Discern because
of a certain dimness which diffused itself about those stars, and
obstructed the view of them." Also the Kachh mariners told Lieutenant
Leech that midway to Zanzibar there was a town (?) called Marethee,
where the North Pole Star sinks below the horizon, and they steer by
a fixed cloud in the heavens. (Bombay Govt. Selections, No. XV. N.S.
p. 215.)
The great Magellan cloud is mentioned by an old Arab writer as a white
blotch at the foot of Canopus, visible in the Tehama along the Red
Sea, but not in Nejd or 'Irak. Humboldt, in quoting this, calculates
that in A.D. 1000 the Great Magellan would have been visible at Aden
some degrees above the horizon. (Examen, V. 235.)
[12] This passage contains points that are omitted in Polo's book, besides
the drawing implied to be from Marco's own hand! The island is of
course Sumatra. The animal is perhaps the peculiar Sumatran wild-goat,
figured by Marsden, the hair of which on the back is "coarse and
strong, almost like bristles." (Sumatra, p. 115.)
[13] A splendid example of Abbot John's Collection is the Livre des
Merveilles of the Great French Library (No. 18 in our App. F.).
This contains Polo, Odoric, William of Boldensel, the Book of the
Estate of the Great Kaan by the Archbishop of Soltania, Maundevile,
Hayton, and Ricold of Montecroce, of which all but Polo and Maundevile
are French versions by this excellent Long John.
