Dr. Laufer draws my attention to the fact that this translation does not
give exactly the sense of the French text, which runs thus:
"Et encore voz di qe en ceste provence a gianbelot [camelot] assez et
autres dras d'or et de soie, et hi naist maintes especes qe unques ne
furent veue en nostre pais." (Ed. Soc. de Geog., Chap, cxvi., p. 128.)
In the Latin text (Ibid., p. 398), we have:
"In ista provincia sunt giambelloti satis et alii panni de sirico et auro;
et ibi nascuntur multae species quae nunquam fuerunt visae in nostris
contractis."
Francisque-Michel (Recherches, II., p. 44) says: "Les Tartares
fabriquaient aussi a Aias de tres-beaux camelots de poil de chameau, que
l'on expediait pour divers pays, et Marco Polo nous apprend que cette
denree etait fort abondante dans le Thibet. Au XV'e siecle, il en venait
de l'ile de Chypre."
XLVII., pp. 50, 52,
WILD OXEN CALLED BEYAMINI.
Dr. Laufer writes to me: "Yule correctly identifies the 'wild oxen' of
Tibet with the gayal (Bos gavaeus), but I do not believe that his
explanation of the word beyamini (from an artificially constructed
buemini = Bohemian) can be upheld. Polo states expressly that these wild
oxen are called beyamini (scil. by the natives), and evidently alludes
to a native Tibetan term.