“Mariner’s compass,” “magnetic needle,” are paraphrases; but in the countries surrounding the Mediterranean, it has a name--_Boussole_, for which no European etymology can be found.[138] The Arabic afforded none, for by no process could Kiblah Nameh be emended into the root of _Boussole_. There is, however, an Arabic word, which has escaped our lexicographers. The figure,[139] which designates the north is MOUASSOLA.[140] When Europeans first saw the instrument, this point, the leading one, was doubtless pointed to and named. From Mouassola to Boussola the transition is easy; M. and B., being labials and cognate letters, and in some dialects of the Arabic constantly transposed. The Greeks, the intermediaries between the Arabs and Europe, still possessed Amalfi, which became a maritime state; Arabic and Greek, not Latin and Italian, were spoken there; and in modern Greek the word for compass is written Μπουσσολα. The Arabic affords another etymology, and while either may have served, both may have concurred to give us our word. The abstract which has been preserved of El Edressi’s “Geography of Spain,”[141] has this sentence, “The outer ocean,” that in which the compass was necessary, “is termed _El Bahar el Bossul_ (the violent), as distinguished from the interior, or _El Bahar el Muit_.” European writers derive the compass from the Arabs.[142] The Arabic geographers absolutely decline this honour.[143] They refer the invention to the Chinese. They quote a Chinese name, _Kya-poun_, meaning, as they assert, a board marked with lines. The Chinese claim the discovery, and have and use the instrument. It is of their own make and fashion, divided according to a rule of their own, and connected with various astronomical and geographic points which we are unacquainted with. The Jesuits, who have been such judicious observers and accurate describers of China, unanimously support the same conclusion.[144] Klaproth, in a letter to M. Humboldt “Sur l’Invention de Boussole,” argues in the same sense. Humboldt, in his recent work, “Cosmos,” answers as follows the letter addressed to him by Klaproth.