FROM TONKIN TO INDIA 



The pacification of Upper Assam has not been an easy 

 undertaking'. For many years the EngUsh have had to main- 

 tain frequent feuds with the Khamtis and the Singphos. At 

 present the country is fairly quiet. The Singphos have been 

 allowed their independence under a chief, who reports to the 

 Imperial Government the movements and intentions of the neigh- 

 bouring tribesmen. In return he receives a subsidy. It was 

 he whom we saw at Ninglou. His subjects pay no taxes to 

 the English, but they are sometimes employed as coolies on such 

 public works as the making of a road or a railway. 



To the north the Himalaya Mountains, through which the 

 Tsangpo and the Lohit or Dzayul rivers fret their way by 

 narrow gorges, are infested by tribes which, although adjacent, 

 differ from each other both in speech and customs. This aggre- 

 gation of little -known and inaccessible peoples, always wild and 

 generally fierce, constitutes a regular Babel. Whence they came ; 

 how, having pitched on the southern flank of the Himalayas 

 overlooking India, they have yet preserved their individual dis- 

 tinctions ; and why, if they are of a common stock, they are so 

 dissimilar, are problems still unsolved. 



Among these populations the most important is that of the 

 Abors, who occupy the hills to the north and north-west of 

 Sadiya. Their name for themselves is Pandam. Ne-xt to them 

 come the Miris, who in successive raids burned three villages in 

 the plain. The Abors having killed some native soldiers in an 

 ambuscade, a punitive expedition was recently sent against them, 

 and encountered great physical difficulties. Mr. Needham described 

 them as having no chief, and as making slaves. Their villages 

 are larce collections of from seven hundred to a thousand 

 dwellings. They invariably put all prisoners to the sword, and 



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