Two deer sprang up from the long grass close to us when we were returning to the camp, where we were glad to change our clothing and have a good rub down after our wade through the icy water. Before we had finished, the rain again came down in torrents, and we had to climb into our howdahs to complete our toilets.
The Boo-arks mark the western edge of the great plain through which the Meh Fang runs on its way to join the Meh Khoke, which passes Kiang Hai, and enters the Meh Kong, or Cambodia river, below Kiang Hsen. Two miles to the north-east of the Boo-arks we reached the Meh Fang, and camped for the night. The river at our camp was 30 feet wide and 6 feet deep, with 1½ foot of water. Our crossing was 65½ miles from Zimmé, and 1747 feet above the sea. Much of the plain, as well as the low plateaux fringing it, are covered with teak-forest, and many of the trees are of great girth. A small deer sprang up from the long grass nearly at my elephant’s feet as I approached the camp.
Here we passed the most unpleasant night we had yet spent, as we were troubled with rain, heat, and mosquitoes. The elephant-drivers, being piqued with my Madras boys ordering them about, chucked their clothes and bedding into a puddle. The boys dawdled as usual, instead of at once erecting their leafy shelter for the night, and they and their bedding got thoroughly drenched, and we had to make arrangements for their comfort in our tent. To increase our misfortunes, our Shan followers had appropriated our fowls on the sly, and we had to be satisfied with tinned soups and meats. The first leeches we had seen on the journey were found on our ankles when we took off our boots.
Next morning we continued our march down the plain, passing some brick ruins and a Viang Hau, or Chinese fort. A mile beyond the fort we reached Ban Meh Kih, where the road to Zimmé viâ Viang Pow and Muang Ken joins the route. The village, the first that we had seen since leaving Muang Ngai, contained only sixteen houses. At another village we were told that game was very plentiful. Wild cattle, larger than buffaloes, come in droves from the hills to graze in the plain, and rhinoceros and elephant roam about the hills. Pigs were, however, the greatest pest of the country, as they rooted up the crops.
We halted for the night at Ban Meh Soon, a village situated near two Viang Hau, and in a good-sized rice-plain. The Viang Hau to the south of the village was the smallest that I had seen, being only 300 feet square. It is surrounded by a ditch 30 feet broad and 15 feet deep. A hundred cattle, laden with tobacco and pepper for Zimmé, were encamped near the house we put up in. We had been travelling all day through a fine plain many miles broad. Our camp was 76½ miles from Zimmé.
After we had settled ourselves in the empty house, a villager came to inform us that the house belonged to the chief of Muang Fang, and that anybody who slept in it would have his head cut off. As rain was threatening, we determined to risk the penalty; and we were soon glad we had done so, as the rain poured down in torrents.
On the head-man of the village coming to pay his respects, he told us that the Meh Fang flooded its banks on both sides between Ban Meh Soon and Ban Meh Mou, but that the inundation only lasts a day and a half. A similar flood happens between the city of Muang Fang and the Meh Khoke. Every basket of rice sown in his fields yielded at least a hundred-fold. He said the country was full of ancient cities whose names had been generally lost. Viang Ma-nee-ka was situated about 12 miles to the north-east of Muang Fang.
The legend attached to Viang Ma-nee-ka relates that a governor of Muang Fang had a daughter who would have been lovely if she had not been so unfortunate as to be born with a hare-lip. When she grew up, the thought of her deformity so preyed upon her mind that she left the city and made her home on the banks of the Meh Ai (the river of Shame), and founded the city of Ma-nee-ka (Hare-lip). There is a superstition that joints of bamboo cut for drinking the water of the Meh Ai should be cut straight across; if cut diagonally, the drinker will incur a hare-lip.
In connection with the new house we were in, I asked the head-man how long it would take in building. In answer, he said it took one man five days to make the thatch for a house 25 feet square; and three men five days to make the mat and bamboo floor and walling, cut the bamboos and posts, and build the house, including a verandah 10 feet square. More men could complete the house in less time. In walking about not far from the village, Mr Martin came across the lair of a tiger in the high grass, and Dr M‘Gilvary found the tracks of wild hog.
We were awakened the next morning to the sound of gibbons wailing in the neighbouring forest, and were detained for about an hour and a half owing to one of our elephants having strayed in search of pastures new. Soon after starting we passed through a Viang Hau, where huge teak-trees were growing, and met a caravan of fifty oxen laden with tobacco for Zimmé, having brought rice thence for the new settlers in Muang Fang. One of the leading oxen wore a mask, formed like a cage, of thin strips of wood painted red, and surmounted by a bunch of pheasant-tail feathers; another had a mask made of tiger-skin, and surmounted by peacock’s plumes.