CHAPTER II

ON TO SHEN-SHEN AND THENCE TO KHOTEN

After travelling for seventeen days, a distance we may calculate of
about 1500 le, (the pilgrims) reached the kingdom of Shen-shen,(1) 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,(2) 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,(3) who were all students of the hinayana.(4) The
common people of this and other kingdoms (in that region), as well
as the sramans,(5) all practise the rules of India,(6) only that
the latter do so more exactly, and the former more loosely. So (the
travellers) found it in all the kingdoms through which they went on
their way from this to the west, only that each had its own peculiar
barbarous speech.(7) (The monks), however, who had (given up the
worldly life) and quitted their families, were all students of Indian
books and the Indian language. Here they stayed for about a month,
and then proceeded on their journey, fifteen days walking to the
north-west bringing them to the country of Woo-e.(8) In this also
there were more than four thousand monks, all students of the
hinayana. They were very strict in their rules, so that sramans from
the territory of Ts'in(9) were all unprepared for their regulations.
Fa-hien, through the management of Foo Kung-sun, _maitre
d'hotellerie_,(10) was able to remain (with his company in the
monastery where they were received) for more than two months, and here
they were rejoined by Pao-yun and his friends.(11) (At the end of
that time) the people of Woo-e neglected the duties of propriety and