Southern Provinces of China, from Cochinchina. It is mentioned sev 
206 : BOTANICON SINICUM. 
explains jen by hemp-seed, as in the Lh ya [104] the 
character fi fen is explained. In another place in t 
Chou li [1, 365] fen has the meaning of “extrait de chanyre,” 
as Brot translates, used as manure. 
In the Li ki the fen is noticed as an article of food, Th : 
Chinese commentators explain it by Je ik F hemp-seed 
I cannot understand why Lace [l.c., I, 451] translates fen 
by spinach. He confounded it perhaps with “ff, a | 
Amarantus Blitum. . 
Leacr defines the character 7 pu, frequently met with i in 
the Classics, by “cloth,” without saying of what material 
Bior by-* toile ordinaire.” See the abov e-quoted passage from 
the Chou Ii [f, 163], from which it would appear that pw 
in ancient times denoted only hempen fabrics. Besides this, 
the Shuo wen explains pu by ¥ or (cloth) woven of 
hemp. Nowadays pu is a general term for cotton, ae 
and other textile fabrics,¥8 
P., XXIL, 11, calls the hemp plant Je fi te ma, the 
great hemp, a name given to it in the Shen nung pen ts‘ a0. 
The Rh ya i [12th century] terms it j& Jit han ma, 
Chinese hemp, in opposition to the #3 ffi hw ma, or foreig 
hemp, the Sesanum orientale, a may introduced from 
Western Asia in the 2nd century B.C. A good drawing Le 
Cannabis sativa, under ta ma is given in Ch, 1, 3. But : 
Peking the popular name of the hemp plant, which is & ; 
found there in a wild state, is dJy ji, sao ma small hemp, 
whilst the name of ta ma is incorrectly applied by the pie 
a8 Cotton, nowadays the most important among the textile materials 
produced in China, was unknown to the ancient Chinese. It was only about 
A.D, 1000 that this usefnl plant became fully introduced into the 
centuries earlier in the Chinese annals as a product of foreign co 
(Southern Asia and Central Asia), See the late W. F, MAYERS’ interesting 
. paper on the subject in Notes and Queries on China and Japan, 1888, P- n 
