FROM TONKIN TO INDIA 



wore Chinese garb. The women had a dress with parti-coloured 

 sleeves, 'an armtess waistcoat, blue with minute white checks and a 

 brown border, and an apron and broad sash. Their costume was 

 completed by a turban of, in some cases, a blue and red scarf, 

 frino-ed with cowries. Almost all had small coral ear-rings, said 

 to be peculiar to these Lissous, who were known as Koua-Lissous 

 (Lissous of colour, cf back, Koua-Lolos), in distinction from the 

 Ain-I.issous of Loukou. Some of these women were not bad- 

 looking. One girl we caught sight of with quite regular features, 

 and in the morning she was induced for a few needles to parade for 

 our inspection. She answered to the gentle name of Lou-Meo. 



At Lotsolo we met with a good reception, and I began to feel 

 quite friendh' with the Lissous, of whom we had heard such 

 alarming accounts. I went into one of their houses, and found the 

 occupants squatted round the fire warming tchaotiou, a rice spirit 

 of which they are great connoisseurs. They had never seen a 

 Yangjen (European) before, nor yet mules ; our arrival therefore 

 was an event which they celebrated as a fete. They invited me to 

 drink, and we observed a custom here which we met with farther 

 on. Two people quaff together out of a two-handled bamboo 

 vessel. Each holds one handle and incites the other to imbibe 

 more than himself. This mutual loving-cup is regarded as a pledge 

 of amity and alliance. In answer to my questions, the natives 

 could not recollect hearing of their tribe having come here trom 

 elsewhere. They knew the Lolos possessed a writing, but they 

 themselves had none. A curious marriage custom is observed 

 among them. The wedding feast over, at nightfall the betrothed 

 retires with her parents into the mountain, and the swain has to 

 seek them ; which quest successfully achieved, the parents withdraw, 

 and the newly-wedded couple remain till morning upon the hillside, 



164 



