250 Back to Burma 
Nothing would induce her to give me the right change, 
but redress was at hand, and to square the account | picked 
up two eggs and a lump of bacon which were lying on the 
table and put them in my pocket. As I departed the woman 
protested feebly that the foreigner was walking off with the 
eggs and bacon, but as neither she nor anyone else seemed 
in the least surprised or showed any signs of hostility, I felt 
quite justified in my violent purchase. 
The very next day I was again victimised by a Shan 
woman, who kept a roadside stall at which I elected to take 
a little nourishment; and this offence was the more heinous 
because she had just refused to serve me at all unless I first 
gave her the money, a proposition which I scouted indig- 
nantly. As acounter-move she advanced the price of her 
goods a hundred per cent. ! 
After I had eaten, we all—namely three men, three 
women, several children and myself—sat round a small 
fire of burning straw, and I was requested to tell the news 
from T‘eng-yueh, my story being subsequently translated 
into Shan for the benefit of the women and younger men. 
Finally a bed was made up for me on a little platform just 
beneath the roof of the buffalo shed, and being weary I 
retired. The bed consisted of a quilt and a very stiff, but 
clean cotton sheet laid on the straw, and but for the fact 
that the buffalos immediately underneath nearly brought 
the whole shed down in the middle of the night, when they 
scratched themselves against the posts, and the presence of 
a fowl perched just above my head, I should have slept well. 
It did not matter that the bedroom thus hastily prepared for 
the guest was open on three sides, because the huts them- 
selves being made of bamboo plastered with mud, which 
had for the most part dropped away, were so full of holes 
and crevices that they were almost equally well ventilated. 
The women of the establishment rose about three 
o'clock, while it was still of course quite dark, to pound 
rice, and as the fowl and the buffalos were making them- 
selves prominent at the same time, I myself got up with 
the first hint of daylight and asked for breakfast, which 
however was a lamentable time in making its appearance. 
Meanwhile I passed the time trying to purchase silver 
bracelets from the women. These bracelets, almost the 
