196 ON THE ANCIENT GEOGRAPHY 



gar is situated very near to the head of the Jaxartes ; the Casia 

 Regio is immensely distant from any part of that river. Now 

 I submit to the learned, whether the imperfect resemblance of 

 a single name can be sufficient to overthrow, not only the 

 whole general description of Asia, but the particular descrip- 

 tion of the very country to which it is applied. It happens 

 very accidentally, however, that we stand here on much strong- 

 er ground ; for it is surprising, that geographers should have 

 overlooked that Ptolemy has in another place given precisely 

 both the name and situation of Cashgar. It is in a people of 

 Scythia intra Imaum, the Cachagce Scythae, whose situation is 

 not precisely laid down, but it is mentioned, that they lie near 

 to the Jaxartse, the nation who inhabit the banks of the Jaxar- 

 tes. I conceive, therefore, that every argument founded upon 

 this name must fall to the ground - t after which there will net 

 remain a single prop on which this system can rest. 



Mr Pinkerton's hypothesis, which places Serica in Little 

 Bucharia, seems liable to all the objections already urged 

 against that of D'Anville, to a somewhat greater extent, and 

 with the addition, that he disregards entirely the dimensions 

 assigned by Ptolemy to those regions. 



M. Gosselin has formed a very different system. He con- 

 ceives the north of India, with the contiguous portion of Thi- 

 bet, to be the real Serica of the ancients. To reconcile this 

 with the statements of Ptolemy, he supposes this geographer 

 to have committed an error, when, in extending the caravan 

 route beyond the Purgos Lithinos, he gave it an eastern direc- 

 tion. It ought, he conceives, to have been southern, which, 

 instead of carrying the travellers towards China, would have 

 brought them directly to the north of India. Now, I am fully 

 aware, that the ancients erred often very materially in what the 

 French call orienting their lines ; that is, in giving them a pro- 

 per 



