1859.] Itinerary in the district of Amherst, Tenasserim. 423 



moderate natural irrigation, the ground is seized upon for culti- 

 vation" — chiefly of rice, and, in higher spots, of certain favorite fruit 

 trees, the amount of orchard compared to cereal culture being very 

 large. The whole area thus under cultivation at one time, (for 

 many of the fields, which get exhausted and are never manured, are 

 abandoned every fourth or fifth year to renovate themselves by 

 lying fallow) may be reckoned at one twentieth of the whole coun- 

 try. The cleared and cultivated patches in the hills themselves are 

 too few to interfere much with this calculation. 



The population of the district is of course most dense at and 

 near Moulmein. Biloogewn island, most parts of the east banks of 

 the Thaulweug, the Gying, and the lower parts of the Attarau, are 

 tolerably well peopled, and inhabited by Talyngs. Further up the 

 rivers and near the foot of the hills the population is chiefly Karen, 

 and scattered, and two or three localities are stocked with Toung- 

 thoos, a tribe whose head quarters appear to be in the Maitabau 

 district. These, with a sprinkling of Shans along the Houugthrau, 

 constitute the population, irrespective of settlers from East Bengal 

 and Coringa. 



Having now attempted a general view of the country and its 

 inhabitants, without entering too much into dry statistical details, 

 I proceed to give a slight retrospect of our journey up the Attarau 

 and Zummee, through the Shan districts of Kyouk-khoung # and 

 Lencrka, to the Houugthrau river, and down it, after a divarication 

 to the highest point of the range on its East, home — the journey 

 occupying from the 31st January to the 7th March, 1859, and com- 

 prising a tour of 450 miles in length. 



January 31s£, 1859. — Mr. Parish and I left Moulmein (or rather 

 Obo, its north-easterly suburb) at Oh. 30m. p. m. We were travel- 

 ling in boats, one, a seven oar, for ourselves, and four others of 

 about the same dimensions conveying our baggage and followers,toge- 

 ther with ofliee writers, clerks, and police. These boats, which are of 

 Burmese build and exceedingly long for their beam, are hollowed out 

 of a single tree (the Hopea Odorata or Thengar) and built up with 

 teak topsides, thwarts, flooring, and lockers ; and with bamboo and 



* Literally "Hollow Stone" a remarkable cleft, gully, or narrow pass amongst 

 rocks, from which the district takes its name . 



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