зоб SUPPLEMENTARY NOTES. 



THE MURUI-USSU, THE TIBETAN SOURCE OF THE 

 YANGTSE-KIANG. 



P. 221. 



The Chinese seem generally to regard the River Min, 

 which flows through the city of Chingtu-fu, and joins the 

 Yangtse at that of Siu-chau-fu, as the true river. But 

 there is no question that the river which comes from Tibet 

 is much the longer, and probably little question that it is 

 also much the larger. The Dutchman, Samuel Van de 

 Putte, who travelled from Lhassa to Peking in the earlier 

 part of last century, wrote to the Italian priests at Lhassa, 

 that when crossing the river upon that journey he started 

 in a boat of hide one morning, passed the night up%i-n a 

 small island in the river, and did not achieve the com- 

 pletion of the passage till the middle of the following day.' 



The ' Tangutan ' name given as Di-cJm in the text 

 should probably be Bi-cJiu. Bi-tsiu, or Bhri-tsiu, ' the 

 River of the Yak-cow,' is the Tibetan name, and this is 

 almost certainly the origin of the name Brins.^ that Marco 

 Polo gives to the river. The Mongol name Mnrui-iissn 

 means, not ' River-water,' as the author says, but ' Winding 

 River.' The Chinese name down to Siu-chau is Kinsha- 

 Kiang or Gold-sand River. — [Y.] 



' Journ. Asiatique, 2nd series, xiv. 191-192. A curious notice 

 of this Dutch traveller has just appeared in Mr. Markham's work 

 upon Tibet. 



