The adventures of Marco Polo, the great traveler

Introduction To The Home Beading Book Seeies By The Editok

The new education takes two important directions—one of these is toward original observation, requiring the pupil to test and verify what is taught him at school by his own experiments. The information that he learns from books or hears from his teacher's lips must be assimilated by incorporating it with his own experience.

The other direction pointed out by the new education is systematic home reading. It forms a part of school extension of all kinds. The so-called " University Extension " that originated at Cambridge and Oxford has as its chief feature the aid of home reading by lectures and round-table discussions, led or conducted by experts who also lay out the course of reading. The Chautauquan movement in this country prescribes a series of excellent books and furnishes for a goodly number of its readers annual courses of lectures. The teachers' reading circles that exist in many States prescribe the books to be read, and publish some analysis, commentary, or catechism to aid the members.

Home reading, it seems, furnishes the essential basis of this great movement to extend education viii THE ADVENTURES OF MARCO POLO

beyond the school and to make self -culture a habit of life.

Looking more carefully at the difference between the two directions of the new education we can see what each accomplishes. There is first an effort to train the original powers of the individual and make him self -active, quick at observation, and free in his thinking. Next, the new education endeavors, by the reading of books and the study of the wisdom of the race, to make the child or youth a participator in the results of experience of all mankind.

These two movements may be made antagonistic by poor teaching. The book knowledge, containing as it does the precious lesson of human experience, may be so taught as to bring with it only dead rules of conduct, only dead scraps of information, and no stimulant to original thinking. Its contents may be memorized without being understood. On the other hand, the self -activity of the child may be stimulated at the expense of his social well-being — his originality may be cultivated at the expense of his rationality. If he is taught persistently to have his own way, to trust only his own senses, to cling to his own opinions heedless of the experience of his fellows, he is preparing for an unsuccessful, misanthropic career, and is likely enough to end his life in a madhouse.

It is admitted that a too exclusive study of the knowledge found in books, the knowledge which is aggregated from the experience and thought of other people, may result in loading the mind of the pupil with material which he can not use to advantage.

EDITOR'S INTRODUCTION i x

Some minds are so full of lumber that there is no space left to set up a workshop. The necessity of uniting both of these directions of intellectual activity in the schools is therefore obvious, but we must not, in this place, fall into the error of supposing that it is the oral instruction in school and the personal influence of the teacher alone that excites the pupil to activity. Book instruction is not always dry and theoretical. The very persons who declaim against the book, and praise in such strong terms the self -activity of the pupil and original research, are mostly persons who have received their practical impulse from reading the writings of educational reformers. Yery few persons have received an impulse from personal contact with inspiring teachers compared with the number that have been aroused by reading such books as Herbert Spencer's Treatise on Education, Rousseau's Emile, Pestalozzi's Leonard and Gertrude, Francis W. Parker's Talks about Teaching, G. Stanley Hall's Pedagogical Seminary. Think in this connection, too, of the impulse to observation in natural science produced by such books as those of Hugh Miller, Faraday, Tyndall, Huxley, Agassiz, and Darwin.

The new scientific book is different from the old. The old style book of science gave dead results where the new one gives not only the results, but a minute account of the method employed in reaching those results. An insight into the method employed in discovery trains the reader into a naturalist, an historian, a sociologist. The books of the writers above named have done more to stimulate original research on the x THE ADVENTURES OP MARCO POLO

part of their readers than all other influences combined.

It is therefore much more a matter of importance to get the right kind of book than to get a living teacher. The book which teaches results, and at the same time gives in an intelligible manner the steps of discovery and the methods employed, is a book which will stimulate the student to repeat the experiments described and get beyond them into fields of original research himself. Every one remembers the published lectures of Faraday on chemistry, which exercised a wide influence in changing the style of books on natural science, causing them to deal with method more than results, and thus train the reader's power of conducting original research. Robinson Crusoe for nearly two hundred years has aroused the spirit of adventure and prompted young men to resort to the border lands of civilization. A library of home reading should contain books that incite to self -activity and arouse the spirit of inquiry. The books should treat of methods of discovery and evolution. All nature is unified by the discovery of the law of evolution. Each and every being in the world is now explained by the process of development to which it belongs. Every fact now throws light on all the others by illustrating the process of growth in which each has its end and aim.

The Home Reading Books are to be classed as follows :

First Division. Natural history, including popular scientific treatises on plants and animals, and also de-

EDITOR'S INTRODUCTION x {

ecriptions of geographical localities. The "branch of study in the district school course which corresponds to this is geography. Travels and sojourns in distant lands ; special writings which treat of this or that animal or plant, or family of animals or plants ; anything that relates to organic nature or to meteorology, or descriptive astronomy may be placed in this class.

Second Division. Whatever relates to physics or natural philosophy, to the statics or dynamics of air or water or light or electricity, or to the properties of matter ; whatever relates to chemistry, either organic or inorganic — books on these subjects belong to the class that relates to what is inorganic. Even the so-called organic chemistry relates to the analysis of organic bodies into their inorganic compounds.

Third Division. History, biography, and ethnology. Books relating to the lives of individuals; to the social life of the nation ; to the collisions of nations in war, as well as to the aid that one nation gives to another through commerce in times of peace ; books on ethnology relating to the modes of life of savage or civilized peoples ; on primitive manners and customs — books on these subjects belong to the third class, relating particularly to the human will, not merely the individual will but the social will, the will of the tribe or nation ; and to this third class belong also books on ethics and morals, and on forms of government and laws, and what is included under the term civics, or the duties of citizenship.

xii THE ADVENTURES OF MARCO POLO

Fourth Division. The fourth class of books includes more especially literature and works that make known the beautiful in such departments as sculpture, painting, architecture and music. Literature and art show human nature in the form of feelings, emotions, and aspirations, and they show how these feelings lead over to deeds and to clear thoughts. This department of books is perhaps more important than any other in our home reading, inasmuch as it teaches a knowledge of human nature and enables us to understand the motives that lead our fellow-men to action.

Plan for Use as Supplementary Reading

The first work of the child in the school is to learn to recognize in a printed form the words that are familiar to him by ear. These words constitute what is called the colloquial vocabulary. They are words that he has come to know from having heard them used by the members of his family and by his playmates. He uses these words himself with considerable skill, but what he knows by ear he does not yet know by sight. It will require many weeks, many months even, of constant effort at reading the printed page to bring him to the point where the sight of the written word brings up as much to his mind as the sound of the spoken word. But patience and practice will by and by make the printed word far more suggestive than the spoken word, as every scholar may testify.

In order to bring about this familiarity with the

EDITOR'S INTRODUCTION" x iii

printed word it has been found necessary to re-enforce the reading in the school by supplementary reading at home. Books of the same grade of difficulty with the reader used in school are to be provided for the pupil. They must be so interesting to him that he will read them at home, using his time before and after school, and even his holidays, for this purpose.

But this matter of familiarizing the child with the printed word is only one half of the object aimed at by the supplementary home reading. He should read that which interests him. He should read that which will increase his power in making deeper studies, and what he reads should tend to correct his habits of observation. Step by step he should be initiated into the scientific method. Too many elementary books fail to teach the scientific method because they point out in an unsystematic way only those features of the object which the untutored senses of the pupil would discover at first glance. It is not useful to tell the child to observe a piece of chalk and see that it is white, more or less friable, and that it makes a mark on a fence or a wall. Scientific observation goes immediately behind the facts which lie obvious to a superficial investigation. Above all, it directs attention to such features of the object as relate it to its environment. It directs attention to the features that have a causal influence in making the object what it is and in extending its effects to other objects. Science discovers the reciprocal action of objects one upon another.

x iv THE ADVENTURES OF MARCO POLO

After the child has learned how to observe what is essentia] in one class of objects he is in a measure fitted to observe for himself all objects that resemble this class. After he has learned how to observe the seeds of the milkweed, he is partially prepared to observe the seeds of the dandelion, the burdock, and the thistle. After he has learned how to study the history of his native country, he has acquired some ability to study the history of England and Scotland or France or Germany. In the same way the daily preparation of his reading lesson at school aids him to read a story of Dickens or Walter Scott.

The teacher of a school will know how to obtain a small sum to invest in supplementary reading. In a graded school of four hundred pupils ten books of each number are sufficient, one set of ten books to be loaned the first week to the best pupils in one of the rooms, the next week to the ten pupils next in ability. On Monday afternoon a discussion should be held over the topics of interest to the pupils who have read the book. The pupils who have not yet read the book will become interested, and await anxiously their turn for the loan of the desired volume. Another set of ten books of a higher grade may be used in the same way in a room containing more advanced pupils. The older pupils who have left school, and also the parents, should avail themselves of the opportunity to read the books brought home from school. Thus is begun that continuous education by means of the public library which is not limited to the school period, but lasts through life. W. T. Harris.

Washington, D. C, Nov. 16, 1896.

Author's Preface

Books of travel find a place in the series of Heme Reading Books, and there is no book of the sort that so well deserves it as the Book of Ser Marco Polo, the Venetian, concerning the Kingdoms and the Marvels of the East. He left Venice in the year 1271 as a lad of seventeen years, and returned to his old home twenty-six years later.

In the meantime he had traversed the provinces of Persia and the nearer East, crossed the high steppes of the Pamir region and the whole length of China, and resided at the Court of the Grand Khan of Tartary for many years as one of his trusted officers. For a part of the time he was the governor of a great Chinese city, and he was often entrusted by the Khan with important missions to distant parts of the empire and to foreign countries.

By a lucky chance, as he himself styles it, he was permitted by thfe Khan to return to Venice, where he lived the life of a merchant prince, willing to converse about his extraordinary adventures, but with no thought of writing them out for future generations to delight in.

By a chance still more fortunate for us, what- 2 xv

XVI ever he may have thought of it, he was imprisoned for about a year at Genoa in the company of a professed man of letters. Here he dictated a long account of his travels in the kingdoms of the East, and of the marvels that he had seen there.

Marco Polo dictating an account of his voyages.

His book is of the first importance to historical geographers. It is of the highest interest also as a human document. It is, moreover, one of the great story-books of the world. It not only throws a flood of light upon the state of southern Europe in his

AUTHOR'S PREFACE xvn

time, thus supplementing Froissart's account of northern Europe a century later,* but it opens the East, till then unknown.

The amazing conquests of the Mongols under Jenghiz Khan and his successors brought the East, from the steppes of Russia to the Pacific, under a single dynasty. Whoever had a tablet of authority from the Grand Khan could travel unmolested from the Oxus to the Hoang-Ho. Marco Polo lived at precisely the right time. Not long after his death the further East became closed to Europeans. The Moslems succeeded the Mongols as rulers in Central Asia, and they stopped the road to China like a wall. Xo European could pass. It was not until the sixteenth century that China was rediscovered, so to say.

Marco was a merchant — and so he tells us of trade; he was a soldier — and he tells us of the wars of the Tartars; he was a court-official — and thus we have an accurate account of the government; he was, for three years, the governor of a great city — and w T e have, from him, a picture of the Chinese people in their homes; he was the trusted ambassador of the Emperor to foreign parts, and he has described many provinces of the remote East from personal experience; others he describes from hearsay. Many names, now familiar — the Pamir, Madagascar, and so forth — appear in his book for the first time.

* The Chronicles of Froissart. Home Reading Book Series, 1900.

xvill THE ADVENTURES OF MARCO POLO

This resolute, intelligent, and sober-minded man spent the best years of his life under absolutely unique conditions. He returned to Europe, and has left an account of his adventures. The present volume is designed to open his book to American children. The story is generally told in Marco's own words (using Colonel Yule's scholarly text and notes), though changes in diction have been introduced whenever it was necessary to make his meaning clearer. When he has treated the same subject in different chapters, his paragraphs have often been brought together in this volume. Foot-notes have been added when necessary; extended comment is made where it may be useful. The modern equivalents of Marco Polo's proper names are always given, as it has seemed unadvisable to burden a child's memory with archaic terms. A few of the ancient names are given along with the modern in cases where they have some modern currency. Marco's errors as to dates, places, are corrected so. far as is possible. The illustrations have been chosen from Colonel Yule's book, from Charton's Yoyageurs, from Thompson's In the Track of the Sun, and from other sources. Little stress has been laid on the merely curious features of his story. It is, however, hoped that a long acquaintance with the narratives of early voyagers, and a lively sympathy with the spirit of the great traveler, has enabled the writer to present all the essential features of this great book.

E. A.

Chapter I Pages

Introductory — Marco Polo's journey to China — Christian missionaries in the East — The civilization of the East — The civilization of Europe in the fourteenth century — The commerce of the Mediterranean Sea — The Arabs and Moors in Spain — The civilization of Asia in the fourteenth century — The Tartars and Mongols — The conquests of Jenghiz Khan — Europe's dread of the Mongols — The price of herrings in England in 1242 — The Mongol kingdoms — Of Jenghiz Khan and how he became the first Khan of all the Tartars — How barbarians become civilized — How the conquering Arabs and Mongols were civilized by their captives 1-29

Chapter II

How Marco Polo happened to go to Peking (a. d. 1271) — How the Great Khan of Tartary received the two brothers (Marco's father and uncle) — The two brothers return to Venice — How the great king received the travelers on their return in a. d. 1275 — How the travelers finally returned to Venice — The travelers at home in Venice (a. d. 1296)— How the book of Ser Marco Polo came to be written (a. d. 1299) ' 30-44

Chapter III

The adventures of Ser Marco Polo — Introduction to his book — Description of Armenia — Mount Ararat — Noah's ark

xix

XX THE ADVENTURES OF MARCO POLO

— Of the great city of Bagdad and how it was taken by the Mongols (a. d. 1258) — Of the great country of Persia — Concerning the great city of Yezd — Of the city of Caniadi and its ruins — Also touching the Caraona robbers (the Hazaras) — Of the city of Hormuz . . 45-55

Chapter IV

The Deserts — Concerning the Old Man of the Mountain — The Assassins — Concerning the city of Balkh — Of Talikan and the mountains of salt — Of the province of Badakhshan — Of the province of Chitral — Of the province of Kashmir — History of Boodha — The Plateau of the Pamir — Travelers' tales 56-72

Chapter V

Marco Polo enters the kingdom of the Grand Khan of Tartary — Of the desert of Gobi — Concerning the Salamander — Concerning the black stones that are dug in Cathay and are burned for fuel (coal) — Of the city of Karakoram — Of those that did reign after Jenghiz Khan — Concerning the customs of the Tartars — Concerning the Tartar customs of war — Concerning the administration of justice among the Tartars — The great wall of China 73-86

Chapter VI

Of the province of Shang-tu, in China, and of the Great Khan's palace there — Coleridge's poem — Concerning the Great Khan (Kublai Khan) and his great power — Of the city of Peking (Cambaluc) — The king's great palace — Concerning the twelve barons who are set over all the affairs of the Great Khan — How the Khan's posts. and runners are sped through many lands and provinces — How the Great Khan causes trees to be planted by the highways — How the Great Khan causes stores of grain to be made to help his people withal in time of scarcity

CONTENTS xxi

PAGES

— Of the charity of the Emperor to the poor — Concerning the religion of the Chinese — Their views as to the soul — Their customs 87-105

Chapter VII

The Chinese nation — Some account of the civilization of the Chinese — Confucius the Sage — Why we do not want the Chinese in America 106-115

Chapter VIII

Great snakes and serpents that Marco Polo saw — Of the battle that was fought by the Great Khan's army against the King of Burma and Bengal — How the Khan rewarded the valor of his captains — Of the great descent that leads toward the kingdom of Burma — The unicorn — Concerning the province of Kwei-chau — Fierce dogs that fight with tigers — Concerning the great river Hoang-Ho (the Yellow River) — The canals of China — Concerning the great city of Siang-Yang-fu and how it was captured — Concerning the great river Yang-tze- Kiang 116-130

Chapter IX

The island of Japan— How the Great Khan sent an army against it— Were any of these Chinese wrecked in Peru ? —Concerning the island of Sumatra— The North Star- Concerning India— Pearl-fishers— Concerning the kingdom of Golconda in India — How diamonds are found there (as told in the Arabian Nights)— Concerning the province of Guzerat, in India, and the Brahmans — Early Chinese trade with India — Concerning the island of Zanzibar — Negroes — Madagascar — The giraffe — The Rukh ? — Siberia — The Land of Darkness — Russia — Conclusion 131-147 xxii THE ADVENTURES OF MARCO POLO

PAGES

Chapter X

What kind of a man was Marco Polo ? — His character — His discoveries — A few words about the progress of geographical discovery in Asia, Africa, and America — Ibn Batuta — The mariner's compass — Prince Henry the Navigator — Christopher Columbus — The story of his life — The discovery of America — Marco Polo's share in its discovery ......... 148-160

Index 161

LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS

PAGE

Portrait of Marco Polo Frontispiece

The name of the author in Chinese sealcharacter Vignette of title-page

Marco Polo in prison dictating an account of his voyages . xvi

The high peaks of the Himalayas 2

Outline map of Asia . 5

The father and uncle of Marco Polo leaving Constantinople

(from a manuscript of the fourteenth century) . . 7

An ancient map of the world 9

An English knight of Marco Polo's time (from an old manuscript) 13

A Tartar house on its wagon 17

The Alhambra, built by the Moors about a. d. 1253 . . 26

The Taj-Mahal at Agra, built by the Moguls about 1630 . 28 The Great Khan gives a tablet of gold (a passport) to the two

brothers (from a manuscript of the fourteenth century) . 33

Portrait of Kublai Khan (from a Chinese engraving) . . 34 The Polo family arrives in Venice after an absence of many

years (from an ancient manuscript) 39

Marco Polo's war-ship 43

War-ships of the Middle Ages 44

The zebu 52

A porcupine 61

A statue of Boodha 68

Marco Polo's sheep 69

The great wall of China 84

A Chinese pavilion 89

A part of the wall of Peking 92

A pagoda at Canton 94

xxiii xxiv THE ADVENTURES OF MARCO POLO

PAGE

The flower pagoda at Canton . . . • . . . .97

An abacus .... 112

A crocodile 118

The British coat of arms — the unicorn 123

Chinese paper money 125

Fusiyama, the sacred mountain of Japan .... 132

The Emperor of Japan (from an ancient native drawing) . 133

An ancient Japanese archer (from a native drawing) . . 134 Ancient standards and weapons of Japan . . . .135

The stars of the northern sky ....... 137

Natives of India 138

The sacred bull of Shiva — a Hindu idol 141

A fleet of Chinese war vessels 142

The rukh, " which feedeth its young upon elephants " . . 144

Portrait of Christopher Columbus 154

Behaim's map of the world, 1492 156

The ships of Columbus ... .... 158

The standard of Spain, 1492 . 159

The banner of Columbus, 1492 159

Chapter I

Introductory — Marco Polo's journey to China — Christian missionaries in the East — The civilization of the East — The civilization of Europe in the fourteenth century — The commerce of the Mediterranean Sea — The Arabs and Moors in Spain — The civilization of Asia in the fourteenth century — The Tartars and Mongols — The conquests of Jenghiz Khan — Europe's dread of the Mongols — The price of herrings in England in 1242 — The Mongol kingdoms — Of Jenghiz Khan and how he became the first Khan of all the Tartars — How barbarians become civilized — How the conquering Arabs and Mongols were civilized by their captives.

Introductory

More than six hundred years ago a lad of seventeen years old started from Venice, on the Adriatic Sea, to make a jonrney across the whole breadth of Asia to Peking, the capital of China. Asia was then a nearly unknown country, and this journey of Marco Polo's is the most famous in history. Years afterward one of his friends wrote down his adventures, and the present volume tells them over again — some of them — for young people.

Marco Polo left Venice in the year 1271 with his father, Nicolo Polo (nek'6-lo), and his uncle, MafTeo Polo (maf-a'-o), bound for Peking, which is more than five thousand miles, in a straight line,

The high peaks of the Himalayas.

from Venice. By the roads they traveled it was at least three times as far. They were more than three years on their journey.

INTRODUCTORY 3

Nearly every step of their way was full of danger. On the sea they traveled in frail sailing vessels, with no compass to guide them — for the compass Avas then unknown in Europe. By day they coasted along from headland to headland, keeping as close to the land as they dared. At night they anchored near the shore when they could find a sheltered bay, or else steered timidly by the stars. Contrary winds delayed them or drove them out of their course. Their vessels were small affairs, not able to buffet storms. The seas they traversed swarmed with pirates and enemies.

On land they made their journeys on foot, on horseback, on camels, always traveling with caravans for fear of robbers. When they came to a river they crossed it as best they could. Sometimes there were boats at the ferry. Sometimes they had to make rafts for themselves. There were few good roads in those days. The mountain passes were very difficult, and often buried in snow. They crossed vast deserts, where there was little water and no food for man or beast. Very often the people in the villages were hostile, and always there was danger from wandering bands of robbers or of soldiers.

After three years and a half of journeying they at last reached Peking. They had traversed Armenia, visited Bagdad on the Tigris, Horrauz (at the mouth of the Persian Gulf), crossed Persia and Turkestan, climbed the high passes of the Himalaya * mountains to the elevated plains of the

* Him a'la-ya ; the name means the abode of snow.

Pamir * region, plodded across the vast desert of Gobi,f and so through all China to Peking. Their home-coming, years afterward, was by a still longer route, as yon shall hear.

The adventures of an American boy who should make such a journey in 1902 would be well worth telling. Think what strange people and strange countries he would see! But on every ocean he would find stout steamships to take him safely from harbor to harbor. At every seaport he would find an American consul ready to give him any advice and assistance he needed. There would be plenty of provisions in every city put up in a handy way for transportation and use.

For a great part of his land journey he would find good roads leading to large cities where there were hotels and shops, and maybe a telegraph line, possibly a railway. He would have little trouble in hiring horses and servants. Most of the rivers would have bridges, or, at least, good ferry-boats. When he had to cross mountains or deserts, which are nearly as difficult to-day as long ago, he would at least know beforehand just what difficulties he was going to meet, because other men, who had been there before him, had written down their experiences in books for him to read, if he chose. In very many places he would find some one, usually a merchant, who could speak some words of English. Half

* Pa-mer' ; this plain is thirteen thousand feet above the sea, higher than most of the Rocky Mountains, f Go'be.

the danger, and nearly all the anxiety, of such a journey, has vanished. Even so, the experiences of an American boy would be interesting to read.

Marco Polo's Journey to China

But in Marco Polo's day all was different. Very few Europeans had penetrated these wild and almost unknown regions. The dangers and difficulties were very real. Often and often his party traveled at the risk of their lives. None of the natives could speak Italian, the language of the Polos, and so young Marco set about learning the languages of the foreigners. In time he learned to speak several languages, and he could write, he tells us, no less than four.