[6] The description of this creature seems to indicate an alligator or
    crocodile; which probably Marco had not seen, and only describes from
    an imperfect account of the natives.—­E.

[7] According to Pinkerton, this province is named Cariti, and its
    principal town Nociam, in the edition of Trevigi.—­E.

[8] Named previously Carazam and Caraian, afterwards Caraiam, or Carian. 
    —­E.

[9] In some modern maps, Mien is introduced as a large province on the
    river of Pegu, immediately to the south-west of Yunnan in China, and
    divided from Bengal by the whole country of Ava.  But the distribution
    of eastern dominion has been always extremely fluctuating; and Mien
    may then have included all the north of Ava.—­E.

[10] In the original text this animal is called the unicorn; a word of the
    same import with rhinoceros.—­E.

[11] This either implies that Bengal on the borders of India is to the
    south of Thibet; or south is here an error for east, Bengal being
    the eastern frontier province of India proper.—­E.

[12] The difficulty, or rather impossibility of tracing the steps of Marco
    Polo, may proceed from various causes.  The provinces or kingdoms,
    mostly named from their chief cities, have suffered infinite changes
    from perpetual revolutions.  The names he gives, besides being
    corrupted in the various transcriptions and editions, he probably set
    down orally, as given to him in the Tartar or Mogul dialect, very
    different from those which have been adopted into modern geography
    from various sources.  Many of these places may have been destroyed,
    and new names imposed.  Upon the whole, his present course appears to
    have been from Bengal eastwards, through the provinces of the farther
    India, to Mangi or southern China; and Cangigu may possibly be
    Chittigong.  Yet Cangigu is said in the text to be an inland country. 
    —­E.

[13] Kathay and Mangi, as formerly mentioned, are Northern and Southern
    China, so that the direction of these rivers ought perhaps to have
    been described as north and south, instead of east and west.  About
    seventy miles from the mouth of the Yellow river, or Hoang-ho, there
    is a town called Tsingo, near which a canal runs to the north,
    communicating with the river on which Pekin is situated, and another
    canal, running far south into Mangi or Southern China.  Tsingo, though
    now an inferior town, may have been formerly Singui-matu, and a place
    of great importance.—­E.