Size is the point in which the bird fails to meet Marco’s description.  In that respect the latter would rather apply to the Crossoptilon auritum, which is nearly as big as a turkey, or to the glorious Munal (Lopophorus impeyanus), but then that has no length of tail.  The latter seems to be the bird described by Aelian:  “Magnificent cocks which have the crest variegated and ornate like a crown of flowers, and the tail feathers not curved like a cock’s, but broad and carried in a train like a peacock’s; the feathers are partly golden, and partly azure or emerald-coloured.” (Wood’s Birds, 610, from which I have copied the illustration; Williams, M. K. I. 261; Ael.  De Nat.  An. XVI. 2.) A species of Crossoptilon has recently been found by Captain Prjevalsky in Alashan, the Egrigaia (as I believe) of next chapter, and one also by Abbe Armand David at the Koko Nor.

[See on the Phasianidae family in Central and Western Asia, David et Oustalet, Oiseaux de la Chine, 401-421; the Phasianus Reevesii or veneratus is called by the Chinese of Tung-lin, near Peking, Djeu-ky (hen-arrow); the Crossoptilon auritum is named Ma-ky.—­H.  C.]

CHAPTER LVIII.

OF THE KINGDOM OF EGRIGAIA.

Starting again from Erguiul you ride eastward for eight days, and then come to a province called EGRIGAIA, containing numerous cities and villages, and belonging to Tangut.[NOTE 1] The capital city is called CALACHAN.[NOTE 2] The people are chiefly Idolaters, but there are fine churches belonging to the Nestorian Christians.  They are all subjects of the Great Kaan.  They make in this city great quantities of camlets of camel’s wool, the finest in the world; and some of the camlets that they make are white, for they have white camels, and these are the best of all.  Merchants purchase these stuffs here, and carry them over the world for sale.[NOTE 3]

We shall now proceed eastward from this place and enter the territory that was formerly Prester John’s.

NOTE 1.—­Chinghiz invaded Tangut in all five times, viz. in 1205, 1207, 1209 (or according to Erdmann, 1210-1211), 1218, and 1226-1227, on which last expedition he died.

A. In the third invasion, according to D’Ohsson’s Chinese guide (Father Hyacinth), he took the town of Uiraca, and the fortress of Imen, and laid siege to the capital, then called Chung-sing or Chung-hing, now Ning-hsia.

Rashid, in a short notice of this campaign, calls the first city Erica, Erlaca, or, as Erdmann has it, Artacki.  In De Mailla it is Ulahai.

B. On the last invasion (1226), D’Ohsson’s Chinese authority says that Chinghiz took Kanchau and Suhchau, Cholo and Khola in the province of Liangcheu, and then proceeded to the Yellow River, and invested Lingchau, south of Ning-hsia.