NOTE 1. - This is from Pauthier's text, which is here superior to the G.T.
The latter has: "They put the goods in small vessels, which proceed on a
river about seven days." Ram. has, "in other smaller vessels, with
which they make a voyage on a gulf of the sea for 20 days, more or less,
as the weather may be. On reaching a certain port they load the goods on
camels, and carry them a 30 days' journey by land to the River Nile, where
they embark them in small vessels called Zerms, and in these descend the
current to Cairo, and thence by an artificial cut, called Calizene, to
Alexandria." The last looks as if it had been edited; Polo never uses
the name Cairo. The canal, the predecessor of the Mahmudiah, is also
called Il Caligine in the journey of Simon Sigoli (Frescobaldi p.
168). Brunetto Latini, too, discoursing of the Nile, says: -
"Cosi serva su' filo,
Ed e chiamato Nilo.
D'un su' ramo si dice,
Ch' e chiamato Calice."
- Tesoretto, pp. 81-82.
Also in the Sfera of Dati: -
- "Chiamasi il Caligine
Egion e Nilo, e non si sa l'origine." P. 9.
