1841.
Travels in Europe and Asia.
311
Naiunai, and to Cheria that lies upon the entrance of China." The 6th, is through Nerczinski and Mongolia to the lake Dalai. "Out of this lake the river Argus takes its rise, which carries you, by water, to the river Yamour, into which it falls. Near the Argus are several mines of silver."
The inhabitants of all these central regions are next noticed, with cursory remarks respecting the Nestorians, Catholics, and the delae- lama, the patriarch of the idolatrous Tartars." This patriarch, by the by, "is without all contradiction that same famous Preste-Jean, concerning whom historians have written so variously." Avril is inclined to think that St. Thomas reached China, and does not fail to notice the celebrated monument found at Singan foo in 1625. Haylon, a Christian author, of the blood rcyal of Armania, "testifies that, in the thirteenth age, Tartary was full of Christians, that Kublai their emperor embarced the Christian faith, and that his brother entered into a religious war for the sake of Christianity." Albazin and its inhabitants, and the war in which they had been engaged, are briefly noticed.
Concerning the little colony that first peopled America, father Avril obtained the followiug particulars from the vaivode of Smolènks, Mouchim Pouckhim "a person of as great a wit as a man can well meet with, and perfectly acquainted with all the countries that lie beyond the Obi, as having been a long time intendant of the chan- cery of the government of Siberia.
"There is, said he, beyond the Obi, a great river call'd Kawoina, into which another river empties itself, by the name of Lena. At the mouth of the first river that discharges itself into the Frozsen sea, stands a spacious island very well peopl'd, and which is no less considerable for hunting the behemot, an amphibious animal, whose teeth are in great esteem. The in- habitants go frequently upon the side of the frozen sea to hunt this monster ; and because it requires great labor and assiduity, they carry their families usually along with them. Now it many times happens, that being surpriz'd by a thaw, they are carry'd away, I know not whither, upon huge pieces of ice that break off one from another. For my part, added he, I am per- suaded that several of those hunters have been carry'd upon these floating pieces of ice to the most northern parts of America, which is not far off from that part of Asia which juts out into the sea of Tartary. And that which confirms me in this opinion is this, that the Americans who inhabit that country which advances farthest toward that sea, have the same physiogno- my as those unfortunate islanders, whom the over-eager thirst after gain exposes in that manner to be transportod into a foreign climate.'
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Travels in Muscovy and Moldavia fill the fourth and fifth books,