Sir E.
Tennent suggests that this Chandra Banu may be Polo's Sende-main or
Sendernaz, as Ramusio has it. Or he may have been the Tamul chief in the
north; the first part of the name may have been either Chandra or
Sundara.
NOTE 4. - Kazwini names the brazil, or sapan-wood of Ceylon. Ibn Batuta
speaks of its abundance (IV. 166); and Ribeyro does the like (ed. of
Columbo, 1847, p. 16); see also Ritter, VI. 39, 122; and Trans. R.A.S.
I. 539.
Sir E. Tennent has observed that Ibn Batuta is the first to speak of the
Ceylon cinnamon. It is, however, mentioned by Kazwini (circa A.D. 1275),
and in a letter written from Mabar by John of Montecorvino about the very
time that Marco was in these seas. (See Ethe's Kazwini, 229, and
Cathay, 213.)
[Mr. G. Phillips, in the Jour. China B.R.A.Soc., XX. 1885, pp. 209-226;
XXI. 1886, pp. 30-42, has given, under the title of The Seaports of India
and Ceylon, a translation of some parts of the Ying-yai-sheng-lan, a
work of a Chinese Mahomedan, Ma-Huan, who was attached to the suite of
Ch'eng-Ho, an envoy of the Emperor Yong-Lo (A.D. 1403-1425) to foreign
countries. Mr. Phillips's translation is a continuation of the Notes of
Mr. W.P. Groeneveldt, who leaves us at Lambri, on the coast of Sumatra.
Ma-Huan takes us to the Ts'ui-lan Islands (Nicobars) and to Hsi-lan-kuo
(Ceylon), whose "people," he says (p. 214), "are abundantly supplied with
all the necessaries of life.
