and Ch’e-li or Kiang-Hung (Xieng-Hung), in Yun-Nan, on the right bank of the Mekong River.  According to Chinese tradition, the Pa-y descended from Muong Tsiu-ch’u, ninth son of Ti Muong-tsiu, son of Piao-tsiu-ti (Asoka).  Deveria gives (p. 105) a specimen of the Pa-y writing (16th century). (Deveria, Front., 99, 117; Bourne, Report, p. 88.) Chapter iv. of the Chinese work, Sze-i-kwan-k’ao, is devoted to the Pa-y, including the sub-divisions of Muong-Yang, Muong-Ting, Nan-tien, Tsien-ngai, Lung-chuen, Wei-yuan, Wan-tien, Chen-k’ang, Ta-how, Mang-shi, Kin-tung, Ho-tsin, Cho-lo tien. (Deveria, Mel. de Harlez, p. 97.) I give a specimen of Pa-yi writing from a Chinese work purchased by Father Amiot at Peking, now in the Paris National Library (Fonds chinois, No. 986). (See on this scrip, F.W.K.  Mueller, T’oung-Pao, III. p. 1, and V. p. 329; E.H.  Parker, The Muong Language, China Review, I. 1891, p. 267; P.  Lefevre-Pontalis, Etudes sur quelques alphabets et vocab.  Thais, T’oung Pao, III. pp. 39-64.)—­H.C.

[Illustration:  Pa-y script.]

These ethnological matters have to be handled cautiously, for there is great ambiguity in the nomenclature.  Thus Man-tzu is often used generically for aborigines, and the Lolos of Richthofen are called Man-tzu by Garnier and Blakiston; whilst Lolo again has in Yun-nan apparently a very comprehensive generic meaning, and is so used by Garnier. (Richt.  Letter VII. 67-68 and MS. notes; Garnier, I. 519 seqq. [T.W.  Kingsmill, Han Wu-ti, China Review, XXV. 103-109.])

[1] Ramusio alone has “a great salt lake.”

CHAPTER XLVIII.

CONCERNING THE PROVINCE OF CARAJAN.

When you have passed that River you enter on the province of CARAJAN, which is so large that it includes seven kingdoms.  It lies towards the west; the people are Idolaters, and they are subject to the Great Kaan.  A son of his, however, is there as King of the country, by name ESSENTIMUR; a very great and rich and puissant Prince; and he well and justly rules his dominion, for he is a wise man, and a valiant.

After leaving the river that I spoke of, you go five days’ journey towards the west, meeting with numerous towns and villages.  The country is one in which excellent horses are bred, and the people live by cattle and agriculture.  They have a language of their own which is passing hard to understand.  At the end of those five days’ journey you come to the capital, which is called YACHI, a very great and noble city, in which are numerous merchants and craftsmen.[NOTE 1]

The people are of sundry kinds, for there are not only Saracens and Idolaters, but also a few Nestorian Christians.[NOTE 2] They have wheat and rice in plenty.  Howbeit they never eat wheaten bread, because in that country it is unwholesome.[NOTE 3] Rice they eat, and make of it sundry messes, besides a kind of drink which is very clear and good, and makes a man drunk just as wine does.