TO THE COURT OF AVA. 
235 
river, was estimated, by former European inquir¬ 
ers, as high as seventeen millions, as nineteen mil¬ 
lions, and even as thirty-three millions. The area 
of the country would then have been about 
268,000 square miles; so that the lowest of these 
estimates would have given above sixty-three in¬ 
habitants to the square mile, the second of above 
seventy, and the third of a hundred and twenty- 
three. When it is considered that the greater 
part of the country is still in a state of nature; 
that the inhabitants are in a semi-barbarous state, 
possessing neither agricultural, commercial, or 
manufacturing industry ; that they have lived for 
ages in a state of war or anarchy; that they are 
egregiously misgoverned; and, finally, that in a 
fertile territory and favourable climate, where 
there is room for a dense population, the effectual 
wages of labour are not low, as in fully-peopled 
countries, but high, as in thinly-inhabited ones, it 
is impossible to believe but that such estimates are 
greatly over-rated. 
We are at present in possession of a few facts, 
which may lead us to more reasonable conjectures e 
The provinces South of the Saluen river, depo¬ 
pulated by oppression and consequent emigration, 
cannot fairly be taken as a standard for the whole 
empire. Arracan, computed to contain about 
seven inhabitants to the square mile, will probably 
make a nearer approach to it. Were the whole 
Burman territory, then, peopled only in the ratio 
