1867.] LIEUT. R. C. BEAVAN ON THE PANOLIA DEER. 761 



a few scattered females and young of the second year, yet the in- 

 sight thus afforded into their habits and economy more than repaid 

 me for the severe attack of illness I subsequently incurred by ex})0- 

 sure to the heat and wet. 



This plain of Yengyaing was then, owing to recent and heavy falls 

 of rain, one large swamp. Nearly the whole of its unbroken extent, 

 which embraces an area of fourteen miles in length with an average 

 breadth of ten, could l)e traversed in a small canoe, except here and 

 there where mud and vegetation combined obliged one to resort to 

 a very unpleasant system of half wading in water and half sticking 

 in deep slime. A continuation of this plain, broken here and there 

 by belts of jungle, extends for several hundred miles up the Burmese 

 coast, and has evidently been formed by the gradual retirement of 

 the sea, which at one time doubtless dashed its waves against the 

 Martaban and other continuous ranges of laterite hills. It is now, 

 at Yengyaing, some eight to ten miles distant from the hills, and 

 seems to be still retiring, since the water along the coasts of the Gulf 

 of Martaban is very shallow, and studded here and there with sand- 

 banks. For the primary cause of this we may doubtless look to 

 the immense amount of silt brought down by the waters of the 

 Salween, Beeling, Sittang, and Rangoon rivers, all of which dis- 

 charge themselves into the Gulf of Martaban. As the sea retires, 

 a belt of mangrove-jungle, about a mile in width, appears to travel 

 with it, and the plain is thus enclosed by a barrier of vegetation 

 on one side and the mountains on the other. This strip of man- 

 grove-jungle gives cover to numberless Hog-deer, Tigers, Leopards, 

 and Pigs, but i§ never entered by the Thamyn, except v.'here some- 

 what open ; nor on the other side do they ever attempt to penetrate 

 into the mountains. The plain is intersected by numerous tidal 

 creeks, which, in the hot weather, when deprived of water from the 

 hills, appear to dry up to a great extent ; and those still open at that 

 time of year contain no admixture of fresh water, so that it is evident 

 that for two, if not three, months in the year the Thamyn must be 

 entirely deprived of fresh water*; whilst during the rainy season, 

 for six months at least, they may be said to live in water. It ap- 

 pears wonderful how they can manage to exist in such extremes of 

 heat and wet. 



With the exception of a few stunted trees here and there, and a 

 fringe of Hibiscus bushes along the creeks, the plain is covered with 

 nothing but grasses and padd}^, of which latter both the wild and 

 cultivated varieties are abundant. Owing to the paucity of the po- 

 pulation and the consequent demand for labour in this immediate 

 neighbourhood, perhaps only one-fourth of the whole area is under 

 cultivation for paddy ; the crop succeeds here admirably, and the 

 grain forms one of the staple articles of expoit from Moulmein and 

 other Burmese ports. 



The remaining three-fourths is covered with the indigenous ui^- 

 cultivated plant, which in seasons of scarcity is reaped and used for 

 food. This forms a vast grazing-ground both for the Thamyn and 

 * The Burmese assert tliat during this period the animal drinks urine ! 



Puoc. ZooL. Soc. — 1867, No. XLIX. 



