[23] This seemingly trifling circumstance was matter of great surprize and
    scandal to the Mahometans, who consider hogs as unclean animals, and
    to whom pork is a forbidden food.—­Astl.

[24] It is singular how very nearly this arrangement resembles the supposed
    modern invention of a chain of telegraphs.—­E.

[25] Six merres make a pharasang, or Persian league, which is equal to four
    English miles, and 868 feet.  One merre is therefore equal to 1221
    yards, and each post station of ten merres is equal to 12,213 yards,
    or almost seven English miles.—­Astl.

[26] Otherwise Kamgiou or Kan-chew, the Kampion or Kainpiou of Marco Polo;
    which is a city of Shen-si, near the great wall and the desert.—­Astl.

In Forsters account of this journey, the ambassadors arrived from the Karaul, or fortified pass, at Natschieu, Nang-tsiew, or Naa-tsieu; after which, they are said to have arrived at Kham-tcheou, the Kan- chew of the text.—­E.

[27] The description given in the text of this Chinese pagoda has much the
    air of a fiction; yet we can hardly conceive the author would venture
    to report to Shah-Rokh what must have been contradicted by his
    ambassadors, if false.—­Astl.

[28] This is called Lam in the French of Thevenot, and is the same with
    the Lamb of Marco Polo.—­Astl.

[29] This is the Cara-moran or Whang-ho, which they crossed a second time
    between Shen-si and Shan-si, where it is much larger than at Lan-chew,
    the place probably alluded to in this part of the text.—­Astl.

    In the edition, by Forster, this river is named Abi Daraan, or the
    Daraan, afterwards Kara-raan; but is obviously the Kara-moran, Whang-
    ho, or Hoang-ho.—­E.

[30] This other river, certainly is the same Kara-moran, passed again at
    a different part of their route.—­Astl.

[31] This must have been some city in the province of Pe-che-li, or near
    its borders in Shan-si; but no such name as that of the text is to be
    found in any of the maps of China.—­Astl.

In Forsters edition, this place is named Chien-dien-puhr, perhaps Tchin-teuen-pou, a city at some distance to the west of the Hoan-ho river.  The route is not distinctly indicated in the text; but seems to have been from Soutcheo, at the N.W. extremity of Chensi, in lat. 40 deg.  N. following a S. E. direction to the Hoan-ho, somewhere about Yung- nam, in lat. 37 deg.  N. long. 104 deg.  E.; and Yung-nam may have been the fine city which the Persians named Rosna-baad, or the Habitation of Beauty.—­E.

[32] About seventeen or twenty-one English miles, or nineteen miles on the
    average.—­E.

[33] This is the same with the Khambalu of Polo.  One name signifies the
    palace of the Khan, the other the city of the Khan.—­Astl.