CHAPTER VIII.
DESCRIPTION OF SHAN HOUSES—CABALISTIC CHARMS—SUPERSTITION—ANCESTRAL AND DEMON WORSHIP—SHAN DYNASTIES IN BURMAH—ZIMMÉ UNDER THE BURMESE—RULES FOR HOUSE-BUILDING—POSSESSING A GHOUL—THE SHADOW SPIRIT—KISSING WITH THE NOSE—FURNITURE—MEALS—CHINESE CHOP-STICKS—SPINSTERS—WEAVING AND EMBROIDERY—DYES—CHINESE HONGS—FISHING—REVOLT AGAINST BURMAH—ZIMMÉ AND LAPOON DESERTED—A REST-HOUSE—SHAN DIALECTS—ENTRANCE OF THE MEH HKUANG—MUSICAL WATER-WHEELS—BRICK AND TILE WORKS—HOUSES FOR THE DEMONS—HOUSES IMBEDDED IN GARDENS—LIGHT-COLOURED BUFFALOES—MY FIRST HUNT IN BURMAH—A FINE PAGODA—APPROACH TO THE CITY—ARRIVE AT ZIMMÉ—AMERICAN PRESBYTERIAN MISSIONS IN SIAM AND ZIMMÉ.
The houses in the Shan villages along the river-banks are situated in orchards of fine fruit-trees, separated from each other by palisades. The people, like the Burmese, are very fond of flowers, and rear them in their gardens, and in wooden boxes and earthenware pots placed on the balustrade of their verandahs. Young children encircle the top-knot on the head with orchids and sweet-smelling flowers. Girls wear roses, magnolias, bauhinias, jessamine, and orchids in their hair; and net flowers, seeds, and buds into fragrant and beautiful hanging ornaments of various designs. Young men are seen with flowers in the holes in their ear-lobes, which likewise serve as holders for their half-smoked cheroots. Even coolies at work in the fields have flowers in their ears to regale themselves at intervals.
The houses of the peasantry are generally built solely of bamboo, with roofs thatched with grass or the leaves of teak and eng trees. The walls are roughly constructed of bamboo matting; and bamboos slit open and spread out by gashing them on the inner side form floor planks a foot and more in width. Not a nail is used in the structure; slips of bamboo twisted into string form the only fastenings when cane is not procurable. In a country where fires are frequent, and bamboos spring up like grass, these houses are eminently adapted to the requirements of the people, as they are cheaply constructed and can easily be replaced.
Passing through the gateway in the bamboo palisading, you enter the garden where the house stands with its floor raised six or eight feet from the ground. Under the house is a space where elephant howdahs, gardening implements, and materials are kept, and where cattle can be tethered for the night. Ascending the steps, you reach a platform or verandah, which is usually partly or wholly roofed. The houses are invariably built with the gable-ends facing north and south; the verandah being generally at the southern extremity.
The east side of the verandah has a wall continuous with that of the house. Along this wall is a shelf on which are placed offerings of flowers for Buddha and for the beneficent spirits. On the western side of the verandah stands a covered settle for the earthen water-pots, which hold water for drinking and cooking purposes. The outer posts of this verandah, when only partially covered in, rise high enough to support the balustrade, on which pot-herbs, onions, chillies, garlic, flowers, and orchids are grown for family use.
The floor of the uncovered portion of the verandah serves in the daytime as a drying-place for betel-nuts and fruit, and at night, after the heat of the day, furnishes a resort for a quiet lounge under the fast cooling sky. If the family is religiously disposed, it is to the verandah that the monks are invited to conduct a merit-making service for the prosperity and health of the household; and it is to the verandah that witch-finders, medicine-men, and sorcerers, as well as monks, are received to render their services for a small consideration in cases of sickness.
Look on the tops of the house-posts, under the rafters, and you will find cabalistic charms inscribed on fragments of cloth, which have been placed there to prevent the intrusion of malignant spirits who bring calamity, disease, and death.
The belief in the spirits of the earth, found in all the dark corners of the world, and at one time nearly universal, fetters its victims with the bonds of superstition. Superstition saps all manliness from them, makes them live in constant dread of their surroundings, and consider themselves akin in soul to spirits inhabiting the lower grades of creation and the vegetable and mineral kingdom.
The spirits in the unseen world, although considered to have previously inhabited human forms, according to the people are as malicious as monkeys, and can only be kept in good humour by constant coaxing. The very best—the spirits of their ancestors, and the spirits of deceased monks, the teachers of their youth—will certainly take vengeance if provoked by neglect.
Knowing that Shan dynasties reigned in Upper Burmah from A.D. 1298 to 1554, and in Lower Burmah from A.D. 1287 to 1540, and again from 1740 to 1746; that the people of Zimmé were tributary to, and at times directly ruled by Burmah, between A.D. 1558 and 1774; and that Talaings, the people of Lower Burmah, flocked to Zimmé and Siam, and settled there in the latter half of last century and in the first half of this century,—it is not surprising to find that many superstitions held by the Talaings and Burmese are common to the people of Zimmé. Thus the instructions given in the Burmese Dehttohn upon house-building, and choosing the site and materials, and also as to the lucky day for the commencement of the house, are generally applicable to Zimmé as well as to Burmah. Superstition takes under its guidance almost every detail; and when the house is completed, it still directs as to the day and the manner of moving in to take possession, and even as to the direction the people are to repose in at night. No door or windows are allowed in the eastern wall, and the family sleep with their heads to the east.
The flooring of the house is supported by posts forked at the top to carry the floor beams on which rest the bamboo joints for supporting the planking. The walls and roof of the house are supported by other posts let two feet into the ground, and reaching to the wall-plates or to the ridge of the house, according to their position. A peculiar feature in most of the Zimmé houses is the general practice of inclining the walls slightly outwards from the floor to the roof.
The posts of the walls are arranged in sets of threes, fives, sevens, &c., as odd numbers bring luck. The spaces between each set of posts have specific names. The door of the house and the verandah or platform in front of it are almost always at the south end. The post that is occupied by the spirits, “Pee,” is on the east side next to the corner post nearest the door. The guardian spirits of the house are supposed to occupy the portion of this post above the floor, and malignant or evil spirits the portion below it.
The Pee Hpōng, or ghoul spirit, who resides in the lower region of the earth, possesses people in the following manner: A person in communion with this spirit rises quietly from sleep at night, and stealing down-stairs, tips his (or her) nose thrice against the spirit post. This action makes the face lustrous, and by its light, as by a lamp, the possessed person seeks the vile food that he craves. When satisfied, he re-tips his nose, the ghoul vanishes, and he returns to bed. The ghoul, I presume, is inhaled when first tipping the nose, and exhaled when re-tipping it. Kissing amongst the Shans and Burmese is performed by inhaling through the nose, and not as with us through the lips. Another spirit rising from the centre of the earth is Phya Ma-choo Lat, the shadow spirit, that renders people prematurely careworn and old.
The house has its floor raised a few inches above that of the verandah, and the interior is divided into one, two, or more apartments, according to its size and the wants of its owner. The furniture of the houses is very simple. Mats and cushions are piled in a corner ready for use; the handsomest cushions being triangular in section and embroidered at each end. Simple mats made of fine strips of bamboos or of a species of rush, often worked into patterns, serve as mattresses in summer, and are replaced by home-made cotton mattresses in the colder months. The mattress is rolled up during the day, and placed on the floor at night, and over it is suspended a thick cotton mosquito-curtain, through which one would think it scarcely possible to breathe. Curtains made of book muslin would be much more conducive to health, and would be equally serviceable, as they would keep out the sand-flies as well as the mosquitoes, which an ordinary mosquito-net does not do, as I found out before I had been many days in Burmah.
The fireplace consists of a wooden frame about four feet square and six inches deep, filled with earth or sand. On this is placed a light iron tripod, or what equally serves the purpose, three pieces of brick or stone to rest the pot on when the fire is kindled. In the dry season cooking is carried on in the garden, but in the rains in a compartment of the house, the smoke finding its way out through the door, windows, interstices in the mat walls, and through the roof. The utensils consist, besides the water-jars, of a few pots, pans, baskets made waterproof by coatings of thyt-si or wood-oil to serve as buckets, dippers to scoop the water from the jars made of half a cocoa-nut shell fitted with a carved wooden handle, spoons, and a few china bowls.
At meal-times, which occur about seven in the morning and towards sunset, the table, about a foot and a half in diameter and six inches high, is taken down from a shelf and placed on the floor, and by its side is put the tall slender basket of steamed glutinous rice. A lacquer or brass tray holding little bowls of fish, pork, beef, bamboo-shoots, vegetables, and curry, all cut up fine before being put in the pot, and fruit, or perhaps only a bowl of curry, a dish of pickled or dried fish, vegetables and some fruit, are then laid on the table. After the family circle has gathered round, the steamed rice is served separately to each person in a small basket. The members squatting like tailors round the tray in a circle, take up the rice in lumps with their fingers, and dip it into the common bowl of curry, and pick out tit-bits from the other bowls as it suits their fancy. When soup or gravy is served, a common spoon is used; each takes a spoonful and then passes the spoon to his neighbour. After meals it is customary to wash your own bowl, as well as your mouth and fingers.
1, 2, Lacquered, bamboo dish with plaited cover. 3, Wooden comb. 4, 5, 6, Baskets for carrying cooked rice. 7, Ladle for water. 8, Bamboo lantern.
Whatever one may think of the habit of eating with one’s fingers, it is much more seemly than the Chinese custom of feeding with chop-sticks. It is simply disgusting to watch a Chinaman shovelling in his food, and attempting to convey it neatly to his mouth, with these curious and most unsuitable implements.
1, Divider for cotton. 2, Basket and bow for carding cotton. 3, Wheel to spin cotton. 4, 5, Spinner for silk. 6, Divider for silk.
As in olden time in England, so now in the Shan States, every unmarried woman is a spinster, and makes homespun garments for the household. Each house has its native loom and spinning implements, and the women, rich and poor, spend much of their time in providing clothes for the monasteries and for their home-folk. Many are skilled in embroidery, working beautiful patterns in gold and silver thread, and in worsted, cotton, and silk. Both cotton and silk fabrics are woven at the looms, and many of the embroidered goods are taken to Burmah, where they fetch a high price.
The cotton is grown in the gardens surrounding the house, or purchased in the neighbourhood. Some of the silk is produced from the cocoons of the local silk-worms, and the rest is brought by the Chinese from China. The dyes used by the people to within the last few years were solely vegetable; but these, and pity ’tis so, are being displaced by German aniline dyes. The favourite colours are indigo, orange, maroon, and a reddish brown. Many of the Muhseurs and Upper Shans use a black dye made from the berries of the ebony tree. Turmeric and safflower give a yellow dye; soap-acacia, green; tamarind-fruit a deep red colour, approaching purple; and sapan and thyt-si wood, red.
After breakfast we left Htong Htau, the monk and his acolytes coming to the bank to see us off. Half a mile farther the Meh Khan, a river 150 feet broad, enters from the west. In the village at its mouth is a large teak-built house in an extensive stockade belonging to a Chinese hong or merchant company. We soon afterwards reached Wang Hluang Pow—the Wang Pow where Phya Cha Ban removed his court after deserting Zimmé in 1775.
The houses about here are thatched under the gable-ends as well as on the roofs. The village extends for over two miles, chiefly along the east bank of the river. Rows of women, approaching each other in lines extending from bank to bank, were fishing with drop-nets, formed of a wire frame 2 feet 6 inches square, to which the net is attached. The frame of the net is suspended from four pieces of bamboo string, one at each corner, tied together to form a handle.
On the west bank of the river is a fine temple and monastery; and a little above Wang Pow a large rest-house stands boldly out from the trees, and is called Nong Doo Sakan by the Zimmé Shans, and Nong Loo Sakan by the Shans in the British Shan States. In the same way Loi, “a mountain,” in British Shan turns to Doi in Zimmé, and in Kampti Shan is Noi. The dialectic differences amongst the various tribes of Shans chiefly lie in a change of the first letter of words and in the occasional dropping of the second letter of a double consonant at the commencement of a word. Ruen, a house, and pla, a fish, in Siamese, become huen and pa in Zimmé and Kampti Shan; ban, a village in Siamese and Zimmé dialects, becomes man in Kampti; chang, an elephant in Siamese and Zimmé, becomes tsang in British Shan and Kampti; and ny changes into y, kl to kr, kh to k, k to ch, and ch into s and ts in various dialects. Most of the Zimmé Shans call Zimmé “Kiang Mai”; the Siamese term it “Chieng Mai.” The Zimmé and British Shans talk of “Kiang Hai”; the Siamese call that place “Chieng Rai.”
Nong Doo Sakan was erected at the expense of the villagers, as a work of merit, for the accommodation of travellers journeying along the main road to Muang Haut. It is built entirely of bamboo and thatched with thek-keh grass. Over a stream on the opposite side of the river was a wooden bridge—the first I had seen since leaving Burmah.
Continuing our journey through the village of Kweh Chow, we reached the southern mouth of the Meh Hkuang, which enters from the east. Between it and the northern mouth lies Pak Bong, a revenue station of the Shan State of Lapoon.
The Meh Hkuang rises in the hills to the north-east of Zimmé, close to the sources of the Meh Low, and by means of canals and irrigating channels irrigates the Zimmé and Lapoon plain nearly to the bank of the Meh Ping. A short distance from its mouth it is joined by the Meh Ta, on which lies the large village of Pa Sang, where Chow Ka Wi La, the successor of Phya Cha Ban, established his court for the fifteen years previous to the reoccupation of Zimmé in 1796. Owing to the rebellion of the Zimmé Shans against the Burmese in 1774, when they threw off the Burman yoke and accepted the protection of Siam, a period of warfare ensued. The Burmese besieged Zimmé in 1775. When relieved by the approach of a Siamese force, the Zimmé Shans scattered to the north and south, and the chief, Phya Cha Ban, removed his court to Ta Wang Pow, and, on the approach of a Burmese force, fled to Raheng. The Burmese entered Siam, but were repulsed after they had taken several Siamese cities. The Zimmé chief then returned with his people to Wang Pow. In 1777, owing to a fresh advance of the Burmese, he removed his court to Nong Long, but the following year, owing to the retirement of the Burmese, fixed it at Lapoon, where he was attacked by the chiefs of Kiang Hai and Kiang Hsen. He then fled southwards and set up his court at Wang Sa Kang. Zimmé was deserted for twenty years, 1776–1796, and Lapoon for forty-one years, 1779–1820.
Two miles beyond Pa Sang we halted for the night at a village on the eastern bank, where ten great spider-web wheels in continuous motion watered the gardens and neighbouring fields. The music made by the axles of these wheels working on the trestles which supported them, resembled the tones of an organ, and at night lulled us to sleep.
Next morning we passed a brick-field where seven small clamps, each ten feet square and five feet high, were being burned. Close by, on the opposite bank, a miniature Shan house, about the size of a large pigeon-house, had been built for the accommodation of a local demon. Many such houses, even in the grounds of temples, were subsequently seen along the route. The boatmen passing us in the various craft were now all clad, as the villages were numerous, and roads skirted the river. Several of them were wearing billycock felt hats, common amongst lower-class Chinamen.
We halted for a few minutes at the village of Nong Sang, or Nong Chang, “the elephant’s lake,” to inspect the tile works. The men were puddling the clay on a buffalo’s hide by pounding it with their feet. The roofing-tiles are a quarter of an inch thick, nine inches long, and four and a half inches broad, and are turned up at one end for three-quarters of an inch to enable them to hang on to the battens of the roof. They are moulded separately on a bench, across which the man sits astride. After sanding the mould, he plunges the clay into it, and cuts off the superfluous material with a string fastened to a fiddle-bow. The upper face of the tile is then smoothed with a three-sided stick, which has been previously cleansed by rubbing it against two cylindrical brushes made of cocoa-nut fibre, which lie in a little trough, raised on posts, and full of water. The front of the mould is movable. The tiles are taken out and dried under a thatched shed, and afterwards are placed on their side-edge in a kiln and burned. The tiles are used for roofing the temples and better class of Shan and Chinese houses.
Two miles farther we passed another village of tile-makers, and at the 220th mile came to Ban Hsope Long, above which is a series of long, cultivated islands. Both banks of the river as well as the islands are embanked to save the cultivation from being swamped in flood-time.
Above Hsope Long, which extends for about two miles, we passed through the village of Ta Kwai, “the buffalo’s ford,” and halted for breakfast. From here the banks of the river to some miles above the city of Zimmé are nearly continuously fringed with villages. The houses, temples, and monasteries are imbedded in, and often hidden by, beautiful orchards, containing palms, cocoa-nut, mango, tamarind, citron, orange, pummelo, and many other fruit and flowering trees, and the whole scene on land and water is one of bustling life.
In an hour we were off again, and after passing the temple and monastery of Koon Kong, came to a large hong belonging to some Chinese merchants of Raheng. A mile farther the Meh Kha entered from the west, and just above its mouth is the village of Pak Muang.
Opposite Pak Muang many buffaloes of a light colour were lying in the river, enjoying still contentment, with their nostrils only just above the water. If they had not been too indolent to scent us, they would have advanced with heads stretched out, horns laid back, and nostrils sniffing to satisfy their natural curiosity, and then have plunged back helter-skelter to the bank, and stood gazing at us from a respectful distance; or else, finding we were strangers of the hated white race, have lowered their heads, made lances of their horns, and charged full tilt at us. My first experience of hunting in Burmah was being hunted when on pony-back by a herd of buffaloes in full chase after me, and being saved by the herd boy, a lad of eleven or twelve years of age, who, happening to be between me and them, rushed forward and drove them in another direction. I would gladly have tipped that boy if I could have got at him without renewing my acquaintance with the buffaloes. At Ta Hong Pai, and later at Song Kare, a village at the mouth of the Meh Ka, which enters from the east, I got a good view of Loi Soo Tayp, the great hill behind Zimmé, and made sketches, at the same time taking angles to the well-defined peaks. We halted for the night at the monastery of Chedi Lee-am, which is situated at the 233d mile to the east of the river.
View of Loi Soo Tayp from Ban Meh Ka.
Chedi Lee-am, the pagoda to which the monastery is attached, was the largest seen by me in the Shan States. A hole five feet in diameter had been broken into one side of it near the top, in order to rob the shrine; otherwise it was in good repair. This pagoda is peculiar in shape, and resembles a rectangular church-steeple rising in five great steps or tiers, cut off from the tower and placed on the ground. Its summit has not been provided with a htee, or umbrella.
Each side of each tier had three niches, and each niche contained a statue of Gaudama larger than life, making sixty images in all. At each corner of each tier was a pedestal finished off with a flame-like ornament at the top. The pagoda was 60 feet square at the base, and 120 feet high. It is made of brick, and plastered over with excellent cement.
The next day, the 25th of February, we left early, being eager to arrive at Zimmé, which was distant less than two hours’ journey. The night’s rain had washed the face of Nature, burnished the trees, and brightened the whole landscape. The cool fresh morning air, that bathed one’s hands and face, was scented with the fragrance of flowering shrubs and trees, and the panorama we were passing through was delightful.
Temples decorated with dark red and gold, and picturesque monasteries, were set like gems in the beautiful fringes of foliage that skirted the banks. Women and girls, gaily attired in a striped petticoat, or one of a small tartan, and a silk scarf thrown over the left shoulder, tripped along barefooted on their way to the city, with baskets of garden-produce and flowers. Here was a group of men and women squatting on the sands, and having a chat before crossing the ford; there men, women, and children, with their garments tucked up above their knees, laughing and joking as they waded the stream; children playing in the water, dashing it about and splashing each other; cattle lowing on the banks on their way to the fields; the sun lighting up the bald pates and yellow garments of the monks and acolytes who were passing in processions and carrying their begging-bowls through the suburbs, which now lined the banks; women and children heaping their little cups of rice and saucers of fish and condiments into the monks’ bowls—whilst the monks,—at least the young ones, who have the reputation of being a jovial crew,—peeped over their fans, which were intended to veil fair women from their sight.
Half an hour before reaching the wooden bridge that spans the river, we came in sight of the walled city, which lies 430 yards inland from the west bank; then rowing between vegetable gardens, which had been planted on the numerous sandbanks, halted at the bridge to learn the position of the quarters of the American Presbyterian Mission, which had been established since 1867 in the suburbs of Zimmé, and since 1840 in Bangkok. The bridge lies 82¼ miles from Muang Haut and 236½ miles from Hlineboay, or about 300 miles from Maulmain. The height of the banks near the bridge is 1008 feet above sea-level.