Marco rose rapidly in favour and was often employed on dis tant missions as well as in domestic administration ; he held for three years the government of Yangchow; on another occasion he visited Kangchow, the capital of Tangut, just within the Great Wall, and perhaps Karakorum on the north of the Gobi, the former residence of the Great Khans : also Ciampa, or southern Cochin China ; and perhaps, once more, on a separate mission to the southern states of India. We are not informed whether his father and uncle shared in such employments, though they rendered great service to the khan, in forwarding the capture of Siang-yang (on the Han river) during the war against southern China, by the construction of powerful artillery engines—a story, however, perplexed by chronological difficulties.
The Polos had become rich, and after their exile they began to dread what might follow Kublai's death. The khan, however, was deaf to suggestions of departure and the opportunity only came by chance. Arghun, khan of Persia, a grand-nephew of Kublai, lost in 1286 his favourite wife. Her dying injunction was that her place should be filled only by a lady of her own Mongol tribe. Ambassadors were despatched to the court of Peking to obtain one. The lady Cocacin (Kukachin), a maiden of seventeen, was chosen. The overland road from Peking to Tabriz was then imperilled by war, and Arghun's envoys proposed to return by sea. Having met the Venetians, and being eager to profit by their experience, they begged the khan to send the Franks in their company. He fitted out the party nobly for the voyage, sending friendly messages to the potentates of Christendom, including the pope, and the kings of France, Spain and England. They sailed from Zaiton or Amoy harbour in Fukien (probably the modern Changchow), then one of the chief Chinese havens for foreign trade, in 1292. The voyage involved long detention on the coast of Sumatra, and in south India, and two years or more passed before they arrived in Persia. Two of the three envoys and most of their suite died by the way; but the three Venetians survived all perils, and so did the young lady, who had come to look on them with filial regard. Arghun Khan had died before they left China ; his brother reigned in his stead ; and his son Ghazan mar ried the lady. The Polos went on by Tabriz, Trehizond, Con stantinople and Negropont to Venice, arriving about the end of 1295.
The first biographer of Marco Polo was John Baptist Ramusio, who wrote more than two centuries after the traveller's death. We need not hesitate to accept as a genuine tradition the sub stance of his story of the Polos' arrival at their family mansion in St. John Chrysostom parish in worn and outlandish garb, of the scornful denial of their identity, and the stratagem by which they secured acknowledgment from Venetian society.
We next hear of Marco Polo in a militant capacity. Jealousies had been growing between Venice and Genoa throughout the 13th century. In 1298 the Genoese prepared to strike at their rivals on their own ground, and a powerful fleet under Lamba Doria made for the Adriatic. Venice equipped a larger fleet under An drea Dandolo. The crew of a Venetian galley at this time amounted to 250 men, under a comito or master. On one of the galleys of Dandolo's fleet Marco Polo served as sopracomito or gentle man commander. The hostile fleets met before Curzola Island on Sept. 6, and engaged next morning. The battle ended in vic tory for Genoa, and Marco Polo was taken there as a prisoner. The captivity lasted less than a year, and Marco returned to Venice in July or August 1299.
His captivity was the immediate cause of his Book. Up to this time he had related his experiences among his friends; and from these stories he had acquired the nickname of Marco Millioni. Yet he had written nothing. The narratives not only of Marco Polo but of other famous mediaeval travellers seem to have been extorted from them by pressure, and written down by other hands. In the prison of Genoa Marco Polo met Rusticiano or Rustichello of Pisa, also a captive of the Genoese, who was a respectable literary hack; he wrote down Marco's experiences at his dictation.
We learn little of Marco Polo's history after this captivity; at his death he left a wife, Donata, and three daughters, Fantina, Bellela and Moreta. One last glimpse of the traveller is gathered from his will. On Jan. 9, 1324, he sent for a priest and notary to make his testament, and died the same day. He was buried, ac cording to his wish, in the Church of St. Lorenzo. The archives of Venice have yielded a few traces of our traveller. Besides his own will just alluded to, there are the wills of his uncles, Marco and Maffeo; a few legal documents connected with the house property in St. John Chrysostom, and two or three entries in the record of the Maggior Consiglio. Another document is a catalogue of curios ities and valuables in the house of Marino Faliero, which mentions several objects that Marco Polo had given to one of the Faliero family. The most tangible record of Polo's memory in Venice is a portion of the Ca' Polo—the mansion where the three travellers, after their long absence, were denied entrance. The court in which it stands was known in Ramusio's time as Corte del millioni, and now is called Corte Sabbionera. That which remains of the ancient edifice is a passage with a decorated 13th century archway.