At the end of those three days you reach the great river CARAMORAN, which flows hither from Prester John’s country. It is a great river, and more than a mile in width, and so deep that great ships can navigate it. It abounds in fish, and very big ones too. You must know that in this river there are some 15,000 vessels, all belonging to the Great Kaan, and kept to transport his troops to the Indian Isles whenever there may be occasion; for the sea is only one day distant from the place we are speaking of. And each of these vessels, taking one with another, will require 20 mariners, and will carry 15 horses with the men belonging to them, and their provisions, arms, and equipments.{2} Hither and thither, on either bank of the river, stands a town; the one facing the other. The one is called COIGANJU and the other CAIJU; the former is a large place, and the latter a little one. And when you pass this river you enter the great province of MANZI. So now I must tell you how this province of Manzi was conquered by the Great Kaan.{3} NOTE 1.—SIJU can scarcely be other than Su-t’sien (_Sootsin_ of Keith Johnston’s map) as Murray and Pauthier have said. The latter states that one of the old names of the place was _Si-chau_, which corresponds to that given by Marco. Biot does not give this name. The town stands on the flat alluvial of the Hwang-Ho, and is approached by high embanked roads. (_Astley_, III. 524–525.) [Sir J. F. Davis writes: “From _Sootsien Hien_ to the point of junction with the Yellow River, a length of about fifty miles, that great stream and the canal run nearly parallel with each other, at an average distance of four or five miles, and sometimes much nearer.” (_Sketches of China_, I. p. 265.)—H. C.] NOTE 2.—We have again arrived on the banks of the Hwang-Ho, which was crossed higher up on our traveller’s route to Karájang. No accounts, since China became known to modern Europe, attribute to the Hwang-Ho the great utility for navigation which Polo here and elsewhere ascribes to it. Indeed, we are told that its current is so rapid that its navigation is scarcely practicable, and the only traffic of the kind that we hear of is a transport of coal in Shan-si for a certain distance down stream. This rapidity also, bringing down vast quantities of soil, has so raised the bed that in recent times the tide has not entered the river, as it probably did in our traveller’s time, when, as it would appear from his account, seagoing craft used to ascend to the ferry north of Hwai-ngan fu, or thereabouts. Another indication of change is his statement that the passage just mentioned was only one day’s journey from the sea, whereas it is now about 50 miles in a direct line. But the river has of late years undergone changes much more material. [Illustration: Sketch Map, exhibiting the VARIATIONS of the TWO GREAT RIVERS OF CHINA Within the Period of History.]