Chapter XLVII: Concerning the Province of Caindu

CAINDU is a province lying towards the west,{1} and there is only one king in it. The people are Idolaters, subject to the Great Kaan, and they have plenty of towns and villages. [The chief city is also called Caindu, and stands at the upper end of the province.] There is a lake here,[1] in which are found pearls [which are white but not round]. But the Great Kaan will not allow them to be fished, for if people were to take as many as they could find there, the supply would be so vast that pearls would lose their value, and come to be worth nothing. Only when it is his pleasure they take from the lake so many as he may desire; but any one attempting to take them on his own account would be incontinently put to death.

There is also a mountain in this country wherein they find a kind of stone called turquoise, in great abundance; and it is a very beautiful stone. These also the Emperor does not allow to be extracted without his special order.{2}

I must tell you of a custom that they have in this country regarding their women. No man considers himself wronged if a foreigner, or any other man, dishonour his wife, or daughter, or sister, or any woman of his family, but on the contrary he deems such intercourse a piece of good fortune. And they say that it brings the favour of their gods and idols, and great increase of temporal prosperity. For this reason they bestow their wives on foreigners and other people as I will tell you.

When they fall in with any stranger in want of a lodging they are all eager to take him in. And as soon as he has taken up his quarters the master of the house goes forth, telling him to consider everything at his disposal, and after saying so he proceeds to his vineyards or his fields, and comes back no more till the stranger has departed. The latter abides in the caitiff’s house, be it three days or be it four, enjoying himself with the fellow’s wife or daughter or sister, or whatsoever woman of the family it best likes him; and as long as he abides there he leaves his hat or some other token hanging at the door, to let the master of the house know that he is still there. As long as the wretched fellow sees that token, he must not go in. And such is the custom over all that province.{3}

The money matters of the people are conducted in this way. They have gold in rods which they weigh, and they reckon its value by its weight in _saggi_, but they have no coined money. Their small change again is made in this way. They have salt which they boil and set in a mould [flat below and round above],{4} and every piece from the mould weighs about half a pound. Now, 80 moulds of this salt are worth one _saggio_ of fine gold, which is a weight so called. So this salt serves them for small change.{5}

“=Et quant l’en est alés ceste dix jornée adonc treuve-l’en un grant
flun qe est apéle Brius, auquel se fenist la provence de Cheindu.=”]

The musk animals are very abundant in that country, and thus of musk also they have great store. They have likewise plenty of fish which they catch in the lake in which the pearls are produced. Wild animals, such as lions, bears, wolves, stags, bucks and roes, exist in great numbers; and there are also vast quantities of fowl of every kind. Wine of the vine they have none, but they make a wine of wheat and rice and sundry good spices, and very good drink it is.{6} There grows also in this country a quantity of clove. The tree that bears it is a small one, with leaves like laurel but longer and narrower, and with a small white flower like the clove.{7} They have also ginger and cinnamon in great plenty, besides other spices which never reach our countries, so we need say nothing about them.

Now we may leave this province, as we have told you all about it. But let me tell you first of this same country of Caindu that you ride through it ten days, constantly meeting with towns and villages, with people of the same description that I have mentioned. After riding those ten days you come to a river called BRIUS, which terminates the province of Caindu. In this river is found much gold-dust, and there is also much cinnamon on its banks. It flows to the Ocean Sea.

There is no more to be said about this river, so I will now tell you about another province called Carajan, as you shall hear in what follows.

NOTE 1.—Ramusio’s version here enlarges: “Don’t suppose from my
saying _towards the west_ that these countries really lie in what
we call the _west_, but only that we have been travelling from
regions in the east-north-east _towards_ the west, and hence we
speak of the countries we come to as lying towards the west.”

NOTE 2.—Chinese authorities quoted by Ritter mention
_mother-o’-pearl_ as a product of Lithang, and speak of turquoises
as found in Djaya to the west of Bathang. (_Ritter_, IV. 235–236.)
Neither of these places is, however, within the tract which we
believe to be Caindu. Amyot states that pearls are found in a
certain river of Yun-nan. (See _Trans. R. A. Soc._ II. 91.)

NOTE 3.—This alleged practice, like that mentioned in the last
chapter but one, is ascribed to a variety of people in different
parts of the world. Both, indeed, have a curious double parallel in
the story of two remote districts of the Himalaya which was told
to Bernier by an old Kashmiri. (See Amst. ed. II. 304–305.) Polo
has told nearly the same story already of the people of Kamul. (Bk.
I. ch. xli.) It is related by Strabo of the Massagetæ; by Eusebius
of the Geli and the Bactrians; by Elphinstone of the Hazaras; by
Mendoza of the Ladrone Islanders; by other authors of the Nairs
of Malabar, and of some of the aborigines of the Canary Islands.
(_Caubul_, I. 209; _Mendoza_, II. 254; _Müller’s Strabo_, p. 439;
_Euseb. Praep. Evan._ vi. 10; _Major’s Pr. Henry_, p. 213.)

NOTE 4.—Ramusio has here: “as big as a twopenny loaf,” and adds,
“on the money so made the Prince’s mark is printed; and no one is
allowed to make it except the royal officers.... And merchants
take this currency and go to those tribes that dwell among the
mountains of those parts in the wildest and most unfrequented
quarters; and there they get a _saggio_ of gold for 60, or 50, or
40 pieces of this salt money, in proportion as the natives are more
barbarous and more remote from towns and civilised folk. For in
such positions they cannot dispose at pleasure of their gold and
other things, such as musk and the like, for want of purchasers;
and so they give them cheap.... And the merchants travel also about
the mountains and districts of Tebet, disposing of this salt money
in like manner to their own great gain. For those people, besides
buying necessaries from the merchants, want this salt to use in
their food; whilst in the towns only broken fragments are used in
food, the whole cakes being kept to use as money.” This exchange of
salt cakes for gold forms a curious parallel to the like exchange
in the heart of Africa, narrated by Cosmas in the 6th century, and
by Aloisio Cadamosto in the 15th. (See _Cathay_, pp. clxx–clxxi.)
Ritter also calls attention to an analogous account in Alvarez’s
description of Ethiopia. “The salt,” Alvarez says, “is current as
money, not only in the kingdom of Prester John, but also in those
of the Moors and the pagans, and the people here say that it passes
right on to Manicongo upon the Western Sea. This salt is dug from
the mountain, it is said, in squared blocks.... At the place where
they are dug, 100 or 120 such pieces pass for a drachm of gold ...
equal to ¾ of a ducat of gold. When they arrive at a certain fair
... one day from the salt mine, these go 5 or 6 pieces fewer to the
drachm. And so, from fair to fair, fewer and fewer, so that when
they arrive at the capital there will be only 6 or 7 pieces to the
drachm.” (_Ramusio_, I. 207.) Lieutenant Bower, in his account of
Major Sladen’s mission, says that at Momein the salt, which was a
government monopoly, was “made up in rolls of one and two viss” (a
Rangoon viss is 3 lbs. 5 oz. 5½ drs.), “and stamped” (p. 120).

[At Hsia-Kuan, near Ta-li, Captain Gill remarked to a friend (II.
p. 312) “that the salt, instead of being in the usual great flat
cakes about two or two and a half feet in diameter, was made in
cylinders eight inches in diameter and nine inches high. ‘Yes,’
he said, ‘they make them here in a sort of loaves,’ unconsciously
using almost the words of old Polo, who said the salt in Yun-Nan
was in pieces ‘as big as a twopenny loaf.’” (See also p.
334.)—H. C.]

M. Desgodins, a missionary in this part of Tibet, gives some
curious details of the way in which the civilised traders still
prey upon the simple hill-folks of that quarter; exactly as the
Hindu Banyas prey upon the simple forest-tribes of India. He states
one case in which the account for a pig had with interest run up to
2127 bushels of corn! (_Ann. de la Prop. de la Foi_, XXXVI. 320.)

Gold is said still to be very plentiful in the mountains called
Gulan Sigong, to the N.W. of Yun-nan, adjoining the great eastern
branch of the Irawadi, and the Chinese traders go there to barter
for it. (See _J. A. S. B._ VI. 272.)

NOTE 5.—Salt is still an object highly coveted by the wild
Lolos already alluded to, and to steal it is a chief aim of
their constant raids on Chinese villages. (_Richthofen_ in
_Verhandlungen_, etc., u.s. p. 36.) On the continued existence of
the use of salt currency in regions of the same frontier, I have
been favoured with the following note by M. Francis Garnier, the
distinguished leader of the expedition of the great Kamboja River
in its latter part: “Salt currency has a very wide diffusion from
Muang Yong [in the Burman-Shan country, about lat. 21° 43′] to
Sheu-pin [in Yun-nan, about lat. 23° 43′]. In the Shan markets,
especially within the limits named, all purchases are made with
salt. At Sse-mao and Pou-erl [_Esmok_ and _Puer_ of some of our
maps], silver, weighed and cut in small pieces, is in our day
tending to drive out the custom, but in former days it must have
been universal in the tract of which I am speaking. The salt
itself, prime necessity as it is, has there to be extracted by
condensation from saline springs of great depth, a very difficult
affair. The operation consumes enormous quantities of fuel, and to
this is partly due the denudation of the country”. Marco’s somewhat
rude description of the process, “_Il prennent la sel e la font
cuire, et puis la gitent en forme_,” points to the manufacture
spoken of in this note. The cut which we give from M. Garnier’s
work illustrates the process, but the cakes are vastly greater than
Marco’s. Instead of a half pound they weigh a _picul_, _i.e._ 133⅓
lbs. In Sze-ch’wan the brine wells are bored to a depth of 700 to
1000 feet, and the brine is drawn up in bamboo tubes by a gin. In
Yun-nan the wells are much less deep, and a succession of hand
pumps is used to raise the brine.

“=Il prennent la sel e la font cuire, et puis la gitent en forme.=”]

[Mr. Hosie has a chapter (_Three Years in W. China_, VII.) to
which he has given the title of _Through Caindu to Carajan_;
regarding salt he writes (p. 121): “The brine wells from which the
salt is derived lie at Pai yen ching, 14 miles to the south-west
of the city [of Yen-yuan] ... [they] are only two in number, and
comparatively shallow, being only 50 feet in depth. Bamboo tubes,
ropes and buffaloes are here dispensed with, and small wooden tubs,
with bamboos fixed to their sides as handles for raising, are
considered sufficient. At one of the wells a staging was erected
half-way down, and from it the tubs of brine were passed up to the
workmen above. Passing from the wells to the evaporating sheds, we
found a series of mud furnaces with round holes at the top, into
which cone-shaped pans, manufactured from iron obtained in the
neighbourhood, and varying in height from one to two and a half
feet, were loosely fitted. When a pan has been sufficiently heated,
a ladleful of the brine is poured into it, and, bubbling up to
the surface, it sinks, leaving a saline deposit on the inside of
the pan. This process is repeated until a layer, some four inches
thick, and corresponding to the shape of the pan, is formed, when
the salt is removed as a hollow cone ready for market. Care must be
taken to keep the bottom of the pan moist; otherwise, the salt cone
would crack, and be rendered unfit for the rough carriage which it
experiences on the backs of pack animals. A soft coal, which is
found just under the surface of the yellow-soiled hills seven miles
to the west of Pai-yen-ching, is the fuel used in the furnaces.
The total daily output of salt at these wells does not exceed two
tons a day, and the cost at the wells, including the Government
tax, amounts to about three half-pence a pound. The area of supply,
owing to the country being sparsely populated, is greater than the
output would lead one to expect.”—H. C.]

NOTE 6.—The spiced wine of Kien-ch’ang (see note to next chapter)
has even now a high repute. (_Richthofen_.)

NOTE 7.—M. Pauthier will have it that Marco was here the discoverer
of Assam tea. Assam is, indeed, far out of our range, but his
notice of this plant, with the laurel-like leaf and white flower,
was brought strongly to my recollection in reading Mr. Cooper’s
repeated notices, almost in this region, of the _large-leaved
tea-tree, with its white flowers_; and, again, of “the hills
covered with _tea-oil_ trees, all white with flowers.” Still, one
does not clearly see why Polo should give tea-trees the name of
cloves.

Failing explanation of this, I should suppose that the cloves of
which the text speaks were _cassia-buds_, an article once more
prominent in commerce (as indeed were all similar aromatics)
than now, but still tolerably well known. I was at once supplied
with them at a _drogheria_, in the city where I write (Palermo),
on asking for _Fiori di Canella_, the name under which they are
mentioned repeatedly by Pegolotti and Uzzano, in the 14th and 15th
centuries. Friar Jordanus, in speaking of the cinnamon (or cassia)
of Malabar, says, “it is the bark of a large tree which has fruit
and _flowers like cloves_” (p. 28). The cassia-buds have indeed a
general resemblance to cloves, but they are shorter, lighter in
colour, and not angular. The cinnamon, mentioned in the next lines
as abundantly produced in the same region, was no doubt one of the
inferior sorts, called cassia-bark.

Williams says: “Cassia grows in all the southern provinces of
China, especially Kwang-si and Yun-nan, also in Annam, Japan,
and the Isles of the Archipelago. The wood, bark, buds, seeds,
twigs, pods, leaves, oil, are all objects of commerce.... The buds
(_kwei-tz’_) are the fleshy ovaries of the seeds; they are pressed
at one end, so that they bear some resemblance to cloves in shape.”
Upwards of 500 _piculs_ (about 30 tons), valued at 30 dollars each,
are annually exported to Europe and India. (_Chin. Commercial
Guide_, 113–114).

The only doubt as regards this explanation will probably be whether
the cassia would be found at such a height as we may suppose to
be that of the country in question above the sea-level. I know
that cassia bark is gathered in the Kasia Hills of Eastern Bengal
up to a height of about 4000 feet above the sea, and at least the
valleys of “Caindu” are probably not too elevated for this product.
Indeed, that of the Kin-sha or _Brius_, near where I suppose Polo
to cross it, is only 2600 feet. Positive evidence I cannot adduce.
No cassia or cinnamon was met with by M. Garnier’s party where they
intersected this region.

But in this 2nd edition I am able to state on the authority of
Baron Richthofen that cassia is produced in the whole length of the
valley of Kien-ch’ang (which is, as we shall see in the notes on
next chapter, Caindu), though in no other part of Sze-ch’wan nor in
Northern Yun-nan.

[Captain Gill (_River of Golden Sand_, II. p. 263) writes: “There
were chestnut trees ...; and the Kwei-Hua, a tree ‘with leaves like
the laurel, and with a small white flower, like the clove,’ having
a delicious, though rather a luscious smell. This was the Cassia,
and I can find no words more suitable to describe it than those of
Polo which I have just used.”—H. C.]

_Ethnology_.—The Chinese at Ch’êng-tu fu, according to Richthofen,
classify the aborigines of the Sze-ch’wan frontier as _Man-tzŭ,
Lolo, Si-fan_, and _Tibetan_. Of these the Si-fan are furthest
north, and extend far into Tibet. The Man-tzŭ (properly so called)
are regarded as the remnant of the ancient occupants of Sze-ch’wan,
and now dwell in the mountains about the parallel 30°, and along
the Lhása road, Ta-t’sien lu being about the centre of their tract.
The Lolo are the wildest and most independent, occupying the
mountains on the left of the Kin-sha Kiang where it runs northwards
(see above p. 48, and below p. 69) and also to some extent on its
right. The Tibetan tribes lie to the west of the Man-tzŭ, and to
the west of Kien-ch’ang. (See next chapter.)

Towards the Lan-ts’ang Kiang is the quasi-Tibetan tribe called
by the Chinese _Mossos_, by the Tibetans _Guions_, and between
the Lan-ts’ang and the Lú-Kiang or Salwen are the _Lissús_, wild
hill-robbers and great musk hunters, like those described by Polo
at p. 45. Garnier, who gives these latter particulars, mentions
that near the confluence of the Yalung and Kin-sha Kiang there
are tribes called _Pa-i_, as there are in the south of Yun-nan,
and, like the latter, of distinctly Shan or Laotian character. He
also speaks of _Si-fan_ tribes in the vicinity of Li-kiang fu,
and coming south of the Kin-sha Kiang even to the east of Ta-li.
Of these are told such loose tales as Polo tells of _Tebet_ and
_Caindu_.

[In the _Topography of the Yun-nan Province_ (edition of 1836)
there is a catalogue of 141 classes of aborigines, each with a
separate name and illustration, without any attempt to arrive at a
broader classification. Mr. Bourne has been led to the conviction
that exclusive of the Tibetans (including Si-fan and Ku-tsung),
there are but three great non-Chinese races in Southern China: the
Lolo, the Shan, and the Miao-tzŭ. (_Report, China_, No. 1, 1888,
p. 87.) This classification is adopted by Dr. Deblenne. (_Mission
Lyonnaise_.)

_Man-tzŭ, Man_, is a general name for “barbarian” (see my note in
_Odoric de Pordenone_, p. 248 _seqq._); it is applied as well to
the Lolo as to the Si-fan.

Mr. Parker remarks (_China Review_, XX. p. 345) that the epithet
of _Man-tzŭ_, or “barbarians,” dates from the time when the Shans,
Annamese, Miao-tzŭ, etc., occupied nearly all South China, for it
is essentially to the Indo-Chinese that the term Man-tzŭ belongs.

Mr. Hosie writes (_Three years in W. China_, 122): “At the time
when Marco Polo passed through Caindu, this country was in the
possession of the Si-fans.... At the present day, they occupy
the country to the west, and are known under the generic name of
Man-tzŭ.”

“It has already been remarked that _Si-fan_, convertible with
_Man-tzŭ_, is a loose Chinese expression of no ethnological value,
meaning nothing more than Western barbarians; but in a more
restricted sense it is used to designate a people (or peoples)
which inhabits the valley of the Yalung and the upper T’ung, with
contiguous valleys and ranges, from about the twenty-seventh
parallel to the borders of Koko-nor. This people is sub-divided
into eighteen tribes.” (_Baber_, p. 81.)

Si-fan or Pa-tsiu is the name by which the Chinese call the Tibetan
tribes which occupy part of Western China. (_Devéria_, p. 167.)

Dr. Bretschneider writes (_Med. Res._ II. p. 24): “The
north-eastern part of Tibet was sometimes designated by the Chinese
name Si-fan, and Hyacinth [Bitchurin] is of opinion that in ancient
times this name was even applied to the whole of Tibet. _Si-fan_
means, ‘Western Barbarians.’ The biographer of Hiuen-Tsang reports
that when this traveller, in 629, visited Liang-chau (in the
province of Kan-Suh), this city was the entrepôt for merchants
from _Si-fan_ and the countries east of the Ts’ung-ling mountains.
In the history of the Hia and Tangut Empire (in the _Sung-shi_)
we read, _s. a._ 1003, that the founder of this Empire invaded
_Si-fan_ and then proceeded to _Si-liang_ (Liang-chau). The
_Yuen-shi_ reports, _s. a._ 1268: ‘The (Mongol) Emperor ordered
_Meng-gu-dai_ to invade _Si-fan_ with 6000 men.’ The name Si-fan
appears also in ch. ccii., biography of _Dan-ba_.” It is stated
in the _Ming-shi_, “that the name _Si-fan_ is applied to the
territory situated beyond the frontiers of the Chinese provinces
of Shen-si (then including the eastern part of present Kan-Suh)
and Sze-ch’wan, and inhabited by various tribes of Tangut race,
anciently known in Chinese history under the name of _Si Kiang_....
The _Kuang yu ki_ notices that _Si-fan_ comprises the territory
of the south-west of Shen-si, west of Sze-ch’wan and north-west
of Yun-nan.... The tribute presented by the Si-fan tribes to
the Emperor used to be carried to the court at Peking by way of
Ya-chau in Sze-ch’wan.” (_Bretschneider_, 203.) The Tangutans of
Prjevalsky, north-east of Tibet, in the country of Ku-ku nor,
correspond to the Si-fan.

“The Ta-tu River may be looked upon as the southern limit of the
region inhabited by Sifan tribes, and the northern boundary of the
Lolo country which stretches southwards to the Yang-tzŭ and east
from the valley of Kien-ch’ang towards the right bank of the Min.”
(_Hosie_, p. 102.)

To Mr. E. C. Baber we owe the most valuable information regarding
the Lolo people:

“‘Lolo’ is itself a word of insult, of unknown Chinese origin,
which should not be used in their presence, although they excuse
it and will even sometimes employ it in the case of ignorant
strangers. In the report of Governor-General Lo Ping-chang,
above quoted, they are called ‘I,’ the term applied by Chinese
to Europeans. They themselves have no objection to being styled
‘I-chia’ (I families), but that word is not their native name.
Near Ma-pien they call themselves ‘Lo-su’; in the neighbourhood of
Lui-po T’ing their name is ‘No-su’ or ‘Ngo-su’ (possibly a mere
variant of ‘Lo-su’); near Hui-li-chou the term is ‘Lé-su’—the
syllable Lé being pronounced as in French. The subject tribes on
the T’ung River, near Mount Wa, also name themselves ‘Ngo-su.’ I
have found the latter people speak very disrespectfully of the
Lé-su, which argues an internal distinction; but there can be no
doubt that they are the same race, and speak the same language,
though with minor differences of dialect.” (_Baber, Travels_,
66–67.)

“With very rare exceptions the male Lolo, rich or poor, free or
subject, may be instantly known by his _horn_. All his hair is
gathered into a knot over his forehead and there twisted up in a
cotton cloth so as to resemble the horn of a unicorn. The horn with
its wrapper is sometimes a good nine inches long. They consider
this _coiffure_ sacred, so at least I was told, and even those who
wear a short pig-tail for convenience in entering Chinese territory
still conserve the indigenous horn, concealed for the occasion
under the folds of the Sze-ch’wan turban.” (_Baber_, p. 61.) See
these horns on figures, Bk. II. ch. lviii.

“The principal clothing of a Lolo is his mantle, a capacious
sleeveless garment of grey or black felt gathered round his neck
by a string, and reaching nearly to his heels. In the case of the
better classes the mantle is of fine felt—in great request among
the Chinese—and has a fringe of cotton-web round its lower border.
For journeys on horseback they have a similar cloak differing only
in being slit half-way up the back; a wide lappet covering the
opening lies easily along the loins and croup of the horse. The
colour of the felt is originally grey, but becomes brown-black
or black, in process of time. It is said that the insects which
haunt humanity never infest these gabardines. The Lolo generally
gathers this garment closely round his shoulders and crosses his
arms inside. His legs, clothed in trousers of Chinese cotton, are
swathed in felt bandages bound on with strings, and he has not yet
been super-civilised into the use of foot-gear. In summer a cotton
cloak is often substituted for the felt mantle. The hat, serving
equally for an umbrella, is woven of bamboo, in a low conical
shape, and is covered with felt. Crouching in his felt mantle under
this roof of felt the hardy Lolo is impervious to wind or rain.”
(_Baber, Travels_, 61–62.)

“The word, ‘Black-bone,’ is generally used by the Chinese as a name
for the independent Lolos, but in the mouth of a Lolo it seems to
mean a ‘freeman’ or ‘noble,’ in which sense it is not a whit more
absurd than the ‘blue-blood,’ of Europeans. The ‘White-bones,’ an
inferior class, but still Lolo by birth, are, so far as I could
understand, the vassals and retainers of the patricians—the people,
in fact. A third class consists of Wa-tzŭ, or slaves, who are all
captive Chinese. It does not appear whether the servile class is
sub-divided, but, at any rate, the slaves born in Lolodom are
treated with more consideration than those who have been captured
in slave-hunts.” (_Baber, Travels_, 67.)

According to the French missionary, Paul Vial (_Les Lolos_,
Shang-hai, 1898) the Lolos say that they come from the country
situated between Tibet and Burma. The proper manner to address a
Lolo in Chinese is _Lao-pen-kia_. The book of Father Vial contains
a very valuable chapter on the writing of the Lolos. Mr. F. S.
A. Bourne writes (_Report, China_, No. I. 1888, p. 88):—“The old
Chinese name for this race was ‘Ts’uan Man’— ‘Ts’uan barbarians,’
a name taken from one of their chiefs. The _Yun-nan Topography_
says:—‘The name of “Ts’uan Man” is a very ancient one, and
originally the tribes of Ts’uan were very numerous. There was that
called “Lu-lu Man,” for instance, now improperly called “Lo-Lo.”’
These people call themselves ‘Nersu,’ and the vocabularies show
that they stretch in scattered communities as far as Ssŭ-mao and
along the whole southern border of Yun-nan. It appears from the
_Topography_ that they are found also on the Burmese border.”

The _Moso_ call themselves _Nashi_ and are called _Djiung_ by the
Tibetans; their ancient capital is Li-kiang fu which was taken by
their chief Mong-ts’u under the Sung Dynasty; the Mongols made
of their country the kingdom of Chaghan-djang. Li-kiang is the
territory of Yuê-si Chao, called also Mo-sie (Moso), one of the
six Chao of Nan-Chao. The Moso of Li-kiang call themselves _Ho_.
They have an epic styled _Djiung-Ling_ (Moso Division) recounting
the invasion of part of Tibet by the Moso. The Moso were submitted
during the 8th century, by the King of Nan-Chao. They have a
special hieroglyphic scrip, a specimen of which has been given by
Devéria. (_Frontière_, p. 166.) A manuscript was secured by Captain
Gill, on the frontier east of Li-t’ang, and presented by him to
the British Museum (_Add._ MSS. Or. 2162); T. de Lacouperie gave
a facsimile of it. (Plates I., II. of _Beginnings of Writing_.)
Prince Henri d’Orléans and M. Bonin both brought home a Moso
manuscript with a Chinese explanation.

Dr. Anderson (_Exped. to Yunnan_, Calcutta, p. 136) says the
_Li-sus_, or _Lissaus_ are “a small hill-people, with fair, round,
flat faces, high cheek bones, and some little obliquity of the
eye.” These Li-su or Li-siè, are scattered throughout the Yunnanese
prefectures of Yao-ngan, Li-kiang, Ta-li and Yung-ch’ang; they were
already in Yun-Nan in the 4th century when the Chinese general Ch’u
Chouang-kiao entered the country. (_Devéria, Front._, p. 164.)

The _Pa-y_ or _P’o-y_ formed under the Han Dynasty the principality
of P’o-tsiu and under the T’ang Dynasty the tribes of Pu-hiung and
of Si-ngo, which were among the thirty-seven tribes dependent on
the ancient state of Nan-Chao and occupied the territory of the
sub-prefectures of Kiang-Chuen (Ch’êng-kiang fu) and of Si-ngo
(Lin-ngan fu). They submitted to China at the beginning of the
Yuen Dynasty; their country bordered upon Burma (Mien-tien) and
Ch’ê-li or Kiang-Hung (Xieng-Hung), in Yun-Nan, on the right
bank of the Mekong River. According to Chinese tradition, the
Pa-y descended from Muong Tsiu-ch’u, ninth son of Ti Muong-tsiu,
son of Piao-tsiu-ti (Asôka). Devéria gives (p. 105) a specimen
of the Pa-y writing (16th century). (_Devéria, Front._, 99,
117; _Bourne, Report_, p. 88.) Chapter iv. of the Chinese work,
_Sze-i-kwan-k’ao_, is devoted to the _Pa-y_, including the
sub-divisions of Muong-Yang, Muong-Ting, Nan-tien, Tsien-ngaï,
Lung-chuen, Wei-yuan, Wan-tien, Chen-k’ang, Ta-how, Mang-shi,
Kin-tung, Ho-tsin, Cho-lo tien. (_Devéria, Mél. de Harlez_, p. 97.)
I give a specimen of Pa-yi writing from a Chinese work purchased
by Father Amiot at Peking, now in the Paris National Library
(Fonds chinois, No. 986). (See on this scrip, _F. W. K. Müller,
T’oung-Pao_, III. p. 1, and V. p. 329; _E. H. Parker, The Muong
Language, China Review_, I. 1891, p. 267; _P. Lefèvre-Pontalis,
Etudes sur quelques alphabets et vocab. Thais, T’oung Pao_, III.
pp. 39–64.)—H. C.]

These ethnological matters have to be handled cautiously, for there
is great ambiguity in the nomenclature. Thus _Man-tzŭ_ is often
used generically for aborigines, and the _Lolos_ of Richthofen are
called Man-tzŭ by Garnier and Blakiston; whilst _Lolo_ again has
in Yun-nan apparently a very comprehensive generic meaning, and
is so used by Garnier. (_Richt. Letter_ VII. 67–68 and MS. notes;
_Garnier_, I. 519 _seqq._ [_T. W. Kingsmill, Han Wu-ti, China
Review_, XXV. 103–109.])

---------------------------------------------------------------------- [1] Ramusio alone has “a great _salt_ lake.”