[Footnote 2:  See the "Katab-al-adjajab,” probably written by MASSOUDI.  REINAUD, Memoires sur l’Inde, p. 200; Relation et Discours, pp. lx. lxviii.; ABOULFEDA, Introd. cdxii.  May not this early mention of the use of “naphtha” by the Chinese for burning the ships of an enemy, throw some light on the disquisitions adverted to by GIBBON, ch. lii., as to the nature of “the Greek fire,” so destructive to the fleets of their assailants during the first and second siege of Constantinople in the seventh and eighth centuries?  GIBBON says that the principal ingredient was naphtha, and that the Greek emperor learned the secret of its composition from a Syrian who deserted from the service of the Khalif.  Did the Khalif acquire the knowledge from the Chinese, whose ships, it appears, were armed with some preparation of this nature in their voyages to Bassora?]

On this point we have the personal testimony of the Chinese traveller Fa Hian, who at the end of the fourth century sailed direct from Ceylon for China, in a merchant vessel so large as to accommodate two hundred persons, and having in tow a smaller one, as a precaution against dangers by sea[1]:—­and Ibn Batuta saw, at Calicut, in the fourteenth century, junks from China capable of accommodating a thousand men, of whom four hundred were soldiers, and each of these large ships was followed by three smaller.[2] With vessels of such magnitude, it would be neither expedient nor practicable to navigate the shallows in the vicinity of Manaar; and besides, Mantotte, or, as it was anciently called, Mahatitta or Maha-totta, “the great ferry,” although it existed as a port upwards of four hundred years before the Christian era, was at no period an emporium of commerce.  Being situated so close to the ancient capital, Anarajapoora, it derived its notoriety from being the point of arrival and departure of the Malabars who resorted to the island; and the only trade for which it afforded facilities was the occasional importation of the produce of the opposite coast of India.[3] It is not only probable, but almost certain that during the middle ages, and especially prior to the eleventh century, when the trade with Persia and Arabia was at its height, Mantotte afforded the facilities indicated by Bertolacci to the smaller craft that availed themselves of the Paumbam passage; but we have still to ascertain the particular harbour which was the centre of the more important commerce between China and the West.  That harbour I believe to have been Point de Galle.

[Footnote 1:  Fo[)e]-kou[)e]-ki, ch. xl. p. 359).  In a previous passage, FA HIAN describes the large vessels in which the trade was carried between Tamlook, on the Hoogly, and Ceylon:—­“A cette epoque, des marchands, se mettant en mer avec de grands vaisseaux, firent route vers le sud-ouest; et au commencement de l’hiver, le vent etant favorable, apres une navigation de quatorze nuits et d’autant de jours, on arriva au Royaume des Lions.”—­Ibid. chap. xxxvi. p. 328.]