NOTE 17.—­Marsden, followed by Pauthier, supposes these unorthodox ascetics to be Hindu Sanyasis, and the latter editor supposes even the name Sensi or Sensin to represent that denomination.  Such wanderers do occasionally find their way to Tartary; Gerbillon mentions having encountered five of them at Kuku Khotan (supra, p. 286), and I think John Bell speaks of meeting one still further north.  But what is said of the great and numerous idols of the Sensin is inconsistent with such a notion, as is indeed, it seems to me, the whole scope of the passage.  Evidently no occasional vagabonds from a far country, but some indigenous sectaries, are in question.  Nor would bran and hot water be a Hindu regimen.  The staple diet of the Tibetans is Chamba, the meal of toasted barley, mixed sometimes with warm water, but more frequently with hot tea, and I think it is probable that these were the elements of the ascetic diet rather than the mere bran which Polo speaks of.  Semedo indeed says that some of the Buddhist devotees professed never to take any food but tea; knowing people said they mixed with it pellets of sun-dried beef.  The determination of the sect intended in the text is, I conceive, to be sought in the history of Chinese or Tibetan Buddhism and their rivals.

Both Baldelli and Neumann have indicated a general opinion that the Taosse or some branch of that sect is meant, but they have entered into no particulars except in a reference by the former to Shien-sien, a title of perfection affected by that sect, as the origin of Polo’s term Sensin.  In the substance of this I think they are right.  But I believe that in the text this Chinese sect are, rightly or wrongly, identified with the ancient Tibetan sect of Bon-po, and that part of the characters assigned belong to each.

First with regard to the Taosse.  These were evidently the Patarini of the Buddhists in China at this time, and Polo was probably aware of the persecution which the latter had stirred up Kublai to direct against them in 1281—­persecution at least it is called, though it was but a mild proceeding in comparison with the thing contemporaneously practised in Christian Lombardy, for in heathen Cathay, books, and not human creatures, were the subjects doomed to burn, and even that doom was not carried out.

["The Tao-sze,” says M. Polo, “were looked upon as heretics by the other sects; that is, of course; by the Lamas and Ho-shangs; in fact in his time a passionate struggle was going on between Buddhists and Tao-sze, or rather a persecution of the latter by the former; the Buddhists attributed to the doctrine of the Tao-sze a pernicious tendency, and accused them of deceit; and in support of these assertions they pointed to some of their sacred books.  Taking advantage of their influence at Court, they persuaded Kublai to decree the burning of these books, and it was carried out in Peking.” (Palladius, 30.)—­H.  C.]