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HONGKONG HOTEL CO., LD,
HALF-YEARLY MEETING.
The ordinary half-yearly meeting of the shareholders of the Hongkong Hotel Co., Ld., was hell on the 7th inst. in the Hotel. Mr. W. Parfitt (chairman) presided and there were also present Mesars. B. C. Wilcox and W. Hatton Potts (directors), A. R. Lowe, F. D. Goddard, Ho Fook, Lo Chung Shin, Chan Chan Nam, J. F. V. Vernon, R. J. Maogowan, W. Davies, and C. Mooney (secretary).
The SECRETARY having read the notice calling the meeting,
THE HONGKONG WEEKLY PRESS AND tablets of Babylon, where we learn that some | twenty-four centuries B.C. they were overrun by the king of the Kassite tribe, who established in the Euphrates valley a dynasty known as the Kassite, the name still surviving in the modern Kbuzistan. About nine hundred year later we find the great king of Egypt, Thothmes III, | hunting elephants in, apparently, the lower valley of what is now the Karun: one of these animals, we are told, nearly killed the King, who owed his life to the timely help of his favourite general who happened to be at hand.
Practically bad it not been for the indicatious gleaned by Herodotus during his residence at the Persian court we should not be in a
[September 12, 1903;
laguages, and four sundry written characters. Evidently missing the point, the commentators without exception haveset themselves wondering over this simple fact, as if it implied almost superhuman ability. Pauthier suggests that the four written Foripts were Bashpa-Mongol, Arabic, Uighur, and Chinese ! It is a pity that commonsense is so rare a quality that not one of his thousand and one commentators saw the- absurdity of the suggestion: of course the four those that Marco written characters were wanted in the course of his adventurous life. They were plainly Latin, Greek, Persian, and Wigur. The only other language he could have possibly found useful was Chinese, aul of that, written or spoken, he certainly knew not a word. As a matter of fact Mongolian was the only eastern language that Marco really understood, and this has led to the innumerable difficulties in comprehending
80 relate the his topography which have completely mystified his commentators. Another difficulty is that with all the desire to be truthful of his predecessors, Polo has not been as particular as they in separating what he had actually witnessed himself from what had been told him by others, and so has appeared to lend his sanction to statements which further considera. tion would have shown him were incorrect or at best questionabl›.
position to take advantage of many accidental side lights from time to time thrown on the scene. Herodotus was a man avaricious of
to
The CHAIRMAN said Gentlemen,-As the report and accounts have now been in your hands for some few days, I will, with your permission, take them as read. The balance at credit of profit and loss account for the half-knowledge, aud perhaps on that account not year just ended is 814,198.36 in excess of that altogether free from a certain tendency to at credit on 30th June last year, which may be credulity when he comes considered satisfactory. The business of the experiences of others; as a rule his own Hotel has, in most departments, continued to
bservations may be thoroughly depended on, improve, and net profits have been greater, bis errors not being attributable to any dos re although the cost of maintaining the to deceiv, or any weakness of judgment other estab'ishment in as efficient a manner as is than was inseparable from his age. Even his possible continues to increase year by year.
most garrulous tales contain within themselves The direotors turst the shareholders will approve the elements of truth, and for the most part of the proposed transfer of the sum of $20,000 to
are t be attributed to the errors of translation. meat part of the cost of the installation of the or misunderstandings between himself and his electric light. It is thought that many of the interpraters. Who, for instance, could have fittings connected with this may deteriorate imagined that his wondrous yarn of the one- somewhat rapidly, and that it would be better eyed men who stole gold from the griffins, a not to treat the whole of the amount payable tale which has penetrated to the four quarters for the installation as an asset. It will be of the globe, was simply a case of misun'er- noticed on reference to the accounts that three standing between Iranian and Oghuz? Chinese houses on Inland Lot No. 80 have been purchased by the Company. These were much needed as quarters for the Chinese servants, there not being anything like sufficient room for them in the hotel-bui ding. Before proposing the adoption of the report and accounts I shall be pleased to answer any question that may be asked, to the best of my ability.
There were no questions asked. The CHAIRMAN accordingly moved the resolution that the report and accounts be adopted.
Mr. GODDARD seconded, and the motion was agreed to.
Mr. Ho Foox moved that Mr. R. C. Wilcox, who retired by rotation from the directorate, be re-elected.
Mr. VERNON seconded and the motion was agreed to.
Mr. MACGOWAN moved that Messrs. H. U. Jeffreys and A. R. Lowe be re-elected auditors. Mr. CHAN CHAN NAM seconded, and the motion was agreed to,
This was all the business.
REVIEW.
The Book of Marco Polo. Trauslated and Edited by Colonel Sir HENRY YULE, R.E., .C.B., K.C.8 I. Third Edition, Revised throughout by HENRI CORDIER (of Paris). London: John Murray, IN the long train of the ages three geographers stand well to the front as having by the know ledge they had assimilated, as well as from the intrinsic interest of the scenes and things they had described, led men to the study of the great world outside the narrow limits to which they had hitherto been confined; and thereby largely influenced the current of human events. The first of these geographers was a Greek, the seconed a Chinese, the third a Venetian. Wide apart as were the nations that gave birth to these three, their divergence in point of time was no less great; the first, Herodotus of Halicarnassus, lived in the former half of the fifth century B.C., the second, Chang K'ien, who inspired Sa'ma's great history, the Shi Ki, lived in the latter half of the second century, also B.C while the third, Marco Polo. the subject of this notice, was born in the year of Grace 1254. The paths of all three travellers overlapped in Persia and parts of Central Asia, so that we are able to make a fair comparison of the work accomplished by each. The men as well as the work, notwithstanding the differance in time and nationality, were remarkably alike, and the eventual results were by no means dissimilar. Our first light is non these regions in the cuneiform
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It is satisfactory to find that the Arimaspi 80 curiously transformed were after all simple Orman Oghuz, whose name actually meant nothing more than " Forest Oghu," proto-'l urks who dwelt in the forests then more extensive in
Herodotus tells u inner Asia than at present, that in the Skythian speech arima means one, and spou, eye; and curiously in the languages that ranged north of Iran airima meant rest, quiet. Bat airimo came to mean a desert place, and hence lonely, solitary. So also spou, eye, was a mistaken rendering of the name of the savage tribs referred to which was really Oghuz; lat oghieuz in Turkish means eye, so the unskilled interpreter, blunder- ing as to the meaning of orman, substitnted Iranian airima, which Herodotus took to mean solitary, and between them both they arrived at the strange combination of "lonely eyes," whence to "
one-eyed" was but a short step. Herodotus, in fact, seems never to have acquired, at least thoroughly, any language but his own Greek, and hence was largely at the mercy of his interpreter for the time being.
Even from the mistakes of an intelligent traveller it is possible to learn much, and in this respect the three stand on a very similar basis. The Chinese Chang K'ien had, however, in regard to his knowledge of languages a dis- tinct advantage over his predecessor. At the ontset of his journey he was captured by the Hinuguu, and remained for ten years a captive, during which time he was permitted to marry a Turkish wife. He employed the time in studying the language of his hosts, in which judging from the numerous remains embedded in his work, he must have become a pro- ficient. Chang K'ien had less confidence thau his predecessor in hearsay tales. and is always precise in distinguishing what he has seen from what has been merely reported. Speaking of, Tiao chi, Sarangia, which he knew only from report, he relates:- "Old men had a tale that here were the Yeak- Shui, "Weak or rather "Dead Water," and the fairy Queen, Siwangma, "but he had not seen them." Of course the tale told of the vanishing lake of Seistan and the Koh i Khoja, but Chang K'ieh preferred not to commit himself to a story known only by hearsay. He too had heard the tale of the miraculons nurture of the king of the Wusun, and retailed the story as it had been related to him. We have in the tale an old-world myth which enables us to bind into one the Getio races which at the time had a wider distribution than in modern days.
The prologue to Marco Polo's work informs na that young Marco in his travels came quickly to know the language of the Tartars, their manner of writing, and their practice of war; in fact, it adds, he came to know several
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The effect of these combined causes has been that Marco Polo's commentators have had considerable difficulty from time to time in following the route taken by the traveller, and this makes it very difficult sometimes to comprehend his descriptions. Even the commencement of his road in Persis has been the subject of controversy. This arises from Marco's inveterate habit of wandering. The description of Tauris, as following medieval custom he calls Tabriz, does not bagin till the 11th chapter of the first book. In the 5th he goes back to describe Mausul, which in the following chapters he supplements with a description of Bagdad so manifestly absurd that we cannot credit his having seen the city. "In eighteen days," so runs the narrative, they
come to a certain city called Kisi, where they enter the Sea of India. There is also on the river, as you do from Baudas to Kisi, a great city called Bastra (Bɔsra)," &o. Major Sykes, who has probably travelled more in Persia tha1 any other European, points out the vagueness, not to say incorrectness of this description, which is so inaccurate as to point to the conclusion that it was vague information given to him by some merchant whom he met in the course of his wanderings. Major Sykes's book was only given to the public in 1902, so that it is credit- able to M. Cordier that his opinion is referred to in the new book. It is, however, less credit- able to his judgment that he should have emendation on insufficient rejected the grounds, as well as with bad grace. The route really followed by the travellers was, as Major Sykes points out, from Tabriz by Kashan and Yezd to Kerman. From Kerman they went to Hormos, of which a really good account is given, showing unmistakably that Polo had visited the port in person and taken careful notes. The adoption of the overland route gave an opportunity to Polo of visiting one of the most interesting localities on his journey-the small town of Saba, still called Sava, situated some eighty miles south-west of Teheran. Here they found still surviving traces of Magism in its Was the oldest form of Tsabaism. Here reputed dwelling of the Three Magi who set out for Bethleham to worship the infant Jesus as King of the Jews.
As its name indicates, Saba must have been one of the most important, as well as probably the most northern of the outposts of Tsabsiem -the worship of the Host of Heaven,” in Hebrew Teaba Hashemim. This religion at one time prevailed over the entire region extending from Abyssinia to Khorassan, and was the foundation of the sect of the Magi. The worship of the Host of Heaven was the simplest, and possibly the oldest form of religion practised by nations in an advanced stage of civilisation: it acknowledged but one God, but paid adoration to the lights of Heaven, and their various angels and intelligences. It prevailed especially amongst the Elamites. inhabitin; Fars before the arrival of the Iranians, and its influence was effective in bringing about that peculiar phase off then-
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