Four years in Upper Burma

by W. R. Winston

“THE MOST DIGNIFIED OF MATRONS AND THE SMARTEST OF YOUNG DAMSELS NOT ONLY SMOKE, BUT PREFER TO HAVE THEIR PORTRAITS TAKEN CHEROOT IN HAND.”

They are exceedingly fond of a condiment of fish paste called ngapee. This is fish dried a little in the sun, salted, and then mashed to a pulp. As the fish for ngapee is not properly cured, the effluvium emitted from it is particularly obnoxious, and can be detected a very long way off. The smell might be described as strong, pungent, high; but none of these adjectives serves properly to characterise it. Having never ventured to eat any I cannot describe the taste. Yet this fish paste is so liked by the Burmans that a meal is hardly complete without it. It gives the food a relish.

The Burmans clothe themselves in very bright colours, and in good taste as regards the harmony of the colours. A good deal of what they wear, both silk and cotton cloth, is locally manufactured. The weavers and dyers have some exquisite shades of pink, of red, of primrose, of navy blue, and other colours. They spend more on dress than the natives of India, and less on jewellery. Many of the people wear silk. The women dress their fine, luxuriant jet-black hair very tastefully. It is combed up from all sides very neatly, and made into a coil on the crown of the head. They wear no headdress but a bunch or wreath of flowers. That the Burmans cannot be considered an uncivilised race is clear from the perfect familiarity of their ladies with the mystery of the chignon, and with the manufacture and use of cosmetics for the improvement of the complexion, to say nothing of scents and artificial flowers, also locally made.

The Burmans have some taste, too, in music. They have a fair ear, pick up English tunes without difficulty, and sing them sweetly. Their musical instruments are primitive, and not very elaborate. They have a kind of pipe or clarionet, also a kind of trumpet; but they are greatest in drums. A performer on the drums will have around him in a circle something like a dozen, of different sizes, and varying in pitch, so that he can almost play a tune on them. For private instrumental solos they have a kind of dulcimer, made of strips of bamboo, which is wonderfully musical and rich in tone, especially considering the material it is made from. It seems strange that the Karens should so excel their neighbours, the other races of Burma, in the capacity for music, especially when we consider that civilisation came to the Karens so late. The relative aptitude for music amongst the different races of the earth, from all one can learn, seems to hinge on something other than the mere extent of the civilisation attained. What does it depend upon?

The Burman artists paint a good many pictures, judging by the great numbers offered for sale and hawked round. The pictures are mostly palace scenes, with kings and queens seated stiffly in state, receiving company, with courtiers standing round, and soldiers posted here and there. Latterly, Thomas Atkins, of the British Infantry, has been the approved type of the soldiery; perhaps with a view to a better sale for the pictures. The artists are adventurous, and willing to attempt anything, and they do not spare the colours, but the pictures are very stiff and the perspective is bad.

The frescoes at the Arakan pagoda in Mandalay, representing the eight hells of Buddhism, are for many reasons a curious study. Those pictures are more of a success from the standpoint of dogmatic theology than from that of high art. The scenes depicted are realistic and definite beyond any manner of doubt. The artist, one would think, had made up his mind to be very “faithful” with us, and to shrink not from depicting what he considered the truth on the subject. Human beings are there seen writhing in torturing fire, fixed on thorns, torn by dogs, dragged by black monsters in human form, thrown by them into torments with pitchforks, or starving by inches, with every bone in their bodies showing, and with faces of unutterable woe. One wretch is represented attempting to climb a tree, his brains being picked out by a bird from above, and his feet being torn off by dogs from beneath; another is seated on the ground, while two men are sawing him in halves, right through the head downwards, the blood all the while flowing in gallons! In one instance, the head, having been entirely severed from the body, is looking on in consternation at the rest of the body being chopped up.

In the matter of sculpture, the numerous marble images of Gautama (Buddha) show considerable ability in execution, especially in the faces, which show regularity of features and true likeness to the human face, as well as the correct expression of calm meditation appropriate to the Buddha; but there is much room for improvement in the general design, and for accuracy and variety in the various details. But we must remember that the sculptor of a Gautama is bound down by conventional canons of taste as to the postures, and as to the expression of the face, which he may not depart from.

In wood-carving, where there is scope for taste and fancy, we get from the Burman really wonderful results. There is nothing in which they excel more than in this, whether it be in the way of small delicate work in picture frames, brackets, and other articles of small and beautiful workmanship, or in the numerous elaborate adornments of the monastery buildings. Many of the more noted monasteries are quite a study of sumptuous carving in teak wood, the whole building in many cases being one mass of scrolls and decorations, with many well-executed figures of men, cattle, horses and supernatural creatures. In the case of some monasteries whole histories are depicted in the carvings.