LISU TRIBES OF THE BURMA-CHINA FRONTIER. 
255 
They married, they were fruitful 
And nine sons were their offspring. 
They married, were multiplied and scattered afar. 
From these nine have sprung the races of men ; 
And now they are divided, spread over the mountains, 
Countless are they and numberless the tongues they speak. 
* * * =j= 
Second Chanty. 
Alas, alas the great Fords will leave us. 
Fike two streams from the mountains our waters have met, 
Have met and for awhile have flowed together. 
Now they must part again, each taking its own course, 
Winding through the valleys, turned by the mountains 
Till the current of our lives at last shall meet again, 
Meet in the great flood and our waters flow together 
Swift and deep, to part no more. 
Black ’ ’ or Independent 
Lisu. 
Remote as are the homes of the “ White” (Pai) and the “ Flowery ” (Hua) 
Fisu, the branches of the tribe which have been even so 
slightly affected by Chinese influence , the ‘ ‘ Black ’ ’ or 
independent Fisu hold the upper reaches of the Salween 
river between Fatitudes 26°~30 / and 27°-30 / , and no authority has dared to question 
their freedom in those wild and inhospitable regions. The late Mr. George Fitton 
and his companion Mr. Forrest 1 endured great hardships during an advance into their 
country as far north as Fatitude 26°-45' in 1905, and in the spring of the present year 
an expedition has tried to learn more of this wild valley, which has been so closely 
guarded by Nature. The two German travellers 2 who led the party lost their lives 
at the hands of the tribesmen near O-ma-ti (about Fat. 27 °-i 5 'F and their Indian servant 
alone survived to tell the tale. From all accounts these Black Fisu differ little in their 
way of life, their customs, their dress or their language from their less savage kins- 
folk, save that they are hemmed in by steep, snow-clad peaks to a narrow river valley 
choked with dense tropical jungle and tough lianas, where there is little opportunity 
for obtaining the bare necessaries of life. They have learned the art of arming them- 
selves better than their neighbours, their cross-bows of wild mulberry wood will carty 
an arrow smeared with deadly aconite into an enemy at a distance of fifty or sixty paces 
and, known to the Chinese by the name of ‘ ‘ Futzu ’ ’ or Salween Men, they have become 
the terror of the Upper Salween. Even the neighbouring villages are generally at feud, 
owing to cattle raids and reprisals, and when the men are not engaged in hunting or in 
harrying their neighbours, they lay wait for the rare Chinese traders who cross the 
ranges from the Mekong, and rob and murder all who venture near their inhospitable 
> Journal of the Royal Geographical Society, Vol. XXXII, Mr. Forrest’s Account of Journey to the Upper Salween. 
2 Dr. Brunhuber and Herr Carl Schmitz. 
