t r a v e l s i n c h i n a .
the Venetian. Its appearance immediately after his death, or,
according to feme, while he was yet living, but at all events.m
his own country, renders fuch a conje&ure extreme y pro a .
The embaffies in which he was employed by Kublai-Khan, and
the long voyages he performed by fea, could fcarcely have been
praaicable without the aid o f the compafs. Be this as it.may,,t e
Chinefe were, without doubt, well acquainted with this inftru-
ment long before the thirteenth century. It is recorded in their
be'ft authenticated annals merely as a fa d , and not as any ex-
traordinary circumftance, that the Emperor Cbung-koyrefented
an embaifador o f Cochin-China, who had loft his way in coming
by fea, with a Ting-nan-tchin « a needle pointing out the fouth
the name which it Hill retains. Even this idea o f the feat o
magnetic influence, together with the conftrua.on 6f the com-
pafs-box, the divifion o f the card into eight principal points and
each o f thefe again fubdivided into three, the manner o f fuf-
pending the needle, and its diminutive fize, feldom exceeding
in length three quarters o f an inch, are all o f them ftrong
preemptions o f its being an original, and not a borrowed
invention.
B y fome, indeed, it has been conjeftured, that the Scythian^
in the-northern regions o f Afia, were acquainted with the
polarity o f the magnet, in ages antecedent to all e fto ry ,an d
the virtue o f this foffil was intended, to be meant by the flying
arrow, prefented to Abaris by Apollo, about the time o f the
T ipjan war, with the help o f which he could tranfport h m-
felf wherever he pleafed. T h e abundance o f iron ores,
perhaps o f native iron, in every part o f Tartary, and the very
3 7
early period o f time in which the natives were acquainted with
the procefs o f fmelting thefe ores, render the idea not improbable,
o f the northern nations o f Europe, and Afia, (or the Scythians,)
being firft acquainted with the polarity o f the magnet. .
Yet even with the afliftance o f the compafs, it is
furprizing how the clumfy and ill-conftrudted vefiels o f the
Chinefe can perform fo long and dangerous a voyage as that to
Batavia. For, befides being thrown out o f their courfe by
every contrary wind, their whole conftru£tion, and particularly
the vaft height o f their upper works above the water, feems
little adapted to oppofe thofe violent tcmpefts that prevail on
the China feas, known, as we have already obferved, b y the
name o f Ta-fung. Thefe hurricanes fometimes blow with
fuch ftrength that, according to the aflertion o f an experienced
and intelligent commander o f one o f the Eaft India Company’s
ihips, “ Were it poffible to blow ten thoufand trumpets, and
“ beat as many drums, on the forecaftle o f an Indiaman, in the
“ height o f a 'Ta-fung, neither the found o f the one nor the
“ other would be heard by a perfon on the quarter-deck o f the
“ fame ihip.” In fa il, vaft numbers o f Chinefe veffels are
loft in thefe heavy gales o f wind; and ten or twelve thoufand
fubje£ts from the port o f Canton alone are reckoned to periih
annually by ihipwreck.
When a ihip leaves this port on a foreign voyage, it is con-
fidered as an equal chance that {he will never return ; and when
the event proves favourable, a general rejoicing takes place
among the friends o f all thofe who had embarked in the
g ha za rdou s