268 A. D. 938. 



cal and military profeflions were thought honourable in Europe, allured 

 his fubjeds to engage in it by a law, which conferred the rank of a 

 thane on every merchant, who made three voyages over the fea with a 

 veflel and cargo of his own. The premium, thus held out to commer- 

 cial enterprife, was very judicioufly chofen, as, by rendering it the path 

 to rank as well as to wealth, it operated upon the two mod powerful 

 paffions of the human breafl. It proves, however, that there murt have 

 been but very few merchants in the kingdom, who were capable of 

 thus raifing themfelves to the order of nobility. 



c)4.y — India, from Caflimere to Cape Comori.;, was now pretty well 

 known by the Arabs, and is deicribed by Maffoudi, with its divifion into 

 feveral potent kingdoms, as follows. The kingdom of Sind, adjacent to 

 the River Sind, or Indus. Canodge, or Bourouh, near the Ganges. 

 Calhmere, a country full of towns and villages, and entirely furround- 

 ed by a ftupendous wall of impafliible mountains, the only entry of 

 which is clofed by a gate *. The dominions of the great Balhara, ( a 

 permanent title like Pharaoh or Auguftusf) or the king of kings, 

 whofe capital is called Mankir, or the great Houfa. The Arabians were 

 much favoured by the Balhara, (doubtlefs for the advantage of their 

 commerce) and were permitted to build mofques for the performance 

 of their religious worlhip. Moultan, between Canodge and the Ara- 

 bian or Saracen dominions in Perlia. Manfura, alfo near the Indus. 

 To the fouthward of all thefe is the kingdom of Zanedge, or Zindge,. 

 governed by the Mehrage, or great raja ; and beyond it the kingdom 

 ofComar (or Comorin). 



This delcription gives reafon to believe, that the commerce from 

 the Weft ftill continued to be chiefly upon the weftern fide of India ; 

 and it is valuable, as giving a view of the progrefs of geography, a 

 fcience fo infeparably conneded with commerce. 



From India, our author proceeds to China. Canton had now recover- 

 ed from the calamities, which, he obferves, it had fuffered vmder Bai- 

 chu, and it was again reforted to by many Arabian merchants from 

 Baflbra, Siraf, and Oman, and alfo by veflels from India, the iflands of 

 Zanedge, Senef, and other places. He fays, that traders went to China 

 not only by fea, but alio by land, through Korafan, Thibet, and Ileftan, 

 which laft is a country mentioned perhaps by no other author, and fup^ 

 poled to be inhabited by a colony from Perfia. 



He next gives an account of Africa, which, though brief, is in fome 



* Tlil'J finguhir country, the paradifc of India, p. \ci, and the map. .See alfo tlie map of the 



IS not fo compli-tcly locked up as Matl'oudi was tliijd fiitlon tonxdtcd, wliicti exhibits levcn lo.ida 



iiiadc to believe ; for in 1783, Mr. Fordcr enter- thioii^h tlic mountainous boundary of Caflimcte. 

 c<l Callinierc at the upper part of it, .nnd following + 'I'he name and fupremacy of the Balhara were 



llie courfe of a navigable river, the txiftencc of noticed by Solinian, ihc Arabian merchant, about 



which Maffoudi was not appn'/ed of, went out at a century before Maflbudi. 

 til* lower part of it. Sec Major Rcr.ucll's Memoir, 



