Vol. IX, No. 3.] The A-ch’ang (Maingtha) Tribe. 143 
[N 8.] 
and not Kaien like those of the Shans and Burmese. Each 
hedge, and stands sheltered in its own grove of bamboos or 
other trees. The residences of the chiefs are built after the 
fashion of an ordinary inese ‘‘ yamen,’’ and the walls are 
decorated with drawings of dragons, which is also a Chinese 
custom 
It e A-ch’angs speak Shan, and many of them know 
some Chinese as well It is owing to these facts and to their 
conversion to Buddhism that their true Tibeto-Burman origin 
has been lost sight of. ey most certainly use their own 
tongue to a very considerable extent amongst themselves, and 
it was by the study of this dialect, influenced and added to by 
Shan as it is, that Major Davies was able to point out its canned 
association with the speeches of the Zi, Lashi an aru ,—the 
curious stranded eee of people left ‘by the Buimeat in the 
highlands of the N’mai Hka valley during their immigration 
from the north into the plains of the Irrawaddy basin.! 
Davies’ evidence was sufficient to bring so high an Lipiatseaged 
as Sir G. A. Grierson to regard the A-ch’ang speech as more or 
less closely connected with Burmese, and to place the ail 
of the Zi, Lashi, Maru, Hpon, and A-ch’ang in a grou 
Kachin and Burmese hybrids. This distinguished author, how- 
ever, is careful to point out that it is possible that pay lan- 
guages are not hybrids but independent forms of spee 
A full and careful examination of these~ Selene is very 
urgently called for, the tribes themselves are being merged into | 
more powerful neighbours with an amazing rapidity, and the 
oppo tunity cannot last very much longer in the case of some 
of them. As it is, the material which is now available, and 
‘which will go far to solve the foundations of the problems con- 
nected with Burmese civilization and culture, is vanishing 
without being recorded. 
propose to summarise mrs the views of the principal 
oe on the A-ch’ang peo 
the first volume of the ‘‘ fn on the Census of Burma 
of 1891, * Mr. H. L. Eales with the assistance of Mr. B. Hough- 
ton, and the late Dr. Cushing, placed the pani pee dialect with 
those of the Chinese Shans, *Ahoms, Hkamptis and Burmese- 
Shans in the Northern subdivision, of the Taic Shan group, of 
the Pol “ey family.* 
In th ft a of Upper Burma and the Shan States ’ 
Eat nein in 1900, Sir George Scott taking the researches of 
Captain (now Major) Davies as a basis, estimates that about 
: she f ” A-ch’ang dialect appear to be connect- 
ie . ph ieee a with Bhan: These age are 
passin Sse 
1 (4). 2 (6), p- 382. Ai 
