( 116 ) 



night, but it was considered etiquette first to call on the Tswabwa, 

 before entering any other house. His May was the last we came 

 to, situated on a slightly higher eminence than the rest. Imme- 

 diately my arrival was announced by the jemadar, I was invited in 

 and seated on a brand-new rug in the guest-room, my followers 

 having a few mats spread for them. It was some half hour before 

 the Tswabwa made his appearance, which afforded me a capital 

 opportunity of studying the style of building and interior arrange- 

 ments. The entire length and breadth of this htay was not under 

 two hundred feet by sixty feet : it was raised off the ground six feet, 

 and the flooring was of bamboos, with walling of the same material 

 flattened out and plaited. The lower part was barricaded up to the 

 floor and used as a pen for live-stock, including large numbers of 

 fine white pigs, with ears over-lapping the eyes — a variety I have 

 seen nowhere else in Burma, and am inclined to think the breed has 

 been introduced from China. The roof was thatched with grass and 

 shaped after the form of a turtle's shell, the eaves extended to some 

 two or three feet beyond the walls, and either end formed into a sort 

 of verandah. The interior was divided down the centre lengthways, 

 one side being intended for guests, and the other for private use. At 

 the entrance, a portion of the guests' room was walled off as a sleep- 

 ing apartment for all male and female adults, and the opposite end 

 devoted to ndt worship, where there was a little shrine, and all the 

 other paraphernalia associated with fetichism. It is in this part 

 of the house, also, that the embalmed corpses are kept until the 

 nearest relation is in a position to kill a buffalo, and feast the whole 

 village on the burial day. I once had the misfortune of having to 

 sleep for a night in close proximity to one of these putrid bodies, 

 as will appear further on. The portico was decorated with the 

 numerous buffaloes' skulls that had been slaughtered on gala days, 

 and trophies of shikar, including the horns of deer, and skulls of 

 tigers and boars : these latter animals abound in the hills, and 

 often cross-breed with the domestic pig when feeding in the forest. 



197. The room presented a most curious collection of things, 



which evidently must have been plun- 

 Coiicction of things in the <jered property: there were two very 



Tswabwa s house. i-i ir ™- n . J 



handsome China vases, three carpets, 

 ono of those utensils included in a toilet service (of rather a 

 unique blue, gold, and white pattern,) which now served as a 

 receptacle for chillies, two handsome dahs with carved ivory 

 handles, one velvet table-cover, a cashmere choga, a large bunch 

 of human hair, intended for sazoos no doubt, and nine double- 

 barrelled percussion guns. 



