can boast of a civilisation dating from twenty-three
centuries B.C." So Terrien de Lacouperie tells us, who had a happy
faculty of drawing upon his imagination for his facts.

Under the wide branches of a banyan tree I made my men stop, for I was
very tired, and while they waited I lay down for an hour on the grass
and had a refreshing sleep. While I slept, the rest of the escort sent
to "_sung_" me to Santa arrived. Within a few yards of my resting place
there is a characteristic monument, dating from the time when Burma
occupied not only this valley but the fertile territory beyond it, and
beyond Tengyueh to the River Salween. It is a solid Burmese pagoda,
built of concentric layers of brick and mortar, and surmounted with a
solid bell-shaped dome that is still intact. It stands alone on the
plain near a group of banyans, and its erection no doubt gained many
myriads of merits for the conscience-stricken Buddhist who found the
money to build it. All goldleaf has been peeled off the pagoda years
ago.

It was a picturesque party that now enfiladed into the wide stretch of
sand which in the rainy season forms the bed of the river. Mounted on
his white pony, there was the inarticulate European who had discarded
his Chinese garb and was now dressed in the aesthetic garments of the
Australian bush; there were his two coolies and Laotseng his boy, none
of whom could speak any English, the two officers in their loose Chinese
clothes, mounted on tough little ponies, and eight soldiers. They were
Shans of kindly feature, small and nimble fellows, in neat
uniforms--green jackets edged with black and braided with yellow, yellow
sashes, and loose dark-blue knickerbockers--the uniform of the Sawbwa of
Ganai. They were armed with Remington rifles, carried their cartridges
in bandoliers, and seemed to be of excellent fighting material. All
their accoutrements were in good order.

Now we had to cross the broad stream, here running with a swift current
over the sand, in channels of varying depths that are frequently
changing. For the width of nearly half a mile at the crossing place the
water was never shallower than to my knee, nor deeper than to my waist.
We all crossed safely, but, to my tribulation, the soldier who was
carrying my two boxes tripped in the deepest channel and let both boxes
slip from the carrying pole into the water. All the notes and papers
upon which this valuable record is founded were much damaged. But it
mi