386 Hill Tribes in the Chittagong District [No. 161. 



drunkenness prevails, or if they are addicted to intoxication, is more 

 than I can tell. The Arracanese who live on the hills pay from three 

 to four rupees of land-tax a year, but the Kookies and Bunzoo are rent- 

 free ; and should they be compelled to pay, being a wandering tribe free 

 as birds, they would immediately leave their residence, and retire to 

 the interior of mountains where no person could molest them. They are 

 certainly the most independent people that can be seen : a no- made life 

 is for them the greatest happiness, and, as children of nature, their wants 

 are few ; and these wants they can supply in any place. They venture on 

 hunting excursions when their agricultural labors are finished ; spears and 

 bows are their principal arms, and their dogs are always their faithful 

 companions. Their exertions and agricultural labors are directed only 

 to the growth of articles necessary for their subsistence, as paddy, yams, 

 plantains, melons, tobacco, cotton, &c. They manufacture their own 

 cloth, and exchange the cotton they do not require for salt, earthenware, 

 &c. They plant a species of indigo growing about two feet high, the 

 leaves which are large are employed to dye their clothes, which is done 

 in the following way : — Taking a certain quantity of leaves, they put them 

 in an earthenware vessel ; when the water boils they dip in it the thread, 

 mixing with it an extract of an astringent bark ; they dry then the 

 thread, and they repeat twice again the same process. The jungle 

 affords them roots of trees or shrubs to dye green, yellow, &c. : salt is 

 the only thing which they procure with some difficulty, but the hills 

 contain several springs of salt water ; two of those are found at Sitacoond, 

 and there is another one in a creek on the opposite side of Sitacra. 

 The greatest part of salt used by people living on the banks of the river 

 was manufactured formerly there, and the spring is so impregnated with 

 salt that it gives in weight half the quantity of the salted water ; some 

 of the tribes by burning trees procure an alkali, which supplies the use 

 of salt. 



The Guayal, Bos frontalis, is found amongst the hills, particularly to 

 the south of Sitacra : there are two species, differing in size and little in 

 color ; the large one is of dark brown, and the male is nearly as high as 

 a female elephant ; the small one is of a reddish brown, it is the Tenas- 

 serim Bison, and the Arracanese call them by the same name as the 

 Burmese do. Those Guayals are perfectly distinct from the Shio of the 

 Kookies, which are smaller, have a projecting skin to their neck, and 



