FROM TALI TO TSEKOU 



The dwellings were always filthy ; we slept better in a 

 passage than in the chief's apartment, which besides was littered 

 with an assortment of articles such as grain bins, ears of corn, 

 bows, bird snares, a broken matchlock, wooden spoons, a flail, 

 bamboo-hooped buckets, and a kind of iron grid on which were 

 kindled bits of resinous wood for light. Over the door there 

 might be a white drawing of men on horses, though it required 

 an effort of imagination to Ofuess what the artist had intended. 



In the woods which we traversed at this time the wild olive 

 flourished, in appearance just like that of our own country ; 

 and here again after a long lapse we found specimens of the 



t^^i 



Native Designs on Door Lintel. 



palm or macaw-tree. How did its seeds find their way hither? 



The wild vine, plum, and hazel were abundant, also some 



excellent little wild apples in which we instructed Nam in the 



art of making compotes. The country itself varied little : on 



one side ran the Mekong at our feet, always yellow and muddy 



in a deep channel, and on our left towered above us the range 



that separated us from the Salwen, its savage peaks and 



skirmisher pines reminding one of the Dolomites of the Tyrol. 



As the 30th (Jul_\) wore on the route became better, and 



by the evening of that day we reached a townlet which we had 



been told was of some importance. We found In-Chouan, as it 



i8q 



