ght have been worse. I had a presentiment that an accident would
happen, and had waded back to the channel and was standing by at the
time. But for this the papers might have been floated down to the
Irrawaddy and been lost to the world--loss irreparable!

The sun was very hot. I laid out my things on the bank and dried them.
Long and narrow dugouts, as light and swift as the string-test gigs of
civilisation, paddled or poled, were gliding with extraordinary speed
down the channel near the bank. Riding then a little way, we dismounted
under a magnificent banyan tree, one of the finest specimens, I should
think, in the world. Ponies and men were dwarfed into Lilliputians under
the amazing canopy of its branches. A number of villagers, come to see
the foreigner, were clambering like monkeys over its roots, which
"writhed in fantastic coils" over half an acre. Their village was hard
by, a poor array of mud houses; the teak temple to which we were
conducted was raised on piles in the centre of the village. The temple
was lumbered like an old curiosity shop with fragmentary gods and torn
missals. Yet the ragged priest in his smirched yellow gown, and shaven
head that had been a week unshaven, seemed to enjoy a reputation for no
common sanctity, to judge by the reverence shown him by my followers,
and the contemptuous indifference with which he regarded their
obeisance. He was club-footed and could only hobble about with
difficulty--an excuse he would, no doubt, urge for the disorder of his
sanctuary. To me, of course, he was very polite, and gave me the best
seat he had, while Laotseng prepared me a bowl of cocoa. Then we rode
along the right bank of the river, but kept moving away from the stream
till in the distance across the plain at the foot of the hills, we saw
the Shan town of Santa, the end of our day's stage.

Native women, returning from the town, were wending their way across the
plain--lank overgrown girls with long thin legs and overhanging mops of
hair like deck-swabs. They were a favourite butt of my men, who chaffed
them in the humorous Eastern manner, with remarks that were, I am
afraid, more coarse than witty. Kachins are not virtuous. Their customs
preclude such a possibility. No Japanese maiden is more innocent of
virtue than a Kachin girl.

CHAPTER XXI.

THE SHAN TOWN OF SANTA, AND MANYUEN, THE SCENE OF CONSUL MARGARY'S
MURDER.

It was market day in Santa, and the accustomed crowd gathered r