[3] According To Abulpharagius, One Abu Said Revolted Against The Khaliff Al Mohated, In The Year Of The Hegira, 285, A.D. 893, And Laid Waste Bassora.

This date agrees with the story of Ebn Wahab in the text. - Harris.

[4] From this circumstance, it appears probable that the great canal of China was not then constructed. - E.

[5] Some circumstances in this very interesting detail have been a little curtailed. If Abu Zaid had been a man of talents, he might surely have acquired and transmitted more useful information from this traveller; who indeed seems to have been a poor drivelling zelot. - E.

[6] There is a vast deal of error in this long paragraph. It certainly was impossible to ascertain the route or voyage of the wreck, which was said to have been cast away on the coast of Syria. If it could have been ascertained to have come from the sea of the Chozars, or the Euxine, by the canal of Constantinople, and the Egean, into the gulf of Syria, and actually was utterly different from the build of the Mediterranean, it may or must have been Russian. If it certainly was built at Siraff, some adventurous Arabian crew must have doubled the south of Africa from the east, and perished when they had well nigh immortalized their fame, by opening up the passage by sea from Europe to India: And as the Arabian Moslems very soon navigated to Zanguebar, Hinzuan, and Madagascar, where their colonies still remain, this list is not impossible, though very unlikely. The ambergris may have proceeded from a sick cachalot that had wandered into the Mediterranean.

The north-east passage around the north of Asia and Europe, which is adduced by the commentator, in Harris's Collection, is now thoroughly known to be impracticable. - E.

[7] It is difficult to say anything certain of the countries to which this story relates; which may have been some of the islands now called Philipines, or perhaps some of the islands in the straits of Sunda. - Harris.

Such is the opinion of the editor of Harris's Collection. But I am disposed, especially from the rivers mentioned, to consider Zapage as Pegu; and that Malacca, Sumatra, and Java, were the dependent islands; and particularly, that Malacca, as the great mart of early trade, though actually no island, was the Cala of Abu Zeid. Siam, or Cambodia may have been the kingdom of Komar. - E.

[8] This alludes to the custom of the Arabs, and other orientals, to squat upon this occasion. - E.

[9] It is presumable, that this was a mere bravado, in the full confidence that no one would be found sufficiently foolhardy to engage to follow the example. It is needless to say, that the promise of laughing aloud could not have been performed; so that any one might have safely accepted the challenge, conditioning for the full performance of the vaunt. - E.

[10] Rubies, emeralds, and topazes. - E.

[11] Obviously Canoge, in Bengal. - E.

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