capital of his native country, in 1319, after an absence of twenty-four years. It was an ill-starred appointment. Af- Here he professes still to have been reter a progress in state through Central In-ceived as the ambassador of Sultan Madia to Guzerat, where they embarked for homed, and to have travelled over the Malabar, the party awaited at Calicut the whole length of the empire from Canton departure of the China junks, which then to Peking. That a part at least of his annually visited the ports of Southern travels in China is genuine there can be India. The Zamorin, or Prince of Calicut, no doubt, but it is highly questionable had prepared accommodation for the mis- whether he ever was at Peking. His desion on board one of the large junks; but scription of the palace arrangements there Ibn Batuta, having ladies with him, went appears to be cooked up from his recollecto the shipping agent to obtain a private tions of the Court of Delhi, and circumcabin for them, having, it would seem, in stances which he asserts to have taken his usual happy-go-lucky style, deferred place during his stay are totally inconsistthis to the last moment. The agent told ent with Chinese history. him that the cabins were all taken up by From China he returned via Sumatra to the Chinese merchants (who had appar- Malabar and Arabia, and thence, by deently return-tickets); there was one, how-vious wanderings, at last reached Fez, the ever, without fittings, belonging to his own son-in-law, which Ibn Batuta could have. So one Thursday afternoon, in the Here he professes to have rejoiced in early summer of 1313, our traveller's bag- the presence of his own Sultan, whom he gage and slaves, male and female, were declares to surpass all the mighty monput on board, while he stayed on shore to archs of the East: in dignity, him of Irák; attend the Friday service before embark- in person, him of India; in manner, him ing. His colleagues with the presents for of Yemen; in courage, the king of the China were already on board. Next morn- Turks; in long-suffering, the Cæsar of ing early his head-servant came to com- Constantinople; in devotion, him of Turkplain that the cabin was a wretched hole, estan; and in knowledge, him of Sumatra ! and would never do. Appeal was made a list of comparisons so oddly selected to the captain, a person who was, as Ibn as almost to suggest irony. After all Batuta tells us, "a great Amir," or, as our that he has seen, he comes to the concluvulgar term would aptly translate it, "asion that there is no country like his own very great swell." The captain said he west. "It is," says he, "the best of all could do nothing (so captains always say); countries. You have fruit in plenty; but if they liked to go in a smaller vessel, good meat and drink are easily come by; called a kakam, it was at their service. and, in fact, its blessings are so many that Our traveller consented, and had his bag- the poet has hit the mark when he sings :— gage and his womankind transferred to the kakam. The sea then began to rise (for the south-west monsoon had set in), and he could not embark. When he got up on Saturday morning he found both the junk and the kakam had weighed and left the harbour, and a gale of wind blowing. The junk was wrecked; the bodies of Ibn Batuta's colleagues in the embassy were cast up on the beach; and the kakam's people, seeing what had befallen their consort, made sail, carrying off with them our traveller's slaves, his girls, and gear, and leaving him there on the beach of His travels, however, were not yet over; Calicut gazing after them, with naught he traversed Andalusia and Granada, and remaining to him but his prayer-carpet, penetrated to the heart of Negroland, beten pieces of gold, and an emancipated fore he finally settled. He died in 1377slave; which last absconded forthwith! 78, aged seventy-three. We cannot follow Ibn Batuta during Ibn Batuta has drawn his own characthe next few years' adventures, which car- ter in an accumulation of slight touches ried him about the ports of Malabar, the through the long history of his wanderMaldine Islands, Ceylon, and Madura; ings; but to do justice to the result in a but eventually he found his way to Ben- few lines would require the hand of gal, which he calls "an inferno full of good Chaucer, and something perhaps of his freethings," and thence to Sumatra and China. dom of speech. Not wanting in acute. VOL. XXII. 1034 LIVING AGE. Of all the four quarters of heaven the best 'Tis the west that first shows you the moon's The dirhems of the west are but little ones, 'tis true; but then you get more for them!" (Just as in the good old days of another dear Land of the West; where, if the pound was but twentypence, the pint anyhow was two quarts!) We shall now quote one or two passages as examples of his narrative. The following extract shows how the Chinese so long ago, though without the aid of photography, had anticipated a modern expedient of the detective police : 6 ness nor in humane feeling; full of vital most highly-respected doctors of the law among energy and enjoyment of life; infinite in the Mussulmans of those parts. They asked curiosity; daring, restless, impulsive, sen- leave to introduce this personage to me, and sual, inconsiderate, and extravagant; su- accordingly he was announced as Our master, perstitious in his regard for the saints of Kiwámuddin the Ceutan.'* I was surprised his religion, and plying devout observan- at the appellation; and when he had entered, ces, especially when in difficulties; doubt had began to converse together, it struck me and after exchanging the usual salutations we less an agreeable companion, for we al- that I knew the man. ways find him welcomed at first, but cling-him earnestly, and he said, You look as if you So I began to look at ing like one of the Ceylon leeches which knew me.' From what country are you?' I he describes, when he found a full-blooded asked. From Ceuta.' And I am from subject, and hence too apt to disgust his Tangier!' So he recommenced his salutations, patrons, and to turn to intrigues against moved to tears at the meeting, till I caught the them. Such are the impressions which infection myself. I then asked him, Have you one reader at least has gathered from the ever been in India? ' 'Yes,' he said, ' I have surface of his narrative. been at Delhi, the capital.' When he said that, I recollected about him, and said, 'Surely you areAl-Bushri?' 'Yes, I am.' He had come to Delhi with his maternal uncle, Abu'l Kasim of Murcia.... I had told the Sultan of India about him, and he had given him 3,000 dinars, and desired to keep him at Delhi. He refused to stay, however, for he was bent on going to "As regards painting, no nation, whether China, and in that country he had acquired of Christians or others, can come up to the much reputation and a great deal of wealth. Chinese; their talent for this art is something He told me that he had some fifty male slaves quite extraordinary. I may mention, among and as many female; and, indeed, he gave me astonishing illustrations of this talent of theirs two of each, with many other presents. Some which I have witnessed myself, viz., that when-years later, I met this man's brother in Negroever I have happened to visit one of their cities, land. What an enormous distance lay between and to return to it after a while, I have always those two!" found my own likeness and those of my companions, painted on the walls, or exhibited in the This meeting, in the heart of China, of bazars. On one occasion that I visited the the two Moors from the adjoining towns emperor's own city, in going to the imperial of Tangier and Ceuta, has a parallel in palace with my comrades, I passed through the that famous, but we fear mythical, story bazar of the painters; we were all dressed after of the capture of the Grand Vizier on the the fashion of Irák. In the evening, on leaving Black Sea by Marshal Keith, then in the the palace, I passed again through the same Russian service. The venerable Turk's bazar, and there I saw my own portrait and the look of recognition drew from the marportraits of my companions, painted on sheets shal the same question that Al-Bushri adof paper, and exposed on the walls. We all dressed to Ibn Batuta, and the answer stopped to examine the likenesses, and every-came forth in broad Fifeshire dialectbody found that of his neighbour to be excel-Eh man! ay; I mind you weel, for my lent! . . . Indeed, the thing is carried so far father was the bellman of Kirkaldy!” that, if by chance a foreigner commits any action that obliges him to fly from China, they Batuta seems to lack words to describe Like all the travellers of that age, Ibn send his portrait into the outlying provinces to assist the search for him, and whenever the the magnitude and glories of the city of original of the portrait is discovered, they ap-himself as received with great honour Kinsai, or Hangcheufu. He represents prehend the man." The next extract illustrates strikingly the manner in which the freemasonry of common religion facilitated the wanderings of the Mahomedans over the world. The traveller is staying at the city of Kanjanfu, apparently Kianchanfu in Kiangsi, where as usual he is hospitably received by his co-religionists: "One day, when I was in the house of Zahiruddin al Kurlani (the sheikh of the Mahomedans in this city), there arrived a great boat, which was stated to be that of one of the by the officials of the Mongol government. there, both by the Mahomedan colony and The following, last of our extracts, refers to this: "The Amir Kustai (the Viceroy of the Province) is the greatest lord in China. He offered us hospitality at his palace, and gave us an entertainment at which the dignitaries of the city were present. He had got Mahomedan cooks to kill the cattle and cook the dishes for us, and this lord, great as he was, carved the i.e. of Ceuta, opposite Gibraltar. meats and helped us with his own hands! We were his guests for three days, and one day he sent his son to escort us on a trip on the canal. We got into one barge, whilst the young lord got into another, taking singers and musicians along with him. The singers sang songs in Chinese, Arabic, and Persian. The lord's son was a great admirer of the Persian songs, and there was one of them sung by them which he caused to be repeated several times, so that I got it by heart from their singing. This song had a pretty cadence in it, and thus it went: 'My heart given up to emotions Was o'erwhelmed in waves like the ocean's, My troubles were gone from me! '* Crowds of people in boats were on the canal. The sails were all of bright colours, the people carried parasols of silk, and the boats themselves were gorgeously painted. They skirmished with one another, and pelted each other with lemons and oranges. In the afternoon we went back to pass the evening at the Amir's palace, where the musicians came again and sang very fine songs. had an attack of palpitation. . . . They gave With this marvellous story of prestidigitation, and the learned Kazi's comment on it, we must close these extracts. The subject is large - China indeed in any point of view is a large subject — and it has been difficult to compress without running to dry bones. But we trust even history of communication with the Chithis fragmentary view of one phase of the nese may have preserved some small flavour of that interest which has always attached to that remote and peculiar nation. The ancients felt this in the dim legends which crossed the length of Asia about the Seres dwelling in secluded peace and plenty on the shores of the "That same night a juggler, who was one of Eastern Ocean; mediæval Christendom the Great Kaan's slaves, made his appearance, was strangely fascinated by the stories and the Amir said to him, Come and show us which these travellers, of whom we have some of your wonders!' Upon this he took a been speaking, brought home-of the wooden ball with several holes in it, through vast population, riches, and orderly civilwhich long thongs were passed, and laying ization of this newly-revealed land of hold of one of these, slung it into the air. It Cathay; the rediscovery of the country as went so high that we lost sight of it altogether. China by the Portuguese kindled a fresh (It was the hottest season of the year, and we were outside in the middle of the palace court.) Curiosity which three centuries of parThere now remained only a short end of a thong tial knowledge scarcely abated. Familiin the conjurer's hand, and he desired one of arity of late years has in some degree the boys who assisted him to lay hold of it and wrought its proverbial result; but among mount. He did so, climbing by the thong, and all the clouds of change that are thickenwe lost sight of him. The conjuror then called ing on the world's horizon, some are sureto him three times, but, getting no answer, he ly big with great events for this hive of snatched up a knife, as if in a great rage, laid four hundred millions, for whom also hold of the thong, and disappeared in his turn! Christ died. The empire, which has a By-and-by he threw down one of the boy's history as old as the oldest of Chaldæa, hands, then a foot, then the other hand and the seems to be breaking up. It has often other foot, then the trunk, and, last of all, the broken up before, and been again united; head! Lastly, he came down himself, puffing it has often been conquered, and has either and blowing, and with his clothes all bloody, kissed the ground before the Amir, and said thrown off the yoke or absorbed its consomething to him in Chinese. The Amir gave querors. But they derived what civilizasome order in reply, and our friend then took tion they had from the land which they the lad's limbs, laid them together in their invaded. The internal combustions that places, and gave a kick, when presto! there are now heaving the soil come in contact was the boy who got up and stood before us! with a new and alien element of western All this astonished me beyond measure, and I origin. Who can guess what shall come of that chemistry? We may note that the "pretty cadence" of the lines which Ibn Batuta gives in the Persian, is precisely that of — "We won't go home till morning, " Omitting the marvellous disappearance in the air, this trick is still a favourite in China. See Doolittle's "Social Life of the Chinese," London ed., 1868, p. 543. From The Pall Mall Gazette. KASAN, the town on the River Volga where the present lines are written, offers great advantages for the study of transportation to Siberia. It is the gathering place towards which convicts from all parts of Russia are despatched in order to be afterwards sent on to their destination. A great deal of important information on this subject is contained in the recent work of Maximov, "Siberia and its Convict Prisons" (3 vols. 8vo, St. Petersburg, 1871), a book written in Russian, and therefore as yet nearly unknown in Western Europe. The system of transportation has, like most Russian institutions, undergone a profound change for the better during the present reign. Since 1867, no Western observer could witness those terrible marches of fettered prisoners, driven on like herds of cattle by mounted Cossacks, which form one of the principal horrors in many of the still current books on Russia. The convicts at present arrive in Kasan by water conveyance on the Volga. To that river they are sent by rail. The long journey from Kasan to Tomsk, in Siberia, is again almost entirely performed by water, on the rivers Volga, Kama, Tur, Tobal, Irtish, Ob, and Tom. Only from the river Kama to the river Tur (from Perm to Tjumen) across the mountainous boundary between Europe and Asia, the prisoners are carried on carts drawn by the three-horse teams (troiki) of the Russian post-service. constructed. This overcrowding is easily supported by convicts who stay only a few days in the temporary prisons, and by the prisoners in the cage, where the air is always fresh. In the cabins of the floating prisons, however, and in Kasan during the winter, the air breathed by the convicts is foul beyond description. The only consolation is that sickness and mortality in the convict gaol of Kasan are not excessive. A glance into one of the prison cages discloses a very curious picture. Most prisoners wear the convict garb, which is as ugly here as in other countries: a kind of cloak with sleeves, of a dirty drab-colour, disfigured by the letters S I B. (Siberio) on the back; these letters being inlaid in yellow cloth. A shapeless cap of the same material as the cloak completes the costume, which seems to answer its purpose very well, for the cloth is thick and firm. Even under that uniform garb many national types may be distinguished; from the stolid, flat-faced Finnish tribes, some of them almost like Esquimaux, to the sharp features of the Jew, and the beautiful face and form of the Circassian mountaineer. The wearing of the prison garb seems besides not to be obligatory even for the greatest criminals, and many of them wear entirely or partly their own clothing: the Circassian the national cloak with its rows of cases for cartridges sewn on the breastcloth, and the shaggy fur cap; the Tartar, the pointed felt hat over the skull-cap which covers his shaven head, and the long caftan; the Russian peasant, his greasy great-coat of sheepskin. Most prisoners have good, well-shaped boots, which guard their ankles against the friction of the chain; others wear the national foot clothing of linden-bast over the linen rags which they tie round their feet and legs. The only chains worn are fetters attached to the two ankles, and lifted up in the middle by means of a strap fastened up to the loins (I believe by a girdle). These chains are not very heavy, and the prisoners walk freely enough with them; yet the clinking of the irons makes one shudder. Such chains are worn only by. those who are sentenced to hard labour, while those who are sentenced merely to settle in Siberia wear no chains whatever. The floating prisons in which the prisoners travel on the rivers are large barges towed by powerful steamers. These barges are very conveniently constructed. Below deck there is but one cabin, sufficiently aired and lighted the principal prison room. The guard room, the office, and the kitchen are on the deck, of which they occupy less than one-third. The rest of the deck forms a large cage; iron posts support a roof of sheet-iron, and between the posts a net of thick iron wire is extended at once the safest and the airiest of prisons. This floating prison would be very comfortable if it were not so terribly overcrowded. Water conveyance is in these high latitudes limited to less than twenty weeks in the year, and the most Groups of women and children are ha, therefore, to be made of it. Neither mixed up with the male prisoners; the the prison-barges nor the temporary pris- women being in the proportion of about ons in Kasan and other towns are nearly one to six and the children one to twelve sufficient for the convicts; the numbers to the men. Two-thirds of the women confined in them are on an average nearly are likewise convicts, the remainder and double those for which the localities are all the children are merely passengers. For the Russian Government, in order to encourage emigration, offers free passages to the families of all those that are sent out to Siberia; an advantage generally appreciated by the wives, though as yet very little by the husbands of convicts. In 1860, the last year for which Maximov gives the statistics, 6,000 male prisoners were accompanied by 326 free women and 566 children; while 700 women were accompanied only by four free men. spirits, to take off the fetters, &c. But all these drawbacks are much lessened by the feeling of companionship between officers and convicts; a feeling which no explanation can make intelligible to the haughty aristocratic officers of Teutonic blood. The word "brethren" (bratci) is often addressed, and in good earnest too, by the officer to the convicts. Savage altercations like those which but too frequently happened between the fierce Poles and the officers to whom they were entrusted, and the atrocious punishments inflicted after such strife, never happen between officers and common criminals The new system of transportation owes its origin to the energy and the spirited enterprise of a Russian merchant, Mr. Kolchin, like most Russian merchants, the son of a peasant. He is the owner of all A remarkable Russian institution, likethe prison barges on the Volga and Kama, wise not easily intelligible to the Western as well as on the Siberian waters; and like- public, the artel, contributes very much to wise of the steamers by which the barges are lessen the sufferings necessarily attached towed. These steamers carry passengers to a march of thousands of miles, perand merchandise; and though their freights formed with fettered legs. Whenever a are much lower than those of the other number of Russians of the peasant class passenger lines, they are, with their barges work together they speedily form an orin tow, nearly as fast as the other steam-ganized body with an elected chief, and ers; and the accommodation for passen- with equal rights and duties for all the gers is as good as elsewhere. Mr. Kolchin members. Such a body is called an artel, has an extensive establishment at Nijui- and breaches of faith of its members Novgorod, where the machinery for all his vessels is made, and where the ships for the European lines are constructed. They are among the best steamers on Russian rivers; though most of the steamers on the Volga and Kama belonging to other Owners are constructed in England or in Belgium. Only a part of the prisoners go as far as Tomsk. At various stations along the rivers, especially at Tobolsk, parties of prisoners are landed in order to be distributed in the more westerly parts of Siberia, where most of those who are sentenced merely to settle in Siberia, and not to hard labour, remain. From the stations to the final places of destination the journey is continued on foot. Those who go for hard labour to the convict establishments in eastern Siberia still march in chains from Tomsk. As far as they are concerned, the old system of transportation is still kept on. towards each other are so absolutely unknown that they are considered impossible. This same organization is adopted by the convicts, and, strange to say, the same faithfulness which belongs to all artels also characterizes those formed by the outlaws. Nay, when the members pledge their "word of honour" for each other, the promise may be safely relied on, even by the officers who guard them. The elders (starosti) at the head of the convict artels administer the money, make all the necessary purchases, and strike those bargains with the officers to which we have above alluded. Maximov describes very prettily, and as an eye-witness, the loves of male and female convicts; how the lovers manage by money, cunning, and even by violence, to meet and to travel together; and how especially the carts on which the prisoners cross the Ural Mountains are made useful for travelling in common. These affections exercise a good influence, and would be infinitely more productive of good if the Russian law promoted - instead of hindering the marriages of convicts. This system, though very severe and cruel for the political prisoner, is much less so for the Russian peasant. Its defects are certainly very great. The stations where the prisoners remain overnight are wretched, and are often un- Flights from the prison barges are imbearably filthy. The officers who com- possible; but from the parties travelling mand the prisoners are not always very on foot, and especially from the convict scrupulous, and often use their discre- establishments themselves, they are extionary power to obtain money, by grant- tremely frequent. From some of these ing or withholding favours which ought establishments nearly one-half of the prisnot to be conceded-permission to buy oners have at various times made attempts |