It is as well to put on record some description of the condition in which the British found the Shan States. A few years hence we shall be denounced as the ruthless destroyers of a country which we had found wealthy and prosperous.
The Sawbwa of Möngnai came in unpretentious fashion to see Mr. Scott the day after his arrival. His superiority in breeding and character to most of the chiefs was marked, He made no difficulty about accepting British supremacy, and proffered all his influence to induce the other chiefs to follow his example. The typical character of the Shans as a race of traders came out in his request that his submission to British authority should be made known in Moulmein. In former times there was a good trade in timber with the Moulmein merchants. When they were informed of the establishment of peace this trade he anticipated would revive.
It remained to induce the Limbin Prince to submit and to accompany Mr. Scott to Fort Stedman. This was not a question of very high diplomacy, but it required some skill, tact, and patience to induce the Prince to make a voluntary surrender. It would have been very easy to have arrested and removed him by force. Such action, however, would have been distasteful to the Shan chiefs and might have rendered it more difficult to dispose of other pretenders still remaining in the Northern States. The Prince showed himself to be a poor creature, whose chief characteristic was an immeasurable conceit. He was, after all, only the illegitimate son of the Ein-she-min, or War Prince, who was the brother of King Mindon. But Burmans and Shans, like some other people, if a man is a prince, do not ask too curiously what sort of a prince he may be. When he left Möngnai, mounted on an elephant, with his gong beating, great numbers of people knelt down by the roadside as he passed, and similar respect was shown to him at other places. Notwithstanding his conceit, he did not put a very high price on his submission. This descendant of kings, who had left his refuge in British Burma to become the head of a great Shan Confederacy to be formed on the model of the German Empire, was glad to barter his lofty ambition for a stipend of £16 sterling a month and a house at Rangoon, or Moulmein, or elsewhere.
While the Prince was making arrangements for the journey, the Assistant Superintendent with Lieutenant Wallace, 27th Punjab Infantry, and Lieutenant Jackson, R.E., rode to Mawkmai, some twenty-five miles over rolling country covered with scrub-oak forest. They found Mawkmai situated in a fine valley 120 miles in extent, irrigated from the Nam Nyim River, and well cultivated; the main crop being paddy. The town was in good order, well built and prosperous. "The one town," records Mr. Scott, "in the Shan States that has not been destroyed in the inter-State wars." The trade relations between Mawkmai and Moulmein are close; the Salween in the rainy season being navigable and affording good means of communication.
The British officers were received with courtesy and hospitality by the Sawbwa and his officials. The suzerainty of the Queen-Empress was accepted as a matter of course. The only anxiety of the chief was in respect of the duty likely to be imposed on exported timber, which had been severely taxed by King Thebaw.
On the 11th of May the party returned to Möngnai. The attitude of the Sawbwa Kun Kyi was excellent. He assured Mr. Scott that he would be able to promise the submission of the Trans-Salween States, who all looked to him as their leader, and to Möngnai as their place of assemblage. He asked as a special favour to himself, and as a confirmation of his authority, that he might be allowed to fly the British flag over his residence. This request was granted. In the evening the British officers with a small guard of honour went to the Sawbwa's haw, or palace, where a flagstaff had been prepared, and the Union Jack was run up by Mr. Scott, the bugles sounding a general salute and the troops presenting arms. A great number of people from Möngnai and the neighbouring villages were present. They saluted the flag in their customary attitude of respect, on their knees, and when the troops marched off the Sawbwa's band struck up. What march it played has not been recorded.
The Limbin Prince had now made his arrangements for the journey, and on the 13th the party started for Fort Stedman, which was reached on the 20th of May. The route lay over a road which had not been used for a year and which the contending parties had endeavoured to make impassable. Four sepoys and several camp-followers were spiked in the feet. But for this mishap the three weeks' march from Möngpawn round by Möngnai would have been accomplished without having a single man on the sick-list; and this although there had been much rain, especially on the return journey. After five days' rest the Limbin Prince was sent under escort to the plains, and passed into obscurity.
On the 22nd of June the Superintendent was able to report from Fort Stedman: "The Southern Shan States have now all given in their submission; caravans of cattle and pedlars move about from State to State with perfect freedom and confidence, a condition of things which has hardly existed since the accession of King Thebaw in 1879." (Mr. Hildebrand's Report, June 22, 1887, par. 147.)