It is a long way north and west from Lan-chow, and
not far from the Great Wall. Its king at this time was, probably,
Twan-yeh of "the northern Leang."]
[Footnote 6: Dana is the name for religious charity, the first of the
six paramitas, or means of attaining to nirvana; and a danapati is "one
who practises dana and thereby crosses the sea of misery."]
[Footnote 7: This was the second summer since the pilgrims left
Ch'ang-gan. We are now, therefore, probably, in A.D. 400.]
[Footnote 8: T'un-hwang is still the name of one of the two districts
constituting the department of Gan-se, the most western of the
prefectures of Kan-suh; beyond the termination of the Great Wall.]
CHAPTER II
~On to Shen-shen and thence to Khoten~
After travelling for seventeen days, a distance we may calculate of
about 1500 li, the pilgrims reached the kingdom of Shen-shen, a country
rugged and hilly, with a thin and barren soil. The clothes of the common
people are coarse, and like those worn in our land of Han, [1] some
wearing felt and others coarse serge or cloth of hair; this was the only
difference seen among them. The king professed our Law, and there might
be in the country more than four thousand monks, who were all students
of the hinayana. [2] The common people of this and other kingdoms in
that region, as well as the Sramans, [3] all practise the rules of
India, only that the latter do so more exactly, and the former more
loosely.
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