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THE NATIONAL GEOGRAPHIC MAGAZINE 



THE MOAT OF THE PALACE OF THE KINGS OF UPPER BURMA: MANDALAY : SUNSET 



Looked up to with envy by their jungle 

 neighbors, some of whom are always in 

 Bhamo either trading or conferring with 

 the deputy commissioner to settle tribal 

 disputes, they seem to take a special pride 

 in presenting arms as any European 

 passes the guard-house. 



Many of them bore and dilate the ear 

 so that it is spread enough to carry a 

 spindle of wood or roll of cloth an inch 

 or more in diameter. They work cleverly 

 in metal, and their heavy cutlasses, called 

 "dahs," are carried over the shoulder by 

 a strong bandoleer. The writer has seen 

 these covered with pieces of tigers' jaws, 

 the proud trophies of the owner. Over 

 the border in Yunnan, Kachins and al- 

 lied barbarians, called "Miaotsz" by the 

 Chinese, are still the terror of their cara- 

 vans. These wild tribes, of which there 

 are more than eighty, are scattered over 

 several Chinese provinces, and the study 

 to determine the interrelationships of 

 those mentioned with the Lolos, Shans, 

 and Laotians forms one of the most intri- 

 cate problems confronting anthropolo- 

 gists at the present time. Of the various 



Chin races and of the Salon I know noth- 

 ing worth recording, for I have never 

 even seen them. 



The Chinese play an important role in 

 the commercial life of Burma, and sev- 

 eral ancient trade routes offer future 

 promise of great value. The railway 

 through the Shan states to Lashio can 

 be brought to Chinese territory at any 

 time the British so desire. While Bhamo 

 itself, the highest military post on .the 

 Irrawaddy, has a decidedly Chinese look, 

 its architecture and one of its temples 

 suggested Wuchow in Kwang-si, while 

 the hundreds of mules and ponies which 

 hurry through the dusty streets, flogged 

 along by lusty Chinamen, show one how 

 the piece-goods of cotton from Man- 

 chester and Birmingham pass overland to 

 where the name of England is but a 

 shadowy myth. 



The cotton comes to Bhamo in the 

 steamers of the Irrawaddy Flotilla Com- 

 pany, which for many years has, ex- 

 tremely successfully, played an important 

 part in the development of the land. The 

 steamers, comfortable and clean, afford a 





