FROM TONKIN TO INDIA 



taken for boys. The older women wore the black turban, 

 Chinese fashion, covering the hair knot. Amongst these folks 

 one met with some pretty faces and more regular features than 

 the Chinese. The men, on the other hand, differ but little from 

 the latter. 



Despite the fact of the doors of the inn where we lay being 

 closed, they shut in a swarm of people, and our repose was 

 broken by the incessant going and coming of the "members 

 of the family," as they explained to all our grumbles. To such 

 an argument there was no rejoinder : yet what a family ! Ceries, 

 there is no fear of depopulation in this country yet awhile. 



It took us five days to reach the Mekong from Fong-Yu 

 alone a rather uniform road. A second hill similar to the last 

 we had climbed, and then on the 20th we found ourselves by 

 the river Yang-pi, which we had already crossed before Tali. 

 The stream here was spanned by a hanging bridge on eight 

 chains fastened at either end to a white stone. At the bridge 

 head was a platform, and on it a recumbent stone buffalo, sole 

 guardian of the spot, as if watching the rush of water with a 

 placid air. Near the Yang-pi we for the first time fell in with 

 some Lissous, a tribe of mountaineers renowned in China for 

 their fierceness. We were to have more to do with them in 

 the future. These representatives were swarthy, and wore a 

 broad straw hat like a panama. 



On the 2ist (June) we traversed a wood, threaded by green 

 glades. The country had few inhabitants and little culture, 

 merely an occasional patch of corn or buckwheat, but the 

 vegetation was luxuriant and the shade grateful. White dog- 

 roses scaled the trees and drooped in fragrant clusters over 



dazzling diadems of lilies of the height of a man, and under 



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