Up the Mekong Valley 35 
rambles was a crimson-purple Primula (P. vztéata) coming 
into flower in the marshes. 
Like all frontier cities, Wei-hsi is a great trading centre, 
and a motley crowd, amongst whom may be seen sallow- 
faced Chinamen, fair-skinned Mosos, swarthy Tibetans, 
and sullen-looking Lissus, throng the main street on a 
market day. 
The surrounding country is inhabited chiefly by the 
Moso tribe, whose centre of distribution is the strip of 
land enclosed by the great loop of the Yang-tze already 
referred to, though they extend as far west as Wei-hsi and 
up the Mekong valley as far as Tsu-kou. They are most 
-numerous in the neighbourhood of their ancient capital, 
now a Chinese prefectural city, Lichiang-fu. 
I can imagine nothing more charming, nothing in better 
taste than a well-dressed Moso girl. She wears a white, 
or perhaps dark-blue skirt, closely pleated lengthways after 
the manner of a skirt-dancer’s costume, reaching well below 
the knees; a dark blue blouse tied round the waist; and a 
head-cloth of a dull red colour, above which is bound the 
queue, probably adorned with jewels of coarse workmanship, 
silver set with coral and turquoise, to match the long 
pendent ear-rings. Nor is it too much to say that many a 
Moso girl is wonderfully pretty, with a round good-natured 
face, regular features, a light complexion which is most 
readily described as sunburnt, and large dreamy eyes, 
though the general expression is one of considerable 
animation. 
Frequently they bind their ankles with narrow strips of 
tape, a custom to which it is difficult to assign any reason 
as it stands. I eventually came to the conclusion that it 
might be the relic of an ancestral custom, comparable to 
those rudimentary structures which, of no use now, yet 
survive in many animals, a sore puzzle to the anatomist, 
who sees in them a remnant of some previous organ which 
through disuse has dwindled to a mere cipher of its former 
complexity, though still perhaps leaving a clue to its history. 
But if so, what can these ankle bandages, of no practical 
utility, though ornamental, represent? Probably ankle- 
bracelets, such as the Burmans and other peoples from 
this part of Asia wear to this day. A metal hoop round 
3-2 
