CHAPTER XVI.
A STATE VISIT FROM CHIEF—INSIGNIA OF OFFICE—PLENTIFUL RAINFALL—RAIN-CLOUDS FROM THE NORTH—ONLY SILVER COINS—INDIAN MONEY—FRONTIER DUES—FERRY TOLL—FISHING AS A LIVELIHOOD—SALT AND COWRIES AS SMALL CHANGE—TRICKS WITH THE CURRENCY IN SIAM—ROBBING THE POOR—A FOOTPRINT OF BUDDH—A MONK SPOILT BY THE LADIES—RUINED TEMPLES STREWN WITH BRONZE IMAGES—CARL BOCK’S LOOT—THE EMERALD BUDDH—A TATTOOED LAOS SHAN—MADRAS BOYS TAKEN FOR OGRES—MARCHING IN SINGLE FILE—SCENE AT THE FORD—CHEAP PROVISIONS—CHINESE CARAVANS—COST OF CARRIAGE—OPINION OF DR CHEEK AS TO THE PROSPECTS FOR A BURMAH-CHINA RAILWAY—POPULATION OF SIAMESE SHAN STATES—PROTECTION OF CARAVAN—BIRDS AND MONKEYS DYING OF GRIEF—SECOND VISIT FROM THE LA-HU—MARRIAGE CUSTOMS—DIVORCE—GOLD IN THE KIANG TUNG LAWA COUNTRY—FISHING BY TORCHLIGHT.
In the afternoon the Chow Hluang came in state to return our visit. He was dressed in a pith helmet, a plum-coloured silk panung, a white cotton jacket with gold buttons, a white sash round his waist, and sandals which he kicked off at the door. He was accompanied by a train of followers holding a large umbrella over him and bearing some of the insignia of his office. The full list of these is given in the chronicle of the governors as follows: Two gold cup-stands, two gold boxes with conical covers, a gold stand for a water-goblet, a gold utensil for siri-leaf, which is chewed with betel-nut, a gold box for lip-salve, a gold-handled sword and scabbard, a silver coronet set with rubies, two helmets and sets of weapons, as well as two elephants.
He told me that the people of Kiang Hai never suffered from drought; the rainfall was plentiful, greatly exceeding that of Zimmé and Lakon, and the rain-clouds came from the north, not from the south-west as in Burmah. On expressing my surprise, Dr M‘Gilvary informed me that the statement was correct, for he had often noticed the fact in Zimmé. This of course would account for Kiang Hai and Kiang Hsen being much more favoured with rain than Lakon, Zimmé, and Lapoon, which lie to the south of the great hills forming the water-parting of the Meh Ping and the Meh Kong. Tea grows wild on the hills to the north of the Meh Khoke, and is cultivated by the hill tribes.
He said that no copper coins were in use in the city, and that the coinage consisted of Indian rupees, and two and four anna bits. The smaller coins are scarce, and are used for buttons and other ornaments. Small purchases are made by barter.
The frontier-duty station is at Muang Doo, a village to the north of the Meh Khoke, where 3 rupees are levied on every ten laden porters, 4 annas on a laden ox, 3 annas on an unladen ox, and 8 annas on a laden pony or mule. Two ponies in every ten are allowed to pass free. Similar frontier import duties are levied in the Siamese Shan States of Lakon, Lapoon, Peh, and Nan. No frontier duties exist in the Burmese Shan States.
At the ferry over the Meh Khoke, near Kiang Hai, a toll is taken which covers the ferry hire, but is charged whether the animals are ferried across or wade the river. The toll amounts to 4 annas for a laden mule, pony, or ox, and 2 annas for a laden porter. No other duties or tolls are levied in the Zimmé State from people entering it from the north.
The only other taxes raised in Kiang Hai are upon the sale of animals. Both the buyer and seller of an elephant have to pay 5 rupees; the purchaser of a buffalo, 8 annas; of cattle, 4 annas; and of a pony, 8 annas. The land-tax goes to the feudal lord, and may be considered as land rent. Comparing it with the tax of one-fourth of the produce, which by the Code of Menu should go to the king, this tax is very light, being only one basket of paddy for each basket that is sown. The out-turn in the Zimmé States varies from 40-fold to 250-fold the amount sown.
The people of Kiang Hai gain their livelihood chiefly by catching and drying fish, which are very plentiful in the streams and lakes. They export the fish to Zimmé, Ngow, Lakon, and Lapoon, in exchange for areca-nuts, cloth, salt, and other necessaries. English salt from Bangkok sells at Kiang Hai for 16 rupees a sen (266⅔ lb.), or about a penny a pound. Salt from Muang Nan fetches only 14 rupees for the same weight. The salt-mines in Muang Nan are situated in the hills above the capital, at Muang Mang, Bau Soo-ek, Bau Hsow, and Bau Wa.
Dr M‘Gilvary said that up to 1874 salt was used as currency for purchases in the Zimmé market; and that up to 1865, bee-a, or cowries, were in use in Siam: the value of these were so small that from 800 to 1500 went to a fuang (7½ cents). The cowries were imported from Bombay.
The late King of Siam determined to stop the use of cowries as currency, and floated a token money of lead. As he could place what value he liked upon the lead coins, he resolved that 64 large stamped pieces, or 128 small stamped pieces, should go to a tical of silver, although the lead in them would cost less than half that amount. At the same time he issued a new flat silver tical (60 cents), a trifle less heavy than the bullet-shaped ticals that had been issued in the previous reign.
The monetary transaction in lead would bring 100 per cent profit to his treasury, and likewise—which he does not seem to have counted on—to the treasury of any one who thought fit to forge the coins. For some time the Government made a splendid profit, but soon domestic and foreign forgers filled the market with their bogus issue. A great panic ensued among the people: the lead pieces were generally refused, and the Government had to stop coining them.
Before the collapse of the lead coinage, the king determined further to replenish his treasury by another device. He issued copper coins, two of which were to be valued at a fuang (7½ cents), and to weigh together a trifle over half an ounce. To ensure their being taken by the people, he declared cowries to be no longer current. As he did not call the cowries in, and exchange them for the lead or copper coins, they became worthless to their possessors.
This was a sad stroke of fortune for the poor people, but worse was to come. When the present King of Siam came to the throne, finding that forgery of the debased coinage was naturally prevalent, he reduced the currency value of the old lead coins by declaring 40 of them equal to a fuang, or 320 to a tical,—considerably less than the actual value of the lead contained in them. The copper pieces he reduced in value to 8 for a fuang, or to a fourth of the value that they had been issued at. The people thus lost the gross value of their cowries, and were robbed of half the value of their lead coins, and three-fourths the value of their copper ones.
The only parallel that I can find for such vexatious proceedings on the part of a Government, is that of Turkey, which repudiated its paper currency in 1877–79, and in the latter year demonetised its debased coinage. But Turkey had the excuse that it had become bankrupt in 1875. It is well for the Siamese Shan States that their currency is that of British India and not that of Siam, or the people would have suffered with the Siamese. The only Siamese currency seen by me to the north of Kampheng Phet were copper coins used for small change.
After the chief had gone, we strolled about the ruins in the city. The chief of these are at Wat Pa Sing, and Wat Ngam Muang, “the beautiful temple of the city.” In the former was a Pra Bat, or footprint of Gaudama, 6½ feet long, 3 feet broad, and 4 inches deep, impressed on a stone slab, and heavily gilded; a Chinese image of Buddha; one of Maha Ka Sat; besides the ordinary images.
Maha Ka Sat, if one may judge from his likenesses, must have been a very Falstaff in the flesh. Portow accounted for his plumpness, by telling us that this individual, although very religiously disposed, was so handsome, that when he put on the yellow robe and became a monk, all the women doted on him; and as the monks and nanes with their pupils went round in the morning collecting food for the day, they piled up all the tit-bits into his bowl. From over-indulgence he grew enormously fat, and lost all chance of becoming a Buddh in his next existence.
A crowned Buddha.
The ruins both within and without the city were strewn with valuable bronze images. The people objected to these being taken away, as they contained the spirits of deceased monks, who would certainly wreak vengeance on them if their domiciles were removed from the sacred precincts. All of the trouble experienced by Carl Bock in the Zimmé States arose from his robbing the ruined temples of their images, and snapping his fingers in the faces of the chiefs and people when they remonstrated with him. How he escaped from the country with his plunder, and why he was not murdered, is an enigma to me.
On the north end of a hillock which protrudes from the north-west corner of the city, where the old palace was situated, and near the river, are the walled grounds of a temple and pagoda, trimly kept, and in good repair. From these grounds the view of the country to the north and west is superb: the great spurs of Loi Pong Pra Bat in the distance look like isolated mountains, the spurs rising considerably higher than the crest of the range linking them together. This peculiar arrangement is noticeable in all the great hill-ranges that I saw in the Shan States, the spurs seeming to have been carved out of a great uneven plateau. Between the great spurs and the river several low hillocks, seemingly the remains of a low-lying plateau, are seen, and amongst these the river winds its way amidst limestone bluffs.
In A.D. 1436 one of the pagodas in the city was rent by lightning, and the celebrated “Emerald Buddh,” cut out of green jasper, was exposed in the shrine in its breast. This image is now enthroned under a seven-tiered white umbrella in Wat Pra Kao, at Bangkok. When discovered it was removed to Zimmé, then being rebuilt after its destruction by the Siamese in 1430. Afterwards it was removed to Vieng Chang, probably early in the sixteenth century, when the successor of the Laos king who ruled at Zimmé moved the capital to Vieng Chang; and ultimately to Bangkok in 1779, two years after the Siamese had made Vieng Chang a province of their empire.
The Lao, with heads shaven with the exception of a blacking-brush tuft at the top, have an absurd resemblance to the wooden monkeys on a draw-stick, formerly sold in the Lowther Arcade. One seen at Kiang Hai was decorated with a peculiar form of tattooing consisting of a mass of blue dots free from any design, with the exception of ornamental edging along the waist and below the knees. This style of tattooing may be a specimen of an ancient type once current amongst the eastern branch of the Shans. At a little distance it resembles a pair of knee-breeches. I have never seen it elsewhere, except in the case of one of the princes of Muang Nan.
The next morning I watched the people streaming over the ford on their way to market, and was amused to see the terror expressed in the faces of the women as they passed our sala, and were horrified at the sight of our Madras boys. Group after group screamed with fright, and scurried by as fast as they could go. Those who looked back were further scared by the hideous grimaces the three scamps made at them. The women must have taken the boys for yaks, or ogres: they had evidently never seen black men before.
Fishing implements used in Siam.
It is the habit of every one in the Shan States to proceed in single file, and the same rule is followed by the elephants and caravan animals. For some time in the early morning the procession of people and animals on their way to the city was continuous. Gaily dressed Burmese Shans, carrying their shoulder-bamboos, passed by, and were often accompanied by their women, who were dressed in beautiful embroidered skirts, loose blue spencers, and steeple-crowned broad-brimmed hats of plaited straw, or else of palm-leaf, similar to those worn by the men, and separated from the crown of their head by a pad, and fastened under the chin by a string. Then would come a string of fisher men and women from the great staked fishing-dam that has been erected across the river a little above the ford. These would be followed by market-women, long caravans of laden oxen, mules, and ponies; and lastly, by some elephants. The market-women, having just crossed the ford, were short-kilted, and, as is usual with the Zimmé Shans, the unmarried women were guiltless of clothing above the waist.
Fishing implements used in Siam.
The prices in the market would make the mouths of our stay-at-home people water: large fowls, twopence each; large ducks, fourpence; rice, three pounds a penny; fresh fish, a halfpenny a pound; and sugar, a penny a pound.
A company of Yunnan Chinese with a caravan of twenty-six ponies camped close to our rest-house. The head-man told me that they had brought with them silk thread, straw hats, and copper pans, and had come from Nah Hseh (Yunnan Fu). Altogether, they would be six months absent, but two months of that time would be spent in selling their goods, in purchasing salt, betel-nut, &c., for sale and barter amongst the Karens, and in bartering for and purchasing the cotton they intended to carry back with them. The journey from Kiang Hai to Yunnan Fu takes them six weeks.
The cotton costs them 5 rupees a muen (25 lb.), and fetches 20 rupees at Yunnan Fu. The cost of carriage, including collection for each muen, is therefore 15 rupees, or (with exchange at sixteen pence for a rupee) £89, 12s. a ton. Assuming Lakon as the centre of their collecting ground, the average distance a ton would have to be conveyed to Yunnan Fu if carried by railway, would be 665 miles; and the cost for the journey, at a penny a mile, would be £2, 15s. 5d., or—if we allow £9, 12s. a ton for the cost of collection, and £80 as the present cost of carriage—nearly twenty-nine times as cheap as the cost by caravan.
Dr Cheek, a son-in-law of Dr M‘Gilvary, who was for some years stationed at Zimmé as medical officer attached to the American Presbyterian Mission, interested himself in collecting information concerning the country, and caravan traffic. In a book termed ‘Siam and Laos,’ recently published by the American Presbyterian Mission Board, he states, in an article written before I explored the country, that—
“Sir Arthur Phayre represents the Laos (Shan) ‘traders as industrious, energetic, possessing a marvellous capacity for travelling as petty merchants, and longing for free trade.’ My own knowledge, after a residence of several years in Cheung Mai (Zimmé), confirms this official statement.
“The agricultural richness of the plain is known. The forests of valuable timber clothing the hills and mountains are another source of wealth. A large proportion of the teak timber shipped from Maulmain comes from the Zimmé forests. The mineral resources of this Laos country are varied and extensive: deposits of many of the useful and precious metals are known to exist; iron, copper, zinc, lead, silver, antimony, nickel, and gold are found in greater or less abundance. Coal has been found along the river (Meh Ping) after heavy rains, and petroleum has also been discovered.
“The importance of Zimmé is not, however, sufficiently indicated by a statement of the productions and population of the province. Its resources can never be fully developed if it is in the future to remain so cut off from the rest of the world as it always has been. The problem of a direct trade-route connecting China with the British possessions in India, is at the present time attracting much interest. The route across northern Yunnan, viâ Bhamo, into Burmah, has been sufficiently investigated to ascertain that for overland commerce to any considerable amount it is impracticable. It remains to discover the best route possible through the Laos (Zimmé Shan) country.
“To one who is aware of the extent of the trade that exists and has been carried on for many generations between Zimmé and Yunnan, and of the ready access to Zimmé from Maulmain, the discussion of the possibility of discovering a trade-route connecting South-western China and British Burmah seems superfluous. The caravan of Yunnan traders coming yearly to Zimmé clearly demonstrates the existence of a trade-route, and this native track is probably available for a much more extensive overland transportation of merchandise than at present exists.
“The Yunnan caravans bring silk and opium, iron and copper utensils, and other articles, which they exchange principally for cotton. This caravan trade has materially increased within the past few years, though I have been informed that years ago it was much more extensive than it is now. The gradual recuperation of Yunnan, consequent upon the restoration of order there, probably explains this recent increase of trade.
“The fact that a party of ten or twelve men with a caravan of sixty or seventy mules makes this journey from Tali in Yunnan, viâ Kiang Hung and Kiang Tung, to Zimmé, is a sufficient indication of the safety of the route. A caravan of sixty mules will ordinarily carry merchandise to the value of 12,000 to 15,000 dollars, occasionally a larger amount. Most of the Yunnan traders who come to Zimmé come from the neighbourhood of Tali.”
Such is the opinion of an exceptionally intelligent and scientific observer, who has traversed the Zimmé States in various directions, has studied the capabilities of the country, and has lived amongst the people for many years. In another place he gives the population as follows: “The entire population of the five Laos (Siamese Shan) provinces tributary to Siam is estimated at about 2,000,000;” and he states that “a recent census of the houses throughout the province of Cheung Mai (Zimmé) gave the number of 97,000, and the census was not at that time (the time Dr Cheek saw it) complete; the population of the entire province is not under 600,000.”[[4]]
Another Chinese caravan, consisting of eleven men with thirty-seven laden mules, passed by without stopping, on their way to Maulmain. The head-man told me that a bundle of the straw hats contained 120; that he had purchased them for 250 rupees in China; and had sold some for 450 rupees a bundle in Kiang Tung. The best kinds cost from 280 to 290 rupees, and fetch 500 rupees. The hats are two feet in diameter, with a six-inch peaked dome for the top-knot of the hair. The price includes the oilskin covers. Only the head-man was armed. He carried two horse-pistols and a trident. Their only other protection was a savage Tartar dog.
A crane, four feet three inches high, known to the Burmese as a Jo-Jah, slate-coloured, with a red band round the top of its long neck reaching to its eyes, was a fund of amusement to the boys, as it was quite tame, and boldly foraged amongst them for any scraps that they chose to fling it. These birds are seldom seen except in couples. The Burmese say that it is cruel to kill one, unless you likewise slay the other, for the remaining bird would become brokenhearted and pine away. I should not be surprised if this were so, for when living in Maulmain I had an instance under my own observation of an animal starving itself to death after losing its companion. I generally had some birds and other animals—parrots, paroquets, lemurs, tigercats, monkeys, &c.—about the house, which had been brought in from the jungle; amongst these was a gibbon, and a small long-tailed monkey that used to sleep at night cuddled up in the gibbon’s arms. The little monkey fell ill and died; the gibbon was inconsolable, refused food and water, and followed its companion in two or three days.
After breakfast the La-hu who had visited us the previous day came according to their promise, and brought with them two of their children, who were as fearless as their parents, and gladly accepted and ate the biscuits and jam that we gave them, although they had never been accustomed to such luxuries. The jam was especially appreciated; the men and women tasting some from their finger, smacking their lips after it, and then letting the children finish it up. They were evidently delighted with the upshot of their former interview, and sat beaming round us in a half-circle, waiting to be questioned.
Their villages near Kiang Hai were Ban Meh Sang Noi, Ban Meh Sang Hluang, Ban Meh Kong, Ban Huay Sang, and Ban Poo Hong, containing in all fifty-six houses. In the Kiang Tung hills their villages were numerous, and contained on an average ninety houses. Many La-hu villages existed in the hills between Kiang Hai and Kiang Tung. Their weapons are bows and poisoned arrows. Their cultivation consists of glutinous rice, tobacco, cotton, and chillies; and as they cultivate more than they need, they barter the balance with the Shans for any articles they require.
I then inquired about their marriage customs, and learnt that a young man, after gaining the permission of his ladylove, seeks her parents’ consent. If they are agreeable to his suit, they request the patriarchs of the village to marry the couple. On the appointed day the youth brings a present of tea and torches, and, sitting by the side of the girl, offers the present to the patriarchs, whilst he and his intended make obeisance with their hands uplifted and pressed together.
The youth is then asked whether he intends to perform all the duties of a husband towards the maiden, and on his answering in the affirmative, the elders give them their blessing. Afterwards the people assemble, and sit down at a banquet provided at the expense of the youth, where rice-spirit is poured out like water, and which includes various kinds of meat, amongst which are rats and mice, but not dogs, cats, or snakes; and, ‘mid women and wine, mirth and laughter, all goes right merrily.
After the marriage feast is concluded, the couple reside in the house of the wife’s parents for two years, and then for the same period in that of the husband’s parents. If they are childless, they continue at the latter abode. A La-hu may only have one wife at a time.
Divorce on either side is at will, but must be accompanied by a payment of 40 rupees to the divorced party. The sons become the property of the man, and the daughters belong to the woman. The goods are divided equally, but two-thirds of the money and one-third of the clothing go to the man; and the remainder of the money and clothing, as well as the house, to the woman. Even if the wife is an adulteress, the husband must leave as soon as the division and settlements are made.
According to the La-hu, the chief seat of their race is on the east of the Salween river, about 30 days’ journey north-west of Kiang Tung, where their chief town, Koo-lie Muang Kha, is situated at the head of the Meh Kha, a river which empties into the Salween.
In connection with the existence of gold to the east of the Salween, they told me that at Nong Sen, a place in the Lawa country to the north of Koo-lie Muang Kha, there was a very great quantity, but the people who live near the Nong (lake) dare not touch it for fear lest the Pee, or guardian spirit, of the locality should destroy them. Thirty Shans once persuaded a Lawa to guide them to the lake, under the promise that they would not remove any of the gold. On reaching it the Shans, under pretence of bathing, took off their clothes, and, whilst bathing, grubbed up the gold and swallowed as much as they could hold, and thus carried it away. One of them swallowed fully 30 rupees’ weight, and others even more.
In the history of the Shan empire of Mung Mau, which has been translated by Mr Ney Elias, is shown the tribute payable to Mung Mau (a Shan State on the Shweli river that enters the Irrawaddi below Bhamo) by its tributary States about the close of the thirteenth century of our era, which likewise betokens wealth of gold in the country to the north of Kiang Hai. Monyin had to send a yearly tribute of a million horses (a large number is probably meant); La-mung (La-Maing, the ancient city of Zimmé), 300 elephants; Yung-Lung or Muang Yong (the Burmese Shan State to the east of the Salween to the north of Kiang Hsen, which most likely included Kiang Hsen and the rest of the Burmese Shan States lying to the east of the river), a quantity of gold; Muang Kula, or Kalei, water from the Chindwin; and Ava (which then included the ruby-mine district), 2 viss (6⅔ lb.) of rubies. The history of Loi Htong likewise refers to gold nuggets being found in the country.
The La-hu bury their dead in a coffin, and place the clothes of the deceased, together with food, on the top of the grave, so that the ghost may not trouble them for neglecting it.
Drop-net.
In the evening, and in fact every night during our stay, men and women were fishing together in lines by torchlight. The light of the torches attracts the fish, and brings them blindly dashing into the nets. Many were using drop-nets; others, cane baskets. Dr M‘Gilvary told me that the men were very cautious not to chance coming into contact with the women whilst fishing, for should one chance even to tread on a woman’s foot in the water, and sickness subsequently occur in her family, the ailment would be traced by a spirit-doctor to that act, and a fine would at once he levied upon the man by the Kumlung, or elder, of the woman’s family.