tation of the Persian _shir_. There is also a lion's
head with a bar in its mouth, recalling the door-handles to temples in
ancient Greece. Besides the snake, the tortoise, and the sea-otter,
there is what is far more remarkable than any of these, namely, a horse
with wings.

On comparing the latter with Pegasus as he appears in sculpture, it is
quite impossible to doubt that the Chinese is a copy of the Greek
animal. The former is said to have come down from heaven, and was
caught, according to tradition, on the banks of a river in B.C. 120.

The name for pomegranate in China is "the Parthian fruit," showing that
it was introduced from Parthia, the Chinese equivalent for Parthia being
[an][xi] _Ansik_, which is an easy corruption of the Greek Arsakes, the
first king of Parthia.

The term for grape is admittedly of foreign origin, like the fruit
itself. It is [pu][tao] _pu t'ou_. Here it is easy to recognise the
Greek word Botrus, a cluster, or bunch, of grapes.

Similarly, the Chinese word for "radish," [luo][bo] _lo po_, also of
foreign origin, is no doubt a corruption of raphe, it being of course
well known that the Chinese cannot pronounce an initial _r_.

There is one term, especially, in Chinese which at once carries
conviction as to its Greek origin. This is the term for watermelon.
The two Chinese characters chosen to represent the sound mean "Western
gourd," _i.e._ the gourd which came from the West. Some Chinese say, on
no authority in particular, that it was introduced by the Kitan Tartars;
others say that it was introduced by the first Emperor of the so-called
Golden Tartars. But the Chinese term is still pronounced _si kua_, which
is absolutely identical with the Greek word sikua, of which Liddell and
Scott say, "perhaps the melon." For these three words it would now
scarcely be rash to substitute "the watermelon."

We are not on quite such firm ground when we compare the Chinese kalends
and ides with similar divisions of the Roman month.

Still it is interesting to note that in ancient China, the first day of
every month was publicly proclaimed, a sheep being sacrificed on each
occasion; also, that the Latin word _kalendae_ meant the day when the
order of days was proclaimed.

Further, that the term in Chinese for ides means to look at, to see,
because on that day we can see the moon; and also that the Latin word
_idus_, the etymology of which has not been absolutely established, may
possibly come