Feb., 191 2. Jade. 59 



The Su-sh£n seem to have been a warlike nation at that time and 

 fought two wars with the Japanese in 658 and 660 a. d., after they 

 had already settled, in 544 a. d., on the island of Sado, west from Hondo 

 where they subsisted on fish-catching. Their relations with Japan 

 are described in the Japanese annals, Nihongi (see Aston, Nihongi, 

 Vol. II, pp. 58, 257, 260, 263, 264). I here allude to them because they 

 contain a passage from which it may be inferred that the Su-shen did 

 not possess iron at that time. In 660 a. d. an expedition of two hun- 

 dred Japanese ships under Abe no Omi with some Ainu on board was 

 despatched against twenty ships of the Su-shen. The Japanese com- 

 mander sent messengers to summon them, but they refused to come. 

 Then he heaped up on the beach colored silk stuffs, weapons, iron, etc., 

 to excite their cupidity. Two old men sent forth by the Su-sMn took 

 these articles away. In the ensuing battle they were defeated, 

 and when they saw during the fight that they could not resist the power 

 of their enemies, put to death their wives and children. 



"In the country of the I-lou, 1 they have bows four feet long. For 

 arrows they use the wood of the tree hu, 2 and make them one foot eight 

 inches long. Of a dark (or green) stone they make the arrow-heads, 

 which are all poisoned and cause the death of a man when they hit 

 him.'' 3 



In a small treatise on mineralogy Yiin lin shih p'u, written by Tu 

 Wan in 1133 a. d., 4 is the following note under the heading "Stones 

 for arrow-heads:" "In the district Sin-kan in the prefecture of Lin- 

 kiang in Kiang-si Province, there is a small place called Pai yang kio 

 ("Horn of the white sheep") ten li from the district -town. There 

 is a mountain called Ling-yiin ling, on the summit of which a plain 

 stretches level like a palm. A military out-post was stationed there 

 in ancient times, and everywhere in the land occupied by it, ancient 

 arrows with sharp -pointed blades and knives have been preserved; 

 examining the blades of these knives, it is still possible to cut with 

 them. The material of these arrows and knives consists of stone; 



1 A Tungusic or Korean tribe located between the Fu-yii and the Wo-tsu, peoples 

 inhabiting Korea. They are described as resembling in their appearance the Fu-yu, 

 but speaking a different language; they were agriculturists without cattle and sheep, 

 and pig-cultivators; they were not acquainted with iron; they wore armor of skin 

 covered with bone. Compare Plath, Die Volker der Mandschurei, pp. 75-77 

 (Gottingen, 1830). 



2 Bretschneider, Botanicon Sinicum, Part II, No. 543: an unidentified tree. 

 Legge's translation "arrow-thorn" is based on the error that Confucius on one 

 occasion referred to the famous hu arrows; his reference is made only to the shafts 

 being of this wood. Many Chinese editors, from not understanding this word, 

 have changed it in the few passages where it occurs into k'u "decayed tree;" but 

 it is not plausible that rotten wood was ever used for arrow-shafts. 



3 Hou Han shu, Tung I chuan, quoted in P'ei w$n yiin fu, Ch. 100 A, p. 18. 



4 Reprinted in the collection Chih pu tsu chai ts'ung shu, Section 28; Ch. 2, p. 8 b. 



