184 Bibliographical Notice. [No. 2. 



dhist Khi-nie, who was sent to the Western countries at the head 

 of three hundred Qramanas and returned in 976. From his notes 

 Fang-tshing-ta, under the same dynasty, composed an account of the 

 travels of Khi-nie. 



" Of the six works just mentioned that left behind by Hiouen 

 Thsang himself is unquestionably of the greatest value, as well for 

 the authenticity of its information as for the completeness of its 

 details. Abel Eemusat and Klaproth acknowledge the great im- 

 portance of this work, and the former announced his intention in 

 a note, p. 77, of his " Melanges posthumes," to give the details of the 

 travels of Hiouen Thsang in a collection which was to be published 

 of travels of the Samanians in India. Paris possessed at that time but 

 extracts, though very numerous ones from Hiouen Thsang' s works in 

 the Pin-i-tien, or Accounts of foreign countries and people, and from 

 these Landresse compiled and communicated in an appendix to 

 Pokoueki, p. 377, a list of the countries mentioned by Hiouen Thsang 

 with detailed notices of them and of their respective distances from 

 each other. He further made an attempt to arrange them in the 

 order in which they were visited, an attempt which could not be 

 successful, because as already mentioned, the distinction between 

 the countries which Hiouen Thsang had visited himself, and those 

 which he described upon the reports of others, had escaped Lan- 

 dresse. The sources of the latter's compilation must not however 

 be overlooked, since they afford strong testimony in favour of Hiouen 

 Thsang' s credibility. 



" With all respect for Abel Remusat's acquirements, it may be 

 doubted whether he was qualified to deal with the obstacles which 

 a translator of the travels of Hiouen Thsang must encounter in 

 his obscure style and in the frequent occurrence of Indian words 

 — especially where he was unprovided with a sure method for 

 the restoration of these words. Stanislas Julien as we have seen, 

 discontinued his translation after having been in possession for 

 sixteen years of a complete copy of the original work and latterly 

 of two more copies received from China, and did not resume his 

 task till he had hit on such a method. His introduction explains 

 the process by which he made this discovery. It contains besides 

 a review of Hiouen Thsang's travels p. xl. a defence of their au- 



