NOTES ON THE SIAMESE PROVINCES OF KOOWI, &C. 75 



Four years ago a telegraph line from Bangkok was carried 

 through these provinces, and a station was opened at Bang- 

 taphan, but so frequently was the wire broken and instruments 

 out of order, that it was seldom of any practical use. Already 

 there is scarcely a sound pole, and certainly not a perpendi- 

 cular one, and in many places the wire has forsaken the 

 insulators and takes its support directly from the ground. 



Location of Towns and Villages. 



Dacoity, or rather midnight robbery, is so rife in the dis- 

 trict that the people, afraid to live in isolated and remote 

 houses, congregate in towns and villages. These, surround- 

 ed by their paddy-fields, are situated upon the banks of a 

 stream just so far from the mouth as a junk or big Siamese 

 boat can reach at high water. In a small stream as that of 

 Krat, the village is but a quarter of a mile from the sea ; 

 Bangtaphan, which stands upon a much larger stream, is two 

 miles up the river, while Champoon, upon a much larger 

 stream still, is nearly ten miles from the sea. The town oc- 

 cupying such a situation has the advantages of an ample sup- 

 ply of fresh water except at full tide, easy access to the sea 

 for trade and fishing, and still in the midst of its paddy-fields. 

 At the mouth of the river is commonly a small fishing hamlet 

 known as the f'aknam, but which as in Taiyang, at the mouth 

 of the Champoon River, may wax bigger than the principal 

 town situated higher up the river. The village of Paron 

 upon the concession of "The Gold Fields of Siam Company/'' 

 is a product of the mining industry there and is the only ex- 

 ception I know of in these provinces to the general situation 

 upon the flat alluvial soil near the mouth of a river. 



Composition of a Village or Town. 



These villages or towns resemble each other as much as 

 peas do ; they agree in being an irregular row of bamboo 

 houses covered with attaps, raised upon posts some five feet 

 above the ground and usually about one hundred of them 

 huddled upon one or both banks of the stream. Gardens 

 surround the houses usually containing chilies, papaya trees, 



