1028 Mission to the Court of Siam. [Dec, 



put some questions to us relative to our number and arms, but no hint 

 was dropped of delaying us ; some mystery was made about the road, 

 and an attempt made to induce me to go by Tauny-Kahoung road, but 

 assuming a perfect right of choice, I merely intimated my intention 

 of going by Ta-kanoon, which is shorter, and nearly level, whilst by 

 the other the hills are very steep. One of our Kareen companions is at 

 tins moment giving most ludicrous and savage imitations of the dances 

 of the Siamese, Taline, Birmans, and Sawas by the fire-light. 



January lOt/i.— Sa-di-diang, 3h. 10m., nine miles. Start at 7b. 

 55m. and crossing the small ravine, in which the Pa-pan runs, pro- 

 ceed along a small reedy valley, through which the road has only been 

 allowed to pass since our peace with Ava, before which time it ran 

 east of the hills. At 8h. 10m. we passed a small trench, said to be the 

 site of an old Siamese stockade, and the elephant pits (Ka-tyne-tsein,) 

 from which the river and a frontier post and stockade on it take 

 their name ; at this post during the whole fine season was kept a force 

 of from eighty to one hundred Talines, and twenty-five in the rains ; the 

 whole of this path is said to have been strewed with Birmese corpses in 

 1147 (a. d. 1812) when Along Mendofa invaded Siam; his force was 

 marching in an extended line, almost from Thaung-kala to Ka-tyne- 

 tsein, when the Siamese broke his line near Neaung-ben ; the king with 

 the rear fled, leaving the van in the hands of the Siamese, who with 

 the barbarity always displayed by both nations whenever they had an 

 opportunity, tied them five or six at a time to the trees and speared 

 or shot them. At 8h. 40m. cross the lesser Ka-tyne-tsein river, knee- 

 deep, from which the country is more open to the west, the hills to the 

 eastward continuing ; at 9h.35m. cross the Ka-tyne-tsein, over the saddle 

 flaps, some six miles below the old stockade now given up; 9h. 50m. cross 

 the Paway, knee-deep, falling into the Ka-tyne-tsein, on the banks of 

 which we fell in with a herd of wild buffaloes, one of which the 

 Kareens wounded, but he got away; at lOh. 40m. enter the clearing of 

 Sa-di-diong, the name of the Tsokay, pass two small villages both 

 bearing his name, and halt herein the same clearing at llh. 10m. We 

 met some Kareens to day, who found fault with our guide for bringing 

 us this way ; he answered that we knew the road, and would not come by 

 the hills. Our present halting place is one of Pra-soo-one's villages, his 

 people amount to seventy families, paying a duty yearly of fifty viss of 

 cotton, carrying it as far as Camhoorie, for which they may make a 

 money payment of five Siamese rupees (about six rupees and a quarter 

 Madras) they have also to find carriage and food for officers passing 

 this way ; they met the chief who came to Maulmain last year at Ta- 



