The steep descent to this alluvial hollow could be easily avoided by a road skirting a spur to the east, sloping down to the Tapeng. Here numerous small streams drain into the Tapeng, from both south and north, the largest of which is called the Thamô. From the north-eastern watershed, we obtained a fine view of the Tapeng valley, stretching away to the east-north-east, and then descended to the level of the river by a gradual slope, over rounded grassy hills and dried-up watercourses. On the way we were met by the tsawbwa-gadaw of Muang-gan, accompanied by a bevy of damsels offering cooked rice, fresh sheroo, and flowers. After a short halt for refreshment and friendly talk with the old lady, whose hospitality was duly rewarded with beads, we proceeded over a fair road six feet broad. From an eminence we viewed the Tapeng entering the hills through a narrow gloomy gorge, which swallowed up the broad placid stream, descending from the north-east between low white sandy banks. Looking up the river, the level valley stretched away, till in the far distance the border ranges, three or four miles apart in the foreground, seemed almost to meet. These defining mountains rose three thousand feet, and others of still greater height towered in the background, while a loftier range, running almost at right angles to them, crowned the far horizon. The level ground on either side of the river was parcelled out into innumerable rice fields, which, with the numerous villages situated on the higher undulations amid clumps of bamboo and fruit trees, attested the presence of a numerous and industrious population. The exposed reaches of sand within the river banks suggested heavy floods during the wet season; but at this period the water was drawn off by many canals, and glistened in little lakes, from which the green blades of the young rice crop were just raising their heads. The gentle slopes running up to the base of the hills and the lower hillsides afforded rich pasture to large herds of cattle and buffaloes. At the various villages large crowds of Shans and Chinese were gathered, awaiting the strangers. At one of some importance, mats were laid out for us under the trees, and we were challenged by the officials of Manwyne, who addressed our leader somewhat to this effect: “You say you are a man of authority, therefore we allow you to pass.” It was not etiquette to take any notice of them, and mounting their ponies, they fell into the rear of the cavalcade, with a crowd of boys behind them. Outside Manwyne itself a dense crowd of men, women, and children surrounded our baggage, which had been unloaded pell-mell on a stretch of sand where we were expected to encamp. No sooner had we dismounted than the crowd pressed around. They appeared by no means friendly, and the Chinese especially jeered and hooted, and one fellow had the impudence to feel the texture of the beard of one of our party. A more inquisitive set of sightseers it is impossible to conceive, and for some time they regularly blockaded us, almost to suffocation. While impatiently waiting for the officials in the full blaze of the afternoon sun, both parties found ample interest in surveying each other. To us the first sight of the peculiar but picturesque dress of the good-looking Shan women was probably as attractive as our physiognomies and attire seemed to be to the natives. The head-dress was a long blue turban, curled in crescent-shaped folds with neat precision, towering nearly a foot above the head, and inclined backwards in an inverted cone, displaying the back of the head adorned with large silver discs. Add to this, neat little white or blue jackets slashed with red, fastened with enamelled silver brooches, and exposing plump little arms adorned with heavy silver bracelets, blue petticoats with deeply embroidered silken borders, fanciful gaiters, and blue shoes, and the reader can imagine that the curious crowd of Manwyne was picturesque.
There was a good sprinkling of Chinese women with dwarfed feet, but they were much more poorly clad than the prosperous-looking Shans.
The men, Shan and Chinese, were all dressed in dark blue jackets and trousers, the Shans being distinguished by blue turbans with the pigtail wound into their coils, while the Chinese wore skull-caps. Almost all carried long-stemmed pipes. After some delay and expostulation with the headmen, we were inducted into a Buddhist khyoung or temple, standing in a separate courtyard just within the town, but entered through a gate of its own in the town wall. It was a low square building, facing the river, built partly of bricks and partly of wood, on a rubble foundation, and roofed with fired tiles.
It had two roofs, the upper in itself somewhat like a smaller khyoung perched on the top of the larger, with two latticed windows in each of its curved sides, and borne up by strong teak pillars. At either end two wooden partitions shut off the cells of the priests and their pupils. A kitchen in one corner completed the domestic arrangements, unless we may include two or three new coffins, and materials for more, piled ready in one corner of the verandah. A long table was covered with models of pagodas, enclosing seated figures of Gaudama, one principal Buddha occupying the centre, with an umbrella suspended over his head. This seemed to serve as an altar, on which two large candles were placed during the evening prayers, intoned with bell accompaniments, strongly reminding us of the Catholic mass. In the verandah three square niches faced this altar, one containing the image of a horse.
As soon as we had taken up our quarters, the temple was thronged inside and out by a curious crowd, who favoured us with their presence till we retired for the night. The ill-feeling of certain of the Chinese inhabitants was so dreaded by the headmen that an armed Shan guard was stationed round the khyoung, in addition to our own police sentries, who were requested by the authorities to be on the alert against an attack.
In the early morning the matin bell and chanting awoke us to find the apartment filled with precise old matrons and buxom Shan girls busy at their devotions. Each carried a little basket filled with rice, and a few brought offerings of flowers. As they entered, they first knelt in front of the principal Buddha, but did not venture on the raised platform. After a short prayer, they turned to the niche containing the horse, before which they repeated a prayer standing, and then deposited an offering of cooked rice in front of the quadruped. We next became the objects of their attention, but they were too timid to give us much of it on the first occasion. After the priests had finished their prayers, all the women arranged themselves in a row outside the khyoung. Presently the burly chief priest, draped in yellow, appeared. With downcast eyes and grave face he walked slowly down the line, holding a large bowl, in which each placed an offering of cooked rice. This done, the congregation dispersed to their homes.
This practice of the phoongyees gathering their daily food from the worshippers, instead of begging it from house to house, patta, or alms-bowl, in hand, is an instance of the unorthodox laxity prevailing among the Shan Buddhists.
A delay of two days was made necessary by consultations as to the route to be followed. The choice lay between crossing the river into the Muangla territory, or continuing along the right bank, through the Sanda state, to the town of that name. The latter was finally decided on, despite the opposition of a Muangla deputy named Kingain.
The town of Manwyne, or Manyen, was itself formerly a dependency of Sanda, but had been ceded to one of the Muangla family as the dowry of a Sanda princess. It is surrounded by a low wall of sun-dried bricks, raised on a lower course of rough stones. The population of Shans and Chinese might be reckoned at seven hundred, and the district contains about five thousand. At this time numerous fugitives from the more disturbed districts had taken refuge there, the war not having extended so far down the valley. The people, though prosperous, were lawless and independent, the nominal authority of the dowager tsawbwa-gadaw, or princess, being little regarded, and the Chinese power being in abeyance. We visited the bazaar held every morning outside the wall. The vendors were mostly girls, each sitting in front of a small basket, supporting a tray on which her stock was laid out. The eatables comprised a curious curd-like paste made from peas and beans, and in great request; peas which had sprouted, beans, onions, and various wild plums, cherries, and berries, while maize, rice, and barley, and several sorts of tobacco, were also on sale. One end of the bazaar was devoted to unbleached home-made cotton cloth, with a small stock of English piece goods, and red and green broadcloth.
Many Kakhyens, chiefly young women, were present, with firewood and short deal planks for sale, and we were struck by the perfect freedom enjoyed by these people as contrasted with their treatment in Burmese territory. The town gate led into a filthy narrow street, or rather lane, about nine feet wide. It was paved with boulders, and bordered on either side by a deep open gutter close under the windows, and alive with swine. The one-storied houses were built of bricks, with one room opening on the street, the sill of the open window serving as a counter, mainly for the sale of pork. This was the Chinese quarter; beyond it lay the clean Shan division, every house detached and surrounded by a neat little courtyard, with ponies, buffaloes, and implements, housed under substantial sheds. A few villages formed, as it were, suburbs of the so-called town, each enclosed in its bamboo fence, and intersected by narrow railed paths. None of the houses were raised on piles, as in Burma; the better sort were built of bricks and tiled, and the smaller ones were mere mud hovels. In one village we saw a man cutting tobacco for the use of the ladies, and were politely invited to be seated while we were instructed in the art of the tobacconist. The fresh leaves rolled firmly together were pushed through a circular hole in a wooden upright, and thin slices rapidly cut off; these are only partially dried and smoked while still green. Some was brought to fill the visitors’ pipes, and for half an hour we sat chatting to these homely Shans. Returning to the khyoung, we found it crowded with numerous patients, all entreating medical aid. The poor people were intensely grateful, though some of the old and infirm seemed to expect miracles, and went away evidently doubting the will, rather than the power, of the physician.