•/OS Account of Arakan. [No. 117. 



In October 1838, the viUsige of ffleng-kreing,* a powerful Kumi 

 chief of the Kola-dan, was attacked by the Lung-khes. The attack 

 took place in the dead of the night, and the surprise was complete. 

 Between thirty and forty persons were killed in the village, and thirty- 

 eight women and children were carried into slavery. This attack 

 was headed by Leng-kung, a young man of 23 or 24 years of age. 

 A party of the Arakan Local Battalion was sent in pursuit of the 

 Lung-khes, but they abandoned their village, and fled with their 

 captives into the hills, where it would have been useless to follow. 

 In December of the same year, I proceeded up the Kola-dan, to make 

 inquiries regarding the assailants, and found they had abandoned 

 the site of their village, and gone westward with their prisoners, 

 putting themselves under the protection of a Kyoung-tha family, 

 living within the hill boundaries of the Chittagong district.j" Being 

 assured of this by persons whom I sent to ascertain the fact, I addressed 

 the Magistrate of Chittagong, who recovered no less than thirty-three 

 women and children that had been captured in Hleng-kreing's village ; 

 these were restored to their homes ; one among them being the chief's 

 daughter ; two had been killed in retreat, and three sold to the Tsein- 

 dus. 



Shortly after their recovery, Leng-kung himself, and his elder brother 

 Leng-hung, came down to Akyah to answer for their misdeeds. Leng- 

 kung so far from denying that he headed the attack, gloried in it, aver- 

 ring, that " thirty years before, Dha-hoing-gyee had attacked his tribe, 

 killed a number of men, carried off several captive, and dug up his 

 grandfather's bones,J plundering the grave of the various implements 

 of war and state, which are always buried with a chief." This sacrilege 

 the young man declared he had been brought up to avenge, and his eyes 

 gleamed with delight as he told of his success ! An elder brother ac- 

 companied him to Akyah, but the younger, from his superior energy 

 and ability, possessed all authority in the tribe. From Leng-kung I 



* This chief is generally called Dha-hoing-gyee, a title of one of the officers of 

 state under the Arakan kings, which he has assumed. 



t This Ky-oung-tha family, the present head of whom is named Thak-tang-phyoo, 

 emigrated from Arakan about 60 years since. 



X The Lung-khes and Tsein-dus bury their dead, differing from the Ku-mis in this 

 respect, who burn them. 



