Chapter IV: Preface: To Second Edition (1)

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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_.

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[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.”

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]

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