegraph, of the great honour done him by the Institute. The message was in the following words: “Reddo gratias, Illustrissimi Domini, ob honores tanto nimios quanto immeritos! Mihi robora deficiunt, vita collabitur, accipiatis voluntatem pro facto. Cum corde pleno et gratissimo moriturus vos, Illustrissimi Domini, saluto. YULE.”

Sunday, 29th December, was a day of the most dense black fog, and he felt its oppression, but was much cheered by a visit from his ever faithful friend, Collinson, who, with his usual unselfishness, came to him that day at very great personal inconvenience.

On Monday, 30th December, the day was clearer, and Henry Yule awoke much refreshed, and in a peculiarly happy and even cheerful frame of mind. He said he felt so comfortable. He spoke of his intended book, and bade his daughter write about the inevitable delay to his publisher: “Go and write to John Murray,” were indeed his last words to her. During the morning he saw some friends and relations, but as noon approached his strength flagged, and after a period of unconsciousness, he passed peacefully away in the presence of his daughter and of an old friend, who had come from Edinburgh to see him, but arrived too late for recognition. Almost at the same time that Yule fell asleep, his “stately message,”[76] was being read under the great Dome in Paris. Some two hours after Yule had passed away, F.-M. Lord Napier of Magdala, called on an errand of friendship, and at his desire was admitted to see the last of his early friend. When Lord Napier came out, he said to the present writer, in his own reflective way: “He looks as if he had just settled to some great work.” With these suggestive words of the great soldier, who was so soon, alas, to follow his old friend to the work of another world, this sketch may fitly close.

• • • • •

The following excellent verses (of unknown authorship) on Yule’s death, subsequently appeared in the _Academy_:[77]

“‘Moriturus vos saluto’ Breathes his last the dying scholar— Tireless student, brilliant writer; He ‘salutes his age’ and journeys To the Undiscovered Country. There await him with warm welcome All the heroes of old Story— The Venetians, the Cà Polo, Marco, Nicolo, Maffeo, Odoric of Pordenone, Ibn Batuta, Marignolli, Benedict de Goës—‘Seeking Lost Cathay and finding Heaven.’ Many more whose lives he cherished With the piety of learning; Fading records, buried pages, Failing lights and fires forgotten, By his energy recovered, By his eloquence re-kindled. ‘Moriturus vos saluto’ Breathes his last the dying scholar, And the far off ages answer: _Immortales te salutant_. D. M.”

The same idea had been previously embodied, in very felicitous language, by the late General Sir William Lockhart, in a letter which that noble soldier addressed to the present writer a few days after Yule’s death. And Yule himself would have taken pleasure in the idea of those meetings with his old travellers, which seemed so certain to his surviving friends.[78]

He rests in the old cemetery at Tunbridge Wells, with his second wife, as he had directed. A great gathering of friends attended the first part of the burial service which was held in London on 3rd January, 1890. Amongst those present were witnesses of every stage of his career, from his boyish days at the High School of Edinburgh downwards. His daughter, of course, was there, led by the faithful, peerless friend who was so soon to follow him into the Undiscovered Country.[79] She and his youngest nephew, with two cousins and a few old friends, followed his remains over the snow to the graveside. The epitaph subsequently inscribed on the tomb was penned by Yule himself, but is by no means representative of his powers in a kind of composition in which he had so often excelled in the service of others. As a composer of epitaphs and other monumental inscriptions few of our time have surpassed, if any have equalled him, in his best efforts.

SIR GEORGE UDNY YULE, C.B., K.C.S.I.[80]

George Udny Yule, born at Inveresk in 1813, passed through Haileybury into the Bengal Civil Service, which he entered at the age of 18 years. For twenty-five years his work lay in Eastern Bengal. He gradually became known to the Government for his activity and good sense, but won a far wider reputation as a mighty hunter, alike with hog-spear and double barrel. By 1856 the roll of his slain tigers exceeded four hundred, some of them of special fame; after that he continued slaying his tigers, but ceased to count them. For some years he and a few friends used annually to visit the plains of the Brahmaputra, near the Garrow Hills—an entirely virgin country then, and swarming with large game. Yule used to describe his once seeing seven rhinoceroses at once on the great plain, besides herds of wild buffalo and deer of several kinds. One of the party started the theory that Noah’s Ark had been shipwrecked there! In those days George Yule was the only man to whom the Maharajah of Nepaul, Sir Jung Bahadur, conceded leave to shoot within his frontier.

Yule was first called from his useful obscurity in 1856. The year before, the Sonthals in insurrection disturbed the long unbroken peace of the Delta. These were a numerous non-Aryan, uncivilised, but industrious race, driven wild by local mismanagement, and the oppressions of Hindoo usurers acting through the regulation courts. After the suppression of their rising, Yule was selected by Sir F. Halliday, who knew his man, to be Commissioner of the Bhagulpoor Division, containing some six million souls, and embracing the hill country of the Sonthals. He obtained sanction to a code for the latter, which removed these people entirely from the Court system, and its tribe of leeches, and abolished all intermediaries between the Sahib and the Sonthal peasant. Through these measures, and his personal influence, aided by picked assistants, he was able to effect, with extraordinary rapidity, not only their entire pacification, but such a beneficial change in their material condition, that they have risen from a state of barbarous penury to comparative prosperity and comfort.

George Yule was thus engaged when the Mutiny broke out, and it soon made itself felt in the districts under him. To its suppression within his limits, he addressed himself with characteristic vigour. Thoroughly trusted by every class—by his Government, by those under him, by planters and by Zemindars—he organised a little force, comprising a small detachment of the 5th Regiment, a party of British sailors, mounted volunteers from the districts, etc., and of this he became practically the captain. Elephants were collected from all quarters to spare the legs of his infantry and sailors; while dog-carts were turned into limbers for the small three-pounders of the seamen. And with this little army George Yule scoured the Trans-Gangetic districts, leading it against bodies of the Mutineers, routing them upon more than one occasion, and out-manœuvring them by his astonishing marches, till he succeeded in driving them across the Nepaul frontier. No part of Bengal was at any time in such danger, and nowhere was the danger more speedily and completely averted.

After this Yule served for two or three years as Chief Commissioner of Oudh, where in 1862 he married Miss Pemberton, the daughter of a very able father, and the niece of Sir Donald MacLeod, of honoured and beloved memory. Then for four or five years he was Resident at Hyderabad, where he won the enduring friendship of Sir Salar Jung. “Everywhere he showed the same characteristic firm but benignant justice. Everywhere he gained the lasting attachment of all with whom he had intimate dealings—except tigers and scoundrels.”

Many years later, indignant at the then apparently supine attitude of the British Government in the matter of the Abyssinian captives, George Yule wrote a letter (necessarily published without his name, as he was then on the Governor-General’s Council), to the editor of an influential Indian paper, proposing a private expedition should be organised for their delivery from King Theodore, and inviting the editor (Dr. George Smith) to open a list of subscriptions in his paper for this purpose, to which Yule offered to contribute £2000 by way of beginning. Although impracticable in itself, it is probable that, as in other cases, the existence of such a project may have helped to force the Government into action. The particulars of the above incident were printed by Dr. Smith in his _Memoir of the Rev. John Wilson_, but are given here from memory.

From Hyderabad he was promoted in 1867 to the Governor-General’s Council, but his health broke down under the sedentary life, and he retired and came home in 1869.

After some years of country life in Scotland, where he bought a small property, he settled near his brother in London, where he was a principal instrument in enabling Sir George Birdwood to establish the celebration of Primrose Day (for he also was “one of Mr. Gladstone’s converts”). Sir George Yule never sought ‘London Society’ or public employment, but in 1877 he was offered and refused the post of Financial Adviser to the Khedive under the Dual control. When his feelings were stirred he made useful contributions to the public press, which, after his escape from official trammels, were always signed. The very last of these (_St. James Gazette_, 24th February 1885) was a spirited protest against the snub administered by the late Lord Derby, as Secretary of State, to the Colonies, when they had generously offered assistance in the Soudan campaign. He lived a quiet, happy, and useful life in London, where he was the friend and unwearied helper of all who needed help. He found his chief interests in books and flowers, and in giving others pleasure. Of rare unselfishness and sweet nature, single in mind and motive, fearing God and knowing no other fear, he was regarded by a large number of people with admiring affection. He met his death by a fall on the frosty pavement at his door, in the very act of doing a kindness. An interesting sketch of Sir George Yule’s Indian career, by one who knew him thoroughly, is to be found in Sir Edward Braddon’s _Thirty Years of Shikar_. An account of his share in the origin of Primrose Day appeared in the _St. James’ Gazette_ during 1891.

---------------------------------------------------------------------- [1] There is a vague tradition that these Yules descend from the same stock as the Scandinavian family of the same name, which gave Denmark several men of note, including the great naval hero Niels Juel. The portraits of these old Danes offer a certain resemblance of type to those of their Scots namesakes, and Henry Yule liked to play with the idea, much in the same way that he took humorous pleasure in his reputed descent from Michael Scott, the Wizard! (This tradition was more historical, however, and stood thus: Yule’s great grandmother was a Scott of Ancrum, and the Scotts of Ancrum had established their descent from Sir Michael Scott of Balwearie, reputed to be the Wizard.) Be their origin what it may, Yule’s forefathers had been already settled on the Border hills for many generations, when in the time of James VI. they migrated to the lower lands of East Lothian, where in the following reign they held the old fortalice of Fentoun Tower of Nisbet of Dirleton. When Charles II. empowered his Lord Lyon to issue certificates of arms (in place of the Lyon records removed and lost at sea by the Cromwellian Government), these Yules were among those who took out confirmation of arms, and the original document is still in the possession of the head of the family.

Though Yules of sorts are still to be found in Scotland, the present writer is the only member of the Fentoun Tower family now left in the country, and of the few remaining out of it most are to be found in the Army List.

[2] The literary taste which marked William Yule probably came to him from his grandfather, the Rev. James Rose, Episcopal Minister of Udny, in Aberdeenshire. James Rose, a non-jurant (_i.e._ one who refused to acknowledge allegiance to the Hanoverian King), was a man of devout, large, and tolerant mind, as shown by writings still extant. His father, John Rose, was the younger son of the 14th Hugh of Kilravock. He married Margaret Udny of Udny, and was induced by her to sell his pleasant Ross-shire property and invest the proceeds in her own bleak Buchan. When George Yule (about 1759) brought home Elizabeth Rose as his wife, the popular feeling against the Episcopal Church was so strong and bitter in Lothian, that all the men of the family—themselves Presbyterians—accompanied Mrs. Yule as a bodyguard on the occasion of her first attendance at the Episcopal place of worship. Years after, when dissensions had arisen in the Church of Scotland, Elizabeth Yule succoured and protected some of the dissident Presbyterian ministers from their persecutors.

[3] General Collinson in _Royal Engineers’ Journal_, 1st Feb. 1890. The gifted author of this excellent sketch himself passed away on 22nd April 1902.

[4] The grave thoughtful face of William Yule was conspicuous in the picture of a Durbar (by an Italian artist, but _not_ Zoffany), which long hung on the walls of the Nawab’s palace at Lucknow. This picture disappeared during the Mutiny of 1857.

[5] Colonel Udny Yule, C.B. “When he joined, his usual _nomen_ and _cognomen_ puzzled the staff-sergeant at Fort-William, and after much boggling on the cadet parade, the name was called out _Whirly Wheel_, which produced no reply, till some one at a venture shouted, ‘sick in hospital.’” (_Athenæum_, 24th Sept. 1881.) The ship which took Udny Yule to India was burnt at sea. After keeping himself afloat for several hours in the water, he was rescued by a passing ship and taken back to the Mauritius, whence, having lost everything but his cadetship, he made a fresh start for India, where he and William for many years had a common purse. Colonel Udny Yule commanded a brigade at the Siege of Cornelis (1811), which gave us Java, and afterwards acted as Resident under Sir Stamford Raffles. Forty-five years after the retrocession of Java, Henry Yule found the memory of his uncle still cherished there.

[6] Article on the Oriental Section of the British Museum Library in _Athenæum_, 24th Sept. 1881. Major Yule’s Oriental Library was presented by his sons to the British Museum a few years after his death.

[7] It may be amusing to note that he was considered an almost dangerous person because he read the _Scotsman_ newspaper!

[8] _Athenæum_, 24th Sept. 1881. A gold chain given by the last Dauphiness is in the writer’s possession.

[9] Dr. John Yule (b. 176–, d. 1827), a kindly old _savant_. He was one of the earliest corresponding members of the Society of Antiquaries of Scotland, and the author of some botanical tracts.

[10] According to Brunet, by Lucas Pennis after Antonio Tempesta.

[11] _Concerning some little-known Travellers in the East_. ASIATIC QUARTERLY, vol. v. (1888).

[12] William Yule died in 1839, and rests with his parents, brothers, and many others of his kindred, in the ruined chancel of the ancient Norman Church of St. Andrew, at Gulane, which had been granted to the Yule family as a place of burial by the Nisbets of Dirleton, in remembrance of the old kindly feeling subsisting for generations between them and their tacksmen in Fentoun Tower. Though few know its history, a fragrant memorial of this wise and kindly scholar is still conspicuous in Edinburgh. The magnificent wall-flower that has, for seventy summers, been a glory of the Castle rock, was originally all sown by the patient hand of Major Yule, the self-sowing of each subsequent year, of course, increasing the extent of bloom. Lest the extraordinarily severe spring of 1895 should have killed off much of the old stock, another (but much more limited) sowing on the northern face of the rock was in that year made by his grand-daughter, the present writer, with the sanction and active personal help of the lamented General (then Colonel) Andrew Wauchope of Niddrie Marischal. In Scotland, where the memory of this noble soldier is so greatly revered, some may like to know this little fact. May the wall-flower of the Castle rock long flourish a fragrant memorial of two faithful soldiers and true-hearted Scots.

[13] Obituary notice of Yule, by Gen. R. Maclagan, R.E. _Proceedings, R. G. S._ 1890.

[14] This was the famous “Grey Dinner,” of which The Shepherd made grim fun in the _Noctes_.

[15] Probably the specimen from South America, of which an account was published in 1833.

[16] Rawnsley, _Memoir of Harvey Goodwin, Bishop of Carlisle_.

[17] Biog. Sketch of Yule, by C. Trotter, _Proceedings, R.S.E._ vol. xvii.

[18] Biog. Sketch of Yule, by C. Trotter, _Proceedings, R.S.E._ vol. xvii.

[19] After leaving the army, Yule always used this sword when wearing uniform.

[20] The Engineer cadets remained at Addiscombe a term (= 6 months) longer than the Artillery cadets, and as the latter were ordinarily gazetted full lieutenants six months after passing out, unfair seniority was obviated by the Engineers receiving the same rank on passing out of Addiscombe.

[21] Yule, in _Memoir of General Becher_.

[22] Collinson’s _Memoir of Yule_ in _R. E. Journal_.

[23] The picture was subscribed for by his brother officers in the corps, and painted in 1880 by T. B. Wirgman. It was exhibited at the Royal Academy in 1881. A reproduction of the artist’s etching from it forms the frontispiece of this volume.

[24] In _Memoir of Gen. John Becher_.

[25] General Patrick Yule (b. 1795, d. 1873) was a thorough soldier, with the repute of being a rigid disciplinarian. He was a man of distinguished presence, and great charm of manner to those whom he liked, which were by no means all. The present writer holds him in affectionate remembrance, and owes to early correspondence with him much of the information embodied in preceding notes. He served on the Canadian Boundary Commission of 1817, and on the Commission of National Defence of 1859, was prominent in the Ordnance Survey, and successively Commanding R.E. in Malta and Scotland. He was Engineer to Sir C. Fellows’ Expedition, which gave the nation the Lycian Marbles, and while Commanding R.E. in Edinburgh, was largely instrumental in rescuing St. Margaret’s Chapel in the Castle from desecration and oblivion. He was a thorough Scot, and never willingly tolerated the designation N.B. on even a letter. He had cultivated tastes, and under a somewhat austere exterior he had a most tender heart. When already past sixty, he made a singularly happy marriage to a truly good woman, who thoroughly appreciated him. He was the author of several Memoirs on professional subjects. He rests in St. Andrew’s, Gulane.

[26] Collinson’s _Memoir of Yule_.

[27] Notes on the Iron of the Khasia Hills and Notes on the Khasia Hills and People, both in Journal of the R. Asiatic Society of Bengal, vols. xi. and xiii.

[28] Mr. (afterwards Sir) George Clerk, Political Officer with the expedition. Was twice Governor of Bombay and once Governor of the Cape: “A diplomatist of the true English stamp—undaunted in difficulties and resolute to maintain the honour of his country.” (Sir H. B. Edwardes, _Life of Henry Lawrence_, i. 267). He died in 1889.

[29] Note by Yule, communicated by him to Mr. R. B. Smith and printed by the latter in _Life of Lord Lawrence_.

[30] And when nearing his own end, it was to her that his thoughts turned most constantly.

[31] Yule and Maclagan’s _Memoir of Sir W. Baker_.

[32] Maclagan’s _Memoir of Yule, P.R.G.S._, Feb. 1890.

[33] On hearing this, Yule said to him, “Your story is quite correct except in one particular; you understated the _amount_ of the fine.”

[34] Yule and Maclagan’s _Memoir of Baker_.

[35] It would appear that Major Yule had presented the Rodgers with some specimens of Indian scissors, probably as suggestions in developing that field of export. Scissors of elaborate design, usually damascened or gilt, used to form a most important item in every set of Oriental writing implements. Even long after adhesive envelopes had become common in European Turkey, their use was considered over familiar, if not actually disrespectful, for formal letters, and there was a particular traditional knack in cutting and folding the special envelope for each missive, which was included in the instruction given by every competent _Khoja_ as the present writer well remembers in the quiet years that ended with the disasters of 1877.

[36] Collinson’s _Memoir of Yule, Royal Engineer Journal_.

[37] Extract from Preface to _Ava_, edition of 1858.

[38] The present whereabouts of this picture is unknown to the writer. It was lent to Yule in 1889 by Lord Dalhousie’s surviving daughter (for whom he had strong regard and much sympathy), and was returned to her early in 1890, but is not named in the catalogue of Lady Susan’s effects, sold at Edinburgh in 1898 after her death. At that sale the present writer had the satisfaction of securing for reverent preservation the watch used throughout his career by the great Marquess.

[39] Now in the writer’s possession. It was for many years on exhibition in the Edinburgh and South Kensington Museums.

[40] Article by Yule on Lord Lawrence, _Quarterly Review_ for April, 1883.

[41] Messrs. Smith & Elder.

[42] Preface to _Narrative of a Mission to the Court of Ava_. Before these words were written, Yule had had the sorrow of losing his elder brother Robert, who had fallen in action before Delhi (19th June, 1857), whilst in command of his regiment, the 9th Lancers. Robert Abercromby Yule (born 1817) was a very noble character and a fine soldier. He had served with distinction in the campaigns in Afghanistan and the Sikh Wars, and was the author of an excellent brief treatise on Cavalry Tactics. He had a ready pencil and a happy turn for graceful verse. In prose his charming little allegorical tale for children, entitled _The White Rhododendron_, is as pure and graceful as the flower whose name it bears. Like both his brothers, he was at once chivalrous and devout, modest, impulsive, and impetuous. No officer was more beloved by his men than Robert Yule, and when some one met them carrying back his covered body from the field and enquired of the sergeant: “Who have you got there?” the reply was: “Colonel Yule, and better have lost half the regiment, sir.” It was in the chivalrous effort to extricate some exposed guns that he fell. Some one told afterwards that when asked to go to the rescue, he turned in the saddle, looked back wistfully on his regiment, well knowing the cost of such an enterprise, then gave the order to advance and charge. “No stone marks the spot where Yule went down, but no stone is needed to commemorate his valour” (Archibald Forbes, in _Daily News_, 8th Feb. 1876). At the time of his death Colonel R. A. Yule had been recommended for the C.B. His eldest son, Colonel J. H. Yule, C.B., distinguished himself in several recent campaigns (on the Burma-Chinese frontier, in Tirah, and South Africa).

[43] Baker went home in November, 1857, but did not retire until the following year.

[44] Nothing was more worthy of respect in Yule’s fine character than the energy and success with which he mastered his natural temperament in the last ten years of his life, when few would have guessed his original fiery disposition.

[45] Not without cause did Sir J. P. Grant officially record that “to his imperturbable temper the Government of India owed much.”

[46] Yule’s colour-blindness was one of the cases in which Dalton, the original investigator of this optical defect, took special interest. At a later date (1859) he sent Yule, through Professor Wilson, skeins of coloured silks to name. Yule’s elder brother Robert had the same peculiarity of sight, and it was also present in two earlier and two later generations of their mother’s family—making five generations in all. But in no case did it pass from parent to child, always passing in these examples, by a sort of Knight’s move, from uncle to nephew. Another peculiarity of Yule’s more difficult to describe was the instinctive association of certain architectural forms or images with the days of the week. He once, and once only (in 1843), met another person, a lady who was a perfect stranger, with the same peculiarity. About 1878–79 he contributed some notes on this obscure subject to one of the newspapers, in connection with the researches of Mr. Francis Galton, on Visualisation, but the particulars are not now accessible.

[47] From Yule’s verses on her grave.

[48] Lord Canning to Lady Clanricarde: Letter dated Barrackpoor, 19th Nov. 1861, 7 A.M., printed in _Two Noble Lives_, by A. J. C. Hare, and here reproduced by Mr. Hare’s permission.

[49] Lord Canning’s letter to Lady Clanricarde. He gave to Yule Lady Canning’s own silver drinking-cup, which she had constantly used. It is carefully treasured, with other Canning and Dalhousie relics, by the present writer.

[50] Many years later Yule wrote of Lord Canning as follows: “He had his defects, no doubt. He had not at first that entire grasp of the situation that was wanted at such a time of crisis. But there is a virtue which in these days seems unknown to Parliamentary statesmen in England—Magnanimity. Lord Canning was an English statesman, and he was surpassingly magnanimous. There is another virtue which in Holy Writ is taken as the type and sum of all righteousness—Justice—and he was eminently just. The misuse of special powers granted early in the Mutiny called for Lord Canning’s interference, and the consequence was a flood of savage abuse; the violence and bitterness of which it is now hard to realise.” (_Quarterly Review_, April, 1883, p. 306.)

[51] During the next ten years Yule continued to visit London annually for two or three months in the spring or early summer.

[52] Now in the writer’s possession. They appear in the well-known portrait of Lord Canning reading a despatch.

[53] Lord Canning’s recommendation had been mislaid, and the India Office was disposed to ignore it. It was Lord Canning’s old friend and Eton chum, Lord Granville, who obtained this tardy justice for Yule, instigated thereto by that most faithful friend, Sir Roderick Murchison.

[54] I cannot let the mention of this time of lonely sickness and trial pass without recording here my deep gratitude to our dear and honoured friend, John Ruskin. As my dear mother stood on the threshold between life and death at Mornex that sad spring, he was untiring in all kindly offices of friendship. It was her old friend, Principal A. J. Scott (then eminent, now forgotten), who sent him to call. He came to see us daily when possible, sometimes bringing MSS. of Rossetti and others to read aloud (and who could equal his reading?), and when she was too ill for this, or himself absent, he would send not only books and flowers to brighten the bare rooms of the hillside inn (then very primitive), but his own best treasures of Turner and W. Hunt, drawings and illuminated missals. It was an anxious solace; and though most gratefully enjoyed, these treasures were never long retained.

[55] Villa Mansi, nearly opposite the old Ducal Palace. With its private chapel, it formed three sides of a small _place_ or court.

[56] He also at all times spared no pains to enforce that ideal on other index-makers, who were not always grateful for his sound doctrine!

[57] He saw a good deal of the outbreak when taking small comforts to a friend, the Commandant of the Military School, who was captured and imprisoned by the insurgents.

[58] After 1869 he discontinued sea-bathing.

[59] This was Yule’s first geographical honour, but he had been elected into the Athenæum Club, under “Rule II.,” in January, 1867.

[60] Garnier took a distinguished part in the Defence of Paris in 1870–71, after which he resumed his naval service in the East, where he was killed in action. His last letter to Yule contained the simple announcement “_J’ai pris Hanoï_” a modest terseness of statement worthy of the best naval traditions.

[61] One year the present writer, at her mother’s desire, induced him to take walks of 10 to 12 miles with her, but interesting and lovely as the scenery was, he soon wearied for his writing-table (even bringing his work with him), and thus little permanent good was effected. And it was just the same afterwards in Scotland, where an old Highland gillie, describing his experience of the Yule brothers, said: “I was liking to take out Sir George, for _he_ takes the time to enjoy the hills, but (plaintively), the Kornel is no good, for he’s just as restless as a water-wagtail!” If there be any _mal de l’écritoire_ corresponding to _mal du pays_, Yule certainly had it.

[62] The Russian Government in 1873 paid the same work the very practical compliment of circulating it largely amongst their officers in Central Asia.

[63] “Auch in den Literaturen von Frankreich, Italien, Deutschland und andere Ländern ist der mächtig treibende Einfluss der Yuleschen Methode, welche wissenschaftliche Grundlichkeit mit anmuthender Form verbindet, bemerkbar.” (_Verhandlungen der Gesellschaft für Erdkunde zu Berlin_, Band XVII. No. 2.)

[64] This subject is too lengthy for more than cursory allusion here, but the patient analytic skill and keen venatic instinct with which Yule not only proved the forgery of the alleged _Travels of Georg Ludwig von ——_ (that had been already established by Lord Strangford, whose last effort it was, and Sir Henry Rawlinson), but step by step traced it home to the arch-culprit Klaproth, was nothing less than masterly.

[65] This is probably the origin of the odd misstatement as to Yule occupying himself at Palermo with photography, made in the delightful _Reminiscences_ of the late Colonel Balcarres Ramsay. Yule never attempted photography after 1852.

[66] She was a woman of fine intellect and wide reading; a skilful musician, who also sang well, and a good amateur artist in the style of Aug. Delacroix (of whom she was a favourite pupil). Of French and Italian she had a thorough and literary mastery, and how well she knew her own language is shown by the sound and pure English of a story she published in early life, under the pseudonym of Max Lyle (_Fair Oaks, or The Experiences of Arnold Osborne, M.D._, 2 vols., 1856). My mother was partly of Highland descent on both sides, and many of her fine qualities were very characteristic of that race. Before her marriage she took an active part in many good works, and herself originated the useful School for the Blind at Bath, in a room which she hired with her pocket-money, where she and her friend Miss Elwin taught such of the blind poor as they could gather together.

In the tablet which he erected to her memory in the family burial-place of St. Andrew’s, Gulane, her husband described her thus:—“A woman singular in endowments, in suffering, and in faith; to whom to live was Christ, to die was gain.”

[67] Mary Wilhelmina, daughter of F. Skipwith, Esq., B.C.S.

[68] Collinson’s _Memoir of Yule_.

[69] See _Notes from a Diary_, 1888–91.

[70] The identification was not limited to Yule, for when travelling in Russia many years ago, the present writer was introduced by an absent-minded Russian _savant_ to his colleagues as _Mademoiselle Marco Paulovna_!

[71] See Note on Sir George Yule’s career at the end of this Memoir.

[72] Addressed to the Editor, _Royal Engineers’ Journal_, who did not, however, publish it.

[73] Debate of 27th August, 1889, as reported in _The Times_ of 28th August.

[74] Yule had published a brief but very interesting Memoir of Major Rennell in the _R. E. Journal_ in 1881. He was extremely proud of the circumstance that Rennell’s surviving grand-daughter presented to him a beautiful wax medallion portrait of the great geographer. This wonderfully life-like presentment was bequeathed by Yule to his friend Sir Joseph Hooker, who presented it to the Royal Society.

[75] Knowing his veneration for that noble lady, I had written to tell her of his condition, and to ask her to give him this last pleasure of a few words. The response was such as few but herself could write. This letter was not to be found after my father’s death, and I can only conjecture that it must either have been given away by himself (which is most improbable), or was appropriated by some unauthorised outsider.

[76] So Sir M. E. Grant Duff well calls it.

[77] _Academy_, 19th March, 1890.

[78] He was much pleased, I remember, by a letter he once received from a kindly Franciscan friar, who wrote: “You may rest assured that the Beato Odorico will not forget all you have done for him.”

[79] F.-M. Lord Napier of Magdala, died 14th January, 1890.

[80] This notice includes the greater part of an article written by my father, and published in the _St. James’ Gazette_ of 18th January, 1886, but I have added other details from personal recollection and other sources.—A. F. Y.

A BIBLIOGRAPHY OF SIR HENRY YULE’S WRITINGS

COMPILED BY H. CORDIER AND A. F. YULE[1]

1842 Notes on the Iron of the Kasia Hills. (_Jour. Asiatic Soc. Bengal_, XI. Part II. July–Dec. 1842, pp. 853–857.)

Reprinted in _Proceedings of the Museum of Economic Geology_, 1852.

1844 Notes on the Kasia Hills and People. By Lieut. H. Yule. (_Jour. Asiatic Soc. Bengal_, XII. Part II. July–Dec. 1844, pp. 612–631.)

1846 A Canal Act of the Emperor Akbar, with some notes and remarks on the History of the Western Jumna Canals. By Lieut. Yule. (_Jour. Asiatic Society Bengal_, XV. 1846, pp. 213–223.)

1850 The African Squadron vindicated. By Lieut. H. Yule. Second Edition. London, J. Ridgway, 1850, 8vo, pp. 41.

Had several editions. Reprinted in the Colonial Magazine of March, 1850.

——— L’Escadre Africaine vengée. Par le lieutenant H. Yule. Traduit du _Colonial Magazine_ de Mars, 1850. (_Revue Coloniale_, Mai, 1850.)

1851 Fortification for Officers of the Army and Students of Military History, with Illustrations and Notes. By Lieut. H. Yule, Blackwood, MDCCCLI. 8vo, pp. xxii.–210. (There had been a previous edition privately printed.)

——— La Fortification mise à la portée des Officiers de l’Armée et des personnes qui se livrent à l’étude de l’histoire militaire (avec Atlas). Par H. Yule. Traduit de l’Anglais par M. Sapia, Chef de Bataillon d’Artillerie de Marine et M. Masselin, Capitaine du Génie. Paris, J. Corréard, 1858, 8vo, pp. iii.–263, and Atlas.

1851 The Loss of the _Birkenhead_ (Verses). (_Edinburgh Courant_, Dec. 1851.)

Republished in Henley’s _Lyra Heroica_, a Book of Verse for Boys. London, D. Nutt, 1890.

1852 Tibet. (_Blackwood’s Edinburgh Magazine_, 1852.)

1856 Narrative of Major Phayre’s Mission to the Court of Ava, with Notices of the Country, Government, and People. Compiled by Capt. H. Yule. Printed for submission to the Government of India. Calcutta, J. Thomas, ... 1856, 4to, pp. xxix. + 1 f. n. ch. p. l. er. + pp. 315 + pp. cxiv. + pp. iv. and pp. 70.

The last pp. iv.–70 contain: Notes on the Geological features of the banks of the River Irawadee and on the Country north of the Amarapoora, by Thomas Oldham ... Calcutta, 1856.

——— A Narrative of the Mission sent by the Governor-General of India to the Court of Ava in 1855, with Notices of the Country, Government, and People. By Capt. H. Yule. With Numerous Illustrations. London, Smith, Elder & Co., 1858, 4to.

1857 On the Geography of Burma and its Tributary States, in illustration of a New Map of those Regions. (_Journal, R.G.S._, XXVII. 1857, pp. 54–108.)

——— Notes on the Geography of Burma, in illustration of a Map of that Country. (_Proceedings R.G.S._, vol. i. 1857, pp. 269–273.)

1857 An Account of the Ancient Buddhist Remains at Pagân on the Iráwadi. By Capt. H. Yule. (_Jour. Asiatic Society, Bengal_, XXVI. 1857, pp. 1–51.)

1861 A few notes on Antiquities near Jubbulpoor. By Lieut.-Col. H. Yule. (_Journal Asiatic Society, Bengal_, XXX. 1861, pp. 211–215.)

——— Memorandum on the Countries between Thibet, Yunân, and Burmah. By the Very Rev. Thomine D’Mazure (_sic_), communicated by Lieut.-Col. A. P. Phayre (with notes and a comment by Lieut.-Col. H. Yule). With a Map of the N. E. Frontier, prepared in the Office of the Surveyor-Gen. of India, Calcutta, Aug. 1861. (_Jour. Asiatic Soc. Bengal_, XXX. 1861, pp. 367–383.)

1862 Notes of a brief Visit to some of the Indian Remains in Java. By Lieut.-Col. H. Yule. (_Jour. Asiatic Society, Bengal_, XXXI. 1862, pp. 16–31.)

——— Sketches of Java. A Lecture delivered at the Meeting of the Bethune Society, Calcutta, 13th Feb. 1862.

——— Fragments of Unprofessional Papers gathered from an Engineer’s portfolio after twenty-three years of service. Calcutta, 1862.

Ten copies printed for private circulation.

1863 _Mirabilia descripta_. The Wonders of the East. By Friar Jordanus, of the Order of Preachers and Bishop of Columbum in India the Greater (_circa_ 1330). Translated from the Latin original, as published at Paris in 1839, in the _Recueil de Voyages et de Mémoires_, of the Society of Geography, with the addition of a Commentary, by Col. H. Yule, London.

Printed for the Hakluyt Society, M.DCCC.LXIII, 8vo, p. iv.–xvii.–68.

——— Report on the Passes between Arakan and Burma [written in 1853]. (_Papers on Indian Civil Engineering_, vol. i. Roorkee.)

1866 Notices of Cathay. (_Proceedings, R.G.S._, X. 1866, pp. 270–278.)

——— Cathay and the Way Thither, being a Collection of Mediæval Notices of China. Translated and Edited by Col. H. Yule. With a Preliminary Essay on the Intercourse between China and the Western Nations previous to the Discovery of the Cape route. London, printed for the Hakluyt Society. M.DCCC.LXVI. 2 vols. 8vo.

1866 The Insurrection at Palermo. (_Times_, 29th Sep., 1866.)

——— Lake People. (_The Athenæum_, No. 2042, 15th Dec. 1866, p. 804.)

Letter dated Palermo, 3rd Dec. 1866.

1867 General Index to the third ten Volumes of the Journal of the Royal Geographical Society. Compiled by Col. H. Yule. London, John Murray, M.DCCCLXVII, 8vo, pp. 228.

——— A Week’s Republic at Palermo. (_Quarterly Review_, Jan. 1867.)

——— On the Cultivation of Sumach (_Rhus coriaria_), in the Vicinity of Colli, near Palermo. By Prof. Inzenga. Translated by Col. H. Yule. Communicated by Dr. Cleghorn. _From the Trans. Bot. Society_, vol. ix., 1867–68, ppt. 8vo, p. 15.

Original first published in the _Annali di Agricoltura Siciliana, redatti per l’Istituzione del Principe di Castelnuovo_. Palermo, 1852.

1868 Marco Polo and his Recent Editors. (_Quarterly Review_, vol. 125, July and Oct. 1868, pp. 133 and 166.)

1870 An Endeavour to Elucidate Rashiduddin’s Geographical Notices of India. (_Journal R. Asiatic Society_, N.S. iv. 1870, pp. 340–356.)

——— Some Account of the Senbyú Pagoda at Mengún, near the Burmese Capital, in a Memorandum by Capt. E. H. Sladen, Political Agent at Mandalé; with Remarks on the Subject, by Col. H. Yule. (_Ibid._ pp. 406–429.)

——— Notes on Analogies of Manners between the Indo-Chinese and the Races of the Malay Archipelago. (_Report Fortieth Meeting British Association, Liverpool_, Sept. 1870, p. 178.)

1871 The Book of Ser Marco Polo, the Venetian, Concerning the Kingdoms and Marvels of the East. Newly translated and edited with notes. By Col. H. Yule. In two volumes. With Maps and other Illustrations. London, John Murray, 1871, 2 vols. 8vo.

——— The Book of Ser Marco Polo, the Venetian, concerning the Kingdoms and Marvels of the East. Newly translated and edited, with Notes, Maps, and other Illustrations. By Col. H. Yule. Second edition. London, John Murray, 1875, 2 vols. 8vo.

1871 Address by Col. H. Yule (_Report Forty-First Meeting British Association, Edinburgh_, Aug. 1871, pp. 162–174.)

1872 A Journey to the Source of the River Oxus. By Captain John Wood, Indian Navy. New edition, edited by his Son. With an Essay on the Geography of the Valley of the Oxus. By Col. H. Yule. With maps. London, John Murray, 1872. In–8, pp. xc.–280.

——— Papers connected with the Upper Oxus Regions. (_Journal_, xlii. 1872, pp. 438–481.)

——— Letter [on Yule’s edition of Wood’s _Oxus_]. (_Ocean Highways_, Feb. 1874, p. 475.)

Palermo, 9th Jan. 1874.

1873 Letter [about the route of M. Polo through Southern Kerman]. (_Ocean Highways_, March, 1873, p. 385.)

Palermo, 11th Jan. 1873.

——— On Northern Sumatra and especially Achin. (_Ocean Highways_, Aug. 1873, pp. 177–183.)

——— Notes on Hwen Thsang’s Account of the Principalities of Tokharistan, in which some previous Geographical Identifications are reconsidered. (_Jour. Royal Asiatic Society_, N.S. vi. 1873, pp. 92–120 and p. 278.)

1874 Francis Garnier (In Memoriam). (_Ocean Highways_, pp. 487–491.) March, 1874.

——— Remarks on Mr. Phillips’s Paper [_Notices of Southern Mangi_]. (_Journal_, XLIV. 1874, pp. 103–112.)

Palermo, 22nd Feb. 1874.

——— [Sir Frederic Goldsmid’s] “Telegraph and Travel.” (_Geographical Magazine_, April, 1874, p. 34; Oct. 1874, pp. 300–303.)

——— Geographical Notes on the Basins of the Oxus and the Zarafshán. By the late Alexis Fedchenko. (_Geog. Mag._, May, 1874, pp. 46–54.)

——— [Mr. Ashton Dilke on the Valley of the Ili.] (_Geog. Mag._, June, 1874, p. 123.) Palermo, 16th May, 1874.

——— The _Atlas Sinensis_ and other Sinensiana. (_Geog. Mag._, 1st July, 1847, pp. 147–148.)

——— Letter [on Belasaghun]. (_Geog. Mag._, 1st July, 1874, p. 167; _Ibid._ 1st Sept. 1874, p. 254.)

Palermo, 17th June, 1874; 8th Aug. 1874.

1874 Bala Sagun and Karakorum. By Eugene Schuyler. With note by Col. Yule. (_Geog. Mag._, 1st Dec. 1874, p. 389.)

——— M. Khanikoff’s Identifications of Names in Clavijo. (_Ibid._ pp. 389–390.)

1875 Notes [to the translation by Eugene Schuyler of Palladius’s version of _The Journey of the Chinese Traveller, Chang Fe-hui_]. (_Geog. Mag._, 1st Jan. 1875, pp. 7–11.)

——— Some Unscientific Notes on the History of Plants. (_Geog. Mag._, 1st Feb. 1875, pp. 49–51.)

——— Trade Routes to Western China. (_Geog. Mag._, April, 1875, pp. 97–101.)

——— Garden of Transmigrated Souls [Friar Odoric]. (_Geog. Mag._, 1st May, 1875, pp. 137–138.)

——— A Glance at the Results of the Expedition to Hissar. By Herr P. Lerch. (_Geog. Mag._, 1st Nov. 1875, pp. 334–339.)

——— Kathay or Cathay. (_Johnson’s American Cyclopædia_.)

——— Achín. (_Encycl. Brit._ 9th edition, 1875, I. pp. 95–97.)

——— Afghânistân. (_Ibid._ pp. 227–241.)

——— Andaman Islands. (_Ibid._ II. 1875, pp. 11–13.)

——— India [Ancient]. (Map No. 31, 1874, in _An Atlas of Ancient Geography, edited by William Smith and George Grove_. London, John Murray, 1875.)

1876 Mongolia, the Tangut Country, and the Solitudes of Northern Tibet, being a Narrative of Three Years’ Travel in Eastern High Asia. By Lieut.-Col. N. Prejevalsky, of the Russian Staff Corps; Mem. of the Imp. Russ. Geog. Soc. Translated by E. Delmar Morgan, F.R.G.S. With Introduction and Notes by Col. H. Yule. With Maps and Illustrations. London, Sampson Low, 1876, 8vo.

——— _Tibet_ ... Edited by C. R. Markham. Notice of. (_Times_, 1876, ——?)

——— Eastern Persia. Letter. (_The Athenæum_, No. 2559, 11th Nov. 1876.)

——— Review of _H. Howorth’s History of the Mongols_, Part I. (_The _Athenæum, No. 2560, 18th Nov. 1876, pp. 654–656.) Correspondence. (_Ibid._ No. 2561, 25th Nov. 1876.)

——— Review of _T. E. Gordon’s Roof of the World_. (_The Academy_, 15th July, 1876, pp. 49–50.)

1876 Cambodia. (_Encycl. Brit._ IV. 1876, pp. 723–726.)

1877 Champa. (_Geog. Mag._, 1st March, 1877, pp. 66–67.)

Article written for the _Encycl. Brit._ 9th edition, but omitted for reasons which the writer did not clearly understand.

——— _Quid, si Mundus evolvatur?_ (_Spectator_, 24th March, 1877.)

Written in 1875.—Signed MARCUS PAULUS VENETUS.

——— On Louis de Backer’s _L’Extrême-Orient au Moyen-Age_. (_The Athenæum_, No. 2598, 11th Aug. 1877, pp. 174–175.)

——— On P. Dabry de Thiersant’s _Catholicisme en Chine_. (_The Athenæum_, No. 2599, 18th Aug. 1877, pp. 209–210.)

——— Review of _Thomas de Quincey, His Life and Writings. By H. A. Page_. (_Times_, 27th Aug. 1877.)

——— Companions of Faust. Letter on the Claims of P. Castaldi. (_Times_, Sept. 1877.)

1878 The late Col. T. G. Montgomerie, R.E. (Bengal). (_R. E. Journal_, April, 1878.) 8vo, pp. 8.

——— Mr. Henry M. Stanley and the Royal Geographical Society; being the Record of a Protest. By Col. H. Yule and H. M. Hyndman B.A., F.R.G.S. London: Bickers and Son, 1878, 8vo, pp. 48.

——— Review of _Burma, Past and Present; with Personal Reminiscences of the Country_. By Lieut.-Gen. Albert Fytche. (_The Athenæum_, No. 2634, 20th April, 1878, pp. 499–500.)

——— Kayal. (_The Athenæum_, No. 2634, 20th April, 1878, p. 515.)

Letter dated April, 1878.

——— Missions in Southern India. (Letter to _Pall Mall Gazette_, 20th June, 1878.)

——— Mr. Stanley and his Letters of 1875. (Letter to _Pall Mall Gazette_, 30th Jan. 1878.)

——— Review of _Richthofen’s China_, Bd. I. (_The Academy_, 13th April, 1878, pp. 315–316.)

——— [A foreshadowing of the Phonograph.] (_The Athenæum_, No. 2636, 4th May, 1878.)

1879 A Memorial of the Life and Services of Maj.-Gen. W. W. H. Greathed, C.B., Royal Engineers (Bengal), (1826–1878). Compiled by a Friend and Brother Officer. London, printed for private circulation, 1879, 8vo, pp. 57.

——— Review of _Gaur: its Ruins and Inscriptions_. By John Henry Ravenshaw. (_The Athenæum_, No. 2672, 11th Jan. 1879, pp. 42–44.)

——— Wellington College. (Letter to _Pall Mall Gazette_, 14th April, 1879.)

——— Dr. Holub’s Travels. (_The Athenæum_, No. 2710, 4th Oct. 1879, pp. 436–437.)

——— Letter to Comm. Berchet, dated 2nd Dec. 1878. (_Archivio Veneto_ XVII. 1879, pp. 360–362.)

Regarding some documents discovered by the Ab. Cav. V. Zanetti.

——— Gaur. (_Encyclop. Brit._ X. 1879, pp. 112–116.)

——— Ghazni. (_Ibid._ pp. 559–562.)

——— Gilgit. (_Ibid._ pp. 596–599.)

——— Singular Coincidences. (_The Athenæum_, No. 2719, 6th Dec. 1879.)

1880 [Brief Obituary Notice of] General W. C. Macleod. (_Pall Mall Gazette_, 10th April, 1880.)

——— [Obituary Notice of] Gen. W. C. Macleod. (_Proc. R. Geog. Soc._, June, 1880.)

——— An Ode in Brown Pig. Suggested by reading Mr. Lang’s _Ballades in Blue China_. [Signed MARCUS PAULUS VENETUS.] (_St. James’ Gazette_, 17th July, 1880.)

——— Notes on Analogies of Manners between the Indo-Chinese Races and the Races of the Indian Archipelago. By Col. Yule (_Journ. Anthrop. Inst. of Great Britain and Ireland_, vol. ix., 1880, pp. 290–301.)

——— Sketches of Asia in the Thirteenth Century and of Marco Polo’s Travels, delivered at Royal Engineer Institute, 18th Nov. 1880.

[This Lecture, with slight modification, was also delivered on other occasions both before and after. Doubtful if ever fully reported.]

——— Dr. Holub’s Collections. (_The Athenæum_, No. 2724, 10th Jan. 1880.)

——— Prof. Max Müller’s Paper at the Royal Asiatic Society. (_The Athenæum_, No. 2731, 28th Feb. 1880, p. 285.)

——— The Temple of Buddha Gaya. (Review of _Dr. Rajendralála Mitra’s Buddha Gaya_.) (_Sat. Rev._, 27th March, 1870.)

——— Mr. Gladstone and Count Karolyi. (Letter to _The Examiner_, 22nd May, 1880, signed TRISTRAM SHANDY.)

——— Stupa of Barhut. [Review of Cunningham’s work.] (_Sat. Rev._, 5th June, 1880.)

——— From Africa: Southampton, Fifth October, 1880.

[Verses to Sir Bartle Frere.] (_Blackwood’s Edinburgh Magazine_, Nov. 1880.)

——— Review of _H. Howorth’s History of the Mongols_, Part II. (_The Athenæum_, No. 2762, 2nd Oct. 1880, pp. 425–427.)

——— _Verboten ist_, a Rhineland Rhapsody. (Printed for private circulation only.)

——— Hindú-Kúsh. (_Encyclop. Brit._ XI. 1880, pp. 837–839.)

——— The River of Golden Sand, the Narrative of a Journey through China and Eastern Tibet to Burmah, With Illustrations and ten Maps from Original Surveys. By Capt. W. Gill, Royal Engineers. With an Introductory Essay. By Col. H. Yule, London, John Murray, ... 1880, 2 vols. 8vo, pp. 95–420, 11–453.

——— The River of Golden Sand: Being the Narrative of a Journey through China and Eastern Tibet to Burmah. By the late Capt. W. Gill, R.E. Condensed by Edward Colborne Baber, Chinese Secretary to H.M.’s Legation at Peking. Edited, with a Memoir and Introductory Essay, by Col. H. Yule. With Portrait, Map, and Woodcuts. London, John Murray, 1883, 8vo., pp. 141–332.

——— Memoir of Captain W. Gill, R.E., and Introductory Essay as prefixed to the New Edition of the “River of Golden Sand.” By Col. H. Yule. London, John Murray, ... 1884, 8vo. [Paged 19–141.]

1881 [Notice on William Yule] in Persian Manuscripts in the British Museum. By Sir F. J. Goldsmid.

(_The Athenæum_, No. 2813, 24th Sept. 1881, pp. 401–403.)

——— Il Beato Odorico di Pordenone, ed i suoi Viaggi: Cenni dettati dal Col. Enrico Yule, quando s’inaugurava in Pordenone il Busto di Odorico il giorno, 23° Settembre, MDCCCLXXXI, 8vo. pp. 8.

——— Hwen T’sang. (_Encyclop. Brit._ XII. 1881, pp. 418–419.)

——— Ibn Batuta. (_Ibid._ pp. 607–609.)

——— Kâfiristân. (_Ibid._ XIII. 1881, pp. 820–823.)

——— Major James Rennell, F.R.S., of the Bengal Engineers. [Reprinted from the _Royal Engineers’ Journal_], 8vo., pp. 16.

(Dated 7th Dec. 1881.)

1881 Notice of Sir William E. Baker. (_St. James’ Gazette_, 27th Dec. 1881.)

——— Parallels [Matthew Arnold and de Barros]. (_The Athenæum_, No. 2790, 16th April, 1881, pp. 536.)

1882 Memoir of Gen. Sir William Erskine Baker, K.C.B., Royal Engineers (Bengal). Compiled by two old friends, brother officers and pupils. London. Printed for private circulation, 1882, 8vo., pp. 67.

By H. Y[ule] and R. M. [Gen. R. Maclagan].

——— Etymological Notes. (_The Athenæum_, No. 2837, 11th March, 1882; No. 2840, 1st April, 1882, p. 413.)

——— Lhása. (_Encyclop. Brit._ XIV. 1882, pp. 496–503.)

——— _Wadono_. (_The Athenæum_, No. 2846, 13th May, 1882, p. 602.)

——— Dr. John Brown. (_The Athenæum_, No. 2847, 20th May, 1882, pp. 635–636.)

——— A Manuscript of Marco Polo. (_The Athenæum_, No. 2851, 17th June, 1882, pp. 765–766.)

[About Baron Nordenskiöld’s Facsimile Edition.]

——— Review of _Ancient India as described by Ktesias the Knidian_, etc. By J. W. M’Crindle. (_The Athenæum_, No. 2860, 19th Aug. 1882, pp. 237–238.)

——— The Silver Coinage of Thibet. (Review of Terrien de Lacouperie’s Paper.) (_The Academy_, 19th Aug. 1882, pp 140–141.)

——— Review of _The Indian Balhara and the Arabian Intercourse with India_. By Edward Thomas. (_The Athenæum_, No. 2866, 30th Sept. 1882, pp. 428–429.)

——— The Expedition of Professor Palmer, Capt. Gill, and Lieut. Charrington. (Letter in _The Times_, 16th Oct. 1882.)

——— Obituary Notice of Dr. Arthur Burnell. (_Times_, 20th Oct. 1882.)

——— Capt. William Gill, R.E. [Notice of]. (_The Times_, 31st Oct. 1882.)

See _supra_, first col. of this page.

——— Notes on the Oldest Records of the Sea Route to China from Western Asia. By Col. Yule. _Proc. of the Royal Geographical Society, and Monthly Record of Geography_, Nov. No. 1882, 8vo.

_Proceedings_, N.S. IV. 1882, pp. 649–660. Read at the Geographical Section, Brit. Assoc., Southampton Meeting, augmented and revised by the author.

1883 Lord Lawrence. [Review of _Life of Lord Lawrence_. By R. Bosworth Smith.] (_Quarterly Review_, vol. 155, April, 1883, pp. 289–326.)

——— Review of _Across Chrysé_. By A. R. Colquhoun. (_The Athenæum_, No. 2900, 26th May, 1883, pp. 663–665.)

——— La Terra del Fuoco e Carlo Darwin. (Extract from Letter published by the _Fanfulla_, Rome 2nd June, 1883.)

——— How was the Trireme rowed? (_The Academy_, 6th Oct. 1883, p. 237.)

——— _Across Chrysé_. (_The Athenæum_, No. 2922, 27th Oct. 1883.)

——— Political Fellowship in the India Council. (Letter in _The Times_, 15th Dec. 1883.) [Heading was not Yule’s.]

——— Maldive Islands. (_Encyclop. Brit._ XV. 1883, pp. 327–332.)

——— Mandeville. (_Ibid._ pp. 473–475.)

1884 A Sketch of the Career of Gen. John Reid Becher, C.B., Royal Engineers (Bengal). By an old friend and brother officer. Printed for private circulation, 1884, 8vo, pp. 40.

——— Ruc Quills. (_The Academy_, No. 620, 22nd March, 1884, pp. 204–205.) Reprinted in present ed. of Marco Polo, vol. ii. p. 596.

——— Lord Canning. (Letter in _The Times_, 2nd April, 1884.)

——— Sir Bartle Frere [Letter respecting Memorial of]. (_St. James’ Gazette_, 27th July, 1884.)

——— Odoric. (_Encyclop. Brit._ XVIII. 1884, pp. 728–729.)

——— Ormus. (_Ibid._ pp. 856–858.)

1885 Memorials of Gen. Sir Edward Harris Greathed, K.C.B. Compiled by the late Lieut.-Gen. Alex. Cunningham Robertson, C.B. Printed for private circulation. (With a prefatory notice of the compiler.) London, Harrison & Sons, ... 1885, 8vo, pp. 95.

The Prefatory Notice of Gen. A. C. Robertson is by H. Yule, June, 1885, p. iii.–viii.

——— Anglo-Indianisms. (Letter in the _St. James’ Gazette_, 30th July, 1885.)

——— Obituary Notice of Col. Grant Allan, Madras Army. (_From the Army and Navy Gazette_, 22nd Aug. 1885.)

——— Shameless Advertisements. (Letter in _The Times_, 28th Oct. 1885.)

1886 Marco Polo. (_Encyclop. Brit._ XIX. 1885, pp. 404–409.)

——— Prester John. (_Ibid._ pp. 714–718.)

——— Brief Notice of Sir Edward Clive Bayley. Pages ix.–xiv. [Prefixed to _The History of India as told by its own Historians: Gujarat_. By the late Sir Edward Clive Bayley.] London, Allen, 1886, 8vo.

——— Sir George Udny Yule. In Memoriam (_St. James’ Gazette_, 18th Jan. 1886.)

——— Cacothanasia. [Political Verse, Signed Μηνιν ἈΕΙΔΕ.] (_St. James’ Gazette_, 1st Feb. 1886.)

——— William Kay, D.D. [Notice of]. (Letter to _The Guardian_, 3rd Feb. 1886.)

——— Col. George Thomson, C.B., R.E. (_Royal Engineers’ Journal_, 1886.)

——— Col. George Thomson, C.B. [Note]. (_St. James’ Gazette_, 16th Feb. 1886.)

——— Hidden Virtues [A Satire on W. E. Gladstone]. (Letter to the _St. James’ Gazette_, 21st March, 1886. Signed M. P. V.)

——— Burma, Past and Present. (_Quart. Rev._ vol. 162, Jan. and April, 1886, pp. 210–238.)

——— Errors of Facts, in two well-known Pictures.

(_The Athenæum_, No. 3059, 12th June, 1886, p. 788.)

——— [Obituary Notice of] Lieut.-Gen. Sir Arthur Phayre, C.B., K.C.S.I., G.C.M.G. (_Proc. R.G.S._, N.S. 1886, VIII. pp. 103–112.)

——— “Lines suggested by a Portrait in the Millais Exhibition.”

Privately printed and (though never published) widely circulated. These powerful verses on Gladstone are those several times referred to by Sir Mountstuart Grant Duff, in his published Diaries.

——— Introductory Remarks on _The Rock-Cut Caves and Statues of Bamian_. By Capt. the Hon. M. G. Talbot. (_Journ. R. As. Soc._ N.S. XVIII. 1886, pp. 323–329.)

——— Opening Address. (_Ibid._ pp. i.–v.)

——— Opening Address. (_Ibid._ xix. pp. i.–iii.)

——— Hobson-Jobsoniana. By H. Yule (_Asiatic Quarterly Review_, vol. i. 1886, pp. 119–140.)

——— HOBSON-JOBSON: Being a Glossary of Anglo-Indian Colloquial Words and Phrases, and of Kindred Terms; etymological, historical, geographical, and discursive. By Col. H. Yule, and the late Arthur Coke Burnell, Ph.D., C.I.E., author of “The Elements of South Indian Palaeography,” etc., London, John Murray, 1886. (All rights reserved), 8vo, p. xliii.–870. Preface, etc.

A new edition is in preparation under the editorship of Mr. William Crooke (1902).

1886 John Bunyan. (Letter in _St. James’ Gazette_, _circa_ 31st Dec. 1886. Signed M. P. V.)

——— Rennell. (_Encyclop. Brit._ XX. 1886, pp. 398–401.)

——— Rubruquis (_Ibid._ XXI. 1886, pp. 46–47.)

1887 Lieut.-Gen. W. A. Crommelen, C.B., R.E. (_Royal Engineers’ Journal_, 1887.)

——— [Obituary Notice] Col. Sir J. U. Bateman Champain. (_Times_, 2nd Feb. 1887).

——— “Pulping Public Records.” (_Notes and Queries_, 19th March, 1887.)

——— A Filial Remonstrance (Political Verses). Signed M. P. V. (_St. James’ Gazette_, 8th Aug. 1887.)

——— Memoir of Major-Gen. J. T. Boileau, R.E., F.R.S. By C. R. Low, I.N., F.R.G.S. With a Preface by Col. H. Yule, C.B., London, Allen, 1887.

——— The Diary of William Hedges, Esq. (afterwards Sir William Hedges), during his Agency in Bengal; as well as on his voyage out and return overland (1681–1687). Transcribed for the Press, with Introductory Notes, etc., by R. Barlow, Esq., and illustrated by copious extracts from unpublished records, etc., by Col. H. Yule. Pub. for Hakluyt Society. London, 1887–1889, 3 vols. 8vo.

1888 Concerning some little known Travellers in the East. (_Asiatic Quarterly Review_, V. 1888, pp. 312–335.)

No. I.—George Strachan.

——— Concerning some little known Travellers in the East. (_Asiatic Quarterly Review_, VI. 1888, pp. 382–398.)

No. II.—William, Earl of Denbigh; Sir Henry Skipwith; and others.

——— Notes on the St. James’s of the 6th Jan. [A Budget of Miscellaneous interesting criticism.] (Letter to _St. James’ Gazette_, 9th Jan. 1888.)

——— Deflections of the Nile. (Letter in _The Times_, 15th Oct. 1888.)

——— The History of the Pitt Diamond, being an excerpt from Documentary Contributions to a Biography of Thomas Pitt, prepared for issue [in Hedges’ Diary] by the Hakluyt Society. London, 1888, 8vo. pp. 23.

Fifty Copies printed for private circulation.

1889 The Remains of Pagan. By H. Yule. (_Trübner’s Record_, 3rd ser. vol. i. pt. i. 1889, p. 2.)

To introduce notes by Dr. E Forchammer.

——— A Coincident Idiom. By H. Yule. (_Trübner’s Record_, 3rd ser. vol. i. pt. iii. pp. 84–85.)

——— The Indian Congress [a Disclaimer]. (Letter to _The Times_, 1st Jan. 1889.)

——— Arrowsmith, the Friend of Thomas Poole. (Letter in _The Academy_, 9th Feb. 1889, p. 96.)

BIOGRAPHIES OF SIR HENRY YULE.

——— Colonel Sir Henry Yule, K.C.S.I., C.B., LL.D., R.E. By General Robert Maclagan, R.E. (_Proceed. Roy. Geog. Soc._ XII. 1890, pp. 108–113.)

——— Colonel Sir Henry Yule, K.C.S.I., C.B., LL.D., R.E., etc. (With a Portrait). By E. Delmar Morgan. (_Scottish Geographical Magazine_, VI. 1890, pp. 93–98.) Contains a very good Bibliography.

——— Col. Sir H. Yule, R.E., C.B., K.C.S.I., by Maj.-Gen. T. B. Collinson, R.E., _Royal Engineers’ Journal_, March, 1890. [This is the best of the Notices of Yule which appeared at the time of his death.]

——— Sir Henry Yule, K.C.S.I, C.B., LL.D., R.E., by E. H. Giglioli. Roma, 1890, ppt. 8vo, pp. 8.

Estratto dal _Bollettino della Società Geografica Italiana_, Marzo, 1890.

——— Sir Henry Yule. By J. S. C[otton]. (_The Academy_, 11th Jan. 1890, No. 923, pp. 26–27.)

——— Sir Henry Yule. (_The Athenæum_, No. 3245, 4th Jan. 1900, p. 17; No. 3246, 11th Jan. p. 53; No. 3247, 18th Jan. p. 88.)

——— _In Memoriam_. Sir Henry Yule. By D. M. (_The Academy_, 29th March, 1890, p. 222.)

See end of _Memoir_ in present work.

——— Le Colonel Sir Henry Yule. Par M. Henri Cordier. Extrait du _Journal Asiatique_. Paris, Imprimerie nationale, MDCCCXC, in–8, pp. 26.

——— The same, _Bulletin de la Société de Géographie_. Par M. Henri Cordier. 1890, 8vo, pp. 4.

Meeting 17th Jan. 1890.

1889 Baron F. von Richthofen. (_Verhandlungen der Gesellschaft für Erdkunde zu Berlin_, xvii. 2.)

——— Colonel Sir Henry Yule, R.E., C.B., K.C.S.I. Memoir by General R. Maclagan, _Journ. R. Asiatic Society_, 1890.

——— Memoir of Colonel Sir Henry Yule, R.E., C.B., K.C.S.I., LL.D., etc. By Coutts Trotter. (_Proceedings of the Royal Society of Edinburgh_, 1891. p. xliii. to p. lvi.)

1889 Sir Henry Yule (1820–1889). By Coutts Trotter. (_Dict. of National Biography_, lxiii. pp. 405–407.)

1903 Memoir of Colonel Sir Henry Yule, R.E., C.B., K.C.S.I., Corr. Inst. France, by his daughter, Amy Frances Yule, L.A. Soc. Ant. Scot., etc. Written for third edition of Yule’s Marco Polo. Reprinted for private circulation only.

---------------------------------------------------------------------- [1] This list is based on the excellent preliminary List compiled by E. Delmar Morgan, published in the _Scottish Geographical Magazine_, vol. vi., pp. 97–98, but the present compilers have much more than doubled the number of entries. It is, however, known to be still incomplete, and any one able to add to the list, will greatly oblige the compilers by sending additions to the Publisher.—A. F. Y.

SYNOPSIS OF CONTENTS.

MARCO POLO AND HIS BOOK.

INTRODUCTORY NOTICES.

PAGE I. OBSCURITIES IN THE HISTORY OF HIS LIFE AND BOOK. RAMUSIO’S STATEMENTS _1_

§ 1. Obscurities, etc. 2. Ramusio his earliest Biographer; his Account of Polo. 3. He vindicates Polo’s Geography. 4. Compares him with Columbus. 5. Recounts a Tradition of the Traveller’s Return to Venice. 6. Recounts Marco’s Capture by the Genoese. 7. His statements about Marco’s liberation and marriage. 8. His account of the Family Polo and its termination.

II. SKETCH OF THE STATE OF THE EAST AT THE TIME OF THE JOURNEYS OF THE POLO FAMILY _8_

§ 9. State of the Levant. 10. The various Mongol Sovereignties in Asia and Eastern Europe. 11. China. 12. India and Indo-China.

III. THE POLO FAMILY. PERSONAL HISTORY OF THE TRAVELLERS TILL THEIR FINAL RETURN FROM THE EAST _13_

§ 13. Alleged origin of the Polos. 14. Claims to Nobility. 15. The Elder Marco Polo. 16. Nicolo and Maffeo Polo commence their Travels. 17. Their intercourse with Kúblái Kaan. 18. Their return home, and Marco’s appearance on the scene. 19. Second Journey of the Polo Brothers, accompanied by Marco. (See App. L. 1.) 20. Marco’s Employment by Kúblái Kaan; and his Journeys. 21. Circumstances of the departure of the Polos from the Kaan’s Court. 22. They pass by Persia to Venice. Their relations there.

IV. DIGRESSION CONCERNING THE MANSION OF THE POLO FAMILY AT S. GIOVANNI GRISOSTOMO _26_

§ 23. Probable period of their establishment at S. Giovanni Grisostomo. 24. Relics of the Casa Polo in the Corte Sabbionera. 24_a_. Recent corroboration as to traditional site of the Casa Polo.

V. DIGRESSION CONCERNING THE WAR-GALLEYS OF THE MEDITERRANEAN STATES IN THE MIDDLE AGES _31_

§ 25. Arrangement of the Rowers in Mediæval Galleys; a separate Oar to every Man. 26. Change of System in 16th Century. 27. Some details of 13th-Century Galleys. 28. Fighting Arrangements. 29. Crew of a Galley and Staff of a Fleet. 30. Music and miscellaneous particulars.

VI. THE JEALOUSIES AND NAVAL WARS OF VENICE AND GENOA. LAMBA DORIA’S EXPEDITION TO THE ADRIATIC; BATTLE OF CURZOLA; AND IMPRISONMENT OF MARCO POLO BY THE GENOESE _41_

§ 31. Growing Jealousies and Outbreaks between the Republics. 32. Battle in Bay of Ayas in 1294. 33. Lamba Doria’s Expedition to the Adriatic. 34. The Fleets come in sight of each other at Curzola. 35. The Venetians defeated, and Marco Polo a Prisoner. 36. Marco Polo in Prison dictates his Book to Rusticiano of Pisa. Release of Venetian Prisoners. 37. Grounds on which the story of Marco Polo’s capture at Curzola rests.

VII. RUSTICIANO OR RUSTICHELLO OF PISA, MARCO POLO’S FELLOW-PRISONER AT GENOA, THE SCRIBE WHO WROTE DOWN THE TRAVELS _55_

§ 38. Rusticiano, perhaps a Prisoner from Meloria. 39. A Person known from other sources. 40. Character of his Romance Compilations. 41. Identity of the Romance Compiler with Polo’s Fellow-Prisoner. 42. Further particulars regarding Rusticiano.

VIII. NOTICES OF MARCO POLO’S HISTORY AFTER THE TERMINATION OF HIS IMPRISONMENT AT GENOA _64_

§ 43. Death of Marco’s Father before 1300. Will of his Brother Maffeo. 44. Documentary Notices of Polo at this time. The Sobriquet of _Milione_. 45. Polo’s relations with Thibault de Cepoy. 46. His Marriage, and his Daughters. Marco as a Merchant. 47. His Last Will; and Death. 48. Place of Sepulture. Professed Portraits of Polo. 49. Further History of the Polo Family. 49 _bis_. Reliques of Marco Polo.

IX. MARCO POLO’S BOOK; AND THE LANGUAGE IN WHICH IT WAS FIRST WRITTEN _80_

§ 50. General Statement of what the Book contains. 51. Language of the original Work. 52. Old French Text of the Société de Géographie. 53. Conclusive proof that the Old French Text is the source of all the others. 54. Greatly diffused employment of French in that age.

X. VARIOUS TYPES OF TEXT OF MARCO POLO’S BOOK _90_

§ 55. Four Principal Types of Text. _First_, that of the Geographic or Oldest French. 56. _Second_, the Remodelled French Text; followed by Pauthier. 57. The Bern MS. and two others form a sub-class of this type. 58. _Third_, Friar Pipino’s Latin. 59. The Latin of Grynæus, a Translation at Fifth Hand. 60. _Fourth_, Ramusio’s Italian. 61. Injudicious Tamperings in Ramusio. 62. Genuine Statements peculiar to Ramusio. 63. Hypothesis of the Sources of the Ramusian Version. 64. Summary in regard to Text of Polo. 65. Notice of a curious Irish Version.

XI. SOME ESTIMATE OF THE CHARACTER OF POLO AND HIS BOOK _104_

§ 66. Grounds of Polo’s Pre-eminence among Mediæval Travellers. 67. His true claims to glory. 68. His personal attributes seen but dimly. 69. Absence of scientific notions. 70. Map constructed on Polo’s data. 71. Singular omissions of Polo in regard to China; historical inaccuracies. 72. Was Polo’s Book materially affected by the Scribe Rusticiano? 73. Marco’s reading embraced the Alexandrian Romances. Examples. 74. Injustice long done to Polo. Singular Modern Example.

XII. CONTEMPORARY RECOGNITION OF POLO AND HIS BOOK _116_

§ 75. How far was there diffusion of his Book in his own day? 76. Contemporary References to Polo. T. de Cepoy; Pipino; Jacopo d’Acqui; Giov. Villani. 77. Pietro d’Abano; Jean le Long of Ypres. 78. Curious borrowings from Polo in the Romance of Bauduin de Sebourc. 78 _bis._ Chaucer and Marco Polo.

XIII. NATURE OF POLO’S INFLUENCE ON GEOGRAPHICAL KNOWLEDGE _129_

§ 79. Tardy operation, and causes thereof. 80. General characteristics of Mediæval Cosmography. 81. Roger Bacon as a Geographer. 82. Arab Geography. 83. Marino Sanudo the Elder. 84. The Catalan Map of 1375, the most complete mediæval embodiment of Polo’s Geography. 85. Fra Mauro’s Map. Confusions in Cartography of the 16th Century from the endeavour to combine new and old information. 86. Gradual disappearance of Polo’s nomenclature. 87. Alleged introduction of Block-printed Books into Europe by Marco Polo in connexion with the fiction of the invention of Printing by Castaldi of Feltre. 88. Frequent opportunities for such introduction in the Age following Polo’s.

XIV. EXPLANATIONS REGARDING THE BASIS ADOPTED FOR THE PRESENT TRANSLATION _141_

§ 89. Texts followed by Marsden and by Pauthier. 90. Eclectic Formation of the English Text of this Translation. 91. Mode of rendering Proper Names.

THE BOOK OF MARCO POLO.

PROLOGUE.

CHAP. PAGE PRELIMINARY ADDRESS OF RUSTICIANO OF PISA 1

I.—HOW THE TWO BROTHERS POLO SET FORTH FROM CONSTANTINOPLE TO TRAVERSE THE WORLD 2

NOTES.—1. _Chronology._ 2. “_The Great Sea._” _The Port of Soldaia._

II.—HOW THE TWO BROTHERS WENT ON BEYOND SOLDAIA 4

NOTES.—1. _Site and Ruins of Sarai._ 2. _City of Bolghar._ 3. _Alau Lord of the Levant (i.e. |Hulaku|)._ 4. _Ucaca on the Volga._ 5. _River Tigeri._

III.—HOW THE TWO BROTHERS, AFTER CROSSING A DESERT, CAME TO THE CITY OF BOCARA, AND FELL IN WITH CERTAIN ENVOYS THERE 9

NOTES.—1. “_Bocara a City of Persia._” 2. _The Great Kaan’s Envoys._

IV.—HOW THE TWO BROTHERS TOOK THE ENVOYS’ COUNSEL, AND WENT TO THE COURT OF THE GREAT KAAN 11

V.—HOW THE TWO BROTHERS ARRIVED AT THE COURT OF THE GREAT KAAN 11

VI.—HOW THE GREAT KAAN ASKED ALL ABOUT THE MANNERS OF THE CHRISTIANS, AND PARTICULARLY ABOUT THE POPE OF ROME 12

NOTE.—_Apostoille._ _The name |Tartar|._

VII.—HOW THE GREAT KAAN SENT THE TWO BROTHERS AS HIS ENVOYS TO THE POPE 13

NOTES.—1. _The Great Kaan’s Letter._ 2. _The Seven Arts._ 3. _Religious Indifference of the Mongol Princes._

VIII.—HOW THE GREAT KAAN GAVE THEM A TABLET OF GOLD, BEARING HIS ORDERS IN THEIR BEHALF 15

NOTES.—1. _The Tablet._ 2. _The Port of Ayas._

IX.—HOW THE TWO BROTHERS CAME TO THE CITY OF ACRE; AND THENCE TO VENICE 17

NOTES.—1. _Names of the deceased Pope and of the Legate._ 2. _Negropont._ 3. _Mark’s age._

X.—HOW THE TWO BROTHERS AGAIN DEPARTED FROM VENICE, ON THEIR WAY BACK TO THE GREAT KAAN, AND TOOK WITH THEM MARK, THE SON OF MESSER NICOLO 19

NOTE.—_Oil from the Holy Sepulchre._

XI.—HOW THE TWO BROTHERS SET OUT FROM ACRE, AND MARK ALONG WITH THEM 20

NOTE.—_Pope Gregory X. and his Election._

XII.—HOW THE TWO BROTHERS PRESENTED THEMSELVES BEFORE THE NEW POPE 22

NOTES.—1. _William of Tripoli._ 2. _Powers conceded to Missionary Friars._ 3. _Bundúḳdár and his Invasion of Armenia; his character._ 4. _The Templars in Cilician Armenia._

XIII.—HOW MESSER NICOLO AND MESSER MAFFEO POLO, ACCOMPANIED BY MARK, TRAVELLED TO THE COURT OF THE GREAT KAAN 25

NOTE.—_The City of Kemenfu, Summer Residence of Kúblái._

XIV.—HOW MESSER NICOLO AND MESSER MAFFEO POLO AND MARCO PRESENTED THEMSELVES BEFORE THE GREAT KAAN 26

NOTES.—1. _Verbal._ 2. “_Vostre Homme._”

XV.—HOW THE LORD SENT MARK ON AN EMBASSY OF HIS 27

NOTES.—1. _The four Characters learned by Marco, what?_ 2. _Ramusio’s addition._ 3. _Nature of Marco’s employment._

XVI.—HOW MARK RETURNED FROM THE MISSION WHEREON HE HAD BEEN SENT 30

XVII.—HOW MESSER NICOLO, MESSER MAFFEO, AND MESSER MARCO, ASKED LEAVE OF THE GREAT KAAN TO GO THEIR WAY 31

NOTES.—1. _Risks to Foreigners on a change of Sovereign._ 2. _The Lady Bolgana._ 3. _Passage from Ramusio._

XVIII.—HOW THE TWO BROTHERS AND MESSER MARCO TOOK LEAVE OF THE GREAT KAAN, AND RETURNED TO THEIR OWN COUNTRY 34

NOTES.—1. _Mongol Royal Messengers._ 2. _Mongol communication with the King of England._ 3. _Mediæval Ships of China._ 4. _Passage from China to Sumatra._ 5. _Mortality among the party._ 6. _The Lady Cocachin in Persian History._ 7. _Death of the Kaan._ 8. _The Princess of Manzi._

BOOK FIRST.

_Account of Regions Visited or heard of on the Journey from the Lesser Armenia to the Court of the Great Kaan at Chandu._

CHAP. PAGE I.—HERE THE BOOK BEGINS; AND FIRST IT SPEAKS OF THE LESSER HERMENIA 41

NOTES.—1. _Little Armenia._ 2. _Meaning of_ Chasteaux. 3. _Sickliness of Cilician Coast._ 4. _The phrase |“fra terre.”|_

II.—CONCERNING THE PROVINCE OF TURCOMANIA 43

NOTES.—1. _Brutality of the people._ 2. _Application of name |Turcomania|. Turcoman Hordes._

III.—DESCRIPTION OF THE GREATER HERMENIA 45

NOTES.—1. _Erzingan._ Buckrams, _what were they?_ 2. _Erzrum._ 3. _Baiburt._ 4. _Ararat._ 5. _Oil wells of Baku._

IV.—OF GEORGIANIA AND THE KINGS THEREOF 50

NOTES.—1. _Georgian Kings._ 2. _The Georgians._ 3. _The Iron Gates and Wall of Alexander._ 4. _Box forests._ 5. _Goshawks._ 6. _Fish Miracle._ 7. _Sea of Ghel or Ghelan._ _Names ending in |-án|._ 8. _Names of the Caspian, and navigation thereon._ 9. _Fish in the Caspian._

V.—OF THE KINGDOM OF MAUSUL 60

NOTES.—1. _Atabeks of Mosul._ 2. _Nestorian and Jacobite Christians._ 3. _Mosolins._ 4. _The Kurds._ 5. _Mush and Mardin._

VI.—OF THE GREAT CITY OF BAUDAS, AND HOW IT WAS TAKEN 63

NOTES.—1. _Baudas, or Baghdad._ 2. _Island of Kish._ 3. _Basra._ 4. _Baldachins and other silk textures; Animal patterns._ 5, 6. _Hulákú’s Expedition._ 7. _The Death of the Khalíf Mosta’sim._ 8. _Froissart._

VII.—HOW THE CALIF OF BAUDAS TOOK COUNSEL TO SLAY ALL THE CHRISTIANS IN HIS LAND 68

NOTES.—1. _Chronology._ 2. “_Ses |Regisles| et ses |Casses|._”

VIII.—HOW THE CHRISTIANS WERE IN GREAT DISMAY BECAUSE OF WHAT THE CALIF HAD SAID 70

NOTE.—_The word “|cralantur|.”_

IX.—HOW THE ONE-EYED COBLER WAS DESIRED TO PRAY FOR THE CHRISTIANS 71

X.—HOW THE PRAYER OF THE ONE-EYED COBLER CAUSED THE MOUNTAIN TO MOVE 72

NOTE.—_The Mountain Miracle._

XI.—OF THE NOBLE CITY OF TAURIS 74

NOTES.—1. _Tabriz._ 2. _Cremesor._ 3. _Traffic at Tabriz._ 4. _The_ Torizi. 5. _Character of City and People._

XII.—OF THE MONASTERY OF SAINT BARSAMO ON THE BORDERS OF TAURIS 77

NOTE.—_The Monastery of Barsauma._

XIII.—OF THE GREAT COUNTRY OF PERSIA; WITH SOME ACCOUNT OF THE THREE KINGS 78

NOTES.—1. _Kala’ Atishparastán._ 2. _The Three Kings._

XIV.—HOW THE THREE KINGS RETURNED TO THEIR OWN COUNTRY 79

NOTES.—1. _The three mystic Gifts._ 2. _The Worshipped Fire._ 3. _Sávah and Ávah. The Legend in Mas’udi. Embellishments of the Story of the Magi._

XV.—OF THE EIGHT KINGDOMS OF PERSIA, AND HOW THEY ARE NAMED 83

NOTES.—1. _The Eight Kingdoms._ 2. _Export of Horses, and Prices._ 3. _Persian Brigands._ 4. _Persian wine._

XVI.—CONCERNING THE GREAT CITY OF YASDI 88

NOTES.—1. _Yezd._ 2. _Yezd to Kerman. The Woods spoken of._

XVII.—CONCERNING THE KINGDOM OF KERMAN 90

NOTES.—1. _City and Province of Kerman._ 2. _Turquoises._ 3. _|Ondanique| or Indian Steel._ 4. _Manufactures of Kerman._ 5. _Falcons._

XVIII.—OF THE CITY OF CAMADI AND ITS RUINS; ALSO TOUCHING THE CARAUNA ROBBERS 97

NOTES.—1. _Products of the warmer plains._ 2. _Humped oxen and fat-tailed sheep._ 3. Scarani. 4. _The Karaunahs and Nigudarian Bands._ 5. _Canosalmi._

XIX.—OF THE DESCENT TO THE CITY OF HORMOS 107

NOTES.—1. _Site of Old Hormuz and Geography of the route from Kerman to Hormuz._ 2. _Dates and Fish Diet._ 3. _Stitched Vessels. “|One rudder|,” why noticed as peculiar._ 4. _Great heat at Hormuz._ 5. _The Simúm._ 6. _History of Hormuz, and Polo’s Ruomedan Acomat._ 7. _Second Route between Hormuz and Kerman._

XX.—OF THE WEARISOME AND DESERT ROAD THAT HAS NOW TO BE TRAVELLED 123

NOTES.—1. _Kerman to Kúbenán._ 2. _Desert of Lút._ 3. _Subterraneous Canals._

XXI.—CONCERNING THE CITY OF COBINAN AND THE THINGS THAT ARE MADE THERE 125

NOTES.—1. _Kuh-Banán._ 2. _Production of Tútíá._

XXII.—OF A CERTAIN DESERT THAT CONTINUES FOR EIGHT DAYS’ JOURNEY 127

NOTES.—1. _Deserts of Khorasan._ 2. _The |Arbre Sol| or |Arbre Sec|._

XXIII.—CONCERNING THE OLD MAN OF THE MOUNTAIN 139

NOTE.—_The Assassins, Hashíshîn, or Muláhidah._

XXIV.—HOW THE OLD MAN USED TO TRAIN HIS ASSASSINS 142

NOTES.—1. _The story widely spread. Notable murders by the Sectaries._ 2. _Their different branches._

XXV.—HOW THE OLD MAN CAME BY HIS END 145

NOTE.—_History of the apparent Destruction of the Sect by Hulákú; its survival to the present time. Castles of Alamut and Girdkuh._

XXVI.—CONCERNING THE CITY OF SAPURGAN 149

NOTE.—_Shibrgân, and the route followed. Dried Melons._

XXVII.—OF THE CITY OF BALC 151

NOTES.—1. _Balkh._ 2. _Country meant by |Dogana|._ 3. _Lions in the Oxus Valley._

XXVIII.—OF TAICAN, AND THE MOUNTAINS OF SALT. ALSO OF THE PROVINCE OF CASEM 153

NOTES.—1. _Talikan._ 2. _Mines of Rock-salt._ 3. _Ethnological characteristics._ 4. _Kishm._ 5. _Porcupines._ 6. _Cave dwellings._ 7. _Old and New Capitals of Badakhshan._

XXIX.—OF THE PROVINCE OF BADASHAN 157

NOTES.—1. _Dialects of Badakhshan. Alexandrian lineage of the Princes._ 2. _Badakhshan and the Balas Ruby._ 3. _Azure Mines._ 4. _Horses of Badakhshan._ 5. _Naked Barley._ 6. _Wild sheep._ 7. _Scenery of Badakhshan._ 8. _Repeated devastation of the Country from War._ 9. _Amplitude of feminine garments._

XXX.—OF THE PROVINCE OF PASHAI 164

NOTE.—_On the country intended by this name._

XXXI.—OF THE PROVINCE OF KESHIMUR 166

NOTES.—1. _Kashmir language._ 2. _Kashmir Conjurers._ (See App. L. 2.) 3. _Importance of Kashmir in History of Buddhism._ 4. _Character of the People._ 5. _Vicissitudes of Buddhism in Kashmir._ 6. _Buddhist practice as to slaughter of animals._ 7. _Coral._

XXXII.—OF THE GREAT RIVER OF BADASHAN; AND PLAIN OF PAMIER 170

NOTES.—1. _The Upper Oxus and Wakhan. The title_ Nono. (See App. L. 3.) 2. _The Plateau of Pamir._ (See App. L. 4 and 5.) _The Great Wild Sheep. Fire at great altitudes._ 3. _Bolor._

XXXIII.—OF THE KINGDOM OF CASCAR 180

NOTE.—_Kashgar._

XXXIV.—OF THE GREAT CITY OF SAMARCAN 183

NOTES.—1. _Christians in Samarkand._ 2. _Chagatai’s relation to Kúblái mis-stated._ 3. _The Miracle of the Stone._

XXXV.—OF THE PROVINCE OF YARCAN 187

NOTE.—_Yarkand. Goître prevalent there._

XXXVI.—OF A PROVINCE CALLED COTAN 188

NOTES.—1. _Government._ 2. “_Adoration of Mahommet._” 3. _Khotan._

XXXVII.—OF THE PROVINCE OF PEIN 191

NOTES.—1. _Position of Pein_ (App. L. 6.) 2. _The_ Yu _or Jade._ 3. _Temporary marriages._

XXXVIII.—OF THE PROVINCE OF CHARCHAN 194

NOTE.—_Position of Charchan and Lop._

XXXIX.—OF THE CITY OF LOP, AND THE GREAT DESERT 196

NOTES.—1. _Geographical discrepancy._ 2. _Superstitions as to Deserts: their wide diffusion. The Sound of Drums on certain sandy acclivities._ 3. _Sha-chau to Lob-nor._

XL.—CONCERNING THE GREAT PROVINCE OF TANGUT 203

NOTES.—1. _Tangut._ 2. _Buddhism encountered here._ 3. _Kalmak superstition, the “|Heaven’s Ram|.”_ 4. _Chinese customs described here._ 5. _Mongol disposal of the Dead._ 6. _Superstitious practice of avoiding to carry out the dead by the house-door; its wide diffusion._

XLI.—OF THE PROVINCE OF CAMUL 209

NOTES.—1. _Kamul._ 2. _Character of the people._ 3. _Shameless custom._ 4. _Parallel._

XLII.—OF THE PROVINCE OF CHINGINTALAS 212

NOTES.—1. _The Country intended._ 2. _Ondanique._ 3. _Asbestos Mountain._ 4. _The four elements._ 5 and 6. _The Story of the Salamander. Asbestos fabrics._

XLIII.—OF THE PROVINCE OF SUKCHUR 217

NOTES.—1. _Explanatory._ 2. _The City of Suhchau._ 3. _Rhubarb country._ 4. _Poisonous pasture._

XLIV.—OF THE CITY OF CAMPICHU 219

NOTES.—1. _The City of Kanchau._ 2. _Recumbent Buddhas._ 3. _Buddhist Days of Special Worship._ 4. _Matrimonial Customs._ 5. _Textual._

XLV.—OF THE CITY OF ETZINA 223

NOTES.—1. _Position of Yetsina._ 2. _Textual._ 3. _The Wild Ass of Mongolia._

XLVI.—OF THE CITY OF CARACORON 226

NOTES.—1. _Karakorum._ 2. _Tartar._ 3. _Chorcha._ 4. _Prester John._

XLVII.—OF CHINGHIS, AND HOW HE BECAME THE FIRST KAAN OF THE TARTARS 238

NOTES.—1. _Chronology._ 2. _Relations between Chinghiz and Aung Khan, the Prester John of Polo._

XLVIII.—HOW CHINGHIS MUSTERED HIS PEOPLE TO MARCH AGAINST PRESTER JOHN 240

XLIX.—HOW PRESTER JOHN MARCHED TO MEET CHINGHIS 241

NOTES.—1. _Plain of Tanduc._ 2. _Divination by Twigs and Arrows._

L.—THE BATTLE BETWEEN CHINGHIS KAAN AND PRESTER JOHN. DEATH OF CHINGHIS 244

NOTE.—_Real circumstances and date of the Death of Chinghiz._

LI.—OF THOSE WHO DID REIGN AFTER CHINGHIS KAAN, AND OF THE CUSTOMS OF THE TARTARS 245

NOTES.—1. _Origin of the |Cambuscan| of Chaucer._ 2. _Historical Errors._ 3. _The Place of Sepulture of Chinghiz._ 4. _Barbarous Funeral Superstition._

LII.—CONCERNING THE CUSTOMS OF THE TARTARS 251

NOTES.—1. _Tartar Huts._ 2. _Tartar Waggons._ 3. _Pharaoh’s Rat._ 4. _Chastity of the Women._ 5. _Polygamy and Marriage Customs._

LIII.—CONCERNING THE GOD OF THE TARTARS 256

NOTES.—1. _The old Tartar idols._ 2. _Kumiz._

LIV.—CONCERNING THE TARTAR CUSTOMS OF WAR 260

NOTES.—1. _Tartar Arms._ 2. _The Decimal Division of their Troops._ 3. _Textual._ 4. _Blood-drinking._ 5. _|Kurút|, or Tartar Curd._ 6. _The Mongol military rapidity and terrorism._ 7. _Corruption of their Nomade simplicity._

LV.—CONCERNING THE ADMINISTERING OF JUSTICE AMONG THE TARTARS 266

NOTES.—1. _The Cudgel._ 2. _Punishment of Theft._ 3. _Marriage of the Dead._ 4. _Textual._

LVI.—SUNDRY PARTICULARS ON THE PLAIN BEYOND CARACORON 269

NOTES.—1. _Textual._ 2. _Bargu, the Mecrit, the Reindeer, and Chase of Water-fowl._ 3. _The bird |Barguerlac|, the Syrrhaptes._ 4. _Gerfalcons._

LVII.—OF THE KINGDOM OF ERGUIUL, AND PROVINCE OF SINJU 274

NOTES.—1. _Erguiul._ 2. _Siningfu._ 3. _The Yak._ 4. _The Musk Deer._ 5. _Reeves’s Pheasant._

LVIII.—OF THE KINGDOM OF EGRIGAIA 281

NOTES.—1. _Egrigaia._ 2. _Calachan._ 3. _White Camels, and Camlets: Siclatoun._

LIX.—CONCERNING THE PROVINCE OF TENDUC, AND THE DESCENDANTS OF PRESTER JOHN 284

LX.—CONCERNING THE KAAN’S PALACE OF CHAGANNOR 296

NOTES.—1. _Palace._ 2. _The word |Sesnes|._ 3. _Chagan-nor._ 4. _The five species of Crane described by Polo._ 5. _The word |Cator|._

LXI.—OF THE CITY OF CHANDU, AND THE KAAN’S PALACE THERE 298

NOTES.—1. _Two Roads._ 2. _Chandu, properly Shangtu._ 3. _Leopards._ 4. _The Bamboo Palace. Uses of the Bamboo._ 5. _Kúblái’s Annual Migration to Shangtu._ 6. _The White Horses. The Oirad Tribe._ 7. _The Mare’s Milk Festival._ 8. _Weather Conjuring._ 9. _Ascription of Cannibalism to Tibetans, etc._ 10. _The term |Bacsi|._ 11. _Magical Feats ascribed to the Lamas._ 12. _Lamas._ 13. _Vast extent of Lama Convents._ 14. _Married Lamas._ 15. _Bran._ 16. _Patarins._ 17. _The Ascetics called |Sensin|._ 18. _Textual._ 19. _Tao-sze Idols._

BOOK SECOND.

PART I.

CHAP. PAGE I.—OF CUBLAY KAAN, THE GREAT KAAN NOW REIGNING, AND OF HIS GREAT PUISSANCE 331

NOTE.—_Eulogies of Kúblái._

II.—CONCERNING THE REVOLT OF NAYAN, WHO WAS UNCLE TO THE GREAT KAAN CUBLAY 332

NOTES.—1. _Chronology._ 2. _Kúblái’s Age._ 3. _His Wars._ 4. _Nayan and his true relationship to Kúblái._

III.—HOW THE GREAT KAAN MARCHED AGAINST NAYAN 335

NOTE.—_Addition from Ramusio._

IV.—OF THE BATTLE THAT THE GREAT KAAN FOUGHT WITH NAYAN 336

NOTES.—1. _The word |Bretesche|._ 2. _Explanatory._ 3. _The Nakkára._ 4. _Parallel Passages._ 5. _Verbal._ 6. _The Story of Nayan._ (See App. L. 7.)

V.—HOW THE GREAT KAAN CAUSED NAYAN TO BE PUT TO DEATH 343

NOTES.—1. _The Shedding of Royal blood avoided._ 2. _Chorcha, Kaoli, Barskul, Sikintinju._ 3. _Jews in China._

VI.—HOW THE GREAT KAAN WENT BACK TO THE CITY OF CAMBALUC 348

NOTE.—_Passage from Ramusio respecting the Kaan’s views of Religion. Remarks._

VII.—HOW THE KAAN REWARDED THE VALOUR OF HIS CAPTAINS 350

NOTES.—1. _Parallel from Sanang Setzen._ 2. _The Golden Honorary Tablets or_ Paizah _of the Mongols._ 3. _Umbrellas._ 4. _The Gerfalcon Tablets._

VIII.—CONCERNING THE PERSON OF THE GREAT KAAN 356

NOTES.—1. _Colour of his Eyes._ 2. _His Wives._ 3. _The Kungurat Tribe. Competitive Examination in Beauty._

IX.—CONCERNING THE GREAT KAAN’S SONS 359

NOTES.—1. _Kúblái’s intended Heir._ 2. _His other Sons._

X.—CONCERNING THE PALACE OF THE GREAT KAAN 362

NOTES.—1. _Palace Wall._ 2. _The word |Tarcasci|._ 3. _Towers._ 4. _Arsenals of the Palace._ 5. _The Gates._ 6. _Various Readings._ 7. _Barracks._ 8. _Wide diffusion of the kind of Palace here described._ 9. _Parallel description._ 10. _“Divine” Park._ 11. _Modern account of the Lake, etc._ 12. “Roze de l’açur.” 13. _The Green Mount._ 14. _Textual._ 15. _Bridge._

XI.—CONCERNING THE CITY OF CAMBALUC 374

NOTES.—1. _Chronology, etc., of Peking._ 2. _The City Wall._ 3. _Changes in the Extent of the City._ 4. _Its ground plan._ 5. _Aspect._ 6. _Public Towers._ 7. _Addition from Ramusio._

XII.—HOW THE GREAT KAAN MAINTAINS A GUARD OF TWELVE THOUSAND HORSE, WHICH ARE CALLED KESHICAN 379

NOTE.—_The term |Quescican|._

XIII.—THE FASHION OF THE GREAT KAAN’S TABLE AT HIS HIGH FEASTS 381

NOTES.—1. _Order of the Tables._ 2. _The word |Vernique|._ 3. _The Buffet of Liquors._ 4. _The superstition of the Threshold._ 5. _Chinese Etiquettes._ 6. _Jugglers at the Banquet._

XIV.—CONCERNING THE GREAT FEAST HELD BY THE GRAND KAAN EVERY YEAR ON HIS BIRTHDAY 386

NOTES.—1. _The Chinese Year._ 2. “_Beaten Gold._” 3. _Textual. Festal changes of costume._ 4. _Festivals._

XV.—OF THE GREAT FESTIVAL WHICH THE KAAN HOLDS ON NEW YEAR’S DAY 390

NOTES.—1. _The White Month._ 2. _Mystic value of the number 9._ 3. _Elephants at Peking._ 4. _Adoration of Tablets. K’o-tow._

XVI.—CONCERNING THE TWELVE THOUSAND BARONS WHO RECEIVE ROBES OF CLOTH OF GOLD FROM THE EMPEROR ON THE GREAT FESTIVALS, THIRTEEN CHANGES A-PIECE 394

NOTES.—1. _Textual._ 2. _The words |Camut| and |Borgal|._ 3. _Tame Lions._

XVII.—HOW THE GREAT KAAN ENJOINETH HIS PEOPLE TO SUPPLY HIM WITH GAME 396

NOTE.—_Parallel Passage._

XVIII.—OF THE LIONS AND LEOPARDS AND WOLVES THAT THE KAAN KEEPS FOR THE CHASE 397

NOTES.—1. _The Cheeta or Hunting Leopard._ 2. _Lynxes._ 3. _The Tiger, termed |Lion| by Polo._ 4. _The Búrgút Eagle._

XIX.—CONCERNING THE TWO BROTHERS WHO HAVE CHARGE OF THE KAAN’S HOUNDS 400

NOTE.—_The Masters of the Hounds, and their title._

XX.—HOW THE EMPEROR GOES ON A HUNTING EXPEDITION 402

NOTES.—1. _Direction of the Tour._ 2. _Hawking Establishments._ 3. _The word |Tosḳáúl|._ 4. _The word |Bularguchi|._ 5. _Kúblái’s Litter._ 6. _Kachar Modun._ 7. _The Kaan’s Great Tents._ 8. _The Sable and Ermine._ 9. _Pétis de la Croix._

XXI.—HOW THE GREAT KAAN, ON RETURNING FROM HIS HUNTING EXPEDITION, HOLDS A GREAT COURT AND ENTERTAINMENT 410

NOTE.—_This chapter peculiar to the 2nd Type of MSS._

XXII.—CONCERNING THE CITY OF CAMBALUC, AND ITS GREAT TRAFFIC AND POPULATION 412

NOTES.—1. _Suburbs of Peking._ 2. _The word |Fondaco|._

XXIII.—[CONCERNING THE OPPRESSIONS OF ACHMATH THE BAILO, AND THE PLOT THAT WAS FORMED AGAINST HIM] 415

NOTES.—1. _Chapter peculiar to Ramusio._ 2. _Kúblái’s Administration. The Rise of Ahmad._ 3. _The term |Bailo|._ 4. _The Conspiracy against Ahmad as related by Gaubil from the Chinese._ 5. _Marco’s presence and upright conduct commemorated in the Chinese Annals. The Kaan’s prejudice against Mahomedans._

XXIV.—HOW THE GREAT KAAN CAUSETH THE BARK OF TREES, MADE INTO SOMETHING LIKE PAPER, TO PASS FOR MONEY OVER ALL HIS COUNTRY 423

NOTE.—_Chinese Paper Currency._

XXV.—CONCERNING THE TWELVE BARONS WHO ARE SET OVER ALL THE AFFAIRS OF THE GREAT KAAN 430

NOTE.—_The Ministers of the Mongol Dynasty. The term |Sing|._

XXVI.—HOW THE KAAN’S POSTS AND RUNNERS ARE SPED THROUGH MANY LANDS AND PROVINCES 433

NOTES.—1. _Textual._ 2. _The word |Yam|._ 3. _Government Hostelries._ 4. _Digression from Ramusio._ 5. _Posts Extraordinary._ 6. _Discipline of the Posts._ 7. _Antiquity of Posts in China, etc._

XXVII.—HOW THE EMPEROR BESTOWS HELP ON HIS PEOPLE, WHEN THEY ARE AFFLICTED WITH DEARTH OR MURRAIN 439

NOTE.—_Kúblái’s remissions, and justice._

XXVIII.—HOW THE GREAT KAAN CAUSES TREES TO BE PLANTED BY THE HIGHWAYS 440

NOTE.—_Kúblái’s Avenues._

XXIX.—CONCERNING THE RICE-WINE DRUNK BY THE PEOPLE OF CATHAY 441

NOTE.—_Rice-wine._

XXX.—CONCERNING THE BLACK STONES THAT ARE DUG IN CATHAY, AND ARE BURNT FOR FUEL 442

NOTE.—_Distribution and Consumption of Coal in China._

XXXI.—HOW THE GREAT KAAN CAUSES STORES OF CORN TO BE MADE, TO HELP HIS PEOPLE WITHAL IN TIME OF DEARTH 443

NOTE.—_The Chinese Public Granaries._

XXXII.—OF THE CHARITY OF THE EMPEROR TO THE POOR 444

NOTE.—_Buddhist influence, and Chinese Charities._

XXXIII.—[CONCERNING THE ASTROLOGERS IN THE CITY OF CAMBALUC] 446

NOTES.—1. _The word |Tacuin|.—_The Chinese Almanacs. The Observatory._ 2. _The Chinese and Mongol Cycle._

XXXIV.—[CONCERNING THE RELIGION OF THE CATHAYANS; THEIR VIEWS AS TO THE SOUL; AND THEIR CUSTOMS] 456

NOTES.—1. _Textual._ 2. _Do._ 3. _Exceptions to the general charge of Irreligion brought against the Chinese._ 4. _Politeness._ 5. _Filial Piety._ 6. _Pocket Spitoons._

EXPLANATORY LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS TO VOLUME I.

INSERTED PLATES AND MAPS.

_To face page_ _Title_ PORTRAIT of Sir HENRY YULE. From the Painting by Mr. T. B. Wirgman, in the Royal Engineers’ Mess House at Chatham.

iv. Illuminated Title, with Medallion representing the POLOS ARRIVING AT VENICE after 26 years’ absence, and being refused admittance to the Family Mansion; as related by Ramusio, p. _4_ of Introductory Essay. Drawn by Signor QUINTO CENNI, No. 7 Via Solferino, Milan; from a Design by the Editor.

_1._ DOORWAY of the HOUSE of MARCO POLO in the Corte Sabbionera at Venice (see p. _27_). Woodcut from a drawing by Signor L. ROSSO, Venice.

_26._ _Corte del Milione_, Venice.

_28._ _Malibran Theatre_, Venice.

_30._ Entrance to the Corte del Milione, Venice. From photographs taken for the present editor, by Signor NAYA.

_42._ Figures from St. Sabba’s, sent to Venice. From a photograph of Signor NAYA.

_50._ Church of SAN MATTEO, at Genoa.

_62._ _Palazzo di S. Giorgio_, at Genoa.

_68._ _Miracle of S. Lorenzo_. From the Painting by V. CARPACCIO.

_70._ FACSIMILE of the WILL of MARCO POLO, preserved in St. Mark’s Library. Lithographed from a photograph specially taken by Bertani at Venice.

_74._ Pavement in front of S. Lorenzo.

_76._ Mosaic Portrait of Marco Polo, at Genoa.

_78._ The Pseudo Marco Polo at Canton.

_80._ Porcelain Incense-Burner, from the Louvre.

_82._ Temple of 500 Genii, at Canton, after a drawing by FÉLIX RÉGAMEY.

_108._ Probable view of MARCO POLO’S OWN GEOGRAPHY: a Map of the World, formed as far as possible from the Traveller’s own data. Drawn by the Editor.

_134._ Part of the _Catalan Map_ of 1375.

• • • • •

1. Marco Polo’s Itineraries, No. I. WESTERN ASIA. This includes also “Sketch showing the chief Monarchies of Asia, in the latter part of the 13th century.”

4. Map illustrating the geographical position of the CITY of SARAI.

4. Plan of part of the remains of the same city. Reduced from a Russian plan published by _M. Grigorieff_.

29 Reduced FACSIMILE of the BUDDHIST INSCRIPTION of the Mongol & 30. Era, on the Archway at KIU-YONG KWAN in the Pass of Nan-k’au, north-west of Peking, showing the characters in use under the Mongol Dynasty. Photogravure from the _Recueil des documents de l’Époque Mongole_, by H.H. Prince ROLAND BONAPARTE. _See an Article by_ Mr. Wylie _in the J. R. A. S. for 1870, p. 14._

41. Plan of AYAS, the Laias of Polo. _From an Admiralty Chart_.

41. Plan of position of DILÁWAR, the supposed site of the Dilavar of Polo. _Ext. from a Survey by Lt.-Col. D. G. Robinson, R.E._

114. Marco Polo’s Itineraries, No. II. Routes between KERMAN and HORMUZ.

178. Marco Polo’s Itineraries, No. III. Regions on and near the UPPER OXUS.

305. Heading, in the old Chinese seal-character, of an INSCRIPTION on a Memorial raised by Kúblái Kaan to a Buddhist Ecclesiastic, in the vicinity of his summer-palace at SHANGTU in Mongolia. Reduced from a facsimile obtained on the spot by _Dr. S. W. Bushell_, 1872, and by him lent to the Editor.

319. The CHO-KHANG. The grand Temple of Buddha at _Lhasa_, from _The Journey to Lhasa_, by SARAT CHANDRA DAS, by kind permission of the Royal Geographical Society.

352. “_Table d’Or de Commandement_;” the PAÏZA of the MONGOLS, from a specimen found in Siberia. _Reduced to one-half the scale of the original, from an engraving in a paper by_ I. J. Schmidt _in the_ Bulletin de la Classe Historico-Philologique de l’Acad. Imp. des Sciences, St.-Pétersbourg, tom. iv. No. 9.

355. Second Example of a Mongol Païza with superscription in the Uighúr character, found near the Dnieper River, 1845. From _Trans. of the Oriental Section, Imp. Soc. of Archæology_ of St. Petersburg, vol. v. The Inscription on this runs: “_By the strength of Eternal Heaven, and thanks to Its Great Power, the Man who obeys not the order of Abdullah shall be guilty, shall die._”

376. Plan of PEKING as it is, and as it was about A.D. 1290.

426. BANK-NOTE of the MING Dynasty, on one-half the scale of the original. Reduced from a genuine note in the possession of the British Museum. Was brought back from Peking after the siege of the Legations in 1900.

448. Mongol “Compendium Instrument.”

450. Mongol Armillary Sphere.

452. Observatory Terrace.

454. Observatory Instruments of the Jesuits. All these from photographs kindly lent to the present Editor by Count de Semallé.

_last Marco Polo’s Itineraries. No. IV. EASTERN ASIA. This includes page_ also Sketch Map of the Ruins of SHANGTU, after Dr. BUSHELL; and Enlarged Sketch of the Passage of the Hwang-ho or Karamoran on the road to Si-ngan fu (see vol. ii. pp. 25–27) from the data of _Baron von Richthofen_.

WOODCUTS PRINTED WITH THE TEXT.

INTRODUCTORY NOTICES.

_Page_ x. A MEDIÆVAL SHIP.

xxvi. COAT OF ARMS of Sir HENRY YULE.

_7._ ARMS of the POLO family, according to Priuli.

_8._ ARMS of the POLO family, according to Marco Barbaro. (See p. 7, note.)

_13._ Autograph of HETHUM or HAYTON I. King of (Cilician) Armenia; copied from _Codice Diplomatico del Sacro Militare Ordine Gerosolemitano_, I. 135. The signature is attached to a French document without date, granting the King’s Daughter “Damoiselle Femie” (Euphemia) in marriage to Sire Julian, son of the Lady of Sayete (Sidon). The words run: _Thagávor Haiwetz_ (“Rex Armenorum”), followed by the King’s cypher or monogram; but the initial letter is absent, probably worn off the original document.

_18._ The PIAZZETTA at VENICE in the 14th century. From a portion of the Frontispiece Miniature of the MS. of Marco Polo in the Bodleian. (Borrowed from the _National Miscellany_, published by J. H. Parker, Oxford, for 1853–55; and see _Street’s Brick and Marble_, etc., 1855, pp. 150–151.) [See vol. ii. p. 529.]

_29._ Three extracts from MAPS of VENICE, showing the site of the CA’ POLO at three different periods, (1) From the great woodcut Map or View of Venice, dated 1500, and commonly called Albert Dürer’s. (2) From a Plan by Cav. Ludovico Ughi, 1729. (3) From the Modern Official Plan of the City.

_34._ Diagram of arrangement of oars in galleys.

_35._ Extract from a fresco by SPINELLO ARETINI, in the Municipal Palace at SIENA, representing a GALLEY-FIGHT (perhaps imaginary) between the Venetians and the fleet of the Emperor Frederick Barbarossa, and illustrating the arrangements of mediæval galleys. Drawn from a very dim and imperfect photograph, after personal study of the original, by the Editor.

_37._ Extract from a picture by DOMENICO TINTORETTO in the Ducal Palace at Venice, representing the same GALLEY-FIGHT. After an engraving in the _Theatrum Venetum_.

_49._ MARCO POLO’S GALLEY going into action at CURZOLA. Drawn by Signor Q. CENNI, from a design by the Editor.

_50._ Map to illustrate the SEA-FIGHT at CURZOLA, where Marco Polo was taken prisoner.

_57._ SEAL of the PISAN PRISONERS in Genoa, after the battle of Meloria (1284). From _Manni, Osservazioni Storiche sopra Sigilli Antichi_, tom. xii. Engraved by T. ADENEY.

_75._ The Convent and CHURCH of S. LORENZO, the burial-place of Marco Polo, as it existed in the 15th century. From the Map of 1500 (see above). Engraved by the same.

_78._ Arms of the TREVISAN family, according to Priuli.

_120._ TAILED STAR near the Antarctic, as Marco Polo drew it for Pietro d’Abano. From the _Conciliator_ of Pietro d’Abano.

PROLOGUE.

_Page_ 3. Remains of the Castle of SOLDAIA or Sudák. After _Dubois de Montpereux, Voyage autour du Caucase_, Atlas, 3d s. Pl. 64.

7. Ruins of BOLGHAR. After _Demidoff, Voyage dans la Russie Méridionale_, Pl. 75.

15. The GREAT KAAN delivering a GOLDEN TABLET to the two elder Polos. From a miniature in the _Livre des Merveilles du Monde_ (Fr. 2810) in the Library at Paris, fol. 3 verso.

16. Castle of AYAS. After _Langlois, Voyage en Cilicie._

18. Plan of ACRE as it was when lost (A.D. 1291). Reduced and translated from the contemporary plan in the _Secreta Fidelium Crucis_ of Marino Sanudo the Elder, engraved in _Bongars, Gesta Dei per Francos_, vol. ii.

21. Portrait of Pope GREGORY X. After _J. B. de Cavaleriis Pontificum Romanorum Effigies_, etc. Romæ, 1580.

37. Ancient CHINESE WAR VESSEL. From the Chinese Encyclopædia called _San-Thsai-Thou-Hoei_, in the Paris Library.

BOOK FIRST.

_Page_ 42. Coin of King HETUM I. and Queen ISABEL of Cilician Armenia. From an original in the British Museum. Engraved by ADENEY.

48. Castle of BAIBURT. After _Texier, L’Arménie_, Pl. 3.

51. Mediæval GEORGIAN FORTRESS. From a drawing by Padre CRISTOFORO DI CASTELLI of the Theatine Mission, made in 1634, and now in the Communal Library at Palermo. The name of the place has been eaten away, and I have not yet been able to ascertain it.

55. View of DERBEND. After a cut from a drawing by M. Moynet in the _Tour du Monde_, vol. i.

61. Coin of BADRUDDÍN LOLO of Mosul (A.H. 620). After _Marsden’s Numismata Orientalia_, No. 164. By ADENEY.

76. GHÁZÁN Khan’s Mosque at TABRIZ. Borrowed from _Fergusson’s History of Architecture._

95. KASHMIR SCARF with animals, etc. After photograph from the scarf in the Indian Museum.

100. Humped Oxen from the Assyrian Sculptures at Kouyunjik. From _Rawlinson’s Ancient Monarchies._

102. Portrait of a Hazára. From a Photograph, kindly taken for the purpose, by M.-Gen. _C. P. Keyes_, C.B., Commanding the Panjáb Frontier Force.

116– Illustrations of the use of the DOUBLE RUDDER in the Middle 118. Ages. 7 figures, viz., No. 1, The Navicella of Giotto in the Porch of St. Peter’s. From _Eastlake’s H. of Painting_; Nos. 2 and 3, from _Pertz, Scriptores_, tom. xviii. after a Genoese Chronicle; No. 4, Sketch from fresco of Spinello Aretini at Siena; No. 5, Seal of Port of Winchelsea, from _Sussex Archæological Collections_, vol. i. 1848; No. 6, Sculpture on Leaning Tower at Pisa, after _Jal, Archéologie Navale_; No. 7, from the Monument of Peter Martyr, the persecutor of the Lombard _Patarini_, in the Church of St. Eustorgius at Milan, after _Le Tombe ed i Monumenti Illustri d’Italia_, Mil. 1822–23.

134. The _ARBRE SEC_, and _ARBRES DU SOLEIL ET DE LA LUNE_. From a miniature in the Prose Romance of Alexander, in the Brit. Museum MS. called the _Shrewsbury Book_ (Reg. xv. e. 6).

137. The CHINÁR or Oriental Plane, viz., that called the Tree of Godfrey of Boulogne at Buyukdéré, near Constantinople. Borrowed from _Le Monde Végétal_ of Figuier.

147. Portrait of H. H. AGHA KHÁN MEHELÁTI, late representative of the OLD MAN of the MOUNTAIN. From a photograph by Messrs. SHEPHERD and BOURNE.

159. Ancient SILVER PATERA of debased Greek Art, formerly in the possession of the Princes of BADAKHSHAN, now in the India Museum.

167. Ancient BUDDHIST Temple at Pandrethan in KÁSHMIR. Borrowed from _Fergusson’s History of Architecture_.

176. Horns of the _OVIS POLI_, or Great Sheep of Pamir. Drawn by the Editor from the specimen belonging to the Royal Asiatic Society.

177. Figure of the _OVIS POLI_ or Great Sheep of Pamir. From a drawing by Mr. Severtsof in a Russian publication.

180. Head of a native of KASHGAR. After Verchaguine. From the _Tour du Monde_.

181. View of KASHGAR. From _Mr. R. Shaw’s Tartary_.

184. View of SAMARKAND. From a Sketch by Mr. D. IVANOFF, engraved in a Russian Illustrated Paper (kindly sent by Mr. I. to the editor).

221. Colossal Figure; BUDDHA entering NIRVANA. Sketched by the Editor at Pagán in Burma.

222. Great LAMA MONASTERY, viz., that at Jehol. After _Staunton’s Narrative of Lord Macartney’s Embassy_.

224. The _Kyang_, or WILD ASS of Mongolia. After a plate by Wolf in the _Journal of the Royal Zoological Society_.

229. The Situation of Karákorum.

230. Entrance to the Erdeni Tso, Great Temple. From MARCEL MONNIER’S _Tour d’Asie_, by kind permission of M. PLON.

244. Death of Chinghiz Khan. From a Miniature in the _Livre des Merveilles_.

253. Dressing up a Tent, from MARCEL MONNIER’S _Tour d’Asie_, by kind permission of M. PLON.

255. Mediæval TARTAR HUTS and WAGGONS. Drawn by Sig. QUINTO CENNI, on a design compiled by the Editor from the descriptions of mediæval and later travellers.

258. Tartar IDOLS and KUMIS Churn. Drawn by the Editor after data in _Pallas_ and _Zaleski_ (_Vie des Steppes Kirghiz_).

273. The _SYRRHAPTES PALLASII; Bargherlac_ of Marco Polo. From a plate by Wolf in the _Ibis_ for April, 1860.

280. REEVES’S PHEASANT. After an engraving in _Wood’s Illustrated Natural History_.

293. The RAMPART of GOG and MAGOG. From a photograph of the Great Wall of China. Borrowed from _Dr. Rennie’s Peking and the Pekingese_.

307. A PAVILION at Yuen-Ming-Yuen, to illustrate the probable style of Kúblái Kaan’s Summer Palace. Borrowed from _Michie’s Siberian Overland Route_.

317. CHINESE CONJURING Extraordinary. Extracted from an engraving in _Edward Melton’s Zeldzaame Reizen_, etc. Amsterdam, 1702.

320. A MONASTERY of LAMAS. Borrowed from the _Tour du Monde_.

326. A TIBETAN BACSI. Sketched from the life by the Editor.

BOOK SECOND.—PART FIRST.

_Page_ 340. NAKKARAS. From a Chinese original in the _Lois des Empereurs Mandchous_ (_Thai-Thsing-Hoei-Tien-Thou_), in the Paris Library.

341. NAKKARAS. After one of the illustrations in Blochmann’s edition of the _Ain-i-Akbari_.

352. Seljukian Coin, with the LION and the SUN (A.H. 640). After _Marsden’s Numismata Orientalia_, No. 98. Engraved by ADENEY.

355. Sculptured GERFALCON from the Gate of Iconium. Copied from _Hammer’s Falknerklee_.

357. Portrait of the Great KAAN KÚBLÁI. From a Chinese engraving in the Encyclopædia called _San Thsai-Thou-Hoei_; in the Paris Library.

367. Ideal Plan of the Ancient Palaces of the Mongol Emperors at Khanbaligh, according to Dr. Bretschneider.

369. Palace at Khan-baligh. From the _Livre des Merveilles_.

369. The WINTER PALACE at PEKING. Borrowed from _Fergusson’s History of Architecture_.

371. View of the “GREEN MOUNT.” From a photograph kindly lent to the present Editor by Count de SEMALLÉ.

373. The _Yüan ch’eng_. From a photograph kindly lent to the present Editor by Count de SEMALLÉ.

376. South GATE of the “IMPERIAL CITY” at Peking. From an original sketch belonging to the late _Dr. W. Lockhart_.

399. The BÚRGÚT EAGLE. After _Atkinson’s Oriental and Western Siberia_.

409. The TENTS of the EMPEROR K’ien-lung. From a drawing in the _Staunton Collection_ in the British Museum.

413. Plain of CAMBALUC; the City in the distance; from the hills on the north-west. From a photograph. Borrowed from _Dr. Rennie’s Peking_.

458. The Great TEMPLE OF HEAVEN at Peking. From _Michie’s Siberian Overland Route_.

463. MARBLE ARCHWAY erected under the MONGOL DYNASTY at Kiu-Yong Kwan in the Nan-k’au Pass, N.W. of Peking. From a photograph in the possession of the present Editor.

[Illustration: Doorway of the House of Marco Polo in the Corte Sabbionera, at Venice.]

MARCO POLO AND HIS BOOK.

INTRODUCTORY NOTICES.

I. OBSCURITIES IN THE HISTORY OF HIS LIFE AND BOOK. RAMUSIO’S STATEMENTS.

[Sidenote: Obscurities of Polo’s Book, and personal History.]

1. With all the intrinsic interest of Marco Polo’s Book it may perhaps be doubted if it would have continued to exercise such fascination on many minds through successive generations were it not for the difficult questions which it suggests. It is a great book of puzzles, whilst our confidence in the man’s veracity is such that we feel certain every puzzle has a solution.

And such difficulties have not attached merely to the identification of places, the interpretation of outlandish terms, or the illustration of obscure customs; for strange entanglements have perplexed also the chief circumstances of the Traveller’s life and authorship. The time of the dictation of his Book and of the execution of his Last Will have been almost the only undisputed epochs in his biography. The year of his birth has been contested, and the date of his death has not been recorded; the critical occasion of his capture by the Genoese, to which we seem to owe the happy fact that he did not go down mute to the tomb of his fathers, has been made the subject of chronological difficulties; there are in the various texts of his story variations hard to account for; the very tongue in which it was written down has furnished a question, solved only in our own age, and in a most unexpected manner.

[Sidenote: Ramusio, his earliest biographer. His account of Polo.]

2. The first person who attempted to gather and string the facts of Marco Polo’s personal history was his countryman, the celebrated John Baptist Ramusio. His essay abounds in what we now know to be errors of detail, but, prepared as it was when traditions of the Traveller were still rife in Venice, a genuine thread runs through it which could never have been spun in later days, and its presentation seems to me an essential element in any full discourse upon the subject.

Ramusio’s preface to the Book of Marco Polo, which opens the second volume of his famous Collection of Voyages and Travels, and is addressed to his learned friend Jerome Fracastoro, after referring to some of the most noted geographers of antiquity, proceeds:[1]—

“Of all that I have named, Ptolemy, as the latest, possessed the greatest extent of knowledge. Thus, towards the North, his knowledge carries him beyond the Caspian, and he is aware of its being shut in all round like a lake,—a fact which was unknown in the days of Strabo and Pliny, though the Romans were already lords of the world. But though his knowledge extends so far, a tract of 15 degrees beyond that sea he can describe only as Terra Incognita; and towards the South he is fain to apply the same character to all beyond the Equinoxial. In these unknown regions, as regards the South, the first to make discoveries have been the Portuguese captains of our own age; but as regards the North and North-East the discoverer was the Magnifico Messer Marco Polo, an honoured nobleman of Venice, nearly 300 years since, as may be read more fully in his own Book. And in truth it makes one marvel to consider the immense extent of the journeys made, first by the Father and Uncle of the said Messer Marco, when they proceeded continually towards the East-North-East, all the way to the Court of the Great Can and the Emperor of the Tartars; and afterwards again by the three of them when, on their return homeward, they traversed the Eastern and Indian Seas. Nor is that all, for one marvels also how the aforesaid gentleman was able to give such an orderly description of all that he had seen; seeing that such an accomplishment was possessed by very few in his day, and he had had a large part of his nurture among those uncultivated Tartars, without any regular training in the art of composition. His Book indeed, owing to the endless errors and inaccuracies that had crept into it, had come for many years to be regarded as fabulous; and the opinion prevailed that the names of cities and provinces contained therein were all fictitious and imaginary, without any ground in fact, or were (I might rather say) mere dreams.

[Sidenote: Ramusio vindicates Polo’s Geography.]

3. “Howbeit, during the last hundred years, persons acquainted with Persia have begun to recognise the existence of Cathay. The voyages of the Portuguese also towards the North-East, beyond the Golden Chersonese, have brought to knowledge many cities and provinces of India, and many islands likewise, with those very names which our Author applies to them; and again, on reaching the Land of China, they have ascertained from the people of that region (as we are told by Sign. John de Barros, a Portuguese gentleman, in his Geography) that Canton, one of the chief cities of that kingdom, is in 30⅔° of latitude, with the coast running N.E. and S.W.; that after a distance of 275 leagues the said coast turns towards the N.W.; and that there are three provinces along the sea-board, Mangi, Zanton, and Quinzai, the last of which is the principal city and the King’s Residence, standing in 46° of latitude. And proceeding yet further the coast attains to 50°.[2] Seeing then how many particulars are in our day becoming known of that part of the world concerning which Messer Marco has written, I have deemed it reasonable to publish his book, with the aid of several copies written (as I judge) more than 200 years ago, in a perfectly accurate form, and one vastly more faithful than that in which it has been heretofore read. And thus the world shall not lose the fruit that may be gathered from so much diligence and industry expended upon so honourable a branch of knowledge.”

4. Ramusio, then, after a brief apologetic parallel of the marvels related by Polo with those related by the Ancients and by the modern discoverers in the West, such as Columbus and Cortes, proceeds:—

[Sidenote: Ramusio compares Polo with Columbus.]

“And often in my own mind, comparing the land explorations of these our Venetian gentlemen with the sea explorations of the aforesaid Signor Don Christopher, I have asked myself which of the two were really the more marvellous. And if patriotic prejudice delude me not, methinks good reason might be adduced for setting the land journey above the sea voyage. Consider only what a height of courage was needed to undertake and carry through so difficult an enterprise, over a route of such desperate length and hardship, whereon it was sometimes necessary to carry food for the supply of man and beast, not for days only but for months together. Columbus, on the other hand, going by sea, readily carried with him all necessary provision; and after a voyage of some 30 or 40 days was conveyed by the wind whither he desired to go, whilst the Venetians again took a whole year’s time to pass all those great deserts and mighty rivers. Indeed that the difficulty of travelling to Cathay was so much greater than that of reaching the New World, and the route so much longer and more perilous, may be gathered from the fact that, since those gentlemen twice made this journey, no one from Europe has dared to repeat it,[3] whereas in the very year following the discovery of the Western Indies many ships immediately retraced the voyage thither, and up to the present day continue to do so, habitually and in countless numbers. Indeed those regions are now so well known, and so thronged by commerce, that the traffic between Italy, Spain, and England is not greater.”

[Sidenote: Recounts a tradition of the travellers’ return to Venice.]

5. Ramusio goes on to explain the light regarding the first part or prologue of Marco Polo’s book that he had derived from a recent piece of luck which had made him partially acquainted with the geography of Abulfeda, and to make a running commentary on the whole of the preliminary narrative until the final return of the travellers to Venice:—

“And when they got thither the same fate befel them as befel Ulysses, who, when he returned, after his twenty years’ wanderings, to his native Ithaca, was recognized by nobody. Thus also those three gentlemen who had been so many years absent from their native city were recognized by none of their kinsfolk, who were under the firm belief that they had all been dead for many a year past, as indeed had been reported. Through the long duration and the hardships of their journeys, and through the many worries and anxieties that they had undergone, they were quite changed in aspect, and had got a certain indescribable smack of the Tartar both in air and accent, having indeed all but forgotten their Venetian tongue. Their clothes too were coarse and shabby, and of a Tartar cut. They proceeded on their arrival to their house in this city in the confine of St. John Chrysostom, where you may see it to this day. The house, which was in those days a very lofty and handsome palazzo, is now known by the name of the _Corte del Millioni_ for a reason that I will tell you presently. Going thither they found it occupied by some of their relatives, and they had the greatest difficulty in making the latter understand who they should be. For these good people, seeing them to be in countenance so unlike what they used to be, and in dress so shabby, flatly refused to believe that they were those very gentlemen of the Ca’ Polo whom they had been looking upon for ever so many years as among the dead.[4] So these three gentlemen,—this is a story I have often heard when I was a youngster from the illustrious Messer GASPARO MALPIERO, a gentleman of very great age, and a Senator of eminent virtue and integrity, whose house was on the Canal of Santa Marina, exactly at the corner over the mouth of the Rio di S. Giovanni Chrisostomo, and just midway among the buildings of the aforesaid Corte del Millioni, and he said he had heard the story from his own father and grandfather, and from other old men among the neighbours,—the three gentlemen, I say, devised a scheme by which they should at once bring about their recognition by their relatives, and secure the honourable notice of the whole city; and this was it:—

“They invited a number of their kindred to an entertainment, which they took care to have prepared with great state and splendour in that house of theirs; and when the hour arrived for sitting down to table they came forth of their chamber all three clothed in crimson satin, fashioned in long robes reaching to the ground such as people in those days wore within doors. And when water for the hands had been served, and the guests were set, they took off those robes and put on others of crimson damask, whilst the first suits were by their orders cut up and divided among the servants. Then after partaking of some of the dishes they went out again and came back in robes of crimson velvet, and when they had again taken their seats, the second suits were divided as before. When dinner was over they did the like with the robes of velvet, after they had put on dresses of the ordinary fashion worn by the rest of the company.[5] These proceedings caused much wonder and amazement among the guests. But when the cloth had been drawn, and all the servants had been ordered to retire from the dining hall, Messer Marco, as the youngest of the three, rose from table, and, going into another chamber, brought forth the three shabby dresses of coarse stuff which they had worn when they first arrived. Straightway they took sharp knives and began to rip up some of the seams and welts, and to take out of them jewels of the greatest value in vast quantities, such as rubies, sapphires, carbuncles, diamonds and emeralds, which had all been stitched up in those dresses in so artful a fashion that nobody could have suspected the fact. For when they took leave of the Great Can they had changed all the wealth that he had bestowed upon them into this mass of rubies, emeralds, and other jewels, being well aware of the impossibility of carrying with them so great an amount in gold over a journey of such extreme length and difficulty. Now this exhibition of such a huge treasure of jewels and precious stones, all tumbled out upon the table, threw the guests into fresh amazement, insomuch that they seemed quite bewildered and dumbfounded. And now they recognized that in spite of all former doubts these were in truth those honoured and worthy gentlemen of the Ca’ Polo that they claimed to be; and so all paid them the greatest honour and reverence. And when the story got wind in Venice, straightway the whole city, gentle and simple, flocked to the house to embrace them, and to make much of them, with every conceivable demonstration of affection and respect. On Messer Maffio, who was the eldest, they conferred the honours of an office that was of great dignity in those days; whilst the young men came daily to visit and converse with the ever polite and gracious Messer Marco, and to ask him questions about Cathay and the Great Can, all which he answered with such kindly courtesy that every man felt himself in a manner his debtor. And as it happened that in the story, which he was constantly called on to repeat, of the magnificence of the Great Can, he would speak of his revenues as amounting to ten or fifteen _millions_ of gold; and in like manner, when recounting other instances of great wealth in those parts, would always make use of the term _millions_, so they gave him the nickname of MESSER MARCO MILLIONI: a thing which I have noted also in the Public Books of this Republic where mention is made of him.[6] The Court of his House, too, at S. Giovanni Chrisostomo, has always from that time been popularly known as the Court of the Millioni.

[Sidenote: Recounts Marco’s capture by the Genoese.]

6. “Not many months after the arrival of the travellers at Venice, news came that LAMPA DORIA, Captain of the Genoese Fleet, had advanced with 70 galleys to the Island of Curzola, upon which orders were issued by the Prince of the Most Illustrious Signory for the arming of 90 galleys with all the expedition possible, and Messer Marco Polo for his valour was put in charge of one of these. So he with the others, under the command of the Most Illustrious MESSER ANDREA DANDOLO, Procurator of St. Mark’s, as Captain General, a very brave and worthy gentleman, set out in search of the Genoese Fleet. They fought on the September feast of Our Lady, and, as is the common hazard of war, our fleet was beaten, and Polo was made prisoner. For, having pressed on in the vanguard of the attack, and fighting with high and worthy courage in defence of his country and his kindred, he did not receive due support, and being wounded, he was taken, along with Dandolo, and immediately put in irons and sent to Genoa.

“When his rare qualities and marvellous travels became known there, the whole city gathered to see him and to speak with him, and he was no longer entreated as a prisoner but as a dear friend and honoured gentleman. Indeed they showed him such honour and affection that at all hours of the day he was visited by the noblest gentlemen of the city, and was continually receiving presents of every useful kind. Messer Marco finding himself in this position, and witnessing the general eagerness to hear all about Cathay and the Great Can, which indeed compelled him daily to repeat his story till he was weary, was advised to put the matter in writing. So having found means to get a letter written to his father here at Venice, in which he desired the latter to send the notes and memoranda which he had brought home with him, after the receipt of these, and assisted by a Genoese gentleman, who was a great friend of his, and who took great delight in learning about the various regions of the world, and used on that account to spend many hours daily in the prison with him, he wrote this present book (to please him) in the Latin tongue.

“To this day the Genoese for the most part write what they have to write in that language, for there is no possibility of expressing their natural dialect with the pen.[7] Thus then it came to pass that the Book was put forth at first by Messer Marco in Latin; but as many copies were taken, and as it was rendered into our vulgar tongue, all Italy became filled with it, so much was this story desired and run after.

[Sidenote: Ramusio’s account of Marco’s liberation and marriage.]

7. “The captivity of Messer Marco greatly disturbed the minds of Messer Maffio and his father Messer Nicolo. They had decided, whilst still on their travels, that Marco should marry as soon as they should get to Venice; but now they found themselves in this unlucky pass, with so much wealth and nobody to inherit it. Fearing that Marco’s imprisonment might endure for many years, or, worse still, that he might not live to quit it (for many assured them that numbers of Venetian prisoners had been kept in Genoa a score of years before obtaining liberty); seeing too no prospect of being able to ransom him,—a thing which they had attempted often and by various channels,—they took counsel together, and came to the conclusion that Messer Nicolo, who, old as he was, was still hale and vigorous, should take to himself a new wife. This he did; and at the end of four years he found himself the father of three sons, Stefano, Maffio, and Giovanni. Not many years after, Messer Marco aforesaid, through the great favour that he had acquired in the eyes of the first gentlemen of Genoa, and indeed of the whole city, was discharged from prison and set free. Returning home he found that his father had in the meantime had those three other sons. Instead of taking this amiss, wise and discreet man that he was, he agreed also to take a wife of his own. He did so accordingly, but he never had any son, only two girls, one called Moreta and the other Fantina.

“When at a later date his father died, like a good and dutiful son he caused to be erected for him a tomb of very honourable kind for those days, being a great sarcophagus cut from the solid stone, which to this day may be seen under the portico before the Church of S. Lorenzo in this city, on the right hand as you enter, with an inscription denoting it to be the tomb of Messer Nicolo Polo of the contrada of S. Gio. Chrisostomo. The arms of his family consist of a _Bend_ with three birds on it, and the colours, according to certain books of old histories in which you see all the coats of the gentlemen of this city emblazoned, are the field _azure_, the bend _argent_, and the three birds _sable_. These last are birds of that kind vulgarly termed _Pole_,[8] or, as the Latins call them, _Gracculi_.

[Sidenote: Ramusio’s account of the Family Polo and its termination.]

8. “As regards the after duration of this noble and worthy family, I find that Messer Andrea Polo of San Felice had three sons, the first of whom was Messer Marco, the second Maffio, the third Nicolo. The two last were those who went to Constantinople first, and afterwards to Cathay, as has been seen. Messer Marco the elder being dead, the wife of Messer Nicolo who had been left at home with child, gave birth to a son, to whom she gave the name of Marco in memory of the deceased, and this is the Author of our Book. Of the brothers who were born from his father’s second marriage, viz. Stephen, John, and Matthew, I do not find that any of them had children, except Matthew. He had five sons and one daughter called Maria; and she, after the death of her brothers without offspring, inherited in 1417 all the property of her father and her brothers. She was honourably married to Messer AZZO TREVISANO of the parish of Santo Stazio in this city, and from her sprung the fortunate and honoured stock of the Illustrious Messer DOMENICO TREVISANO, Procurator of St. Mark’s, and valorous Captain General of the Sea Forces of the Republic, whose virtue and singular good qualities are represented with augmentation in the person of the Most Illustrious Prince Ser MARC’ANTONIO TREVISANO, his son.[9]

“Such has been the history of this noble family of the Ca’ Polo, which lasted as we see till the year of our Redemption 1417, in which year died childless Marco Polo, the last of the five sons of Maffeo, and so it came to an end. Such be the chances and changes of human affairs!”

[Illustration: Arms of the Ca’ Polo.]

---------------------------------------------------------------------- [1] The Preface is dated Venice, 7th July, 1553. Fracastorius died in the same year, and Ramusio erected a statue of him at Padua. Ramusio himself died in July, 1557.

[2] The Geography of De Barros, from which this is quoted, has never been printed. I can find nothing corresponding to this passage in the Decades.

[3] A grievous error of Ramusio’s.

[4] See the decorated title-page of this volume for an attempt to realise the scene.

[5] At first sight this fantastic tradition seems to have little verisimilitude; but when we regard it in the light of genuine Mongol custom, such as is quoted from Rubruquis, at p. 389 of this volume, we shall be disposed to look on the whole story with respect.

[6] This curious statement is confirmed by a passage in the records of the Great Council, which, on a late visit to Venice, I was enabled to extract, through an obliging communication from Professor Minotto. (See below, p. _67_.)

[7] This rather preposterous skit at the Genoese dialect naturally excites a remonstrance from the Abate Spotorno. (_Storia Letteraria della Liguria_, II. 217.)

[8] _Jackdaws_, I believe, in spite of some doubt from the imbecility of ordinary dictionaries in such matters.

They are under this name made the object of a similitude by Dante (surely a most unhappy one) in reference to the resplendent spirits flitting on the celestial stairs in the sphere of Saturn:—

“E come per lo natural costume _Le Pole_ insieme, al cominciar del giorno, Si muovono a scaldar le fredde piume: Poi altre vanno vià senza ritorno, Altre rivolgon sè, onde son mosse, Ed altre roteando fan soggiorno.”—_Parad._ XXI. 34.

There is some difference among authorities as to the details of the Polo blazon. According to a MS. concerning the genealogies of Venetian families written by Marco Barbaro in 1566, and of which there is a copy in the Museo Civico, the field is _gules_, the bend _or_. And this I have followed in the cut. But a note by S. Stefani of Venice, with which I have been favoured since the cut was made, informs me that a fine 15th-century MS. in his possession gives the field as _argent_, with no _bend_, and the three birds _sable_ with beaks _gules_, disposed thus ∵.

[Illustration: Arms of the Polo[A]]

[A] [This coat of arms is reproduced from the Genealogies of Priuli, Archivio di Stato, Venice.—H. C.]

[9] Marco Antonio Trevisano was elected Doge, 4th June, 1553, but died on the 31st of May following. We do not here notice Ramusio’s numerous errors, which will be corrected in the sequel. [See p. 78.]

II. SKETCH OF THE STATE OF THE EAST AT THE TIME OF THE JOURNEYS OF THE POLO FAMILY.

9. The story of the travels of the Polo family opens in 1260.

[Sidenote: State of the Levant.]

Christendom had recovered from the alarm into which it had been thrown some 18 years before when the Tartar cataclysm had threatened to engulph it. The Tartars themselves were already becoming an object of curiosity rather than of fear, and soon became an object of hope, as a possible help against the old Mahomedan foe. The frail Latin throne in Constantinople was still standing, but tottering to its fall. The successors of the Crusaders still held the Coast of Syria from Antioch to Jaffa, though a deadlier brood of enemies than they had yet encountered was now coming to maturity in the Dynasty of the Mamelukes, which had one foot firmly planted in Cairo, the other in Damascus. The jealousies of the commercial republics of Italy were daily waxing greater. The position of Genoese trade on the coasts of the Aegean was greatly depressed, through the predominance which Venice had acquired there by her part in the expulsion of the Greek Emperors, and which won for the Doge the lofty style of Lord of Three-Eighths of the Empire of Romania. But Genoa was biding her time for an early revenge, and year by year her naval strength and skill were increasing. Both these republics held possessions and establishments in the ports of Syria, which were often the scene of sanguinary conflicts between their citizens. Alexandria was still largely frequented in the intervals of war as the great emporium of Indian wares, but the facilities afforded by the Mongol conquerors who now held the whole tract from the Persian Gulf to the shores of the Caspian and of the Black Sea, or nearly so, were beginning to give a great advantage to the caravan routes which debouched at the ports of Cilician Armenia in the Mediterranean and at Trebizond on the Euxine. Tana (or Azov) had not as yet become the outlet of a similar traffic; the Venetians had apparently frequented to some extent the coast of the Crimea for local trade, but their rivals appear to have been in great measure excluded from this commerce, and the Genoese establishments which so long flourished on that coast, are first heard of some years after a Greek dynasty was again in possession of Constantinople.[1]

[Sidenote: The various Mongol Sovereignties in Asia and Eastern Europe.]

10. In Asia and Eastern Europe scarcely a dog might bark without Mongol leave, from the borders of Poland and the Gulf of Scanderoon to the Amur and the Yellow Sea. The vast empire which Chinghiz had conquered still owned a nominally supreme head in the Great Kaan,[2] but practically it was splitting up into several great monarchies under the descendants of the four sons of Chinghiz, Juji, Chaghatai, Okkodai, and Tuli; and wars on a vast scale were already brewing between them. Hulaku, third son of Tuli, and brother of two Great Kaans, Mangku and Kúblái, had become practically independent as ruler of Persia, Babylonia, Mesopotamia, and Armenia, though he and his sons, and his sons’ sons, continued to stamp the name of the Great Kaan upon their coins, and to use the Chinese seals of state which he bestowed upon them. The Seljukian Sultans of Iconium, whose dominion bore the proud title of Rúm (Rome), were now but the struggling bondsmen of the Ilkhans. The Armenian Hayton in his Cilician Kingdom had pledged a more frank allegiance to the Tartar, the enemy of his Moslem enemies.

Barka, son of Juji, the first ruling prince of the House of Chinghiz to turn Mahomedan, reigned on the steppes of the Volga, where a standing camp, which eventually became a great city under the name of Sarai, had been established by his brother and predecessor Batu.

The House of Chaghatai had settled upon the pastures of the Ili and the valley of the Jaxartes, and ruled the wealthy cities of Sogdiana.

Kaidu, the grandson of Okkodai who had been the successor of Chinghiz in the Kaanship, refused to acknowledge the transfer of the supreme authority to the House of Tuli, and was through the long life of Kúblái a thorn in his side, perpetually keeping his north-western frontier in alarm. His immediate authority was exercised over some part of what we should now call Eastern Turkestan and Southern Central Siberia; whilst his hordes of horsemen, force of character, and close neighbourhood brought the Khans of Chaghatai under his influence, and they generally acted in concert with him.

The chief throne of the Mongol Empire had just been ascended by Kúblái, the most able of its occupants after the Founder. Before the death of his brother and predecessor Mangku, who died in 1259 before an obscure fortress of Western China, it had been intended to remove the seat of government from Kara Korum on the northern verge of the Mongolian Desert to the more populous regions that had been conquered in the further East, and this step, which in the end converted the Mongol Kaan into a Chinese Emperor,[3] was carried out by Kúblái.

[Sidenote: China.]

11. For about three centuries the Northern provinces of China had been detached from native rule, and subject to foreign dynasties; first to the _Khitan_, a people from the basin of the Sungari River, and supposed (but doubtfully) to have been akin to the Tunguses, whose rule subsisted for 200 years, and originated the name of KHITAI, Khata, or CATHAY, by which for nearly 1000 years China has been known to the nations of Inner Asia, and to those whose acquaintance with it was got by that channel.[4] The Khitan, whose dynasty is known in Chinese history as the _Liao_ or “Iron,” had been displaced in 1123 by the Chúrchés or Niu-chen, another race of Eastern Tartary, of the same blood as the modern Manchus, whose Emperors in their brief period of prosperity were known by the Chinese name of Tai-_Kin_, by the Mongol name of the _Altun_ Kaans, both signifying “Golden.” Already in the lifetime of Chinghiz himself the northern Provinces of China Proper, including their capital, known as Chung-tu or Yen-King, now Peking, had been wrenched from them, and the conquest of the dynasty was completed by Chinghiz’s successor Okkodai in 1234.

Southern China still remained in the hands of the native dynasty of the Sung, who had their capital at the great city now well known as Hang-chau fu. Their dominion was still substantially untouched, but its subjugation was a task to which Kúblái before many years turned his attention, and which became the most prominent event of his reign.

[Sidenote: India, and Indo-China.]

12. In India the most powerful sovereign was the Sultan of Delhi, Nassir-uddin Mahmud of the Turki House of Iltitmish;[5] but, though both Sind and Bengal acknowledged his supremacy, no part of Peninsular India had yet been invaded, and throughout the long period of our Traveller’s residence in the East the Kings of Delhi had their hands too full, owing to the incessant incursions of the Mongols across the Indus, to venture on extensive campaigning in the south. Hence the Dravidian Kingdoms of Southern India were as yet untouched by foreign conquest, and the accumulated gold of ages lay in their temples and treasuries, an easy prey for the coming invader.

In the Indo-Chinese Peninsula and the Eastern Islands a variety of kingdoms and dynasties were expanding and contracting, of which we have at best but dim and shifting glimpses. That they were advanced in wealth and art, far beyond what the present state of those regions would suggest, is attested by vast and magnificent remains of Architecture, nearly all dating, so far as dates can be ascertained, from the 12th to the 14th centuries (that epoch during which an architectural afflatus seems to have descended on the human race), and which are found at intervals over both the Indo-Chinese continent and the Islands, as at Pagán in Burma, at Ayuthia in Siam, at Angkor in Kamboja, at Borobodor and Brambánan in Java. All these remains are deeply marked by Hindu influence, and, at the same time, by strong peculiarities, both generic and individual.

[Illustration: Autograph of Hayton, King of Armenia, _circa_ A.D. 1243.

“... =e por so qui cestes lettres soient fermes e establis ci avuns escrit l’escrit de notre main vermoil e sayelé de notre ceau pendant=....”]

---------------------------------------------------------------------- [1] See Heyd, _Le Colonie Commerciali degli Italiani_, etc., passim.

[2] We endeavour to preserve throughout the book the distinction that was made in the age of the Mongol Empire between _Khán_ and _Ḳaán_ (خان and قآان, as written by Arabic and Persian authors). The former may be rendered _Lord_, and was applied generally to Tartar chiefs whether sovereign or not; it has since become in Persia, and especially in Afghanistan, a sort of “Esq.,” and in India is now a common affix in the names of (Musulman) Hindustanis of all classes; in Turkey alone it has been reserved for the Sultan. _Ḳaán_, again, appears to be a form of _Kháḳán_, the Χαγάνος of the Byzantine historians, and was the peculiar title of the supreme sovereign of the Mongols; the Mongol princes of Persia, Chaghatai, etc., were entitled only to the former affix (Khán), though _Ḳaán_ and _Ḳhaḳán_ are sometimes applied to them in adulation. Polo always writes _Kaan_ as applied to the Great Khan, and does not, I think, use _Khan_ in any form, styling the subordinate princes by their name only, as _Argon_, _Alau_, etc. _Ilkhan_ was a special title assumed by Huláku and his successors in Persia; it is said to be compounded from a word _Il_, signifying tribe or nation. The relation between _Khán_ and _Khaḳán_ seems to be probably that the latter signifies “_Khán of Kháns_,” Lord of Lords. Chinghiz, it is said, did not take the higher title; it was first assumed by his son Okkodai. But there are doubts about this. (See _Quatremère’s Rashid_, pp. 10 _seqq._ and _Pavet de Courteille, Dict. Turk-Oriental._) The tendency of swelling titles is always to degenerate, and when the value of Khan had sunk, a new form, _Khán-khánán_, was devised at the Court of Delhi, and applied to one of the high officers of state.

[Mr. Rockhill writes (_Rubruck_, p. 108, note): “The title _Khan_, though of very great antiquity, was only used by the Turks after A.D. 560, at which time the use of the word _Khatun_ came in use for the wives of the Khan, who himself was termed _Ilkhan_. The older title of _Shan-yü_ did not, however, completely disappear among them, for Albiruni says that in his time the chief of the Ghuz Turks, or Turkomans, still bore the title of _Jenuyeh_, which Sir Henry Rawlinson (_Proc. R. G. S._, v. 15) takes to be the same word as that transcribed _Shan-yü_ by the Chinese (see _Ch’ien Han shu_, Bk. 94, and _Chou shu_, Bk. 50, 2). Although the word _Khakhan_ occurs in Menander’s account of the embassy of Zemarchus, the earliest mention I have found of it in a Western writer is in the _Chronicon_ of Albericus Trium Fontium, where (571), under the year 1239, he uses it in the form _Cacanus_”—Cf. _Terrien de Lacouperie, Khan, Khakan, and other Tartar Titles_. Lond., Dec. 1888.—H. C.]

[3] “China is a sea that salts all the rivers that flow into it.”—_P. Parrenin_ in _Lett. Édif._ XXIV. 58.

[4] _E.g._ the Russians still call it Khitai. The pair of names, _Khitai_ and _Machin_, or Cathay and China, is analogous to the other pair, _Seres_ and _Sinae_. _Seres_ was the name of the great nation in the far East as known by land, _Sinae_ as known by sea; and they were often supposed to be diverse, just as Cathay and China were afterwards.

[5] There has been much doubt about the true form of this name. _Iltitmish_ is that sanctioned by Mr. Blochmann (see _Proc. As. Soc. Bengal_, 1870, p. 181).

III. THE POLO FAMILY. PERSONAL HISTORY OF THE TRAVELLERS DOWN TO THEIR FINAL RETURN FROM THE EAST.

[Sidenote: Alleged origin of the Polos.]

13. In days when History and Genealogy were allowed to draw largely on the imagination for the _origines_ of states and families, it was set down by one Venetian Antiquary that among the companions of King Venetus, or of Prince Antenor of Troy, when they settled on the northern shores of the Adriatic, there was one LUCIUS POLUS, who became the progenitor of our Traveller’s Family;[1] whilst another deduces it from PAOLO the first Doge[2] (Paulus Lucas Anafestus of Heraclea, A.D. 696).

More trustworthy traditions, recorded among the Family Histories of Venice, but still no more it is believed than traditions, represent the Family of Polo as having come from Sebenico in Dalmatia, in the 11th century.[3] Before the end of the century they had taken seats in the Great Council of the Republic; for the name of Domenico Polo is said to be subscribed to a grant of 1094, that of Pietro Polo to an act of the time of the Doge Domenico Michiele in 1122, and that of a Domenico Polo to an acquittance granted by the Doge Domenico Morosini and his Council in 1153.[4]

The ascertained genealogy of the Traveller, however, begins only with his grandfather, who lived in the early part of the 13th century.

Two branches of the Polo Family were then recognized, distinguished by the _confini_ or Parishes in which they lived, as Polo of S. Geremia, and Polo of S. Felice. ANDREA POLO of S. Felice was the father of three sons, MARCO, NICOLO, and MAFFEO. And Nicolo was the Father of our Marco.

[Sidenote: Claims to be styled noble.]

14. Till quite recently it had never been precisely ascertained whether the immediate family of our Traveller belonged to the _Nobles_ of Venice properly so called, who had seats in the Great Council and were enrolled in the Libro d’Oro. Ramusio indeed styles our Marco _Nobile_ and _Magnifico_, and Rusticiano, the actual scribe of the Traveller’s recollections, calls him “_sajes et noble citaiens de Venece_,” but Ramusio’s accuracy and Rusticiano’s precision were scarcely to be depended on. Very recently, however, since the subject has been discussed with accomplished students of the Venice Archives, proofs have been found establishing Marco’s personal claim to nobility, inasmuch as both in judicial decisions and in official resolutions of the Great Council, he is designated _Nobilis Vir_, a formula which would never have been used in such documents (I am assured) had he not been technically noble.[5]

[Sidenote: Marco the Elder.]

15. Of the three sons of Andrea Polo of S. Felice, Marco seems to have been the eldest, and Maffeo the youngest.[6] They were all engaged in commerce, and apparently in a partnership, which to some extent held good even when the two younger had been many years absent in the Far East.[7] Marco seems to have been established for a time at Constantinople,[8] and also to have had a house (no doubt of business) at Soldaia, in the Crimea, where his son and daughter, Nicolo and Maroca by name, were living in 1280. This year is the date of the Elder Marco’s Will, executed at Venice, and when he was “weighed down by bodily ailment.” Whether he survived for any length of time we do not know.

[Sidenote: Nicolo and Maffeo commence their travels.]

16. Nicolo Polo, the second of the Brothers, had two legitimate sons, MARCO, the Author of our Book, born in 1254,[9] and MAFFEO, of whose place in the family we shall have a few words to say presently. The story opens, as we have said, in 1260, when we find the two brothers, Nicolo and Maffeo the Elder, at Constantinople. How long they had been absent from Venice we are not distinctly told. Nicolo had left his wife there behind him; Maffeo apparently was a bachelor. In the year named they started on a trading venture to the Crimea, whence a succession of openings and chances, recounted in the Introductory chapters of Marco’s work, carried them far north along the Volga, and thence first to Bokhara, and then to the Court of the Great Kaan Kúblái in the Far East, on or within the borders of CATHAY. That a great and civilized country so called existed in the extremity of Asia had already been reported in Europe by the Friars Plano Carpini (1246) and William Rubruquis (1253), who had not indeed reached its frontiers, but had met with its people at the Court of the Great Kaan in Mongolia; whilst the latter of the two with characteristic acumen had seen that they were identical with the Seres of classic fame.

[Sidenote: Their intercourse with Kúblái Kaan.]

17. Kúblái had never before fallen in with European gentlemen. He was delighted with these Venetians, listened with strong interest to all that they had to tell him of the Latin world, and determined to send them back as his ambassadors to the Pope, accompanied by an officer of his own Court. His letters to the Pope, as the Polos represent them, were mainly to desire the despatch of a large body of educated missionaries to convert his people to Christianity. It is not likely that religious motives influenced Kúblái in this, but he probably desired religious aid in softening and civilizing his rude kinsmen of the Steppes, and judged, from what he saw in the Venetians and heard from them, that Europe could afford such aid of a higher quality than the degenerate Oriental Christians with whom he was familiar, or the Tibetan Lamas on whom his patronage eventually devolved when Rome so deplorably failed to meet his advances.

[Sidenote: Their return home, and Marco’s appearance on the scene.]

18. The Brothers arrived at Acre in April,[10] 1269, and found that no Pope existed, for Clement IV. was dead the year before, and no new election had taken place. So they went home to Venice to see how things stood there after their absence of so many years.

The wife of Nicolo was no longer among the living, but he found his son Marco a fine lad of fifteen.

The best and most authentic MSS. tell us no more than this. But one class of copies, consisting of the Latin version made by our Traveller’s contemporary, Francesco Pipino, and of the numerous editions based indirectly upon it, represents that Nicolo had left Venice when Marco was as yet unborn, and consequently had never seen him till his return from the East in 1269.[11]

We have mentioned that Nicolo Polo had another legitimate son, by name Maffeo, and him we infer to have been younger than Marco, because he is named last (_Marcus et Matheus_) in the Testament of their uncle Marco the Elder. We do not know if they were by the same mother. They could not have been so if we are right in supposing Maffeo to have been the younger, and if Pipino’s version of the history be genuine. If however we reject the latter, as I incline to do, no ground remains for supposing that Nicolo went to the East much before we find him there viz., in 1260, and Maffeo may have been born of the same mother during the interval between 1254 and 1260. If on the other hand Pipino’s version be held to, we must suppose that Maffeo (who is named by his uncle in 1280, during his father’s second absence in the East) was born of a marriage contracted during Nicolo’s residence at home after his first journey, a residence which lasted from 1269 to 1271.[12]

[Illustration: The Piazzetta at Venice. (From the Bodleian MS. of Polo.)]

[Sidenote: Second Journey of the Polo Brothers, accompanied by Marco.]

19. The Papal interregnum was the longest known, at least since the dark ages. Those two years passed, and yet the Cardinals at Viterbo had come to no agreement. The brothers were unwilling to let the Great Kaan think them faithless, and perhaps they hankered after the virgin field of speculation that they had discovered; so they started again for the East, taking young Mark with them. At Acre they took counsel with an eminent churchman, TEDALDO (or Tebaldo) VISCONTI, Archdeacon of Liège, whom the Book represents to have been Legate in Syria, and who in any case was a personage of much gravity and influence. From him they got letters to authenticate the causes of the miscarriage of their mission, and started for the further East. But they were still at the port of Ayas on the Gulf of Scanderoon, which was then becoming one of the chief points of arrival and departure for the inland trade of Asia, when they were overtaken by the news that a Pope was at last elected, and that the choice had fallen upon their friend Archdeacon Tedaldo. They immediately returned to Acre, and at last were able to execute the Kaan’s commission, and to obtain a reply. But instead of the hundred able teachers of science and religion whom Kúblái is said to have asked for, the new Pope, Gregory X., could supply but two Dominicans; and these lost heart and drew back when they had barely taken the first step of the journey.

Judging from certain indications we conceive it probable that the three Venetians, whose second start from Acre took place about November 1271, proceeded by Ayas and Sivas, and then by Mardin, Mosul, and Baghdad, to Hormuz at the mouth of the Persian Gulf, with the view of going on by sea, but that some obstacle arose which compelled them to abandon this project and turn north again from Hormuz.[13] They then traversed successively Kerman and Khorasan, Balkh and Badakhshan, whence they ascended the Panja or upper Oxus to the Plateau of Pamir, a route not known to have been since followed by any European traveller except Benedict Goës, till the spirited expedition of Lieutenant John Wood of the Indian Navy in 1838.[14] Crossing the Pamir highlands the travellers descended upon Kashgar, whence they proceeded by Yarkand and Khotan, and the vicinity of Lake Lob, and eventually across the Great Gobi Desert to Tangut, the name then applied by Mongols and Persians to territory at the extreme North-west of China, both within and without the Wall. Skirting the northern frontier of China they at last reached the presence of the Kaan, who was at his usual summer retreat at Kai-ping fu, near the base of the Khingan Mountains, and nearly 100 miles north of the Great Wall at Kalgan. If there be no mistake in the time (three years and a half) ascribed to this journey in all the existing texts, the travellers did not reach the Court till about May of 1275.[15]

[Sidenote: Marco’s employment by Kúblái Kaan; and his journeys.]

20. Kúblái received the Venetians with great cordiality, and took kindly to young Mark, who must have been by this time one-and-twenty. The _Joenne Bacheler_, as the story calls him, applied himself to the acquisition of the languages and written characters in chief use among the multifarious nationalities included in the Kaan’s Court and administration; and Kúblái after a time, seeing his discretion and ability, began to employ him in the public service. M. Pauthier has found a record in the Chinese Annals of the Mongol Dynasty, which states that in the year 1277, a certain POLO was nominated a second-class commissioner or agent attached to the Privy Council, a passage which we are happy to believe to refer to our young traveller.[16]

His first mission apparently was that which carried him through the provinces of Shan-si, Shen-si, and Sze-ch’wan, and the wild country on the East of Tibet, to the remote province of Yun-nan, called by the Mongols Karájàng, and which had been partially conquered by an army under Kúblái himself in 1253, before his accession to the throne.[17] Mark, during his stay at court, had observed the Kaan’s delight in hearing of strange countries, their marvels, manners, and oddities, and had heard his Majesty’s frank expressions of disgust at the stupidity of his commissioners when they could speak of nothing but the official business on which they had been sent. Profiting by these observations, he took care to store his memory or his note-books with all curious facts that were likely to interest Kúblái, and related them with vivacity on his return to Court. This first journey, which led him through a region which is still very nearly a _terra incognita_, and in which there existed and still exists, among the deep valleys of the Great Rivers flowing down from Eastern Tibet, and in the rugged mountain ranges bordering Yun-nan and Kwei-chau, a vast Ethnological Garden, as it were, of tribes of various race and in every stage of uncivilisation, afforded him an acquaintance with many strange products and eccentric traits of manners, wherewith to delight the Emperor.

Mark rose rapidly in favour, and often served Kúblái again on distant missions, as well as in domestic administration, but we gather few details as to his employments. At one time we know that he held for three years the government of the great city of Yang-chau, though we need not try to magnify this office, as some commentators have done, into the viceroyalty of one of the great provinces of the Empire; on another occasion we find him with his uncle Maffeo, passing a year at Kan-chau in Tangut; again, it would appear, visiting Kara Korum, the old capital of the Kaans in Mongolia; on another occasion in Champa or Southern Cochin China; and again, or perhaps as a part of the last expedition, on a mission to the Indian Seas, when he appears to have visited several of the southern states of India. We are not informed whether his father and uncle shared in such employments;[18] and the story of their services rendered to the Kaan in promoting the capture of the city of Siang-yang, by the construction of powerful engines of attack, is too much perplexed by difficulties of chronology to be cited with confidence. Anyhow they were gathering wealth, and after years of exile they began to dread what might follow old Kúblái’s death, and longed to carry their gear and their own grey heads safe home to the Lagoons. The aged Emperor growled refusal to all their hints, and but for a happy chance we should have lost our mediæval Herodotus.

[Sidenote: Circumstances of the Departure of the Polos from the Kaan’s Court.]

21. Arghún Khan of Persia, Kúblái’s great-nephew, had in 1286 lost his favourite wife the Khatun Bulughán; and, mourning her sorely, took steps to fulfil her dying injunction that her place should be filled only by a lady of her own kin, the Mongol Tribe of Bayaut. Ambassadors were despatched to the Court of Kaan-baligh to seek such a bride. The message was courteously received, and the choice fell on the lady Kokáchin, a maiden of 17, “_moult bele dame et avenant_.” The overland road from Peking to Tabriz was not only of portentous length for such a tender charge, but was imperilled by war, so the envoys desired to return by sea. Tartars in general were strangers to all navigation; and the envoys, much taken with the Venetians, and eager to profit by their experience, especially as Marco had just then returned from his Indian mission, begged the Kaan as a favour to send the three _Firinghis_ in their company. He consented with reluctance, but, having done so, fitted the party out nobly for the voyage, charging the Polos with friendly messages for the potentates of Europe, including the King of England. They appear to have sailed from the port of Zayton (as the Westerns called T’swan-chau or Chin-cheu in Fo-kien) in the beginning of 1292. It was an ill-starred voyage, involving long detentions on the coast of Sumatra, and in the South of India, to which, however, we are indebted for some of the best chapters in the book; and two years or upwards passed before they arrived at their destination in Persia.[19] The three hardy Venetians survived all perils, and so did the lady, who had come to look on them with filial regard; but two of the three envoys, and a vast proportion of the suite, had perished by the way.[20] Arghún Khan too had been dead even before they quitted China;[21] his brother Kaikhátú reigned in his stead; and his son Gházán succeeded to the lady’s hand. We are told by one who knew both the princes well that Arghún was one of the handsomest men of his time, whilst Gházán was, among all his host, one of the most insignificant in appearance. But in other respects the lady’s change was for the better. Gházán had some of the highest qualities of a soldier, a legislator and a king, adorned by many and varied accomplishments; though his reign was too short for the full development of his fame.

[Sidenote: They pass by Persia to Venice. Their relations there.]

22. The princess, whose enjoyment of her royalty was brief, wept as she took leave of the kindly and noble Venetians. They went on to Tabriz, and after a long halt there proceeded homewards, reaching Venice, according to all the texts some time in 1295.[22]

We have related Ramusio’s interesting tradition, like a bit out of the Arabian Nights, of the reception that the Travellers met with from their relations, and of the means that they took to establish their position with those relations, and with Venetian society.[23] Of the relations, Marco the Elder had probably been long dead;[24] Maffeo the brother of our Marco was alive, and we hear also of a cousin (_consanguineus_) Felice Polo, and his wife Fiordelisa, without being able to fix their precise position in the family. We know also that Nicolo, who died before the end of the century, left behind him two illegitimate sons, Stefano and Zannino. It is not unlikely that these were born from some connection entered into during the long residence of the Polos in Cathay, though naturally their presence in the travelling company is not commemorated in Marco’s Prologue.[25]

---------------------------------------------------------------------- [1] _Zurla_, I. 42, quoting a MS. entitled _Petrus Ciera S. R. E. Card, de Origine Venetorum et de Civitate Venetiarum_. Cicogna says he could not find this MS. as it had been carried to England; and then breaks into a diatribe against foreigners who purchase and carry away such treasures, “not to make a serious study of them, but for mere vain-glory ... or in order to write books contradicting the very MSS. that they have bought, and with that dishonesty and untruth which are so notorious!” (IV. 227.)

[2] _Campidoglio Veneto_ of Cappellari (MS. in St. Mark’s Lib.), quoting “the Venetian Annals of Giulio Faroldi.”

[3] The _Genealogies_ of Marco Barbaro specify 1033 as the year of the migration to Venice; on what authority does not appear (MS. copy in _Museo Civico_ at Venice).

[4] _Cappellari_, u.s., and _Barbaro_. In the same century we find (1125, 1195) indications of Polos at Torcello, and of others (1160) at Equileo, and (1179, 1206) Lido Maggiore; in 1154 a Marco Polo of Rialto. Contemporary with these is a family of Polos (1139, 1183, 1193, 1201) at Chioggia (_Documents and Lists of Documents from various Archives at_ Venice).

[5] See Appendix C, Nos. 4, 5, and 16. It was supposed that an autograph of Marco as member of the Great Council had been discovered, but this proves to be a mistake, as will be explained further on (see p. _74_, note). In those days the demarcation between Patrician and non-Patrician at Venice, where all classes shared in commerce, all were (generally speaking) of one race, and where there were neither castles, domains, nor trains of horsemen, formed no wide gulf. Still it is interesting to establish the verity of the old tradition of Marco’s technical nobility.

[6] Marco’s seniority rests only on the assertion of Ramusio, who also calls Maffeo older than Nicolo. But in Marco the Elder’s Will these two are always (3 times) specified as “_Nicolaus et Matheus_.”

[7] This seems implied in the Elder Marco’s Will (1280): “_Item de bonis quæ me habere contingunt_ de fraternâ Compagniâ _a suprascriptis Nicolao et Matheo Paulo_,” etc.

[8] In his Will he terms himself “Ego Marcus Polo quondam de Constantinopoli.”

[9] There is no real ground for doubt as to this. All the extant MSS. agree in making Marco fifteen years old when his father returned to Venice in 1269.

[10] Baldelli and Lazari say that the Bern MS. specifies 30th April; but this is a mistake.

[11] Pipino’s version runs: “Invenit Dominus Nicolaus Paulus uxorem suam esse defunctam, quae in recessu suo fuit praegnans. Invenitque filium, Marcum nomine, qui jam annos xv. habebat aetatis, qui post discessum ipsius de Venetiis natus fuerat de uxore sua praefatâ.” To this Ramusio adds the further particular that the mother died in giving birth to Mark.

The interpolation is older even than Pipino’s version, for we find in the rude Latin published by the Société de Géographie “quam cum Venetiis primo recessit praegnantem dimiserat.” But the statement is certainly an _interpolation_, for it does not exist in any of the older texts; nor have we any good reason for believing that it was an _authorised_ interpolation. I suspect it to have been introduced to harmonise with an erroneous date for the commencement of the travels of the two brothers.

Lazari prints: “Messer Nicolò trovò che la sua donna era morta, e n’era rimasto un fanciullo di _dodici_ anni per nome Marco, _che il padre non avea veduto mai, perchè non era ancor nato quando egli partì_.” These words have no equivalent in the French Texts, but are taken from one of the Italian MSS. in the Magliabecchian Library, and are I suspect also interpolated. The _dodici_ is pure error (see p. 21 _infra_).

[12] The last view is in substance, I find, suggested by Cicogna (ii. 389).

The matter is of some interest, because in the Will of the younger Maffeo, which is extant, he makes a bequest to his uncle (_Avunculus_) Jordan Trevisan. This seems an indication that his mother’s name may have been Trevisan. The same Maffeo had a daughter _Fiordelisa_. And Marco the Elder, in his Will (1280), appoints as his executors, during the absence of his brothers, the same Jordan Trevisan and his own sister-in-law _Fiordelisa_ (“Jordanum Trivisanum de confinio S. Antonini: et Flordelisam cognatam meam”). Hence I conjecture that this _cognata Fiordelisa_ (Trevisan?) was the wife of the absent Nicolo, and the mother of Maffeo. In that case of course Maffeo and Marco were the sons of different mothers. With reference to the above suggestion of Nicolo’s second marriage in 1269 there is a curious variation in a fragmentary Venetian Polo in the Barberini Library at Rome. It runs, in the passage corresponding to the latter part of ch. ix. of Prologue: “i qual do fratelli steteno do anni in Veniezia aspettando la elletion de nuovo Papa, _nel qual tempo Mess. Nicolo si tolse moier et si la lasò graveda._” I believe, however, that it is only a careless misrendering of Pipino’s statement about Marco’s birth.

[13] [Major Sykes, in his remarkable book on _Persia_, ch. xxiii. pp. 262–263, does not share Sir Henry Yule’s opinion regarding this itinerary, and he writes:

“To return to our travellers, who started on their second great journey in 1271, Sir Henry Yule, in his introduction,[A] makes them travel _viâ_ Sivas to Mosul and Baghdád, and thence by sea to Hormuz, and this is the itinerary shown on his sketch map. This view I am unwilling to accept for more than one reason. In the first place, if, with Colonel Yule, we suppose that Ser Marco visited Baghdád, is it not unlikely that he should term the River Volga the Tigris,[B] and yet leave the river of Baghdád nameless? It may be urged that Marco believed the legend of the reappearance of the Volga in Kurdistán, but yet, if the text be read with care and the character of the traveller be taken into account, this error is scarcely explicable in any other way, than that he was never there.

“Again, he gives no description of the striking buildings of Baudas, as he terms it, but this is nothing to the inaccuracy of his supposed onward journey. To quote the text, ‘A very great river flows through the city, ... and merchants descend some eighteen days from Baudas, and then come to a certain city called Kisi,[C] where they enter the Sea of India.’ Surely Marco, had he travelled down the Persian Gulf, would never have given this description of the route, which is so untrue as to point to the conclusion that it was vague information given by some merchant whom he met in the course of his wanderings.

“Finally, apart from the fact that Baghdád, since its fall, was rather off the main caravan route, Marco so evidently travels east from Yezd and thence south to Hormuz, that unless his journey be described backwards, which is highly improbable, it is only possible to arrive at one conclusion, namely, that the Venetians entered Persia near Tabriz, and travelled to Sultania, Kashán, and Yezd. Thence they proceeded to Kermán and Hormuz, where, probably fearing the sea voyage, owing to the manifest unseaworthiness of the ships, which he describes as ‘wretched affairs,’ the Khorasán route was finally adopted. Hormuz, in this case, was not visited again until the return from China, when it seems probable that the same route was retraced to Tabriz, where their charge, the Lady Kokachin, ‘moult bele dame et avenant,’ was married to Gházan Khán, the son of her fiancé Arghun. It remains to add that Sir Henry Yule may have finally accepted this view in part, as in the plate showing _Probable View of Marco Polo’s own Geography_,[D] the itinerary is not shown as running to Baghdád.”

I may be allowed to answer that when Marco Polo _started_ for the East, Baghdád was not rather off the main caravan route. The fall of Baghdád was not immediately followed by its decay, and we have proof of its prosperity at the beginning of the 14th century. Tauris had not yet the importance it had reached when the Polos visited it on their _return_ journey. We have the will of the Venetian Pietro Viglioni, dated from Tauris, 10th December, 1264 (_Archiv. Veneto_, xxvi. 161–165), which shows that he was but a pioneer. It was only under Arghún Khan (1284–1291) that Tauris became the great market for foreign, especially Genoese, merchants, as Marco Polo remarks on his return journey; with Gházán and the new city built by that prince, Tauris reached a very high degree of prosperity, and was then really the chief emporium on the route from Europe to Persia and the far East. Sir Henry Yule had not changed his views, and if in the plate showing _Probable View of Marco Polo’s own Geography_, the itinerary is not shown as running to Baghdád, it is mere neglect on the part of the draughtsman.—H. C.]

[A] Page 19.

[B] _Vide Yule_, vol. i. p. 5. It is noticeable that John of Pian de Carpine, who travelled 1245 to 1247, names it correctly.

[C] The modern name is Keis, an island lying off Linga.

[D] Vol. i. p. 110 (Introduction).

[14] It is stated by Neumann that this most estimable traveller once intended to have devoted a special work to the elucidation of Marco’s chapters on the Oxus Provinces, and it is much to be regretted that this intention was never fulfilled. Pamir has been explored more extensively and deliberately, whilst this book was going through the press, by Colonel Gordon, and other officers, detached from Sir Douglas Forsyth’s Mission. [We have made use of the information given by these officers and by more recent travellers.—H. C.]

[15] Half a year earlier, if we suppose the three years and a half to count from Venice rather than Acre. But at that season (November) Kúblái would not have been at Kai-ping fu (otherwise Shang-tu).

[16] _Pauthier_, p. ix., and p. 361.

[17] That this was Marco’s first mission is positively stated in the Ramusian edition; and though this may be only an editor’s gloss it seems well-founded. The French texts say only that the Great Kaan, “l’envoia en un message en une terre ou bien avoit vj. mois de chemin.” The traveller’s actual Itinerary affords to Vochan (Yung-ch’ang), on the frontier of Burma, 147 days’ journey, which with halts might well be reckoned six months in round estimate. And we are enabled by various circumstances to fix the date of the Yun-nan journey between 1277 and 1280. The former limit is determined by Polo’s account of the battle with the Burmese, near Vochan, which took place according to the Chinese Annals in 1277. The latter is fixed by his mention of Kúblái’s son, Mangalai, as governing at Kenjanfu (Si-ngan fu), a prince who died in 1280. (See vol. ii. pp. 24, 31, also 64, 80.)

[18] Excepting in the doubtful case of Kan-chau, where one reading says that the three Polos were there on business of their own not necessary to mention, and another, that only Maffeo and Marco were there, “_en légation_.”

[19] Persian history seems to fix the arrival of the lady Kokáchin in the North of Persia to the winter of 1293–1294. The voyage to Sumatra occupied three months (vol. i. p. 34); they were five months detained there (ii. 292); and the remainder of the voyage extended to eighteen more (i. 35),—twenty-six months in all.

The data are too slight for unexceptional precision, but the following adjustment will fairly meet the facts. Say that they sailed from Fo-kien in January 1292. In April they would be in Sumatra, and find the S.W. Monsoon too near to admit of their crossing the Bay of Bengal. They remain in port till September (five months), and then proceed, touching (perhaps) at Ceylon, at Kayal, and at several ports of Western India. In one of these, _e.g._ Kayal or Tana, they pass the S.W. Monsoon of 1293, and then proceed to the Gulf. They reach Hormuz in the winter, and the camp of the Persian Prince Gházán, the son of Arghún, in March, twenty-six months from their departure.

I have been unable to trace Hammer’s authority (not Wassáf I find), which perhaps gives the precise date of the Lady’s arrival in Persia (see _infra_, p. 38). From his narrative, however (_Gesch. der Ilchane_, ii. 20), March 1294 is perhaps too late a date. But the five months’ stoppage in Sumatra _must_ have been in the S.W. Monsoon; and if the arrival in Persia is put earlier, Polo’s numbers can scarcely be held to. Or, the eighteen months mentioned at vol. i. p. 35, must _include_ the five months’ stoppage. We may then suppose that they reached Hormuz about November 1293, and Gházán’s camp a month or two later. [20] The French text which forms the _basis_ of my translation says that, excluding mariners, there were 600 souls, out of whom only 8 survived. The older MS. which I quote as G. T., makes the number 18, a fact that I had overlooked till the sheets were printed off.

[21] Died 12th March, 1291.

[22] All dates are found so corrupt that even in this one I do not feel absolute confidence. Marco in dictating the book is aware that Gházán had attained the throne of Persia (see vol. i. p. 36, and ii. pp. 50 and 477), an event which did not occur till October, 1295. The date assigned to it, however, by Marco (ii. 477) is 1294, or the year _before_ that assigned to the return home.

The travellers may have stopped some time at Constantinople on their way, or even may have visited the northern shores of the Black Sea; otherwise, indeed, how did Marco acquire his knowledge of that Sea (ii. 486–488) and of events in Kipchak (ii. 496 _seqq._)? If 1296 was the date of return, moreover, the six-and-twenty years assigned in the preamble as the period of Marco’s absence (p. 2) would be nearer accuracy. For he left Venice in the spring or summer of 1271.

[23] Marco Barbaro, in his account of the Polo family, tells what seems to be the same tradition in a different and more mythical version:—

“From ear to ear the story has past till it reached mine, that when the three Kinsmen arrived at their home they were dressed in the most shabby and sordid manner, insomuch that the wife of one of them gave away to a beggar that came to the door one of those garments of his, all torn, patched, and dirty as it was. The next day he asked his wife for that mantle of his, in order to put away the jewels that were sewn up in it; but she told him she had given it away to a poor man, whom she did not know. Now, the stratagem he employed to recover it was this. He went to the Bridge of Rialto, and stood there turning a wheel, to no apparent purpose, but as if he were a madman, and to all those who crowded round to see what prank was this, and asked him why he did it, he answered: ‘He’ll come if God pleases.’ So after two or three days he recognised his old coat on the back of one of those who came to stare at his mad proceedings, and got it back again. Then, indeed, he was judged to be quite the reverse of a madman! And from those jewels he built in the contrada of S. Giovanni Grisostomo a very fine palace for those days; and the family got among the vulgar the name of the _Ca’ Million_, because the report was that they had jewels to the value of a million of ducats; and the palace has kept that name to the present day—_viz._, 1566.” (_Genealogies_, MS. copy in _Museo Civico_; quoted also by _Baldelli Boni, Vita_, p. xxxi.)

[24] The Will of the Elder Marco, to which we have several times referred, is dated at Rialto 5th August, 1280.

The testator describes himself as formerly of Constantinople, but now dwelling in the confine of S. Severo.

His brothers _Nicolo_ and _Maffeo_, if at Venice, are to be his sole trustees and executors, but in case of their continued absence he nominates _Jordano Trevisano_, and his sister-in-law _Fiordelisa_ of the confine of S. Severo.

The proper tithe to be paid. All his clothes and furniture to be sold, and from the proceeds his funeral to be defrayed, and the balance to purchase masses for his soul at the discretion of his trustees.

Particulars of money due to him from his partnership with Donato Grasso, now of Justinople (Capo d’Istria), 1200 _lire_ in all. (Fifty-two lire due by said partnership to Angelo di Tumba of S. Severo.)

The above money bequeathed to his son _Nicolo_, living at _Soldachia_, or failing him, to his beloved brothers _Nicolo_ and _Maffeo_. Failing them, to the sons of his said brothers (_sic_) _Marco_ and _Maffeo_. Failing them, to be spent for the good of his soul at the discretion of his trustees.

To his son Nicolo he bequeaths a silver-wrought girdle of vermilion silk, two silver spoons, a silver cup without cover (or saucer? _sine cembalo_), his desk, two pairs of sheets, a velvet quilt, a counterpane, a feather-bed—all on the same conditions as above, and to remain with the trustees till his son returns to Venice.

Meanwhile the trustees are to invest the money at his son’s risk and benefit, but only here in Venice (_investiant seu investire, faciant_).

From the proceeds to come in from his partnership with his brothers Nicolo and Maffeo, he bequeaths 200 lire to his daughter Maroca.

From same source 100 lire to his natural son Antony.

Has in his desk (_capsella_) two hyperperae (Byzantine gold coins), and three golden florins, which he bequeaths to the sister-in-law _Fiordelisa_.

Gives freedom to all his slaves and handmaidens.

Leaves his house in Soldachia to the Minor Friars of that place, reserving life-occupancy to his son Nicolo and daughter Maroca.

The rest of his goods to his son Nicolo.

[25] The terms in which the younger Maffeo mentions these half-brothers in his Will (1300) seem to indicate that they were still young.

IV. DIGRESSION CONCERNING THE MANSION OF THE POLO FAMILY AT VENICE.

[Sidenote: Probable period of their establishment at S. Giovanni Grisostomo.]

23. We have seen that Ramusio places the scene of the story recently alluded to at the mansion in the parish of S. Giovanni Grisostomo, the court of which was known in his time as the Corte del Millioni; and indeed he speaks of the Travellers as at once on their arrival resorting to that mansion as their family residence. Ramusio’s details have so often proved erroneous that I should not be surprised if this also should be a mistake. At least we find (so far as I can learn) no previous intimation that the family were connected with that locality. The grandfather Andrea is styled of _San Felice_. The will of Maffeo Polo the younger, made in 1300, which we shall give hereafter in abstract, appears to be the first document that connects the family with S. Giovanni Grisostomo. It indeed styles the testator’s father “the late Nicolo Paulo of the confine of St. John Chrysostom,” but that only shows what is not disputed, that the Travellers after their return from the East settled in this locality. And the same will appears to indicate a surviving connexion with S. Felice, for the priests and clerks who drew it up and witness it are all of the church of S. Felice, and it is to the parson of S. Felice and his successor that Maffeo bequeaths an annuity to procure their prayers for the souls of his father, his mother, and himself, though after the successor the annuity is to pass on the same condition to the senior priest of S. Giovanni Grisostomo. Marco Polo the Elder is in his will described as of _S. Severo_, as is also his sister-in-law Fiordelisa, and the document contains no reference to S. Giovanni. On the whole therefore it seems probable that the Palazzo in the latter parish was purchased by the Travellers after their return from the East.[1]

[Illustration: Corte del Milione, Venice.]

[Sidenote: Relic of the Casa Polo in the Corte Sabbionera.]

24. The Court which was known in the 16th century as the Corte del Millioni has been generally understood to be that now known as the Corte Sabbionera, and here is still pointed out a relic of Marco Polo’s mansion. [Indeed it is called now (1899) _Corte del Milione_; see p. _30_.—H. C.]

M. Pauthier’s edition is embellished with a good engraving which purports to represent the House of Marco Polo. But he has been misled. His engraving in fact exhibits, at least as the prominent feature, an embellished representation of a small house which exists on the _west side_ of the Sabbionera, and which had at one time perhaps that pointed style of architecture which his engraving shows, though its present decoration is paltry and unreal. But it is on the _north side_ of the Court, and on the foundations now occupied by the Malibran theatre, that Venetian tradition and the investigations of Venetian antiquaries concur in indicating the site of the Casa Polo. At the end of the 16th century a great fire destroyed the Palazzo,[2] and under the description of “an old mansion ruined from the foundation” it passed into the hands of one Stefano Vecchia, who sold it in 1678 to Giovanni Carlo Grimani. He built on the site of the ruins a theatre which was in its day one of the largest in Italy, and was called the Theatre of S. Giovanni Grisostomo; afterwards the _Teatro Emeronitio_. When modernized in our own day the proprietors gave it the name of Malibran, in honour of that famous singer, and this it still bears.[3]

[In 1881, the year of the Venice International Geographical Congress, a Tablet was put up on the Theatre with the following inscription:—

QVI FURONO LE CASE DI MARCO POLO CHE VIAGGIÒ LE PIÙ LONTANE REGIONI DELL’ASIA E LE DESCRISSE

PER DECRETO DEL COMUNE MDCCCLXXXI].

There is still to be seen on the north side of the Court an arched doorway in Italo-Byzantine style, richly sculptured with scrolls, disks, and symbolical animals, and on the wall above the doorway is a cross similarly ornamented.[4] The style and the decorations are those which were usual in Venice in the 13th century. The arch opens into a passage from which a similar doorway at the other end, also retaining some scantier relics of decoration, leads to the entrance of the Malibran Theatre. Over the archway in the Corte Sabbionera the building rises into a kind of tower. This, as well as the sculptured arches and cross, Signor Casoni, who gave a good deal of consideration to the subject, believed to be a relic of the old Polo House. But the tower (which Pauthier’s view does show) is now entirely modernized.[5]

[Illustration: Malibran Theatre, Venice.]

[Illustration: The site of the CA’ POLO.

Fig. A. From the Dürer Map. A.D. 1500. Fig. B. From Map by Ludovico Ughi. A.D. 1729 Scale 1 to 2500. Fig. C. From Recent Map. Scale 1 to 1315.]

Other remains of Byzantine sculpture, which are probably fragments of the decoration of the same mansion, are found imbedded in the walls of neighbouring houses.[6] It is impossible to determine anything further as to the form or extent of the house of the time of the Polos, but some slight idea of its appearance about the year 1500 may be seen in the extract (fig. A) which we give from the famous pictorial map of Venice attributed erroneously to Albert Dürer. The state of the buildings in the last century is shown in (fig. B) an extract from the fine Map of Ughi; and their present condition in one (fig. C) reduced from the Modern Official Map of the Municipality.

[Coming from the Church of S. G. Grisostomo to enter the calle del Teatro on the left and the passage (_Sottoportico_) leading to the _Corte del Milione_, one has in front of him a building with a door of the epoch of the Renaissance; it was the office of the _provveditori_ of silk; on the architrave are engraved the words:

PROVISORES SERICI

and below, above the door, is the Tablet which] in the year 1827 the Abate Zenier caused to be put up with this inscription:—

AEDES PROXIMA THALIAE CVLTVI MODO ADDICTA MARCI POLO P. V. ITINERVM FAMA PRAECLARI JAM HABITATIO FVIT.

[Sidenote: Recent corroboration as to the traditional site of the Casa Polo.]

24_a_. I believe that of late years some doubts have been thrown on the tradition of the site indicated as that of the Casa Polo, though I am not aware of the grounds of such doubts. But a document recently discovered at Venice by Comm. Barozzi, one of a series relating to the testamentary estate of Marco Polo, goes far to confirm the tradition. This is the copy of a technical definition of two pieces of house property adjoining the property of Marco Polo and his brother Stephen, which were sold to Marco Polo by his wife Donata[7] in June 1321. Though the definition is not decisive, from the rarity of topographical references and absence of points of the compass, the description of Donata’s tenements as standing on the Rio (presumably that of S. Giovanni Grisostomo) on one side, opening by certain porticoes and stairs on the other to the Court and common alley leading to the Church of S. Giovanni Grisostomo, and abutting in two places on the CA’ POLO, the property of her husband and Stefano, will apply perfectly to a building occupying the western portion of the area on which now stands the Theatre, and perhaps forming the western side of a Court of which Casa Polo formed the other three sides.[8]

[Illustration: Entrance to the Corte del Milione, Venice.]

We know nothing more of Polo till we find him appearing a year or two later in rapid succession as the Captain of a Venetian Galley, as a prisoner of war, and as an author.

---------------------------------------------------------------------- [1] Marco Barbaro’s story related at p. _25_ speaks of the Ca’ Million as _built_ by the travellers.

From a list of parchments existing in the archives of the _Casa di Ricovero_, or Great Poor House, at Venice, Comm. Berchet obtained the following indication:—

“_No. 94. Marco Galetti invests_ Marco Polo _S. of_ Nicolo _with the ownership of his possessions_ (beni) _in_ S. Giovanni Grisostomo; _10 September, 1319; drawn up by the Notary Nicolo, priest of S. Canciano._”

This document would perhaps have thrown light on the matter, but unfortunately recent search by several parties has failed to trace it. [The document has been discovered since: see vol. ii., _Calendar_, No. 6.—H. C.]

[2] ——“Sua casa che era posta nel confin di S. Giovanni Chrisostomo, _che hor fà l’anno s’abbrugiò totalmente_, con gran danno di molti.” (_Doglioní, Hist. Venetiana_, Ven. 1598, pp. 161–162.)

“1596. 7 _Nov. Senato_ (Arsenal ... ix c. 159 t).

“Essendo conveniente usar qualche ricognizione a quelli della maestranza dell’Arsenal nostro, che prontamente sono concorsi all’ incendio occorso ultimamente a S. Zuane Grizostomo nelli stabeli detti di CA’ MILION dove per la relazion fatta nell collegio nostro dalli patroni di esso Arsenal hanno nell’estinguere il foco prestato ogni buon servitio....”—(Comm. by Cav. Cecchetti through Comm. Berchet.)

[3] See a paper by G. C. (the Engineer Giovanni Casoni) in _Teatro Emeronitio Almanacco per l’Anno 1835_.

[4] This Cross is engraved by Mr. Ruskin in vol. ii. of the _Stones of Venice_: see p. 139, and Pl. xi. Fig. 4.

[5] Casoni’s only doubt was whether the _Corte del Millioni_ was what is now the Sabbionera, or the interior area of the theatre. The latter seems most probable.

One Illustration of this volume, p. 1, shows the archway in the Corte Sabbionera, and also the decorations of the soffit.

[6] See _Ruskin_, iii. 320.

[7] Comm. Barozzi writes: “Among us, contracts between husband and wife are and were very common, and recognized by law. The wife sells to the husband property not included in dowry, or that she may have inherited, just as any third person might.”

[8] See Appendix C, No. 16.

V. DIGRESSION CONCERNING THE WAR-GALLEYS OF THE MEDITERRANEAN STATES IN THE MIDDLE AGES.

[Sidenote: Arrangement of the Rowers in Mediæval Galleys: a separate oar to every man.]

25. And before entering on this new phase of the Traveller’s biography it may not be without interest that we say something regarding the equipment of those galleys which are so prominent in the mediæval history of the Mediterranean.[1]

Eschewing that “Serbonian Bog, where armies whole have sunk” of Books and Commentators, the theory of the classification of the Biremes and Triremes of the Ancients, we can at least assert on secure grounds that in _mediæval_ armament, up to the middle of the 16th century or thereabouts, the characteristic distinction of galleys of different calibres, so far as such differences existed, was based _on the number of rowers that sat on one bench pulling each his separate oar, but through one_ portella _or rowlock-port_.[2] And to the classes of galleys so distinguished the Italians, of the later Middle Age at least, did certainly apply, rightly or wrongly, the classical terms of _Bireme_, _Trireme_, and _Quinquereme_, in the sense of galleys having two men and two oars to a bench, three men and three oars to a bench, and five men and five oars to a bench.[3]

That this was the mediæval arrangement is very certain from the details afforded by Marino Sanudo the Elder, confirmed by later writers and by works of art. Previous to 1290, Sanudo tells us, almost all the galleys that went to the Levant had but two oars and men to a bench; but as it had been found that three oars and men to a bench could be employed with great advantage, after that date nearly all galleys adopted this arrangement, which was called _ai Terzaruoli_.[4]

Moreover experiments made by the Venetians in 1316 had shown that four rowers to a bench could be employed still more advantageously. And where the galleys could be used on inland waters, and could be made more bulky, Sanudo would even recommend five to a bench, or have gangs of rowers on two decks with either three or four men to the bench on each deck.

[Sidenote: Change of System in the 16th century.]

26. This system of grouping the oars, and putting only one man to an oar, continued down to the 16th century, during the first half of which came in the more modern system of using great oars, equally spaced, and requiring from four to seven men each to ply them, in the manner which endured till late in the last century, when galleys became altogether obsolete. Captain Pantero Pantera, the author of a work on Naval Tactics (1616), says he had heard, from veterans who had commanded galleys equipped in the antiquated fashion, that _three_ men to a bench, with separate oars, answered better than three men to one great oar, but four men to one great oar (he says) were certainly more efficient than four men with separate oars. The new-fashioned great oars, he tells us, were styled _Remi di Scaloccio_, the old grouped oars _Remi a Zenzile_,—terms the etymology of which I cannot explain.[5]

It may be doubted whether the four-banked and five-banked galleys, of which Marino Sanudo speaks, really then came into practical use. A great five-banked galley on this system, built in 1529 in the Venice Arsenal by Vettor Fausto, was the subject of so much talk and excitement, that it must evidently have been something quite new and unheard of.[6] So late as 1567 indeed the King of Spain built at Barcelona a galley of thirty-six benches to the side, and seven men to the bench, with a separate oar to each in the old fashion. But it proved a failure.[7]

Down to the introduction of the great oars the usual system appears to have been three oars to a bench for the larger galleys, and two oars for lighter ones. The _fuste_ or lighter galleys of the Venetians, even to about the middle of the 16th century, had their oars in pairs from the stern to the mast, and single oars only from the mast forward.[8]

[Sidenote: Some details of the 13th century Galleys.]

27. Returning then to the three-banked and two-banked galleys of the latter part of the 13th century, the number of benches on each side seems to have run from twenty-five to twenty-eight, at least as I interpret Sanudo’s calculations. The 100-oared vessels often mentioned (_e.g._ by _Muntaner_, p. 419) were probably two-banked vessels with twenty-five benches to a side.

[Illustration]

The galleys were very narrow, only 15½ feet in beam.[9] But to give room for the play of the oars and the passage of the fighting-men, &c., this width was largely augmented by an _opera-morta_, or outrigger deck, projecting much beyond the ship’s sides and supported by timber brackets.[10] I do not find it stated how great this projection was in the mediæval galleys, but in those of the 17th century it was _on each side_ as much as ²⁄₉ths of the true beam. And if it was as great in the 13th-century galleys the total width between the false gunnels would be about 22¼ feet.

In the centre line of the deck ran, the whole length of the vessel, a raised gangway called the _corsia_, for passage clear of the oars.

The benches were arranged as in this diagram. The part of the bench next the gunnel was at right angles to it, but the other two-thirds of the bench were thrown forward obliquely. _a_, _b_, _c_, indicate the position of the three rowers. The shortest oar _a_ was called _Terlicchio_, the middle one _b Posticcio_, the long oar _c Piamero_.[11]

I do not find any information as to how the oars worked on the gunnels. The Siena fresco (see p. _35_) appears to show them attached by loops and pins, which is the usual practice in boats of the Mediterranean now. In the cut from D. Tintoretto (p. _37_) the groups of oars protrude through regular ports in the bulwarks, but this probably represents the use of a later day. In any case the oars of each bench must have worked in very close proximity. Sanudo states the length of the galleys of his time (1300–1320) as 117 feet. This was doubtless length of _keel_, for that is specified (“_da ruoda a ruoda_”) in other Venetian measurements, but the whole oar space could scarcely have been so much, and with twenty-eight benches to a side there could not have been more than 4 feet gunnel-space to each bench. And as one of the objects of the grouping of the oars was to allow room between the benches for the action of cross-bowmen, &c., it is plain that the rowlock space for the three oars must have been very much compressed.[12]

[Illustration: Galley-Fight, from a Mediæval Fresco at Siena. (See p. _36_.)]

The rowers were divided into three classes, with graduated pay. The highest class, who pulled the poop or stroke oars, were called _Portolati_; those at the bow, called _Prodieri_, formed the second class.[13]

Some elucidation of the arrangements that we have tried to describe will be found in our cuts. That at p. _35_ is from a drawing, by the aid of a very imperfect photograph, of part of one of the frescoes of Spinello Aretini in the Municipal Palace at Siena, representing a victory of the Venetians over the Emperor Frederick Barbarossa’s fleet, commanded by his son Otho, in 1176; but no doubt the galleys, &c., are of the artist’s own age, the middle of the 14th century.[14] In this we see plainly the projecting _opera-morta_, and the rowers sitting two to a bench, each with his oar, for these are two-banked. We can also discern the Latin rudder on the quarter. (See this volume, p. 119.) In a picture in the Uffizj, at Florence, of about the same date, by Pietro Laurato (it is in the corridor near the entrance), may be seen a small figure of a galley with the oars also very distinctly coupled.[15] Casoni has engraved, after Cristoforo Canale, a pictorial plan of a Venetian trireme of the 16th century, which shows the arrangement of the oars in _triplets_ very plainly.

The following cut has been sketched from an engraving of a picture by Domenico Tintoretto in the Doge’s palace, representing, I believe, the same action (real or imaginary) as Spinello’s fresco, but with the costume and construction of a later date. It shows, however, very plainly, the projecting _opera-morta_ and the arrangement of the oars in fours, issuing through row-ports in high bulwarks.

[Illustration: Part of a Sea Fight, after Dom. Tintoretto.]

[Sidenote: Fighting Arrangements.]

28. Midships in the mediæval galley a castle was erected, of the width of the ship, and some 20 feet in length; its platform being elevated sufficiently to allow of free passage under it and over the benches. At the bow was the battery, consisting of mangonels (see vol. ii. p. 161 _seqq._) and great cross-bows with winding gear,[16] whilst there were shot-ports[17] for smaller cross-bows along the gunnels in the intervals between the benches. Some of the larger galleys had openings to admit horses at the stern, which were closed and caulked for the voyage, being under water when the vessel was at sea.[18]

It seems to have been a very usual piece of tactics, in attacking as well as in awaiting attack, to connect a large number of galleys by hawsers, and sometimes also to link the oars together, so as to render it difficult for the enemy to break the line or run aboard. We find this practised by the Genoese on the defensive at the battle of Ayas (_infra_, p. _43_), and it is constantly resorted to by the Catalans in the battles described by Ramon de Muntaner.[19]

Sanudo says the toil of rowing in the galleys was excessive, almost unendurable. Yet it seems to have been performed by freely-enlisted men, and therefore it was probably less severe than that of the great-oared galleys of more recent times, which it was found impracticable to work by free enlistment, or otherwise than by slaves under the most cruel driving.[20] I am not well enough read to say that war-galleys were never rowed by slaves in the Middle Ages, but the only doubtful allusion to such a class that I have met with is in one passage of Muntaner, where he says, describing the Neapolitan and Catalan fleets drawing together for action, that the gangs of the galleys had to toil _like_ “forçats” (p. 313). Indeed, as regards Venice at least, convict rowers are stated to have been first introduced in 1549, previous to which the gangs were of _galeotti assoldati_.[21]

[Sidenote: Crew of a Galley and Staff of a Fleet.]

29. We have already mentioned that Sanudo requires for his three-banked galley a ship’s company of 250 men. They are distributed as follows:—

_Comito_ or Master 1 Quartermasters 8 Carpenters 2 Caulkers 2 In charge of stores and arms 4 Orderlies 2 Cook 1 Arblasteers 50 Rowers 180 ——— 250[22]

This does not include the _Sopracomito_, or Gentleman-Commander, who was expected to be _valens homo et probus_, a soldier and a gentleman, fit to be consulted on occasion by the captain-general. In the Venetian fleet he was generally a noble.[23]

The aggregate pay of such a crew, not including the sopracomito, amounted monthly to 60 _lire de’ grossi_, or 600 florins, equivalent to 280_l._ at modern gold value; and the cost for a year to nearly 3160_l._, exclusive of the victualling of the vessel and the pay of the gentleman-commander. The build or purchase of a galley complete is estimated by the same author at 15,000 florins, or 7012_l._

We see that war cost a good deal in money even then.

Besides the ship’s own complement Sanudo gives an estimate for the general staff of a fleet of 60 galleys. This consists of a captain-general, two (vice) admirals, and the following:—

6 _Probi homines_, or gentlemen of character, forming a council to the Captain-General; 4 Commissaries of Stores; 2 Commissaries over the Arms; 3 Physicians; 3 Surgeons; 5 Master Engineers and Carpenters; 15 Master Smiths; 12 Master Fletchers; 5 Cuirass men and Helmet-makers; 15 Oar-makers and Shaft-makers; 10 Stone cutters for stone shot; 10 Master Arblast-makers; 20 Musicians; 20 Orderlies, &c.

[Sidenote: Music; and other particulars.]

30. The musicians formed an important part of the equipment. Sanudo says that in going into action every vessel should make the greatest possible display of colours; gonfalons and broad banners should float from stem to stern, and gay pennons all along the bulwarks; whilst it was impossible to have too much of noisy music, of pipes, trumpets, kettle-drums, and what not, to put heart into the crew and strike fear into the enemy.[24]

So Joinville, in a glorious passage, describes the galley of his kinsman, the Count of Jaffa, at the landing of St. Lewis in Egypt:—

“That galley made the most gallant figure of them all, for it was painted all over, above water and below, with scutcheons of the count’s arms, the field of which was _or_ with a cross _patée gules_.[25] He had a good 300 rowers in his galley, and every man of them had a target blazoned with his arms in beaten gold. And, as they came on, the galley looked to be some flying creature, with such spirit did the rowers spin it along;—or rather, with the rustle of its flags, and the roar of its nacaires and drums and Saracen horns, you might have taken it for a rushing bolt of heaven.”[26]

The galleys, which were very low in the water,[27] could not keep the sea in rough weather, and in winter they never willingly kept the sea at night, however fair the weather might be. Yet Sanudo mentions that he had been with armed galleys to Sluys in Flanders.

I will mention two more particulars before concluding this digression. When captured galleys were towed into port it was stern foremost, and with their colours dragging on the surface of the sea.[28] And the custom of saluting at sunset (probably by music) was in vogue on board the galleys of the 13th century.[29]

We shall now sketch the circumstances that led to the appearance of our Traveller in the command of a war-galley.

---------------------------------------------------------------------- [1] I regret not to have had access to Jal’s learned memoirs (_Archéologie Navale_, Paris, 1839) whilst writing this section, nor since, except for a hasty look at his Essay on the difficult subject of the oar arrangements. I see that he rejects so great a number of oars as I deduce from the statements of Sanudo and others, and that he regards a large number of the rowers as supplementary.

[2] It seems the more desirable to elucidate this, because writers on mediæval subjects so accomplished as Buchon and Capmany have (it would seem) entirely misconceived the matter, assuming that all the men on one bench pulled at one oar.

[3] See _Coronelli, Atlante Veneto_, I. 139, 140. Marino Sanudo the Elder, though not using the term _trireme_, says it was well understood from ancient authors that the Romans employed their rowers _three to a bench_ (p. 59).

[4] “_Ad terzarolos_” (_Secreta Fidelium Crucis_, p. 57). The Catalan Worthy, Ramon de Muntaner, indeed constantly denounces the practice of manning _all_ the galleys with _terzaruoli_, or _tersols_, as his term is. But his reason is that these thirds-men were taken from the oar when crossbowmen were wanted, to act in that capacity, and as such they were good for nothing; the crossbowmen, he insists, should be men specially enlisted for that service and kept to that. He would have some 10 or 20 per cent. only of the fleet built very light and manned in threes. He does not seem to have contemplated oars three-banked, and crossbowmen _besides_, as Sanudo does. (See below; and _Muntaner_, pp. 288, 323, 525, etc.)

In Sanudo we have a glimpse worth noting of the word _soldiers_ advancing towards the modern sense; he expresses a strong preference for _soldati_ (viz. _paid_ soldiers) over _crusaders_ (viz. volunteers), p. 74.

[5] _L’Armata Navale_, Roma, 1616, pp. 150–151.

[6] See a work to which I am indebted for a good deal of light and information, the Engineer Giovanni Casoni’s Essay: “_Dei Navigli Poliremi usati nella Marina dagli Antichi Veneziani_,” in “_Esercitazioni dell’Ateneo Veneto_,” vol. ii. p. 338. This great _Quinquereme_, as it was styled, is stated to have been struck by a fire-arrow, and blown up, in January 1570.

[7] _Pantera_, p. 22.

[8] _Lazarus Bayfius de Re Navali Veterum_, in _Gronovii Thesaurus_, Ven. 1737, vol. xi. p. 581. This writer also speaks of the Quinquereme mentioned above (p. 577).

[9] _Marinus Sanutius_, p. 65.

[10] See the woodcuts opposite and at p. 37; also _Pantera_, p. 46 (who is here, however, speaking of the great-oared galleys), and _Coronelli_, i. 140.

[11] _Casoni_, p. 324. He obtains these particulars from a manuscript work of the 16th century by Cristoforo Canale.

[12] Signor Casoni (p. 324) expresses his belief that no galley of the 14th century had more than 100 oars. I differ from him with hesitation, and still more as I find M. Jal agrees in this view. I will state the grounds on which I came to a different conclusion. (1) Marino Sanudo assigns 180 rowers for a galley equipped _ai Terzaruoli_ (p. 75). This seemed to imply something near 180 oars, for I do not find any allusion to reliefs being provided. In the French galleys of the 18th century there were no reliefs except in this way, that in long runs without urgency only half the oars were pulled. (See _Mém. d’un Protestant condamné aux Galères_, etc., Réimprimés, Paris, 1865, p. 447.) If four men to a bench were to be employed, then Sanudo seems to calculate for his smaller galleys 220 men actually rowing (see pp. 75–78). This seems to assume 55 benches, _i.e._, 28 on one side and 27 on the other, which with 3-banked oars would give 165 rowers. (2) Casoni himself refers to Pietro Martire d’Anghieria’s account of a Great Galley of Venice in which he was sent ambassador to Egypt from the Spanish Court in 1503. The crew amounted to 200, of whom 150 were for working the sails and oars, _that being the number of oars in each galley_, one man to each oar and three to each bench. Casoni assumes that this vessel must have been much larger than the galleys of the 14th century; but, however that may have been, Sanudo to his galley assigns the larger crew of 250, of whom almost exactly the same proportion (180) were rowers. And in the _galeazza_ described by Pietro Martire the oars were used only as an occasional auxiliary. (See his _Legationis Babylonicæ Libri Tres_, appended to his 3 Decads concerning the New World; _Basil_. 1533, f. 77 _ver._) (3) The galleys of the 18th century, with their great oars 50 feet long pulled by six or seven men each, had 25 benches to the side, and only 4′ 6″ (French) gunnel-space to each oar. (See _Mém. d’un Protest._, p. 434.) I imagine that a smaller space would suffice for the 3 light oars of the mediæval system, so that this need scarcely be a difficulty in the face of the preceding evidence. Note also the _three hundred rowers_ in Joinville’s description quoted at p. _40_. The great galleys of the Malay Sultan of Achin in 1621 had, according to Beaulieu, from 700 to 800 rowers, but I do not know on what system.

[13] _Marinus Sanutius_, p. 78. These titles occur also in the _Documenti d’ Amore_ of Fr. Barberino referred to at p. 117 of this volume:—

“Convienti qui manieri _Portolatti e prodieri_ E presti galeotti Aver, e forti e dotti.”

[14] Spinello’s works, according to Vasari, extended from 1334 till late in the century. A religious picture of his at Siena is assigned to 1385, so the frescoes may probably be of about the same period. Of the battle represented I can find no record.

[15] Engraved in Jal, i. 330; with other mediæval illustrations of the same points.

[16] To these Casoni adds _Sifoni_ for discharging Greek fire; but this he seems to take from the Greek treatise of the Emperor Leo. Though I have introduced Greek fire in the cut at p. _49_, I doubt if there is evidence of its use by the Italians in the thirteenth century. Joinville describes it like something strange and new.

In after days the artillery occupied the same position, at the bow of the galley.

Great beams, hung like battering rams, are mentioned by Sanudo, as well as iron crow’s-feet with fire attached, to shoot among the rigging, and jars of quick-lime and soft soap to fling in the eyes of the enemy. The lime is said to have been used by Doria against the Venetians at Curzola (_infra_, p. _48_), and seems to have been a usual provision. Francesco Barberini specifies among the stores for his galley: “_Calcina_, con lancioni, Pece, pietre, e ronconi” (p. 259). And Christine de Pisan, in her _Faiz du Sage Roy Charles_ (V. of France), explains also the use of the soap: “_Item_, on doit avoir pluseurs vaisseaulx legiers à rompre, comme _poz plains de chauls_ ou pouldre, et gecter dedens; et, par ce, seront comme avuglez, au brisier des poz. _Item_, on doit avoir autres _poz de mol savon_ et gecter es nefzs des adversaires, et quant les vaisseaulx brisent, le savon est glissant, si ne se peuent en piez soustenir et chiéent en l’eaue” (pt. ii. ch. 38).

[17] _Balistariæ_, whence no doubt _Balistrada_ and our _Balustrade_. Wedgwood’s etymology is far-fetched. And in his new edition (1872), though he has shifted his ground, he has not got nearer the truth.

[18] _Sanutius_, p. 53; _Joinville_, p. 40; _Muntaner_, 316, 403.

[19] See pp. 270, 288, 324, and especially 346.

[20] See the _Protestant_, cited above, p. 441, _et seqq._

[21] _Venezia e le sue Lagune_, ii. 52.

[22] _Mar. Sanut._ p. 75.

[23] _Mar. Sanut._, p. 30.

[24] The Catalan Admiral Roger de Loria, advancing at daybreak to attack the Provençal Fleet of Charles of Naples (1283) in the harbour of Malta, “did a thing which should be reckoned to him rather as an act of madness,” says Muntaner, “than of reason. He said, ‘God forbid that I should attack them, all asleep as they are! Let the trumpets and nacaires sound to awaken them, and I will tarry till they be ready for action. No man shall have it to say, if I beat them, that it was by catching them asleep.’” (_Munt._ p. 287.) It is what Nelson might have done!

The Turkish admiral Sidi ’Ali, about to engage a Portuguese squadron in the Straits of Hormuz, in 1553, describes the Franks as “dressing their vessels with flags and coming on.” (_J. As._ ix. 70.)

[25] A cross _patée_, is one with the extremities broadened out into _feet_ as it were.

[26] Page 50.

[27] The galley at p. _49_ is somewhat too high; and I believe it should have had no _shrouds_.

[28] See _Muntaner_, passim, _e.g._ 271, 286, 315, 349.

[29] _Ibid._ 346.

VI. THE JEALOUSIES AND NAVAL WARS OF VENICE AND GENOA. LAMBA DORIA’S EXPEDITION TO THE ADRIATIC; BATTLE OF CURZOLA; AND IMPRISONMENT OF MARCO POLO BY THE GENOESE.

[Sidenote: Growing jealousies and outbreaks between the Republics.]

31. Jealousies, too characteristic of the Italian communities, were, in the case of the three great trading republics of Venice, Genoa, and Pisa, aggravated by commercial rivalries, whilst, between the two first of those states, and also between the two last, the bitterness of such feelings had been augmenting during the whole course of the 13th century.[1]

The brilliant part played by Venice in the conquest of Constantinople (1204), and the preponderance she thus acquired on the Greek shores, stimulated her arrogance and the resentment of her rivals. The three states no longer stood on a level as bidders for the shifting favour of the Emperor of the East. By treaty, not only was Venice established as the most important ally of the empire and as mistress of a large fraction of its territory, but all members of nations at war with her were prohibited from entering its limits. Though the Genoese colonies continued to exist, they stood at a great disadvantage, where their rivals were so predominant and enjoyed exemption from duties, to which the Genoese remained subject. Hence jealousies and resentments reached a climax in the Levantine settlements, and this colonial exacerbation reacted on the mother States.

A dispute which broke out at Acre in 1255 came to a head in a war which lasted for years, and was felt all over Syria. It began in a quarrel about a very old church called St. Sabba’s, which stood on the common boundary of the Venetian and Genoese estates in Acre,[2] and this flame was blown by other unlucky occurrences. Acre suffered grievously.[3] Venice at this time generally kept the upper hand, beating Genoa by land and sea, and driving her from Acre altogether.✛ Four ancient porphyry figures from St. Sabba’s were sent in triumph to Venice, and with their strange devices still stand at the exterior corner of St. Mark’s, towards the Ducal Palace.[4]

But no number of defeats could extinguish the spirit of Genoa, and the tables were turned when in her wrath she allied herself with Michael Palaeologus to upset the feeble and tottering Latin Dynasty, and with it the preponderance of Venice on the Bosphorus. The new emperor handed over to his allies the castle of their foes, which they tore down with jubilations, and now it was their turn to send its stones as trophies to Genoa. Mutual hate waxed fiercer than ever; no merchant fleet of either state could go to sea without convoy, and wherever their ships met they fought.[5] It was something like the state of things between Spain and England in the days of Drake.

[Illustration: Figures from St. Sabba’s, sent to Venice.]

The energy and capacity of the Genoese seemed to rise with their success, and both in seamanship and in splendour they began almost to surpass their old rivals. The fall of Acre (1291), and the total expulsion of the Franks from Syria, in great measure barred the southern routes of Indian trade, whilst the predominance of Genoa in the Euxine more or less obstructed the free access of her rival to the northern routes by Trebizond and Tana.

[Sidenote: Battle in Bay of Ayas in 1294.]

32. Truces were made and renewed, but the old fire still smouldered. In the spring of 1294 it broke into flame, in consequence of the seizure in the Grecian seas of three Genoese vessels by a Venetian fleet. This led to an action with a Genoese convoy which sought redress. The fight took place off Ayas in the Gulf of Scanderoon,[6] and though the Genoese were inferior in strength by one-third they gained a signal victory, capturing all but three of the Venetian galleys, with rich cargoes, including that of Marco Basilio (or Basegio), the commodore.

This victory over their haughty foe was in its completeness evidently a surprise to the Genoese, as well as a source of immense exultation, which is vigorously expressed in a ballad of the day, written in a stirring salt-water rhythm.[7] It represents the Venetians, as they enter the bay, in arrogant mirth reviling the Genoese with very unsavoury epithets as having deserted their ships to skulk on shore. They are described as saying:—

“‘Off they’ve slunk! and left us nothing; We shall get nor prize nor praise; Nothing save those crazy timbers Only fit to make a blaze.’”

So they advance carelessly—

“On they come! But lo their blunder! When our lads start up anon, Breaking out like unchained lions, With a roar, ‘Fall on! Fall on!’”[8]

After relating the battle and the thoroughness of the victory, ending in the conflagration of five-and-twenty captured galleys, the poet concludes by an admonition to the enemy to moderate his pride and curb his arrogant tongue, harping on the obnoxious epithet _porci leproxi_, which seems to have galled the Genoese.[9] He concludes:—

“Nor can I at all remember Ever to have heard the story Of a fight wherein the Victors Reaped so rich a meed of glory!”[10]

The community of Genoa decreed that the victory should be commemorated by the annual presentation of a golden pall to the monastery of St. German’s, the saint on whose feast (28th May) it had been won.[11]

The startling news was received at Venice with wrath and grief, for the flower of their navy had perished, and all energies were bent at once to raise an overwhelming force.[12] The Pope (Boniface VIII.) interfered as arbiter, calling for plenipotentiaries from both sides. But spirits were too much inflamed, and this mediation came to nought.

Further outrages on both sides occurred in 1296. The Genoese residences at Pera were fired, their great alum works on the coast of Anatolia were devastated, and Caffa was stormed and sacked; whilst on the other hand a number of the Venetians at Constantinople were massacred by the Genoese, and Marco Bembo, their Bailo, was flung from a house-top. Amid such events the fire of enmity between the cities waxed hotter and hotter.

[Sidenote: Lamba Doria’s Expedition to the Adriatic.]

33. In 1298 the Genoese made elaborate preparations for a great blow at the enemy, and fitted out a powerful fleet which they placed under the command of LAMBA DORIA, a younger brother of Uberto of that illustrious house, under whom he had served fourteen years before in the great rout of the Pisans at Meloria.

The rendezvous of the fleet was in the Gulf of Spezia, as we learn from the same pithy Genoese poet who celebrated Ayas. This time the Genoese were bent on bearding St. Mark’s Lion in his own den; and after touching at Messina they steered straight for the Adriatic:—

“Now, as astern Otranto bears, Pull with a will! and, please the Lord, Let them who bragged, with fire and sword, To waste our homesteads, look to theirs!”[13]

On their entering the gulf a great storm dispersed the fleet. The admiral with twenty of his galleys got into port at Antivari on the Albanian coast, and next day was rejoined by fifty-eight more, with which he scoured the Dalmatian shore, plundering all Venetian property. Some sixteen of his galleys were still missing when he reached the island of Curzola, or Scurzola as the more popular name seems to have been, the Black Corcyra of the Ancients—the chief town of which, a rich and flourishing place, the Genoese took and burned.[14] Thus they were engaged when word came that the Venetian fleet was in sight.

Venice, on first hearing of the Genoese armament, sent Andrea Dandolo with a large force to join and supersede Maffeo Quirini, who was already cruising with a squadron in the Ionian sea; and, on receiving further information of the strength of the hostile expedition, the Signory hastily equipped thirty-two more galleys in Chioggia and the ports of Dalmatia, and despatched them to join Dandolo, making the whole number under his command up to something like ninety-five. Recent drafts had apparently told heavily upon the Venetian sources of enlistment, and it is stated that many of the complements were made up of rustics swept in haste from the Euganean hills. To this the Genoese poet seems to allude, alleging that the Venetians, in spite of their haughty language, had to go begging for men and money up and down Lombardy. “Did _we_ do like that, think you?” he adds:—

“Beat up for aliens? _We_ indeed? When lacked we homeborn Genoese? Search all the seas, no salts like these, For Courage, Seacraft, Wit at need.”[15]

Of one of the Venetian galleys, probably in the fleet which sailed under Dandolo’s immediate command, went Marco Polo as _Sopracomito_ or Gentleman-Commander.[16]

[Sidenote: The Fleets come in sight of each other at Curzola.]

34. It was on the afternoon of Saturday the 6th September that the Genoese saw the Venetian fleet approaching, but, as sunset was not far off, both sides tacitly agreed to defer the engagement.[17]

The Genoese would appear to have occupied a position near the eastern end of the Island of Curzola, with the Peninsula of Sabbioncello behind them, and Meleda on their left, whilst the Venetians advanced along the south side of Curzola. (See map on p. _50_).

According to Venetian accounts the Genoese were staggered at the sight of the Venetian armaments, and sent more than once to seek terms, offering finally to surrender galleys and munitions of war, if the crews were allowed to depart. This is an improbable story, and that of the Genoese ballad seems more like truth. Doria, it says, held a council of his captains in the evening at which they all voted for attack, whilst the Venetians, with that overweening sense of superiority which at this time is reflected in their own annals as distinctly as in those of their enemies, kept scout-vessels out to watch that the Genoese fleet, which they looked on as already their own, did not steal away in the darkness. A vain imagination, says the poet:—

“Blind error of vainglorious men To dream that we should seek to flee After those weary leagues of sea Crossed, but to hunt them in their den!”[18]

[Sidenote: The Venetians defeated, and Marco Polo a prisoner.]

35. The battle began early on Sunday and lasted till the afternoon. The Venetians had the wind in their favour, but the morning sun in their eyes. They made the attack, and with great impetuosity, capturing ten Genoese galleys; but they pressed on too wildly, and some of their vessels ran aground. One of their galleys too, being taken, was cleared of her crew and turned against the Venetians. These incidents caused confusion among the assailants; the Genoese, who had begun to give way, took fresh heart, formed a close column, and advanced boldly through the Venetian line, already in disorder. The sun had begun to decline when there appeared on the Venetian flank the fifteen or sixteen missing galleys of Doria’s fleet, and fell upon it with fresh force. This decided the action. The Genoese gained a complete victory, capturing all but a few of the Venetian galleys, and including the flagship with Dandolo. The Genoese themselves lost heavily, especially in the early part of the action, and Lamba Doria’s eldest son Octavian is said to have fallen on board his father’s vessel.[19] The number of prisoners taken was over 7000, and among these was Marco Polo.[20]

[Illustration: Marco Polo’s Galley going into action at Curzola.

... “=il sembloit que la galie volast, par les nageurs qui la contreingnoient aux avirons, et sembloit que foudre cheist des ciex, au bruit que les pennonciaus menoient; et que les nacaires les tabours et les cors sarrazinnois menoient, qui estoient en sa galie.=”

(_Joinville_, vide _ante_, p. 40.)]

The prisoners, even of the highest rank, appear to have been chained. Dandolo, in despair at his defeat, and at the prospect of being carried captive into Genoa, refused food, and ended by dashing his head against a bench.[21] A Genoese account asserts that a noble funeral was given him after the arrival of the fleet at Genoa, which took place on the evening of the 16th October.[22] It was received with great rejoicing, and the City voted the annual presentation of a pallium of gold brocade to the altar of the Virgin in the Church of St. Matthew, on every 8th of September, the Madonna’s day, on the eve of which the Battle had been won. To the admiral himself a Palace was decreed. It still stands, opposite the Church of St. Matthew, though it has passed from the possession of the Family. On the striped marble façades, both of the Church and of the Palace, inscriptions of that age, in excellent preservation, still commemorate Lamba’s achievement.[23] Malik al Mansúr, the Mameluke Sultan of Egypt, as an enemy of Venice, sent a complimentary letter to Doria accompanied by costly presents.[24]

[Illustration: Scene of the Battle of Curzola.]

[Illustration: Church of San Matteo, Genoa.]

The latter died at Savona 17th October, 1323, a few months before the most illustrious of his prisoners, and his bones were laid in a sarcophagus which may still be seen forming the sill of one of the windows of S. Matteo (on the right as you enter). Over this sarcophagus stood the Bust of Lamba till 1797, when the mob of Genoa, in idiotic imitation of the French proceedings of that age, threw it down. All of Lamba’s six sons had fought with him at Meloria. In 1291 one of them, Tedisio, went forth into the Atlantic in company with Ugolino Vivaldi on a voyage of discovery, and never returned. Through Cæsar, the youngest, this branch of the Family still survives, bearing the distinctive surname of _Lamba-Doria_.[25]

As to the treatment of the prisoners, accounts differ; a thing usual in such cases. The Genoese Poet asserts that the hearts of his countrymen were touched, and that the captives were treated with compassionate courtesy. Navagiero the Venetian, on the other hand, declares that most of them died of hunger.[26]

[Sidenote: Marco Polo in prison dictates his book to Rusticiano of Pisa. Release of Venetian prisoners.]

36. Howsoever they may have been treated, here was Marco Polo one of those many thousand prisoners in Genoa; and here, before long, he appears to have made acquaintance with a man of literary propensities, whose destiny had brought him into the like plight, by name RUSTICIANO or RUSTICHELLO of Pisa. It was this person perhaps who persuaded the Traveller to defer no longer the reduction to writing of his notable experiences; but in any case it was he who wrote down those experiences at Marco’s dictation; it is he therefore to whom we owe the preservation of this record, and possibly even that of the Traveller’s very memory. This makes the Genoese imprisonment so important an episode in Polo’s biography.

To Rusticiano we shall presently recur. But let us first bring to a conclusion what may be gathered as to the duration of Polo’s imprisonment.

It does not appear whether Pope Boniface made any new effort for accommodation between the Republics; but other Italian princes did interpose, and Matteo Visconti, Captain-General of Milan, styling himself Vicar-General of the Holy Roman Empire in Lombardy, was accepted as Mediator, along with the community of Milan. Ambassadors from both States presented themselves at that city, and on the 25th May, 1299, they signed the terms of a Peace.

These terms were perfectly honourable to Venice, being absolutely equal and reciprocal; from which one is apt to conclude that the damage to the City of the Sea was rather to her pride than to her power; the success of Genoa, in fact, having been followed up by no systematic attack upon Venetian commerce.[27] Among the terms was the mutual release of prisoners on a day to be fixed by Visconti after the completion of all formalities. This day is not recorded, but as the Treaty was ratified by the Doge of Venice on the 1st July, and the latest extant document connected with the formalities appears to be dated 18th July, we may believe that before the end of August Marco Polo was restored to the family mansion in S. Giovanni Grisostomo.

[Sidenote: Grounds on which the story of Marco Polo’s capture at Curzola rests.]

37. Something further requires to be said before quitting this event in our Traveller’s life. For we confess that a critical reader may have some justification in asking what evidence there is that Marco Polo ever fought at Curzola, and ever was carried a prisoner to Genoa from that unfortunate action?

A learned Frenchman, whom we shall have to quote freely in the immediately ensuing pages, does not venture to be more precise in reference to the meeting of Polo and Rusticiano than to say of the latter: “In 1298, being in durance in the Prison of Genoa, he there became acquainted with Marco Polo, whom the Genoese had deprived of his liberty _from motives equally unknown_.”[28]

To those who have no relish for biographies that round the meagre skeleton of authentic facts with a plump padding of what _might have been_, this sentence of Paulin Paris is quite refreshing in its stern limitation to positive knowledge. And certainly no contemporary authority has yet been found for the capture of our Traveller at Curzola. Still I think that the fact is beyond reasonable doubt.

Ramusio’s biographical notices certainly contain many errors of detail; and some, such as the many years’ interval which he sets between the Battle of Curzola and Marco’s return, are errors which a very little trouble would have enabled him to eschew. But still it does seem reasonable to believe that the main fact of Marco’s command of a galley at Curzola, and capture there, was derived from a genuine tradition, if not from documents.

Let us then turn to the words which close Rusticiano’s preamble (see _post_, p. 2):—“Lequel (Messire Marc) puis demorant en le charthre de Jene, fist retraire toutes cestes chouses a Messire Rustacians de Pise que en celle meissme charthre estoit, au tens qu’il avoit 1298 anz que Jezu eut vesqui.” These words are at least thoroughly consistent with Marco’s capture at Curzola, as regards both the position in which they present him, and the year in which he is thus presented.

There is however another piece of evidence, though it is curiously indirect.

The Dominican Friar Jacopo of Acqui was a contemporary of Polo’s, and was the author of a somewhat obscure Chronicle called _Imago Mundi_.[29] Now this Chronicle does contain mention of Marco’s capture in action by the Genoese, but attributes it to a different action from Curzola, and one fought at a time when Polo could not have been present. The passage runs as follows in a manuscript of the Ambrosian Library, according to an extract given by Baldelli Boni:—

“In the year of Christ MCCLXXXXVI, in the time of Pope Boniface VI., of whom we have spoken above, a battle was fought in Arminia, at the place called Layaz, between xv. galleys of Genoese merchants and xxv. of Venetian merchants; and after a great fight the galleys of the Venetians were beaten, and (the crews) all slain or taken; and among them was taken Messer Marco the Venetian, who was in company with those merchants, and who was called _Milono_, which is as much as to say ‘a thousand thousand pounds,’ for so goes the phrase in Venice. So this Messer Marco Milono the Venetian, with the other Venetian prisoners, is carried off to the prison of Genoa, and there kept for a long time. This Messer Marco was a long time with his father and uncle in Tartary, and he there saw many things, and made much wealth, and also learned many things, for he was a man of ability. And so, being in prison at Genoa, he made a Book concerning the great wonders of the World, _i.e._, concerning such of them as he had seen. And what he told in the Book was not as much as he had really seen, because of the tongues of detractors, who, being ready to impose their own lies on others, are over hasty to set down as lies what they in their perversity disbelieve, or do not understand. And because there are many great and strange things in that Book, which are reckoned past all credence, he was asked by his friends on his death-bed to correct the Book by removing everything that went beyond the facts. To which his reply was that he had not told _one-half_ of what he had really seen!”[30]

This statement regarding the capture of Marco _at the Battle of Ayas_ is one which cannot be true, for we know that he did not reach Venice till 1295, travelling from Persia by way of Trebizond and the Bosphorus, whilst the Battle of Ayas of which we have purposely given some detail, was fought in May, 1294. The date MCCLXXXXVI assigned to it in the preceding extract has given rise to some unprofitable discussion. Could that date be accepted, no doubt it would enable us also to accept this, the sole statement from the Traveller’s own age of the circumstances which brought him into a Genoese prison; it would enable us to place that imprisonment within a few months of his return from the East, and to extend its duration to three years, points which would thus accord better with the general tenor of Ramusio’s tradition than the capture of Curzola. But the matter is not open to such a solution. The date of the Battle of Ayas is not more doubtful than that of the Battle of the Nile. It is clearly stated by several independent chroniclers, and is carefully established in the Ballad that we have quoted above.[31] We shall see repeatedly in the course of this Book how uncertain are the transcriptions of dates in Roman numerals, and in the present case the LXXXXVI is as certainly a mistake for LXXXXIV as is Boniface VI. in the same quotation a mistake for Boniface VIII.

But though we cannot accept the statement that Polo was taken prisoner at _Ayas, in the spring of 1294_, we may accept the passage as evidence from a contemporary source that he was _taken prisoner in some sea-fight with the Genoese_, and thus admit it in corroboration of the Ramusian Tradition of his capture in a sea-fight at Curzola in 1298, which is perfectly consistent with all other facts in our possession.

---------------------------------------------------------------------- [1] In this part of these notices I am repeatedly indebted to _Heyd._ (See _supra_, p. 9.)

[2] On or close to the Hill called _Monjoie_; see the plan from Marino Sanudo at p. 18.

[3] “Throughout that year there were not less than 40 machines all at work upon the city of Acre, battering its houses and its towers, and smashing and overthrowing everything within their range. There were at least ten of those engines that shot stones so big and heavy that they weighed a good 1500 lbs. by the weight of Champagne; insomuch that nearly all the towers and forts of Acre were destroyed, and only the religious houses were left. And there were slain in this same war good 20,000 men on the two sides, but chiefly of Genoese and Spaniards.” (_Lettre de Jean Pierre Sarrasin_, in _Michel’s Joinville_, p. 308.)

[4] The origin of these columns is, however, somewhat uncertain. [See _Cicogna_, I. p. 379.]

[5] In 1262, when a Venetian squadron was taken by the Greek fleet in alliance with the Genoese, the whole of the survivors of the captive crews were _blinded_ by order of Palaeologus. (_Roman._ ii. 272.)

[6] See pp. 16, 41, and Plan of Ayas at beginning of Bk. I.

[7] See _Archivio Storico Italiano_, Appendice, tom. iv.

[8]

_Niente ne resta a prender Se no li corpi de li legni: Preixi som senza difender; De bruxar som tute degni!_ * * * * _Como li fom aproximai Queli si levan lantor Como leon descaenai Tuti criando_ “Alor! Alor!”

This _Alor! Alor!_ (“Up, Boys, and at ’em”), or something similar, appears to have been the usual war-cry of both parties. So a trumpet-like poem of the Troubadour warrior Bertram de Born, whom Dante found in such evil plight below (xxviii. 118 _seqq._), in which he sings with extraordinary spirit the joys of war:—

“=Ie us dic que tan no m’a sabor Manjars, ni beure, ni dormir, Cum a quant aug cridar,= ALOR! =D’ambas la partz; et aug agnir Cavals voits per l’ombratge=....”

“I tell you a zest far before Aught of slumber, or drink, or of food, I snatch when the shouts of ALOR Ring from both sides: and out of the wood Comes the neighing of steeds dimly seen....”

In a galley fight at Tyre in 1258, according to a Latin narrative, the Genoese shout “Ad arma, ad arma! _ad ipsos, ad ipsos!_” The cry of the Venetians before engaging the Greeks is represented by Martino da Canale, in his old French, as “_or à yaus! or à yaus!_” that of the Genoese on another occasion as _Aur! Aur!_ and this last is the shout of the Catalans also in Ramon de Muntaner. (_Villemain, Litt. du Moyen Age_, i. 99; _Archiv. Stor. Ital._ viii. 364, 506; _Pertz, Script._ xviii. 239; _Muntaner_, 269, 287.) Recently in a Sicilian newspaper, narrating an act of gallant and successful reprisal (only too rare) by country folk on a body of the brigands who are such a scourge to parts of the island, I read that the honest men in charging the villains raised a shout of “_Ad iddi! Ad iddi!_”

[9] A phrase curiously identical, with a similar sequence, is attributed to an Austrian General at the battle of Skalitz in 1866. (_Stoffel’s Letters._)

[10]

_E no me posso aregordar Dalcuno romanzo vertadê Donde oyse uncha cointar Alcun triumfo si sobré!_

[11] _Stella_ in _Muratori_, xvii. 984.

[12] _Dandulo_, Ibid. xii. 404–405.

[13]

_Or entram con gran vigor, En De sperando aver triumpho, Queli zerchando inter lo Gorfo Chi menazeram zercha lor!_

And in the next verse note the pure Scotch use of the word _bra_:—

_Sichè da Otranto se partim Quella bra compagnia, Per assar in Ihavonia, D’Avosto a vinte nove dì._

[14] The island of Curzola now counts about 4000 inhabitants; the town half the number. It was probably reckoned a dependency of Venice at this time. The King of Hungary had renounced his claims on the Dalmatian coasts by treaty in 1244. (_Romanin_, ii. 235.) The gallant defence of the place against the Algerines in 1571 won for Curzola from the Venetian Senate the honourable title in all documents of _fedelissima_. (_Paton’s Adriatic_, I. 47.)

[15]

_Ma sé si gran colmo avea Perchè andava mendigando_

_Per terra de Lombardia Peccunia, gente a sodi? Pone mente tu che l’odi Se noi tegnamo questa via?_

_No, ma’ più! ajamo omi nostrar Destri, valenti, e avisti, Che mai par de lor n’o visti In tuti officj de mar._

[16] In July 1294, a Council of Thirty decreed that galleys should be equipped by the richest families in proportion to their wealth. Among the families held to equip one galley each, or one galley among two or more, in this list, is the CA’ POLO. But this was before the return of the travellers from the East, and just after the battle of Ayas. (_Romanin_, ii. 332; this author misdates Ayas, however.) When a levy was required in Venice for any expedition the heads of each _contrada_ divided the male inhabitants, between the ages of twenty and sixty, into groups of twelve each, called _duodene_. The dice were thrown to decide who should go first on service. He who went received five _lire_ a month from the State, and one _lira_ from each of his colleagues in the _duodena_. Hence his pay was sixteen _lire_ a month, about 2_s._ a day in silver value, if these were _lire ai grossi_, or 1_s._ 4_d._ if _lire dei piccoli_. (See _Romanin_, ii. 393–394.)

Money on such occasions was frequently raised by what was called an _Estimo_ or _Facion_, which was a force loan levied on the citizens in proportion to their estimated wealth; and for which they were entitled to interest from the State.

[17] Several of the Italian chroniclers, as Ferreto of Vicenza and Navagiero, whom Muratori has followed in his “Annals,” say the battle was fought on the 8th September, the so-called Birthday of the Madonna. But the inscription on the Church of St. Matthew at Genoa, cited further on, says the 7th, and with this agree both Stella and the Genoese poet. For the latter, though not specifying the day of the month, says it was on a Sunday:—

“Lo di de Domenga era Passa prima en l’ora bona Stormezam fin provo nona Con bataio forte e fera.”

Now the 7th September, 1298, fell on a Sunday.

[18]

_Ma li pensavam grande error Che in fuga se fussem tuti metui Che de si lonzi eram vegnui Per cerchali a casa lor._

[19] “Note here that the Genoese generally, commonly, and by nature, are the most covetous of Men, and the Love of Gain spurs them to every Crime. Yet are they deemed also the most valiant Men in the World. Such an one was Lampa, of that very Doria family, a man of an high Courage truly. For when he was engaged in a Sea-Fight against the Venetians, and was standing on the Poop of his Galley, his Son, fighting valiantly at the Forecastle, was shot by an Arrow in the Breast, and fell wounded to the Death; a Mishap whereat his Comrades were sorely shaken, and Fear came upon the whole Ship’s Company. But Lampa, hot with the Spirit of Battle, and more mindful of his Country’s Service and his own Glory than of his Son, ran forward to the spot, loftily rebuked the agitated Crowd, and ordered his Son’s Body to be cast into the Deep, telling them for their Comfort that the Land could never have afforded his Boy a nobler Tomb. And then, renewing the Fight more fiercely than ever, he achieved the Victory.” (_Benvenuto of Imola_, in _Comment. on Dante, in Muratori, Antiq._ i. 1146.)

(“Yet like an English General will I die, And all the Ocean make my spacious Grave; Women and Cowards on the Land may lie, The Sea’s the Tomb that’s proper for the Brave!” —_Annus Mirabilis_.)

[20] The particulars of the battle are gathered from _Ferretus Vicentinus_, in _Murat._ ix. 985 _seqq._; _And. Dandulo_, in xii. 407–408; _Navagiero_, in xxiii. 1009–1010; and the Genoese Poem as before.

[21] _Navagiero_, u.s. Dandulo says, “after a few days he died of grief”; Ferretus, that he was killed in the action and buried at Curzola.

[22] For the funeral, a MS. of Cibo Recco quoted by _Jacopo Doria_ in _La Chiesa di San Matteo descritta_, etc., Genova, 1860, p. 26. For the date of arrival the poem so often quoted:—

“_De Oitover_, a zoia, _a seze di_ Lo nostro ostel, con gran festa En nostro porto, a or di sesta Domine De restitui.”

[23] S. Matteo was built by Martin Doria in 1125, but pulled down and rebuilt by the family in a slightly different position in 1278. On this occasion is recorded a remarkable anticipation of the feats of American engineering: “As there was an ancient and very fine picture of Christ upon the apse of the Church, it was thought a great pity that so fine a work should be destroyed. And so they contrived an ingenious method by which the apse bodily was transported without injury, picture and all, for a distance of 25 ells, and firmly set upon the foundations where it now exists.” (_Jacopo de Varagine_ in _Muratori_, vol. ix. 36.)

The inscription on S. Matteo regarding the battle is as follows:—“_Ad Honorem Dei et Beate Virginis Marie Anno MCCLXXXXVIII Die Dominico VII Septembris iste Angelus captus fuit in Gulfo Venetiarum in Civitate Scursole et ibidem fuit prelium Galearum LXXVI Januensium cum Galeis LXXXXVI Veneciarum. Capte fuerunt LXXXIIII per Nobilem Virum Dominum Lambam Aurie Capitaneum et Armiratum tunc Comunis et Populi Janue cum omnibus existentibus in eisdem, de quibus conduxit Janue homines vivos carceratos VII cccc et Galeas XVIII, reliquas LXVI fecit cumburi in dicto Gulfo Veneciarum. Qui obiit Sagone I. MCCCXXIII._” It is not clear to what the _Angelus_ refers.

[24] _Rampoldi, Ann. Musulm._ ix. 217.

[25] _Jacopo Doria_, p. 280.

[26] _Murat._ xxiii. 1010. I learn from a Genoese gentleman, through my friend Professor Henry Giglioli (to whose kindness I owe the transcript of the inscription just given), that a faint tradition exists as to the place of our traveller’s imprisonment. It is alleged to have been a massive building, standing between the _Grazie_ and the Mole, and bearing the name of the _Malapaga_, which is now a barrack for Doganieri, but continued till comparatively recent times to be used as a civil prison. “It is certain,” says my informant, “that men of fame in arms who had fallen into the power of the Genoese _were_ imprisoned there, and among others is recorded the name of the Corsican Giudice dalla Rocca and Lord of Cinarca, who died there in 1312;” a date so near that of Marco’s imprisonment as to give some interest to the hypothesis, slender as are its grounds. Another Genoese, however, indicates as the scene of Marco’s captivity certain old prisons near the Old Arsenal, in a site still known as the _Vico degli Schiavi_. (_Celesia, Dante in Liguria_, 1865, p. 43.) [Was not the place of Polo’s captivity the basement of the _Palazzo del Capitan del Popolo_, afterwards _Palazzo del Comune al Mare_, where the Customs (_Dogana_) had their office, and from the 15th century the _Casa_ or _Palazzo di S. Giorgio?_—H. C.]

[27] The Treaty and some subsidiary documents are printed in the Genoese _Liber Jurium_, forming a part of the _Monumenta Historiae Patriae_, published at Turin. (See _Lib. Jur._ II. 344, _seqq._) Muratori in his Annals has followed John Villani (Bk. VIII. ch. 27) in representing the terms as highly unfavourable to Venice. But for this there is no foundation in the documents. And the terms are stated with substantial accuracy in Navagiero. (_Murat. Script._ xxiii. 1011.)

[28] _Paulin Paris, Les Manuscrits François de la Bibliothèque du Roi_, ii. 355.

[29] Though there is no precise information as to the birth or death of this writer, who belonged to a noble family of Lombardy, the Bellingeri, he can be traced with tolerable certainty as in life in 1289, 1320, and 1334. (See the Introduction to his Chronicle in the Turin _Monumentà_, _Scriptores_ III.)

[30] There is another MS. of the _Imago Mundi_ at Turin, which has been printed in the _Monumenta_. The passage about Polo in that copy differs widely in wording, is much shorter, and contains no date. But it relates his capture as having taken place at _Là Glazà_, which I think there can be no doubt is also intended for Ayas (sometimes called _Giàzza_), a place which in fact is called _Glaza_ in three of the MSS. of which various readings are given in the edition of the Société de Géographie (p. 535).

[31]

“_E per meio esse aregordenti De si grande scacho mato Correa mille duxenti Zonto ge novanta e quatro._”

The Armenian Prince Hayton or Héthum has put it under 1293. (See _Langlois, Mém. sur les Relations de Gênes avec la Petite-Arménie_.)

VII. RUSTICIANO OR RUSTICHELLO OF PISA, MARCO POLO’S FELLOW-PRISONER AT GENOA, THE SCRIBE WHO WROTE DOWN THE TRAVELS.

38. We have now to say something of that Rusticiano to whom all who value Polo’s book are so much indebted.

[Sidenote: Rusticiano, perhaps a prisoner from Meloria.]

The relations between Genoa and Pisa had long been so hostile that it was only too natural in 1298 to find a Pisan in the gaol of Genoa. An unhappy multitude of such prisoners had been carried thither fourteen years before, and the survivors still lingered there in vastly dwindled numbers. In the summer of 1284 was fought the battle from which Pisa had to date the commencement of her long decay. In July of that year the Pisans, at a time when the Genoese had no fleet in their own immediate waters, had advanced to the very port of Genoa and shot their defiance into the proud city in the form of silver-headed arrows, and stones belted with scarlet.[1] They had to pay dearly for this insult. The Genoese, recalling their cruisers, speedily mustered a fleet of eighty-eight galleys, which were placed under the command of another of that illustrious House of Doria, the Scipios of Genoa as they have been called, Uberto, the elder brother of Lamba. Lamba himself with his six sons, and another brother, was in the fleet, whilst the whole number of Dorias who fought in the ensuing action amounted to 250, most of them on board one great galley bearing the name of the family patron, St. Matthew.[2]

The Pisans, more than one-fourth inferior in strength, came out boldly, and the battle was fought off the Porto Pisano, in fact close in front of Leghorn, where a lighthouse on a remarkable arched basement still marks the islet of MELORIA, whence the battle got its name. The day was the 6th of August, the feast of St. Sixtus, a day memorable in the Pisan Fasti for several great victories. But on this occasion the defeat of Pisa was overwhelming. Forty of their galleys were taken or sunk, and upwards of 9000 prisoners carried to Genoa. In fact so vast a sweep was made of the flower of Pisan manhood that it was a common saying then: “_Che vuol veder Pisa, vada a Genova_!” Many noble ladies of Pisa went in large companies on foot to Genoa to seek their husbands or kinsmen: “And when they made enquiry of the Keepers of the Prisons, the reply would be, ‘Yesterday there died thirty of them, to-day there have died forty; all of whom we have cast into the sea; and so it is daily.’”[3]

[Illustration: Seal of the Pisan Prisoners.]

A body of prisoners so numerous and important naturally exerted themselves in the cause of peace, and through their efforts, after many months of negotiation, a formal peace was signed (15th April, 1288). But through the influence, as was alleged, of Count Ugolino (Dante’s) who was then in power at Pisa, the peace became abortive; war almost immediately recommenced, and the prisoners had no release.[4] And, when the 6000 or 7000 Venetians were thrown into the prisons of Genoa in October 1298, they would find there the scanty surviving remnant of the Pisan Prisoners of Meloria, and would gather from them dismal forebodings of the fate before them.

It is a fair conjecture that to that remnant Rusticiano of Pisa may have belonged.

We have seen Ramusio’s representation of the kindness shown to Marco during his imprisonment by a certain Genoese gentleman who also assisted him to reduce his travels to writing. We may be certain that this Genoese gentleman is only a distorted image of Rusticiano, the Pisan prisoner in the gaol of Genoa, whose name and part in the history of his hero’s book Ramusio so strangely ignores. Yet patriotic Genoese writers in our own times have striven to determine the identity of this their imaginary countryman![5]

[Sidenote: Rusticiano, a person known from other sources.]

39. Who, then, was Rusticiano, or, as the name actually is read in the oldest type of MS., “Messire Rustacians de Pise”?

Our knowledge of him is but scanty. Still something is known of him besides the few words concluding his preamble to our Traveller’s Book, which you may read at pp. 1–2 of the body of this volume.

In Sir Walter Scott’s “Essay on Romance,” when he speaks of the new mould in which the subjects of the old metrical stories were cast by the school of prose romancers which arose in the 13th century, we find the following words:—

“Whatever fragments or shadows of true history may yet remain hidden under the mass of accumulated fable which had been heaped upon them during successive ages, must undoubtedly be sought in the metrical romances.... But those prose authors who wrote under the imaginary names of RUSTICIEN DE PISE, Robert de Borron, and the like, usually seized upon the subject of some old minstrel; and recomposing the whole narrative after their own fashion, with additional character and adventure, totally obliterated in that operation any shades which remained of the original and probably authentic tradition,” &c.[6]

Evidently, therefore, Sir Walter regarded Rustician of Pisa as a person belonging to the same ghostly company as his own Cleishbothams and Dryasdusts. But in this we see that he was wrong.

In the great Paris Library and elsewhere there are manuscript volumes containing the stories of the Round Table abridged and somewhat clumsily combined from the various Prose Romances of that cycle, such as _Sir Tristan_, _Lancelot_, _Palamedes_, _Giron le Courtois_, &c., which had been composed, it would seem, by various Anglo-French gentlemen at the court of Henry III., styled, or styling themselves, Gasses le Blunt, Luces du Gast, Robert de Borron, and Hélis de Borron. And these abridgments or recasts are professedly the work of _Le Maistre Rusticien de Pise_. Several of them were printed at Paris in the end of the 15th and beginning of the 16th centuries as the works of Rusticien de Pise; and as the preambles and the like, especially in the form presented in those printed editions, appear to be due sometimes to the original composers (as Robert and Hélis de Borron) and sometimes to Rusticien de Pise the recaster, there would seem to have been a good deal of confusion made in regard to their respective personalities.

From a preamble to one of those compilations which undoubtedly belongs to Rustician, and which we shall quote at length by and bye, we learn that Master Rustician “translated” (or perhaps _transferred?_) his compilation from a book belonging to King Edward of England, at the time when that prince went beyond seas to recover the Holy Sepulchre. Now Prince Edward started for the Holy Land in 1270, spent the winter of that year in Sicily, and arrived in Palestine in May 1271. He quitted it again in August, 1272, and passed again by Sicily, where in January, 1273, he heard of his father’s death and his own consequent accession. Paulin Paris supposes that Rustician was attached to the Sicilian Court of Charles of Anjou, and that Edward “may have deposited with that king the Romances of the Round Table, of which all the world was talking, but the manuscripts of which were still very rare, especially those of the work of Helye de Borron[7] ... whether by order, or only with permission of the King of Sicily, our Rustician made haste to read, abridge, and re-arrange the whole, and when Edward returned to Sicily he recovered possession of the book from which the indefatigable Pisan had extracted the contents.”

But this I believe is, in so far as it passes the facts stated in Rustician’s own preamble, pure hypothesis, for nothing is cited that connects Rustician with the King of Sicily. And if there be not some such confusion of personality as we have alluded to, in another of the preambles, which is quoted by Dunlop as an utterance of Rustician’s, that personage would seem to claim to have been a comrade in arms of the two de Borrons. We might, therefore, conjecture that Rustician himself had accompanied Prince Edward to Syria.[8]

[Sidenote: Character of Rustician’s Romance compilations.]

40. Rustician’s literary work appears from the extracts and remarks of Paulin Paris to be that of an industrious simple man, without method or much judgment. “The haste with which he worked is too perceptible; the adventures are told without connection; you find long stories of Tristan followed by adventures of his father Meliadus.” For the latter derangement of historical sequence we find a quaint and ingenuous apology offered in Rustician’s epilogue to Giron le Courtois:—

“Cy fine le Maistre Rusticien de Pise son conte en louant et regraciant le Père le Filz et le Saint Esperit, et ung mesme Dieu, Filz de la Benoiste Vierge Marie, de ce qu’il m’a doné grace, sens, force, et mémoire, temps et lieu, de me mener à fin de si haulte et si noble matière come ceste-cy dont j’ay traicté les faiz et proesses recitez et recordez à mon livre. Et se aucun me demandoit pour quoy j’ay parlé de Tristan avant que de son père le Roy Meliadus, je respons que ma matière n’estoist pas congneue. Car je ne puis pas scavoir tout, ne mettre toutes mes paroles par ordre. Et ainsi fine mon conte. Amen.”[9]

In a passage of these compilations the Emperor Charlemagne is asked whether in his judgment King Meliadus or his son Tristan were the better man? The Emperor’s answer is: “I should say that the King Meliadus was the better man, and I will tell you why I say so. As far as I can see, everything that Tristan did was done for Love, and his great feats would never have been done but under the constraint of Love, which was his spur and goad. Now that never can be said of King Meliadus! For what deeds he did, he did them not by dint of Love, but by dint of his strong right arm. Purely out of his own goodness he did good, and not by constraint of Love.” “It will be seen,” remarks on this Paulin Paris, “that we are here a long way removed from the ordinary principles of Round Table Romances. And one thing besides will be manifest, viz., that Rusticien de Pise was no Frenchman!”[10]

The same discretion is shown even more prominently in a passage of one of his compilations, which contains the romances of Arthur, Gyron, and Meliadus (No. 6975—see last note but one):—

“No doubt,” Rustician says, “other books tell the story of the Queen Ginevra and Lancelot differently from this; and there were certain passages between them of which the Master, in his concern for the honour of both those personages, will say not a word.” Alas, says the French Bibliographer, that the copy of Lancelot, which fell into the hands of poor Francesca of Rimini, was not one of those _expurgated_ by our worthy friend Rustician![11]

[Sidenote: Identity of the Romance Compiler with Polo’s fellow-prisoner.]

41. A question may still occur to an attentive reader as to the identity of this Romance-compiler Rusticien de Pise with the Messire _Rustacians de Pise_, of a solitary MS. of Polo’s work (though the oldest and most authentic), a name which appears in other copies as _Rusta Pisan_, _Rasta Pysan_, _Rustichelus Civis Pisanus_, _Rustico_, _Restazio da Pisa_, _Stazio da Pisa_, and who is stated in the preamble to have acted as the Traveller’s scribe at Genoa.

M. Pauthier indeed[12] asserts that the French of the MS. Romances of Rusticien de Pise is of the same barbarous character as that of the early French MS. of Polo’s Book to which we have just alluded, and which we shall show to be the nearest presentation of the work as originally dictated by the Traveller. The language of the latter MS. is so peculiar that this would be almost perfect evidence of the identity of the writers, if it were really the fact. A cursory inspection which I have made of two of those MSS. in Paris, and the extracts which I have given and am about to give, do not, however, by any means support M. Pauthier’s view. Nor would that view be consistent with the judgment of so competent an authority as Paulin Paris, implied in his calling Rustician a _nom recommandable_ in old French literature, and his speaking of him as “versed in the secrets of the French Romance Tongue.”[13] In fact the difference of language in the two cases would really be a difficulty in the way of identification, if there were room for doubt. This, however, Paulin Paris seems to have excluded finally, by calling attention to the peculiar formula of preamble which is common to the Book of Marco Polo and to one of the Romance compilations of Rusticien de Pise.

The former will be found in English at pp. 1, 2, of our Translation; but we give a part of the original below[14] for comparison with the preamble to the Romances of Meliadus, Tristan, and Lancelot, as taken from MS. 6961 (Fr. 340) of the Paris Library:—

“_Seigneurs Empereurs et Princes, Ducs et Contes et Barons et Chevaliers et Vavasseurs et Bourgeois, et tous les preudommes de cestui monde qui avez talent de vous deliter en rommans, si prenez cestui (livre) et le faites lire de chief en chief, si orrez toutes les grans aventure_ qui advindrent entre les Chevaliers errans du temps au Roy Uter Pendragon, jusques à le temps au Roy Artus son fils, et des compaignons de la Table Ronde. Et sachiez tout vraiment que cist livres fust translatez du livre Monseigneur Edouart le Roy d’Engleterre en cellui temps qu’il passa oultre la mer au service nostre Seigneur Damedieu pour conquester le Sant Sepulcre, et Maistre Rusticiens de Pise, lequel est ymaginez yci dessus,[15] compila ce rommant, car il en translata toutes les merveilleuses nouvelles et aventures qu’il trouva en celle livre et traita tout certainement de toutes les aventures du monde, et si sachiez qu’il traitera plus de Monseigneur Lancelot du Lac, et Monsʳ Tristan le fils au Roy Meliadus de Leonnoie que d’autres, porcequ’ilz furent sans faille les meilleurs chevaliers qui à ce temps furent en terre; et li Maistres en dira de ces deux pluseurs choses et pluseurs nouvelles que l’en treuvera escript en tous les autres livres; et porce que le Maistres les trouva escript au Livre d’Engleterre.”

[Illustration: Palazzo di S. Giorgio Genoa.]

“Certainly,” Paulin Paris observes, “there is a singular analogy between these two prefaces. And it must be remarked that the formula is not an ordinary one with translators, compilers, or authors of the 13th and 14th centuries. Perhaps you would not find a single other example of it.”[16]

This seems to place beyond question the identity of the Romance-compiler of Prince Edward’s suite in 1270, and the Prisoner of Genoa in 1298.

[Sidenote: Further particulars concerning Rustician.]

42. In Dunlop’s History of Fiction a passage is quoted from the preamble of _Meliadus_, as set forth in the Paris printed edition of 1528, which gives us to understand that Rusticien de Pise had received as a reward for some of his compositions from King Henry III. the prodigal gift of two _chateaux_. I gather, however, from passages in the work of Paulin Paris that this must certainly be one of those confusions of persons to which I have referred before, and that the recipient of the chateaux was in reality Helye de Borron, the author of some of the originals which Rustician manipulated.[17] This supposed incident in Rustician’s scanty history must therefore be given up.

We call this worthy _Rustician_ or _Rusticiano_, as the nearest probable representation in Italian form of the _Rusticien_ of the Round-Table MSS. and the _Rustacians_ of the old text of Polo. But it is highly probable that his real name was _Rustichello_, as is suggested by the form _Rustichelus_ in the early Latin version published by the _Société de Géographie_. The change of one liquid for another never goes for much in Italy,[18] and Rustichello might easily Gallicize himself as Rusticien. In a very long list of Pisan officials during the Middle Ages I find several bearing the name of _Rustichello_ or _Rustichelli_, but no _Rusticiano_ or _Rustigiano_.[19]

Respecting him we have only to add that the peace between Genoa and Venice was speedily followed by a treaty between Genoa and Pisa. On the 31st July, 1299, a truce for twenty-five years was signed between those two Republics. It was a very different matter from that between Genoa and Venice, and contained much that was humiliating and detrimental to Pisa. But it embraced the release of prisoners; and those of Meloria, reduced it is said to less than one tithe of their original number, had their liberty at last. Among the prisoners then released no doubt Rustician was one. But we hear of him no more.

---------------------------------------------------------------------- [1] _B. Marangone, Croniche della C. di Pisa_, in _Rerum Ital. Script._ of _Tartini_, Florence, 1748, i. 563; _Dal Borgo, Dissert. sopra l’Istoria Pisana_, ii. 287.

[2] The list of the whole number is preserved in the Doria archives, and has been published by Sign. Jacopo D’Oria. Many of the Baptismal names are curious, and show how far sponsors wandered from the Church Calendar. _Assan, Alton, Turco, Soldan_ seem to come of the constant interest in the East. _Alaone_, a name which remained in the family for several generations, I had thought certainly borrowed from the fierce conqueror of the Khalif (_infra_, p. 63). But as one Alaone, present at this battle, had a son also there, he must surely have been christened before the fame of Hulaku could have reached Genoa. (See _La Chiesa di S. Matteo_, pp. 250, _seqq._)

In documents of the kingdom of Jerusalem there are names still more anomalous, _e.g._, _Gualterius Baffumeth_, _Joannes Mahomet_. (See _Cod. Dipl. del Sac. Milit. Ord. Gerosol._ I. 2–3, 62.)

[3] _Memorial. Potestat. Regiens._ in _Muratori_, viii. 1162.

[4] See _Fragm. Hist. Pisan._ in _Muratori_, xxiv. 651, _seqq._; and _Caffaro_, _id._ vi. 588, 594–595. The cut in the text represents a striking memorial of those Pisan Prisoners, which perhaps still survives, but which at any rate existed last century in a collection at Lucca. It is the seal of the prisoners as a body corporate: SIGILLUM UNIVERSITATIS CARCERATORUM PISANORUM JANUE DETENTORUM, and was doubtless used in their negotiations for peace with the Genoese Commissioners. It represents two of the prisoners imploring the Madonna, Patron of the Duomo at Pisa. It is from _Manni, Osserv. Stor. sopra Sigilli Antichi_, etc., Firenze, 1739, tom. xii. The seal is also engraved in _Dal Borgo_, _op. cit._ ii. 316.

[5] The Abate Spotorno in his _Storia Letteraria della Liguria_, II. 219, fixes on a Genoese philosopher called Andalo del Negro, mentioned by Boccaccio.

[6] I quote from Galignani’s ed. of Prose Works, v. 712. This has “Rusticien de _Puise_.” In this view of the fictitious character of the names of Rusticien and the rest, Sir Walter seems to have been following Ritson, as I gather from a quotation in Dunlop’s H. of Fiction. (_Liebrecht’s_ German Version, p. 63.)

[7] _Giron le Courtois_, and the conclusion of _Tristan_.

[8] The passage runs thus as quoted (from the preamble of the _Meliadus_—I suspect in one of the old printed editions):—

“Aussi Luces du Gau (Gas) translata en langue Françoise une partie de l’Hystoire de Monseigneur Tristan, et moins assez qu’il ne deust. Moult commença bien son livre et si ny mist tout les faicts de Tristan, ains la greigneur partie. Après s’en entremist Messire Gasse le Blond, qui estoit parent au Roy Henry, et divisa l’Hystoire de Lancelot du Lac, et d’autre chose ne parla il mye grandement en son livre. Messire Robert de Borron s’en entremist et Helye de Borron, par la prière du dit Robert de Borron, _et pource que compaignons feusmes d’armes longuement_, je commencay mon livre,” etc. (_Liebrecht’s Dunlop_, p. 80.) If this passage be authentic it would set beyond doubt the age of the de Borrons and the other writers of Anglo-French Round Table Romances, who are placed by the _Hist. Littéraire de la France_, and apparently by Fr. Michel, under Henry II. I have no means of pursuing the matter, and have preferred to follow Paulin Paris, who places them under Henry III. I notice, moreover, that the _Hist. Litt._ (xv. p. 498) puts not only the de Borrons but Rustician himself under Henry II.; and, as the last view is certainly an error, the first is probably so too.

[9] Transc. from MS. 6975 (now Fr. 355) of Paris Library.

[10] _MSS. François_, iii. 60–61.

[11] _Ibid._ 56–59.

[12] _Introd._ pp. lxxxvi.–vii. note.

[13] See _Jour. As._ sér. II. tom. xii. p. 251.

[14] “_Seignors Enperaor, & Rois, Dux & Marquois, Cuens, Chevaliers & Bargions_ [for Borgiois] _& toutes gens qe uoles sauoir les deuerses jenerasions des homes_, & les deuersités des deuerses region dou monde, _si prennés cestui liure & le feites lire & chi trouerés toutes les grandismes meruoilles_,” etc.

[15] The portrait of Rustician here referred to would have been a precious illustration for our book. But unfortunately it has not been transferred to MS. 6961, nor apparently to any other noticed by Paulin Paris.

[16] _Jour. As._ as above.

[17] See _Liebrecht’s Dunlop_, p. 77; and _MSS. François_, II. 349, 353. The alleged gift to Rustician is also put forth by D’Israeli the Elder in his _Amenities of Literature_, 1841, I. p. 103.

[18] _E.g._ Geronimo, _Girolamo_; and garofalo, _garofano_; Cristoforo, _Cristovalo_; gonfalone, _gonfanone_, etc.

[19] See the List in _Archivio Stor. Ital._ VI. p. 64, _seqq._

VIII. NOTICES OF MARCO POLO’S HISTORY, AFTER THE TERMINATION OF HIS IMPRISONMENT AT GENOA.

43. A few very disconnected notices are all that can be collected of matter properly biographical in relation to the quarter century during which Marco Polo survived the Genoese captivity.

[Sidenote: Death of Marco’s Father before 1300. Will of his brother Maffeo.]

We have seen that he would probably reach Venice in the course of August, 1299. Whether he found his aged father alive is not known; but we know at least that a year later (31st August, 1300) Messer Nicolo was no longer in life.

This we learn from the Will of the younger Maffeo, Marco’s brother, which bears the date just named, and of which we give an abstract below.[1] It seems to imply strong regard for the testator’s brother Marco, who is made inheritor of the bulk of the property, failing the possible birth of a son. I have already indicated some conjectural deductions from this document. I may add that the terms of the second clause, as quoted in the note, seem to me to throw considerable doubt on the genealogy which bestows a large family of sons upon this brother Maffeo. If he lived to have such a family it seems improbable that the draft which he thus left in the hands of a notary, to be converted into a Will in the event of his death (a curious example of the validity attaching to all acts of notaries in those days), should never have been superseded, but should actually have been so converted after his death, as the existence of the parchment seems to prove. But for this circumstance we might suppose the Marcolino mentioned in the ensuing paragraph to have been a son of the younger Maffeo.

Messer Maffeo, the uncle, was, we see, alive at this time. We do not know the year of his death. But it is alluded to by Friar Pipino in the Preamble to his Translation of the Book, supposed to have been executed about 1315–1320; and we learn from a document in the Venetian archives (see p. 77) that it must have been previous to 1318, and subsequent to February 1309, the date of his last Will. The Will itself is not known to be extant, but from the reference to it in this document we learn that he left 1000 _lire_ of public debt[2] (_? imprestitorum_) to a certain Marco Polo, called _Marcolino_. The relationship of this Marco to old Maffeo is not stated, but we may suspect him to have been an illegitimate son. [Marcolino was a son of Nicolo, son of Marco the Elder; see vol. ii., _Calendar_, No. 6.—H. C.]

[Sidenote: Documentary notices of Polo at this time. The sobriquet of Milione.]

44. In 1302 occurs what was at first supposed to be a glimpse of Marco as a citizen, slight and quaint enough; being a resolution on the Books of the Great Council to exempt the respectable Marco Polo from the penalty incurred by him on account of the omission to have his water-pipe duly inspected. But since our Marco’s claims to the designation of _Nobilis Vir_ have been established, there is a doubt whether the _providus vir_ or _prud’-homme_ here spoken of may not have been rather his namesake Marco Polo of Cannareggio or S. Geremia, of whose existence we learn from another entry of the same year.[3] It is, however, possible that Marco the Traveller was called to the Great Council _after_ the date of the document in question.

We have seen that the Traveller, and after him his House and his Book, acquired from his contemporaries the surname, or nickname rather, of _Il Milione_. Different writers have given different explanations of the origin of this name; some, beginning with his contemporary Fra Jacopo d’Acqui, (_supra_, p. _54_), ascribing it to the family’s having brought home a fortune of a million of _lire_, in fact to their being _millionaires_. This is the explanation followed by Sansovino, Marco Barbaro, Coronelli, and others.[4] More far-fetched is that of Fontanini, who supposes the name to have been given to the Book as containing a great number of stories, like the _Cento Novelle_ or the _Thousand and One Nights!_ But there can be no doubt that Ramusio’s is the true, as it is the natural, explanation; and that the name was bestowed on Marco by the young wits of his native city, because of his frequent use of a word which appears to have been then unusual, in his attempts to convey an idea of the vast wealth and magnificence of the Kaan’s Treasury and Court.[5] Ramusio has told us (_supra_, p. _6_) that he had seen Marco styled by this sobriquet in the Books of the Signory; and it is pleasant to be able to confirm this by the next document which we cite. This is an extract from the Books of the Great Council under 10th April, 1305, condoning the offence of a certain Bonocio of Mestre in smuggling wine, for whose penalty one of the sureties had been the NOBILIS VIR MARCHUS PAULO MILIONI.[6]

It is alleged that long after our Traveller’s death there was always, in the Venetian Masques, one individual who assumed the character of Marco Milioni, and told Munchausenlike stories to divert the vulgar. Such, if this be true, was the honour of our prophet among the populace of his own country.[7]

45. A little later we hear of Marco once more, as presenting a copy of his Book to a noble Frenchman in the service of Charles of Valois.

[Sidenote: Polo’s relations with Thibault de Cepoy.]

This Prince, brother of Philip the Fair, in 1301 had married Catharine, daughter and heiress of Philip de Courtenay, titular Emperor of Constantinople, and on the strength of this marriage had at a later date set up his own claim to the Empire of the East. To this he was prompted by Pope Clement V., who in the beginning of 1306 wrote to Venice, stimulating that Government to take part in the enterprise. In the same year, Charles and his wife sent as their envoys to Venice, in connection with this matter, a noble knight called THIBAULT DE CEPOY, along with an ecclesiastic of Chartres called Pierre le Riche, and these two succeeded in executing a treaty of alliance with Venice, of which the original, dated 14th December, 1306, exists at Paris. Thibault de Cepoy eventually went on to Greece with a squadron of Venetian Galleys, but accomplished nothing of moment, and returned to his master in 1310.[8]

[Illustration: Miracle of S. Lorenzo.]

During the stay of Thibault at Venice he seems to have made acquaintance with Marco Polo, and to have received from him a copy of his Book. This is recorded in a curious note which appears on two existing MSS. of Polo’s Book, viz., that of the Paris Library (10,270 or Fr. 5649), and that of Bern, which is substantially identical in its text with the former, and is, as I believe, a copy of it.[9] The note runs as follows:—

“Here you have the Book of which My Lord THIEBAULT, Knight and LORD OF CEPOY, (whom may God assoil!) requested a copy from SIRE MARC POL, Burgess and Resident of the City of Venice. And the said Sire Marc Pol, being a very honourable Person, of high character and respect in many countries, because of his desire that what he had witnessed should be known throughout the World, and also for the honour and reverence he bore to the most excellent and puissant Prince my Lord CHARLES, Son of the King of France and COUNT OF VALOIS, gave and presented to the aforesaid Lord of Cepoy the first copy (that was taken) of his said Book after he had made the same. And very pleasing it was to him that his Book should be carried to the noble country of France and there made known by so worthy a gentleman. And from that copy which the said Messire Thibault, Sire de Cepoy above-named, did carry into France, Messire John, who was his eldest son and is the present Sire de Cepoy,[10] after his Father’s decease did have a copy made, and that very first copy that was made of the Book after its being carried into France he did present to his very dear and dread Lord Monseigneur de Valois. Thereafter he gave copies of it to such of his friends as asked for them.

“And the copy above-mentioned was presented by the said Sire Marc Pol to the said Lord de Cepoy when the latter went to Venice, on the part of Monseigneur de Valois and of Madame the Empress his wife, as Vicar General for them both in all the Territories of the Empire of Constantinople. And this happened in the year of the Incarnation of our Lord Jesus Christ one thousand three hundred and seven, and in the month of August.”

Of the bearings of this memorandum on the literary history of Polo’s Book we shall speak in a following section.

[Sidenote: His marriage and his daughters. Marco as a merchant.]

46. When Marco married we have not been able to ascertain, but it was no doubt early in the 14th century, for in 1324, we find that he had two married daughters besides one unmarried. His wife’s Christian name was _Donata_, but of her family we have as yet found no assurance. I suspect, however, that her name may have been Loredano (_vide infra_, p. _77_).

Under 1311 we find a document which is of considerable interest, because it is the only one yet discovered which exhibits Marco under the aspect of a practical trader. It is the judgment of the Court of Requests upon a suit brought by the NOBLE MARCO POLO of the parish of S. Giovanni Grisostomo against one Paulo Girardo of S. Apollinare. It appears that Marco had entrusted to the latter as a commission agent for sale, on an agreement for half profits, a pound and a half of musk, priced at six _lire of grossi_ (about 22_l._ 10_s._ in value of silver) the pound. Girardo had sold half-a-pound at that rate, and the remaining pound which he brought back was deficient of a _saggio_, or, one-sixth of an ounce, but he had accounted for neither the sale nor the deficiency. Hence Marco sues him for three _lire of Grossi_, the price of the half-pound sold, and for twenty _grossi_ as the value of the saggio. And the Judges cast the defendant in the amount with costs, and the penalty of imprisonment in the common gaol of Venice if the amounts were not paid within a suitable term.[11]

Again in May, 1323, probably within a year of his death, Ser Marco appears (perhaps only by attorney), before the Doge and his judicial examiners, to obtain a decision respecting a question touching the rights to certain stairs and porticoes in contact with his own house property, and that obtained from his wife, in S. Giovanni Grisostomo. To this allusion has been already made (_supra_, p. _31_).

[Illustration: MARCO POLO’S LAST WILL

(_Dimensions of Original, 26·4 inches by 9·4 inches_)

FROM A PHOTOGRAPH SPECIALLY TAKEN IN ST. MARK’S LIBRARY BY SIGNOR BERTANI.]

[Sidenote: Marco Polo’s Last Will and Death.]

47. We catch sight of our Traveller only once more. It is on the 9th of January, 1324; he is labouring with disease, under which he is sinking day by day; and he has sent for Giovanni Giustiniani, Priest of S. Proculo and Notary, to make his Last Will and Testament. It runs thus:—

“IN THE NAME OF THE ETERNAL GOD AMEN!

“In the year from the Incarnation of our Lord Jesus Christ 1323, on the 9th day of the month of January, in the first half of the 7th Indiction,[12] at Rialto.

“It is the counsel of Divine Inspiration as well as the judgment of a provident mind that every man should take thought to make a disposition of his property before death become imminent, lest in the end it should remain without any disposition:

“Wherefore I MARCUS PAULO of the parish of St. John Chrysostom, finding myself to grow daily feebler through bodily ailment, but being by the grace of God of a sound mind, and of senses and judgment unimpaired, have sent for JOHN GIUSTINIANI, Priest of S. Proculo and Notary, and have instructed him to draw out in complete form this my Testament:

“Whereby I constitute as my Trustees DONATA my beloved wife, and my dear daughters FANTINA, BELLELA, and MORETA,[13] in order that after my decease they may execute the dispositions and bequests which I am about to make herein.

“First of all: I will and direct that the proper Tithe be paid.[14] And over and above the said tithe I direct that 2000 _lire_ of Venice denari be distributed as follows:[15]

“_Viz._, 20 _soldi_ of Venice _grossi_ to the Monastery of St. Lawrence where I desire to be buried.

“Also 300 _lire_ of Venice denari to my sister-in-law YSABETA QUIRINO,[16] that she owes me.

“Also 40 _soldi_ to each of the Monasteries and Hospitals all the way from Grado to Capo d’Argine.[17]

“Also I bequeath to the Convent of SS. Giovanni and Paolo, of the Order of Preachers, that which it owes me, and also 10 _lire_ to Friar RENIER, and 5 _lire_ to Friar BENVENUTO the Venetian, of the Order of Preachers, in addition to the amount of his debt to me.

“I also bequeath 5 _lire_ to every Congregation in Rialto, and 4 _lire_ to every Guild or Fraternity of which I am a member.[18]

“Also I bequeath 20 _soldi_ of Venetian grossi to the Priest Giovanni Giustiniani the Notary, for his trouble about this my Will, and in order that he may pray the Lord in my behalf.

“Also I release PETER the Tartar, my servant, from all bondage, as completely as I pray God to release mine own soul from all sin and guilt. And I also remit him whatever he may have gained by work at his own house; and over and above I bequeath him 100 _lire_ of Venice denari.[19]

“And the residue of the said 2000 _lire_ free of tithe, I direct to be distributed for the good of my soul, according to the discretion of my trustees.

“Out of my remaining property I bequeath to the aforesaid Donata, my Wife and Trustee, 8 _lire_ of Venetian grossi annually during her life, for her own use, over and above her settlement, and the linen and all the household utensils,[20] with 3 beds garnished.

“And all my other property movable and immovable that has not been disposed of [here follow some lines of mere technicality] I specially and expressly bequeath to my aforesaid Daughters Fantina, Bellela, and Moreta, freely and absolutely, to be divided equally among them. And I constitute them my heirs as regards all and sundry my property movable and immovable, and as regards all rights and contingencies tacit and expressed, of whatsoever kind as hereinbefore detailed, that belong to me or may fall to me. Save and except that before division my said daughter Moreta shall receive the same as each of my other daughters hath received for dowry and outfit [here follow many lines of technicalities, ending]

“And if any one shall presume to infringe or violate this Will, may he incur the malediction of God Almighty, and abide bound under the anathema of the 318 Fathers; and farthermore he shall forfeit to my Trustees aforesaid five pounds of gold;[21] and so let this my Testament abide in force. The signature of the above named Messer Marco Paulo who gave instructions for this deed.

“‡ I Peter Grifon, Priest, Witness.

“* I Humfrey Barberi, Witness.

“† I John Giustiniani, Priest of S. Proculo, and Notary, have completed and authenticated (this testament).”[22]

We do not know, as has been said, how long Marco survived the making of this will, but we know, from a scanty series of documents commencing in June of the following year (1325), that he had _then_ been some time dead.[23]

[Sidenote: Place of Sepulture. Professed Portraits of Polo.]

48. He was buried, no doubt, according to his declared wish, in the Church of S. Lorenzo; and indeed Sansovino bears testimony to the fact in a confused notice of our Traveller.[24] But there does not seem to have been any monument to Marco, though the sarcophagus which had been erected to his father Nicolo, by his own filial care, existed till near the end of the 16th century in the porch or corridor leading to the old Church of S. Lorenzo, and bore the inscription: “SEPULTURA DOMINI NICOLAI PAULO DE CONTRATA S. IOANNIS GRISOSTEMI.” The church was renewed from its foundations in 1592, and then, probably, the sarcophagus was cast aside and lost, and with it all certainty as to the position of the tomb.[25]

[Illustration: Pavement in front of San Lorenzo, Venice.]

There is no portrait of Marco Polo in existence with any claim to authenticity. The quaint figure which we give in the _Bibliography_, vol. ii. p. 555, extracted from the earliest printed edition of his book, can certainly make no such pretension. The oldest one after this is probably a picture in the collection of Monsignor Badia at Rome, of which I am now able, by the owner’s courtesy, to give a copy. It is set down in the catalogue to Titian, but is probably a work of 1600, or thereabouts, to which the aspect and costume belong. It is inscribed “_Marcus Polvs Venetvs Totivs Orbis et Indie Peregrator Primus._” Its history unfortunately cannot be traced, but I believe it came from a collection at Urbino. A marble statue was erected in his honour by a family at Venice in the 17th century, and is still to be seen in the Palazzo Morosini-Gattemburg in the Campo S. Stefano in that city. The medallion portrait on the wall of the _Sala dello Scudo_ in the ducal palace, and which was engraved in Bettom’s “Collection of Portraits of Illustrious Italians,” is a work of imagination painted by Francesco Griselini in 1761.[26] From this, however, was taken the medal by Fabris, which was struck in 1847 in honour of the last meeting of the Italian Congresso Scientifico; and from the medal again is copied, I believe, the elegant woodcut which adorns the introduction to M. Pauthier’s edition, though without any information as to its history. A handsome bust, by Augusto Gamba, has lately been placed among the illustrious Venetians in the inner arcade of the Ducal Palace.[27] There is also a mosaic portrait of Polo, opposite the similar portrait of Columbus in the Municipio at Genoa.

[Illustration: S. Lorenzo as it was in the 15th century]

[Sidenote: Further History of the Polo Family.]

49. From the short series of documents recently alluded to,[28] we gather all that we know of the remaining history of Marco Polo’s immediate family. We have seen in his will an indication that the two elder daughters, Fantina and Bellela, were married before his death. In 1333 we find the youngest, Moreta, also a married woman, and Bellela deceased. In 1336 we find that their mother Donata had died in the interval. We learn, too, that Fantina’s husband was MARCO BRAGADINO, and Moreta’s, RANUZZO DOLFINO.[29] The name of Bellela’s husband does not appear.

Fantina’s husband is probably the Marco Bragadino, son of Pietro, who in 1346 is mentioned to have been sent as Provveditore-Generale to act against the Patriarch of Acquileia.[30] And in 1379 we find Donna Fantina herself, presumably in widowhood, assessed as a resident of S. Giovanni Grisostomo, on the _Estimo_ or forced loan for the Genoese war, at 1300 _lire_, whilst Pietro Bragadino of the same parish—her son as I imagine—is assessed at 1500 _lire_.[31] [See vol. ii., _Calendar_.]

The documents show a few other incidents which may be briefly noted. In 1326 we have the record of a charge against one Zanino Grioni for insulting Donna Moreta in the Campo of San Vitale; a misdemeanour punished by the Council of Forty with two months’ imprisonment.

[Illustration: Mosaic Portrait of Marco Polo at Genoa.]

In March, 1328, Marco Polo, called Marcolino, of St. John Chrysostom (see p. _66_), represents before the _Domini Advocatores_ of the Republic that certain _imprestita_ that had belonged to the late Maffeo Polo the Elder, had been alienated and transferred in May 1318, by the late Marco Polo of St. John Chrysostom and since his death by his heirs, without regard to the rights of the said Marcolino, to whom the said Messer Maffeo had bequeathed 1000 _lire_ by his will executed on 6th February, 1308 (_i.e._ 1309). The Advocatores find that the transfer was to that extent unjust and improper, and they order that to the same extent it should be revoked and annulled. Two months later the Lady Donata makes rather an unpleasant figure before the Council of Forty. It would seem that on the claim of Messer Bertuccio Quirino a mandate of sequestration had been issued by the Court of Requests affecting certain articles in the Ca’ Polo; including two bags of money which had been tied and sealed, but left in custody of the Lady Donata. The sum so sealed was about 80 _lire_ of grossi (300_l._ in silver value), but when opened only 45 _lire_ and 22 _grossi_ (about 170_l._) were found therein, and the Lady was accused of abstracting the balance _non bono modo_. Probably she acted, as ladies sometimes do, on a strong sense of her own rights, and a weak sense of the claims of law. But the Council pronounced against her, ordering restitution, and a fine of 200 _lire_ over and above “_ut ceteris transeat in exemplum._”[32]

It will have been seen that there is nothing in the amounts mentioned in Marco’s will to bear out the large reports as to his wealth, though at the same time there is no positive ground for a deduction to the contrary.[33]

The mention in two of the documents of Agnes Loredano as the sister of the Lady Donata suggests that the latter may have belonged to the Loredano family, but as it does not appear whether Agnes was maid or wife this remains uncertain.[34]

Respecting the further history of the family there is nothing certain, nor can we give unhesitating faith to Ramusio’s statement that the last male descendant of the Polos of S. Giovanni Grisostomo was Marco, who died Castellano of Verona in 1417 (according to others, 1418, or 1425),[35] and that the family property then passed to Maria (or _Anna_, as she is styled in a MS. statement furnished to me from Venice), who was married in 1401 to Benedetto Cornaro, and again in 1414 to Azzo Trevisan. Her descendant in the fourth generation by the latter was Marc Antonio Trevisano,[36] who was chosen Doge in 1553.

[Illustration: Arms of the Trevisan family.]

The genealogy recorded by Marco Barbaro, as drawn up from documents by Ramusio, makes the Castellano of Verona a grandson of our Marco by a son Maffeo, whom we may safely pronounce not to have existed, and makes Maria the daughter of Maffeo, Marco’s brother—that is to say, makes a lady marry in 1414 and have children, whose father was born in 1271 at the very latest! The genealogy is given in several other ways, but as I have satisfied myself that they all (except perhaps this of Barbaro’s, which we see to be otherwise erroneous) confound together the two distinct families of Polo of S. Geremia and Polo of S. Giov. Grisostomo, I reserve my faith, and abstain from presenting them. Assuming that the Marco or Marcolino Polo, spoken of in the preceding page, was a near relation (as is probable, though perhaps an illegitimate one), he is the only male descendant of old Andrea of San Felice whom we can indicate as having survived Marco himself; and from a study of the links in the professed genealogies I think it not unlikely that both Marco the Castellano of Verona and Maria Trevisan belonged to the branch of S. Geremia.[37] [See vol. ii., _App. C_, p. 510.]

[Illustration: The Pseudo Marco Polo at Canton.]

[49. _bis._—It is interesting to note some of the _reliques_ left by our traveller.

I. The unfortunate Doge of Venice, Marino Faliero, seems to have possessed many souvenirs of Marco Polo, and among them two manuscripts, one in the handwriting of his celebrated fellow-citizen(?), and one adorned with miniatures. M. Julius von Schlosser has reprinted (_Die ältesten Medaillen und die Antike_, Bd. XVIII., _Jahrb. d. Kunsthist. Samml. d. Allerhöchsten Kaiserhauses_, Vienna, 1897, pp. 42–43) from the _Bulletino di arti, industrie e curiosità veneziane_, III., 1880–81, p. 101,[38] the inventory of the curiosities kept in the “Red Chamber” of Marino Faliero’s palace in the Parish of the SS. Apostles; we give the following abstract of it:—

Anno ab incarnacione domini nostri Jesu Christi 1351° indictione sexta mensis aprilis. Inuentarium rerum qui sunt in camera rubea domi habitationis clarissimi domini MARINI FALETRO de confinio SS. Apostolorum, scriptum per me Johannem, presbiterum, dicte ecclesie.

• • • • •

_Item_ alia capsaleta cum ogiis auri et argenti, inter quos unum anulum con inscriptione que dicit: _Ciuble Can Marco Polo_, et unum torques cum multis animalibus Tartarorum sculptis, que res donum dedit predictus MARCUS cuidam Faletrorum.

• • • • •

_Item_ 2 capsalete de corio albo cum variis rebus auri et argenti, quas habuit praedictus MARCUS a Barbarorum rege.

• • • • •

_Item_ 1 ensem mirabilem, qui habet 3 enses simul, quem habuit in suis itineribus praedictus MARCUS.

• • • • •

_Item_ 1 tenturam de pannis indicis, quam habuit praedictus MARCUS.

_Item_ de itineribus MARCI praedicti liber in corio albo cum multis figuris.

_Item_ aliud volumen quod vocatur _de locis mirabilibus Tartarorum, scriptum manu praedicti_ MARCI.

• • • • •

II. There is kept at the Louvre, in the very valuable collection of China Ware given by M. Ernest Grandidier, a white porcelain incense-burner said to come from Marco Polo. This incense-burner, which belonged to Baron Davillier, who received it, as a present, from one of the keepers of the Treasury of St. Mark’s at Venice, is an octagonal _ting_ from the Fo-kien province, and of the time of the Sung Dynasty. By the kind permission of M. P. Grandidier, we reproduce it from Pl. II. 6, of the _Céramique chinoise_, Paris, 1894, published by this learned amateur.—H. C.]

---------------------------------------------------------------------- [1] 1. The Will is made in prospect of his voyage to Crete.

2. He had drafted his will with his own hand, sealed the draft, and made it over to Pietro Pagano, priest of S. Felice and Notary, to draw out a formal testament in faithful accordance therewith in case of the Testator’s death; and that which follows is the substance of the said draft rendered from the vernacular into Latin. (“Ego Matheus Paulo ... volens ire in Cretam, ne repentinus casus hujus vite fragilis me subreperet intestatum, mea propria manu meum scripsi et condidi testamentum, rogans Petrum Paganum ecclesie Scti. Felicis presbiterum et Notarium, sana mente et integro consilio, ut, secundum ipsius scripturam quam sibi tunc dedi meo sigillo munitam, meum scriberet testamentum, si me de hoc seculo contigeret pertransire; cujus scripture tenor translato vulgari in latinum per omnia talis est.”)

3. Appoints as Trustees Messer Maffeo Polo his uncle, Marco Polo his brother, Messer Nicolo Secreto (or Sagredo) his father-in-law, and Felix Polo his cousin (_consanguineum_).

4. Leaves 20 _soldi_ to each of the Monasteries from Grado to Capo d’Argine; and 150 _lire_ to all the congregations of Rialto, on condition that the priests of these maintain an annual service in behalf of the souls of his father, mother, and self.

5. To his daughter Fiordelisa 2000 _lire_ to marry her withal. To be invested in safe mortgages in Venice, and the interest to go to her.

Also leaves her the interest from 1000 _lire_ of his funds in Public Debt (? _de meis imprestitis_) to provide for her till she marries. After her marriage this 1000 _lire_ and its interest shall go to his male heir if he has one, and failing that to his brother Marco.

6. To his wife Catharine 400 _lire_ and all her clothes as they stand now. To the Lady Maroca 100 _lire_.

7. To his natural daughter Pasqua 400 _lire_ to marry her withal. Or, if she likes to be a nun, 200 _lire_ shall go to her convent and the other 200 shall purchase securities for her benefit. After her death these shall come to his male heir, or failing that be sold, and the proceeds distributed for the good of the souls of his father, mother, and self.

8. To his natural brothers Stephen and Giovannino he leaves 500 _lire_. If one dies the whole to go to the other. If both die before marrying, to go to his male heir; failing such, to his brother Marco or _his_ male heir.

9. To his uncle Giordano Trevisano 200 _lire_. To Marco de Tumba 100. To Fiordelisa, wife of Felix Polo, 100. To Maroca, the daughter of the late Pietro Trevisano, living at Negropont, 100. To Agnes, wife of Pietro Lion, 100; and to Francis, son of the late Pietro Trevisano, in Negropont, 100.

10. To buy Public Debt producing an annual 20 _lire ai grossi_ to be paid yearly to Pietro Pagano, Priest of S. Felice, who shall pray for the souls aforesaid: on death of said Pietro the income to go to Pietro’s cousin Lionardo, Clerk of S. Felice; and after him always to the senior priest of S. Giovanni Grisostomo with the same obligation.

11. Should his wife prove with child and bear a son or sons they shall have his whole property not disposed of. If a daughter, she shall have the same as Fiordelisa.

12. If he have no male heir his Brother Marco shall have the Testator’s share of his Father’s bequest, and 2000 _lire_ besides. Cousin Nicolo shall have 500 _lire_, and Uncle Maffeo 500.

13. Should Daughter Fiordelisa die unmarried her 2000 _lire_ and interest to go to his male heir, and failing such to Brother Marco and his male heir. But in that case Marco shall pay 500 _lire_ to Cousin Nicolo or his male heir.

14. Should his wife bear him a male heir or heirs, but these should die under age, the whole of his undisposed property shall go to Brother Marco or his male heir. But in that case 500 _lire_ shall be paid to Cousin Nicolo.

15. Should his wife bear a daughter and she die unmarried, her 2000 _lire_ and interest shall go to Brother Marco, with the same stipulation in behalf of Cousin Nicolo.

16. Should the whole amount of his property between cash and goods not amount to 10,000 _lire_ (though he believes he has fully as much), his bequests are to be ratably diminished, except those to his own children which he does not wish diminished. Should any legatee die before receiving the bequest, its amount shall fall to the Testator’s heir male, and failing such, the half to go to Marco or his male heir, and the other half to be distributed for the good of the souls aforesaid.

The witnesses are Lionardo priest of S. Felice, Lionardo clerk of the same, and the Notary Pietro Pagano priest of the same.

[2] According to Romanin (I. 321) the _lira dei grossi_ was also called _Lira d’imprestidi_, and if the _lire_ here are to be so taken, the sum will be 10,000 ducats, the largest amount by far that occurs in any of these Polo documents, unless, indeed, the 1000 _lire_ in § 5 of Maffeo Junior’s Will be the like; but I have some doubt if such lire are intended in either case.

[3] “(Resolved) That grace be granted to the respectable MARCO PAULO, relieving him of the penalty he has incurred for neglecting to have his water-pipe examined, seeing that he was ignorant of the order on that subject.” (See _Appendix C._ No. 3.) The other reference, to M. Polo, of S. Geremia, runs as follows:—

[_MCCCII. indic. XV. die VIII. Macii q̄ fiat grā Gūillō aurifici q̄ ipe absolvat a pena ī qua dicit icurisse p̄ uno spōtono sibi iūeto veuiēdo de Mestre p̄p̄e domū Macī Pauli de Canaregio ūi descenderat ad bibendū._]

“That grace be granted to William the Goldsmith, relieving him of the penalty which he is stated to have incurred on account of a spontoon (_spontono_, a loaded bludgeon) found upon him near the house of MARCO PAULO of Cannareggio, where he had landed to drink on his way from Mestre.” (See _Cicogna_, V. p. 606.)

[4] _Sansovino, Venezia, Città Nobilissima e Singolare, Descritta_, etc., Ven. 1581, f. 236 _v._; _Barbaro, Alberi; Coronelli, Allante Veneto_, I. 19.

[5] The word _Millio_ occurs several times in the Chronicle of the Doge Andrea Dandolo, who wrote about 1342; and _Milion_ occurs at least once (besides the application of the term to Polo) in the History of Giovanni Villani; viz. when he speaks of the Treasury of Avignon:— “_diciotto_ milioni _di fiorini d’oro_ ec. _che ogni_ milione _è mille migliaja di fiorini d’ oro la valuta_.” (xi. 20, § 1; _Ducange_, and _Vocab. Univ. Ital._). But the definition, thought necessary by Villani, in itself points to the use of the word as rare. _Domilion_ occurs in the estimated value of houses at Venice in 1367, recorded in the _Cronaca Magna_ in St. Mark’s Library. (_Romanin_, III. 385).

[6] “Also; that Pardon be granted to Bonocio of Mestre for that 152 _lire_ in which he stood condemned by the Captains of the Posts, on account of wine smuggled by him, in such wise: to wit, that he was to pay the said fine in 4 years by annual instalments of one fourth, to be retrenched from the pay due to him on his journey in the suite of our ambassadors, with assurance that anything then remaining deficient of his instalments should be made good by himself or his securities. And his securities are the Nobles Pietro Morosini and MARCO PAULO MILION̄.” Under _Milion̄_ is written in an ancient hand “_mortuus_.” (See _Appendix C_, No. 4.)

[7] Humboldt tells this (_Examen_, II. 221), alleging _Jacopo d’Acqui_ as authority; and Libri (_H. des Sciences Mathématiques_, II. 149), quoting _Doglioni, Historia Veneziana_. But neither authority bears out the citations. The story seems really to come from Amoretti’s commentary on the _Voyage du Cap. L. F. Maldonado_, Plaisance, 1812, p. 67. Amoretti quotes as authority _Pignoria, Degli Dei Antichi_.

An odd revival of this old libel was mentioned to me recently by Mr. George Moffatt. When he was at school it was common among the boys to express incredulity by the phrase: “Oh, what a Marco Polo!”

[8] Thibault, according to Ducange, was in 1307 named Grand Master of the Arblasteers of France; and Buchon says his portrait is at Versailles among the Admirals (No. 1170). Ramon de Muntaner fell in with the Seigneur de Cepoy in Greece, and speaks of him as “but a Captain of the Wind, as his Master was King of the Wind.” (See _Ducange, H. de l’Empire de Const. sous les Emp. François_, Venice ed. 1729, pp. 109, 110; _Buchon, Chroniques Etrangères_, pp. lv. 467–470.)

[9] The note is not found in the Bodleian MS., which is the third known one of this precise type.

[10] Messire Jean, the son of Thibault, is mentioned in the accounts of the latter in the _Chambre des Comptes_ at Paris, as having been with his Father in Romania. And in 1344 he commanded a confederate Christian armament sent to check the rising power of the Turks, and beat a great Turkish fleet in the Greek seas. (_Heyd._ I. 377; _Buchon_, 468.)

[11] The document is given in _Appendix C_, No. 5. It was found by Comm. Barozzi, the Director of the Museo Civico, when he had most kindly accompanied me to aid in the search for certain other documents in the archives of the _Casa di Ricovero_, or Poor House of Venice. These archives contain a great mass of testamentary and other documents, which probably have come into that singular depository in connection with bequests to public charities.

The document next mentioned was found in as strange a site, viz., the _Casa degli Esposti_ or Foundling Hospital, which possesses similar muniments. This also I owe to Comm. Barozzi, who had noted it some years before, when commencing an arrangement of the archives of the Institution.

[12] The Legal Year at Venice began on the 1st of March. And 1324 was 7th of the Indiction. Hence the date is, according to the modern Calendar, 1324.

[13] Marsden says of Moreta and Fantina, the only daughters named by Ramusio, that these may be thought rather familiar terms of endearment than baptismal names. This is a mistake however. _Fantina_ is from one of the parochial saints of Venice, S. Fantino, and the male name was borne by sundry Venetians, among others by a son of Henry Dandolo’s. Moreta is perhaps a variation of Maroca, which seems to have been a family name among the Polos. We find also the male name of Bellela, written _Bellello_, _Bellero_, _Belletto_.

[14] The _Decima_ went to the Bishop of Castello (eventually converted into Patriarch of Venice) to divide between himself, the Clergy, the Church, and the Poor. It became a source of much bad feeling, which came to a head after the plague of 1348, when some families had to pay the tenth three times within a very short space. The existing Bishop agreed to a composition, but his successor Paolo Foscari (1367) claimed that on the death of every citizen an exact inventory should be made, and a full tithe levied. The Signory fought hard with the Bishop, but he fled to the Papal Court and refused all concession. After his death in 1376 a composition was made for 5500 ducats yearly. (_Romanin_, II. 406; III. 161, 165.)

[15] There is a difficulty about estimating the value of these sums from the variety of Venice pounds or _lire_. Thus the _Lira dei piccoli_ was reckoned 3 to the ducat or zecchin, the _Lira ai grossi_ 2 to the ducat, but the _Lira_ dei _grossi_ or _Lira d’imprestidi_ was equal to 10 ducats, or (allowing for higher value of silver then) about 3_l._ 15_s._; a little more than the equivalent of the then Pound sterling. This last money is _specified_ in some of the bequests, as in the 20 soldi (or 1 lira) to St. Lorenzo, and in the annuity of 8 lire to Polo’s wife; but it seems doubtful what money is meant when _libra_ only or _libra denariorum venetorum_ is used. And this doubt is not new. Gallicciolli relates that in 1232 Giacomo Menotto left to the Church of S. Cassiano as an annuity _libras denariorum venetorum quatuor_. Till 1427 the church received the income as of _lire dei piccoli_, but on bringing a suit on the subject it was adjudged that _lire ai grossi_ were to be understood. (_Delle Mem. Venet. Ant._ II. 18.) This story, however, cuts both ways, and does not decide our doubt.

[16] The form of the name _Ysabeta_ aptly illustrates the transition that seems so strange from _Elizabeth_ into the _Isabel_ that the Spaniards made of it.

[17] _I.e._ the extent of what was properly called the Dogado, all along the Lagoons from Grado on the extreme east to Capo d’Argine (Cavarzere at the mouth of the Adige) on the extreme west.

[18] The word rendered _Guilds_ is “_Scholarum_.” The crafts at Venice were united in corporations called _Fraglie_ or _Scholae_, each of which had its statutes, its head called the _Gastald_, and its place of meeting under the patronage of some saint. These acted as societies of mutual aid, gave dowries to poor girls, caused masses to be celebrated for deceased members, joined in public religious processions, etc., nor could any craft be exercised except by members of such a guild. (_Romanin_, I. 390.)

[19] A few years after Ser Marco’s death (1328) we find the Great Council granting to this Peter the rights of a natural Venetian, as having been a long time at Venice, and well-conducted. (See App. C, _Calendar of Documents_, No. 13.) This might give some additional colour to M. Pauthier’s supposition that this Peter the Tartar was a faithful servant who had accompanied Messer Marco from the East 30 years before. But yet the supposition is probably unfounded. Slavery and slave-trade were very prevalent at Venice in the Middle Ages, and V. Lazari, a writer who examined a great many records connected therewith, found that by far the greater number of slaves were described as _Tartars_. There does not seem to be any clear information as to how they were imported, but probably from the factories on the Black Sea, especially Tana after its establishment.

A tax of 5 ducats per head was set on the export of slaves in 1379, and as the revenue so received under the Doge Tommaso Mocenigo (1414–1423) amounted (so says Lazari) to 50,000 ducats, the startling conclusion is that 10,000 slaves yearly were exported! This it is difficult to accept. The slaves were chiefly employed in domestic service, and the records indicate the women to have been about twice as numerous as the men. The highest price recorded is 87 ducats paid for a Russian girl sold in 1429. All the higher prices are for young women; a significant circumstance. With the existence of this system we may safely connect the extraordinary frequence of mention of illegitimate children in Venetian wills and genealogies. (See _Lazari, Del Traffico degli Schiavi in Venezia_, etc., in _Miscellanea di Storia Italiana_, I. 463 _seqq._) In 1308 the Khan Toktai of Kipchak (see Polo, II. 496), hearing that the Genoese and other Franks were in the habit of carrying off Tartar children to sell, sent a force against Caffa, which was occupied without resistance, the people taking refuge in their ships. The Khan also seized the Genoese property in Sarai. (_Heyd._ II. 27.)

[20] “_Stracium et omne capud massariciorum_”; in Scotch phrase “_napery and plenishing_.” A Venetian statute of 1242 prescribes that a bequest of _massariticum_ shall be held to carry to the legatee all articles of common family use except those of gold and silver plate or jeweller’s work. (See _Ducange, sub voce._) _Stracci_ is still used technically in Venice for “household linen.”

[21] In the original _aureas libras quinque_. According to Marino Sanudo the Younger (_Vite dei Dogi_ in _Muratori_, xxii. 521) this should be pounds or _lire_ of _aureole_, the name of a silver coin struck by and named after the Doge _Aurio_ Mastropietro (1178–1192): “Ancora fu fatta una Moneta d’argento che si chiamava _Aureola_ per la casata del Doge; _è quella Moneta che i Notai de Venezia mettevano di pena sotto i loro instrumenti_.” But this was a vulgar error. An example of the penalty of 5 pounds of gold is quoted from a decree of 960; and the penalty is sometimes expressed “_auri purissimi librae_ 5.” A coin called the _lira d’oro_ or _redonda_ is alleged to have been in use before the ducat was introduced. (See _Gallicciolli_, II. 16.) But another authority seems to identify the _lira a oro_ with the _lira dei grossi_. (See _Zanetti, Nuova Racc. delle Monete &c. d’Italia_, 1775. I. 308.)

[22] We give a photographic reduction of the original document. This, and the other two Polo Wills already quoted, had come into the possession of the Noble Filippo Balbi, and were by him presented in our own time to the St. Mark’s Library. They are all on parchment, in writing of that age, and have been officially examined and declared to be originals. They were first published by _Cicogna, Iscrizioni Veneziane_, III. 489–493. We give Marco’s in the original language, line for line with the facsimile, in _Appendix C_.

There is no signature, as may be seen, except those of the Witnesses and the Notary. The sole presence of a Notary was held to make a deed valid, and from about the middle of the 13th century in Italy it is common to find no actual signature (even of witnesses) except that of the Notary. The peculiar flourish before the Notary’s name is what is called the _Tabellionato_, a fanciful distinctive monogram which each Notary adopted. Marco’s Will is unfortunately written in a very cramp hand with many contractions. The other two Wills (of Marco the Elder and Maffeo) are in beautiful and clear Gothic penmanship.

[23] We have noticed formerly (pp. _14–15_, _note_) the recent discovery of a document bearing what was supposed to be the autograph signature of our Traveller. The document in question is the Minute of a Resolution of the Great Council, attested by the signatures of three members, of whom the last is MARCUS PAULLO. But the date alone, 11th March, 1324, is sufficient to raise the gravest doubts as to this signature being that of our Marco. And further examination, as I learn from a friend at Venice, has shown that the same name occurs in connection with analogous entries on several subsequent occasions up to the middle of the century. I presume that this Marco Polo is the same that is noticed in our _Appendix B_, II. as a voter in the elections of the Doges Marino Faliero and Giovanni Gradenigo. I have not been able to ascertain his relation to either branch of the Polo family; but I suspect that he belonged to that of S. Geremia, of which there _was_ certainly a Marco about the middle of the century.

[24] “Under the _angiporta_ (of S. Lorenzo) [see plate] is buried that Marco Polo surnamed Milione, who wrote the Travels in the New World, and who was the first before Christopher Columbus to discover new countries. No faith was put in him because of the extravagant things that he recounted; but in the days of our Fathers Columbus augmented belief in him, by discovering that part of the world which eminent men had heretofore judged to be uninhabited.” (_Venezia ... Descritta_, etc., f. 23 _v._) Marco Barbaro attests the same inscription in his Genealogies (copy in Museo Civico at Venice).

[25] _Cicogna_, II. 385.

[26] _Lazari_, xxxi.

[27] In the first edition I noticed briefly a statement that had reached me from China that, in the Temple at Canton vulgarly called “of the 500 gods,” there is a foreign figure which from the name attached had been supposed to represent Marco Polo! From what I have heard from Mr. Wylie, a very competent authority, this is nonsense. The temple contains 500 figures of _Arhans_ or Buddhist saints, and one of these attracts attention from having a hat like a sailor’s straw hat. Mr. Wylie had not remarked the name. [A model of this figure was exhibited at Venice at the international Geographical Congress, in 1881. I give a reproduction of this figure and of the Temple of 500 Genii (_Fa Lum Sze_) at Canton, from drawings by Félix Régamey made after photographs sent to me by my late friend, M. Camille Imbault Huart, French Consul at Canton.—H. C.]

[28] These documents are noted in Appendix C, Nos. 9–12, 14, 17, 18.

[29] I can find no _Ranuzzo_ Dolfino among the Venetian genealogies, but several _Reniers_. And I suspect Ranuzzo may be a form of the latter name.

[30] _Cappellari_ (see p. 77, footnote) under _Bragadino_.

[31] _Ibid._ and _Gallicciolli_, II. 146.

[32] The _lire_ of the fine are not specified; but probably _ai grossi_, which would be = 37_l._ 10_s._; not, we hope, _dei_ grossi!

[33] Yet, if the family were so wealthy as tradition represents, it is strange that Marco’s brother Maffeo, _after_ receiving a share of his father’s property, should have possessed barely 10,000 _lire_, probably equivalent to 5000 ducats at most. (See p. _65_, _supra_.)

[34] An Agnes Loredano, Abbess of S. Maria delle Vergini, died in 1397. (_Cicogna_, V. 91 and 629.) The interval of 61 years makes it somewhat improbable that it should be the same.

[35] In the _Museo Civico_ (No. 2271 of the Cicogna collection) there is a commission addressed by the Doge Michiel Steno in 1408, “_Nobili Viro Marcho Paulo_,” nominating him Podestà of Arostica (a Castello of the Vicentino). This is probably the same Marco.

[36] The descent runs: (1) Azzo = Maria Polo; (2) Febo, Captain at Padua; (3) Zaccaria, Senator; (4) Domenico, Procurator of St. Mark’s; (5) Marc’Antonio, Doge (_Cappellari_, _Campidoglio Veneto_, MS. St. Mark’s Lib.).

Marc’Antonio _nolebat ducari_ and after election desired to renounce. His friends persuaded him to retain office, but he lived scarcely a year after. (_Cicogna_, IV. 566.) [See p. _8_.]

[37] In Appendix B will be found tabulated all the facts that seem to be positively ascertained as to the Polo genealogies.

In the Venetian archives occurs a procuration executed by the Doge in favour of the _Nobilis Vir_ SER MARCO PAULO that he may present himself before the king of Sicily; under date, Venice 9th November, 1342. And some years later we have in the Sicilian Archives an order by King Lewis of Sicily, directed to the Maestri Procuratori of Messina, which grants to MARCO POLO of Venice, on account of services rendered to the king’s court, the privilege of free import and export at the port of Messina, without payment of customs of goods to the amount annually of 20 ounces. Dated in Catania 13th January, 1346 (1347?).

For the former notice I am indebted to the courtesy of Signor B. Cecchetti of the Venetian Archives, who cites it as “transcribed in the _Commemor._ IV. p. 5”; for the latter to that of the Abate Carini of the _Reale Archivio_ at Palermo; it is in _Archivio della Regia Cancellaria_ 1343–1357, f. 58.

The mission of this MARCO POLO is mentioned also in a rescript of the Sicilian king Peter II., dated Messina, 14th November, 1340, in reference to certain claims of Venice, about which the said Marco appeared as the Doge’s ambassador. This is printed in F. TESTA, _De Vitâ et Rebus Gestis Federici II., Siciliæ Regis_, Panormi, 1775, pp. 267 _seqq._ The Sicilian Antiquary Rosario Gregorio identifies the Envoy with our Marco, dead long before. (See _Opere scelte del Canon Ros. Gregorio_, Palermo, 1845, 3za ediz., p. 352.)

It is possible that this Marco, who from the latter notice seems to have been engaged in mercantile affairs, may have been the Marcolino above mentioned, but it is perhaps on the whole more probable that this _nobilis vir_ is the Marco spoken of in the note at p. _74_.

[38] _La Collezione del Doge Marin Faliero e i Tesori di Marco Polo_, pp. 98–103. I have seen this article.—H. C.

IX. MARCO POLO’S BOOK; AND THE LANGUAGE IN WHICH IT WAS FIRST WRITTEN.

[Sidenote: General statement of what the Book contains.]

50. The Book itself consists essentially of Two Parts. _First_, of a Prologue, as it is termed, the only part which is actual personal narrative, and which relates, in a very interesting but far too brief manner, the circumstances which led the two elder Polos to the Kaan’s Court, and those of their second journey with Mark, and of their return to Persia through the Indian Seas. _Secondly_, of a long series of chapters of very unequal length, descriptive of notable sights and products, of curious manners and remarkable events, relating to the different nations and states of Asia, but, above all, to the Emperor Kúblái, his court, wars, and administration. A series of chapters near the close treats in a verbose and monotonous manner of sundry wars that took place between the various branches of the House of Chinghiz in the latter half of the 13th century. This last series is either omitted or greatly curtailed in all the copies and versions except one; a circumstance perfectly accounted for by the absence of interest as well as value in the bulk of these chapters. Indeed, desirous though I have been to give the Traveller’s work complete, and sharing the dislike that every man who _uses_ books must bear to abridgments, I have felt that it would be sheer waste and dead-weight to print these chapters in full.

[Illustration: Porcelain Incense-Burner, from the Louvre.]

This second and main portion of the Work is in its oldest forms undivided, the chapters running on consecutively to the end.[1] In some very early Italian or Venetian version, which Friar Pipino translated into Latin, it was divided into three Books, and this convenient division has generally been adhered to. We have adopted M. Pauthier’s suggestion in making the final series of chapters, chiefly historical, into a Fourth.

[Sidenote: Language of the original Work.]

51. As regards the language in which Marco’s Book was first committed to writing, we have seen that Ramusio assumed, somewhat arbitrarily, that it was _Latin_; Marsden supposed it to have been the _Venetian_ dialect; Baldelli Boni first showed, in his elaborate edition (Florence, 1827), by arguments that have been illustrated and corroborated by learned men since, that it was _French_.

That the work was originally written in _some_ Italian dialect was a natural presumption, and slight contemporary evidence can be alleged in its favour; for Fra Pipino, in the Latin version of the work, executed whilst Marco still lived, describes his task as a translation _de vulgari_. And in one MS. copy of the same Friar Pipino’s Chronicle, existing in the library at Modena, he refers to the said version as made “_ex vulgari idiomate_ Lombardico.” But though it may seem improbable that at so early a date a Latin version should have been made at second hand, I believe this to have been the case, and that some internal evidence also is traceable that Pipino translated _not_ from the original but from an Italian _version_ of the original.

The oldest MS. (it is supposed) in any Italian dialect is one in the Magliabecchian Library at Florence, which is known in Italy as _L’Ottima_, on account of the purity of its Tuscan, and as _Della Crusca_ from its being one of the authorities cited by that body in their Vocabulary.[2] It bears on its face the following note in Italian:—

“This Book called the Navigation of Messer Marco Polo, a noble Citizen of Venice, was written in Florence by Michael Ormanni my great grandfather by the Mother’s side, who died in the Year of Grace One Thousand Three Hundred and Nine; and my mother brought it into our Family of Del Riccio, and it belongs to me Pier del Riccio and to my Brother; 1452.”

As far as I can learn, the age which this note implies is considered to be supported by the character of the MS. itself.[3] If it be accepted, the latter is a performance going back to within eleven years _at most_ of the first dictation of the Travels. At first sight, therefore, this would rather argue that the original had been written in pure Tuscan. But when Baldelli came to prepare it for the press he found manifest indications of its being a Translation from the _French_. Some of these he has noted; others have followed up the same line of comparison. We give some detailed examples in a note.[4]

[Illustration: Temple of 500 Genii, at Canton, _after a Drawing by_ FÉLIX RÉGAMEY.]

[Sidenote: Old French Text published by the Société de Géographie.]

52. The French Text that we have been quoting, published by the Geographical Society of Paris in 1824, affords on the other hand the strongest corresponding proof that it is an original and not a Translation. Rude as is the language of the manuscript (Fr. 1116, formerly No. 7367, of Paris Library), it is, in the correctness of the proper names, and the intelligible exhibition of the itineraries, much superior to any form of the Work previously published.

The language is very peculiar. We are obliged to call it French, but it is not “Frenche of Paris.” “Its style,” says Paulin Paris, “is about as like that of good French authors of the age, as in our day the natural accent of a German, an Englishman, or an Italian, is like that of a citizen of Paris or Blois.” The author is at war with all the practices of French grammar; subject and object, numbers, moods, and tenses, are in consummate confusion. Even readers of his own day must at times have been fain to guess his meaning. Italian words are constantly introduced, either quite in the crude or rudely Gallicized.[5] And words also, we may add, sometimes slip in which appear to be purely Oriental, just as is apt to happen with Anglo-Indians in these days.[6] All this is perfectly consistent with the supposition that we have in this MS. a copy at least of the original words as written down by Rusticiano a Tuscan, from the dictation of Marco an Orientalized Venetian, in French, a language foreign to both.

But the character of the language _as French_ is not its only peculiarity. There is in the style, apart from grammar or vocabulary, a rude angularity, a rough dramatism like that of oral narrative; there is a want of proportion in the style of different parts, now over curt, now diffuse and wordy, with at times even a hammering reiteration; a constant recurrence of pet colloquial phrases (in which, however, other literary works of the age partake); a frequent change in the spelling of the same proper names, even when recurring within a few lines, as if caught by ear only; a literal following to and fro of the hesitations of the narrator; a more general use of the third person in speaking of the Traveller, but an occasional lapse into the first. All these characteristics are strikingly indicative of the unrevised product of dictation, and many of them would _necessarily_ disappear either in translation or in a revised copy.

Of changes in representing the same proper name, take as an example that of the Kaan of Persia whom Polo calls _Quiacatu_ (Kaikhátú), but also _Acatu, Catu_, and the like.

As an example of the literal following of dictation take the following:—

“Let us leave Rosia, and I will tell you about the Great Sea (the Euxine), and what provinces and nations lie round about it, all in detail; and we will begin with Constantinople—First, however, I should tell you about a province, etc.... There is nothing more worth mentioning, so I will speak of other subjects,—but there is one thing more to tell you about Rosia that I had forgotten.... Now then let us speak of the Great Sea as I was about to do. To be sure many merchants and others have been here, but still there are many again who know nothing about it, so it will be well to include it in our Book. We will do so then, and let us begin first with the Strait of Constantinople.

“At the Straits leading into the Great Sea, on the West Side, there is a hill called the Faro.—But since beginning on this matter I have changed my mind, because so many people know all about it, so we will not put it in our description but go on to something else.” (See vol. ii. p. 487 _seqq._)

And so on.

As a specimen of tautology and hammering reiteration the following can scarcely be surpassed. The Traveller is speaking of the _Chughi_, _i.e._ the Indian Jogis:—

“And there are among them certain devotees, called _Chughi_; these are longer-lived than the other people, for they live from 150 to 200 years; and yet they are so hale of body that they can go and come wheresoever they please, and do all the service needed for their monastery or their idols, and do it just as well as if they were younger; and that comes of the great abstinence that they practise, in eating little food and only what is wholesome; for they use to eat rice and milk more than anything else. And again I tell you that these Chughi who live such a long time as I have told you, do also eat what I am going to tell you, and you will think it a great matter. For I tell you that they take quicksilver and sulphur, and mix them together, and make a drink of them, and then they drink this, and they say that it adds to their life; and in fact they do live much longer for it; and I tell you that they do this twice every month. And let me tell you that these people use this drink from their infancy in order to live longer, and without fail those who live so long as I have told you use this drink of sulphur and quicksilver.” (See G. T. p. 213.)

Such talk as this does not survive the solvent of translation; and we may be certain that we have here the nearest approach to the Traveller’s reminiscences as they were taken down from his lips in the prison of Genoa.

[Sidenote: Conclusive proof that the Old French Text is the source of all the others.]

53. Another circumstance, heretofore I believe unnoticed, is in itself enough to demonstrate the Geographic Text to be the source of all other versions of the Work. It is this.

In reviewing the various classes or types of texts of Polo’s Book, which we shall hereafter attempt to discriminate, there are certain proper names which we find in the different texts to take very different forms, each class adhering in the main to one particular form.

Thus the names of the Mongol ladies introduced at pp. 32 and 36 of this volume, which are in proper Oriental form _Bulughán_ and _Kukáchin_, appear in the class of MSS. which Pauthier has followed as _Bolgara_ and _Cogatra_; in the MSS. of Pipino’s version, and those founded on it, including Ramusio, the names appear in the correcter forms _Bolgana_ or _Balgana_ and _Cogacin_. Now _all the forms_ Bolgana, Balgana, Bolgara, _and_ Cogatra, Cocacin _appear in the Geographic Text_.

Kaikhátú Kaan appears in the Pauthier MSS. as _Chiato_, in the Pipinian as _Acatu_, in the Ramusian as _Chiacato. All three forms_, Chiato, Achatu, and Quiacatu _are found in the Geographic Text_.

The city of Koh-banan appears in the Pauthier MSS. as _Cabanant_, in the Pipinian and Ramusian editions as _Cobinam_ or _Cobinan_. _Both forms are found in the Geographic Text_.

The city of the Great Kaan (Khanbalig) is called in the Pauthier MSS. _Cambaluc_, in the Pipinian and Ramusian less correctly _Cambalu_. _Both forms appear in the Geographic Text_.

The aboriginal People on the Burmese Frontier who received from the Western officers of the Mongols the Persian name (translated from that applied by the Chinese) of _Zardandán_, or Gold-Teeth, appear in the Pauthier MSS. most accurately as Zardandan, but in the Pipinian as _Ardandan_ (still further corrupted in some copies into _Arcladam_). Now _both forms are found in the Geographic Text_. Other examples might be given, but these I think may suffice to prove that this Text was the common source of both classes.

In considering the question of the French original too we must remember what has been already said regarding Rusticien de Pise and his other French writings; and we shall find hereafter an express testimony borne in the next generation that Marco’s Book was composed _in vulgari Gallico_.

[Sidenote: Greatly diffused employment of French in that age.]

54. But, after all, the circumstantial evidence that has been adduced from the texts themselves is the most conclusive. We have then every reason to believe both that the work was written in French, and that an existing French Text is a close representation of it as originally committed to paper. And that being so we may cite some circumstances to show that the use of French or quasi-French for the purpose was not a fact of a very unusual or surprising nature. The French language had at that time almost as wide, perhaps relatively a wider, diffusion than it has now. It was still spoken at the Court of England, and still used by many English writers, of whom the authors or translators of the Round Table Romances at Henry III.’s Court are examples.[7] In 1249 Alexander III. King of Scotland, at his coronation spoke in Latin and French; and in 1291 the English Chancellor addressing the Scotch Parliament did so in French. At certain of the Oxford Colleges as late as 1328 it was an order that the students should converse _colloquio latino vel saltem gallico_.[8] Late in the same century Gower had not ceased to use French, composing many poems in it, though apologizing for his want of skill therein:—

“Et si jeo nai de François la faconde * * * * Jeo suis Englois; si quier par tiele voie Estre excusé.”[9]

Indeed down to nearly 1385, boys in the English grammar-schools were taught to construe their Latin lessons into French.[10] St. Francis of Assisi is said by some of his biographers to have had his original name changed to Francesco because of his early mastery of that language as a qualification for commerce. French had been the prevalent tongue of the Crusaders, and was that of the numerous Frank Courts which they established in the East, including Jerusalem and the states of the Syrian coast, Cyprus, Constantinople during the reign of the Courtenays, and the principalities of the Morea. The Catalan soldier and chronicler Ramon de Muntaner tells us that it was commonly said of the Morean chivalry that they spoke as good French as at Paris.[11] Quasi-French at least was still spoken half a century later by the numerous Christians settled at Aleppo, as John Marignolli testifies;[12] and if we may trust Sir John Maundevile the Soldan of Egypt himself and four of his chief Lords “_spak Frensche righte wel!_”[13] Gházán Kaan, the accomplished Mongol Sovereign of Persia, to whom our Traveller conveyed a bride from Cambaluc, is said by the historian Rashiduddin to have known something of the Frank tongue, probably French.[14] Nay, if we may trust the author of the Romance of Richard Cœur-de-Lion, French was in his day the language of still higher spheres![15]

Nor was Polo’s case an exceptional one even among writers on the East who were not Frenchmen. Maundevile himself tells us that he put his book first “out of Latyn into Frensche,” and then out of French into English.[16] The History of the East which the Armenian Prince and Monk Hayton dictated to Nicolas Faulcon at Poictiers in 1307 was taken down in French. There are many other instances of the employment of French by foreign, and especially by Italian authors of that age. The Latin chronicle of the Benedictine Amato of Monte Cassino was translated into French early in the 13th century by another monk of the same abbey, at the particular desire of the Count of Militrée (or Malta), “_Pour ce qu’il set lire et entendre fransoize et s’en delitte._”[17] Martino da Canale, a countryman and contemporary of Polo’s, during the absence of the latter in the East wrote a Chronicle of Venice in the same language, as a reason for which he alleges its general popularity.[18] The like does the most notable example of all, Brunetto Latini, Dante’s master, who wrote in French his encyclopædic and once highly popular work _Li Tresor_.[19] Other examples might be given, but in fact such illustration is superfluous when we consider that Rusticiano himself was a compiler of French Romances.

But why the language of the Book as we see it in the Geographic Text should be so much more rude, inaccurate, and Italianized than that of Rusticiano’s other writings, is a question to which I can suggest no reply quite satisfactory to myself. Is it possible that we have in it a literal representation of Polo’s own language in dictating the story,—a rough draft which it was intended afterwards to reduce to better form, and which was so reduced (after a fashion) in French copies of another type, regarding which we shall have to speak presently?[20] And, if this be the true answer, why should Polo have used a French jargon in which to tell his story? Is it possible that his own mother Venetian, such as he had carried to the East with him and brought back again, was so little intelligible to Rusticiano that French of some kind was the handiest medium of communication between the two? I have known an Englishman and a Hollander driven to converse in Malay; Chinese Christians of different provinces are said sometimes to take to English as the readiest means of intercommunication; and the same is said even of Irish-speaking Irishmen from remote parts of the Island.

It is worthy of remark how many notable narratives of the Middle Ages have been dictated instead of being written by their authors, and that in cases where it is impossible to ascribe this to ignorance of writing. The Armenian Hayton, though evidently a well-read man, possibly could not write in Roman characters. But Joinville is an illustrious example. And the narratives of four of the most famous Mediæval Travellers[21] seem to have been drawn from them by a kind of pressure, and committed to paper by other hands. I have elsewhere remarked this as indicating how little diffused was literary ambition or vanity; but it would perhaps be more correct to ascribe it to that intense dislike which is still seen on the shores of the Mediterranean to the use of pen and ink. On certain of those shores at least there is scarcely any inconvenience that the majority of respectable and good-natured people will not tolerate—inconvenience to their neighbours be it understood—rather than put pen to paper for the purpose of preventing it.

---------------------------------------------------------------------- [1] 232 chapters in the oldest French which we quote as the _Geographic Text_ (or G. T.), 200 in Pauthier’s Text, 183 in the Crusca Italian.

[2] The MS. has been printed by Baldelli as above, and again by Bartoli in 1863.

[3] This is somewhat peculiar. I traced a few lines of it, which with Del Riccio’s note were given in facsimile in the First Edition.

[4] The Crusca is cited from Bartoli’s edition.

French idioms are frequent, as _l’uomo_ for the French _on_; _quattro-vinti_ instead of _ottanta_; etc.

We have at p. 35, “_Questo piano è molto_ cavo,” which is nonsense, but is explained by reference to the French (G. T.) “_Voz di qu’il est celle plaingne mout_ chaue” (_chaude_).

The bread in Kerman is bitter, says the G. T. “_por ce que l’eive hi est_ amer,” because the water there is bitter. The Crusca mistakes the last word and renders (p. 40) “_e questi è per lo_ mare _che vi viene_.”

“_Sachiés de voir qe_ endementiers,” know for a truth that whilst——, by some misunderstanding of the last word becomes (p. 129) “_Sappiate di vero_ sanza mentire.”

“_Mès de sel_ font-il monoie”—“They make money of salt,” becomes (p. 168) “_ma fannole_ da loro,” _sel_ being taken for a pronoun, whilst in another place _sel_ is transferred bodily without translation.

“_Chevoil_,” “hair” of the old French, appears in the Tuscan (p. 20) as _cavagli_, “horses.”—“_La Grant Provence_ Jereraus,” the great general province, appears (p. 68) as a province whose proper name is _Ienaraus_. In describing Kúblái’s expedition against Mien or Burma, Polo has a story of his calling on the Jugglers at his court to undertake the job, promising them a Captain and other help, “_Cheveitain et aide_.” This has fairly puzzled the Tuscan, who converts these (p. 186) into two Tartar tribes, “_quegli d’_Aide _e quegli di_ Caveità.”

So also we have _lievre_ for hare transferred without change; _lait_, milk, appearing as _laido_ instead of _latte_; _très_, rendered as “three”; _bue_, “mud,” Italianised as _buoi_, “oxen,” and so forth. Finally, in various places when Polo is explaining Oriental terms we find in the Tuscan MS. “_cioè a dire in_ Francesco.”

The blunders mentioned are intelligible enough as in a version _from the French_; but in the description of the Indian pearl-fishery we have a startling one not so easy to account for. The French says, “the divers gather the sea-oysters (_hostrige de Mer_), and in these the pearls are found.” This appears in the Tuscan in the extraordinary form that the divers catch those fishes called _Herrings_ (Aringhe), and in those Herrings are found the Pearls!

[5] As examples of these Italianisms: “_Et ont del_ olio _de la lanpe dou_ sepolchro _de Crist_”; “_L’Angel ven en vision pour mesajes de Deu à un_ Veschevo _qe mout estoient home de_ sante vite”; “_E certes il estoit bien_ beizongno”; “_ne trop caut ne trop_ fredo”; “_la_ crense” (_credenza_); “remort” for noise (_rumore_); “inverno”; “jorno”; “dementiqué” (_dimenticato_); “enferme” for sickly; “leign” (_legno_); “devisce” (_dovizia_); “ammalaide” (_ammalato_), etc. etc.

Professor Bianconi points out that there are also traces of _Venetian_ dialect, as _Pare_ for _père_; _Mojer_ for wife; _Zabater_, cobbler; _cazaor_, huntsman, etc.

I have not been able to learn to what extent books in this kind of mixed language are extant. I have observed one, a romance in verse called _Macaire_ (_Altfranzösische Gedichte aus Venez. Handschriften_, von _Adolf Mussafia_, Wien, 1864), the language of which is not unlike this jargon of Rustician’s, _e.g._:—

“‘Dama,’ fait-il, ‘molto me poso merviler De ves enfant quant le fi batecer De un signo qe le vi sor la spal’a droiturer Qe non ait nul se no filz d’inperer.’”—(p. 41)

[6] As examples of such Orientalisms: _Bonus_, “ebony,” and _calamanz_, “pencases,” seem to represent the Persian _abnús_ and _ḳalamdàn_; the dead are mourned by _les mères et les_ Araines, the _Harems_; in speaking of the land of the Ismaelites or Assassins, called _Mulhete_, _i.e._ the Arabic _Muláhidah_, “Heretics,” he explains this term as meaning “des _Aram_” (_Ḥarám_, “the reprobate”). Speaking of the Viceroys of Chinese Provinces, we are told that they rendered their accounts yearly to the _Safators_ of the Great Kaan. This is certainly an Oriental word. Sir H. Rawlinson has suggested that it stands for _dafátir_ (“registers or public books”), pl. of _daftar_. This seems probable, and in that case the true reading may have been _dafators_.

[7] Luces du Gast, one of the first of these, introduces himself thus:— “Je Luces, Chevaliers et Sires du Chastel du Gast, voisins prochain de Salebieres, comme chevaliers amoureus enprens à translater du Latin en François une partie de cette estoire, non mie pour ce que je sache gramment de François, ainz apartient plus ma langue et ma parleure à la manière de l’Engleterre que à celle de France, comme cel qui fu en Engleterre nez, mais tele est ma volentez et mon proposement, que je en langue françoise le translaterai.” (_Hist. Litt. de La France_, xv. 494.)

[8] _Hist. Litt. de la France_, xv. 500.

[9] _Ibid._ 508.

[10] _Tyrwhitt’s Essay on Lang., etc., of Chaucer_, p. xxii. (Moxon’s Ed. 1852.)

[11] _Chroniques Etrangères_, p. 502.

[12] “_Loquuntur linguam quasi Gallicam, scilicet quasi de Cipro_.” (See _Cathay_, p. 332.)

[13] Page 138.

[14] _Hammers Ilchan_, II. 148.

[15] After the capture of Acre, Richard orders 60,000 Saracen prisoners to be executed:—

“They wer brought out off the toun, Save twenty, he heeld to raunsoun. They wer led into the place ful evene: _Ther they herden Aungeles off Hevene_: _They sayde_: ‘SEYNYORS, TUEZ, TUEZ! ‘Spares hem nought! Behedith these!’ Kyng Rychard herde the Aungelys voys, And thankyd God, and the Holy Croys.” —_Weber_, II. 144.

Note that, from the rhyme, the Angelic French was apparently pronounced “_Too-eese! Too-eese!_”

[16] [Refer to the edition of Mr. George F. Warner, 1889, for the Roxburghe Club, and to my own paper in the _T’oung Pao_, Vol. II., No. 4, regarding the compilation published under the name of Maundeville. Also _App. L_. 13—H. C.]

[17] _L’Ystoire de li Normand_, etc., edited by M. Champollion-Figeac, Paris, 1835, p. v.

[18] “_Porce que lengue Frenceise cort parmi le monde, et est la plus delitable à lire et à oir que nule autre, me sui-je entremis de translater l’ancien estoire des Veneciens de Latin en Franceis._” (Archiv. Stor. Ital. viii. 268.)

[19] “_Et se aucuns demandoit por quoi cist livres est escriz en Romans, selonc le langage des François, puisque nos somes Ytaliens, je diroie que ce est por. ij. raisons: l’une, car nos somes en France; et l’autre porce que la parleure est plus delitable et plus commune à toutes gens._” (Li Livres dou Tresor, p. 3.)

[20] It is, however, not improbable that Rusticiano’s hasty and abbreviated original was extended by a scribe who knew next to nothing of French; otherwise it is hard to account for such forms as _perlinage_ (pelerinage), _peseries_ (espiceries), _proque_ (see vol. ii. p. 370), _oisi_ (G. T. p. 208), _thochere_ (toucher), etc. (See _Bianconi_, 2nd Mem. pp. 30–32.)

[21] Polo, Friar Odoric, Nicolo Conti, Ibn Batuta.

X. VARIOUS TYPES OF TEXT OF MARCO POLO’S BOOK.

[Sidenote: Four Principal Types of Text. First, that of the Geographic, or oldest French.]

55. In treating of the various Texts of Polo’s Book we must necessarily go into some irksome detail.

Those Texts that have come down to us may be classified under Four principal Types.

I. The First Type is that of the Geographic Text of which we have already said so much. This is found nowhere _complete_ except in the unique MS. of the Paris Library, to which it is stated to have come from the old Library of the French Kings at Blois. But the Italian _Crusca_, and the old Latin version (No. 3195 of the Paris Library) published with the Geographic Text, are evidently derived entirely from it, though both are considerably abridged. It is also demonstrable that neither of these copies has been translated from the other, for each has passages which the other omits, but that both have been taken, the one as a copy more or less loose, the other as a translation, from an intermediate _Italian_ copy.[1] A special difference lies in the fact that the Latin version is divided into three Books, whilst the Crusca has no such division. I shall show in a tabular form the _filiation_ of the texts which these facts seem to demonstrate (see Appendix G).

There are other Italian MSS. of this type, some of which show signs of having been derived independently from the French;[2] but I have not been able to examine any of them with the care needful to make specific deductions regarding them.

[Sidenote: Second; the remodelled French Text, followed by Pauthier.]

56. II. The next Type is that of the French MSS. on which M. Pauthier’s Text is based, and for which he claims the highest authority, as having had the mature revision and sanction of the Traveller. There are, as far as I know, five MSS. which may be classed together under this type, three in the Great Paris Library, one at Bern, and one in the Bodleian.

The high claims made by Pauthier on behalf of this class of MSS. (on the first three of which his Text is formed) rest mainly upon the kind of certificate which two of them bear regarding the presentation of a copy by Marco Polo to Thibault de Cepoy, which we have already quoted (_supra_, p. _69_). This certificate is held by Pauthier to imply that the original of the copies which bear it, and of those having a general correspondence with them, had the special seal of Marco’s revision and approval. To some considerable extent their character is corroborative of such a claim, but they are far from having the perfection which Pauthier attributes to them, and which leads him into many paradoxes.

It is not possible to interpret rigidly the bearing of this so-called certificate, as if no copies had previously been taken of _any_ form of the Book; nor can we allow it to impugn the authenticity of the Geographic Text, which demonstratively represents an older original, and has been (as we have seen) the parent of all other versions, including some very old ones, Italian and Latin, which certainly owe nothing to this revision.

The first idea apparently entertained by d’Avezac and Paulin Paris was that the Geographic Text was _itself_ the copy given to the Sieur de Cepoy, and that the differences in the copies of the class which we describe as Type II. merely resulted from the modifications which would naturally arise in the process of transcription into purer French. But closer examination showed the differences to be too great and too marked to admit of this explanation. These differences consist not only in the conversion of the rude, obscure, and half Italian language of the original into good French of the period. There is also very considerable curtailment, generally of tautology, but also extending often to circumstances of substantial interest; whilst we observe the omission of a few notably erroneous statements or expressions; and a few insertions of small importance. None of the MSS. of this class contain more than a few of the historical chapters which we have formed into Book IV.

The only _addition_ of any magnitude is that chapter which in our translation forms chapter xxi. of Book II. It will be seen that it contains no new facts, but is only a tedious recapitulation of circumstances already stated, though scattered over several chapters. There are a few minor additions. I have not thought it worth while to collect them systematically here, but two or three examples are given in a note.[3]

There are also one or two corrections of erroneous statements in the G. T. which seem not to be accidental and to indicate some attempt at revision. Thus a notable error in the account of Aden, which seems to conceive of the Red Sea as a _river_, disappears in Pauthier’s MSS. A and B.[4] And we find in these MSS. one or two interesting names preserved which are not found in the older Text.[5]

But on the other hand this class of MSS. contains many erroneous readings of names, either adopting the worse of two forms occurring in the G. T. or originating blunders of its own.[6]

M. Pauthier lays great stress on the character of these MSS. as the sole authentic form of the work, from their claim to have been specially revised by Marco Polo. It is evident, however, from what has been said, that this revision can have been only a very careless and superficial one, and must have been done in great measure by deputy, being almost entirely confined to curtailment and to the improvement of the expression, and that it is by no means such as to allow an editor to dispense with a careful study of the Older Text.

[Sidenote: The Bern MS. and two others form a sub-class of this Type.]

57. There is another curious circumstance about the MSS. of this type, viz., that they clearly divide into two distinct recensions, of which both have so many peculiarities and errors in common that they must necessarily have been both derived from _one_ modification of the original text, whilst at the same time there are such differences between the two as cannot be set down to the accidents of transcription. Pauthier’s MSS. A and B (Nos. 16 and 15 of the List in App. F) form one of these subdivisions: his C (No. 17 of List), Bern (No. 56), and Oxford (No. 6), the other. Between A and B the differences are only such as seem constantly to have arisen from the whims of transcribers or their dialectic peculiarities. But between A and B on the one side, and C on the other, the differences are much greater. The readings of proper names in C are often superior, sometimes worse; but in the latter half of the work especially it contains a number of substantial passages[7] which are to be found in the G. T., but are altogether absent from the MSS. A and B; whilst in one case at least (the history of the Siege of Saianfu, vol. ii. p. 159) it diverges considerably from the G. T. _as well_ as from A and B.[8]

I gather from the facts that the MS. C represents an older form of the work than A and B. I should judge that the latter had been derived from that older form, but intentionally modified from it. And as it is the MS. C, with its copy at Bern, that alone presents the certificate of derivation from the Book given to the Sieur de Cepoy, there can be no doubt that it is the true representative of that recension.

[Sidenote: Third; Friar Pipino’s Latin.]

58. III. The next Type of Text is that found in Friar Pipino’s Latin version. It is the type of which MSS. are by far the most numerous. In it condensation and curtailment are carried a good deal further than in Type II. The work is also divided into three Books. But this division does not seem to have originated with Pipino, as we find it in the ruder and perhaps older Latin version of which we have already spoken under Type I. And we have demonstrated that this ruder Latin is a translation from an Italian copy. It is probable therefore that an Italian version similarly divided was the common source of what we call the Geographic Latin and of Pipino’s more condensed version.[9]

Pipino’s version appears to have been executed in the later years of Polo’s life.[10] But I can see no ground for the idea entertained by Baldelli-Boni and Professor Bianconi that it was executed with Polo’s cognizance and retouched by him.

[Sidenote: The Latin of Grynæus a translation at fifth hand.]

59. The absence of effective publication in the Middle Ages led to a curious complication of translation and retranslation. Thus the Latin version published by Grynæus in the _Novus Orbis_ (Basle, 1532) is different from Pipino’s, and yet clearly traceable to it as a base. In fact it is a retranslation into Latin from some version (Marsden thinks the printed Portuguese one) of Pipino. It introduces many minor modifications, omitting specific statements of numbers and values, generalizing the names and descriptions of specific animals, exhibiting frequent sciolism and self-sufficiency in modifying statements which the Editor disbelieved.[11] It is therefore utterly worthless as a Text, and it is curious that Andreas Müller, who in the 17th century devoted himself to the careful editing of Polo, should have made so unfortunate a choice as to reproduce this fifth-hand Translation. I may add that the French editions published in the middle of the 16th century are _translations_ from Grynæus. Hence they complete this curious and vicious circle of translation: French—Italian—Pipino’s Latin—Portuguese?—Grynæus’s Latin—French![12]

[Sidenote: Fourth; Ramusio’s Italian.]

60. IV. We now come to a Type of Text which deviates largely from any of those hitherto spoken of, and the history and true character of which are involved in a cloud of difficulty. We mean that Italian version prepared for the press by G. B. Ramusio, with most interesting, though, as we have seen, not always accurate preliminary dissertations, and published at Venice two years after his death, in the second volume of the _Navigationi e Viaggi_.[13]

The peculiarities of this version are very remarkable. Ramusio seems to imply that he used as one basis at least the Latin of Pipino; and many circumstances, such as the division into Books, the absence of the terminal historical chapters and of those about the Magi, and the form of many proper names, confirm this. But also many additional circumstances and anecdotes are introduced, many of the names assume a new shape, and the whole style is more copious and literary in character than in any other form of the work.

Whilst some of the changes or interpolations seem to carry us further from the truth, others contain facts of Asiatic nature or history, as well as of Polo’s own experiences, which it is extremely difficult to ascribe to any hand but the Traveller’s own. This was the view taken by Baldelli, Klaproth, and Neumann;[14] but Hugh Murray, Lazari, and Bartoli regard the changes as interpolations by another hand; and Lazari is rash enough to ascribe the whole to a _rifacimento_ of Ramusio’s own age, asserting it to contain interpolations not merely from Polo’s own contemporary Hayton, but also from travellers of later centuries, such as Conti, Barbosa, and Pigafetta. The grounds for these last assertions have not been cited, nor can I trace them. But I admit _to a certain extent_ indications of modern tampering with the text, especially in cases where proper names seem to have been identified and more modern forms substituted. In days, however, where an Editor’s duties were ill understood, this was natural.

[Sidenote: Injudicious tamperings in Ramusio.]

61. Thus we find substituted for the _Bastra_ (or _Bascra_) of the older texts the more modern and incorrect _Balsora_, dear to memories of the Arabian Nights; among the provinces of Persia we have _Spaan_ (Ispahan) where older texts read _Istanit_; for _Cormos_ we have _Ormus_; for _Herminia_ and _Laias_, _Armenia_ and _Giazza_; _Coulam_ for the older _Coilum_; _Socotera_ for _Scotra_. With these changes may be classed the chapter-headings, which are undisguisedly modern, and probably Ramusio’s own. In some other cases this editorial spirit has been over-meddlesome and has gone astray. Thus _Malabar_ is substituted wrongly for _Maabar_ in one place, and by a grosser error for _Dalivar_ in another. The age of young Marco, at the time of his father’s first return to Venice, has been arbitrarily altered from 15 to 19, in order to correspond with a date which is itself erroneous. Thus also Polo is made to describe Ormus as on an Island, contrary to the old texts and to the fact; for the city of Hormuz was not transferred to the island, afterwards so famous, till some years after Polo’s return from the East. It is probably also the editor who in the notice of the oil-springs of Caucasus (i. p. 46) has substituted _camel-loads_ for _ship-loads_, in ignorance that the site of those alluded to was probably Baku on the Caspian.

Other erroneous statements, such as the introduction of window-glass as one of the embellishments of the palace at Cambaluc, are probably due only to accidental misunderstanding.

[Sidenote: Genuine statements peculiar to Ramusio.]

62. Of circumstances certainly genuine, which are peculiar to this edition of Polo’s work, and which it is difficult to assign to any one but himself, we may note the specification of the woods east of Yezd as composed of _date trees_ (vol. i pp. 88–89); the unmistakable allusion to the subterranean irrigation channels of Persia (p. 123); the accurate explanation of the term _Mulehet_ applied to the sect of Assassins (pp. 139–142); the mention of the Lake (Sirikul?) on the plateau of Pamer, of the wolves that prey on the wild sheep, and of the piles of wild rams’ horns used as landmarks in the snow (pp. 171–177). To the description of the Tibetan Yak, which is in all the texts, Ramusio’s version alone adds a fact probably not recorded again till the present century, viz., that it is the practice to cross the Yak with the common cow (p. 274). Ramusio alone notices the prevalence of _goître_ at Yarkand, confirmed by recent travellers (i. p. 187); the vermilion seal of the Great Kaan imprinted on the paper-currency, which may be seen in our plate of a Chinese note (p. 426); the variation in Chinese dialects (ii. p. 236); the division of the hulls of junks into water-tight compartments (ii. p. 249); the introduction into China from Egypt of the art of refining sugar (ii. p. 226). Ramusio’s account of the position of the city of Sindafu (Ch’êng-tu fu) encompassed and intersected by many branches of a great river (ii. p. 40), is much more just than that in the old text, which speaks of but one river through the middle of the city. The intelligent notices of the Kaan’s charities as originated by his adoption of “idolatry” or Buddhism; of the astrological superstitions of the Chinese, and of the manners and character of the latter nation, are found in Ramusio alone. To whom but Marco himself, or one of his party, can we refer the brief but vivid picture of the delicious atmosphere and scenery of the Badakhshan plateaux (i. p. 158), and of the benefit that Messer Marco’s health derived from a visit to them? In this version alone again we have an account of the oppressions exercised by Kúblái’s Mahomedan Minister Ahmad, telling how the Cathayans rose against him and murdered him, with the addition that Messer Marco was on the spot when all this happened. Now not only is the whole story in substantial accordance with the Chinese Annals, even to the name of the chief conspirator,[15] but those annals also tell of the courageous frankness of “Polo, assessor of the Privy Council,” in opening the Kaan’s eyes to the truth.

Many more such examples might be adduced, but these will suffice. It is true that many of the passages peculiar to the Ramusian version, and indeed the whole version, show a freer utterance and more of a literary faculty than we should attribute to Polo, judging from the earlier texts. It is possible, however, that this may be almost, if not entirely, due to the fact that the version is the result of a double translation, and probably of an editorial fusion of several documents; processes in which angularities of expression would be dissolved.[16]

[Sidenote: Hypothesis of the sources of the Ramusian Version.]

63. Though difficulties will certainly remain,[17] the most probable explanation of the origin of this text seems to me to be some such hypothesis as the following:—I suppose that Polo in his latter years added with his own hand supplementary notes and reminiscences, marginally or otherwise, to a copy of his book; that these, perhaps in his lifetime, more probably after his death, were digested and translated into Latin;[18] and that Ramusio, or some friend of his, in retranslating and fusing them with Pipino’s version for the _Navigationi_, made those minor modifications in names and other matters which we have already noticed. The mere facts of digestion from memoranda and double translation would account for a good deal of unintentional corruption.

That more than one version was employed in the composition of Ramusio’s edition we have curious proof in at least one passage of the latter. We have pointed out at p. 410 of this volume a curious example of misunderstanding of the old French Text, a passage in which the term _Roi des Pelaines_, or “King of Furs,” is applied to the Sable, and which in the Crusca has been converted into an imaginary Tartar phrase _Leroide pelame_, or as Pipino makes it _Rondes_ (another indication that Pipino’s Version and the Crusca passed through a common medium). But Ramusio exhibits _both_ the true reading and the perversion: “_E li Tartari la chiamano_ Regina delle pelli” (there is the true reading), “_E gli animali si chiamano_ Rondes” (and there the perverted one).

We may further remark that Ramusio’s version betrays indications that one of its bases either was in the Venetian dialect, or had passed through that dialect; for a good many of the names appear in Venetian forms, _e.g._, substituting the _z_ for the sound of _ch_, _j_, or soft _g_, as in _Goza_, _Zorzania_, _Zagatay_, _Gonza_ (for Giogiu), _Quenzanfu_, _Coiganzu_, _Tapinzu_, _Zipangu_, _Ziamba_.

[Sidenote: Summary in regard to Text of Polo.]

64. To sum up. It is, I think, beyond reasonable dispute that we have, in what we call the Geographic Text, as nearly as may be an exact transcript of the Traveller’s words as originally taken down in the prison of Genoa. We have again in the MSS. of the second type an edition pruned and refined, probably under instructions from Marco Polo, but not with any critical exactness. And lastly, I believe, that we have, imbedded in the Ramusian edition, the supplementary recollections of the Traveller, noted down at a later period of his life, but perplexed by repeated translation, compilation, and editorial mishandling.

And the most important remaining problem in regard to the text of Polo’s work is the discovery of the supplemental manuscript from which Ramusio derived those passages which are found only in his edition. It is possible that it may still exist, but no trace of it in anything like completeness has yet been found; though when my task was all but done I discovered a small part of the Ramusian peculiarities in a MS. at Venice.[19]

65. Whilst upon this subject of manuscripts of our Author, I will give some particulars regarding a very curious one, containing a version in the _Irish_ language.

[Sidenote: Notice of a curious Irish Version of Polo.]

This remarkable document is found in the _Book of Lismore_, belonging to the Duke of Devonshire. That magnificent book, finely written on vellum of the largest size, was discovered in 1814, enclosed in a wooden box, along with a superb crozier, on opening a closed doorway in the castle of Lismore. It contained Lives of the Saints, the (Romance) History of Charlemagne, the History of the Lombards, histories and tales of Irish wars, etc., etc., and among the other matter this version of Marco Polo. A full account of the Book and its mutilations will be found in _O’Curry’s Lectures on the MS. Materials of Ancient Irish History_, p. 196 _seqq._, Dublin, 1861. The _Book of Lismore_ was written about 1460 for Finghin MacCarthy and his wife Catharine Fitzgerald, daughter of Gerald, Eighth Earl of Desmond.

The date of the Translation of Polo is not known, but it may be supposed to have been executed about the above date, probably in the Monastery of Lismore (county of Waterford).

From the extracts that have been translated for me, it is obvious that the version was made, with an astounding freedom certainly, from Friar Francesco Pipino’s Latin.

Both beginning and end are missing. But what remains opens thus; compare it with Friar Pipino’s real prologue as we give it in the Appendix![20]

[Irish text] &c.

——“Kings and chieftains of that city. There was then in the city a princely Friar in the habit of St. Francis, named Franciscus, who was versed in many languages. He was brought to the place where those nobles were, and they requested of him to translate the book from the Tartar (!) into the Latin language. ‘It is an abomination to me,’ said he, ‘to devote my mind or labour to works of Idolatry and Irreligion.’ They entreated him again. ‘It shall be done,’ said he; ‘for though it be an irreligious narrative that is related therein, yet the things are miracles of the True God; and every one who hears this much against the Holy Faith shall pray fervently for their conversion. And he who will not pray shall waste the vigour of his body to convert them.’ I am not in dread of this Book of Marcus, for there is no lie in it. My eyes beheld him bringing the relics of the holy Church with him, and he left [his testimony], whilst tasting of death, that it was true. And Marcus was a devout man. What is there in it, then, but that Franciscus translated this Book of Marcus from the Tartar into Latin; and the years of the Lord at that time were fifteen years, two score, two hundred, and one thousand” (1255).

It then describes _Armein Bec_ (Little Armenia), _Armein Mor_ (Great Armenia), _Musul_, _Taurisius_, _Persida_, _Camandi_, and so forth. The last chapter is that on _Abaschia_:—

“ABASCHIA also is an extensive country, under the government of Seven Kings, four of whom worship the true God, and each of them wears a golden cross on the forehead; and they are valiant in battle, having been brought up fighting against the Gentiles of the other three kings, who are Unbelievers and Idolaters. And the kingdom of ADEN; a Soudan rules over them.

“The king of Abaschia once took a notion to make a pilgrimage to the Sepulchre of Jesus. ‘Not at all,’ said his nobles and warriors to him, ‘for we should be afraid lest the infidels through whose territories you would have to pass, should kill you. There is a Holy Bishop with you,’ said they; ‘send him to the Sepulchre of Jesus, and much gold with him’”——

The rest is wanting.

---------------------------------------------------------------------- [1] In the following citations, the Geographic Text (G. T.) is quoted by page from the printed edition (1824); the Latin published in the same volume (G. L.) also by page; the Crusca, as before, from Bartoli’s edition of 1863. References in parentheses are to the present translation:—

A. _Passages showing the G. L. to be a translation from the Italian, and derived from the same Italian text as the_ Crusca.

Page (1). G.T. 17 (I. 43). Il hi se laborent _le souran tapis_ dou monde.

Crusca, 17 .. E quivi si fanno _i sovrani tappeti_ del mondo.

G.L. 311 .. Et ibi fiunt _soriani et tapeti_ pulcriores de mundo.

(2). G.T. 23 (I. 69). Et adonc le calif mande par tuit les cristiez ... _que en sa tere estoient_.

Crusca, 27 .. _Ora mandò_ lo aliffo per tutti gli Cristiani _ch’erano di là_.

G.L. 316 .. _Or misit_ califus pro Christianis _qui erant ultra fluvium_ (the last words being clearly a misunderstanding of the Italian _di là_).

(3). G.T. 198 (II. 313). Ont _sosimain_ (sesamum) de coi il font le olio.

Crusca, 253 .. Hanno _sosimai_ onde fanno l’olio.

G.L. 448 .. Habent _turpes manus_ (taking _sosimani_ for _sozze mani_ “Dirty hands”!).

(4). Crusca, 52 (I. 158). _Cacciare e uccellare_ v’è lo migliore del mondo.

G.L. 332 .. Et est ibi optimum _caciare et ucellare_.

(5). G.T. 124 (II. 36). Adonc treuve ... une Provence _qe est encore_ de le confin dou Mangi.

Crusca, 162–3 .. L’uomo truova una Provincia _ch’è chiamata ancora_ delle confine de’ Mangi.

G.L. 396 .. Invenit unam Provinciam _quae vocatur Anchota_ de confinibus Mangi.

(6). G.T. 146 (II. 119). Les dames portent as jambes et es braces, braciaus d’or et d’arjent de grandisme vailance.

Crusca, 189 .. Le donne _portano alle braccia e alle gambe bracciali d’oro_ e d’ariento di gran valuta.

G.L. 411 .. Dominæ eorum _portant ad brachia et ad gambas brazalia de auro_ et de argento magni valoris.

B. _Passages showing additionally the errors, or other peculiarities of a translation from a French original, common to the Italian and the Latin._

(7). G.T. 32 (I. 97). Est celle plaingne mout _chaue_ (chaude).

Crusca, 35 .. Questo piano è molto _cavo_.

G.L. 322 .. Ista planities est multum _cava_.

(8). G.T. 36 (I. 110). Avent por ce que l’eive hi est _amer_.

Crusca, 40 .. E questo è _per lo mare_ che vi viene.

G.L. 324 .. Istud est _propter mare_ quod est ibi.

(9). G.T. 18 (I. 50). Un roi qi est apelés par tout tens Davit Melic, que veut à dir _en fransois_ Davit Roi.

Crusca, 20 .. Uno re il quale si chiama _sempre_ David Melic, ciò è a dire _in francesco_ David Re.

G.L. 312 .. Rex qui _semper_ vocatur David Mellic, quod sonat _in gallico_ David Rex.

These passages, and many more that might be quoted, seem to me to demonstrate (1) that the Latin and the Crusca have had a common original, and (2) that this original was an Italian version from the French.

[2] Thus the _Pucci_ MS. at Florence, in the passage regarding the Golden King (vol. ii. p. 17) which begins in G. T. “_Lequel fist faire_ jadis _un rois qe fu apellés le Roi Dor_,” renders “_Lo quale fa fare_ Jaddis _uno re_,” a mistake which is not in the Crusca nor in the Latin, and seems to imply derivation from the French directly, or by some other channel (_Baldelli Boni_).

[3] In the Prologue (vol. i. p. 34) this class of MSS. alone names the King of England.

In the account of the Battle with Nayan (i. p. 337) this class alone speaks of the two-stringed instruments which the Tartars played whilst awaiting the signal for battle. But the circumstance appears elsewhere in the G. T. (p. 250).

In the chapter on _Malabar_ (vol. ii. p. 390), it is said that the ships which go with cargoes towards Alexandria are not one-tenth of those that go to the further East. This is not in the older French.

In the chapter on _Coilun_ (ii. p. 375), we have a notice of the Columbine ginger so celebrated in the Middle Ages, which is also absent from the older text.

[4] See vol. ii. p. 439. It is, however, remarkable that a like mistake is made about the Persian Gulf (see i. 63, 64). Perhaps Polo _thought_ in Persian, in which the word _darya_ means either _sea_ or a _large river_. The same habit and the ambiguity of the Persian _sher_ led him probably to his confusion of lions and tigers (see i. 397).

[5] Such are Pasciai-_Dir_ and _Ariora_ Kesciemur (i. p. 98.)

[6] Thus the MSS. of this type have elected the erroneous readings _Bolgara, Cogatra, Chiato, Cabanant_, etc., instead of the correcter _Bolgana, Cocacin, Quiacatu, Cobinan_, where the G. T. presents both (_supra_, p. _86_). They read _Esanar_ for the correct _Etzina_; _Chascun_ for _Casvin_; _Achalet_ for _Acbalec_; _Sardansu_ for _Sindafu_, _Kayteu, Kayton, Sarcon_ for _Zaiton_ or _Caiton_; _Soucat_ for _Locac_; _Falec_ for _Ferlec_, and so on, the worse instead of the better. They make the _Mer Occeane_ into _Mer Occident_; the wild asses (_asnes_) of the Kerman Desert into wild geese (_oes_); the _escoillez_ of Bengal (ii. p. 115) into _escoliers_; the _giraffes_ of Africa into _girofles_, or cloves, etc., etc.

[7] There are about five-and-thirty such passages altogether.

[8] The Bern MS. I have satisfied myself is an actual _copy_ of the Paris MS. C.

The Oxford MS. closely resembles both, but I have not made the comparison minutely enough to say if it is an exact copy of either.

[9] The following comparison will also show that these two Latin versions have probably had a common source, such as is here suggested.

At the end of the Prologue the Geographic Text reads simply:—

“Or puis que je voz ai contez tot le fat dou prolegue ensi con voz avés oï, adonc (commencerai) le Livre.”

Whilst the Geographic Latin has:—

“_Postquam recitavimus et diximus facta et condictiones morum, itinerum_ et ea quae nobis contigerunt per vias, _incipiemus dicere ea quae vidimus. Et primo dicemus de Minore Hermenia_.”

And Pipino:—

“_Narratione facta nostri itineris, nunc ad ea narranda quae vidimus accedamus. Primo autem Armeniam Minorem describemus breviter_.”

[10] Friar Francesco Pipino of Bologna, a Dominican, is known also as the author of a lengthy chronicle from the time of the Frank Kings down to 1314; of a Latin Translation of the French History of the Conquest of the Holy Land, by Bernard the Treasurer; and of a short Itinerary of a Pilgrimage to Palestine in 1320. Extracts from the Chronicle, and the version of Bernard, are printed in Muratori’s Collection. As Pipino states himself to have executed the translation of Polo by order of his Superiors, it is probable that the task was set him at a general chapter of the order which was held at Bologna in 1315. (See _Muratori_, IX. 583; and _Quétif, Script. Ord. Praed._ I. 539). We do not know why Ramusio assigned the translation specifically to 1320, but he may have had grounds.

[11] See _Bianconi_, 1st Mem. 29 _seqq._

[12] C. Dickens somewhere narrates the history of the equivalents for a sovereign as changed and rechanged at every frontier on a continental tour. The final equivalent received at Dover on his return was some 12 or 13 shillings; a fair parallel to the comparative value of the first and last copies in the circle of translation.

[13] The Ramusios were a family of note in literature for several generations. Paolo, the father of Gian Battista, came originally from Rimini to Venice in 1458, and had a great repute as a jurist, besides being a littérateur of some eminence, as was also his younger brother Girolamo. G. B. Ramusio was born at Treviso in 1485, and early entered the public service. In 1533 he became one of the Secretaries of the Council of X. He was especially devoted to geographical studies, and had a school for such studies in his house. He retired eventually from public duties, and lived at Villa Ramusia, near Padua. He died in the latter city, 10th July, 1557, but was buried at Venice in the Church of S. Maria dell’Orto. There was a portrait of him by Paul Veronese in the Hall of the Great Council, but it perished in the fire of 1577; and that which is now seen in the Sala dello Scudo is, like the companion portrait of Marco Polo, imaginary. Paolo Ramusio, his son, was the author of the well-known History of the Capture of Constantinople. (_Cicogna_, II. 310 _seqq._)

[14] The old French texts were unknown in Marsden’s time. Hence this question did not present itself to him.

[15] _Wangcheu_ in the Chinese Annals; _Vanchu_ in Ramusio. I assume that Polo’s _Vanchu_ was pronounced as in English; for in Venetian the _ch_ very often has that sound. But I confess that I can adduce no other instance in Ramusio where I suppose it to have this sound, except in the initial sound of _Chinchitalas_ and twice in _Choiach_ (see II. 364).

Professor Bianconi, who has treated the questions connected with the Texts of Polo with honest enthusiasm and laborious detail, will admit nothing genuine in the Ramusian interpolations beyond the preservation of some _oral traditions_ of Polo’s supplementary recollections. But such a theory is out of the question in face of a chapter like that on Ahmad.

[16] Old Purchas appears to have greatly relished Ramusio’s comparative lucidity: “I found (says he) this Booke translated by Master Hakluyt out of the Latine (_i.e._ among Hakluyt’s MS. collections). But where the blind leade the blind both fall: as here the corrupt _Latine_ could not but yeeld a corruption of truth in _English_. Ramusio, Secretarie to the _Decemviri_ in _Venice_, found a better Copie and published the same, whence you have the worke in manner new: so renewed, that I have found the Proverbe true, that it is better to pull downe an old house and to build it anew, then to repaire it; as I also should have done, had I knowne that which in the event I found. The _Latine_ is Latten, compared to _Ramusio’s_ Gold. And hee which hath the _Latine_ hath but _Marco Polo’s_ carkasse or not so much, but a few bones, yea, sometimes stones rather then bones; things divers, averse, adverse, perverted in manner, disjoynted in manner, beyond beliefe. I have seene some Authors maymed, but never any so mangled and so mingled, so present and so absent, as this vulgar _Latine_ of _Marco Polo_; not so like himselfe, as the Three _Polo’s_ were at their returne to _Venice_, where none knew them.... Much are wee beholden to _Ramusio_, for restoring this _Pole_ and Load-starre of _Asia_, out of that mirie poole or puddle in which he lay drouned.” (III. p. 65.)

[17] Of these difficulties the following are some of the more prominent:—

1. The mention of the death of Kúblái (see note 7, p. 38 of this volume), whilst throughout the book Polo speaks of Kúblái as if still reigning.

2. Mr. Hugh Murray objects that whilst in the old texts Polo appears to look on Kúblái with reverence as a faultless Prince, in the Ramusian we find passages of an opposite tendency, as in the chapter about Ahmad.

3. The same editor points to the manner in which one of the Ramusian additions represents the traveller to have visited the Palace of the Chinese Kings at Kinsay, which he conceives to be inconsistent with Marco’s position as an official of the Mongol Government. (See vol. ii. p. 208.)

If we could conceive the Ramusian additions to have been originally notes written by old Maffeo Polo on his nephew’s book, this hypothesis would remove almost all difficulty.

One passage in Ramusio seems to bear a reference to the date at which these interpolated notes were amalgamated with the original. In the chapter on Samarkand (i. p. 191) the conversion of the Prince Chagatai is said in the old texts to have occurred “not a great while ago” (_il ne a encore grament de tens_). But in Ramusio the supposed event is fixed at “one hundred and twenty-five years since.” This number could not have been uttered with reference to 1298, the year of the dictation at Genoa, nor to any year of Polo’s own life. Hence it is probable that the original note contained a date or definite term which was altered by the compiler to suit the date of his own compilation, some time in the 14th century.

[18] In the first edition of Ramusio the preface contained the following passage, which is omitted from the succeeding editions; but as even the first edition was issued after Ramusio’s own death, I do not see that any stress can be laid on this:

“A copy of the Book of Marco Polo, as it was originally written in Latin, marvellously old, and perhaps directly copied from the original as it came from M. Marco’s own hand, has been often consulted by me and compared with that which we now publish, having been lent me by a nobleman of this city, belonging to the Ca’ Ghisi.”

[19] For a moment I thought I had been lucky enough to light on a part of the missing original of Ramusio in the Barberini Library at Rome. A fragment of a Venetian version in that library (No. 56 in our list of MSS.) bore on the fly-leaf the title “_Alcuni primi capi del Libro di S. Marco Polo, copiati dall esemplare manoscritto di PAOLO RANNUSIO._” But it proved to be of no importance. One brief passage of those which have been thought peculiar to Ramusio, viz., the reference to the Martyrdom of St. Blaize at Sebaste (see p. 43 of this volume), is found also in the Geographic Latin.

It was pointed out by Lazari, that another passage (vol. i. p. 60) of those otherwise peculiar to Ramusio, is found in a somewhat abridged Latin version in a MS. which belonged to the late eminent antiquary Emanuel Cicogna. (See List in Appendix F, No. 35.) This fact induced me when at Venice in 1870 to examine the MS. throughout, and, though I could give little time to it, the result was very curious.

I find that this MS. contains, not one only, but at least _seven_ of the passages otherwise peculiar to Ramusio, and must have been one of the elements that went to the formation of his text. Yet of his more important interpolations, such as the chapter on Ahmad’s oppressions and the additional matter on the City of Kinsay, there is no indication. The seven passages alluded to are as follows; the words corresponding to Ramusian peculiarities are in italics, the references are to my own volumes.

1. In the chapter on Georgia:

“Mare quod dicitur Gheluchelan _vel ABACU_”....

“Est ejus stricta via et dubia. Ab una parte est mare _quod dixi de ABACU_ et ab aliâ nemora invia,” etc. (See I. p. 59, note 8.)

2. “Et ibi optimi austures _dicti AVIGI_” (I. 50).

3. After the chapter on Mosul is another short chapter, already alluded to:

“_Prope hanc civitatem (est) alia provincia dicta MUS e MEREDIEN in quâ nascitur magna quantitas bombacis, et hic fiunt bocharini et alia multa, et sunt mercatores homines et artiste_.” (See i. p. 60.)

4. In the chapter on _Tarcan_ (for Carcan, _i.e._ Yarkand):

“_Et maior pars horum habent unum ex pedibus grossum et habent gosum in gulâ_; et est hic fertilis contracta.” (See i. p. 187.)

5. In the Desert of Lop:

“_Homines trasseuntes appendunt bestiis suis capanullas_ [_i.e._ campanellas] _ut ipsas senciant et ne deviare possint_” (i. p. 197.)

6. “Ciagannor, _quod sonat in Latino STAGNUM ALBUM_.” (i. p. 296.)

7. “Et in medio hujus viridarii est palacium sive logia, _tota super columpnas. Et in summitate cujuslibet columnæ est draco magnus circundans totam columpnam, et hic substinet eorum cohoperturam cum ore et pedibus_; et est cohopertura tota de cannis hoc modo,” etc. (See i. p. 299.)

[20] My valued friend Sir Arthur Phayre made known to me the passage in _O’Curry’s Lectures_. I then procured the extracts and further particulars from Mr. J. Long, Irish Transcriber and Translator in Dublin, who took them from the Transcript of the _Book of Lismore_, in the possession of the Royal Irish Academy. [Cf. _Anecdota Oxoniensia. Lives of the Saints from the Book of Lismore, edited with a translation ... by_ Whitley Stokes, Oxford, 1890.—_Marco Polo_ forms fo. 79 a, 1–fo. 89 b, 2, of the MS., and is described pp. xxii.–xxiv. of Mr. Whitley Stokes’ Book, who has since published the Text in the _Zeit. f. Celtische Philol._ (See _Bibliography_, vol. ii. p. 573.)— H. C.]

XI. SOME ESTIMATE OF THE CHARACTER OF POLO AND HIS BOOK.

[Sidenote: Grounds of Polo’s pre-eminence among mediæval travellers.]

66. That Marco Polo has been so universally recognised as the King of Mediæval Travellers is due rather to the width of his experience, the vast compass of his journeys, and the romantic nature of his personal history, than to transcendent superiority of character or capacity.

The generation immediately preceding his own has bequeathed to us, in the Report of the Franciscan Friar William de Rubruquis,[1] on the Mission with which St. Lewis charged him to the Tartar Courts, the narrative of one great journey, which, in its rich detail, its vivid pictures, its acuteness of observation and strong good sense, seems to me to form a Book of Travels of much higher claims than _any one series_ of Polo’s chapters; a book, indeed, which has never had justice done to it, for it has few superiors in the whole Library of Travel.

Enthusiastic Biographers, beginning with Ramusio, have placed Polo on the same platform with Columbus. But where has our Venetian Traveller left behind him any trace of the genius and lofty enthusiasm, the ardent and justified previsions which mark the great Admiral as one of the lights of the human race?[2] It is a juster praise that the spur which his Book eventually gave to geographical studies, and the beacons which it hung out at the Eastern extremities of the Earth helped to guide the aims, though scarcely to kindle the fire, of the greater son of the rival Republic. His work was at least a link in the Providential chain which at last dragged the New World to light.[3]

[Sidenote: His true claims to glory.]

67. Surely Marco’s real, indisputable, and, in their kind, unique claims to glory may suffice! _He was the first Traveller to trace a route across the whole longitude of_ ASIA, _naming and describing kingdom after kingdom which he had seen with his own eyes; the Deserts of_ PERSIA, _the flowering plateaux and wild gorges of_ BADAKHSHAN, _the jade-bearing rivers of_ KHOTAN, _the_ MONGOLIAN _Steppes, cradle of the power that had so lately threatened to swallow up Christendom, the new and brilliant Court that had been established at_ CAMBALUC: _The first Traveller to reveal_ CHINA _in all its wealth and vastness, its mighty rivers, its huge cities, its rich manufactures, its swarming population, the inconceivably vast fleets that quickened its seas and its inland waters; to tell us of the nations on its borders with all their eccentricities of manners and worship; of_ TIBET _with its sordid devotees; of_ BURMA _with its golden pagodas and their tinkling crowns; of_ LAOS, _of_ SIAM, _of_ COCHIN CHINA, _of_ JAPAN, _the Eastern Thule, with its rosy pearls and golden-roofed palaces; the first to speak of that Museum of Beauty and Wonder, still so imperfectly ransacked, the_ INDIAN ARCHIPELAGO, _source of those aromatics then so highly prized and whose origin was so dark; of_ JAVA _the Pearl of Islands; of_ SUMATRA _with its many kings, its strange costly products, and its cannibal races; of the naked savages of_ NICOBAR _and_ ANDAMAN; _of_ CEYLON _the Isle of Gems with its Sacred Mountain and its Tomb of Adam; of_ INDIA THE GREAT, _not as a dream-land of Alexandrian fables, but as a country seen and partially explored, with its virtuous Brahmans, its obscene ascetics, its diamonds and the strange tales of their acquisition, its sea-beds of pearl, and its powerful sun; the first in mediæval times to give any distinct account of the secluded Christian Empire of_ ABYSSINIA, _and the semi-Christian Island of_ SOCOTRA; _to speak, though indeed dimly, of_ ZANGIBAR _with its negroes and its ivory, and of the vast and distant_ MADAGASCAR, _bordering on the Dark Ocean of the South, with its Ruc and other monstrosities; and, in a remotely opposite region, of_ SIBERIA _and the_ ARCTIC OCEAN, _of dog-sledges, white bears, and reindeer-riding Tunguses_.

That all this rich catalogue of discoveries should belong to the revelations of one Man and one Book is surely ample ground enough to account for and to justify the Author’s high place in the roll of Fame, and there can be no need to exaggerate his greatness, or to invest him with imaginary attributes.[4]

[Sidenote: His personal attributes seen but dimly.]

68. What manner of man was Ser Marco? It is a question hard to answer. Some critics cry out against personal detail in books of Travel; but as regards him who would not welcome a little more egotism! In his Book impersonality is carried to excess; and we are often driven to discern by indirect and doubtful indications alone, whether he is speaking of a place from personal knowledge or only from hearsay. In truth, though there are delightful exceptions, and nearly every part of the book suggests interesting questions, a desperate meagreness and baldness does extend over considerable tracts of the story. In fact his book reminds us sometimes of his own description of Khorasan:—“_On chevauche par beaus plains et belles costieres, là où il a moult beaus herbages et bonne pasture et fruis assez.... Et aucune fois y treuve l’en un desert de soixante milles ou de mains, esquels desers ne treuve l’en point d’eaue; mais la convient porter o lui!_”

Still, some shadowy image of the man may be seen in the Book; a practical man, brave, shrewd, prudent, keen in affairs, and never losing his interest in mercantile details, very fond of the chase, sparing of speech; with a deep wondering respect for Saints, even though they be Pagan Saints, and their asceticism, but a contempt for Patarins and such like, whose consciences would not run in customary grooves, and on his own part a keen appreciation of the World’s pomps and vanities. See, on the one hand, his undisguised admiration of the hard life and long fastings of Sakya Muni; and on the other how enthusiastic he gets in speaking of the great Kaan’s command of the good things of the world, but above all of his matchless opportunities of sport![5]

Of humour there are hardly any signs in his Book. His almost solitary joke (I know but one more, and it pertains to the οὐκ ἀνήκοντα) occurs in speaking of the Kaan’s paper-money when he observes that Kúblái might be said to have the true Philosopher’s Stone, for he made his money at pleasure out of the bark of Trees.[6] Even the oddest eccentricities of outlandish tribes scarcely seem to disturb his gravity; as when he relates in his brief way of the people called Gold-Teeth on the frontier of Burma, that ludicrous custom which Mr. Tylor has so well illustrated under the name of the _Couvade_. There is more savour of laughter in the few lines of a Greek Epic, which relate precisely the same custom of a people on the Euxine:—

————“In the Tibarenian Land When some good woman bears her lord a babe, ’Tis _he_ is swathed and groaning put to bed; Whilst _she_, arising, tends his baths, and serves Nice possets for her husband in the straw.”[7]

[Illustration: Probable View OF MARCO POLO’S OWN GEOGRAPHY

Lit. Frauenfelder, Palermo]

[Sidenote: Absence of scientific notions.]

69. Of scientific notions, such as we find in the unveracious Maundevile, we have no trace in truthful Marco. The former, “lying with a circumstance,” tells us boldly that he was in 33° of South Latitude; the latter is full of wonder that some of the Indian Islands where he had been lay so far to the south that you lost sight of the Pole-star. When it rises again on his horizon he estimates the Latitude by the Pole-star’s being so many _cubits_ high. So the gallant Baber speaks of the sun having mounted _spear-high_ when the onset of battle began at Paniput. Such expressions convey no notion at all to such as have had their ideas sophisticated by angular perceptions of altitude, but similar expressions are common among Orientals,[8] and indeed I have heard them from educated Englishmen. In another place Marco states regarding certain islands in the Northern Ocean that they lie so very far to the north that in going thither one actually leaves the Pole-star a trifle behind towards the south; a statement to which we know only one parallel, to wit, in the voyage of that adventurous Dutch skipper who told Master Moxon, King Charles II.’s Hydrographer, that he had sailed two degrees beyond the Pole!

[Sidenote: Map constructed on Polo’s data.]

70. The Book, however, is full of bearings and distances, and I have thought it worth while to construct a map from its indications, in order to get some approximation to Polo’s own idea of the face of that world which he had traversed so extensively. There are three allusions to maps in the course of his work (II. 245, 312, 424).

In his own bearings, at least on land journeys, he usually carries us along a great general traverse line, without much caring about small changes of direction. Thus on the great outward journey from the frontier of Persia to that of China the line runs almost continuously “_entre Levant et Grec_” or E.N.E. In his journey from Cambaluc or Peking to Mien or Burma, it is always _Ponent_ or W.; and in that from Peking to Zayton in Fo-kien, the port of embarkation for India, it is _Sceloc_ or S.E. The line of bearings in which he deviates most widely from truth is that of the cities on the Arabian Coast from Aden to Hormuz, which he makes to run steadily _vers Maistre_ or N.W., a conception which it has not been very easy to realise on the map.[9]

[Sidenote: Singular omissions of Polo in regard to China; Historical inaccuracies.]

71. In the early part of the Book we are told that Marco acquired several of the languages current in the Mongol Empire, and no less than four written characters. We have discussed what these are likely to have been (i. pp. 28–29), and have given a decided opinion that Chinese was not one of them. Besides intrinsic improbability, and positive indications of Marco’s ignorance of Chinese, in no respect is his book so defective as in regard to Chinese manners and peculiarities. The Great Wall is never mentioned, though we have shown reason for believing that it was in his mind when one passage of his book was dictated.[10] The use of Tea, though he travelled through the Tea districts of Fo-kien, is never mentioned;[11] the compressed feet of the women and the employment of the fishing cormorant (both mentioned by Friar Odoric, the contemporary of his later years), artificial egg-hatching, printing of books (though the notice of this art seems positively challenged in his account of paper-money), besides a score of remarkable arts and customs which one would have expected to recur to his memory, are never alluded to. Neither does he speak of the great characteristic of the Chinese writing. It is difficult to account for these omissions, especially considering the comparative fulness with which he treats the manners of the Tartars and of the Southern Hindoos; but the impression remains that his associations in China were chiefly with foreigners. Wherever the place he speaks of had a Tartar or Persian name he uses that rather than the Chinese one. Thus _Cathay_, _Cambaluc_, _Pulisanghin_, _Tangut_, _Chagannor_, _Saianfu_, _Kenjanfu_, _Tenduc_, _Acbalec_, _Carajan_, _Zardandan_, _Zayton_, _Kemenfu_, _Brius_, _Caramoran_, _Chorcha_, _Juju_, are all Mongol, Turki, or Persian forms, though all have Chinese equivalents.[12]

In reference to the then recent history of Asia, Marco is often inaccurate, _e.g._ in his account of the death of Chinghiz, in the list of his successors, and in his statement of the relationship between notable members of that House.[13] But the most perplexing knot in the whole book lies in the interesting account which he gives of the Siege of Sayanfu or Siang-yang, during the subjugation of Southern China by Kúblái. I have entered on this matter in the notes (vol. ii. p. 167), and will only say here that M. Pauthier’s solution of the difficulty is no solution, being absolutely inconsistent with the story as told by Marco himself, and that I see none; though I have so much faith in Marco’s veracity that I am loath to believe that the facts admit of no reconciliation.

Our faint attempt to appreciate some of Marco’s qualities, as gathered from his work, will seem far below the very high estimates that have been pronounced, not only by some who have delighted rather to enlarge upon his frame than to make themselves acquainted with his work,[14] but also by persons whose studies and opinions have been worthy of all respect. Our estimate, however, does not abate a jot of our intense interest in his Book and affection for his memory. And we have a strong feeling that, owing partly to his reticence, and partly to the great disadvantages under which the Book was committed to writing, we have in it a singularly imperfect image of the Man.

[Sidenote: Was Polo’s Book materially affected by the Scribe Rusticiano?]

72. A question naturally suggests itself, how far Polo’s narrative, at least in its expression, was modified by passing under the pen of a professed littérateur of somewhat humble claims, such as Rusticiano was. The case is not a singular one, and in our own day the ill-judged use of such assistance has been fatal to the reputation of an adventurous Traveller.

We have, however, already expressed our own view that in the Geographic Text we have the nearest possible approach to a photographic impression of Marco’s oral narrative. If there be an exception to this we should seek it in the descriptions of battles, in which we find the narrator to fall constantly into a certain vein of bombastic commonplaces, which look like the stock phrases of a professed romancer, and which indeed have a strong resemblance to the actual phraseology of certain metrical romances.[15] Whether this feature be due to Rusticiano I cannot say, but I have not been able to trace anything of the same character in a cursory inspection of some of his romance-compilations. Still one finds it impossible to conceive of our sober and reticent Messer Marco pacing the floor of his Genoese dungeon, and seven times over rolling out this magniloquent bombast, with sufficient deliberation to be overtaken by the pen of the faithful amanuensis!

[Sidenote: Marco’s reading embraced the Alexandrian Romances. Examples.]

73. On the other hand, though Marco, who had left home at fifteen years of age, naturally shows very few signs of reading, there are indications that he had read romances, especially those dealing with the fabulous adventures of Alexander.

To these he refers explicitly or tacitly in his notices of the Irongate and of Gog and Magog, in his allusions to the marriage of Alexander with Darius’s daughter, and to the battle between those two heroes, and in his repeated mention of the _Arbre Sol_ or _Arbre Sec_ on the Khorasan frontier.

The key to these allusions is to be found in that Legendary History of Alexander, entirely distinct from the true history of the Macedonian Conqueror, which in great measure took the place of the latter in the imagination of East and West for more than a thousand years. This fabulous history is believed to be of Græco-Egyptian origin, and in its earliest extant compiled form, in the Greek of the Pseudo-Callisthenes, can be traced back to at least about A.D. 200. From the Greek its marvels spread eastward at an early date; some part at least of their matter was known to Moses of Chorene, in the 5th century;[16] they were translated into Armenian, Arabic, Hebrew, and Syriac; and were reproduced in the verses of Firdusi and various other Persian Poets; spreading eventually even to the Indian Archipelago, and finding utterance in Malay and Siamese. At an early date they had been rendered into Latin by Julius Valerius; but this work had probably been lost sight of, and it was in the 10th century that they were re-imported from Byzantium to Italy by the Archpriest Leo, who had gone as Envoy to the Eastern Capital from John Duke of Campania.[17] Romantic histories on this foundation, in verse and prose, became diffused in all the languages of Western Europe, from Spain to Scandinavia, rivalling in popularity the romantic cycles of the Round Table or of Charlemagne. Nor did this popularity cease till the 16th century was well advanced.

The heads of most of the Mediæval Travellers were crammed with these fables as genuine history.[18] And by the help of that community of legend on this subject which they found wherever Mahomedan literature had spread, Alexander Magnus was to be traced everywhere in Asia. Friar Odoric found Tana, near Bombay, to be the veritable City of King Porus; John Marignolli’s vainglory led him to imitate King Alexander in setting up a marble column “in the corner of the world over against Paradise,” _i.e._ somewhere on the coast of Travancore; whilst Sir John Maundevile, with a cheaper ambition, borrowed wonders from the Travels of Alexander to adorn his own. Nay, even in after days, when the Portuguese stumbled with amazement on those vast ruins in Camboja, which have so lately become familiar to us through the works of Mouhot, Thomson, and Garnier, they ascribed them to Alexander.[19]

Prominent in all these stories is the tale of Alexander’s shutting up a score of impure nations, at the head of which were Gog and Magog, within a barrier of impassable mountains, there to await the latter days; a legend with which the disturbed mind of Europe not unnaturally connected that cataclysm of unheard-of Pagans that seemed about to deluge Christendom in the first half of the 13th century. In these stories also the beautiful Roxana, who becomes the bride of Alexander, is _Darius’s_ daughter, bequeathed to his arms by the dying monarch. Conspicuous among them again is the Legend of the Oracular Trees of the Sun and Moon, which with audible voice foretell the place and manner of Alexander’s death. With this Alexandrian legend some of the later forms of the story had mixed up one of Christian origin about the Dry Tree, _L’Arbre Sec_. And they had also adopted the Oriental story of the Land of Darkness and the mode of escape from it, which Polo relates at p. 484 of vol. ii.

[Sidenote: Injustice long done to Polo. Singular modern instance.]

74. We have seen in the most probable interpretation of the nickname _Milioni_ that Polo’s popular reputation in his lifetime was of a questionable kind; and a contemporary chronicler, already quoted, has told us how on his death-bed the Traveller was begged by anxious friends to retract his extraordinary stories.[20] A little later one who copied the Book “_per passare tempo e malinconia_” says frankly that he puts no faith in it.[21] Sir Thomas Brown is content “to carry a wary eye” in reading “Paulus Venetus”; but others of our countrymen in the last century express strong doubts whether he ever was in Tartary or China.[22] Marden’s edition might well have extinguished the last sparks of scepticism.[23] Hammer meant praise in calling Polo “_der Vater orientalischer Hodogetik_,” in spite of the uncouthness of the eulogy. But another grave German writer, ten years after Marsden’s publication, put forth in a serious book that the whole story was a clumsy imposture![24]

---------------------------------------------------------------------- [1] M. d’Avezac has refuted the common supposition that this admirable traveller was a native of Brabant.

The form _Rubruquis_ of the name of the traveller William de Rubruk has been habitually used in this book, perhaps without sufficient consideration, but it is the most familiar in England, from its use by Hakluyt and Purchas. The former, who first published the narrative, professedly printed from an imperfect MS. belonging to the Lord Lumley, which does not seem to be now known. But all the MSS. collated by Messrs. Francisque-Michel and Wright, in preparing their edition of the Traveller, call him simply Willelmus de Rubruc or Rubruk.

Some old authors, apparently without the slightest ground, having called him _Risbroucke_ and the like, it came to be assumed that he was a native of Ruysbroeck, a place in South Brabant.

But there is a place still called _Rubrouck_ in French Flanders. This is a commune containing about 1500 inhabitants, belonging to the Canton of Cassel and _arrondissement_ of Hazebrouck, in the Department du Nord. And we may take for granted, till facts are alleged against it, that _this_ was the place from which the envoy of St. Lewis drew his origin. Many documents of the Middle Ages, referring expressly to this place Rubrouck, exist in the Library of St. Omer, and a detailed notice of them has been published by M. Edm. Coussemaker, of Lille. Several of these documents refer to persons bearing the same name as the Traveller, _e.g._, in 1190, Thierry de Rubrouc; in 1202 and 1221, Gauthier du Rubrouc; in 1250, Jean du Rubrouc; and in 1258, Woutermann de Rubrouc. It is reasonable to suppose that Friar William was of the same stock. See _Bulletin de la Soc. de Géographie_, 2nd vol. for 1868, pp. 569–570, in which there are some remarks on the subject by M. d’Avezac; and I am indebted to the kind courtesy of that eminent geographer himself for the indication of this reference and the main facts, as I had lost a note of my own on the subject.

It seems a somewhat complex question whether a native even of _French_ Flanders at that time should be necessarily claimable as a Frenchman;[A] but no doubt on this point is alluded to by M. d’Avezac, so he probably had good ground for that assumption. [See also _Yule’s_ article in the _Encyclopædia Britannica_, and _Rockhill’s Rubruck_, Int., p. xxxv.—H. C.]

That cross-grained Orientalist, I. J. Schmidt, on several occasions speaks contemptuously of this veracious and delightful traveller, whose evidence goes in the teeth of some of his crotchets. But I am glad to find that Professor Peschel takes a view similar to that expressed in the text: “The narrative of Ruysbroek [Rubruquis], almost immaculate in its freedom from fabulous insertions, may be indicated on account of its truth to nature as the greatest geographical masterpiece of the Middle Ages.” (_Gesch. der Erdkunde_, 1865, p. 151.)

[A] The County of Flanders was at this time in large part a fief of the French Crown. (See _Natalis de Wailly_, notes to Joinville, p. 576.) But that would not much affect the question either one way or the other.

[2] High as Marco’s name deserves to be set, his place is not beside the writer of such burning words as these addressed to Ferdinand and Isabella: “From the most tender age I went to sea, and to this day I have continued to do so. Whosoever devotes himself to this craft must desire to know the secrets of Nature here below. For 40 years now have I thus been engaged, and wherever man has sailed hitherto on the face of the sea, thither have I sailed also. I have been in constant relation with men of learning, whether ecclesiastic or secular, Latins and Greeks, Jews and Moors, and men of many a sect besides. To accomplish this my longing (to know the Secrets of the World) I found the Lord favourable to my purposes; it is He who hath given me the needful disposition and understanding. He bestowed upon me abundantly the knowledge of seamanship: and of Astronomy He gave me enough to work withal, and so with Geometry and Arithmetic.... In the days of my youth I studied works of all kinds, history, chronicles, philosophy, and other arts, and to apprehend these the Lord opened my understanding. Under His manifest guidance I navigated hence to the Indies; for it was the Lord who gave me the will to accomplish that task, and it was in the ardour of that will that I came before your Highnesses. All those who heard of my project scouted and derided it; all the acquirements I have mentioned stood me in no stead; and if in your Highnesses, and in you alone, Faith and Constancy endured, to Whom are due the Lights that have enlightened you as well as me, but to the Holy Spirit?” (Quoted in _Humboldt’s Examen Critique_, I. 17, 18.)

[3] Libri, however, speaks too strongly when he says: “The finest of all the results due to the influence of Marco Polo is that of having stirred Columbus to the discovery of the New World. Columbus, jealous of Polo’s laurels, spent his life in preparing means to get to that Zipangu of which the Venetian traveller had told such great things; his desire was to reach China by sailing westward, and in his way he fell in with America.” (_H. des Sciences Mathém._ etc. II. 150.)

The fact seems to be that Columbus knew of Polo’s revelations only at second hand, from the letters of the Florentine Paolo Toscanelli and the like; and I cannot find that he _ever_ refers to Polo by name. [How deep was the interest taken by Colombus in Marco Polo’s travels is shown by the numerous marginal notes of the Admiral in the printed copy of the latin version of Pipino kept at the Bib. Colombina at Seville. See _Appendix H_. p. 558.—H. C.] Though to the day of his death he was full of imaginations about Zipangu and the land of the Great Kaan as being in immediate proximity to his discoveries, these were but accidents of his great theory. It was the intense conviction he had acquired of the absolute smallness of the Earth, of the vast extension of Asia eastward, and of the consequent narrowness of the Western Ocean, on which his life’s project was based. This conviction he seems to have derived chiefly from the works of Cardinal Pierre d’Ailly. But the latter borrowed his collected arguments from Roger Bacon, who has stated them, erroneous as they are, very forcibly in his _Opus Majus_ (p. 137), as Humboldt has noticed in his _Examen_ (vol. i. p. 64). The Spanish historian Mariana makes a strange jumble of the alleged guides of Columbus, saying that some ascribed his convictions to “the information given by _one Marco Polo, a Florentine Physician!_” (“como otros dizen, por aviso que le dio _un cierto Marco Polo, Medico Florentin_;” _Hist. de España_, lib. xxvi. cap 3). Toscanelli is called by Columbus _Maestro Paulo_, which seems to have led to this mistake; see Sign. _G. Uzielli_, in _Boll. della Soc. Geog. Ital._ IX. p. 119. [Also by the same: _Paolo dal Pozzo Toscanelli iniziatore della scoperta d’America_, Florence, 1892; _Toscanelli_, No. 1; _Toscanelli_, Vol. V. of the _Raccolta Colombiana_, 1894.—H. C.]

[4] “C’est diminuer l’expression d’un éloge que de l’exagérer.” (_Humboldt, Examen_, III. 13.)

[5] See vol. ii. p. 318, and vol. i. p. 404.

[6] Vol. i. p. 423.

[7] Vol. ii. p. 85, and _Apollonius Rhodius, Argonaut_. II. 1012.

[8] Chinese Observers record the length of Comets’ tails by _cubits_!

[9] The map, perhaps, gives too favourable an idea of Marco’s geographical conceptions. For in such a construction much has to be supplied for which there are no data, and that is apt to take mould from modern knowledge. Just as in the book illustrations of ninety years ago we find that Princesses of Abyssinia, damsels of Otaheite, and Beauties of Mary Stuart’s Court have all somehow a savour of the high waists, low foreheads, and tight garments of 1810.

We are told that Prince Pedro of Portugal in 1426 received from the Signory of Venice a map which was supposed to be either an original or a copy of one by Marco Polo’s own hand. (_Major’s P. Henry_, p. 62.) There is no evidence to justify any absolute expression of disbelief; and if any map-maker with the spirit of the author of the Carta Catalana then dwelt in Venice, Polo certainly could not have gone to his grave uncatechised. But I should suspect the map to have been a copy of the old one that existed in the Sala dello Scudo of the Ducal Palace.

The maps now to be seen painted on the walls of that Hall, and on which Polo’s route is marked, are not of any great interest. But in the middle of the 15th century there was an old _Descriptio Orbis sive Mappamundus_ in the Hall, and when the apartment was renewed in 1459 a decree of the Senate ordered that such a map should be repainted on the new walls. This also perished by a fire in 1483. On the motion of Ramusio, in the next century, four new maps were painted. These had become dingy and ragged, when, in 1762, the Doge Marco Foscarini caused them to be renewed by the painter Francesco Grisellini. He professed to have adhered closely to the old maps, but he certainly did not, as Morelli testifies. Eastern Asia looks as if based on a work of Ramusio’s age, but Western Asia is of undoubtedly modern character. (See _Operetti di Iacopo Morelli_, Ven. 1820, I. 299.)

[10] “Humboldt confirms the opinion I have more than once expressed that too much must not be inferred from the silence of authors. He adduces three important and perfectly undeniable matters of fact, as to which no evidence is to be found where it would be most anticipated: In the archives of Barcelona no trace of the triumphal entry of Columbus into that city; _in Marco Polo no allusion to the Chinese Wall_; in the archives of Portugal nothing about the voyages of Amerigo Vespucci in the service of that crown.” (_Varnhagen_ v. _Ense_, quoted by Hayward, _Essays_, 2nd Ser. I. 36.) See regarding the Chinese Wall the remarks referred to above, at p. 292 of this volume.

[11] [It is a strange fact that Polo never mentions the use of _Tea_ in China, although he travelled through the Tea districts in Fu Kien, and tea was then as generally drunk by the Chinese as it is now. It is mentioned more than four centuries earlier by the Mohammedan merchant Soleyman, who visited China about the middle of the 9th century. He states (_Reinaud, Relation des Voyages faits par les Arabes et les Persans dans l’Inde et à la Chine_, 1845, I. 40): “The people of China are accustomed to use as a beverage an infusion of a plant, which they call _sakh_, and the leaves of which are aromatic and of a bitter taste. It is considered very wholesome. This plant (the leaves) is sold in all the cities of the empire.” (_Bretschneider, Hist. Bot. Disc._ I. p. 5.)—H. C.]

[12] It is probable that Persian, which had long been the language of Turanian courts, was also the common tongue of foreigners at that of the Mongols. _Pulisanghin_ and _Zardandan_, in the preceding list, are pure Persian. So are several of the Oriental phrases noted at p. _84_. See also notes on _Ondanique_ and _Vernique_ at pp. 93 and 384 of this volume, on _Tacuin_ at p. 448, and a note at p. _93_ _supra_. The narratives of Odoric, and others of the early travellers to Cathay, afford corroborative examples. Lord Stanley of Alderley, in one of his contributions to the Hakluyt Series, has given evidence from experience that Chinese Mahomedans still preserve the knowledge of numerous Persian words.

[13] Compare these errors with like errors of Herodotus, _e.g._, regarding the conspiracy of the False Smerdis. (See Rawlinson’s Introduction, p. 55.) There is a curious parallel between the two also in the supposed occasional use of Oriental state records, as in Herodotus’s accounts of the revenues of the satrapies, and of the army of Xerxes, and in Marco Polo’s account of Kinsay, and of the Kaan’s revenues. (Vol. ii pp. 185, 216.)

[14] An example is seen in the voluminous _Annali Musulmani_ of _G. B. Rampoldi_, Milan, 1825. This writer speaks of the Travels of Marco Polo with his _brother_ and uncle; declares that he visited _Tipango_ (_sic_), Java, Ceylon, and the _Maldives_, collected all the geographical notions of his age, traversed the two peninsulas of the Indies, examined the islands of _Socotra, Madagascar, Sofala_, and traversed with _philosophic eye_ the regions of Zanguebar, Abyssinia, Nubia, and Egypt! and so forth (ix. 174). And whilst Malte-Brun bestows on Marco the sounding and ridiculous title of “_the Humboldt of the 13th century_,” he shows little real acquaintance with his Book. (See his _Précis_, ed. of 1836, I. 551 _seqq._)

[15] See for example vol. i. p. 338, and note 4 at p. 341; also vol. ii. p. 103. The descriptions in the style referred to recur in all seven times; but most of them (which are in Book IV.) have been omitted in this translation.

[16] [On the subject of Moses of Chorene and his works, I must refer to the clever researches of the late Auguste Carrière, Professor of Armenian at the École des Langues Orientales.—H. C.]

[17] _Zacher, Forschungen zur Critik, &c., der Alexandersage_, Halle, 1867, p. 108.

[18] Even so sagacious a man as Roger Bacon quotes the fabulous letter of Alexander to Aristotle as authentic. (_Opus Majus_, p. 137.)

[19] _J. As._ sér. VI. tom. xviii. p. 352.

[20] See passage from Jacopo d’Acqui, _supra_, p. _54_.

[21] It is the transcriber of one of the Florence MSS. who appends this terminal note, worthy of Mrs. Nickleby:—“Here ends the Book of Messer M. P. of Venice, written with mine own hand by me Amalio Bonaguisi when Podestà of Cierreto Guidi, to get rid of time and _ennui_. The contents seem to me incredible things, not lies so much as miracles; and it may be all very true what he says, but I don’t believe it; though to be sure throughout the world very different things are found in different countries. But these things, it has seemed to me in copying, are entertaining enough, but not things to believe or put any faith in; that at least is my opinion. And I finished copying this at Cierreto aforesaid, 12th November, A.D. 1392.”

[22] _Vulgar Errors_, Bk. I. ch. viii.; _Astley’s Voyages_, IV. 583.

[23] A few years before Marsden’s publication, the Historical branch of the R. S. of Science at Göttingen appears to have put forth as the subject of a prize Essay the Geography of the Travels of Carpini, Rubruquis, and especially of Marco Polo. (See _L. of M. Polo_, by _Zurla_, in _Collezione di Vite e Ritratti d’Illustri Italiani_. Pad. 1816.)

[24] See _Städtewesen des Mittelalters_, by _K. D. Hüllmann_, Bonn, 1829, vol. iv.

After speaking of the Missions of Pope Innocent IV. and St. Lewis, this author sketches the Travels of the Polos, and then proceeds:—“Such are the clumsily compiled contents of this ecclesiastical fiction (_Kirchengeschichtlichen Dichtung_) disguised as a Book of Travels, a thing devised generally in the spirit of the age, but specially in the interests of the Clergy and of Trade.... This compiler’s aim was analogous to that of the inventor of the Song of Roland, to kindle enthusiasm for the conversion of the Mongols, and so to facilitate commerce through their dominions.... Assuredly the Poli never got further than Great Bucharia, which was then reached by many Italian Travellers. What they have related of the regions of the Mongol Empire lying further east consists merely of recollections of the bazaar and travel-talk of traders from those countries; whilst the notices of India, Persia, Arabia, and Ethiopia, are borrowed from Arabic Works. The compiler no doubt carries his audacity in fiction a long way, when he makes his hero Marcus assert that he had been seventeen years in Kúblái’s service,” etc. etc. (pp. 360–362).

In the French edition of _Malcolm’s History of Persia_ (II. 141), Marco is styled “_prêtre Venetien_”! I do not know whether this is due to Sir John or to the translator.

[Polo is also called “a Venetian Priest,” in a note, vol. i., p. 409, of the original edition of London, 1815, 2 vols., 4to.—H. C.]

XII. CONTEMPORARY RECOGNITION OF POLO AND HIS BOOK.

[Sidenote: How far was there diffusion of his Book in his own day?]

75. But we must return for a little to Polo’s own times. Ramusio states, as we have seen, that immediately after the first commission of Polo’s narrative to writing (in Latin as he imagined), many copies of it were made, it was translated into the vulgar tongue, and in a few months all Italy was full of it.

The few facts that we can collect do not justify this view of the rapid and diffused renown of the Traveller and his Book. The number of MSS. of the latter dating from the 14th century is no doubt considerable, but a large proportion of these are of Pipino’s condensed Latin Translation, which was not put forth, if we can trust Ramusio, till 1320, and certainly not much earlier. The whole number of MSS. in various languages that we have been able to register, amounts to about eighty. I find it difficult to obtain statistical data as to the comparative number of copies of different works existing in manuscript. With Dante’s great Poem, of which there are reckoned close upon 500 MSS.,[1] comparison would be inappropriate. But of the Travels of Friar Odoric, a poor work indeed beside Marco Polo’s, I reckoned thirty-nine MSS., and could now add at least three more to the list. [I described seventy-three in my edition of _Odoric_.—H. C.] Also I find that of the nearly contemporary work of Brunetto Latini, the _Tresor_, a sort of condensed Encyclopædia of knowledge, but a work which one would scarcely have expected to approach the popularity of Polo’s Book, the Editor enumerates some fifty MSS. And from the great frequency with which one encounters in Catalogues both MSS. and early printed editions of Sir John Maundevile, I should suppose that the lying wonders of our English Knight had a far greater popularity and more extensive diffusion than the veracious and more sober marvels of Polo.[2] To Southern Italy Polo’s popularity certainly does not seem at any time to have extended. I cannot learn that any MS. of his Book exists in any Library of the late Kingdom of Naples or in Sicily.[3]

Dante, who lived for twenty-three years after Marco’s work was written, and who touches so many things in the seen and unseen Worlds, never alludes to Polo, nor I think to anything that can be connected with his Book. I believe that no mention of _Cathay_ occurs in the _Divina Commedia_. That distant region is indeed mentioned more than once in the poems of a humbler contemporary, Francesco da Barberino, but there is nothing in his allusions besides this name to suggest any knowledge of Polo’s work.[4]

Neither can I discover any trace of Polo or his work in that of his contemporary and countryman, Marino Sanudo the Elder, though this worthy is well acquainted with the somewhat later work of Hayton, and many of the subjects which he touches in his own book would seem to challenge a reference to Marco’s labours.

[Sidenote: Contemporary references to Polo.]

76. Of contemporary or nearly contemporary references to our Traveller by name, the following are all that I can produce, and none of them are new.

First there is the notice regarding his presentation of his book to Thibault de Cepoy, of which we need say no more (_supra_, p. _68_).

Next there is the Preface to Friar Pipino’s Translation, which we give at length in the Appendix (E) to these notices. The phraseology of this appears to imply that Marco was still alive, and this agrees with the date assigned to the work by Ramusio. Pipino was also the author of a Chronicle, of which a part was printed by Muratori, and this contains chapters on the Tartar wars, the destruction of the Old Man of the Mountain, etc., derived from Polo. A passage not printed by Muratori has been extracted by Prof. Bianconi from a MS. of this Chronicle in the Modena Library, and runs as follows:—

“The matters which follow, concerning the magnificence of the Tartar Emperors, whom in their language they call _Cham_ as we have said, are related by Marcus Paulus the Venetian in a certain Book of his which has been translated by me into Latin out of the Lombardic Vernacular. Having gained the notice of the Emperor himself and become attached to his service, he passed nearly 27 years in the Tartar countries.”[5]

Again we have that mention of Marco by Friar Jacopo d’Acqui, which we have quoted in connection with his capture by the Genoese, at p. _54_.[6] And the Florentine historian GIOVANNI VILLANI,[7] when alluding to the Tartars, says:—

“Let him who would make full acquaintance with their history examine the book of Friar Hayton, Lord of Colcos in Armenia, which he made at the instance of Pope Clement V., and also the Book called _Milione_ which was made by Messer Marco Polo of Venice, who tells much about their power and dominion, having spent a long time among them. And so let us quit the Tartars and return to our subject, the History of Florence.”[8]

[Sidenote: Further contemporary references.]

77. Lastly, we learn from a curious passage in a medical work by PIETRO OF ABANO, a celebrated physician and philosopher, and a man of Polo’s own generation, that he was personally acquainted with the Traveller. In a discussion on the old notion of the non-habitability of the Equatorial regions, which Pietro controverts, he says:[9]

[Illustration: Star at the Antarctic as sketched by Marco Polo[10].]

“In the country of the ZINGHI there is seen a star as big as a sack. I know a man who has seen it, and he told me it had a faint light like a piece of a cloud, and is always in the south.[11] I have been told of this and other matters by MARCO the Venetian, the most extensive traveller and the most diligent inquirer whom I have ever known. He saw this same star under the Antarctic; he described it as having a great tail, and drew a figure of it _thus_. He also told me that he saw the Antarctic Pole at an altitude above the earth apparently equal to the length of a soldier’s lance, whilst the Arctic Pole was as much below the horizon. ’Tis from that place, he says, that they export to us camphor, lign-aloes, and brazil. He says the heat there is intense, and the habitations few. And these things he witnessed in a certain island at which he arrived by Sea. He tells me also that there are (wild?) men there, and also certain very great rams that have very coarse and stiff wool just like the bristles of our pigs.”[12]

In addition to these five I know no other contemporary references to Polo, nor indeed any other within the 14th century, though such there must surely be, excepting in a Chronicle written after the middle of that century by JOHN of YPRES, Abbot of St. Bertin, otherwise known as Friar John the Long, and himself a person of very high merit in the history of Travel, as a precursor of the Ramusios, Hakluyts and Purchases, for he collected together and translated (when needful) into French all of the most valuable works of Eastern Travel and Geography produced in the age immediately preceding his own.[13] In his Chronicle the Abbot speaks at some length of the adventures of the Polo Family, concluding with a passage to which we have already had occasion to refer:

“And so Messers Nicolaus and Maffeus, with certain Tartars, were sent a second time to these parts; but Marcus Pauli was retained by the Emperor and employed in his military service, abiding with him for a space of 27 years. And the Cham, on account of his ability despatched him upon affairs of his to various parts of Tartary and India and the Islands, on which journeys he beheld many of the marvels of those regions. And concerning these he afterwards composed a book in the French vernacular, which said Book of Marvels, with others of the same kind, we do possess.” (_Thesaur. Nov. Anecdot._ III. 747.)

[Sidenote: Curious borrowings from Polo in the Romance of Bauduin de Sebourc.]

78. There is, however, a notable work which is ascribed to a rather early date in the 14th century, and which, though it contains no reference to Polo by name, shows a thorough acquaintance with his book, and borrows themes largely from it. This is the poetical Romance of Bauduin de Sebourc, an exceedingly clever and vivacious production, partaking largely of that bantering, half-mocking spirit which is, I believe, characteristic of many of the later mediæval French Romances.[14] Bauduin is a knight who, after a very wild and loose youth, goes through an extraordinary series of adventures, displaying great faith and courage, and eventually becomes King of Jerusalem. I will cite some of the traits evidently derived from our Traveller, which I have met with in a short examination of this curious work.

Bauduin, embarked on a dromond in the Indian Sea, is wrecked in the territory of Baudas, and near a city called Falise, which stands on the River of Baudas. The people of this city were an unbelieving race.

“Il ne créoient Dieu, Mahon, né Tervogant, Ydole, cruchéfis, déable, né tirant.” P. 300.

Their only belief was this, that when a man died a great fire should be made beside his tomb, in which should be burned all his clothes, arms, and necessary furniture, whilst his horse and servant should be put to death, and then the dead man would have the benefit of all these useful properties in the other world.[15] Moreover, if it was the king that died—

“Sé li rois de la terre i aloit trespassant, * * * * * Si fasoit-on tuer, .viij. jour en un tenant, Tout chiaus c’on encontroit par la chité passant, Pour tenir compaingnie leur ségnor soffisant. Telle estoit le créanche ou païs dont je cant!”[16] P. 301.

Baudin arrives when the king has been dead three days, and through dread of this custom all the people of the city are shut up in their houses. He enters an inn, and helps himself to a vast repast, having been fasting for three days. He is then seized and carried before the king, Polibans by name. We might have quoted this prince at p. _87_ as an instance of the diffusion of the French tongue:

“Polibans sot Fransois, car on le doctrina: j. renoiés de Franche .vij. ans i demora, Qui li aprist Fransois, si que bel en parla.” P. 309.

Bauduin exclaims against their barbarous belief, and declares the Christian doctrine to the king, who acknowledges good points in it, but concludes:

“Vassaus, dist Polibans, à le chière hardie, Jà ne crerrai vou Dieux, à nul jour de ma vie; Né vostre Loy ne vaut une pomme pourie!” P. 311.

Bauduin proposes to prove his Faith by fighting the prince, himself unarmed, the latter with all his arms. The prince agrees, but is rather dismayed at Bauduin’s confidence, and desires his followers, in case of his own death, to burn with him horses, armour, etc., asking at the same time which of them would consent to burn along with him, in order to be his companions in the other world:

“Là en i ot .ijᵉ. dont cascuns s’escria: Nous morons volentiers, quant vo corps mort sara!”[17] P. 313.

Bauduin’s prayer for help is miraculously granted; Polibans is beaten, and converted by a vision. He tells Bauduin that in his neighbourhood, beyond Baudas—

“ou .v. liewes, ou .vi. Ché un felles prinches, orgoellieus et despis; De la Rouge-Montaingne est Prinches et Marchis. Or vous dirai comment il a ses gens nouris: Je vous di que chius Roys a fait un Paradis Tant noble et gratieus, et plain de tels déliis, * * * * * Car en che Paradis est un riex establis, Qui se partist en trois, en che noble pourpris: En l’un coert li clarés, d’espises bien garnis; Et en l’autre li miés, qui les a resouffis; Et li vins di pieument i queurt par droit avis— * * * * * Il n’i vente, né gèle. Che liés est de samis, De riches dras de soie, bien ouvrés à devis. Et aveukes tout che que je chi vous devis, I a .ijᵉ. puchelles qui moult ont cler les vis, Carolans et tresquans, menans gales et ris. Et si est li dieuesse, dame et suppellatis, Qui doctrine les autres et en fais et en dis, Celle est la fille au Roy c’on dist des _Haus-Assis_.”[18] Pp. 319–320.

This Lady Ivorine, the Old Man’s daughter, is described among other points as having—

“Les iex vairs com faucons, nobles et agentis.”[19] P. 320.

The King of the Mountain collects all the young male children of the country, and has them brought up for nine or ten years:

“Dedens un lieu oscur: là les met-on toudis Aveukes males bestes; kiens, et cas, et soris, Culoères, et lisaerdes, escorpions petis. Là endroit ne peut nuls avoir joie, né ris.” Pp. 320–321.

And after this dreary life they are shown the Paradise, and told that such shall be their portion if they do their Lord’s behest.

“S’il disoit à son homme: ‘Va-t-ent droit à Paris; Si me fier d’un coutel le Roy de Saint Denis, Jamais n’aresteroit, né par nuit né par dis, S’aroit tué le Roy, voïant tous ches marchis; Et déuist estre à fources traïnés et mal mis.’” P. 321.

Bauduin determines to see this Paradise and the lovely Ivorine. The road led by Baudas:

“Or avoit à che tamps, sé l’istoire ne ment, En le chit de Baudas Kristiens jusqu’à cent; Qui manonent illoec par tréu d’argent, Que cascuns cristiens au Roy-Calife rent. Li pères du Calife, qui régna longement, Ama les Crestiens, et Dieu primièrement: * * * * * Et lor fist establir. j. monstier noble et gent, Où Crestien faisoient faire lor sacrement. Une mout noble pière lor donna proprement, Où on avoit posé Mahon moult longement.”[20] P. 322.

The story is, in fact, that which Marco relates of Samarkand.[21] The Caliph dies. His son hates the Christians. His people complain of the toleration of the Christians and their minister; but he says his father had pledged him not to interfere, and he dared not forswear himself. If, without doing so, he could do them an ill turn, he would gladly. The people then suggest their claim to the stone:

“Or leur donna vos pères, dont che fu mesprisons. Ceste pierre, biaus Sire, Crestiens demandons: Il ne le porront rendre, pour vrai le vous disons, Si li monstiers n’est mis et par pièches et par mons; Et s’il estoit desfais, jamais ne le larons Refaire chi-endroit. Ensément averons Faites et acomplies nostres ententions.” P. 324.

The Caliph accordingly sends for Maistre Thumas, the Priest of the Christians, and tells him the stone must be given up:

“Il a .c. ans ut plus c’on i mist à solas Mahon, le nostre Dieu: dont che n’est mie estas Que li vous monstiers soit fais de nostre harnas!” P. 324.

Master Thomas, in great trouble, collects his flock, mounts the pulpit, and announces the calamity. Bauduin and his convert Polibans then arrive. Bauduin recommends confession, fasting, and prayer. They follow his advice, and on the third day the miracle occurs:

“L’escripture le dist, qui nous achertéfie Que le pierre Mahon, qui ou mur fut fiquie, Sali hors du piler, coi que nul vous en die, Droit enmi le monstier, c’onques ne fut brisie. Et demoura li traus, dont le pière ert widie, Sans pière est sans quailliel, à cascune partie; Chou deseure soustient, par divine maistrie, Tout en air proprement, n’el tenés a falie. Encore le voit-on en ichelle partie: Qui croire ne m’en voelt, si voist; car je l’en prie!” P. 327.

The Caliph comes to see, and declares it to be the Devil’s doing. Seeing Polibans, who is his cousin, he hails him, but Polibans draws back, avowing his Christian faith. The Caliph in a rage has him off to prison. Bauduin becomes very ill, and has to sell his horse and arms. His disease is so offensive that he is thrust out of his hostel, and in his wretchedness sitting on a stone he still avows his faith, and confesses that even then he has not received his deserts. He goes to beg in the Christian quarter, and no one gives to him; but still his faith and love to God hold out:

“Ensément Bauduins chelle rue cherqua, Tant qu’à .j. chavetier Bauduins s’arresta, Qui chavates cousoit; son pain en garigna: Jones fu et plaisans, apertement ouvra. Bauduins le regarde, c’onques mot ne parla.” P. 334.

The cobler is charitable, gives him bread, shoes, and a grey coat that was a foot too short. He then asks Bauduin if he will not learn his trade; but that is too much for the knightly stomach:

“Et Bauduins respont, li preus et li membrus: J’ameroie trop miex que je fuisse pendus!” P. 335.

The Caliph now in his Council expresses his vexation about the miracle, and says he does not know how to disprove the faith of the Christians. A very sage old Saracen who knew Hebrew, and Latin, and some thirty languages, makes a suggestion, which is, in fact, that about the moving of the Mountain, as related by Marco Polo.[22] Master Thomas is sent for again, and told that they must transport the high mountain of _Thir_ to the valley of _Joaquin_, which lies to the westward. He goes away in new despair and causes his clerk to _sonner le clocke_ for his people. Whilst they are weeping and wailing in the church, a voice is heard desiring them to seek a certain holy man who is at the good cobler’s, and to do him honour. God at his prayer will do a miracle. They go in procession to Bauduin, who thinks they are mocking him. They treat him as a saint, and strive to touch his old coat. At last he consents to pray along with the whole congregation.

The Caliph is in his palace with his princes, taking his ease at a window. Suddenly he starts up exclaiming:

“‘Seignour, par Mahoumet que j’aoure et tieng chier, Le Mont de Thir enportent le déable d’enfeir!’ Li Califes s’écrie: ‘Seignour, franc palasin, Voïés le Mont de Thir qui ch’est mis au chemin! Vés-le-là tout en air, par mon Dieu Apolin; Jà bientost le verrons ens ou val Joaquin!’” P. 345.

The Caliph is converted, releases Polibans, and is baptised, taking the name of Bauduin, to whom he expresses his fear of the Viex de la Montagne with his _Hauts-Assis_, telling anew the story of the Assassin’s Paradise, and so enlarges on the beauty of Ivorine that Bauduin is smitten, and his love heals his malady. Toleration is not learned however:

“Bauduins, li Califes, fist baptisier sa gent, Et qui ne voilt Dieu crore, li teste on li pourfent!” P. 350.

The Caliph gives up his kingdom to Bauduin, proposing to follow him to the Wars of Syria. And Bauduin presents the Kingdom to the Cobler.

Bauduin, the Caliph, and Prince Polibans then proceed to visit the Mountain of the Old Man. The Caliph professes to him that they want help against Godfrey of Bouillon. The Viex says he does not give a _bouton_ for Godfrey; he will send one of his _Hauts-Assis_ straight to his tent, and give him a great knife of steel between _fie et poumon!_

After dinner they go out and witness the feat of devotion which we have quoted elsewhere.[23] They then see the Paradise and the lovely Ivorine, with whose beauty Bauduin is struck dumb. The lady had never smiled before; now she declares that he for whom she had long waited was come. Bauduin exclaims:

“‘Madame, fu-jou chou qui sui le vous soubgis?’ Quant la puchelle l’ot, lors li geta .j. ris; Et li dist: ‘Bauduins, vous estes mes amis!’” Pp. 362–363.

The Old One is vexed, but speaks pleasantly to his daughter, who replies with frightfully bad language, and declares herself to be a Christian. The father calls out to the Caliph to kill her. The Caliph pulls out a big knife and gives him a blow that nearly cuts him in two. The amiable Ivorine says she will go with Bauduin:

“‘Sé mes pères est mors, n’en donne .j. paresis!’” P. 364.

We need not follow the story further, as I did not trace beyond this point any distinct derivation from our Traveller, with the exception of that allusion to the incombustible covering of the napkin of St. Veronica, which I have quoted at p. 216 of this volume. But including this, here are at least seven different themes borrowed from Marco Polo’s book, on which to be sure his poetical contemporary plays the most extraordinary variations.

[Sidenote: Chaucer and Marco Polo.]

[78 _bis._—In the third volume of _The Complete Works of Geoffrey Chaucer_, Oxford, 1894, the Rev. Walter W. Skeat gives (pp. 372 _seqq._) an _Account of the Sources of the Canterbury Tales_. Regarding _The Squieres Tales_, he says that one of his sources was the Travels of Marco; Mr. Keighley in his _Tales and Popular Fictions_, published in 1834, at p. 76, distinctly derives Chaucer’s Tale from the travels of Marco Polo. (_Skeat, l. c._, p. 463, note.) I cannot quote all the arguments given by the Rev. W. W. Skeat to support his theory, pp. 463–477.

Regarding the opinion of Professor Skeat of Chaucer’s indebtedness to Marco Polo, cf. _Marco Polo and the Squire’s Tale_, by Professor John Matthews Manly, vol. xi. of the _Publications of the Modern Language Association of America_, 1896, pp. 349–362. Mr. Manly says (p. 360): “It seems clear, upon reviewing the whole problem, that if Chaucer used Marco Polo’s narrative, he either carelessly or intentionally confused all the features of the setting that could possibly be confused, and retained not a single really characteristic trait of any person, place or event. It is only by twisting everything that any part of Chaucer’s story can be brought into relation with any part of Polo’s. To do this might be allowable, if any rational explanation could be given for Chaucer’s supposed treatment of his ‘author,’ or if there were any scarcity of sources from which Chaucer might have obtained as much information about Tartary as he seems really to have possessed; but such an explanation would be difficult to devise, and there is no such scarcity. Any one of half a dozen accessible accounts could be distorted into almost if not quite as great resemblance to the _Squire’s Tale_ as Marco Polo’s can.”

Mr. A. W. Pollard, in his edition of _The Squire’s Tale_ (Lond., 1899) writes: “A very able paper, by Prof. J. M. Manly, demonstrates the needlessness of Prof. Skeat’s theory, which has introduced fresh complications into an already complicated story. My own belief is that, though we may illustrate the Squire’s Tale from these old accounts of Tartary, and especially from Marco Polo, because he has been so well edited by Colonel Yule, there is very little probability that Chaucer consulted any of them. It is much more likely that he found these details where he found more important parts of his story, _i.e._ in some lost romance. But if we must suppose that he provided his own local colour, we have no right to pin him down to using Marco Polo to the exclusion of other accessible authorities.” Mr. Pollard adds in a note (p. xiii.): “There are some features in these narratives, _e.g._ the account of the gorgeous dresses worn at the Kaan’s feast, which Chaucer with his love of colour could hardly have helped reproducing if he had known them.”—H. C.]

---------------------------------------------------------------------- [1] See _Ferrazzi, Manuele Dantesca_, Bassano, 1865, p. 729.

[2] In Quaritch’s catalogue for Nov. 1870 there is only one old edition of Polo; there are _nine_ of Maundevile. In 1839 there were nineteen MSS. of the latter author _catalogued_ in the British Museum Library. There are _now_ only six of Marco Polo. At least twenty-five editions of Maundevile and only five of Polo were printed in the 15th century.

[3] I have made personal enquiry at the National Libraries of Naples and Palermo, at the Communal Library in the latter city, and at the Benedictine Libraries of Monte Cassino, Monreale, S. Martino, and Catania.

In the 15th century, when Polo’s book had become more generally diffused we find three copies of it in the Catalogue of the Library of Charles VI. of France, made at the Louvre in 1423, by order of the Duke of Bedford.

The estimates of value are curious. They are in _sols parisis_, which we shall not estimate very wrongly at a shilling each:—

“No. 295. _Item_. Marcus Paulus; _en ung cahier escript de lettre formée, en françois, à deux coulombes. Commt. ou ii{e.} fo._ ‘deux frères prescheurs,’ _et ou derrenier_ ‘que sa arrières.’ _X. s. p._

* * *

“No. 334. _Item_. Marcus Paulus. _Couvert de drap d’or, bien escript & enluminé, de lettre de forme en françois, à deux coulombes. Commt. ou ii{e.} fol._; ‘il fut Roys,’ _& ou derrenier_ ‘propremen,’ _à deux fermouers de laton. XV. s. p._

* * *

“No. 336. _Item_. Marcus Paulus; _non enluminé, escript en françois, de lettre de forme. Commt. ou ii{e.} fo._ ‘vocata moult grant,’ _& ou derrenier_ ‘ilec dist il.’ _Couvert de cuir blanc, à deux fermouers de laton. XII. s. p._”

(_Inventaire de la Bibliothèque du Roi Charles VI._, etc. Paris, Société des Bibliophiles, 1867.)

[4] See _Del Reggimento e de’ Costumi delle donne di Messer Francesco da Barberino_, Roma, 1815, pp. 166 and 271. The latter passage runs thus, on _Slavery_:—

“E fu indutta prima da Noé, E fu cagion lo vin, perchè si egge: Ch’egli è un paese, dove Son molti servi in parte di Cathay: Che per questa cagione Hanno a nimico il vino, E non ne beon, nè voglion vedere.”

The author was born the year before Dante (1264), and though he lived to 1348 it is probable that the poems in question were written in his earlier years. _Cathay_ was no doubt known by dim repute long before the final return of the Polos, both through the original journey of Nicolo and Maffeo, and by information gathered by the Missionary Friars. Indeed, in 1278 Pope Nicolas III., in consequence of information said to have come from Abaka Khan of Persia, that Kúblái was a baptised Christian, sent a party of Franciscans with a long letter to the Kaan _Quobley_, as he is termed. They never seem to have reached their destination. And in 1289 Nicolas IV. entrusted a similar mission to Friar John of Monte Corvino, which eventually led to very tangible results. Neither of the Papal letters, however, mentions _Cathay_. (See _Mosheim_, App. pp. 76 and 94.)

[5] See _Muratori_, IX. 583, _seqq._; _Bianconi_, Mem. I. p. 37.

[6] This Friar makes a strange hotch-potch of what he had read, _e.g._: “The Tartars, when they came out of the mountains, made them a king, viz., the son of Prester John, who is thus vulgarly termed _Vetulus de la Montagna!_” (_Mon. Hist. Patr._ Script. III. 1557.)

[7] G. Villani died in the great plague of 1348. But his book was begun soon after Marco’s was written, for he states that it was the sight of the memorials of greatness which he witnessed at Rome, during the Jubilee of 1300, that put it into his head to write the history of the rising glories of Florence, and that he began the work after his return home. (Bk. VIII. ch. 36.)

[8] Book V. ch. 29.

[9] _Petri Aponensis Medici ac Philosophi Celeberrimi, Conciliator_, Venice, 1521, fol. 97. Peter was born in 1250 at Abano, near Padua, and was Professor of Medicine at the University in the latter city. He twice fell into the claws of the Unholy Office, and only escaped them by death in 1316.

[10] [It is curious that this figure is almost exactly that which among oriental carpets is called a “cloud.” I have heard the term so applied by Vincent Robinson. It often appears in old Persian carpets, and also in Chinese designs. Mr. Purdon Clarke tells me it is called _nebula_ in heraldry; it is also called in Chinese by a term signifying cloud; in Persian, by a term which he called _silen-i-khitai_, but of this I can make nothing.—_MS. Note by Yule_.]

[11] The great Magellanic cloud? In the account of Vincent Yanez Pinzon’s Voyage to the S.W. in 1499 as given in Ramusio (III. 15) after Pietro Martire d’Anghieria, it is said:—“Taking the astrolabe in hand, and ascertaining the Antarctic Pole, they did not see any star like our Pole Star; but they related that they saw another manner of stars very different from ours, and which they could not clearly discern because of a certain dimness which diffused itself about those stars, and obstructed the view of them.” Also the Kachh mariners told Lieutenant Leech that midway to Zanzibar there was a town (?) called Marethee, where the North Pole Star sinks below the horizon, and they steer by _a fixed cloud in the heavens_. (Bombay Govt. Selections, No. XV. N.S. p. 215.)

The great Magellan cloud is mentioned by an old Arab writer as a white blotch at the foot of Canopus, visible in the Tehama along the Red Sea, but not in Nejd or ’Irák. Humboldt, in quoting this, calculates that in A.D. 1000 the Great Magellan would have been visible at Aden some degrees above the horizon. (_Examen_, V. 235.)

[12] This passage contains points that are omitted in Polo’s book, besides the drawing implied to be from Marco’s own hand! The island is of course Sumatra. The animal is perhaps the peculiar Sumatran wild-goat, figured by Marsden, the hair of which on the back is “coarse and strong, almost like bristles.” (_Sumatra_, p. 115.)

[13] A splendid example of Abbot John’s Collection is the _Livre des Merveilles_ of the Great French Library (No. 18 in our _App. F._). This contains Polo, Odoric, William of Boldensel, the Book of the Estate of the Great Kaan by the Archbishop of Soltania, Maundevile, Hayton, and Ricold of Montecroce, of which all but Polo and Maundevile are French versions by this excellent Long John. A list of the Polo miniatures is given in _App. F_. of this Edition, p. 527.

It is a question for which there is sufficient ground, whether the Persian Historians Rashiduddin and Wassáf, one or other or both, did not derive certain information that appears in their histories, from Marco Polo personally, he having spent many months in Persia, and at the Court of Tabriz, when either or both may have been there. Such passages as that about the Cotton-trees of Guzerat (vol. ii. p. 393, and note), those about the horse trade with Maabar (id. p. 340, and note), about the brother-kings of that country (id. p. 331), about the naked savages of Necuveram (id. p. 306), about the wild people of Sumatra calling themselves subjects of the Great Kaan (id. pp. 285, 292, 293, 299), have so strong a resemblance to parallel passages in one or both of the above historians, as given in the first and third volumes of Elliot, that the probability, at least, of the Persian writers having derived their information from Polo might be fairly maintained.

[14] _Li Romans de Bauduin de Sebourc IIIᵉ Roy de Jhérusalem_; Poēme du XIVᵉ Siècle; Valenciennes, 1841. 2 vols. 8vo. I was indebted to two references of M. Pauthier’s for knowledge of the existence of this work. He cites the legends of the Mountain, and of the Stone of the Saracens from an abstract, but does not seem to have consulted the work itself, nor to have been aware of the extent of its borrowings from Marco Polo. M. Génin, from whose account Pauthier quotes, ascribes the poem to an early date after the death of Philip the Fair (1314). See _Pauthier_, pp. 57, 58, and 140.

[15] See Polo, vol. i. p. 204, and vol. ii. p. 191.

[16] See Polo, vol. i. p. 246.

[17] See Polo, vol. ii. p. 339.

[18] See Polo, vol. i. p. 140. _Hashishi_ has got altered into _Haus Assis_.

[19] See vol. i. p. 358, note.

[20] See vol. i. p. 189, note 2.

[21] Vol. i. pp. 183–186.

[22] Vol. i. pp. 68 _seqq._ The virtuous cobler is not left out, but is made to play second fiddle to the hero Bauduin.

[23] Vol. i. p. 144.

XIII. NATURE OF POLO’S INFLUENCE ON GEOGRAPHICAL KNOWLEDGE.

[Sidenote: Tardy operation, and causes thereof.]

79. Marco Polo contributed such a vast amount of new facts to the knowledge of the Earth’s surface, that one might have expected his book to have had a sudden effect upon the Science of Geography: but no such result occurred speedily, nor was its beneficial effect of any long duration.

No doubt several causes contributed to the slowness of its action upon the notions of Cosmographers, of which the unreal character attributed to the Book, as a collection of romantic marvels rather than of geographical and historical facts, may have been one, as Santarem urges. But the essential causes were no doubt the imperfect nature of publication before the invention of the press; the traditional character which clogged geography as well as all other branches of knowledge in the Middle Ages; and the entire absence of scientific principle in what passed for geography, so that there was no organ competent to the assimilation of a large mass of new knowledge.

Of the action of the first cause no examples can be more striking than we find in the false conception of the Caspian as a gulf of the Ocean, entertained by Strabo, and the opposite error in regard to the Indian Sea held by Ptolemy, who regards it as an enclosed basin, when we contrast these with the correct ideas on both subjects possessed by Herodotus. The later Geographers no doubt knew his statements, but did not appreciate them, probably from not possessing the evidence on which they were based.

[Sidenote: General characteristics of Mediæval Cosmography.]

80. As regards the second cause alleged, we may say that down nearly to the middle of the 15th century cosmographers, as a rule, made scarcely any attempt to reform their maps by any elaborate search for new matter, or by lights that might be collected from recent travellers. Their world was in its outline that handed down by the traditions of their craft, as sanctioned by some Father of the Church, such as Orosius or Isidore, as sprinkled with a combination of classical and mediæval legend; Solinus being the great authority for the former. Almost universally the earth’s surface is represented as filling the greater part of a circular disk, rounded by the ocean; a fashion that already existed in the time of Aristotle and was ridiculed by him.[1] No dogma of false geography was more persistent or more pernicious than this. Jerusalem occupies the central point, because it was found written in the Prophet Ezekiel: “_Haec dicit Dominus Deus: Ista est Jerusalem_, in medio gentium _posui eam, et in circuitu ejus terras_;”[2] a declaration supposed to be corroborated by the Psalmist’s expression, regarded as prophetic of the death of Our Lord: “_Deus autem, Rex noster, ante secula operatus est salutem_ in medio Terrae” (Ps. lxxiii. 12).[3] The Terrestrial Paradise was represented as occupying the extreme East, because it was found in Genesis that the Lord planted a garden eastward in Eden.[4] _Gog and Magog_ were set in the far north or north-east, because it was said again in Ezekiel: “_Ecce Ego super te Gog Principem capitis Mosoch et Thubal ... et ascendere te faciam de lateribus Aquilonis_,” whilst probably the topography of those mysterious nationalities was completed by a girdle of mountains out of the Alexandrian Fables. The loose and scanty nomenclature was mainly borrowed from Pliny or Mela through such Fathers as we have named; whilst vacant spaces were occupied by Amazons, Arimaspians, and the realm of Prester John. A favourite representation of the inhabited earth was this [circled T]; a great O enclosing a T, which thus divides the circle in three parts; the greater or half-circle being Asia, the two quarter circles Europe and Africa.[5] These Maps were known to St. Augustine.[6]

[Sidenote: Roger Bacon as a geographer.]

81. Even Ptolemy seems to have been almost unknown; and indeed had his Geography been studied it might, with all its errors, have tended to some greater endeavours after accuracy. Roger Bacon, whilst lamenting the exceeding deficiency of geographical knowledge in the Latin world, and purposing to essay an exacter distribution of countries, says he will not attempt to do so by latitude and longitude, for that is a system of which the Latins have learned nothing. He himself, whilst still somewhat burdened by the authoritative dicta of “saints and sages” of past times, ventures at least to criticise some of the latter, such as Pliny and Ptolemy, and declares his intention to have recourse to the information of those who have travelled most extensively over the Earth’s surface. And judging from the good use he makes, in his description of the northern parts of the world, of the Travels of Rubruquis, whom he had known and questioned, besides diligently studying his narrative,[7] we might have expected much in Geography from this great man, had similar materials been available to him for other parts of the earth. He did attempt a map with mathematical determination of places, but it has not been preserved.[8]

It may be said with general truth that the world-maps current up to the end of the 13th century had more analogy to the mythical cosmography of the Hindus than to any thing properly geographical. Both, no doubt, were originally based in the main on real features. In the Hindu cosmography these genuine features are symmetrised as in a kaleidoscope; in the European cartography they are squeezed together in a manner that one can only compare to a pig in brawn. Here and there some feature strangely compressed and distorted is just recognisable. A splendid example of this kind of map is that famous one at Hereford, executed about A.D. 1275, of which a facsimile has lately been published, accompanied by a highly meritorious illustrative Essay.[9]

82. Among the Arabs many able men, from the early days of Islám, took an interest in Geography, and devoted labour to geographical compilations, in which they often made use of their own observations, of the itineraries of travellers, and of other fresh knowledge. But somehow or other their maps were always far behind their books. Though they appear to have had an early translation of Ptolemy, and elaborate Tables of Latitudes and Longitudes form a prominent feature in many of their geographical treatises, there appears to be no Arabic map in existence, laid down with meridians and parallels; whilst _all_ of their best known maps are on the old system of the circular disk. This apparent incapacity for map-making appears to have acted as a heavy drag and bar upon progress in Geography among the Arabs, notwithstanding its early promise among them, and in spite of the application to its furtherance of the great intellects of some (such as Abu Rihán al-Biruni), and of the indefatigable spirit of travel and omnivorous curiosity of others (such as Mas’udi).

[Sidenote: Marino Sanudo the Elder.]

83. Some distinct trace of acquaintance with the Arabian Geography is to be found in the World-Map of Marino Sanudo the Elder, constructed between 1300 and 1320; and this may be regarded as an exceptionally favourable specimen of the cosmography in vogue, for the author was a diligent investigator and compiler, who evidently took a considerable interest in geographical questions, and had a strong enjoyment and appreciation of a map.[10] Nor is the map in question without some result of these characteristics. His representation of Europe, Northern Africa, Syria, Asia Minor, Arabia and its two gulfs, is a fair approximation to general facts; his collected knowledge has enabled him to locate, with more or less of general truth, Georgia, the Iron Gates, Cathay, the Plain of Moghan, Euphrates and Tigris, Persia, Bagdad, Kais, Aden (though on the wrong side of the Red Sea), Abyssinia (_Habesh_), Zangibar (_Zinz_), Jidda (Zede), etc. But after all the traditional forms are too strong for him. Jerusalem is still the centre of the disk of the habitable earth, so that the distance is as great from Syria to Gades in the extreme West, as from Syria to the India Interior of Prester John which terminates the extreme East. And Africa beyond the Arabian Gulf is carried, according to the Arabian modification of Ptolemy’s misconception, far to the eastward until it almost meets the prominent shores of India.

[Sidenote: The Catalan Map of 1375, the most complete mediæval embodiment of Polo’s Geography.]

84. The first genuine mediæval attempt at a geographical construction that I know of, absolutely free from the traditional _idola_, is the Map of the known World from the Portulano Mediceo (in the Laurentian Library), of which an extract is engraved in the atlas of Baldelli-Boni’s Polo. I need not describe it, however, because I cannot satisfy myself that it makes much use of Polo’s contributions, and its facts have been embodied in a more ambitious work of the next generation, the celebrated Catalan Map of 1375 in the great Library of Paris. This also, but on a larger scale and in a more comprehensive manner, is an honest endeavour to represent the known world on the basis of collected facts, casting aside all theories pseudo-scientific or pseudo-theological; and a very remarkable work it is. In this map it seems to me Marco Polo’s influence, I will not say on geography, but on map-making, is seen to the greatest advantage. His Book is the basis of the Map as regards Central and Further Asia, and partially as regards India. His names are often sadly perverted, and it is not always easy to understand the view that the compiler took of his itineraries. Still we have Cathay admirably placed in the true position of China, as a great Empire filling the south-east of Asia. The Eastern Peninsula of India is indeed absent altogether, but the Peninsula of Hither India is for the first time in the History of Geography represented with a fair approximation to its correct form and position,[11] and Sumatra also (_Jaua_) is not badly placed. Carajan, Vocian, Mien, and Bangala, are located with a happy conception of their relation to Cathay and to India. Many details in India foreign to Polo’s book,[12] and some in Cathay (as well as in Turkestan and Siberia, which have been entirely derived from other sources) have been embodied in the Map. But the study of his Book has, I conceive, been essentially the basis of those great portions which I have specified, and the additional matter has not been in mass sufficient to perplex the compiler. Hence we really see in this Map something like the idea of Asia that the Traveller himself would have presented, had he bequeathed a Map to us.

[Illustration: Part of the Catalan Map (1375).]

[Some years ago, I made a special study of the Far East in the Catalan Map (_L’Extrême-Orient dans l’Atlas catalan de Charles V._, Paris, 1895), and I have come to the conclusion that the cartographer’s knowledge of Eastern Asia is drawn almost entirely from Marco Polo. We give a reproduction of part of the Catalan Map.—H. C.]

[Sidenote: Confusions in Cartography of the 16th century, from the endeavour to combine new and old information.]

85. In the following age we find more frequent indications that Polo’s book was diffused and read. And now that the spirit of discovery began to stir, it was apparently regarded in a juster light as a Book of Facts, and not as a mere _Romman du Grant Kaan_.[13] But in fact this age produced new supplies of crude information in greater abundance than the knowledge of geographers was prepared to digest or co-ordinate, and the consequence is that the magnificent Work of Fra Mauro (1459), though the result of immense labour in the collection of facts and the endeavour to combine them, really gives a considerably less accurate idea of Asia than that which the Catalan Map had afforded.[14]

And when at a still later date the great burst of discovery eastward and westward took effect, the results of all attempts to combine the new knowledge with the old was most unhappy. The first and crudest forms of such combinations attempted to realise the ideas of Columbus regarding the identity of his discoveries with the regions of the Great Kaan’s dominion;[15] but even after AMERICA had vindicated its independent position on the surface of the globe, and the new knowledge of the Portuguese had introduced CHINA where the Catalan Map of the 14th century had presented CATHAY, the latter country, with the whole of Polo’s nomenclature, was shoved away to the north, forming a separate system.[16] Henceforward the influence of Polo’s work on maps was simply injurious; and when to his nomenclature was added a sprinkling of Ptolemy’s, as was usual throughout the 16th century, the result was a most extraordinary hotch-potch, conveying no approximation to any consistent representation of facts.

Thus, in a map of 1522,[17] running the eye along the north of Europe and Asia from West to East, we find the following succession of names: Groenlandia, or Greenland, as a great peninsula overlapping that of Norvegia and Suecia; Livonia, Plescovia and Moscovia, Tartaria bounded on the South by _Scithia extra Imaum_, and on the East, by the Rivers _Ochardes_ and _Bautisis_ (out of Ptolemy), which are made to flow into the Arctic Sea. South of these are _Aureacithis_ and _Asmirea_ (Ptolemy’s _Auxacitis_ and _Asmiræa_), and _Serica Regio_. Then following the northern coast _Balor Regio_,[18] _Judei Clausi_, _i.e._ the Ten Tribes who are constantly associated or confounded with the Shut-up Nations of Gog and Magog. These impinge upon the River _Polisacus_, flowing into the Northern Ocean in Lat. 75°, but which is in fact no other than Polo’s _Pulisanghin_![19] Immediately south of this is _Tholomon Provincia_ (Polo’s again), and on the coast _Tangut_, _Cathaya_, the Rivers _Caramoran_ and _Oman_ (a misreading of Polo’s _Quian_), _Quinsay_ and _Mangi_.

[Sidenote: Gradual disappearance of Polo’s nomenclature.]

86. The Maps of Mercator (1587) and Magini (1597) are similar in character, but more elaborate, introducing China as a separate system. Such indeed also is Blaeu’s Map (1663) excepting that Ptolemy’s contributions are reduced to one or two.

In Sanson’s Map (1659) the data of Polo and the mediæval Travellers are more cautiously handled, but a new element of confusion is introduced in the form of numerous features derived from Edrisi.

It is scarcely worth while to follow the matter further. With the increase of knowledge of Northern Asia from the Russian side, and that of China from the Maps of Martini, followed by the surveys of the Jesuits, and with the real science brought to bear on Asiatic Geography by such men as De l’Isle and D’Anville, mere traditional nomenclature gradually disappeared. And the task which the study of Polo has provided for the geographers of later days has been chiefly that of determining the true localities that his book describes under obsolete or corrupted names.

[My late illustrious friend, Baron _A. E. Nordenskiöld_, who has devoted much time and labour to the study of Marco Polo (see his _Periplus_, Stockholm, 1897), and published a facsimile edition of one of the French MSS. kept in the Stockholm Royal Library (see vol. ii. _Bibliography_, p. 570), has given to _The Geographical Journal_ for April, 1899, pp. 396–406, a paper on _The Influence of the “Travels of Marco Polo” on Jacobo Gastaldi’s Maps of Asia_. He writes (p. 398) that as far as he knows, none “of the many learned men who have devoted their attention to the discoveries of Marco Polo, have been able to refer to any maps in which all or almost all those places mentioned by Marco Polo are given. All friends of the history of geography will therefore be glad to hear that such an atlas from the middle of the sixteenth century really does exist, viz. Gastaldi’s ‘Prima, seconda e terza parte dell’Asia.’” All the names of places in Ramusio’s Marco Polo are introduced in the maps of Asia of Jacobo Gastaldi (1561). Cf. _Periplus_, liv., lv., and lvi.

I may refer to what both Yule and myself say _supra_ of the Catalan Map.—H. C.]

[Sidenote: Alleged introduction of Block-printed Books into Europe by Marco Polo.]

87. Before concluding, it may be desirable to say a few words on the subject of important knowledge other than geographical, which various persons have supposed that Marco Polo must have introduced from Eastern Asia to Europe.

Respecting the mariner’s compass and gunpowder I shall say nothing, as no one now, I believe, imagines Marco to have had anything to do with their introduction. But from a highly respectable source in recent years we have seen the introduction of Block-printing into Europe connected with the name of our Traveller. The circumstances are stated as follows:[20]

“In the beginning of the 15th century a man named Pamphilo Castaldi, of Feltre ... was employed by the Seignory or Government of the Republic, to engross deeds and public edicts of various kinds ... the initial letters at the commencement of the writing being usually ornamented with red ink, or illuminated in gold and colours.

“According to Sansovino, certain stamps or types had been invented some time previously by Pietro di Natali, Bishop of Aquilœa.[21] These were made at Murano of glass, and were used to stamp or print the outline of the large initial letters of public documents, which were afterwards filled up by hand.... Pamphilo Castaldi improved on these glass types, by having others made of wood or metal, and having seen several Chinese books which the famous traveller Marco Polo had brought from China, and of which the entire text was printed with wooden blocks, he caused moveable wooden types to be made, each type containing a single letter; and with these he printed several broadsides and single leaves, at Venice, in the year 1426. Some of these single sheets are said to be preserved among the archives at Feltre....

“The tradition continues that John Faust, of Mayence ... became acquainted with Castaldi, and passed some time with him, at his _Scriptorium_, ... at Feltre;”

and in short developed from the knowledge so acquired the great invention of printing. Mr. Curzon goes on to say that Panfilo Castaldi was born in 1398, and died in 1490, and that he gives the story as he found it in an article written by Dr. Jacopo Facen, of Feltre, in a (Venetian?) newspaper called _Il Gondoliere_, No. 103, of 27th December, 1843.

In a later paper Mr. Curzon thus recurs to the subject:[22]

“Though none of the early block-books have dates affixed to them, many of them are with reason supposed to be more ancient than any books printed with moveable types. Their resemblance to Chinese block-books is so exact, that they would almost seem to be copied from the books commonly used in China. _The impressions are taken off on one side of the paper only, and in binding, both the Chinese, and ancient German, or Dutch block-books, the blank sides of the pages are placed opposite each other_, and sometimes pasted together.... The impressions are not taken off with printer’s ink, but _with a brown paint or colour, of a much thinner description, more in the nature of Indian ink, as we call it, which is used in printing Chinese books_. Altogether the German and Oriental block-books are so precisely alike, in almost every respect, that ... we must suppose that the process of printing then must have been copied from ancient Chinese specimens, brought from that country by some early travellers, whose names have not been handed down to our times.”

The writer then refers to the tradition about _Guttemberg_ (so it is stated on this occasion, not Faust) having learned Castaldi’s art, etc., mentioning a circumstance which he supposes to indicate that Guttemberg had relations with Venice; and appears to assent to the probability of the story of the art having been founded on specimens brought home by Marco Polo.

This story was in recent years diligently propagated in Northern Italy, and resulted in the erection at Feltre of a public statue of Panfilo Castaldi, bearing this inscription (besides others of like tenor):—

“_To Panfilo Castaldi the illustrious Inventor of Movable Printing Types, Italy renders this Tribute of Honour, too long deferred._”

In the first edition of this book I devoted a special note to the exposure of the worthlessness of the evidence for this story.[23] This note was, with the present Essay, translated and published at Venice by Comm. Berchet, but this challenge to the supporters of the patriotic romance, so far as I have heard, brought none of them into the lists in its defence.

But since Castaldi has got his statue from the printers of Lombardy, would it not be mere equity that the mariners of Spain should set up a statue at Huelva to the Pilot Alonzo Sanchez of that port, who, according to Spanish historians, after discovering the New World, died in the house of Columbus at Terceira, and left the crafty Genoese to appropriate his journals, and rob him of his fame?

Seriously; if anybody in Feltre cares for the real reputation of his native city, let him do his best to have that preposterous and discreditable fiction removed from the base of the statue. If Castaldi has deserved a statue on other and truer grounds let _him_ stand; if not, let him be burnt into honest lime! I imagine that the original story that attracted Mr. Curzon was more _jeu d’esprit_ than anything else; but that the author, finding what a stone he had set rolling, did not venture to retract.

[Sidenote: Frequent opportunities for such introduction in the age following Polo’s.]

88. Mr. Curzon’s own observations, which I have italicised about the resemblance of the two systems are, however, very striking, and seem clearly to indicate the derivation of the art from China. But I should suppose that in the tradition, if there ever was any genuine tradition of the kind at Feltre (a circumstance worthy of all doubt), the name of Marco Polo was introduced merely because it was so prominent a name in Eastern Travel. The fact has been generally overlooked and forgotten[24] that, for many years in the course of the 14th century, not only were missionaries of the Roman Church and Houses of the Franciscan Order established in the chief cities of China, but a regular trade was carried on overland between Italy and China, by way of Tana (or Azov), Astracan, Otrar and Kamul, insomuch that instructions for the Italian merchant following that route form the two first chapters in the Mercantile Handbook of Balducci Pegolotti (_circa_ 1340).[25] Many a traveller besides Marco Polo might therefore have brought home the block-books. And this is the less to be ascribed to him because he so curiously omits to speak of the art of printing, when his subject seems absolutely to challenge its description.

---------------------------------------------------------------------- [1] “They draw nowadays the map of the world in a laughable manner, for they draw the inhabited earth as a circle; but this is impossible, both from what we see and from reason.” (_Meteorolog. Lib._ II. cap. 5.) Cf. _Herodotus_, iv. 36.

[2] In Dante’s Cosmography, Jerusalem is the centre of our οἰκουμένη, whilst the Mount of Purgatory occupies the middle of the Antipodal hemisphere:—

“Come ciò sia, se’ l vuoi poter pensare, Dentro raccolto immagina Sion Con questo monte in su la terra stare, Sì, ch’ambodue hann’un solo orrizon E diversi emisperi”.... —_Purg._ IV. 67.

[3] The belief, with this latter ground of it, is alluded to in curious verses by Jacopo Alighieri, Dante’s son:—

“_E molti gran Profeti_ _Filosofi e Poeti_ Fanno il colco dell’Emme Dov’è Gerusalemme; _Se le loro scritture_ _Hanno vere figure:_ _E per la Santa fede_ _Cristiana ancor si vede_ _Che’ l’ suo principio Cristo_ Nel suo mezzo _conquisto_ _Per cui prese morte_ _E vi pose la sorte_.” —(_Rime Antiche Toscane_, III. 9.)

Though the general meaning of the second couplet is obvious, the expression _il colco dell’Emme_, “the couch of the M,” is puzzling. The best solution that occurs to me is this: In looking at the world map of Marino Sanudo, noticed on p. _133_, as engraved by Bongars in the _Gesta Dei per Francos_, you find geometrical lines laid down, connecting the N.E., N.W., S.E., and S.W. points, and thus forming a square inscribed in the circular disk of the Earth, with its diagonals passing through the Central Zion. The eye easily discerns in these a great M inscribed in the circle, with its middle angular point at Jerusalem. Gervasius of Tilbury (with some confusion in his mind between tropic and equinoxial, like that which Pliny makes in speaking of the Indian Mons Malleus) says that “some are of opinion that the Centre is in the place where the Lord spoke to the woman of Samaria at the well, for there, at the summer solstice, the noonday sun descends perpendicularly into the water of the well, casting no shadow; a thing which the philosophers say occurs at Syene”! (_Otia Imperialia_, by Liebrecht, p. 1.)

[4] This circumstance does not, however, show in the Vulgate.

[5]

“Veggiamo in prima in general la terra Come risiede e come il mar la serra.

Un T dentro ad un O mostra il disegno Come in tre parti fu diviso il Mondo, E la superiore è il maggior regno Che quasi piglia la metà del tondo. ASIA chiamata: il gambo ritto è segno Che parte il terzo nome dal secondo AFFRICA dico da EUROPA: il mare Mediterran tra esse in mezzo appare.” —_La Sfera_, di F. Leonardo di Stagio Dati, Lib. iii. st. 11.

[6] _De Civ. Dei_, xvi. 17, quoted by _Peschel_, 92.

[7] _Opus Majus_, Venice ed. pp. 142, _seqq._

[8] _Peschel_, p. 195. This had escaped me.

[9] By the Rev. W. L. Bevan, M.A., and the Rev. H. W. Phillott, M.A. In Asia, they point out, the only name showing any recognition of modern knowledge is Samarcand.

[10] His work, _Liber Secretorum Fidelium Crucis_, intended to stimulate a new Crusade, has three capital maps, besides that of the World, one of which, translated, but otherwise in facsimile, is given at p. 18 of this volume. But besides these maps, he gives, in a tabular form of parallel columns, the reigning sovereigns in Europe and Asia connected with his historical retrospect, just on the plan presented in Sir Harris Nicolas’s Chronology of History.

[11] I do not see that al-Birúni deserves the credit in this respect assigned to him by Professor Peschel, so far as one can judge from the data given by Sprenger (_Peschel_, p. 128; _Post und Reise-Routen_, 81–82.)

[12] For example, _Delli_, which Polo does not name; _Diogil_ (Deogír); on the Coromandel coast _Setemelti_, which I take to be a clerical error for _Sette-Templi_, the Seven Pagodas; round the Gulf of Cambay we have _Cambetum_ (Kambayat), _Cocintaya_ (Kokan-Tana, see vol. ii. p. 396), _Goga, Baroche, Neruala_ (Anharwala), and to the north _Moltan_. Below Multan are _Hocibelch_ and _Bargelidoa_, two puzzles. The former is, I think, _Uch-baligh_, showing that part of the information was from Perso-Mongol sources.

[13] I see it stated by competent authority that _Romman_ is often applied to any prose composition in a Romance language.

In or about 1426, Prince Pedro of Portugal, the elder brother of the illustrious Prince Henry, being on a visit to Venice, was presented by the Signory with a copy of Marco Polo’s book, together with a map already alluded to. (_Major’s P. Henry_, pp. 61, 62.)

[14] This is partly due also to Fra Mauro’s reversion to the fancy of the circular disk limiting the inhabited portion of the earth.

[15] An early graphic instance of this is Ruysch’s famous map (1508). The following extract of a work printed as late as 1533 is an example of the like confusion in verbal description: “The Territories which are beyond the limits of Ptolemy’s Tables have not yet been described on certain authority. Behind the Sinae and the Seres, and beyond 180° of East Longitude, many countries were discovered by one [_quendam_] Marco Polo a Venetian and others, and the sea-coasts of those countries have now recently again been explored by Columbus the Genoese and Amerigo Vespucci in navigating the Western Ocean.... To this part (of Asia) belong the territory called that of the _Bachalaos_ [or Codfish, Newfoundland], _Florida_, _the Desert of Lop_, _Tangut_, _Cathay_, the realm of _Mexico_ (wherein is the vast city of _Temistitan_, built in the middle of a great lake, but which the older travellers styled QUINSAY), besides _Paria_, _Uraba_, and the countries of the _Canibals_.” (_Joannis Schoneri Carolostadtii Opusculum Geogr._, quoted by Humboldt, _Examen_, V. 171, 172.)

[16] In Robert Parke’s Dedication of his Translation of Mendoza’s, London, 1st of January, 1589, he identifies China and Japan with the regions of which _Paulus Venetus_ and _Sir John Mandeuill_ “wrote long agoe.”—_MS. Note by Yule_.

[17] “_Totius Europae et Asiae Tabula Geographica, Auctore Thoma D. Aucupario. Edita Argentorati_, MDXXII.” Copied in Witsen.

[18] This strange association of _Balor_ (_i.e._, Bolor, that name of so many odd vicissitudes, see pp. 178–179 _infra_) with the shut-up Israelites must be traced to a passage which Athanasius Kircher quotes from _R. Abraham Pizol_ (qu. Peritsol?): “_Regnum_, inquit, Belor _magnum et excelsum nimis, juxta omnes illos qui scripserunt Historicos_. Sunt in eo Judaei _plurimi inclusi, et illud in latere Orientali et Boreali_,” etc. (_China Illustrata_, p. 49.)

[19] Vol. ii. p. 1.

[20] _A short Account of Libraries of Italy_, by the Hon. R. Curzon (the late Lord de la Zouche); in _Bibliog. and Hist. Miscellanies; Philobiblon Society_, vol. i, 1854, pp. 6. _seqq._

[21] P. del Natali was Bishop of Equilio, a city of the Venetian Lagoons, in the latter part of the 14th century. (See _Ughelli, Italia Sacra_, X. 87.) There is no ground whatever for connecting him with these inventions. The story of the glass types appears to rest entirely and solely on one obscure passage of Sansovino, who says that under the Doge Marco Corner (1365–1367): “_certe Natale Veneto lasciò un libro della materie delle forme da giustar intorno alle lettere, ed il modo di formarle di vetro_.” There is absolutely nothing more. Some kind of stencilling seems indicated.

[22] _History of Printing in China and Europe_, in _Philobiblon_, vol. vi. p. 23.

[23] See _Appendix L_. in First Edition.

[24] Ramusio himself appears to have been entirely unconscious of it, _vide supra_, p. 3.

[25] This subject has been fully treated in _Cathay and the Way Thither_.

XIV. EXPLANATIONS REGARDING THE BASIS ADOPTED FOR THE PRESENT TRANSLATION.

89. It remains to say a few words regarding the basis adopted for our English version of the Traveller’s record.

[Sidenote: Text followed by Marsden and by Pauthier.]

Ramusio’s recension was that which Marsden selected for translation. But at the date of his most meritorious publication nothing was known of the real literary history of Polo’s Book, and no one was aware of the peculiar value and originality of the French manuscript texts, nor had Marsden seen any of them. A translation from one of those texts is a translation at first hand; a translation from Ramusio’s Italian is, as far as I can judge, the translation of a translated compilation from two or more translations, and therefore, whatever be the merits of its matter, inevitably carries us far away from the spirit and style of the original narrator. M. Pauthier, I think, did well in adopting for the text of his edition the MSS. which I have classed as of the second Type, the more as there had hitherto been no publication from those texts. But editing a text in the original language, and translating, are tasks substantially different in their demands.

[Sidenote: Eclectic formation of the English Text of this Translation.]

90. It will be clear from what has been said in the preceding pages that I should not regard as a fair or full representation of Polo’s Work, a version on which the Geographic Text did not exercise a material influence. But to adopt that Text, with all its awkwardnesses and tautologies, as the absolute subject of translation, would have been a mistake. What I have done has been, in the first instance, to translate from Pauthier’s Text. The process of abridgment in this text, however it came about, has been on the whole judiciously executed, getting rid of the intolerable prolixities of manner which belong to many parts of the Original Dictation, but _as a general rule_ preserving the matter. Having translated this,—not always from the Text adopted by Pauthier himself, but with the exercise of my own judgment on the various readings which that Editor lays before us,—I then compared the translation with the Geographic Text, and transferred from the latter not only all items of real substance that had been omitted, but also all expressions of special interest and character, and occasionally a greater fulness of phraseology where condensation in Pauthier’s text seemed to have been carried too far. And finally I introduced _between brackets_ everything peculiar to Ramusio’s version that seemed to me to have a just claim to be reckoned authentic, and that could be so introduced without harshness or mutilation. Many passages from the same source which were of interest in themselves, but failed to meet one or other of these conditions, have been given in the notes.[1]

[Sidenote: Mode of rendering proper names.]

91. As regards the reading of proper names and foreign words, in which there is so much variation in the different MSS. and editions, I have done my best to select what seemed to be the true reading from the G. T. and Pauthier’s three MSS., only in some rare instances transgressing this limit.

Where the MSS. in the repetition of a name afforded a choice of forms, I have selected that which came nearest the real name when known. Thus the G. T. affords _Baldasciain, Badascian, Badasciam, Badausiam, Balasian_. I adopt BADASCIAN, or in English spelling BADASHAN, because it is closest to the real name _Badakhshan_. Another place appears as COBINAN, _Cabanat, Cobian_. I adopt the first because it is the truest expression of the real name _Koh-benán_. In chapters 23, 24 of Book I., we have in the G. T. _Asisim, Asciscin, Asescin_, and in Pauthier’s MSS. _Hasisins, Harsisins_, etc. I adopt ASCISCIN, or in English spelling ASHISHIN, for the same reason as before. So with _Creman, Crerman, Crermain_, QUERMAN, Anglicè KERMAN; Cormos, HORMOS, and many more.[2]

In two or three cases I have adopted a reading which I cannot show _literatim_ in any authority, but because such a form appears to be the just resultant from the variety of readings which are presented; as in surveying one takes the mean of a number of observations when no one can claim an absolute preference.

Polo’s proper names, even in the French Texts, are _in the main_ formed on an Italian fashion of spelling.[3] I see no object in preserving such spelling in an English book, so after selecting the best reading of the name I express it in English spelling, printing _Badashan, Pashai, Kerman_, instead of _Badascian, Pasciai, Querman_, and so on.

And when a little trouble has been taken to ascertain the true form and force of Polo’s spelling of Oriental names and technical expressions, it will be found that they are in the main as accurate as Italian lips and orthography will admit, and not justly liable either to those disparaging epithets[4] or to those exegetical distortions which have been too often applied to them. Thus, for example, _Cocacin, Ghel_ or _Ghelan, Tonocain, Cobinan, Ondanique, Barguerlac, Argon, Sensin, Quescican, Toscaol, Bularguci, Zardandan, Anin, Caugigu, Coloman, Gauenispola, Mutfili, Avarian, Choiach_, are not, it will be seen, the ignorant blunderings which the interpretations affixed by some commentators would imply them to be, but are, on the contrary, all but perfectly accurate utterances of the names and words intended.

The _-tchéou_ (of French writers), _-choo_, _-chow_, or _-chau_[5] of English writers, which so frequently forms the terminal part in the names of Chinese cities, is almost invariably rendered by Polo as _-giu_. This has frequently in the MSS., and constantly in the printed editions, been converted into _-gui_, and thence into _-guy_. This is on the whole the most constant canon of Polo’s geographical orthography, and holds in _Caagiu_ (Ho-chau), _Singiu_ (Sining-chau), _Cui-giu_ (Kwei-chau), _Sin-giu_ (T’sining-chau), _Pi-giu_ (Pei-chau), _Coigangiu_ (Hwaingan-chau), _Si-giu_ (Si-chau), _Ti-giu_ (Tai-chau), _Tin-giu_ (Tung-chau), _Yan-giu_ (Yang-chau), _Sin-giu_ (Chin-chau), _Cai-giu_ (Kwa-chau), _Chinghi-giu_ (Chang-chau), _Su-giu_ (Su-chau), _Vu-giu_ (Wu-chau), and perhaps a few more. In one or two instances only (as _Sinda-ciu_, _Caiciu_) he has _-ciu_ instead of _-giu_.

The chapter-headings I have generally taken from Pauthier’s Text, but they are no essential part of the original work, and they have been slightly modified or enlarged where it seemed desirable.

• • • • •

“=Behold! I see the Haven nigh at Hand, To which I meane my wearie Course to bend; Vere the maine Shete, and beare up with the Land, The which afore is fayrly to be kend, And seemeth safe from Storms that may offend.= * * * * * =There eke my Feeble Barke a while may stay, Till mery Wynd and Weather call her thence away.=” —THE FAERIE QUEENE, I. xii. 1.

[Illustration]

---------------------------------------------------------------------- [1] This “eclectic formation of the English text,” as I have called it for brevity in the marginal rubric, has been disapproved by Mr. de Khanikoff, a critic worthy of high respect. But I must repeat that the duties of a translator, and of the Editor of an original text, at least where the various recensions bear so peculiar a relation to each other as in this case, are essentially different; and that, on reconsidering the matter after an interval of four or five years, the plan which I have adopted, whatever be the faults of execution, still commends itself to me as the only appropriate one.

Let Mr. de Khanikoff consider what course he would adopt if he were about to publish Marco Polo in Russian. I feel certain that with whatever theory he might set out, before his task should be concluded he would have arrived practically at the same system that I have adopted.

[2] In Polo’s diction C frequently represents H., _e.g._, _Cormos_ = Hormuz; _Camadi_ probably = Hamadi; _Caagiu_ probably = Hochau; _Cacianfu_ = Hochangfu, and so on. This is perhaps attributable to Rusticiano’s Tuscan ear. A true Pisan will absolutely contort his features in the intensity of his efforts to aspirate sufficiently the letter C. Filippo Villani, speaking of the famous Aguto (Sir J. Hawkwood), says his name in English was _Kauchouvole_. (_Murat. Script._ xiv. 746.)

[3] In the Venetian dialect _ch_ and _j_ are often sounded as in English, not as in Italian. Some traces of such pronunciation I think there are, as in _Coja, Carajan_, and in the Chinese name _Vanchu_ (occurring only in Ramusio, _supra_, p. _99_). But the scribe of the original work being a Tuscan, the spelling is in the main Tuscan. The sound of the _Qu_ is, however, French, as in _Quescican, Quinsai_, except perhaps in the case of _Quenianfu_, for a reason given in vol. ii. p. 29.

[4] For example, that enthusiastic student of mediæval Geography, Joachim Lelewel, speaks of Polo’s “gibberish” (_le baragouinage du Venitien_) with special reference to such names as _Zayton_ and _Kinsay_, whilst we now know that these names were in universal use by all foreigners in China, and no more deserve to be called gibberish than _Bocca-Tigris_, _Leghorn_, _Ratisbon_, or _Buda_.

[5] I am quite sensible of the diffidence with which any outsider should touch any question of Chinese language or orthography. A Chinese scholar and missionary (Mr. Moule) objects to my spelling _chau_, whilst he, I see, uses _chow_. I imagine we mean the same sound, according to the spelling which I try to use throughout the book. Dr. C. Douglas, another missionary scholar, writes _chau_.

[Illustration: MARCO POLO’S ITINERARIES, Nᵒ. I. (Prologue; Book I, Chapters 1–36; and Book IV.)

SKETCH SHOWING CHIEF MONARCHIES OF ASIA IN LATTER PART OF 13ᵗʰ CENTURY]

THE BOOK OF MARCO POLO.

PROLOGUE.

Great Princes, Emperors, and Kings, Dukes and Marquises, Counts, Knights, and Burgesses! and People of all degrees who desire to get knowledge of the various races of mankind and of the diversities of the sundry regions of the World, take this Book and cause it to be read to you. For ye shall find therein all kinds of wonderful things, and the divers histories of the Great Hermenia, and of Persia, and of the Land of the Tartars, and of India, and of many another country of which our Book doth speak, particularly and in regular succession, according to the description of Messer Marco Polo, a wise and noble citizen of Venice, as he saw them with his own eyes. Some things indeed there be therein which he beheld not; but these he heard from men of credit and veracity. And we shall set down things seen as seen, and things heard as heard only, so that no jot of falsehood may mar the truth of our Book, and that all who shall read it or hear it read may put full faith in the truth of all its contents.

For let me tell you that since our Lord God did mould with his hands our first Father Adam, even until this day, never hath there been Christian, or Pagan, or Tartar, or Indian, or any man of any nation, who in his own person hath had so much knowledge and experience of the divers parts of the World and its Wonders as hath had this Messer Marco! And for that reason he bethought himself that it would be a very great pity did he not cause to be put in writing all the great marvels that he had seen, or on sure information heard of, so that other people who had not these advantages might, by his Book, get such knowledge. And I may tell you that in acquiring this knowledge he spent in those various parts of the World good six-and-twenty years. Now, being thereafter an inmate of the Prison at Genoa, he caused Messer Rusticiano of Pisa, who was in the said Prison likewise, to reduce the whole to writing; and this befell in the year 1298 from the birth of Jesus.