By our common friend, Dr. REINHOLD ROST, and
from that time we met frequently and kept up a correspondence which
terminated only with the life of the great geographer, whose friend I had
become. A new edition of the travels of Friar Odoric of Pordenone, our
"mutual friend," in which Yule had taken the greatest interest, was
dedicated by me to his memory. I knew that Yule contemplated a third
edition of his Marco Polo, and all will regret that time was not allowed
to him to complete this labour of love, to see it published. If the duty
of bringing out the new edition of Marco Polo has fallen on one who
considers himself but an unworthy successor of the first illustrious
commentator, it is fair to add that the work could not have been entrusted
to a more respectful disciple. Many of our tastes were similar; we had the
same desire to seek the truth, the same earnest wish to be exact, perhaps
the same sense of humour, and, what is necessary when writing on Marco
Polo, certainly the same love for Venice and its history. Not only am I,
with the late CHARLES SCHEFER, the founder and the editor of the Recueil
de Voyages et de Documents pour servir a l'Histoire de la Geographie
depuis le XIII'e jusqu'a la fin du XVI'e siecle, but I am also the
successor, at the Ecole des langues Orientales Vivantes, of G. PAUTHIER,
whose book on the Venetian Traveller is still valuable, so the mantle of
the last two editors fell upon my shoulders.
I therefore, gladly and thankfully, accepted Miss AMY FRANCIS YULE'S kind
proposal to undertake the editorship of the third edition of the Book of
Ser Marco Polo, and I wish to express here my gratitude to her for the
great honour she has thus done me.[1]
Unfortunately for his successor, Sir Henry Yule, evidently trusting to his
own good memory, left but few notes. These are contained in an interleaved
copy obligingly placed at my disposal by Miss Yule, but I luckily found
assistance from various other quarters. The following works have proved of
the greatest assistance to me: - The articles of General HOUTUM-SCHINDLER
in the Journal of the Royal Asiatic Society, and the excellent books of
Lord CURZON and of Major P. MOLESWORTH SYKES on Persia, M. GRENARD'S
account of DUTREUIL DE RHINS' Mission to Central Asia, BRETSCHNEIDER'S and
PALLADIUS' remarkable papers on Mediaeval Travellers and Geography, and
above all, the valuable books of the Hon. W. W. ROCKHILL on Tibet and
Rubruck, to which the distinguished diplomatist, traveller, and scholar
kindly added a list of notes of the greatest importance to me, for which I
offer him my hearty thanks.
My thanks are also due to H.H. Prince ROLAND BONAPARTE, who kindly gave me
permission to reproduce some of the plates of his Recueil de Documents de
l'Epoque Mongole, to M. LEOPOLD DELISLE, the learned Principal Librarian
of the Bibliotheque Nationale, who gave me the opportunity to study the
inventory made after the death of the Doge Marino Faliero, to the Count de
SEMALLE, formerly French Charge d'Affaires at Peking, who gave me for
reproduction a number of photographs from his valuable personal
collection, and last, not least, my old friend Comm. NICOLO BAROZZI, who
continued to lend me the assistance which he had formerly rendered to Sir
Henry Yule at Venice.
Since the last edition was published, more than twenty-five years ago,
Persia has been more thoroughly studied; new routes have been explored in
Central Asia, Karakorum has been fully described, and Western and
South-Western China have been opened up to our knowledge in many
directions. The results of these investigations form the main features of
this new edition of Marco Polo. I have suppressed hardly any of Sir Henry
Yule's notes and altered but few, doing so only when the light of recent
information has proved him to be in error, but I have supplemented them by
what, I hope, will be found useful, new information.[2]
Before I take leave of the kind reader, I wish to thank sincerely Mr. JOHN
MURRAY for the courtesy and the care he has displayed while this edition
was going through the press.
HENRI CORDIER.
PARIS, 1st of October, 1902.
[1] Miss Yule has written the Memoir of her father and the new Dedication.
[2] Paragraphs which have been altered are marked thus +; my own additions
are placed between brackets [ ]. - H. C.
[Illustration:
"Now strike your Sailes yee jolly Mariners,
For we be come into a quiet Rode"....
- THE FAERIE QUEENE, I. xii. 42.]
PREFACE TO SECOND EDITION.
The unexpected amount of favour bestowed on the former edition of this
Work has been a great encouragement to the Editor in preparing this second
one.
Not a few of the kind friends and correspondents who lent their aid before
have continued it to the present revision. The contributions of Mr. A.
WYLIE of Shang-hai, whether as regards the amount of labour which they
must have cost him, or the value of the result, demand above all others a
grateful record here. Nor can I omit to name again with hearty
acknowledgment Signor Comm. G. BERCHET of Venice, the Rev. Dr. CALDWELL,
Colonel (now Major-General) R. MACLAGAN, R.E., Mr. D. HANBURY, F.R.S., Mr.
EDWARD THOMAS, F.R.S. (Corresponding Member of the Institute), and Mr. R.
H. MAJOR.
But besides these old names, not a few new ones claim my thanks.
The Baron F. VON RICHTHOFEN, now President of the Geographical Society of
Berlin, a traveller who not only has trodden many hundreds of miles in the
footsteps of our Marco, but has perhaps travelled over more of the
Interior of China than Marco ever did, and who carried to that survey high
scientific accomplishments of which the Venetian had not even a
rudimentary conception, has spontaneously opened his bountiful stores of
new knowledge in my behalf.
