THE LAND OF THE CROSSBOW 



145 



wash and who smeared their faces with 

 grease and fihh ; this was perfectly true 

 of the inhabitants we were now meeting. 



The food question, however, was the 

 .most difficult for us to solve, and on No- 

 vember 9 we stopped at the considerable 

 village of La-tou-wa-de (4,500 feet) to 

 endeavor to raise supplies. Here all the 

 people, men, women, and children, were 

 ■dressed in hempen garments of pure 

 Lissoo style ; none of them spoke a word 

 ■of Chinese or acknowledged any sort of 

 Chinese or other authority. They had 

 not even a head-man of their own. They 

 were, however, willing to trade, and sug- 

 gested that Mr Litton and I should barter 

 our breeches for a bag of rice, but, as we 

 had only one pair in serviceable condition, 

 we could not accede ; but a Chinese coolie 

 who was with us did a deal with one of 

 his ragged and lousy jackets, which he 

 l^artered for some maize and salt. 



Cloth was the object in greatest de- 

 mand, but unluckily we had none to 

 ■spare; therefore one skinny chicken, a 

 few pounds of bad rice and maize, and 

 two bamboo tubes full of honey were all 

 we could get from this village of thirty 

 houses, and even this purchase upset the 

 local market. 



Beyond La-tou-wa-de the country be- 

 came wilder at every step. We were able 

 to do a good long march of 11 miles, 

 mostly along the river, here broken by 

 many rapids and under beetling cliffs, to 

 an opening in the mountains, where, 

 above some padi patches, is situated the 

 picturesque village of Chong-wa. The 

 few inhabitants fled at our approach, but 

 we captured one, and through kindness 

 shown to him managed eventually to coax 

 some of the bolder spirits back to our 

 camp. We found they had feuds with 

 all their neighbors, and were afraid to 

 •guide us a mile in any direction, vtnless 

 we were anxious to attempt a little-fre- 

 quented pass which, thev declared, led up 

 from their village in three days' march 

 to some friendly Lissoo villages on the 

 other side of the Irrawadi divide. Our 

 chief object, however, was to reach a 

 point farther north, whence it would be 

 possible to get an extensive view up the 



Salwin, and thus discover the general 

 geographical features of the country. 



WHERE FIREARMS WERE UNKNOWN 



Learning of the existence of a rope 

 bridge across the Salwin a few miles 

 farther on, we decided to cross the whole 

 party to the other side, where, we were 

 told, the villages were larger and more 

 civilized, and that there were passes east- 

 ward over to the ^lekong. Luckily we 

 found a native of the important village 

 of Lo-ma-di, on the left bank, returning 

 home from the right bank, and he at once 

 volunteered, in consideration of a bead 

 necklace, to fetch his comrades with the 

 ropes and runners necessary for crossing 

 our party, which consisted in all of 35 

 persons and a dog. 



Meanwhile the people of the village on 

 the right bank, where we were camped, 

 had heard of our arrival, and came down 

 to see us, and a wild lot they were. It 

 then appeared there was a feud about this 

 rope bridge between the two villages on 

 the right and left banks respectively, each 

 party claiming that the right and profit 

 of assisting travelers across belonged to 

 them alone. We offered to give an equal 

 present to both parties, but when our 

 friends from the left bank returned with 

 the runners we saw at once we were in 

 for a serious disturbance. The right- 

 bank party was led by a bullying savage, 

 who shouted that the left-bank party 

 should not help us across. The lefts had 

 rashly left their weapons on the other 

 side, but proceeded to tie up one of our 

 loads for the passage ; whereupon the 

 leader of the rights whipped out a 

 poisoned arrow, ran back along the path 

 several paces, fitted it in his bow, and shot 

 it over our heads into the river — a sign, 

 like Mr Snodgrass taking off his coat, 

 that he was about to begin. 



As we were all crowded on a narrow 

 path, near a tree to which the end of the 

 rope bridge was secured, and the belli- 

 cose Lissoo was about to draw his bow 

 again with an arrow in it which might 

 find a billet in the body of any of us, the 

 situation was critical. Mr Lilton and T 

 at once rushed him, and I fired several 



