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The last view is in substance, I find, suggested by Cicogna .

"Again, he gives no description of the striking buildings of Baudas, as he terms it, but this is nothing to the inaccuracy of his supposed onward journey. To quote the text, 'A very great river flows through the city, ... and merchants descend some eighteen days from Baudas, and then come to a certain city called Kisi, where they enter the Sea of India.' Surely Marco, had he travelled down the Persian Gulf, would never have given this description of the route, which is so untrue as to point to the conclusion that it was vague information given by some merchant whom he met in the course of his wanderings.

Page 19.

The modern name is Keis, an island lying off Linga.

Vol. i. p. 110 .

It is stated by Neumann that this most estimable traveller once intended to have devoted a special work to the elucidation of Marco's chapters on the Oxus Provinces, and it is much to be regretted that this intention was never fulfilled. Pamir has been explored more extensively and deliberately, whilst this book was going through the press, by Colonel Gordon, and other officers, detached from Sir Douglas Forsyth's Mission.

Half a year earlier, if we suppose the three years and a half to count from Venice rather than Acre. But at that season K?bl?i would not have been at Kai-ping fu .

That this was Marco's first mission is positively stated in the Ramusian edition; and though this may be only an editor's gloss it seems well-founded. The French texts say only that the Great Kaan, "l'envoia en un message en une terre ou bien avoit vj. mois de chemin." The traveller's actual Itinerary affords to Vochan , on the frontier of Burma, 147 days' journey, which with halts might well be reckoned six months in round estimate. And we are enabled by various circumstances to fix the date of the Yun-nan journey between 1277 and 1280. The former limit is determined by Polo's account of the battle with the Burmese, near Vochan, which took place according to the Chinese Annals in 1277. The latter is fixed by his mention of K?bl?i's son, Mangalai, as governing at Kenjanfu , a prince who died in 1280.

Persian history seems to fix the arrival of the lady Kok?chin in the North of Persia to the winter of 1293-1294. The voyage to Sumatra occupied three months ; they were five months detained there ; and the remainder of the voyage extended to eighteen more ,--twenty-six months in all.

Died 12th March, 1291.

The travellers may have stopped some time at Constantinople on their way, or even may have visited the northern shores of the Black Sea; otherwise, indeed, how did Marco acquire his knowledge of that Sea and of events in Kipchak ? If 1296 was the date of return, moreover, the six-and-twenty years assigned in the preamble as the period of Marco's absence would be nearer accuracy. For he left Venice in the spring or summer of 1271.

Marco Barbaro, in his account of the Polo family, tells what seems to be the same tradition in a different and more mythical version:--

The Will of the Elder Marco, to which we have several times referred, is dated at Rialto 5th August, 1280.

The testator describes himself as formerly of Constantinople, but now dwelling in the confine of S. Severo.

The proper tithe to be paid. All his clothes and furniture to be sold, and from the proceeds his funeral to be defrayed, and the balance to purchase masses for his soul at the discretion of his trustees.

To his son Nicolo he bequeaths a silver-wrought girdle of vermilion silk, two silver spoons, a silver cup without cover , his desk, two pairs of sheets, a velvet quilt, a counterpane, a feather-bed--all on the same conditions as above, and to remain with the trustees till his son returns to Venice.

Meanwhile the trustees are to invest the money at his son's risk and benefit, but only here in Venice .

From the proceeds to come in from his partnership with his brothers Nicolo and Maffeo, he bequeaths 200 lire to his daughter Maroca.

From same source 100 lire to his natural son Antony.

Gives freedom to all his slaves and handmaidens.

Leaves his house in Soldachia to the Minor Friars of that place, reserving life-occupancy to his son Nicolo and daughter Maroca.

The rest of his goods to his son Nicolo.

The terms in which the younger Maffeo mentions these half-brothers in his Will seem to indicate that they were still young.

There is still to be seen on the north side of the Court an arched doorway in Italo-Byzantine style, richly sculptured with scrolls, disks, and symbolical animals, and on the wall above the doorway is a cross similarly ornamented. The style and the decorations are those which were usual in Venice in the 13th century. The arch opens into a passage from which a similar doorway at the other end, also retaining some scantier relics of decoration, leads to the entrance of the Malibran Theatre. Over the archway in the Corte Sabbionera the building rises into a kind of tower. This, as well as the sculptured arches and cross, Signor Casoni, who gave a good deal of consideration to the subject, believed to be a relic of the old Polo House. But the tower is now entirely modernized.

Other remains of Byzantine sculpture, which are probably fragments of the decoration of the same mansion, are found imbedded in the walls of neighbouring houses. It is impossible to determine anything further as to the form or extent of the house of the time of the Polos, but some slight idea of its appearance about the year 1500 may be seen in the extract which we give from the famous pictorial map of Venice attributed erroneously to Albert D?rer. The state of the buildings in the last century is shown in an extract from the fine Map of Ughi; and their present condition in one reduced from the Modern Official Map of the Municipality.

in the year 1827 the Abate Zenier caused to be put up with this inscription:--

We know nothing more of Polo till we find him appearing a year or two later in rapid succession as the Captain of a Venetian Galley, as a prisoner of war, and as an author.

This document would perhaps have thrown light on the matter, but unfortunately recent search by several parties has failed to trace it.

"Essendo conveniente usar qualche ricognizione a quelli della maestranza dell'Arsenal nostro, che prontamente sono concorsi all' incendio occorso ultimamente a S. Zuane Grizostomo nelli stabeli detti di CA' MILION dove per la relazion fatta nell collegio nostro dalli patroni di esso Arsenal hanno nell'estinguere il foco prestato ogni buon servitio...."--

One Illustration of this volume, p. 1, shows the archway in the Corte Sabbionera, and also the decorations of the soffit.

Comm. Barozzi writes: "Among us, contracts between husband and wife are and were very common, and recognized by law. The wife sells to the husband property not included in dowry, or that she may have inherited, just as any third person might."

See Appendix C, No. 16.

Moreover experiments made by the Venetians in 1316 had shown that four rowers to a bench could be employed still more advantageously. And where the galleys could be used on inland waters, and could be made more bulky, Sanudo would even recommend five to a bench, or have gangs of rowers on two decks with either three or four men to the bench on each deck.

It may be doubted whether the four-banked and five-banked galleys, of which Marino Sanudo speaks, really then came into practical use. A great five-banked galley on this system, built in 1529 in the Venice Arsenal by Vettor Fausto, was the subject of so much talk and excitement, that it must evidently have been something quite new and unheard of. So late as 1567 indeed the King of Spain built at Barcelona a galley of thirty-six benches to the side, and seven men to the bench, with a separate oar to each in the old fashion. But it proved a failure.

It seems to have been a very usual piece of tactics, in attacking as well as in awaiting attack, to connect a large number of galleys by hawsers, and sometimes also to link the oars together, so as to render it difficult for the enemy to break the line or run aboard. We find this practised by the Genoese on the defensive at the battle of Ayas , and it is constantly resorted to by the Catalans in the battles described by Ramon de Muntaner.

We see that war cost a good deal in money even then.

Besides the ship's own complement Sanudo gives an estimate for the general staff of a fleet of 60 galleys. This consists of a captain-general, two admirals, and the following:--

So Joinville, in a glorious passage, describes the galley of his kinsman, the Count of Jaffa, at the landing of St. Lewis in Egypt:--

The galleys, which were very low in the water, could not keep the sea in rough weather, and in winter they never willingly kept the sea at night, however fair the weather might be. Yet Sanudo mentions that he had been with armed galleys to Sluys in Flanders.

I will mention two more particulars before concluding this digression. When captured galleys were towed into port it was stern foremost, and with their colours dragging on the surface of the sea. And the custom of saluting at sunset was in vogue on board the galleys of the 13th century.

We shall now sketch the circumstances that led to the appearance of our Traveller in the command of a war-galley.

It seems the more desirable to elucidate this, because writers on mediaeval subjects so accomplished as Buchon and Capmany have entirely misconceived the matter, assuming that all the men on one bench pulled at one oar.

Spinello's works, according to Vasari, extended from 1334 till late in the century. A religious picture of his at Siena is assigned to 1385, so the frescoes may probably be of about the same period. Of the battle represented I can find no record.

In after days the artillery occupied the same position, at the bow of the galley.

See pp. 270, 288, 324, and especially 346.

The Catalan Admiral Roger de Loria, advancing at daybreak to attack the Proven?al Fleet of Charles of Naples in the harbour of Malta, "did a thing which should be reckoned to him rather as an act of madness," says Muntaner, "than of reason. He said, 'God forbid that I should attack them, all asleep as they are! Let the trumpets and nacaires sound to awaken them, and I will tarry till they be ready for action. No man shall have it to say, if I beat them, that it was by catching them asleep.'" It is what Nelson might have done!

The Turkish admiral Sidi 'Ali, about to engage a Portuguese squadron in the Straits of Hormuz, in 1553, describes the Franks as "dressing their vessels with flags and coming on."

Page 50.

A dispute which broke out at Acre in 1255 came to a head in a war which lasted for years, and was felt all over Syria. It began in a quarrel about a very old church called St. Sabba's, which stood on the common boundary of the Venetian and Genoese estates in Acre, and this flame was blown by other unlucky occurrences. Acre suffered grievously. Venice at this time generally kept the upper hand, beating Genoa by land and sea, and driving her from Acre altogether.? Four ancient porphyry figures from St. Sabba's were sent in triumph to Venice, and with their strange devices still stand at the exterior corner of St. Mark's, towards the Ducal Palace.

But no number of defeats could extinguish the spirit of Genoa, and the tables were turned when in her wrath she allied herself with Michael Palaeologus to upset the feeble and tottering Latin Dynasty, and with it the preponderance of Venice on the Bosphorus. The new emperor handed over to his allies the castle of their foes, which they tore down with jubilations, and now it was their turn to send its stones as trophies to Genoa. Mutual hate waxed fiercer than ever; no merchant fleet of either state could go to sea without convoy, and wherever their ships met they fought. It was something like the state of things between Spain and England in the days of Drake.

The energy and capacity of the Genoese seemed to rise with their success, and both in seamanship and in splendour they began almost to surpass their old rivals. The fall of Acre , and the total expulsion of the Franks from Syria, in great measure barred the southern routes of Indian trade, whilst the predominance of Genoa in the Euxine more or less obstructed the free access of her rival to the northern routes by Trebizond and Tana.

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