1839.] on the Tenasserim Provinces, SfC. 975 



Erroneous opinions of the people. — In the same manner in which 

 the abilities of the ruling power were misrepresented, an erroneous 

 opinion was also formed of the character of the inhabitants. 



Equally corrected.— Instead of finding the mass of the population 

 brute warriors, they are in fact a harmless, naturally mild race 

 of husbandmen, oppressed by a highly tyrannical absolutism. 



Reasons of their military excursions. — The love of sudden gain, 

 and that (to every nation) inordinate desire after adventures, carried 

 them, under the lead of ambitious men in power, from time to time to 

 invasions of surrounding states, and rendered them chiefly under the 

 founder of the present dynasty, Alompra, in the last century, a con- 

 quering nation. Yet they were destitute of the roaming ferocity of the 

 Tartars, or the bloody propensity of the Arabs, and of the personal 

 courage of both. The mass engaged in such expeditions, after a few 

 months devastation and plundering, returned to their homes to labour 

 in the fields ; and a small part of them continued robber3 even in 

 their own country, often not discouraged by their own government, 

 perhaps, with a view of conserving in them the stock and spirit of 

 soldiery, useful for future enterprizes. 



An exaggerated military reputation. — The dread of surrounding, 

 unsettled, petty nations, the never decided superiority between them 

 and the Siamese, their succeeding even in defeating a Chinese army, 

 nurtured in them a persuasion of their invincibility; the boasting 

 of their blinded adulating courtiers, the ignorance of the true state of 

 the country — a terra incognita to Europeans — all this contributed 

 to create a high opinion of their power, and consequently an erroneous 

 belief of danger to British India, until their own signal defeat in 

 the last war, followed by the first dismemberment of their empire, 

 destroyed this delusion. 



Other neighbours. — Shans. — The neighbours to the north, the tri- 

 butary Shan states of Zimmay, Laboung, and Yaihaing, are equally 

 an agricultural race of people, the nature of their mountainous 

 sub-alpine country induces them also to partly follow the pursuits of 

 pastoral tribes. They appear to be weak clans, and profess to detest 

 the Burmese, but are too insignificant to become independent ; they 

 have hitherto manifested a spirit of amity towards the British, and 

 have shewn themselves anxious to be allowed to throw themselves 

 under their protection. 



Siamese. — The kingdom of Siam, fronting the Tenasserim provinces 

 towards the east, is established upon the same foundations which are in 

 these parts universally acknowledged and adopted. The government 



