aio A. D. 353. 



and gentle people, who never quarrel with their neighbours, arc ex- 

 empted from the alarms of war, and are even without the ufe of arms. 

 Eleiled with a fertile foil, and a delicious and falubrious climate, they 

 pafs their happy days in perfect tranquillity amid fhady groves, which 

 are fanned by gentle breezes, and produce fleeces of wool, which, after 

 being fprinkled with water, is combed off in the fined threads, and 

 woven into fcrictim *. The Seres, fatisfied with the happinefs of their 

 own condition, are very fliy of having any intercourfe with th^^ reft of 

 mankind ; and when. foreigners have pafled a river to buy thread (feem- 

 ingly raw filk) or other goods, they confider the price offered in filence, 

 and tranfad their bufinefs without exchanging a word. And as the pro- 

 dudions of their own country are fufficient to fupply all their wants, 

 and fatisfy all their wiflies, they receive nothing in exchange from the 

 flrangers but hard money. Such is the befl account which Ammianus 

 could obtain of the country, from which, through the agency of a great 

 many hands, the Romans obtained the luxurious drefs called fericum, 

 which, though formerly confined to the nobles, was now indifcriminate- 

 ly ufed by all claffes of people, not only in clothing, but alfo in cover- 

 lets for their beds f. 



357 — Paris, firft mentioned by Julius Csefar under the name of Lu- 

 tecia or Lutetia, was now the refidence of Julian, who, with the rank 

 of Ccefar, governed the weftern provinces of the empire. It appears to 

 have been fiill confined within the fmall ifland in the river, and to have 

 been confidered rather as a fortified poll or cafl:le than as a town. 



359 — When Julian was occupied in confiirudling a chain of fortified 

 towns on the banks of the Rhine, he found that the adjacent country, 

 neglected and exhaufted by the calamities of war, was incapable of fup- 

 porting the garrifons and inhabitants of his new fettlements. He im- 

 mediately conftruded fix hundred :j: velTels with the wood growing on 



Erythraean fea, and the Sera metro])(ilis of Ptole- f Some parts of tliis defeription may feem to 



my, which the learned geographer D'Anville makes be copied fiom Ph'iiy. [_Hi/h iiat. L. vi, cc. 17, 



the fame with the modem city ot Kan-tche>i-foo, 22.] Three or four ceiitiiricii had not made tlie 



fituated in that divifion of Taiigut, whitli is inchid- fmalleft addition to the knowlcgc of the nature of 



ed in the province of Shcn-fec, in the north-weft ytr.v«») among the Romans, beyond what they pof- 



part of tlie empire. \_Iii'cl.>erclie3 fur In Scrique des itflld in the days of Virgil or Pliny. 



eincicns, in Mem. de lllleralure, V. xxxii, p. 579. j % Such is the number by Julian's own account 



This pofition of the Sftes agrees pretty well with in his Letter to the Athenians. Zofimus fays, there 



tlie iiillory, or tradition, of the origin of the Chi- were eight hundred fliips larger than lembi (' vXtiK 



iicfe, fuppofing them the defcendents of the Seres, ftfi|5»a /!,«£«»') ; and he has been often referred 



that their lirll fettlements were in the north-wefl to, not quoted, to prove that Britain exported ci'er'\) 



parts of the prefent empire of China, as it was year corn fufficient to load eight hundred large 



pointed out by a well-informed Pandit to Sir VVil- (hips ; whereas, without affirming or denying that 



liani Jones. [Sec his Difcourfe on the origin of the Britain could fpare an equal quantity every year, 



Chinrfe, in the /Ifiatic refearches, V. ii.] he only fays that fuch an exportation took place 



* Perliaps the Seres were themfelves the invent- on that occailon. Of the burthen of the velTcls 



ors of this llory, whicii ftemcd to render it impof- we can form no accurate judgment, unlefs we knew 



fiblc for any other nation to obtain a participation the ordinary fize of lembi, which, if we may trull 



in the filk harvell, jull as fimilar fables were pro- to fuch guides as Ifidore, Nonius Marcellus, and 



pagated rtfpe6ting the production of fpices. FulgeiUius, were fmall vcffcls or fjfliing boats ; and 



