SSUMAO TO TALI 



they had come, by Puchi Fou and Tali. This news reUeved us 

 greatly, as a dread took us lest we should have been forestalled 

 in our projected route. None the less did it behove us to press 

 forward, — explorers were already increasingly common in Yunnan ; 

 it was a race between French and English, and an eager rivalry 

 had arisen even among Frenchmen themselves. The field of the 

 unknown grew daily narrower, and blank spaces were vanishing 



Street in Ssumao. 



with remarkable rapidity. Hitherto we might congratulate our- 

 selves : we had filled in the first portion of our work, and that in 

 a country declared by the English to be impracticable. Colquhoun 

 had written that, notwithstanding the promise of his inception, he 

 could not advance from INIanhao by the right bank of the Song- 

 Coi; while, according to Bourne, the district which we had just 

 traversed was without any means of communication. This state- 



85 



