The History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire - Edward Gibbon [796]
[Footnote 28: See in Duhalde (tom. iv. p. 18 - 65) a circumstantial description, with a correct map, of the country of the Mongous.]
[Footnote 29: The Igours, or Vigours, were divided into three branches; hunters, shepherds, and husbandmen; and the last class was despised by the two former. See Abulghazi, part ii. c. 7.
Note: On the Ouigour or Igour characters, see the work of M. A. Remusat, Sur les Langues Tartares. He conceives the Ouigour alphabet of sixteen letters to have been formed from the Syriac, and introduced by the Nestorian Christians. - Ch. ii. M.]
[Footnote 30: Memoires de l'Academie des Inscriptions, tom. xxv. p. 17 - 33. The comprehensive view of M. de Guignes has compared these distant events.]
[Footnote 31: The fame of Sovou, or So-ou, his merit, and his singular adventurers, are still celebrated in China. See the Eloge de Moukden, p. 20, and notes, p. 241 - 247; and Memoires sur la Chine, tom. iii. p. 317 - 360.]
[Footnote 32: See Isbrand Ives in Harris's Collection, vol. ii. p. 931; Bell's Travels, vol. i. p. 247 - 254; and Gmelin, in the Hist. Generale des Voyages, tom. xviii. 283 - 329. They all remark the vulgar opinion that the holy sea grows angry and tempestuous if any one presumes to call it a lake. This grammatical nicety often excites a dispute between the absurd superstition of the mariners and the absurd obstinacy of travellers.]
[Footnote !: 224 years before Christ. It was built by Chi-hoang-ti of the Dynasty Thsin. It is from twenty to twenty-five feet high. Ce monument, aussi gigantesque qu'impuissant, arreterait bien les incursions de quelques Nomades; mais il n'a jamais empeche les invasions des Turcs, des Mongols, et des Mandchous. Abe Remusat Rech. Asiat. 2d ser. vol. i. p. 58 - M.]
[Footnote 33: The construction of the wall of China is mentioned by Duhalde (tom. ii. p. 45) and De Guignes, (tom. ii. p. 59.)]
[Footnote 34: See the life of Lieoupang, or Kaoti, in the Hist, de la Chine, published at Paris, 1777, &c., tom. i. p. 442 - 522.
This voluminous work is the translation (by the P. de Mailla) of the Tong-Kien- Kang-Mou, the celebrated abridgment of the great History of Semakouang (A.D. 1084) and his continuators.]
[Footnote 35: See a free and ample memorial, presented by a Mandarin to the emperor Venti, (before Christ 180 - 157,) in Duhalde, (tom. ii. p. 412 - 426,) from a collection of State papers marked with the red pencil by Kamhi himself, (p. 354 - 612.) Another memorial from the minister of war (Kang- Mou, tom. ii. p 555) supplies some curious circumstances of the manners of the Huns.]
[Footnote 36: A supply of women is mentioned as a customary article of treaty and tribute, (Hist. de la Conquete de la Chine, par les Tartares Mantcheoux, tom. i. p. 186, 187, with the note of the editor.)]
[Footnote 37: De Guignes, Hist. des Huns, tom. ii. p. 62.]
The conquest of China has been twice achieved by the pastoral tribes of the North: the forces of the Huns were not inferior to those of the Moguls, or of the Mantcheoux; and their ambition might entertain the most sanguine hopes of success. But their pride was humbled, and their progress was checked, by the arms and policy of Vouti, ^38 the fifth emperor of the powerful dynasty of the Han. In his long reign of fifty-four years, the Barbarians of the southern provinces submitted to the laws and manners of China; and the ancient limits of the monarchy were enlarged, from the great river of Kiang, to the port of Canton. Instead of confining himself to the timid operations of a defensive war, his lieutenants penetrated many hundred miles into the country of the Huns. In those boundless deserts, where it is impossible to form magazines, and difficult to transport