Note {4} — Chapter XIV

Note 4.—[“The accounts given by Marco Polo regarding the feasts of the Khan and the festival dresses at his Court, agree perfectly with the statements on the same subject of contemporary Chinese writers. Banquets were called in the common Mongol language chama, and festival dresses chisun. General festivals used to be held at the New Year and at the Birthday of the Khan. In the Mongol-Chinese Code, the ceremonies performed in the provinces on the Khan’s Birthday are described. One month before that day the civil and military officers repaired to a temple, where a service was performed to the Khan’s health. On the morning of the Birthday a sumptuously adorned table was placed in the open air, and the representatives of all classes and all confessions were obliged to approach the table, to prostrate themselves and exclaim three times: Wan-sui (i.e. ‘Ten thousand years’ life to the Khan). After that the banquet took place. In the same code (in the article on the Ye li ke un [Christians, Erke-un]) it is stated, that in the year 1304,—owing to a dispute, which had arisen in the province of Kiang-nan between the ho-shang (Buddhist priests) and the Christian missionaries, as to precedence in the above-mentioned ceremony,—a special edict was published, in which it was decided that in the rite of supplication, Christians should follow the Buddhist and Taouist priests.” (Palladius, pp. 44–45.)—H. C.]