The Call of the Red Gods 3 
below that curious little village of many vicissitudes. Nearer 
we could not get, and the journey was completed overland 
ina gharry. Having been in turn Chinese, Burmese, and 
British, Bhamo could no doubt tell some strange stories of 
frontier fights, raids, and other incidents of its chequered 
career. Cooper, the great Chinese traveller, was murdered 
here, and it was from Bhamo that the ill-fated Margary 
started on his last journey. In addition to the British 
authorities, civil and military, the polyglot population of 
Bhamo now includes Burmans, Chinamen, Shans, Kachins, 
Chittagonians and other peoples from India, while specimens 
of most of the frontier tribes are occasionally to be seen 
there, and a large volume of trade still passes through the 
little border town in spite of the French railway to Yunnan- 
fu. At this time it was probably more lively than usual, 
on account of the friction on the Burma-Yunnan frontier 
further north. 
I spent five days in Bhamo, chiefly waiting for some 
of my luggage which the railway company had failed to 
account for satisfactorily, and the only civil authority with 
whom | had dealings was by no means encouraging and 
from start to finish poured cold water on my proposed 
journey. My preparations, however, being as far as possible 
complete, I decided to delay no longer in Bhamo, but to 
cross the frontier at once. I had obtained the services of 
a civilised Kachin to minister to my needs until I could en- 
gage Chinese servants to go with me the whole journey, but 
at the last minute his wife put her foot down (even Kachin 
women can assert themselves in a crisis) and refused to 
let him come. I was therefore abandoned to the tender 
mercies of a somewhat unlovely looking lad of doubtful but 
decidedly mixed parentage and little experience, who never- 
theless served me faithfully as far as T’eng-yueh. 
What delightful fellows the Kachins are! I was quite 
distressed at parting with my tribesman. Clean, neatly 
dressed, and debonair, he stood waiting motionless behind 
my chair or moved noiselessly round the bungalow as a 
waiter moves round a first-class London club. 
On February 26 the mules were loaded and headed 
towards the distant dancing hills; an hour later I too 
mounted, and turning my back on sun-scorched Bhamo, 
I——2 
