t road to
_I-tsi-nay_.... I-tsi-nay, or _Echine_, is properly the name of a lake.
Khubilai, disquieted by his factious relatives on the north, established a
military post near lake I-tsi-nay, and built a town, or a fort on the
south-western shore of this lake. The name of I-tsi-nay appears from that
time; it does not occur in the chronicle of the Tangut kingdom; the lake
had then another name. Vestiges of the town are seen to this day; the
buildings were of large dimensions, and some of them were very fine. In
Marco Polo's time there existed a direct route from I-tsi-nay to
Karakorum; traces of this road are still noticeable, but it is no more
used. This circumstance, i.e. the existence of a road from I-tsi-nay to
Karakorum, probably led Marco Polo to make an excursion (a mental one, I
suppose) to the residence of the Khans in Northern Mongolia."
(_Palladius_, l.c. pp. 10-11.)--H. C.]

NOTE 2.--"_Erberge_" (G. T.). Pauthier has _Herbage_.

NOTE 3.--The Wild Ass of Mongolia is the _Dshiggetai_ of Pallas (_Asinus
hemionus_ of Gray), and identical with the Tibetan _Kyang_ of Moorcroft
and Trans-Himalayan sportsmen. It differs, according to Blyth, only in
shades of colour and unimportant markings from the _Ghor Khar_ of Western
India and the Persian Deserts, the _Kulan_ of Turkestan, which Marco has
spoken of in a previous passage (_supra_, ch. xvi.; _J. A. S. B._ XXVIII.
229 seqq.). There is a fine Kyang in the Zoological Gardens, whose
portrait, after Wolf, is given here. But Mr. Ney Elias says of this animal
that he has little of the aspect of his nomadic brethren. [The wild ass
(Tibetan _Kyang_, Mongol _Holu_ or _Hulan_) is called by the Chinese _yeh
ma_, "wild horse," though "every one admits that it is an ass, and should
be called _yeh lo-tzu_." (_Rockhill, Land of the Lamas_, 151, note.)--H.
C.]

[Captain Younghusband (1886) saw in the Altai Mountains "considerable
numbers of wild asses, which appeared to be perfectly similar to the Kyang
of Ladak and Tibet, and wild horses too--the _Equus Prejevalskii_--roaming
about these great open plains." (_Proc. R. G. S._ X. 1888, p. 495.) Dr.
Sven Hedin says the _habitat_ of the _Kulan_ is the heights of Tibet as
well as the valley of the Tarim; it looks like a mule with the mane and
tail of an ass, but shorter ears, longer than those of a horse; he gives a
picture of it.--H. C.]

CHAPTER XLVI.

OF THE CITY OF CARACORON.

Caracoron is a city of some three miles