en, and six are seventeen, and let us say nine with that, and you
have twenty-six. And the month I'm forgetting on the rocks of Aden is
twenty-seven, and a week here and a week there for bad winds and such
like. It would be safe to put that at three months. So it's two years
and a half since I left China."

"You never," says young Marco, "met anybody in China by the name of
Polo?"

"Poh-lo? Poh-lo? China's a bigger place nor you would imagine,
laddie. There's half a hundred million people there."

"These were foreigners," Marco explained, "traders. They were at the
court of the great Khan."

"Polo? Polo? Well, now, I think I've heard of them. Was one of them
a big red-bearded man with a great eye for a horse and a great eye for
a woman?"

"That would be my Uncle Matthew."

"For God's sake! And was the other a cold, dark man, a good judge of a
jewel and a grand judge of a sword?"

"My father, Nicholas Polo."

"For God's sake! You're the son of one and the nephew of the other?"

"Did you know them?"

"Ah, laddie, how would I be knowing people like that! Sure, they're
great folks, high in the esteem of the grand Khan, and I'm only a poor
sailorman."

"But you heard of them."

"I heard of them. They were in good health. And I heard they were on
their way home, though they would travel overland and not risk the
great dangers of the sea. I suppose, if they go back to China, you'll
be going with them?"

"I don't know," says Marco Polo.

"You ought to see China. It's a great country, a beautiful country."

"It would have to be very great and beautiful," says Marco Polo, "to
out-weigh the greatness and the beauty that are here. You mustn't
think I'm running down your country, mister," says he; "but for
greatness, where is the beating of Venice in this day? What struck
Constantinople like a thunderbolt but the mailed hand of Venice? When
the Barbary corsairs roamed the seven seas, so that it was no more safe
for a merchant vessel to be sailing than for a babe to be walking
through a wild jungle, it was Venice who accepted the challenge and
made the great sea as peaceful as the Grand Canal. Who humbled proud
Genoa? And hurled the Saracen from Saint John of Acre's walls? Venice.
And as for magnificence, the retinue of our doge when he goes to marry
the sea with a ring it makes the court of Lorenzo seem like a
huckster's train."

"It is a crowning city."

"And as for beauty, sir," went on