284 
JOURNAL OF AN EMBASSY 
its rudeness and want of political skill, peculiarly 
ill suited for maintaining a beneficial authority 
over remote acquisitions. These possessions far¬ 
ther brought them into that collision with a civil¬ 
ized nation which ended in a contest that has 
probably for ever arrested the progress of their 
wild and barbarous conquests. 
One remarkable event in the history of the fa¬ 
mily of Alompra deserves some notice: the inva¬ 
sion of the Bur man dominions by the Chinese. 
This took place in the successive Bur man years, 
1128, 1129, 1130, and 1131, or, from 1776 to 
1780, in the reign of Sembuen, the third prince 
of the dynasty. Colonel Symes, in his narrative, 
represents the defeat and capture of a great Chi¬ 
nese army, by the skilful manoeuvres of a Bur_ 
man force sent against it. I could not hear that 
there was any foundation for this compliment to 
the military skill of the Burmese; and the fol¬ 
lowing is the version of this story, which I re¬ 
ceived from the natives themselves. The Chi¬ 
nese had ravaged the upper part of the coun¬ 
try for three years, and, on certain submissions 
being made to them by the Burmese, including 
the acknowledgment of vassalage, which they 
are accustomed to exact from their other neigh¬ 
bours, they retired. Instead of the Burmese ge¬ 
neral having captured a Chinese army, the con¬ 
vention by which he procured the evacuation 
of the country was considered by the King of 
