that it lies with God to do less or more according to His pleasure.  And they write down the results of their examination in certain little pamphlets for the year, which are called Tacuin, and these are sold for a groat to all who desire to know what is coming.  Those of the astrologers, of course whose predictions are found to be most exact, are held to be the greatest adepts in their art, and get the greater fame.[NOTE 1]

And if any one having some great matter in hand, or proposing to make a long journey for traffic or other business, desires to know what will be the upshot, he goes to one of these astrologers and says:  “Turn up your books and see what is the present aspect of the heavens, for I am going away on such and such a business.”  Then the astrologer will reply that the applicant must also tell the year, month, and hour of his birth; and when he has got that information he will see how the horoscope of his nativity combines with the indications of the time when the question is put, and then he predicts the result, good or bad, according to the aspect of the heavens.

You must know, too, that the Tartars reckon their years by twelves; the sign of the first year being the Lion, of the second the Ox, of the third the Dragon, of the fourth the Dog, and so forth up to the twelfth;[NOTE 2] so that when one is asked the year of his birth he answers that it was in the year of the Lion (let us say), on such a day or night, at such an hour, and such a moment.  And the father of a child always takes care to write these particulars down in a book.  When the twelve yearly symbols have been gone through, then they come back to the first, and go through with them again in the same succession.]

NOTE 1.—­It is odd that Marsden should have sought a Chinese explanation of the Arabic word Takwim even with Tavernier before him:  “They sell in Persia an annual almanac called Tacuim, which is properly an ephemeris containing the longitude and latitude of the planets, their conjunctions and oppositions, and other such matter.  The Tacuim is full of predictions regarding war, pestilence, and famine; it indicates the favourable time for putting on new clothes, for getting bled or purged, for making a journey, and so forth.  They put entire faith in it, and whoever can afford one governs himself in all things by its rules.” (Bk.  V. ch. xiv.)

The use of the term by Marco may possibly be an illustration of what I have elsewhere propounded, viz. that he was not acquainted with Chinese, but that his intercourse and conversation lay chiefly with the foreigners at the Kaan’s Court, and probably was carried on in the Persian language.  But not long after the date of our Book we find the word used in Italian by Jacopo Alighieri (Dante’s son):—­

  “A voler giudicare
  Si conviene adequare
  Inprimo il Taccuino,
  Per vedere il cammino
  Come i Pianeti vanno
  Per tutto quanto l’anno.”
      —­Rime Antiche Toscane, III. 10.