Thayet Myo, January 20th.--After leaving Prome we have a good long wait
here; we have the Prince's mails on board. Their Royal Highnesses are
coming down river from Mandalay, so we wait their steamer. As we lunch
on deck we watch the villagers collecting, coming in bullock carts and
canoes.
The Flotilla Company have painted their steamer for the Prince all
white--given her a buff funnel, and she flies the Royal Standard with
the quarterings wrong, as usual, and looks mighty big and fine as she
surges south over the silky, mirror-like surface of the river. There is
a blaze of sun, and three dug-out canoes, with men in pink and white,
flying bannerets, go out to meet her. With their gay colours, the white
steamer, and the gleam of brass-work, you have a subject for a picture
after the style of Van Beers--if there was only time! I just make a
modest grab at it with an inky pen.
[Illustration]
Burmans come streaming along the yellow sandy shore in rainbow tints,
and two of our soldiers in khaki, almost invisible but for the boots and
red necks, sweat along the loose sand with them. Up the bank are seated
groups of girls and women, quietly filling their souls with the joy of
gazing at the white ship that contains the Imperial Ti.
... Put in the night at Minhla.--After dropping anchor, our new
passengers, Mrs Jacobs and daughter, and their guests and ourselves sit
round the deck-table and talk of the celebrations in Rangoon, and we all
turn in at ten, for we grudge an hour taken off these days of light.
They got off at Yenangyat further up the river, a place where there are
oil springs and works.
21st.--We get up early these days, because the country is so beautiful,
and because it is a little chilly out of the sun, and morning tub begins
to have attractions again; it is so cold and exhilarating, and you feel
fifty times more energetic up here than in Rangoon; you feel you must
not miss any of the river's features, so tumble out betimes. Possibly
the anchor coming up at daybreak awakened you, and if that did not, a
dear little Burmese boy's cock and hen must have done so; the cock sends
out such clarion challenges to all the cocks ashore before daybreak. The
boy in green silk kilt with touch of pink, holding his two white pets
with their red combs, makes a most fetching piece of colour.
We begin to think thicker clothing would not be amiss--but a quick walk
on shore makes one's blood go merrily. We decided to come here again
with some sort of a house on a keel of our own, and stop and shoot here
and there, and paint; perhaps drift down river from Bhamo through the
defiles, with sport wherever one wanted it--four kinds of deer,
elephant, jungle fowl, francolin, snipe, geese, duck, possibly leopard
or tiger, and a few miles inland there are rhino and gaur--there's a
choice!--and I'd have a net too--four weeks out, by "Henderson" or
"Bibby," four here, and four back--I wonder if my presence could be
spared at home.
MIMBU.--Here are splendid trees, like those in Watteau's pictures, on
the top of the banks, their foliage drooping over cottages. These are
very neatly built on teak-wood legs. You can see into some of them
through the bamboo walls and floors, and see touches of rich colour in
their brown interiors--ladies in emerald silk and powdered faces, jet
black hair and white torch cheroot, and, perhaps, the goodman coming in,
in green cloth jacket, pink round his hair, and say, a crushed
strawberry _putsoe_ down to the middle of his sturdy brown calves.
A number of Burmese get off here. Up the sandy bank are collected about
fifty carts. The bullocks in them are finely bred, and are coloured like
fallow deer, and look fat and well-cared for. The carts are
sand-coloured and sun-bleached, with great thick wheels, and the
contrast of the dainty passengers--women and children with neat
packages--getting into these is very pleasant. The men busy themselves
yoking the oxen; they are dressed in bright silks and cottons, several
have M'Pherson tartan _putsoes_. A mother lifts her butterfly-coloured
children into the clean straw and gets in herself, and the eldest
daughter, with white jacket and prettily-dressed hair, steps in
demurely, tucks up her knees in her exquisite plum-coloured silk skirt,
and away they go in dust and sun and jollity--verily, I do believe, that
Solomon in his very Sunday best was not a patch to one of these daintly
dressed figures....
I walk along the country road and have a glimpse of the white and gold
of a pagoda, and a glimpse of the river through tree trunks in shadow,
and wish the steamer's horn for recall would not sound for many days.
21st January.--Past Mimbu--sands wide and whitey-grey. There are white
cirri on blue--sky and sand repeated on the river's surface. At the ends
of the sand-spits are waders--oyster catchers I vow--one might be at
Arisaig in a splendid June instead of the Irrawaddy in January.... Long
rafts of teak logs pass us occasionally, drifting slowly down with the
current. The three or four oarsmen, when they see us, run about over the
round logs and give a pull here and a pull there at long oars, and try
to get the unwieldy length up and down stream; they wear only a waist
cloth, and look so sun-bitten; there is but one tiny patch of shadow in
the middle of their island under a lean-to cottage of matting, with a
burgee on a tall bamboo flying over it. Our wash sends their dug-out
canoe bobbling alongside their raft, and splashes over and between the
logs, and the raftsmen have to bustle to keep their herd together, and
we pass, and they go and dream, of--well I don't know what; that's the
worst of being only a visitor in a country--without the language, you
can only guess what the people think by their expressions.
We drop anchor off Yenangyaung. There are sandy cliffs here, riddled
with holes made by blue rock-pigeons (?)--more shooting going a-begging!
And there is a bungalow on a sandy bluff, and picturesque native craft
lie along the sandy shore, altogether rather a sandy place. The oil
works don't show from the river very much[27]. The Jacobs' party get off
here. Mr Jacobs manages this particular source of Burmah's wealth. They
go ashore in a smart white launch.
[27] Crude oil production of Burmah in 1904--116 million gallons, of
which 73 million came from Yenangyaung. In 1902 the Burmese oil fields
yielded nearly 55 million gallons, valued at the rate of 250 gallons for
a sovereign--Del Mar's "Romantic East."
There is the wreck of a river steamer on a sandbank off Yenangyaung, its
black ribs lie about like the bones of disintegrated whale; it is not
pleasant to look at. She went on fire, and about 200 Burmans were
drowned, and no one would save them, though there were many canoes and
people within three hundred yards. A Scotsman could only get one boat's
crew to go off, and they saved the captain and others, the rest jumped
overboard and were drowned. Burmese are said to be good swimmers, but I
have not so far seen a Burman swim more than two or three strokes,
though I see hundreds bathing every day. The Chittagong Indians who form
our crew swim ashore with a line every time we tie up, and they are
about the worst swimmers I have ever seen; they jump in on all fours and
swim like dogs or cattle. In this case of the drowning people, the
lookers on would say it was not their affair, just as they would, with
the utmost politeness, if you chose to worship in a way different from
them; a _reductio ad absurdum_, from the point of view of those in the
water, of a very charming trait. The Burman is naturally brave, but his
philosophy is that of the Christian Socialist, it is not his creed to be
heroic, or to take life, or thought for the morrow; and if a man smites
him on the cheek, though he may not actually turn the other, he doesn't
counter quick enough in our opinion--doesn't know our working
creed--"Twice blest is he whose cause is just, but three times blest
whose blow's in first;" so we took his country--and make it pay by the
sweat of our brows--poor devils.
We are steaming now north by east, a very winding course, for the water
is shallow though the river is wide. At high water season I'd think
there must be too much water for appearance sake--it must feel too wide
for a river and too narrow for the sea.
We stop at another village. Popa mountain detaches itself from
surroundings, thirty or forty miles to the east; it is faint violet and
rises from a slightly undulating wooded plain. It is a great place for
game and nats. Most powerful nats or spirits live there, and if you go
shooting you get nothing, unless you offer some of your breakfast as a
peace-offering to these spirits in the morning. This has been found to
be true over and over again by those who have shot there.
The day closes, the Arrakan Mountains far away in the west are violet.
The river here is wide as a fine lake and so smooth it reflects the most
delicate tints of cloud-land. In front of us a low promontory stretches
out from the east bank; we have to spend the night there. It is heavily
clad with trees, delicate pagoda spires, white and gold, rise from the
dark foliage and gleam with warm sunset light against the cool grey sky
in the north. Trees and spires, sands, cliffs, cottages, and the canoes
with bright-coloured paddlers, are all reflected in the smooth water.
As we get within ten yards of the shore six of our Chittagong crew
plunge into the glittering water with a light rope, and are ashore in a
minute and are hauling in our wire hawser; the setting sun striking
their wet bodies, makes them almost like ruddy gold, and their black
trousers cling to their legs. It seems an elementary way of taking a
line ashore; I think that with a little practise two men in a dinghy
would be quicker and would look more seamanlike--but probably it was the
way in the Ark, so the custom remains.
The Burmese villagers gather in groups and sit on the top of the bank in
the growing dusk. We can just see a suggestion of their gay colours and
the gleam of their cheroots. G. and I go ashore and stumble along a
deep, sandy road; on either side are little and big trees with open
cottages behind them, made of neatly woven bamboo matting, lit with oil
crusies. We come to a pagoda, and tall white griffins at its entrance
staring up into the sky, strange, grotesque beasts--the white-wash they
are covered with looks violet in the fading light.
At dinner, yarns on the fore-deck, big beetles humming out of the night
against our lamp, and the Captain telling us deep-sea yarns--how he
signed articles as a cabin boy, and of the times before the annexation
of Upper Burmah, when the white man skipper was of necessity something
of a diplomatist and a soldier. Some sailors can't spin yarns, but those
who can--how well they do it!
As we were at coffee there was a gurgling and groaning came from the
people aft, so we took our cigars, and went to see the row, and order
restored. There was a little crowd struggling and rolling in a ball, and
it turned out there was a long Sikh in the middle of it in grips with a
diminutive Chinaman, who might have been a wizened little old woman from
his appearance. It was the big Sikh who had done the horrible gurgling;
the silly ass had joined in with several Chinese, professional gamblers,
and of course lost, and unlike a Burman or a Chinaman, the native of
India can't lose stolidly. He vowed he'd been set on from behind, and
had been robbed of fifty-four rupees. The Captain assessed probable loss
at two rupees, and the first officer took him down the companion to the
lower deck, the Sikh standing two feet higher than the little Scot.
Later, the long black man went hunting the shrimp of a Chinaman round
the native part of the ship, and caught him again and asked the Captain
for justice, and looked at me as he spoke, which made me uncomfortable,
for I could not understand, but guessed he expected the Sahib to stick
up for a Sikh against any damn Chinee. I would have liked to photograph
the two--they were such a contrast as they sat on their heels beside
each other, the wizened little expressionless, beady-eyed Chinaman with
his thread of a pigtail, and his arm in the grasp of the long Sikh, with
black beard and long hair wound untidily round his head.
[Illustration]
22nd January.--Another very distinctive charm about this river is that
the two sides are generally quite different in character. On one side
this morning, the sun is rising over a wilderness of level sandbank,
buff-coloured against the sun, over this there is a low range of
distant mountains, with Popa by itself, lonely and pink; and looking out
on the other side from our cabin window we find we are steaming close
under steep, sunny banks, overhung with luxuriant foliage.
Where there is a break in the bank we look up sandy corries that come
down from hills, clad with park-like trees and scrub--the very place for
deer! There are no inhabitants on the river side, though we pass every
mile or two a ruined pagoda spire.
Passing Pagan we see the tops of some of its nine hundred and
ninety-nine pagodas. Many of them are different in shape from the
bell-shaped type we have seen so far. At breakfast we watch them as we
pass. The Flotilla Company does not give an opportunity of landing to
see these "Fanes of Pagan," which is very disappointing. So this ancient
city, one of the world's, wonders, is seldom seen by Europeans. There
are nine miles of the ruined city; "as numerous as the Pagodas of Pagan"
is, in Burmah, a term for a number that cannot be counted. Mrs Ernest
Hart, in "Picturesque Burmah," describes them in a most interesting
chapter. The authorities on Indian architecture, Fergusson, Colonel
Yule, and Marco Polo, all agree that they are of the wonders of the
world. Mrs Hart compares them in their historical interest to the
Pyramids, and in their architecture to the cathedrals of the Middle
Ages. She says of Gaudapalin Temple, which is the first temple seen on
approaching Pagan, that the central spire, which is 180 feet, recalls
Milan Cathedral. It was built about the year 1160 A.D. Colonel Yule says
that in these temples "there is an actual sublimity of architectural
effect which excites wonder, almost awe, and takes hold of the
imagination." Mr Fergusson is inclined to think this form of fane was
derived from Babylonia, and probably reached Burmah, via Thibet, by some
route now unknown. They have pointed arches to roof passages and halls,
and to span doorways and porticoes; and as no Buddhist arch is known in
India, except in the reign of Akbar, and hardly an arch in any Hindoo
temple, this disposes of the idea that the Burmese of the eleventh and
twelfth centuries derived their architecture from India. There are
besides temples and fanes, many solid bell-shaped pagodas of the Shwey
Dagon type. The Ananda Temple is the oldest. It is built in the form of
a Greek cross, the outer corridors are a hundred feet. The interior,
from descriptions I've read, must be splendidly effective and
impressive.
We stop at oil works, Yenangyat. The people come on and off in boat
loads of bright colours, and women come and sit on the sand beside the
ship. Each woman has an assortment of lacquered ware, orange and red,
delicately patterned cylindrical boxes, with neatly fitting trays and
lids, and bowls, trays, and priests' luncheon baskets--large bowls with
trays and smaller bowls inside each other, rising to a point with a cup
over the top. This ware is made of finely woven cane, and some of woven
horse-hair, alternately coated with a tree varnish, ash, and clay,
polished in laths and covered with faintly raised designs and colours
between, and brought to a polished surface. The best is so elastic that
one side of a tumbler or box can be pressed to meet the other without
cracking the colour inlay. They seem to cost a good deal, but when you
examine them, the intricacies of the designs of figures and foliage
account for the price. The groups of sellers on the shore were
interesting, but there was altogether loo much orange vermilion for my
particular taste--a little of that colour goes far, in nature or art.
The women wore rose red tamiens or skirts, and these, plus the red
lacquer work and reddish sand, made an effect as hot as if you had
swallowed a chili!
After Pagan, the traveller may snatch a rest for wearied eyes. The
sandbanks and distance are so level that the views are less interesting
than they were below, but, after all, appearances depend so much on the
weather effect. To-day, sky, water, and sand are so alike in colour,
that the effect is almost monotonous.
At the next village every one seemed jolly and busy, men and women
humping parcels, sacks, and boxes ashore, up the soft, hot sands into
bullock-carts. Now, after our lunch and their day's work, the men are
coming down the banks to bathe--social, cheery fellows, they all go in
together, wading with nothing on but their kilts tucked round their
hips, showing the tattooed designs, that all grown Burmans have over
their thighs. They give a plunge or two, and soap down, and gleam like
copper. Then they put on the dry kilt they have taken out with them,
slipping it on as they came out, modestly and neatly. The women pass
close by and exchange the day's news, and walk in with their skirts on
too, and also change into their dry garments as they come out with equal
propriety. No towelling is needed, for the air is so hot and still--but
the water is pretty cold--I know!
Another entertainment we have at lunch; on a sandbank a little to our
right, a long net; some 200 fathoms, is being drawn ashore, and people
in canoes are splashing the water outside and at the ends to keep in the
fish. There must be twenty men, boys, and women, working at it; beyond
them, there is a rolling distance of woodland, and with solitary Popa in
the distance--this mountain begins to grow on one, it is so constantly
the view from so many places.
Two new passengers, a Captain in R. A., I think, and his wife, came on
board here--came riding out of the greenery and along the shore on two
pretty arabs, through the bustling crowd of Burmans and natives.
He tells me he got with another gun, 60 couple of snipe yesterday, which
is a little unsettling for me. However, my gun is in Rangoon, and I will
leave it there, and hang on to my pencil! I find our fellow passenger,
who is somewhat deaf, is an artist, studied in Paris, and draws little
character figures in most excellent style; so he and G. and I draw all
day! one encourages the other.
[Illustration]
At Myingyan we tie up for the night, and we all go ashore together, that
is, Captain Terndrup, G., and I and the artist and his friend and walk
on the flat on the top of the sandy banks, and here is the view down the
river from where we landed, a yellow and violet sunset. Bullock carts go
slowly creaking past us; the dust they raise hangs in yellow clouds in
the sunset light. There are crops here, a little like potatoes, which
suggest partridges. I am told there are quail; some day I must come back
to see for myself.[28] There are deer about, for two heads came on
board, like our red deer, but with only a brow antler, and a well-curved
single switch above that--some fellow sending them to be set up for
home? I begin to feel awfully sorry I did not bring up gun and rifles
and fishing tackle, especially as there's any amount of space on board
for stowing luggage.
[28] Since return have seen Messrs Colonel Pollock and Thorn's book on
Sport in Burmah, Upper and Lower, and wish I had read it before going
out.
28th January.--The air gets more and more exhilarating as we get
North,--there's a Strathspey in the air now in the morning when you
waken; but what poor rags we felt only a few days ago down at Rangoon!
It is said that men in the Woods and Forests with fever come from the
jungle to the river, get on board a Flotilla steamer, and recover
immediately.
This is our last day's journey on this boat, but we are to stay on board
her to-night at Mandalay, and perhaps to-morrow night, till we get on
board the upper river cargo boat, which is slightly smaller than this
mail boat. The cargo boats go slower than the mails, for they stop
oftener, and tow _two_ flats or barges, one on each side. After
Mandalay, Bhamo will be our objective; it is the most northerly British
cantonment in Burmah, and is near the Chinese frontier. All the way
there trade is carried on at the stopping places between the traders'
booths on the flats and the riverside villagers. We expect to find this
trade mightily interesting, as we shall see men and women of the wild
mountain tribes. I hope to see the Shan sword-makers particularly; they
make splendid blades by the light of the moon, for secrecy, I am told,
like Ferrara, and also because they can then see the fluctuating colour
of the tempering better than in daylight--and perhaps because it is
cooler at night!