Arrived at the other side, we were struck by the prevalence of white marble, and the extraordinary contorted folds of an abrupt cliff of blue crystalline quartzite rock, about fifty feet high, overlooking the ferry. A narrow footpath to the north-east of this cliff led to a ridge of pure white crystalline marble, of the same structure as the marble of the Tsagain hills. The ridge, which was destitute of trees, was about six hundred feet above the level of the river, running almost parallel with its course for about a mile. A small watercourse dividing the ridge from a rounded hill covered with waterworn boulders of the quartzite rock marked the limits of the marble, which terminated so abruptly as to be at once noticeable, and the pawmine said there was no silver beyond this limit. We walked along the almost level top of the treeless ridge, and found at the eastern side a pleasant valley, where the cultivated terraces showed signs of the neighbourhood of a village, and a Bauhinia in full bloom of white flowers with violet centre occurred in great profusion.
The mines consisted of a series of galleries about four feet in diameter, run horizontally into the slope of the ridge facing the river. Our conductors led us along the steep hillside, strewn with large masses of iron pyrites, and overgrown with grass and low jungle, so thick that each man had to cut his way with a dah. We passed about thirty of these adits, which penetrated the hillside for two or three hundred feet, sloping slightly downwards, and with passages opening at right angles. I crawled into one of them, preceded by a guide with a lantern, and made my way for a considerable distance along the tunnel, the sides of which showed red earth mixed with masses of marble and quartzite, but my progress was stopped by finding the passage blocked by the fallen roof, the bamboo props used when the mine was worked having given way. No detailed information regarding the productiveness of these mines could be obtained, and since the outbreak of the civil war in Yunnan they had not been worked, save to a very small and intermittent extent by the Kakhyens. The heaps of slag in the glen near the small watercourses, where all smelting operations had been conducted, showed that a very considerable quantity of ore used to be raised. Specimens of the ore assayed by Professor Oldham have been found to contain 0·191 per cent. of silver in the galena. The mines are of easy access, and from their close proximity to the borders of China, little or no difficulty would be experienced in finding labourers to work them. Silver is also said to be found on the right bank of the river, at a great elevation on the hillsides to the west of Ponsee; and gold is asserted to occur near the same locality, and specimens were shown to me at Bhamô in grains some of which were as large as small peas.
From the mines we returned across the river, and breakfasted on the bank of the Tapeng, treating our Kakhyen companions to some of the eatables, their approval of which was indicated by jerking their fists with the thumb extended, which emphatically signifies that anything is very good. The forefinger is held straight to indicate that a man is good, and crooked to denote one who is not to be trusted.
So we returned to Ponsee, where we must again take up the tangled thread of events bearing on our progress. A month had passed since our arrival, and the advance of the season was marked by the call of the cuckoo, which was often heard in the eastern woods. The jungle had all been felled in the new clearings, and nightly fires illuminated the opposite hills, caused by the burning of the jungle over acres of ground. Heavy thunder showers almost every night did not add to our comfort, and heralded the speedy setting in of the south-west monsoon.
But we were apparently as far off from any extrication from our detention as ever.
The Seray tsawbwa had on March 22nd returned with news that a Panthay official had arrived at Sanda, and that the country so far was open. He also produced a letter addressed to himself by the governor of Momien, requesting him to give us all the help in his power, and promising to reimburse any expense he might be put to in our service. The chief seemed fully disposed to help, and started for his own village to procure mules, with which he promised to return in two days, leaving his Chinese clerk to help us as an interpreter.
This was pleasant, and the improved temper of the people was shown by the arrival of messengers from the widow of a tsawbwa ruling a district on the road to Manwyne, with a present of fowls, eggs, and an uninviting compound of flour and chillies; accompanied by a message that she and her people would come and escort us to Manwyne. The dowager of the late chief of that town also sent Sladen the gift of two Kakhyen bags, and a curious implement forming a toothbrush and tongue-scraper combined.
The Seray chief, however, did not show according to promise, and a week after his departure news came that two Chinamen had arrived from Bhamô, with a party of fifty armed Burmese. These men gave out that they had been sent to recommence mining operations at the silver mines. The immediate result was that the Seray chief, first by a messenger, and then in person, repudiated his engagement to procure mules, alleging that the Ponsee chief had threatened to kill him if he assisted us to quit the Ponsee territory. Argument and expostulation were useless, and he nodded assent when Sladen attributed his change of purpose to private instructions received from Bhamô. He departed, after warning us to be on our guard against the Ponsee chief, who had resolved to attack the camp.
The hostility of the Ponsee chief was soon shown, for the day after the arrival of the Burmese his Kakhyens drove off all the Shans from our little bazaar; the chief himself came down with his dah drawn, and cut down one of the traders, which act of violence made him liable to pay an indemnity to the Manwyne people. His pawmines came next with the intelligence that he had summoned two neighbouring tsawbwas to his assistance, that two buffaloes had been slaughtered, and a grand sacrificial feast was to be held that night, after which the nats would be consulted as to our fate, when, if the oracle commended it, the Kakhyens, drunk with sheroo and samshu, would attack the camp. One of the buffaloes had been supplied by the Burmese, and the symbolic present of a pound of flesh, the acceptance of which signified consent, had been offered to and accepted by the tsare-daw-gyee, or Burmese royal secretary, in charge of the party. The pound of flesh had been also sent to the pawmines, but rejected by them, and they loudly denounced their chief as an uncontrollable madman.
A wholesome fear of the European strangers had gradually grown up; they were believed to possess supernatural powers. Breech-loading rifles and revolvers, and “Bryant and May’s matches,” which ignited only on the box, and defied wind and rain, argued a close alliance with the nats of the elements; while the photographic apparatus appeared in Kakhyen eyes to be the instruments of conjurers, who could control the sun himself. Hence but few of the Kakhyens would join the chief, whom they considered bent on his own destruction. While the conspirators were revelling and consulting, our police escort was drawn out and exercised, and the ominous sound of three volleys from fifty guns, which to their universal astonishment and awe all went off at once, terrified them, and gave a significant hint that assailants would meet a warm reception. The pawmines prayed that they and their houses might be spared in the general destruction that must overtake our enemies, and the news soon reached us that the meetway, who was secretly in our pay, had announced that the nats disapproved of the conspiracy.