BOTANICON SINICUM. 69 
It is clear that the greatest geographical errors can be com- 
mitted by the reader unacquainted with the time at which the 
respective Chinese author, referring to names of countries and 
places, wrote. In the year 1842 E. Biot published a usetul book, 
Dictionnaire des noms anciens et modernes des Villes etc. dans 
?Empire Chinois. It is translated from the f& Bi 32 Kuang yit 
ki, a small geographical account of the Empire, and arranged in 
alphabetical order; but it proves to be insufficient for determining 
the geographical names, occurring in the Pen ts‘ao. As far as 
‘only the names of Chinese cities at different times are concerned 
I would recommend for reference a very complete Chinese Geo- 
graphical Dictionary, the FE (t th BEG BHR OO Litt 
li chi yiin pien kin shi, in 20 books, published in 1837. The names 
of Chinese cities, ancient and modern, are arranged in it accord- 
ing to a Chinese system under about 1600 characters. It is not 
quite easy to find a name in this book, but by arranging these 
1600 characters according to the radicals (as I have done for my 
own use) it can be made more practicable for consultation. But 
in this work we find only ancient and modern names of Chinese 
departments and districts, whilst ancient Chinese writers on 
botany in giving the stations of plants frequently mention pro- 
vinces, the names of which have also been repeatedly changed in 
course of time. This want is in some degree met by the new 
edition of the Li tai ti li chi, etc., published in 1872, by Ze $5 Ht 
Li Hung chang, the well-known Viceroy of Chibli. In this 
edition a series of historical maps referring to the political divisions 
of China under the different dynasties has been added. More 
detailed information on the subject may be found in an elaborate 
compilation of historical maps of China, which came to light in 
1879 (Tung hu hien, Hu pei) with the title FE ¢& Bl Hh 75 Hi Be 
BE MB] Li tai yit ti yen ko hien yao tu. It comprises 68 maps 
wn up according to the geographical sections in the Dynastic 
Histories. 
In the Pen ts‘ao occur also frequently names of ancient 
countries not included in China. These must be sought for in the 
Histories of the various Chinese Dynasties, which generally con- 
tain at the end notices of foreign countries. Os. 
