The following account of this remarkable freak of nature is taken from Captain Yule's "Mission to Ava." Writing from the city of Amarapoora, the capital of Burmah, the Captain says:—
"To-day we had a singular visitor at the residency. This was Maphoon, the daughter of Shwé-maong, the "Homo hirsutus" described and depicted in Crawfurd's narrative, where a portrait of her, as a young child, also appears. Not expecting such a visitor, one started and exclaimed involuntarily as there entered what at first-sight seemed an absolute realization of the dog-headed Anubis.
"The whole of the Maphoon's face was more or less covered with hair. On a part of the cheek, and between the nose and mouth, this was confined to a short down, but over all the rest of the face was a thick silky hair of a brown colour, paling about the nose and chin, four or five inches long. At the alea of the nose, under the eye, and on the cheek-bone, this was very fully developed, but it was in and on the ear that it was most extraordinary. Except the extreme upper tip, no part of the ear was visible: all the rest was filled and veiled by a large mass of silky hair, growing apparently out of every part of the external organ, and hanging in a dependent lock to a length of eight or ten inches. The hair over her forehead was brushed so as to blend with the hair of the head, the latter being dressed (as usual with her countrywomen) à la Chinoise. It was not so thick as to conceal altogether the forehead.
"The nose, densely covered with hair so as no animal's is that I know of, and with long fine locks curving out and pendent like the wisps of a fine Skye terrier's coat, had a most strange appearance. The beard was pale in colour, and about four inches in length, seemingly very soft and silky.
"Poor Maphoon's manners were good and modest, her voice soft and feminine, and her expression mild and not unpleasing, after the first instinctive repulsion was overcome. Her appearance rather suggested the idea of a pleasant-looking woman masquerading than that of anything brutal. This discrimination, however, was very difficult to preserve in sketching her likeness, a task which devolved on me to-day in Mr. Grant's absence. On an after-visit, however, Mr. Grant made a portrait of her, which was generally acknowledged to be most successful. Her neck, bosom, and arms appeared to be covered with fine pale down, scarcely visible in some lights. She made a move, as if to take off her upper clothing, but reluctantly, and we prevented it. Her husband and two boys accompanied her. The elder boy, about four or five years old, had nothing abnormal about him. The youngest, who was fourteen months old and still at the breast, was evidently taking after his mother. There was little hair on the head, but the child's ear was full of long silky floss, and it could boast a moustache and beard of pale silky down that would have cheered the heart of many a cornet. In fact, the appearance of the child agrees almost exactly with what Mr. Crawford says of Maphoon herself as an infant. This child is thus the third in descent exhibiting this strange peculiarity; and in this third generation, as in the two preceding, this peculiarity has appeared only in one individual. Maphoon has the same dental peculiarity also that her father had—the absence of the canine teeth and grinders, the back part of the gums presenting merely a hard ridge. Still she chews pawn like her neighbours.
Mr. Camaretta tells some story of an Italian wishing to marry her and take her to Europe, which was not allowed. Should the great Barnum hear of her, he would not be so easily thwarted.
According to the Woundouk, the King offered a reward to any man who would marry her, but it was long before any one was found bold enough or avaricious enough to venture. Her father, Shwé-maong, was murdered by robbers many years ago."
A TRAVELLER'S PASSPORT.
The following document, included among the rolls, is dated 1680, from Whitehall:—