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During the rains, it is reported navigable for large boats to a dis- 

 tance of ninety miles, and is the route by which the interior is 

 transported to the Irrawaddy. 



276. Either bank is populated both by Kakhyens and Shans, 

 who cultivate, to some considerable extent, til-seed, paddy, and cot- 

 ton. At 10 p.m., I went up into the village, accompanied by my 

 guide, a Kakhyen interpreter, and Yan Sing, to inquire into the 

 reason of the attack last night. I was informed that the assault 

 was not committed by any of the villagers, but by the Kazar Kak- 

 hyens who had come to wage war with them : it was prudent here 

 to make a virtue of a necessity, and accept their explanation, but I 

 gave them to understand that a repetition of such conduct would 

 result in my storming and burning down their village. 



277. My people amused themselves by making pipe-bowls, 

 little utensils of sorts, and statuette caricatures of my guide Moung 

 Oung from a blue clay that forms a strata of the river-bank here. 

 The Burmese are very natty with their fingers, and, like the Chinese, 

 their organs of imitation and colour are strongly developed, but 

 they are wanting in originality. A peon, I picked up at Myanoung, 

 proved to be a skilful carver, and his idle hours were spent in 

 carving cocoanut-shells for me. The designs represented a com- 

 bination of the vegetable and animal kingdom ; the signs of the 

 zodiac forming abelt round the centre, and the whole finished off 

 with a silver rim and neat little pedestal : these vessels answer a 

 number of purposes, among other they can either be used as sugar- 

 bowls or salt cellars, a difference in the depth of the shell only being 

 required. The open carved ones, lined with silver, have also a very 

 pretty effect. Samples of tea said to be grown by the Kakhyens, west 

 cf the Irrawaddy, were brought me to-day ; the leaves appeared 

 smaller and of a better quality than those I saw at Bhamo ; but I am a 

 poor judge in such matters, never having seen what really constitutes 

 a good specimen of this plant. The green leaves, I was told, undergo 

 no proper system of curing, they are simply dried and compressed 

 in hollow bamboos, from which a slice is cut off when required, the 

 wall peeled off, and the beverage prepared in the usual manner. 

 Heard that the Kakhyens had sacrificed a fowl, and directed their 

 Meetway to place himself in communication with the spirits to 

 ascertain the future safety of the village. The n&ts declared an evilly- 

 disposed person was amongst them, and that the further immolation 

 of a pig was necessary for their welfare: it was whispered, I was the 

 evil genius. Moung Gnet returned in a canoe, accompanied by the 

 Pomine and four other Kakhyens of Lakwah village. They had 

 been sent by the Tswabwa in charge of presents, consisting of a 

 tiger- skin, some vegetables, and liquor, and arequest to visit him, and 



