85 
North from Ava. 
nobly and conveniently situated, at the junction, in a fertile and 
Jiiglily beautiful country, containing immense rivers, extended 
plains, lofty mountains, projecting rocks, and abundant mate- 
rials for the most ornamented architecture. The climate, however, 
of the Mranma territory is not very favourable ; the rains being 
seldom sufficiently abundant ; so that without artificial irrigation, 
all the neighbouring countries are more productive of grain. A 
though not reckoned so salubrious as Rangoun, Ava is by 
means unhealthy. The Mringngseh, in the accompanying map 
appears as if it sprung from the face of the hills east from Ava 
but, in fact, as we learn from the general map of the slave, 
it passes a great way through the mountainous country of 
the Shanwas, rising on the frontier of China, and probably 
passes near Bodusen, from whence running south, throqgh a 
populous valley, to the parallel of Ava, it there turns west to 
join the Erawadi ; nor, on account of its being called the Little 
River, are we to conceive, that its size is like the streams of 
Britain, the largest of which, among the Mranmas, would be 
only considered as a Khiaun, and would not receive the title of 
Mrit. Its mouth, which alone I saw, was very wide, although 
no doubt inferior to the Rrawadi, and it is only in comparison 
with this, that it has obtained the denomination Little. 
Some way before the Mringngseh joins the Erawadi, it re- 
ceives two branches, one only of which, the Panlaun, is men- 
tioned in the accompanying Map ; and as it comes from about 
the south-west, the paper did not admit of its being laid right 
down. The compiler, therefore, has been under the necessity 
of making its course east and west, and therefore of bringing 
all the neighbouring cities, such as Puefla and Lsehghia, much 
too near Sibho. Neither of the branches of the Mringngaeh ad- 
mit of navigation ; but canals dug from them irrigate a large 
extent of country, at present, I believe, the most productive ter- 
ritory of the empire. 
Owing to the Panlaun having been too much bent to the 
north, and the Banmo too much to the south, the whole of the 
Mrelap Shan country to the east of the Erawadi is in this Map 
much distorted; but the distances will serve to give the real si- 
tuations. It must be observed, that to the east of the seven ci- 
lies held by Shanwa chiefs on the Era^vadi, there is a large 
