[Illustration: THE PADDY-FIELDS, HIN VALLEY.]
Like the quarrymen in North Wales, whenever there is a cry of "gold" at Clogan, the Laos take every piece of yellow copper pyrites or iron pyrites for gold, and we had several very hard days' travelling both east and west after gold-mines of this description.
The minimum readings for the last five days were 62°, 49°, 46°, 43°, and 45° Fahr., and going on one day's march over the plain to Muang Nan, the capital of this great province, we had 60° as minimum for several days.
The salas stand outside the red-brick walls of Nan, and are only a few hundred yards from the river, and here was every sign of prosperity; every other family seems to own an elephant or two. The houses are well built and enclosed in stout palisades; and besides the town inside the walls, there is a very large number of houses between them and the river. I saw numbers of dug-outs arriving with cotton, and many too going away south. There are a few Burmese shopkeepers along the east wall, their principal stock consisting of check-patterned panungs and sarongs and small knickknacks, betel boxes, and a little silver-work. A mule caravan of Haws from the north—as dirty and ugly as the dirtiest Chinamen—were also anxious to sell Chinese slippers, sheepskin coats, walnuts and sandals, and shortly after left for the south, like others we had met at Muang Sa. From M. Sa I gathered they were going to make westward toward M. Pray. Some of the Burmese brought me some sapphires from Chieng Kong, and there were some fine stones, but I was at the time surprised to find they had no rubies. Coloured quartzes are also found in this neighbourhood, and are cut for ornament. The rupee is the current coin, and the Burmese shopkeepers and a Chinaman or two were the only people who would exchange our money for us—at the rate of three salung to the rupee.
[Illustration: WAT BEN YEUN, M. SA.]
[Illustration: EAST GATE OF NAN.]
The sight of Nan is the early morning market, to which before sunrise the women are seen coming from all directions, wrapped in their long plaids—for such, indeed, the Lao cloak is, both in pattern and mode of wearing. The market is held within the walls in the open space, in which stands the sanam, or court-house; this is surrounded on three sides by wats, and on the west by the palace, a large house with no very striking features. The women crouch along the sides in rows with their baskets in front of them, as at Luang Prabang and at all the markets one sees in this part of the peninsula. Fruit, biscuits, and cakes, ready rolled cigarettes and flowers, are for sale, but the quantities are very small. There is a muffled sound of subdued chatter and laughter, and the scene is a very pretty one—till at last the mists are gone, the sun is well up in the heavens, and the crowd melts away as silently as it came.
Once inside the walls the town may be described as countrified, the houses standing in their own enclosures among their palms, where the elephants twirl their trunks among the cocks and hens. Very fair roads run at right angles to one another, but are always quiet and shady, like country lanes. The chief business seems to be outside the town, villages extending on all sides, and especially along the road to the north, past the "old city," which is about one mile in that direction, and where there are some very good substantial palisades still standing, with the remains of a deep ditch and massive wall on the north-west side, all of course very much grown over. The custom of shaving the head all round, with the exception of the tuft at the top which stands bristling straight on end, and gives a good grip to the light-red or white turban which is often worn, is a cool and cleanly one, and gives the men a smart appearance; the black tattooing, which extends from the knee up to the middle of the body, is the other distinctive feature throughout the province of Nan. They seldom wear more than the panung and a short blue jacket, except in the early mornings, when, with the thermometer at 50°, they shiver inside their long plaids; as the day becomes warmer, the plaid is rolled up and stowed in the bag, which is as indispensable as the dhâp, and goes over one shoulder, carrying its owner's all—consisting of a small basket of kao neo for the day, some tobacco, and betel-nut, with often a long-stemmed pipe and flint and steel.
[Illustration: LAOS BAG, OR STRIPED CLOTH.]
[Illustration: KAO NEO WICKER BASKETS.]