What? How you jump! What is it? Another beast? Yes, I see him, that is a tarantula crouching in the darkest corner and looking at us out of wicked little eyes that shine like diamond points. He is a monster spider, isn't he? All hairy too, and his body striped with yellow bands like a wasp's. He sits still, but he is very much alive and ready to jump at a minute's notice. They are venomous brutes. Not quite so bad as a scorpion, but still the bite from one of these fellows is a very unpleasant thing. We will leave him, he can't do much harm here.
Now we will drive round the town and see how the people live.
Here is a happy family seated on a wooden platform stretching out in front of their house. The dust around and over them and in the roadway is almost as bad as Egypt, but here there is nearly always a tree or shrub of some sort to bring in a flash of green. The huts too are built of wood and mats and are raised several feet from the ground; they do not look so hopelessly crooked as the Egyptian mud houses. In the space underneath huge black pigs, like great boars, wander, and there are black goats too, and skinny hens and pariah dogs. Do you see that mother-dog lying in the roadway, too lazy to move, with six yellow puppies sprawling over her? Poor brute, she is a mass of mange and so skinny that her ribs stick out! The people here are taught by their religion not to take life of any kind; some of the priests strain their water through a sieve lest they should inadvertently swallow an insect! So no one kills, even in mercy. All these miserable puppies are allowed to grow up to a starved wretched existence, a misery to themselves and everyone else.
Look at those two elephants stalking down the road; they move majestically, and when they reach the pariah dog the driver, or oozie, seated on the first one's neck, pricks him with a point to make him look where he is going, so that he avoids the dog. You will see plenty of elephants here, for elephants are to Burma what camels are to Egypt, the regular beasts of burden. They carry the kit and camp paraphernalia for the men who go into the jungle sometimes for months. They move the logs and trunks of the timber which is cut in the forests in large quantities. You remember the dark wood of the Circuit House and the poongyi choung? That is all teak, the best known wood in the country, corresponding to our oak. There are forests of it, and large companies exist simply for getting it out. There are still herds of wild elephants in the little disturbed parts of Burma, and every now and again Government catches them in keddahs in great quantities. I wish we had the luck to go with a hunting-party.
ELEPHANTS, BURMA.
The family which owns that hut is seated on the edge of the platform and are watching us with as much interest as we watch them. Two bright-eyed little girls in jackets play beside a smiling woman. You will notice here the girls and women have quite as good a time as the boys and men; no veiling of faces or hiding away for them. The Burman knows better, and he would get on badly without the active help and advice of his comrade and wife.