NOTE 1.—­Though M. Pauthier has imagined objections there is no room for doubt that Kesmacoran is the province of Mekran, known habitually all over the East as Kij-Makran, from the combination with the name of the country of that of its chief town, just as we lately met with a converse combination in Konkan-tana.  This was pointed out to Marsden by his illustrious friend Major Rennell.  We find the term Kij Makran used by Ibn Batuta (III. 47); by the Turkish Admiral Sidi ’Ali (J.  As., ser.  I. tom. ix. 72; and J.A.S.B. V. 463); by Sharifuddin (P. de la Croix, I. 379, II. 417-418); in the famous Sindian Romeo-and-Juliet tale of Sassi and Pannun (Elliot, I. 333); by Pietro della Valle (I. 724, II. 358); by Sir F. Goldsmid (J.R.A.S., N.S., I. 38); and see for other examples, J.A.S.B. VII. 298, 305, 308; VIII. 764; XIV. 158; XVII. pt. ii. 559:  XX. 262, 263.

The argument that Mekran was not a province of India only amounts to saying that Polo has made a mistake.  But the fact is that it often was reckoned to belong to India, from ancient down to comparatively modern times.  Pliny says:  “Many indeed do not reckon the Indus to be the western boundary of India, but include in that term also four satrapies on this side the river, the Gedrosi, the Arachoti, the Arii, and the Parapomisadae (i.e.  Mekran, Kandahar, Herat, and Kabul) .... whilst others class all these together under the name of Ariana” (VI. 23).  Arachosia, according to Isidore of Charax, was termed by the Parthians “White India.”  Aelian calls Gedrosia a part of India. (Hist.  Animal. XVII. 6.) In the 6th century the Nestorian Patriarch Jesujabus, as we have seen (supra, ch. xxii. note 1), considered all to be India from the coast of Persia, i.e. of Fars, beginning from near the Gulf.  According to Ibn Khordadbeh, the boundary between Persia and India was seven days’ sail from Hormuz and eight from Daibul, or less than half-way from the mouth of the Gulf to the Indus. (J.  As. ser.  VI. tom. v. 283.) Beladhori speaks of the Arabs in early expeditions as invading Indian territory about the Lake of Sijistan; and Istakhri represents this latter country as bounded on the north and partly on the west by portions of India.  Kabul was still reckoned in India.  Chach, the last Hindu king of Sind but one, is related to have marched through Mekran to a river which formed the limit between Mekran and Kerman.  On its banks he planted date-trees, and set up a monument which bore:  "This was the boundary of Hind in the time of Chach, the son of Sflaij, the son of Basabas.”  In the Geography of Bakui we find it stated that “Hind is a great country which begins at the province of Mekran.” (N. and E. II. 54.) In the map of Marino Sanuto India begins from Hormuz; and it is plain from what Polo says in quitting that city that he considered the next step from it south-eastward would have taken him to India (supra, I. p. 110).