1846.] on the Kuladyne River: — Arracan. 65 



When a man marries, he gives what he can to the parents of his bride, 

 feasts his native village, and the ceremony is concluded. The dress of 

 the Khumi female, in common with that of the Toungthas, is a parody on 

 Eve's apron ; the men have a small cloth over the loins but are still next 

 to naked ; the women wear a petticoat about a cubit in length, which is 

 kept on in a most indescribable manner by heavy strings of brass rings. 

 They have a singular tradition accounting for the scantiness of their 

 costume. In former ages, say they, all the world was of one tongue, 

 and of one kind ; there was then a god upon the earth — his name they 

 do not know, — when he was about to depart from among men, he 

 divided them into nations and tongues, and gave to each the peculiar 

 costume by which it was to be distinguished. The poor Toungthas, 

 however, were at the time wandering over their native mountains, and 

 engaged in their plantations in the hills, so that they came last. The god 

 told them he had given away all that he had, except one small piece of 

 cloth, a cubit broad, which their women were to wear ; the men to shift 

 as they could. The only visible objects of worship of the Khumis, are the 

 trunks of three or four trees, which have been cut down in clearing a 

 space for the village ; also the same number of pillar-like stones. These are 

 fixed in the earth together, in the middle of a large shed, which is also 

 employed as the place of reunion and festivity of the village. 



The cultivation of the Toungthas is styled Jhoom. A hill, the best 

 covered with vegetation, is cleared, the rubbish burnt to fertilize it, and 

 the space sown with an indigenous species called hill or red rice. As 

 the soil on these steep hills is necessarily scanty, and becomes more 

 liable to be washed away by the periodical rains when denuded of its 

 forest covering, a piece of ground rarely yields more than one crop ; in 

 each successive year other spots are in like manner chosen, till all those 

 around the village are exhausted : a move is then made to another loca- 

 lity, fresh habitations are erected, and the same process gone through. 

 These migrations occur about every third year, and they are the means 

 by which long periods of time are calculated ; thus a Toungtha will tell 

 you that such and such an event occurred so many migrations since. 

 In forcing one's way through the forest, one often comes suddenly on a 

 deserted village, which presents a peculiarly melancholy appearance ; a 

 dense vegetation rapidly reclaims it as a domain of ancient wood ; the very 

 bamboos long since decayed and old, the materials of a once merry home, 

 become covered with luxuriant creepers, and appear mockingly to vegetate 



