Chapter 17

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}

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.

[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.”