Silver in Tengyueh is the purest Szechuen or Yunnanese silver. Rupees are also current, and at this time were equivalent to 400 cash—the tael at the same time being worth 1260 cash. Every 10 taels, costing me 30s. in Shanghai, I could exchange in Tengyueh for 31 rupees. Rupees are the chief silver currency west from Tengyueh into Burma.
On May 31st I had given instructions that we were to leave early, but my men, who did not sleep in the telegraph compound, were late in coming. To still further delay me, at the time of leaving no escort had made its appearance. I did not wait for it. We marched out of the town unaccompanied, and were among the tombstones on the rise overlooking the town when the escort hurriedly overtook us. It consisted of a quiet-mannered chairen and two soldiers, one of whom was an impudent cub that I had to treat with every indignity. He was armed with a sword carried in the folds of his red cincture, in which was also concealed an old muzzle-loading pistol, formidable to look at but unloaded. This was one of the days on my journey when I wished that I had brought a revolver, not as a defence in case of danger, for there was no danger, but as a menace on occasion of anger.
Rain fell continuously. At a small village thronged with muleteers from Bhamo we took shelter for an hour. The men sipping tea under the verandahs had seen Europeans in Bhamo, and my presence evoked no interest whatever. Many of these strangers possessed an astonishing likeness to European friends of my own. Contact with Europeans, causing the phenomena of "maternal impression," was probably in a few cases accountable for the moulding of their features, but the general prevalence of the European type has yet to be explained. "My conscience! Who could ever have expected to meet you here?" I was often on the point of saying to some Chinese Shan or Burmese Shan in whom, to my confusion, I thought I recognised a college friend of my own.
Leaving the village, we followed the windings of the River Taiping, coasting along the edge of the high land on the left bank of the river.
The Suburb beyond the South Gate of Tengyueh.
(Stalls under the Umbrellas.)
Rain poured incessantly; the creeks overflowed; the paths became watercourses and were scarcely fordable. "Bones," my opium-eating coolie with the long neck, slipped into a hole which was too deep even for his long shanks, and all my bedding was wetted. It was ninety li to Nantien, the fort we were bound to beyond Tengyueh, and we finished the distance by sundown. The town is of little importance. It is situated on an eminence and is surrounded by a wall built, with that strange spirit of contrariness characteristic of the Chinese, and because it incloses a fort, more weakly than any city wall. It is not more substantial nor higher than the wall round many a mission compound. Some 400 soldiers are stationed in the fort, which means that the commander draws the pay for 1000 soldiers, and represents the strength of his garrison as 1000. Their arms are primitive and rusty muzzle-loaders of many patterns; there are no guns to be seen, if there are any in existence—which is doubtful. The few rusty cast-iron ten-pounders that lie hors de combat in the mud have long since become useless. There may be ammunition in the fort; but there is none to be seen. It is more probable, and more in accordance with Chinese practice in such matters, that the ammunition left by his predecessor (if any were left, which is doubtful) has long ago been sold by the colonel in command, whose perquisite this would naturally be.
The fort of Nantien is a fort in name only—it has no need to be otherwise, for peace and quiet are abroad in the valley. Besides, the mere fact of its being called a fort is sufficiently misleading to the neighbouring British province of Burma, where they are apt to picture a Chinese fort as a structure seriously built in some accordance with modern methods of fortification.
I was given a comfortable room in a large inn already well filled with travellers. All treated me with pleasant courtesy. They were at supper when I entered the room, and they invited me to share their food. They gave me the best table to myself, and after supper they crowded into another room in order to let me have the room to myself.