Burma under British rule--and before;

RMi^

THE LIBRARY

OF

THE UNIVERSITY

OF CALIFORNIA
LOS ANGELES

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BURMA UNDER BRITISH RULE
-AND BEFORE

BURMA UNDER BRITISH
RULE-AND BEFORE

BY JOHN NISBET D.CEC

LATE CONSERVATOR OF FORESTS, BURMA
AUTHOR OF "BRITISH FOREST TREES"
"STUDIES IN FORESTRY" "OUR
FORESTS AND WOOD-
LANDS" ETC

IN TWO VOLUMES

WITH MAPS

VOL I

WESTMINSTER
ARCHIBALD CONSTABLE & CO Ltd

2 WHITEHALL GARDENS
1 901

BUTLER & Tanner,

The Selwood printing works,

frome, and london.

Ms

^^'%5

}'\

To
SIR FREDERIC WILLIAM RICHARDS FRYER K.C.S.I

THE LAST OF MANY EMINENT CHIEF COMMISSIONERS AND THE

FIRST LIEUTENANT-GOVERNOR OF BURMA

THIS ENDEAVOUR TO DESCRIBE THE GREAT

PROVINCE ENTRUSTED TO HIS CHARGE

ITS INTERESTING PEOPLE AND

THE RAPID PROGRESS OF

BURMA UNDER BRITISH RULE

IS DEDICATED

V>^

'H O / » -^ -*

Preface

MANY books are now written about distant lands
by those who have only a very slight acquaint-
ance with them, and such usually form very pleasant
reading. Burma has received a fair share of this sort
of attention from casual visitors, but the present work is
not one of these books written in lighter vein. It is
intended to be a comprehensive treatise on one of the
richest provinces of our Indian Empire, and it embodies
knowledge and experience acquired there in a service
extending over nearly twenty-five years.

During that time great political, commercial, and social
changes have taken place throughout Burma and among
the Burmese, and the main objects of this book are
to describe these, and to show how they have already
affected and are bound still more to affect the land and
the people. It tries to describe the latter as they were,
and as they now are. The historical sketch of Burma
has been confined solely to what is necessary in order to
understand the position of affairs at different times.

The author feels that some explanation is needed for
the appearance of these volumes. The work was under-
taken for the simple reason that no comprehensive book
has been published about Burma since it came entirely:
under British rule in 1886, although the record of the
material progress achieved seems well worthy of being
submitted to the public in some such convenient form.
Matters affecting the life and habits of the Burmese have
also been treated in a way which it is hoped may be
of use to those going to spend the best years of their
lives in Burma, and this is the reason why so many
Burmese terms have been introduced and explained.
An endeavour has at the same time been made to in-
dicate various commercial openings for investment of
capital, because the development of a rich Indian pro-
vince ought surely to be worthy of consideration by
British capitalists.

PREFACE

The plan of the book was sketched early in 1896, and
several chapters of it were then written, but press of
official work prevented its completion till the leisure of
furlough from 1898-1900. In the meantime the official
Gazetteer of Upper Burma has been published, which
also deals with many of the matters here treated of.
The two works, however, cannot in any way clash. The
one is an official record, the other is an independent
publication meant for such of the general public as may
feel an interest in Burma or in its administration by the
British. If there be any similarity between portions of
the two books with regard to matters specially affecting
Upper Burma, this can only be due to the fact that
the actual historical data have been obtained from the
same sources, because neither a'othor has yet seen the
work of the other.

The scheme which has been followed was to treat each
subject comprehensively in a chapter by itself. One
drawback to this method is the necessity for occasional
repetitions and references to previous pages, but the
advantages seemed to outweigh this disadvantage.

The French position in Indo-China has of course been
dealt with at considerable length. But even since the
chapter dealing with "Britain and France in Further India
and Western China" has been passed for press, matters
affecting French railway enterprise in south-western
China have again advanced. The latest account of the
existing position will be found in an article on " The
French Railway into Yun-nan " in the Times of July 22,
1 90 1, to which the attention of those specially interested
in this subject may be drawn.

A book of this description can hardly appeal to any
large circle of readers, and it is not at all likely to com-
mand anything but a very limited sale. It is therefore
in no small degree owing to assistance kindly guaranteed
by the leading steamship companies and the merchants
of Rangoon that its publication has been assured, and
the author gladly takes this opportunity of thanking them
for the encouragement thus given.

London, August 15, 1901.

CONTENTS

CHAPTER I

ESSENTIAL FACTS IN THE HISTORY OF BURMA

DOWN TO THE SECOND BURMESE WAR (1S52) . i

CHAPTER II

POLITICAL AND COMMERCIAL RELATIONS BETWEEN
BRITISH INDIA AND UPPER BURMA FROM 1853
TO 1880 26

CHAPTER III

POLITICAL AND COMMERCIAL RELATIONS BETWEEN
BRITISH INDIA AND UPPER BURMA FROM 1881 TO
1885 : THE CAUSES OF TPIE THIRD BURMESE WAR 54

CHAPTER IV
THE THIRD BURMESE WAR (1885). .... 82

CHAPTER V
THE PACIFICATION OF UPPER BURMA (1886-1890) . . 105

CHAPTER VI

CIVIL AND MILITARY ADMINISTRATION UNDER BUR-
MESE RULE 1^0

vii

CONTENTS

PAGE

CHAPTER VII
LAW AND JUSTICE UNDER BURMESE RULE . . .176

CHAPTER VIII
THE ROYAL GOLDEN CITY : "THE CLUSTER OF GEMS" 19S

CHAPTER IX
BURMA UNDER BRITISH ADMINISTRATION . . .214

CHAPTER X
LAND TENURE AND THE REVENUE SETTLEMENT . 268

CHAPTER XI
AGRICULTURE AND RURAL CUSTOMS 3'^3

CHAPTER XII
MINOR RURAL INDUSTRIES 345

CHAPTER XIII
MINERAL RESOURCES . • 389

CHAPTER XIV
TRADE AND COMMERCE . .413

APPENDIX

SUMMARIZED EXTRACT FROM THE ATTASANKHEPA
VANNANA DAMMATHAT, or INSTITUTES OF BUR-
MESE LAW (1882) 454

Vlll

LIST OF
MAPS AND ILLUSTRATIONS

VOLUME I

A BURMESE VILLAGE (SEYWA, THARRAWADY

DISTRICT) Frontispiece

PLAN OF THE PALACE BUILDINGS WITHIN

THE ROYAL CITY OF MANDALAY . . . To face p. 198

COLOURED MAP OF BURMA At end

VOLUME IL

LIMESTONE ROCK SURMOUNTED BY PAGODA

(TENASSERIM DIVISION) Frontispiece

SKETCH MAP OF BURMA, TONQUIN AND

SOUTHERN CHINA To face p. 16

SKETCH MAP OF RAILWAYS OPEN AND

UNDER CONSTRUCTION AND SURVEY To face p. 24

chapter I

ESSENTIAL FACTS IN THE HISTORY OF BURMA DOWN
TO THE SECOND BURMESE WAR (1852)

THE early history of Burma is wrapped in the mists
of traditional legends, which afterwards became
crystallised in the Yazawin or Royal Chronicles. Formed
by the fusion and union of Mongol tribes, the Burmese
probably drove the earlier settlers out of the valleys into
the mountain fastnesses, where they form the wild hill-
tribes of the present day.

Successive waves of immigration seem to have burst
in from the north-west, due to incursions from Upper
India, each fresh immigration forcing southwards towards
the sea those who had established themselves in the
fertile valley of the Irrawaddy river.

In course of time various independent kingdoms
sprang up, so that when the truly historical epoch was
reached separate nations, with dynasties of their own,
held sway in different parts of the country. Thus there
arose the petty kingdoms of Arakan, Pegu, and Tavoy
along the coastline, of Prome and Toungoo in Central
Burma, and of Burma proper in the upper portion of the
Irrawaddy valley.

Internecine warfare was habitual among these various
petty kingdoms, though Arakan and Tavoy, thanks to
their geographical position, suffered much less on this
account than the central principalities occupying different
portions of the Irrawaddy valley.

Arakan formed a separate kingdom over which various
dynasties are supposed to have ruled in an unbroken line
of succession from 2666 B.C. down to 1784 a.d., when
Thamada, who ruled at the city of Myauku (or Myo-
haung), was conquered and taken prisoner by Bodaw
Paya, king of Ava. Tavoy, colonised from Arakan,

BURMA UNDER BRITISH RULE

was soon absorbed into the Peguan kingdom, though it
long formed a bone of contention between the rulers of
Pegu and Siam, now being held by one and again by the
other. The central kingdoms of Prome and Toungoo
appear to have been, respectively, merely a very early
dynasty and a comparatively recent off-shoot from the
kingdom of Burma, into which they were subsequently
again merged. The Prome dynasty was established at
Thare Kettara by Maha Thambawd, in 483 B.C., and
terminated with the death of Thu Pinya in 95 a.d.,
shortly after which a new dynasty was founded at Pagdn,
in 108 A.D., by Thamokdarit. Later on, it assumed
independence from time to time, before it was finally
absorbed into the kingdom of Burma. The Toungoo
off-shoot, however, played a much more important part
in the general history of the country.

While Duttiya Min Kaung ruled over Burma he con-
ferred independence on his tributary Min Kyi Nyo of
Toungoo about 1480 a.d. The latter was succeeded in
1530 by his son, Min Taya Shweti, better known as
Tabin Shweti. Ten years later, by the time he was
only twenty-six years of age, Tabin Shweti had made
himself master of Pegu, and had been appointed king,
according to the ancient ceremonies, in the capital. To
celebrate this event he placed new Ti on the great na-
tional pagodas at Pegu and Dagon (now Rangoon).
Ousting the Shan usurpers from Ava he next had him-
self solemnly consecrated there, in 1544, as "king of
kings" or emperor of all Burma, and he appointed
tributary kings for the government of Ava, Prome,
Toungoo, and Martaban. In 1546 he invaded Arakan,
but was obliged to discontinue operations owing to dis-
turbances in his eastern territories. He was now master
of all Burma, except Arakan, and would probably also
have conquered and added to his dominions the whole of
the Shan States and Northern Siam, as happened during
the second half of the sixteenth century, had he not
given way to debauchery rendering him incapable of
ruling. In 1550, when only thirty-six years of age, this
able, but cruel and unscrupulous monarch was murdered
by a scion of the late royal race of Pegu.

2 _y

MYTHICAL AND LEGENDARY HISTORY

( In considering the history of Burma, even broadly
and briefly without going into details, the two main
factors most deserving of consideration are the Burmese
kingdom in the upper portion of the Irrawaddy, and the

Mon kingdom occupying the lower portions of the Irra-
waddy and Sittang valleys, as well as the whole of the
southern sea-coast. To prevent confusion, the rulers of
these kingdoms will invariably be respectively referred
to throughout this chapter as the kings of Burma and of
Pegu, while their subjects will be called by their correct
distinctive names, Burmese and Mon.

( The Burmese kingdom seems to have been originally
established by a dynasty which came from India) That
portion of the Royal Chronicle which may be classed as
purely mythical gives a list of thirty-three kings who
reigned at Tagaung (Hastinapura), and of seventeen
more who had their capital at Mauroya and Tagaung.
The last king, Thado Damma Raja, was dethroned at
the time of an invasion from the east.

The legendary portion of the Burmese Chronicles
may be regarded as commencing about 483 b.c, when
Maha Thambawa established a new dynasty at Prome
(Thare Kettara). Here twenty-seven kings reigned till
the close of the first century a.d., when, after the death
of King Thu Pinyd, his nephew, Thamokdarit, removed
the capital to Pagdn. Forty kings reigned at Pagan
before what may be regarded as the actually historic
epoch began with the accession of King Anawratazaw to
the throne, about loio a.d. Even this period possesses,
however, so little of interest for the general reader that
the course of events in Burma may be lightly skimmed,
only the essential facts being noted, till the last dynasty
WAS founded in 1755 by Alaung Payd.
f The Pagan dynasty came to an end in 1279 a.d., when
King Kyawswa was deposed and afterwards killed by
three Shan brothers. Previous to this, there had been a
Mongol invasion, caused by the Emperor of China enforc-
ing his claim to receive tribute and homage from Burma.
The army consisted more probably of Shans and Shan-
Chinese than of Chinese proper ; for men of Shan race
had long been gradually overrunning the country and

3

BURMA UNDER BRITISH RULE

acquiring positions of great influence through royal
favour. This was not the first time the Shans had
spread over the country. Centuries before they had
swarmed into Burma, and had even pushed northwards
so far as to found the Shan or Ahom kmgdom of As-

sam

In 1298 A.D. a Shan dynasty was founded in Burma,
which reigned for about seventy years with Mymzamg,
Panyd. and Sagaing as the capitals. In 1364, however, a
new Burmese dynasty was founded by 1 hado Mmbya,
who dethroned the contemporaneous rulers at Panya and
Sagaing, and established his capital at Ava. Said to be a
descendant of the ancient kings of Tagaung, Thado Mm-
bya was of Shan extraction on his mother's side; and
all the seventeen kings of his dynasty, which held the
reins of government till 1554, were mainly of Shan
descent. On the last king of this line being conquered
and deposed by Bayin Naung, of the Toungoo dynasty,
King of Pegu, the kingdom of Burma was held as a
tributary of the kingdom of Pegu.

The ancient Mon Chronicles give a list of fifty-nine
kings of Pegu, who reigned at Suvarna Bhiami or
Thaton. The first of these, Thiha Raja, came from
India, and died in 543 B.C., the year in which Gaudama
attained Buddhahood ; and the last of the long line,
Manuha, was conquered and carried off as a prisoner to
Pagdn by Anawratazaw, in 1057 a.d.

An off-shoot from this direct line had, however, long
before this been sent to establish itself to the west of
Thaton ; and this resulted in the foundation of the city of
Pegu(Hanthawadi)in 573 a.d. Between then and 781 a.d.
seventeen kings reigned here ; but after that there is a
blank of about 500 years in the Pegu chronicles, during
which the names of the rulers are not given. This may
perhaps in part be explained by the religious strife
existing between the Brahminists and the Buddhists,
which extended over about 300 years ; for each monkish
party would naturally tamper with the chronicles when-
ever they gained the ascendancy for the time being.

After the conquest of the kingdom of Pegu, including
both Thaton and Hanthawadi, Pegu became subject to

4 V

EXTENSION OF BURMESE EMPIRE

Burma for about 230 years, until a Shan chief called
VVareyu established a dynasty in 1287 a.d., with the
seat of government at Muttama (Martaban). About
sixty years later, however, the capital was transferred to
the ancient city of Hanthawadi, which remained the
stronghold of the dynasty till Takdrutbi was conquered
and deposed by Tabin Shweti, King of Toungoo, in
1540 A.D.

The dynasty founded by Tabin Shweti, a king of
Burmese race to whom reference has already been made,
was but of short duration. It ended in 1599, when
Nanda Bayin, the eldest son of Bayin Naung, was de-
throned and put to death by his tributary, the King of
Toungoo.

From 1599, when the Nyaung Yan Min, a younger
son of Bayin Naung, ascended the throne of the " king
of kings," the Toungoo dynasty reigned at Ava, and at
Pegu, holding sway throughout the whole of the present
province, with the exception of Arakan. This was the
first time the kingdoms of Burma and Pegu had ever been
united under one sovereign. At the same time, the
eastern frontiers of the Burmese empire had been pushed
forward so as to include large tracts in Western China,
all the Shan and Siamese-Shan States, and the greater
portion of Siam.

In 1740, however, the Mon, who had never relin-
quished their aspirations for national independence,
again revolted, and elected as King of Pegu a monk of
Shan origin, who took the title of Budda Ketti. Six
years later he abandoned the throne in favour of another
Shan, who assumed the title of Binya Dala, a name
famous in Mon history. Successful in arms against the
King of Burma, he conquered Ava in 1751 and burned
it to the ground, taking prisoner Maha Damma Raja
Dibuti, who was sent to Pegu and there executed two
years later,

Binya Dala's sway over the re-united kingdoms of
Pegu and Burma, this time under a ruler of Shan
descent, was but of short duration. In 1757 he was
conquered and taken prisoner by Alaung Payd, the
founder of the last ruling dynasty in Burma, which was

5

BURMA UNDER BRITISH RULE

overthrown for ever in 1885. Binya Dala ultimately
met the same fate as he had meted out to Maha
Damma Raja, for he was publicly executed by Sinpyuym,
son of Alaung Payd, in 1775. when the Burmese king
held ^reat religious festival at the Shwe Dagon pagoda

in Rangoon. n 1 u 4.1,

Alaung Paya. or Alompra as he was called by the
Encrlish. was perhaps the greatest of all the rulers of
AvI Born in 1714 at Moksobo, "the hunter's cookmg
place," he was first of all the subordinate of a village
headman and then became headman of the town.
Through his craft and his personal influence, aided no
doubt among so superstitious a people by his auspicious
name, Maung Aung Zeya, or " conquering victory," he
raised a petty local revolt against the Mon power, then
paramount in Burma. This proving successful, large
numbers flocked to his rebel band, and he was at last
able to score important victories against the forces of the
King of Pegu.

In 1754 Ava fell before him, and he carried the war
southwards to the delta, occupying Bassein, at that time
the chief seaport of the country. It was then, in 1755,
that he proclaimed himself King of Burma and Pegu,
assuming the pretentious title of Alaung Payd. "the
incarnation of a Buddha," and conferring royal titles
upon his two eldest sons. He established his capital at
Moksobo, now called Shwebo.

He died in 1760, at the early age of forty-six years.
During the short space of seven years he not only freed
his country from the yoke of the Mon, whom he
degraded to be the Talaing or "down-trodden" race,
and raised himself to the throne, but he also extended
the boundaries of his kingdom from Manipur in the
north-west to Siam in the south and east. And while
thus engaged in successful warlike operations, he like-
wise did much for the improvement of internal ad-
ministration throughout his dominions. He prohibited
gambling and the sale of intoxicating drink, and he
purified the judicial system by enforcing the trial of cases
in public and the registration of every judicial order
that was passed. It was a misfortune for Burma that

6

ALAUNG PAYA'S DYNASTY, 1755-1885

the sway of so competent a ruler only lasted between
five and six years, — for he died in i 760, while laying
siege to Ayodya, then the capital of Siam.

In the following genealogical tree of this dynasty it
will be seen how the succession varied by the national
custom of nominating the heir-apparent and successor, in
place of following any distinct rule like that of primo-
geniture : —

(1) Alaung Paya (17 55-1 760).
I

(2) Naungdawgyi (3) Sinpyuyin (^) Bodaw Paya
(1760-1763) (1763-1776) (1781-1819)

I I 1

{^) Maung Maung (■*) Singu Min £m She Min or

(reigned only 7 (1776-1781) " Heir Apparent"

days in 1781) (died during his

father's reign)

(') Bagyidaw Paya
(1819-1838)

(^) King Tharrawaddi
(Shwebo Min)
(1838— 1846)

(^) Pagan Min
(1846-1852,
deposed)

(1") Mindon Min
(1853-1878)

I
(11) King Thibaw

only a younger son

(1878-1885)

From shortly after the date of the foundation of
Alaung Payd's dynasty the history of Burma becomes
gradually more closely interwoven than was previously
the case with that of British India until, after partial
dismemberments in 1826 and 1852, the kingdom of
Ava was finally and completely absorbed into the British
Indian Empire on ist January, 1886.

Down to the close of Alaung Payas reign the
influences of foreign countries on Burma, so far as
territorial possessions were concerned, were confined
to those emanating from the other Mongol kingdoms,
China and Siam, lying further to the east, and nothing

7

BURMA UNDER BRITISH RULE
had yet been felt of the irresistible pressure which was
finally to be exerted from the west. A Chinese or
Shan- Chinese invasion from Yunnan had taken place m
1659, but the invaders were repulsed in their attack on
Ava, the capital. • Siam (Ay6dyd) had been conquered
and made a tributary province of Bayin Naung in 1564,
and Zimme was dealt with in the same manner in 1578,
while the northern Shan States were also brought to the
condition of subordinate tributaries. Siam soon after
freed itself from the Burmese yoke, and even invaded
Pegu. Alaung Paya s war of 1759 against Siam was
caused by offended vanity, the King of Siam having
refused to give him one of his daughters in marriage as
a minor queen.

Alaung Paya had six sons by his chief wife, and he
expressed the wish that the succession to the throne
should devolve upon each of these in turn. Looked
upon as a sort of dynastic order, this unfortunate and
rather unreasonable wish later on proved the cause of
much bloodshed.

The first king to succeed Alaung Payd was his eldest
son, who took the title of Naungdawgyi. Transferring
his capital to Sagaing, then the chief town in his
dominions, his short reign of only three years was
chiefly occupied in putting down an insurrection in Ava,
and quelling minor disturbances in various parts of the
large empire to which he had fallen heir.

On being succeeded in 1763 by his brother, who
assumed the grandiloquent regal name of Sinpyuyin
or " Lord of the White Elephant," the capital was
immediately removed from Sagaing to M6ks6bo.
Dissatisfied with this change as soon as it had been
effected, the King consulted his astrologers, who advised
him to select Ava once more as the capital. Accord-
ingly he re-transferred the seat of government to Ava.

Naturally ambitious, Sinpyuyin invaded and annexed
Manipur in 1764, reduced Zimme and the Shan States to
obedience, and subsequently invaded Siam in 1765.
Ayodyd, the capital, was taken, and was destroyed by
fire early in 1767, when the victorious king found
himself compelled to return to Ava to defend his own

8

BURMESE WARS WITH CHINA

proper dominions against a threatened Chinese invasion.
This incursion arose out of purely commercial causes.

In the spring of 1765 a Chinese trader had been
interfered with when approaching Bhamo, and was
taken into custody and sent to Ava. Being there
released, he found some of his goods were missing when
he got to Bhamo. Similar friction having frequently
been caused by misconduct of Burmese officials at
various points along the eastern frontier, a Shan- Chinese
incursion was made into the southern Shan States.

This was soon easily quelled, but Sinpyuyin became
uneasy about his relations with China when he heard,
early in the following year, that a large army was being
massed on the frontier near Momein. In 1 767 the Chinese
troops invaded Burma and occupied Bhamo, while a
southern column marched by the trade route through
the northern Shan State of Theinni to threaten the
capital. The Burmese, however, succeeded in routing
and driving back again the northern column, and in
forcing the southern also to retreat. The net result of
the contest proved advantageous for Burma, as it
definitely gained certain Shan States in the extreme
north which really belonged to China, though they had
from time to time been under Burmese suzerainty.

Furious at one he considered an upstart and a petty
barbarian daring to resist an army of the son of heaven,
the Emperor of China again sent troops across the Shan
hills towards the close of 1767. Defeating one of the
Burmese columns in the Thibaw State, it pushed on
towards the edge of the plateau overlooking the valley of
the Irrawaddy, but was then defeated and forced to retreat
from Burmese territory. The Chinese entrenchments or
camping grounds ( Tarok Sakdn) then formed are still to
be found dotted all along the line of march from Maymyo,
through Thibaw and Lashio, eastwards. But from the
size of even the largest of these entrenchments, it seems
evident that only small bodies of troops could have been
employed, and not the large army of 50,000 men whose
inglorious defeat the Burmese Chronicle boastfully nar-
rates.

Rumours of troops being massed in still larger numbers

BURMA UNDER BRITISH RULE

beyond the frontiers soon again troubled the King, and the
earthquakes of 1 769. which rent asunder pagodas and
threw down the golden Ti, or " umbrella " pinnacle of the
great Shwe Dagon pagoda in Rangoon, were viewed
as omens of direst import, presaging national disaster.
Religious frenzy seized hold of the people and of their
King. Vast treasures were lavished in repairing and
beautifying the great pagodas throughout the land, and
thousands of gold and silver images were enshrined in
order to gain sufficient Kutho, or " religious merit," to
avert disaster.

Hardly had these great works of religious merit been
accomplished before the storm broke from the north-east,
in the early part of the autumn of 1769. Decimated by
malarious fever, the Chinese were easily overpowered by
the Burmese ; and before the close of the year peace was
established by a convention signed at Bhamo. This was
the last time war actually occurred between Burma and
China. Shortly after this the Siamese revolted, and in
1 77 1 a Burmese force was sent against them. It con-
sisted mainly of Talaings, who mutinied, massacred their
Burmese fellow-soldiers, and, retracing their steps, in-
vested Rangoon, the new metropolis of the sea-board.
This uprising was soon suppressed locally, but it was not
till the beginning of 17 74 that the Burmese authority was
completely re-established throughout Pegu. To celebrate
this happy issue and the victories of Burmese arms in
Manipur and Kachar, as well as to consolidate his power
in Pegu, Sinpyuyin placed a new golden TV on the
summit of the Shwe Dagon pagoda in 1774 ; and then,
full of what he probably considered good deeds, he passed
away in 1776, being succeeded by his son, the Singu
Min.

When Singu Min ascended the throne, Burma was
again embroiled in a Siamese war. After the complete
destruction of Ayodya by fire, and the carrying off of the
Siamese royal family as prisoners by Sinpyuyin's army
in 1767, a man named Paya Tak, of Chinese descent,
obtained a following, and inflicted heavy losses on the
retreating Burmese. Assuming the title of king, he
founded a new capital at Bangkok. It was not till 1774

10

DYNASTIC LAW OF SUCCESSION

that Sinpyuyin found himself in a position to conduct
fresh operations against Siam, and these had not been
concluded when he died. Meanwhile, it was not going
well in Siam with the Burmese arms. So the new king
determined to put an end to the conflict, and ordered the
withdrawal of his troops, both from Ay6dyd and from
the Zimme and Upper Menam territories, where they
could no longer stay with safety.

Internal disturbances connected with the succession now
began as a direct consequence of Alaung Payd's desire
that each of the six sons of his chief queen should in
their turn succeed to the throne, as it became vacant.
The Singu Min was the son of Sinpyuyin. If Alaung
Paya's death-bed wish were to be regarded as the law of
succession, then the eldest surviving son was the rightful
heir to the throne ; while, if otherwise, then a prince
named Maung Maung, son of King Naungdawgyi, was
by some held to have stronger claims to the throne than
the Singu Min. These ideas were probably only formu-
lated about a couple of years after the latter had obtained
regal power, and even then only because he turned out
a cruel, dissolute, and brutal monster.

Suspicious of plots that began to be whispered in 1779,
he had his two most favoured rivals killed. These were
a younger brother of his own and his uncle, the fourth
son of Alaung Payd ; and a short time after that, in a fit
of jealousy, he drowned his favourite queen. Another
uncle, Badun Min, the fifth son of Alaung Paya, an astute
prince, who had so conducted himself as to be considered
almost outside the pale of rivalry for the throne, escaped
death, but was sent to Sagaing, and there kept under
close supervision.

In 1 78 1, however, a band of conspirators seized the
palace while the King was absent from Ava on a royal
progress, and proclaimed as king Maung Maung, who
was then a lad of eighteen. Returning to the palace, the
Singu Min was allowed to enter the inner precincts, where
he was slain by the father of his murdered queen. At
once seizing the opportunity, the Badiin Min cited Alaung
Paya s dying wish, that his sons should succeed him ac-
cording to their seniority, as the dynastic law of succes-

II

BURMA UNDER BRITISH RULE

sion, and Maung Maung, who only reigned a week, was
at once put to death, the Badiin Min being now pro-
claimed the rightful king.

The new king from time to time adopted various
titles, one of them being "lord of many white elephants,"
but he is best known to the English by the name of
Bodaw Paya, although the Burmese themselves usually
refer to him as Min Tayagyi, " the great lawgiver."

To seat himself more securely on the throne, he put to
death many of those who had secured the power for
Maung Maung. About a year later an attempt was
made to seize the palace for a scion of the old Burmese
royal family ; but, this proving unsuccessful, the assailants
were put to death. And to prevent conspiracies in future,
a holocaust was made of all the inhabitants of the village
of Paungha, where the plot was hatched. Men, even in-
cluding monks, and women to tne number of over a hun-
dred are said to have been burned alive on huge piles of
wood, while their houses were razed to the ground, their
fruit trees cut down, and their fields allowed to revert to
jungle. A revolt about the same time occurred among
the Talaing near Rangoon, which was also crushed with
characteristic cruelty, more than 500 of the malcontents
being put to the sword.

Having thus crushed organised opposition to his king-
ship, Bodaw Paya at once proceeded to wash away the
blood-stains with which his life-account had become
blotted and beflecked. He built a vast pagoda near
Sagaing, and, following the advice of his astrologers,
founded a new capital at Amdrapura, about six miles to
the north-east of Ava, which was occupied in 1 yS2). That
same year he caused a sort of Domesday Book to be
compiled, giving the financial resources of each district
throughout his kingdom, but the first use he made of this
was to demand an extraordinary contribution from each
town and village for the repairing and restoration of
pagodas, and for other royal works of religious merit.

On the foundation of the new capital, Bodaw Paya at
the same time determined the succession to the throne in
favour of his eldest son, whom he appointed Ezn Slid Min,
or " heir apparent." On Pandali Thakin, the sixth son

12

ARAKAN ANNEXED TO BURMA

of Alaung Payd, quoting the dynastic wish which the
King had enforced in dethroning Maung Maung, Bodaw
Paya now pooh-poohed that as a silly idea. The younger
brother then becoming troublesome, he was disposed of
in what was considered the really orthodox and proper
way of doing a royal prince to death : he was tied in a
red velvet sack and thrown into the Irrawaddy river.
/ Impelled partly by lust of territory, and partly by
religious desire to possess the great sacred image of
Arakan, Bodaw Payd waged war against that kingdom
in 1 783, and annexed it in 1 784. Elated with his easy
success in this enterprise, he conceived the ambitious
design of conquering the whole of Further India.

ijln pursuit of this object, Bodaw Paya began by in-
va!ding Siam in 1785. Placing himself at the head of an
army, he demanded tribute asserted to be due, and inti-
mated his intention to avenge the defeats inflicted by
Payd Tak on the Burmese arms. Junk Ceylon was taken,
but was soon after regained by the Siamese ; and Bodaw
Payd precipitately retreated to Rangoon.

In the following year a fresh invasion of Siam was em-
barked on, but the Burmese troops were cut to pieces
hear the frontiers of Tavoy and Mergui. Bodaw Payd
fled back to Martaban, and thence proceeded to his own
capital, there to engage his attention with further works
of religious merit, so that future undertakings might be
more auspicious.

During 1791 the Siamese established themselves at
Tavoy, but the town was in 1792 regained by the Bur-
mese, and peace between the two countries was declared
in 1793. But many of the Shan chiefs had meanwhile
been incited to throw off their allegiance to Burma, and
to become tributaries of Siam ; and these tributaries were
retained by the Siamese.

Foiled in his aspirations as to the conquest of Siam,
Bodaw Payd resigned all thoughts of invading and over-
running China. But he still devoted attention to the
extension of his frontiers towards the north and west.
Dissensions, intrigues, and difficulties about the succession
gave him the opportunities he desired both in Manipur
and in Assam. After the death of Alaung Paya, Manipur,

13

BURMA UNDER BRITISH RULE

with British assistance from Bengal, had been enabled to
free itself again from the Burmese yoke, but in 1813
Bodaw Payd was appealed to for the purpose of settling
a disputed succession. Citing the occupant of the throne
before him, in order to settle the dispute, the Raja
refused to appear ; so Burmese troops overran Manipur
in 1 8 1 3, the prince who had sought the intervention of
Bodaw Payd was placed on the throne, and the Kubo
valley was annexed to Burma.

Similarly, in Assam, a dispute about the succession to
the throne led to one candidate beseeching the interven-
tion of the King of Burma, and troops were sent there
in 181 6. But before anything definite had resulted
from this ready interference in the internal affairs of
Assam, Bodaw Payd died in 18 19. Cruel and ferocious,
he drew fearful bills of mortality on the Burmese nation.
Though he was almost constantly engaged in warfare, yet
the tale of men killed in cold blood by his inhuman orders
was even greater than the total of those that fell in the
field. Conscious of his blood-guiltiness, he tried to wipe
out the debit balance standing to his life-account, and
to earn a surplus of religious merit by lavish expenditure
of money, labour, and life — all wrung from his people
without consideration, payment, or return of any sort^ — on
pagodas, irrigation tanks, and sacred shrines. Bodaw
Payd's impulse towards creating works of religious merit
gradually became a passion, and finally developed into a
mania. As such, it was probably a premonitory symp-
tom of the more pronounced insanity with which his
grandsons, who succeeded him on the throne, were subse-
quently afflicted. But the crowning glory of his reign
was, in his own estimation, the possession of a perfect
white male elephant, caught in the Pegu forests, which
was received at Court with more than regal honours, and
which was greatly venerated during the fifty years it
lived at the capital.

Bodaw Payd was succeeded by his grandson, Sagaing
Min, who had been appointed heir-apparent on his
father's death in 1809, and who now took the title of
Bagyidaw.

Although his accession to the throne was unopposed,

14

BAGYIDAW'S FOREIGN POLICY

he soon made himself a terror by executing two of his
uncles, the Princes of Prome and Toungoo, together with
a large number of public officers whom he suspected of
conspiring against him. Early in Bagyidaw's reign an
evil omen made itself seen, for a vulture one day alighted
on the spire of the palace. Soon after this, too, the spire
itself, along with other portions of the palace buildings,
the court of justice, and a large part of the city were de-
stroyed by fire. So it was resolved to re-establish Ava
as the capital. Preparations were at once begun, though
it was not till 1823 that the move was ultimately made.

In matters of foreign policy, Bagyidaw followed in
the footsteps of his predecessor. Marjit, Raja of Mani-
pur, who had been placed on the throne by Bodaw Payd
in 18 13, was summoned to do homage to his new suzerain
along with the other tributary princes in 18 19, but merely
made excuses in place of putting in his appearance.
This, coupled with offences against the Burmese
sumptuary laws as to the number of roofs on the spire
above his palace,^ and the amount of gilding in it, was
r. made an excuse for despatching troops against him.
/ These occupied the capital, and the Burmese garrison
was retained at Manipur during 1820.
I In Assam, too, Chandra Kanta, who was seated on the
throne by the troops sent by Bodaw Payd, soon showed
a desire to be free from Burmese control and interfer-
ence. Additional troops were therefore sent under a
commander named Maung Yit, who, through his suc-
cesses in Manipur and Assam, gained the title of *' Maha
Bandiila," after a mighty warrior who did great deeds
according to the Burmese legends. This general after-
wards commanded the troops fighting against the British.
The result of this Burmese invasion was that Chandra
'f/Kanta was defeated and fled into British territory, and
^ Assam was declared a Burmese province in 1821.

The extension of the frontiers to the north and west,

^ The roofs of the spire above the king's chief throne, and of those
above the four main gates of the royal capital, were nine in number ;
and monasteries may also have the same number. But even the most
powerful tributary princes were only allowed seven roofs on the palace
spire surmounting their throne.

15

BURMA UNDER BRITISH RULE

beyond the mountain ranges forming the western water-
shed of the Irrawaddy valley, proved a source of friction
with British India. The situations which in this manner
arose from time to time were the preponderating causes
of both the first and the second Burmese wars. And, as
neither of these very severe lessons could teach the Bur-
mese Court that the British Empire in India was of a
more solid and resisting nature than any of the countries
mentioned in the Royal Chronicles, similar causes in
course of time led directly to the total extinction of the
Burmese monarchy and of national independence. >

The earliest contact of Burma with western nations was
extremely limited, and was purely of a commercial
character. Brief reference to the details of this is there-
fore more appropriately made in the beginning of the
chapter on "Trade and Commerce" (chap. XIV.).

/ The annexation of Arakan by Bodaw Paya in 1 784
had already brought Burma into collision with the British
in Chittagong. The British territory was utilised as a
sanctuary by some thousands of Arakanese refugees, who
made raids from time to time and harassed the Burmese
garrison. In place of representing that, as would only
have been just, the British authorities should take
measures to put a stop to these incursions, the Burmese
demanded that the raiders should be given up to them.
This being refused, they followed the outlaws into British
territory. The friction thus caused led to an Envoy,
Captain Symes,of H.M, 76th Regiment, being sent to Ran-
goon in 1795. He was treated with great indignity, but
received what seemed to be a treaty. In accordance with
this, Captain Hiram Cox was sent in the following year
as Resident at Amarapura. Received only once in
audience by the King, he was afterwards treated with
great insult, and finally withdrew during 1 798. Difficul-
ties soon again arose on the Arakan frontier, and the
Envoy of 1795, now Lieut.-Col. Symes, was once more
sent to negotiate a treaty. This time he was treated
even more insultingly than before, being made to halt
and reside for forty days on an "accursed" island where
criminals were executed, and cremations and burials were
carried out. After waiting for nearly eighteen months

16

FIRST BURMESE WAR, 1824-26

he returned to India, without having attained the desired
objects of his mission. Another mission, sent in 1809,
under Captain Canning, also returned in 18 10 without
having effected its object.S^

Troubles again occurring on the Chittagong frontier,
Captain Canning was once more sent on a mission to
Rangoon in 181 1, but had to return in 181 2 with as un-
satisfactory a result as before. In 1813 a Burmese Envoy
was sent to Calcutta to demand the extradition of the
Arakanese fugitives in Chittagong, which was refused.

During the next few years matters gradually drifted
from bad to worse, and the Burmese began to intrigue
with the Mahrattas and the Court of Lahore, intending
to enter the confederacy against the British then being
arranged by the Peishwa — a plan which was frustrated
by the victory at Kirki and the routing of the Pindari
hordes.
/On the death of Bodaw Paya, in 18 19, affairs had fallen
ihto a chronic state of trouble all along the frontiers of
Arakan, Manipur, and Assam ; and they were soon
forced by the Burmese into a more acute stage. On the
borders of Chittagong aggressions were almost uninter-
rupted. From Manipur and from Assam a Burmese
force marched in two columns into Kachar, which had
been taken under British protection to check any advance
of the Burmese towards Sylhet. The column from
Assam was driven back from the Surma river ; while
that from Manipur also retired, but not until after it had
stubbornly and successfully beaten off a British attack on
a strong stockade on the bank of the Bardk river.

While these skirmishes were going on further north, a
casus belli had evolved itself on the Naf river, the bound-
ary between Arakan and Chittagong. On 23rd Septem-
ber, 1823, an armed party of Burmese attacked a British
guard on Shapuri, an island close to the Chittagong side,
killing and wounding six of the guard. During Novem-
ber the island was re-occupied by a detachment of British
sepoys ; but Bagyidaw was bent on war. Confident of
victory, he sent Maha Bandiila, in January, 1824, with
6,000 men, to assume command of the troops in
Arakan, and to march on Chittagong. \

17 / c

BURMA UNDER BRITISH RULE

On 5th March, 1824, war was formally declared by the
British against Burma. Recognising that any attempt
to reach the Burmese capital through one or other of the
frontier districts would be attended with enormous diffi-
culties, the plan of attack on Ava was made by sea and
up the Irrawaddy river. Troops were massed at Cal-
cutta and Madras to the number of about 11,500 men,
and the chief command was entrusted to General Sir
Archibald Campbell, K.C.B. But other troops operated
also in Assam under Brigadier- General McMorine, and
in Kachar under Brigadier-General Shuldham.

On nth May Rangoon was occupied without opposi-
tion, and shordy after that two strong stockades, thrown
up at Kemmendine, now a north-western suburb, were
captured. Some petty successes had been gained by the
Burmese at the Naf, but these could not be followed up,
while the Burmese troops were also withdrawn from
Assam and Kachar.

The advance up the Irrawaddy was delayed through
want of adequate transport, and as the rainy season set
in the British troops suffered severely from sickness.
Later on, finding it still impossible to operate in the Irra-
waddy valley, expeditions were sent to Tavoy, Mergui,
Martaban, and Pegu, all of which places were occupied
by November.

Maha Bandula had meanwhile been recalled from
Arakan, and placed in chief command of the troops, said
to number 60,000, opposing the advance of the Brit-
ish on the capital. Occupying as his base Daniibyu
a town on the right bank of the Irrawaddy, about sixty
miles north-west of Rangoon, he crossed the river and
marched on Rangoon. But, before the close of the year,
the attacks of the Burmese had been repulsed with so
much slaughter that they found themselves forced to
retreat, the greater part of the force breaking up and
dispersing itself.

' Owing to the unforeseen difficulties about transport in
the Irrawaddy valley, another British army, of about
1 1,000 men, was assembled at Chittagong under General
Morrison, and sent, partly by sea and partly by land, into
Arakan. Little opposition was encountered in occupying

FIRST BURMESE WAR, 1824-26

the districts, but the climate proved deadly during the
rains. As the Arakan Yoma, forming the western water-
shed of the Irrawaddy, proved impracticable for the trans-
port of heavy guns, the idea of attacking Ava from
Arakan had to be abandoned. By the end of the dry
season, in the spring of 1825, the Burmese had been
driven from all the places they had previously occupied
in Assam, Kachar, Manipur, and Arakan, while the
British held the chief towns along the sea-coast, and were
preparing to advance in strength up the Irrawaddy to
Ava. Sickness had, however, sapped the strength of
the troops to such an extent that only 1,300 Europeans
and 2,500 native soldiers were fit for duty at the time of
Bandula laying siege to Rangoon in December.

Reinforcements having been received, Sir Archibald
Campbell marched north. His force was divided into
two columns, on^ of which proceeded by land and the
other by the river.N The Burmese were found occupying
a strongly fortified position at Danubyu. Siege being
laid, an assault was fixed for 2nd April, when it was
found that the fort had been evacuated during the pre-
vious night. Maha Bandula had been killed on ist
April by a portion of a shell, and with his death all re-
sistance collapsed. Resuming the onward march, the
British occupied Prome without opposition, and went
into cantonment there for the rainy season.

When news of Bandiilas death and the advance on
Prome reached Ava, the King and his courtiers were
filled with dismay ; yet the astrologers continued to pre-
dict success. During the latter part of the rains, the
Burmese proposed and obtained an armistice, but the
terms of peace offered were not accepted. As soon as
the rains came to an end the advance on Ava was re-
sumed. Some opposition was encountered about ten
miles to the north of Prome, and again at Maliin, about
fifty miles further north, which was taken after renewed
negotiations for the conclusion of hostilities had been
again futile. \

On 3rd January, 1826, the terms of a treaty for peace
being signed, fifteen days were allowed for its ratifica-
tion ; but, as this did not arrive, the advance was con-

19

BURMA UNDER BRITISH RULE

tinned. Pagdn was taken on 8th February after some
little fighting, and on the i6th the British encamped at
Yandabii, only four marches from Ava. Intimation was
then forthcoming that the treaty would be duly ratified,
and it was signed without further discussion on the 24th. j
Under its provisions Assam, Arakan, and all Tenas-
serim lying east of the Salween river were ceded to the
British/while the Burmese agreed to abstain from inter-
ference of any sort in Manipur, Kachar and Jyntia. An
indemnity of a crore of rupees, or about ^1,000,000,
was paid towards the British military expenditure, which
had exceeded five times that amount. Provision was
also made for the arrangement of a commercial treaty,
which was subsequently concluded in November, 1826,
though no British Resident went to Ava till 1830, when
Major Burney was sent there. Thus their first war with
the British ended with a vast loss of territory and such a
crushing blow to their national pride and prestige as
the Burmese had never before received.

Ba-gyi-daw soon grew subject to melancholy fits, which
finally led to insanity. The palace then became the
scene of continual intrigues, until at last, in February,
1837, the Prince of Tharrawaddi, who presided over the
State Council, somewhat in the manner of a Regent,
deposed his brother and seized the throne for himself,
assuming the name of King Tharrawaddi. The de-
throned monarch was not made away with, but lived
under restraint till 1845.

Meanwhile the British Resident to the Burmese Court
had to put up with many indignities. Finding that he
was thwarted in every way, and could do no good by
remaining, Major Burney withdrew in 1837, for King
Tharrawaddi simply refused to receive him or to consider
himself bound by the treaty made by his brother, the
late king. But the Governor-General, Lord Auckland,
disapproved of this step, and in 1838 sent Colonel Ben-
son to Amarapura as Resident. Him, too, the King de-
clined to receive; and after enduring many indignities
(Colonel Benson also withdrew in 1839, leaving his sub-
ordinate, Captain Macleod, in charge of affairs. Early
in 1 840 Macleod was ordered to return, as the Govern-

20

FRESH CAUSES OF FRICTION

ment of India had now at length become convinced that
diplomatic relations could only be opened and main-
tained by armed force.

Removing his capital to Amdrapura, King Tharra-
waddi reigned for nine years. But, shortly after his
usurpation of the throne, he also exhibited symptoms of
insanity. Gradually becoming worse, he finally became
subject to fits of ungovernable fury, during which he
committed acts of inhuman cruelty. One of his amuse-
ments at such times was to order any courtier near by
to kneel down while he scored a chessboard on the poor
fellow's back with a sword. More than once he was put
under restraint by his sons, and he died in confinement
in 1846, being most probably done to death secretly.

I On Tharrawaddi's demise the throne was occupied
by his eldest son, the Pagdn Min, who had already as-
sumed charge of the government when it became neces-
sary to place his father under restraint. The new king
followed his father's example in ignoring the provisions
of the treaty of 1826; and, feeling sure of not being
interfered with from Amarapura, the Governors of Pegu
recommenced the course of exactions from British traders
which had so often called for the remonstrance of the
Resident. ' After the withdrawal of the Governor-
General's Agent in 1 840, things of course gradually went
from bad to worse, until at last in 1851 matters came to
a head through two more than usually outrageous cases
of extortion.

King Pagan was cursed with the heritage of his
father's vicious and cruel disposition, but was not en-
dowed with any of his better or redeeming qualities.
Avaricious to a degree, the King contrived to enrich
himself by the deaths of well-to-do subjects, of whom
he massacred about two thousand within a couple of
years, some being secretly murdered, and others even
executed in public.

Now Maung Ok, who was appointed Governor of
Pegu in 1846, followed his royal master's example —
" like master, like man " — as closely as he dared in
Rangoon. But at last he went too far. In July, 1S51,
he caused the master of a British barque, the Monarchy

21

BURMA UNDER BRITISH RULE .

to be arrested on a false charge of murdering his pilot/
Liberated on security, fined, re-arrested, and again fined,
his crew arrested, ill-used, and fined, and not allowed to
clear the port till payment of other money had been
extorted, the master, Mr. Sheppard, reported the matter
to the British Commissioner in Tenasserim, and made a
claim of ten thousand rupees (^i,ooo) against the Bur-
mese Government. A month later Mr. Lewis, master
of the barque Champion, was treated in a very similar
manner. Proceeding to Calcutta, he laid his complaint
before Government and made a claim of nine thousand
two hundred rupees (^920) against the Burmese au-
thorities.

The amounts claimed by Messrs. Sheppard and Lewis
being reduced to what were considered reasonable limits,
Lord Dalhousie, the Governor General, on 17th Novem-
ber, 1 85 1, sent a letter to the King of Burma by H.M.S.
Fox (Commodore Lambert), accompanied by three other
ships, bringing to his notice the many complaints re-
ceived concerning Maung Ok's conduct, desiring that
compensation should be given in these two particular
cases, and also that Maung Ok should be removed from
the Governorship of Pegu, where he was causing friction
and breaking the provisions of the commercial treaty of
1826.

Maung Ok was superseded, but the new Governor
sent to Rangoon was accompanied by a large army, while
very large bodies of troops were also moved down to
Bassein, the western seaport, and to Martaban on the
east, almost opposite Moulmein. The new Governor at
once proved himself just the same sort of man as his
predecessor in his attitude towards the British subjects,
who were permanendy or temporarily resident in Ran-

foon.
, In January, 1852, Commander Fishbourne was sent
ashore by the Commodore with a letter to the Governor
requesting that honourable reception might be accorded
to him as British Agent along with a guard of fifty men,
as provided for under Article VII. of the Treaty of
Yandabu. But he was grossly insulted, and not even
allowed to present the letter he had brought.

22 .^

SECOND BURMESE WAR, 1852

{A blockade of the port was therefore declared, and
some fighting took place : then Commodore Lambert
returned to Calcutta in order to confer with Government
as to the further course to be pursued.

(Measures were at once taken to pour reinforcements
into Arakan and Tenasserim. Before proceeding to ex-
tremities, however, Lord Dalhousie, in February, gave
the Burmese Court another chance of settling matters
without recourse to arms, but in vain. ^ The tone of the
letter was certainly most peremptory,' yet King Pagdn
never for a moment believed that the British would
really follow up even a letter like this with immediate
declaration of war. Consequently no special prepara-
tions were made for defence. The ultimatum was re-
ceived at Amarapura on 15th March, and hostile opera-
tions were to be commenced if full compliance with all
demands were not agreed to by the ist April. Mean-
while a force consisting of 8,100 troops had been de-
spatched to Rangoon under the command of General
Godwin, C.B., while Commodore Lambert commanded
the naval contingent.

No reply being vouchsafed to this letter, the first
blow of the second Burmese war was struck by the
British on 5th April, 1852, when Martaban was taken.-
Rangoon town was occupied on the 1 2th, and the Shwe
Dagon pagoda on the i6th, after heavy fighting, when
the Burmese army retired northwards. Bassein was
seized on the 17th May, and Pegu was taken on 3rd
June after some sharp fighting around the Shwe-maw-
daw pagoda.

During the rainy season the approval of the Court of
Directors and of the British Government was obtained
to the annexation of the lower portion of the Irrawaddy
valley as the only feasible measure of adequate redress
and of security against recurrence of past friction, and it
was further approved that the line of annexation should
be drawn so as to include the town of Prome within the
new British territory. Lord Dalhousie visited Rangoon
in July and August, and discussed the whole situation
with the civil, military, and naval authorities. The re-
sult of this visit was that, in September, General Godwin

23

BURMA UNDER BRITISH RULE

advanced on Prome, which he occupied after but slight
resistance on 9th October, while the Shwesandaw pa-
goda and stockades were captured during the course of
the following week.

Thinking that the time had now come for terminating
the war, Lord Dalhousie early in December appointed
Captain (afterwards Sir Arthur) Phayre to the Commis-
sionership of Pegu, and forwarded a letter to the King
of Burma informing him that after what had occurred
the province of Pegu should henceforth be a portion of
the British territories in India. It also added that any
Burmese troops still in Pegu or Martaban would be ex-
pelled, and warned the King that if he attempted to
interfere with the British possessions in Pegu hostilities
would be continued and His Majesty's kingdom inevit-
ably and utterly extinguished. On 20th December,
1852, this proclamation was issued, the frontier from
Arakan to the Salween being drawn along the parallel of
i9j° north latitude. And thus the second Burmese war
was brought to a close without any treaty being made.

The pacification of Pegu and its reduction to order
occupied about ten years of constant work. But the
second half of this period included the years of the
Indian Mutiny, when all available troops were required
to quell that uprising and to re-establish order through-
out Upper India.

Even before this humiliating termination of the war
was known at Amarapura, a rebellion had broken out
there. ■ King Pagdn, conscious of being not only dis-
reputable but also very unpopular, had of late been re-
garding two half-brothers of his own with marked
jealousy. One of these, who found himself the special
object of suspicion, the Mindon Prince, at last felt his
life to be unsafe; so on 17th December he fled, accom-
panied by his brother, the Mindat Prince, to Moksobo,
the dynastic stronghold. This, on the part of any prince
of the house of Alaung Payd, was ever a sign of revolt
and of aspiration to the throne.

Within a few days the princes had a sufficient number
of adherents to march on the capital. This was done, al-
though the Mindon Prince remained behind in M6ks6bo,

24

MINDON ASCENDS THRONE, 1853

the very plausible reason given being that he, a most
pious Buddhist, was averse to the shedding of blood.
Even though there was but little real fighting, yet a
considerable quantity of blood was spilled before the
Pagdn Min was dethroned on .i8th February, 1853,
when one of his half-brothers ascended the throne as the
Mindon Minj ( With remarkable humanity in a Burmese
king, Mindon permitted the dethroned monarch to reside
in honourable confinement. There he held a small court
of his own, while in other matters he was treated with
much respect, until he at length died a natural death
after outliving his successor on the throne. ].

25

Chapter II

POLITICAL AND COMMERCIAL RELATIONS BETWEEN

BRITISH INDIA AND UPPER BURMA

FROM 1853 TO 1880

AMONG other terms ratified in the Yandabii treaty
of 1826, with which the first Burmese war was con-
cluded, a stipulation was made that at the Court of each
Government an accredited Minister should be placed by
the other State and requisite facility given for providing
him with a suitable guard and residence. Subsidiary to
this treaty a commercial agreement was also made in the
same year ; but it soon became apparent that the Bur-
mese Government had no real intention of carrying out
such conventions in the spirit of civilised nations. After
repeated failures the Government of India at last, in
1840, abandoned the attempt to maintain any representa-
tive at Amarapura. After the second Burmese war of
1852, when the kingdom of Ava was shorn of all its
coast-line and cut off from the sea so as to become a
purely inland territory, a special mission was sent to
Amdrapura, where it was suitably received. But any-
thing like regular diplomatic representation of the
Government of India, which had been suspended in
1840, was not resumed till many years afterwards.
// In 1862 Sir Arthur Phayre, the first Chief Commis-
sioner of British Burma, negotiated a new commercial
treaty with King Mindon at Mandalay, and left an Agent
there to see that due observance was paid to the clauses
relating to free navigation of the Irrawaddy and to cus-
toms dues. Under this convention traders from British
territory were to be allowed, without let or hindrance
from the Burmese authorities, to travel in such manner
as they pleased throughout the whole extent of the Irra-

26

CONCESSIONS TO AVA, 1863

waddy river and to purchase whatever they required,
while similar advantages were secured to Burmese
traders along the lower portion of the Irrawaddy in
British Burma. To promote trade the British abolished
certain customs duties levied on the southern side
of the frontier, but the Burmese indefinitely delayed
performance of their part of the agreement. Royal
monopolies acted very prejudicially for the develop-
ment of trade, and altogether the working of the treaty
was not successful, although considerable sacrifices had
been made by the Government of India to foster
trade and to ensure freedom from arbitrary interference.
At the time of their abolition, in 1863, the British frontier
duties yielded over ^60,000 a year, while foreign
goods imported through Rangoon for consumption in
Upper Burma were chargeable with a nominal duty of
only one per cent, although upon such goods imported
for use in British Burma a duty of five per cent, was
levied (except as regarded spirits, upon which the duty
amounted to about 100 per cent.). This concession alone
amounted to about another ;^30,ooo annually. But
a further privilege existed as regards rice, of which
Upper Burma required large supplies. Its export up
the Irrawaddy was allowed free of charge, whereas all
exports by sea were chargeable with a duty of about five
rupees a ton (or about ten shillings at that time).

Matters had again become so unsatisfactory by 1867
that the Government of India intimated to the Court of
Ava their intention to restore the frontier duties unless
negotiations were entered into for a new and more satis-
factory treaty. A new commercial treaty was accord-
ingly concluded by Colonel Fytche in 1867. Notwith-
standing certain defects, this new convention, while
confirming the agreement of 1862, pledged the Govern-
ment of Ava to several valuable commercial arrange-
ments, one of which was the restriction of the trade
monopolies retained in the hands of the king. It like-
wise conferred upon the British Resident recognised
powers to watch over British interests, by securing for
him certain civil jurisdiction over cases concerning British
subjects in Avan territory; and it provided for a political

27

BURMA UNDER BRITISH RULE

ao-ent, subordinate to the Resident at Mandalay, being
srationed at Bhamo, the town in the north through which
the bulk of the trade with Yunnan was carried on.

From 1867 to 1879 the Government of India were
continuously represented by a Resident at Mandalay,''
and the political and commercial arrangements between
the two countries were placed upon a basis of reciprocity
which was accepted in theory, though evaded in practice,
by the Court of Ava. But questions of various sorts
arose from time to time, some of which were settled
temporarily and provisionally, while others were allowed
to drag on without any attempt at a settlement being
made by the Upper Burmese authorities.; To neglect
obligations whenever possible, and to temporise merely
when brought to book, were of course the only tactics
that could be expected of such a nation. Apart from the
facts that the principal concessions secured by treaty for
British traders were only temporary, for a period of ten
years, and had never been carried out, while guarantees
for their proper observance were altogether inadequate,
the other three main causes of friction referred, firstly, to
"the Shoe Question," or the want of a proper system of
diplomatic intercourse ; secondly, to the proper treat-
ment of British subjects in Upper Burmese territory ;
and, thirdly, to certain territorial discussions. These
four questions of importance varied in urgency, but, to-
wards the close of King Mindon's reign, they had all
assumed the status of pending cases which it was neces-
sary to bring to some practical issue. The hope of
solving them by means of friendly negotiation was futile.
The attitude of the Government of India, reluctant to
proceed to force, merely encouraged the Court of Ava
to assume and maintain an attitude of indifference with
regard to proposals and remonstrances made in a spirit
of forbearance, and repeatedly renewed.

As the commercial treaties of 1862 and 1867 were
found to require revision, overtures were made with this
view in 1877, ^^^ repeated in the following year: but
they proved unsuccessful. King Mindon was then ap-
proaching his end, and the Government of India hoped
that his successor might feel inclined to inaugurate his

28

KING MINDON'S MONOPOLIES ^

reign by adopting a new and more conciliatory poVicyyj
For about five years previous to Mindon's death, in
1878, all overtures and remonstrances on the part of the
Government of India were ignored and disregarded by
the Court of Ava ; and it became perfectly clear that,
unless they were urged in peremptory terms, and en-
forced by other pressure if necessary, the mere arrange-
ment of a new commercial agreement would of itself not
improve the state of affairs then existing.

The way in which King Mindon managed to evade
the spirit of the treaties was ingenious, though un-
scrupulous. Previous to the treaty of 1867, the Burmese
Government would, from time to time, arbitrarily pro-
scribe particular articles of commerce, and notify the
trade in them throughout Upper Burma to be a royal
monopoly. The effect of this was to debar private
traders from purchasing any of these proscribed articles
direct from the producer. The producer had to sell
these classes of goods at fixed rates to the king's agents,
who vended them at high profits to other trgiders. The
treaty of 1867 stipulated for the royal monopolies being
confined to teak-timber, earth-oil, and precious stones,
while all other goods and merchandise were, throughout
a period of ten years, to be subject to a duty of five per
cent, ad valorem, leviable at the Burmese custom-houses.
'The object of this was to confine the old system of
monopolies to the three products specifically named,
and it was expected that the large and steadily increasing
general commerce between Lower and Upper Burma
would only be interfered with by the Burmese Govern-
ment in so far as was necessary for the levy of the
stipulated customs duty. ; But the king was by far the
largest produce-merchant in Upper Burma, and, until
his requirements had been fully met, none of his sub-
jects were able to transact business with other traders.
Thus, while the royal monopolies were nominally reduced
to timber, petroleum, rubies, and jade, so that traders
were at liberty to buy and sell freely, and without re-
striction, whatever they wanted, yet the fact remained
that all purchases had practically to be made from the
king or from the Pweza, his brokers or agents. By these

29

BURMA UNDER BRITISH RULE
means the spirit of the treaty was circumvented, and its
main object frustrated, without the king being directly
chargeable with actual violation or infraction of the
verbal terms.

Again, in the case of goods imported from Lower into
Upper Burma, the European merchants in Rangoon re-
presented to the Government of India that pressure was
brought to bear upon independent dealers to induce them
to sell goods preferentially to the royal brokers, from
whom alone the king's subjects were allowed to buy.
All of these unwarrantable proceedings tended to reduce
the trade in staple products between Lower and Upper
Burma to practical monopolies in the hands of the king,
and of those who dealt with him on his own terms. The
effect of this cramping system was to interfere with the
action of private traders, both as to the remunerative sale
of goods imported from Lower Burma and the purchase
of articles for export from Upper Burma.

The " Shoe Question " was an indignity of long stand-
ing. The British Envoy or the Minister at Mandalay
had always submitted, on the occasion of official visits
to the palace, to the enforcement of a ceremonial re-
quiring him to take off his shoes before entering the
royal presence, and to sit upon the floor before the king.
It is the custom in Burma that an inferior should sit
before a superior in such manner that his feet should
not be visible, for the feet are, in more than one sense,
considered an inferior part of the body. Hence the
respectful position amounts to kneeling down on the
floor and sitting upon one's feet — a form of making
obeisance called Sheko. When Sir Douglas Forsyth
was sent upon a mission to Mandalay, in 1875, he was
instructed to use his own discretion as to following past
precedent in his interview with King Mindon, but not
to let such mere questions of form militate against the
success of his negotiations ; and he accordingly com-
plied with the past usage by divesting himself of sword
and shoes before entering the palace, and seating himself
on the floor with his feet tucked in behind him, in the
posture of a supplicant before the king. But, when his
mission had been concluded. Sir Douglas Forsyth raised

30

THE "SHOE QUESTION"

in his report the question of continuing to submit to a
ceremonial so degrading to a British Envoy. A further
opportunity of discussing this point was simultaneously
obtained at the end of that year, when the King of Ava
sent an Envoy to Calcutta to greet His Royal Highness
the Prince of Wales, then making his tour in India.
Intimation was given to the Envoy that as the Govern-
ment of India had assumed direct relations with the
Burmese Court, it was necessary that the British Resi-
dent should be received in a manner suitable to his high
rank, and should in this respect receive similar treatment
to that accorded to the Envoy by the Viceroy. When
the members of the mission from Ava obtained audience
from the Viceroy a few days later, they wore head-cover-
ing and shoes, and they were accommodated with chairs.
The Envoy was then verbally informed by Lord North-
brook that it was impossible the custom observed at the
Court of Mandalay should continue any longer, and that
it must cease, although the matter would not be pressed
in a manner distasteful to the king. At the same time
Colonel Duncan, then Resident at Mandalay, was in-
structed not to take off his shoes or to sit on the floor
when received in audience by the king ; but Mindon
tacitly declined to comply with this request. The con-
sequence was, that from then till the final withdrawal
of the British representatives from Mandalay, in Octo-
ber, 1879, no British Resident was ever again re-
ceived in audience, business between the latter and
the Court being conducted through the Burmese Min-
isters.

This suspension of direct personal intercourse was
directly inimical to British influence, for it often hap-
pened that, under such an absolutely autocratic monarchy,
the success of diplomatic representations ultimately de-
pended entirely on the influence and arguments which
the Resident could personally bring to bear on the king.
Among the ministers were some who, besides being un-
trustworthy as to general character, had their own
special and peculiar interests to look after : hence the
Resident could never rely upon matters being correctly
represented to the king. Upon critical occasions he

31

BURMA UNDER BRITISH RULE

could not act promptly and energetically without having
the right of royal audience.

Whenever this '' Shoe Question " was broached by
the Resident, the Ministers of the Court of Ava were
markedly averse to discuss it, and it became very plain
that the resolute determination existed not to yield to
ordinary diplomatic pressure upon the point. That it
was necessary to terminate this degrading ceremony,
and to insist on more civilised treatment for their ac-
credited Minister, was equally clear to the Government
of India ; but it seems to have been a mistake to make
the intimation that the taking off of shoes and making
S/ie/(;(^ by the British Resident was not to be continued
without the Government of India being prepared to in-
sist both on a suitable form of reception being arranged,
and on full privilege of access to the king being secured
to their representative. It was a weak policy, because
it led Government into a not altogether creditable
impasse for the last three years of King Mindon's reign ;
and, when Thibaw succeeded him, the opportunity was
lost of insisting on an improved status of the diplomatic
situation at Mandalay.

The treatment of British subjects under Burmese
jurisdiction, and the disparity between the laws and the
official usages of Lower and Upper Burma, were also
among the chief matters calling for consideration. In
1878 a variety of cases occurred in which British subjects
were barbarously treated and subjected to wanton in-
dignities. Only two typical instances need be mentioned
by way of illustration. In one of these, two dhobi or
washermen, who had been assisting the Burmese police
in catching some thieves and conveying them to the
guard-house, were seized by some other police while re-
turning home, and charged with being out after dark
without a lantern. In place of merely being confined
till the facts of the case could be ascertained, the two
unfortunate washermen were thrown into the stocks,
which were raised so high by pegs as to threaten dislo-
cation of the ankles. While in this position a bribe of
six rupees was demanded, and the two men had to give
up their turbans as a pledge for the bribe in order to be

32

KING MINDON'S DEATH, 1878

relieved of further torture. Simultaneously with this,
Captain Doyle, of the Irrawaddy Flotilla Company's
steamer Chindwin, unintentionally trespassed on the river
bund at Mandalay by crossing it to avoid a muddy bit
of road. H The path he took was a beaten track across
the bund, and there was nothing to indicate that its
use was prohibited. When challenged by the Burmese
police he at once came down from the bund, but was
seized, thrown into the stocks, and exhibited there to the
public gaze for two hours, till relieved at the instance of
Mr. Andreino, the Company's agent.

These cases were reported to the Minister by the
British Resident on 4th September, 1878. Presuming
them to be the unauthorized acts of the lowest classes of
officials, it was pointed out that prompt and sufficient
punishment would be taken as a proof of the Burmese
Government being actuated by friendly feelings for the
British. A couple of months later, on 5th November,
the underlings concerned in the dhobi case were con-
demned to ten stripes and restitution of twice the sum
extorted ; while In Doyle's case the captain of the town-
gate, where the Indignity was perpetrated, was degraded
from his post and imprisoned.

Mandalay was at that time in a very bad state. During
the month of September King Mindon lay dying. The
palace was a hot-bed of intrigue, and the Ministers whose
influence worked for good were thwarted and Interfered
with by those who were bent on evil. On 21st Sep-
tember the Thibaw Prince was declared heir-apparent to
the Burmese throne, and on ist October, after many
false rumours, authentic Intelligence was at last received
of the King's death. His body lay in state for seven
days, and then he was buried between the mausoleums
of two of his queens near the great council chamber,
outside of the main gate of the palace enclosure.^'

The British Resident was authorized to Intimate to
the Court of Ava that general recognition and support
of King Thibaw by the Government of India would be
proportionate to his adopting a more friendly policy
towards them and their subjects, and that evidences of
this would be expected In greater consideration for the

33 D

BURMA UNDER BRITISH RULE

position and influence of the Resident and in according
him free access to the King. One of the first evidences
of the spirit which ruled in the palace occurred on the
31st October, in connexion with the Irrawaddy Flotilla
Company's steamer Yankintaung, under Captain Pater-
son. Before leaving Mandalay the steamer was boarded,
and certain passengers were demanded to be given up
for the purpose of being taken away. As no written
authority was produced, the Captain refused to allow
his passengers to be abducted in this manner, and left
his moorings. On arrival at Myingyan, about eighty
miles down stream, the Company's agent received a
note from the Governor, which appeared to be a
telegram from Mandalay, directing the seizure of thirty
of the passengers ; but a reply was given that the
Governor's warrant or writf^n order was necessary
before the Captain could be required to deliver over the
men. During the night over a hundred armed men,
under two officials, boarded the steamer and forcibly
abducted the passengers in question. It must be
remembered that this was a steamer carrying Her
Majesty's mails and flying the British flag.

But for the patience of the British Government and the
various political events which were then peremptorily
claiming their attention in other portions of the empire
at this particular juncture, these acts of injustice and
indignity must have ended in open rupture with the
Court of Ava. As it was, the procedure adopted was
to ask, through the Resident, for explanation and
redress, which were never conceded without unnecessary
delays deliberately made with the intention of showing
that the King considered himself, and wished to exhibit
himself in the eyes of his subjects, as strong enough
to heap indignities and even inflict barbarous tortures
on British subjects without fear of disastrous conse-
quences to himself. The manifestation of this spirit
of bravado had been increasing during the last years
of Mindon's reign, but it culminated when he lay
stricken with fatal illness and then passed away, leaving
the kingdom to his successor and to the practical
guidance of the ignorant, barbarous, and unscrupulous

34

TERRITORIAL QUESTIONS

men whose influence was greatest in the Council of
the State.

Even in purely judicial matters great difficulty was
experienced in obtaining any remedy for injustice to
British subjects, for the careless indifference or inten-
tional laches of the Mandalay officials led to interminable
delays in the law courts and in the definite settlement of
suits instituted. As there was little reason to hope for
reforms in the judicial administration of Upper Burma
the Government of India, though naturally unwilling to
interfere with the Burmese jurisdiction, found themselves
forced to face the question of securing adequate pro-
tection for their subjects by insisting on the enforcement
of extra-territorial rights for them and for the establish-
ment of British Courts of Justice for the settlement of
cases affecting British subjects. Such extra-territorial
judicial rights and courts were no novelty in oriental
countries.

The territorial questions in debate were also by no
means unimportant. After the second Burmese war of
1852, the King of Burma refused to cede any portion of
the territory conquered by the British, arid all attempts
to negotiate a treaty proved ineffectual.^ The matter
was soon settled, however, by the Viceroy, Lord
Dalhousie, defining as the northern boundary of the
British province a line drawn along the parallel of
latitude six miles north of the fort at Myede, from the
crest of the Arakan hill range on the west to the
Salween river on the east. As the coast territories
of Arakan and Tenasserim had been ceded under
the treaty of Yandabu in 1826, on the conclusion of
the first Burmese war, this prompt and powerful
action of Lord Dalhousie added all the coast of Pegu
to the British possessions and completely shut off
the kingdom of Ava from the coast-line. The loss of
Rangoon, then little more than a mere fishing village
on a swampy tidal bank where each ebb of the water
laid bare long black stretches of oozy mud, was not
so much felt by the King as that of the port of Bassein
situated on the Ngawun river, the extreme western
branch of the Irrawaddy delta, near Cape Negrais.

35

BURMA UNDER BRITISH RULE

During the whole of the twenty-five years of King
Mindon's reign he never ceased cherishing the hope
that he might one day get back this port as part of his
possessions.

In pursuance of the Viceroy's orders, a survey party,
accompanied by a suitable military escort, proceeded to
clear the boundary line and demarcate it with suitable
pillars. The work was under the charge of Major
Allan — whose name still exists in Allanmyo, the old
frontier customs' station on the Irrawaddy. For the
most part the line had to be carried through dense
woodlands and thick jungles offering considerable
material difficulties to rapid progress. From west of the
Irrawaddy across the Pegu range of hills, and beyond
the Sittang river, the work was duly performed ; but
before the cleared line could reach its eastern limit on
the Salween river, the survey officers had to suspend
operations in Western Karenni, whose inhabitants
claimed recognition of their independence on the
ground that this had always been respected by the
Kings of Burma. On the matter being referred to Lord
Dalhousie, he agreed to respect their alleged independ-
ence, subject to the proviso that, if any future attempt
should be made by the Court of Ava to obtain
possession of this tract, the British Government would
interpose to defeat it. As Western Karenni was sur-
rounded on the north by Upper Burmese territory, the
officials in the latter habitually endeavoured to ferment
trouble on our frontier by instigating the Karenni to
annoyances. In 1873 King Mindon took a farther step
in claiming suzerainty over Western Karenni on the
ground that it had always paid tribute to him. Two
years having been wasted in correspondence and repre-
sentations about the matter. Lord Northbrook finally
ordered military preparations for repelling, if necessary,
further interference by the Upper Burmese in Western
Karenni. This was the main cause of Sir Douglas
Forsyth's special mission to Mandalay in 1S75, which
resulted in an amicable agreement that Western
Karenni was to be recognized and to remain a separate
and independent State. The demarcation of the

36

A FRONTIER INCIDENT

boundary between Western Karenni and Upper Burma
was thereupon undertaken by the British authorities, the
Court of Ava tacitly decHning when invited to co-
operate in carrying it out. Intimation was at the same
time given that the British Government reserved to
themselves the right of prolonging their boundary
eastwards to the Salween river in accordance with
Lord Dalhousie's dictum of 1853, whenever this might
seem desirable. This arrangement was in many ways
unsatisfactory. Free from control, the Karenni country
became a sort of sanctuary for lawless characters and a
source of constant disturbance to the tranquillity of the
British frontier.

On the western boundary of Upper Burma another
territorial difficulty sprang up, during the closing years of
Mindon's reign, through the advancement and erection
of a Burmese outpost on land which was known to
be within the frontier of the Arakan Commissionership
of Lower Burma. Requests for the removal of this
outpost were practically ignored, beyond the casual
expression of a doubt as to the validity of the Yandabu
treaty of 1826, which the Burmese alleged to be now
obsolete and out of date. While the Government of
India could not afford to permit any doubt to exist as to
the validity of this treaty, which formed the permanent
deed of settlement regarding the cession of the territory
in Arakan, this little frontier incident was obviously
a matter for friendly agreement by laying down the
boundary and demarcating it in a permanent manner.
But this was just what the Burmese declined to do.
They would neither comply with legitimate demands,
nor adjust the disputed questions in a friendly manner.
Obviously, the proper step to take under such circum-
stances was to notify to the Court of Ava that, if the
obnoxious outpost were not withdrawn within a reason-
able time, it would be removed by the British Govern-
ment ; but as this was in itself only a minor matter,
it was merged in the general list of outstanding
questions requiring settlement between the Governments
of India and Upper Burma.

Up to this time, and till some years later, the external

37

BURMA UNDER BRITISH RULE

relations of the Court of Ava with other nations than
the British did not occasion much concern to the
Government of India. A Treaty of Commerce between
France and Upper Burma had been signed in Paris, on
24th January, 1873, and its ratification was authorized
by the French National Assembly ; but such ratification
was not effected till April, 1884, when another Burmese
embassy visited Paris to undertake fresh negotiations,
which will be referred to later on. It need only be
remarked here that, in order to arrange the question of the
ratification with Ava, a M. de Rochechouart was sent to
Mandalay. Instead of insisting upon the confirmation
of the Convention already concluded at Paris, he took
upon himself to sign another Treaty as a substitute for
or a supplement to it. This new Treaty contained such
objectionable clauses {mter alia, giving Upper Burma
certain facilities for purchasing arms) that objections
were raised by the British Cabinet and a promise was
obtained from the French Government that this Treaty
should not be ratified.

As the interests affected by the relations between
Upper Burma and India in 1878 were mainly com-
mercial rather than political, the political position of the
Court of Ava with reference to other foreign countries
had not yet assumed the importance they were sub-
sequently to acquire a few years later. What concerned
the Government of India most were the unsatisfactory
commercial relations, the treatment of British subjects,
the want of satisfactory judicial arrangements, the
settlement of pending territorial questions, and the status
of the Resident at Mandalay. .

On King Mindon's death it was felt that the time had
come for collecting all these various questions and sub-
mitting them to the Secretary of State for decision as to
a settled policy in dealing with the existing state of
affairs. It was plainly pointed out, in forwarding for
approval the proposals of the Government of India, that
there seemed absolutely no hope of any adequate settle-
ment of the pending questions unless a marked improve-
ment of the position of the British Resident was to
be insisted on. His extremely unsatisfactory position

38

TREATY RELATIONS IN 1878

was the primary obstacle to success in placing British
relations with Upper Burma on a footing more con-
sistent with the dignity of the Government of India, and
more conducive to the protection and the development
of the interests committed to their charge. But no steps
could be taken by the Government of India to ensure
proper treatment unless the British Cabinet were pre-
pared to authorize armed force being used, if necessary,
to secure compliance with the demands once it was de-
cided to formulate and present them.

/[When King Mindon died, in 1878, it was hoped that
the very unsatisfactory condition of these relations
might perhaps spontaneously become improved. It was
known that the late King felt strong personal reluctance
to sign or to recognize any Treaty recording the cession
of any portion of his territories, and it was believed that
this sentiment strengthened his dislike of anything in the
shape of a treaty adjusting and regulating commercial
and political relations. Moreover, the strong trading
instincts which led him to extend and abuse the system
of monopolies were also regarded as probably personal
idiosyncrasies from which his successor might perhaps
be free. But it soon became evident that no such
spontaneous action was to be expected from King
Thibaw, and that no overtures he might make to the
Government of India for the improvement of existing
relations could possibly be accepted as sincere ; while
the massacres with which his reign was inaugurated, and
his seat on the throne secured, rendered it impossible for
the Government of India to take the first steps in
making amicable overtures to the Court of Av^. What
was insisted on at this juncture was the right, under the
Treaty of Yandabii, to furnish the Resident with a
suitable guard, which the disturbed condition of Upper
Burma rendered absolutely necessary. This proposal
was opposed by the King's Ministers, and they only
yielded to strong and persistent pressure from the
Government of India.

In the kingdom of Ava succession to the throne did
not necessarily go by primogeniture, but by the exercise
of royal prerogative. It was the custom of the country

39

BURMA UNDER BRITISH RULE

that an Einshd Min, or heir apparent, a " prince in
front of the house," was formally elected by the King,
and was thereafter associated with him in the govern-
ment. He became vice-president of the State Council,
and was ex officio regent at Mandalay whenever the King
might be absent The heir apparent, the King's brother,
who had been elected early in his reign by Mindon,
was killed in 1866, when two of Mindon's elder sons,
displeased on that account, endeavoured to assassinate
their father and uncle. King Mindon had in all
about thirty sons ; but, as they grew up, he delayed till
his last moments to carry out the duty of formally
appointing his successor. In this he was actuated partly,
no doubt, by fear of his own assassination, but also by
the knowledge that the nomination of an heir apparent
might probably lead to civil war. Each of his four
principal sons aspired to the succession, and each of them
had a political following. Of these the Nyaungyan
Prince, of whose legitimacy there was no doubt, was the
most popular, while he was the most esteemed and
trusted by the King on account of his intellectual qualities
and humane disposition. It was generally believed that
Mindon had frequently indicated his intention of
nominating this favourite son as his successor ; it is said
that, in order to save the country from the horrors of
civil war, a family compact had been signed by all the
thirty royal princes mutually pledging themselves to
respect the claims of him upon whom the King's choice
might fall.

While on his death-bed, in September, 1878, King
Mindon sent for the Nyaungyan Prince for the purpose
of conferring upon him the status of heir apparent ; but
in the meanwhile the mother of the Thibaw Prince, the
youngest of the four principal sons then in Mandalay,
had made herself mistress of the palace. Apprehensive
of treachery, the Nyaungyan Prince delayed compliance
with the royal summons, and shortly afterwards, during
the third week in September, an announcement was made
that the Thibaw Prince had been elected heir apparent.
The mother of this Prince was one of the Queens of
pure royal blood, but there were supposed to be grave

40

THIBAW ASCENDS THE THRONE

doubts respecting the paternity, and it was said that King
Mindon had often expressed his determination not to
select Thibaw to be his successor. Other accounts repre-
sent him as the favourite of the King, and it is certain
that a very gorgeous and beautiful miniature Kyaung, or
monastery, had been specially built near the State Council
Chamber for the purpose of the young Thibaw Prince
therein performing his obligatory duties in withdrawing
for a period from the world and living the life of a
yellow- robed religious mendicant, as prescribed for every
male Burmese. But Thibaw, then a lad of twenty years
of age, had there performed more than the usual pre-
scribed religious duties in this respect. He devoted him-
self with exemplary zeal to the religious life, studied hard,
and attained the high rank of a Patama Byan for dis-
tinguished excellence in knowledge of Buddhist literature
at a competitive examination held by royal order in
Mandalay.^ Both from apparent habit of mind and from
religious training it might therefore have been antici-
pated that Thibaw's prospective reign would be in-
augurated otherwise than by bloodthirsty and wholesale
massacres. Meanwhile all news of the King's state of
health was carefully kept secret, although rumours were
already afloat that he was dead. The city of Mandalay
was in a state of alarm and unrest, and the Nyaungyan
Prince had, with his younger brother, the Nyaungok
Prince, to seek refuge in the British Residency, alleging
that their lives were in danger. On the ist October
authentic intimation of the King's death was at last
received by the Resident, and he was desired by the
Minister to deliver up the two refugees. Declining to do
this, he was then requested to have them deported to
India, on account of the danger and disturbance to
which the new King might otherwise be exposed from
their presence in any part of Burma. This request was
complied with, and, in maintaining these two Princes
as pensioners in Calcutta, the Government of India
substantially assisted in seating King Thibaw on his
throne.

The Burmese Government were, however, appre-
hensive of British interference in the matter of succes-

41

BURMA UNDER BRITISH RULE

sion, and moved troops southwards to the frontier of
Lower Burma. Nor had the Government of India
been idle in taking precautionary measures with regard
to trouble on the frontier, or danger to the Resident at
Mandalay. In view of the contingency of disputes as
to the succession, and of lawlessness sure to become
epidemic if a civil war broke out, the armament of the
Indian Marine steamer /;'r^z£/^<^^ had been strengthened,
and she lay at the military frontier station of Thayetmyo
ready to proceed at once to Mandalay with troops to
strengthen the guard at the Residency whenever a
summons to this effect might come from the Resident.

For some time these arrangements and the fear of
further military preparations kept the palace authorities
in restraint, but this was only a temporary lull before the
storm of horrors soon to burst over Mandalay. After
the flight of the two Princes to the British Residency,
all the other Princes and the Princesses of the royal
blood were confined within the palace. According to
hereditary custom, Thibaw was married to a half-sister
of his own, Supayalat, the daughter of one of Mindon's
chief Queens. Ignorant, domineering, and lustful of
power, she had great influence over him, and persuaded
him that, to secure his position, it was necessary to make
a holocaust of all those of the blood royal who were in
confinement. Thibaw's mother urged the same policy.
This horrible suggestion met with opposition from the
majority of the Ministers. Two of these, the Yenan-
gyaung Mingyi and the Magwe Mingy i, were deposed
from office in order to weaken the opposition of the
Ministry to their barbarous measure ; but the scheme had
the support of the notorious Taingda Mingyi, a military
chief lately promoted to high rank and a great favourite
with the King, of the Taingda's son, the Governor of the
South Gate, and of the Myowiui, or Governor of Manda-
lay. Despite the more humane counsels of the Kinwun
Mingyi, the Prime Minister, and a few others among the
high officials, orders were given by the King for the
massacre of the majority of his relatives. The adminis-
tration was disorganized ; the chief executive power had
for the time being passed from the constitutionally

42

MASSACRES IN MANDALAY

responsible Ministers into the hands of the violent and
reckless party headed by the Taingda Mingy i.

(On the night of the 15th February, 1879, the jail to
the west of the main palace buildings was cleared for the
reception of the political prisoners, and a large hole was
dug in the jail precincts. The massacre was begun on
that night under the superintendence of the personal fol-
lowers of the King, and was continued on the following
nights, the executioners being the worst among certain
ruffians who had just been released from the jail in order
to prepare it for being the scene of this crime. Excited
with drink, they killed their victims with bludgeons, and
strangled with their hands those who still had strength
left to utter cries. The bodies of the women and children
were thrown into the pit prepared in the jail, while
on the following night eight cartloads of the corpses
of the Princes were removed from the city by the
western gate, and thrown into the Irrawaddy, according
to custom. The massacre was continued during the
nights of the i6th and the 17th; and on the 19th Mr.
Shaw, the Resident, having meanwhile received con-
firmation of the horrors perpetrated, intimated to the
Ministers that if any further slaughter occurred he would
haul down the British flag, and break off all relations
with the Court.., Among those who were saved by this
remonstrance Were the mother of the Nyaungyan and
the Mingun Princes living under British protection in
Calcutta, the Princess Salin Supya, a favourite daughter
of the late King, and some children of the heir apparent
who was killed in 1866. The number of those thus
done to death is supposed to have amounted to about
eighty, amongst whom were most of the near relatives
of the popular Nyaungyan Prince. In defiance of any-
thing like international usage, emissaries were sent from
Mandalay to Calcutta to attempt the life of the latter ;
but, on receiving intimation that they were under police
. supervision, they returned without effecting their object,
/f No conspiracy or other provocation was ever put for-
V ward as a plea in justification of either the massacres at
Mandalay or the attempted assassination in Calcutta. )
The remonstrances of the Resident as to the brutal

43

BURMA UNDER BRITISH RULE

massacres received the reply on the following day, pre-
pared under direct instructions from the King, that it was
his right as an independent sovereign to take such
measures as seemed fit to prevent disturbance in his own
country. The Resident then requested that, as a favour
to the British Government, the lives of the remaining
political prisoners, and especially of women and children,
might be spared ; and he offered to take charge of, and
to convey beyond reach of doing harm, any such from
whom disturbance to the kingdom might be feared.
This friendly offer was tacitly declined by the King and
his advisers. Remonstrances had also been made by the
Italian consul.

The Chief Commissioner of British Burma, Mr. (after-
wards Sir Charles) Aitchison, asked for a reinforcement
of the troops in Burma, as a camp had been established
outside Mandalay, and the garrison of the river forts had
been increased, while the Resident telegraphed that the
violent party in power, headed by the Taingda Mingyi,
desired a rupture with the British Government, and
wanted an excuse for overruling the moderate party of
the Prime Minister. Levies were demanded from seven
of the Shan chiefs, the officers of the army were com-
pletely changed, and troops were being drilled and
despatched to the frontier, after being armed with rifles
from the palace and undergoing the most unusual experi-
ence of receiving a month's pay in advance. With the
King in an excitable condition from his own barbarities,
and perhaps also from alarm at the possible consequences
of his defiance of the Resident's remonstrances, some
display of military strength on the British frontier was
necessary to maintain peace within our own territory,
and to support the Resident in his critical position.
This measure secured its immediate objects, and put a
stop to massacres for the time being. The military
preparations brought home to the minds of the Court
party that it had now become less a question of their
attacking the British, than of the British proceeding
against Mandalay. They could not disguise their un-
easiness, and earnestly requested that the reinforcements
might be withdrawn. Throughout both Lower and

44

WAR PROJECT CONSIDERED

^ Upper Burma it was everywhere believed that the
Government of India were contemplating some early and
decisive change in their policy of reserve and precaution, i

Simultaneously with these military preparations the'
Government of India impressed on the Secretary of
State the necessity of taking an early occasion for con-
veying to King Thibaw a clear exposition of their views
and expectations with regard to a revision of treaty
arrangements, to the improvement of existing com-
mercial and political relations, to the settlement of pending
differences and grievances, and to a change in his policy
towards the British. ! But the British Government
decided, early in April, 1879, that the grievances which
had been tolerated from Mindon had not yet been
aggravated by King Thibaw, and that the time for such
a decided intimation of policy as the Government of
India desired would not be well chosen while the young
King was surrounded by the worst of counsellors. Con-
sequently no ultimatum was sent, and the Resident
remained at his post in Mandalay.

This tone of extreme forbearance on the part of the
British Cabinet would seem astoundingly weak if the
circumstances of the spring of 1879 were not borne in
mind. The Afghan war had been entered on in
November, 1878, and the Zulu war had commenced in
January, 1879, with disaster to British troops at Isan-
dhlwana on the 22nd of that month. On Major-General
Knox Gore, then in military command of Burma, being
asked if he were prepared to march on Mandalay with
the troops under him, he replied to the effect that he
would guarantee to take Mandalay with 500 men, but
that he would require 5,000 more than the recent rein-
forcements of the Burma garrison to enable him to
pacify Upper Burma when once he had possessed him-
self of the capital. This settled the matter. Troops
could not possibly be spared ; they were wanted badly
both in South Africa and in Afghanistan. Hence the
British Government's rejection of the stronger policy
advocated by the Government of India.

Looking back now, with the knowledge of subsequent
events, there is much reason for congratulation at the

45

BURMA UNDER BRITISH RULE

turn events took. The Zulu war continued till Cete-
wayo's total defeat and capture in July, 1880; and the
Afghan war was only brought to an end late in the same
year, after a serious reverse had been sustained by the
British arms at Maiwand in July, 1880. The experiences
from 1886 to 1890 in Upper Burma make it extremely
improbable that General Knox Gore's estimate of the
strength required to pacify the country after the fall of
the capital would have been sufficient ; and it would
have been a matter of rather serious difficulty to provide
large numbers of trained British troops for Burma, in
addition to the special demands of South Africa and
Afghanistan. Moreover, if war had then been waged
against Upper Burma, it would only have been for the
purpose of deposing Thibaw and placing the Nyaung-
yan Prince on the throne in his stead ; whereas the
ultimate annexation of Ava on ist January, 1886,
completely settled all political and commercial grievances,
and added to the British Empire in India vast territories
rich in material wealth, and far richer still in future
possibilities.

The respite thus given to Thibaw, and the tidings of
reverse to the British troops in Zululand, stimulated him
and his ignorant advisers to further acts of discourtesy
and injustice to the British, despite a certain feeling of
disquietude at the maintenance of military preparations
along the British frontier. In the middle of April a
fracas took place at Sinbyugyun on board the Irra-
waddy Flotilla Company's steamer Shinsawbu, owing to
the local coolies insisting on piling loads of Ngdpi, or fish
pickled with salt, a favourite condiment having a vile
smell, on the bedding and luggage of the passengers, and
then belabouring these latter with bamboos and billets of
firewood on their objecting to their personal effects being
thus defiled. When the Commander tried to cause the
combatants to separate by ordering the mooring-line to
be cast off", the coolies on shore prevented his order being
carried out ; and when this interference was circumvented
by cutting the hawser on board the steamer, the irate
coolies seized the Company's lascars, who were discharging
salt from a flat near by which had been left by a previous

46

FURTHER BARBARITIES

steamer. This was apparently done under the direction
of an official mounted on a pony. About the same time
another of the Company's steamers had to cast off sud-
denly from Myingyan, without completing the landing of
her cargo, on account of the violence of the coolies. To-
wards the end of May the Assistant- Resident at Manda-
lay, Mr. Phayre, whilst returning from an early morning
ride, was jeered at and reviled with insulting terms when
passing a group of young Burmese, although he was
attended by a small retinue bearing the usual large um-
brella and fan forming the customary insignia of an
official, and by two of the police guard furnished by the
Burmese Government. Treatment of this sort had be-
come not unusual, but it was often difficult to ascertain
the offender; and in this case the Minister was asked to
see that suitable punishment should be given to put a
stop to such conduct. These were all very trifling and
petty matters in themselves, but they distinctly showed
the drift of popular opinion throughout the capital of the
country as a reflection of the attitude of the Court and
the feelings which were known to exist there.

Barbarities at the same time were again inflicted on the
remaining political prisoners within the palace. The
mother and the sister of the Nyaungyan Prince were
loaded with irons and placed in closer confinement within
a cell bricked upon all sides with the exception of a hole
just big enough to admit a man. Here they were im-
prisoned along with three other ex-Queens at a time of
the year when the thermometer usually registers about
105° in the shade during the daytime. They existed on
alms of money sent secretly from the Residency ; but the
go-between becoming alarmed and fleeing to Rangoon, the
prisoners became dependent on doles of food sent to them
by one of the Queen-mothers. Orders were issued for
their execution, but they were saved by the joint interces-
sion of the mothers of the King and the Queen, prompted
thereto by the Prime Minister, the Kinwun Mingyi.
Some Princesses who endeavoured to escape by boat into
Lower Burma were caught not far from the frontier, and
were at once thrown into the river and drowned.

Whilst matters were still in a state of extreme tension

47

BURMA UNDER BRITISH RULE
the British Resident at Mandalay, Mr. R. B. Shaw, died
on the 15th June, 1879, and his duties were taken tem-
porarily by Colonel Horace Browne, Commissioner of
Peo-u, who was sent up to Mandalay on deputation. As
it was feared that the formal appointment of a successor
to Mr. Shaw would be misconstrued and taken as a sign
that the British were content to let both commercial and
political matters drift on as they had been doing, and
might be misinterpreted into a condonation of the disre-
o-ard shown to the remonstrances made regarding the
massacres in Mandalay, the Government of India deter-
mined not to fill the vacancy thus caused. It was con-
sidered that Mr. St. Barbe, a junior civil servant then
acting as political agent at Bhamo, would be quite com-
petent to transact ordinary business with the Burmese
officials upon the footing to which the intercourse between
the Residency and the Ministers had now been reduced.
On 29th August, Colonel Browne accordingly left Manda-
lay, leaving Mr. St. Barbe as Chargi d'affaires, with Mr.
Phayre as Assistant Resident. Out of regard for the
safety of those he was leaving behind him. Colonel
Browne refrained from saying or doing anything prior to
leaving which might be likely to arouse hostility within
the Court. No notice of his departure was taken by the
Burmese authorities, although he had given them five
days' informal and three days' formal notice of his in-
tention to leave.

On the 4th September, 1879, Sir Louis Cavagnari, the
English Envoy to Cabul, was murdered ; and the
Government of India naturally became apprehensive of
the safety of their representatives in Upper Burma.
Authority was therefore promptly given to the Chief
Commissioner of Burma to withdraw the whole Mandalay
agency and escort whenever he should consider this step
advisable, or when any suitable opportunity occurred ;
but it was pointed out that this should not be done in any
manner liable to misinterpretation as hasty or unnecessary.
Apart from considerations regarding the welfare of
Messrs. St. Barbe and Phayre, the withdrawal of Brit-
ish representatives from Mandalay was viewed by the
Government of India with no reluctance; for relations

48

BRITISH RESIDENT WITHDRAWN

with the Court of Ava had latterly been such as to leave
little hope of advantage, and much risk of disadvantage,
from maintaining the Residency at Mandalay. By a
strange coincidence these last representatives of British
diplomacy at Mandalay were unfortunately the first two
civilians to lose their lives in the operations after the
annexation in 1886— Mr. St. Barbe (March, 1886) while
attacking dacoits in the Bassein district (Lower Burma),
and Mr. Phayre (June, 1886) while operating against Bo
Shwe in the Minhla jungles.

Meanwhile rumours grew rife in Mandalay of con-
spiracies in favour of the Nyaungyan Prince, who was
reported to be on the point of coming to Upper Burma.
Large numbers of men and women were arrested in con-
nexion with these supposed plots, and some were put to
death. The pay of troops was now in arrears, and it
was feared that advantage of the discontent among the
soldiery might be taken by the Taingda Mingy i to over-
throw the Prime Minister's party, which alone restrained
the King and his bloodthirsty crew from massacring the
inhabitants of the Residency. On several occasions in
1879 designs had been deliberately formed and prelimi-
nary preparations made with this object ; and it was
mainly due to the still existing authority of the Prime
Minister that such designs had not actually been carried
out. The Government of India therefore ordered the
withdrawal of the officers, escort, and records from the
Residency. „ Notice thereof was duly given to the Bur-
mese Ministers and to all Europeans and British subjects
residing in Mandalay or in Bhamo ; and the withdrawal
was quietly effected on 7th October, 1879, without the
occurrence of any untoward incident.'/

The first move of the Burmese Government after this
was to despatch an Ambassador on 23rd October with a
letter and presents to the Viceroy of India. On arrival
at the British frontier station of Thayetmyo, the Embassy
was detained to ascertain its objects and the rank and
powers of the Ambassador. As the inquiries regarding
these points proved unsatisfactory, the Envoy was in-
formed that the Government of India were not disposed,
under existing circumstances, to receive a mission of cere-

49 E

BURMA UNDER BRITISH RULE

mony, with nothing more than mere formal assurances of
friendship from the King of Ava. The Envoy was after-
wards duly empowered to discuss preliminaries for a new
Treaty, but the proposals were entirely inadequate. He
had consequently to be informed that, unless more sub-
stantial overtures could be expected, his remaining indefi-
nitely at Thayetmyo was inconvenient and generally unde-
sirable. After being hospitably entertained as a guest
for more than six months at Thayetmyo without making
any reasonable proposals for adjusting differences, he at
length returned to Mandalay. But, before doing so, he
sent to the Chief Commissioner of Burma a letter which
was so improper both in tone and in matter that it was
returned to him.

The frontier districts of Thayetmyo and Toungoo, with
their strong garrisons, remained quiet and tranquil ; but
emissaries from Upper Burma began to sow the seeds of
sedition among some of the Lower Burmese township
officials, more particularly in the western districts of the
Irrawaddy delta, from Danubyu to Bassein, which had
always remained rather disaffected ever since their an-
nexation in 1853. The workshops of Mandalay were
busy with the manufacture of rifles and torpedoes, while
further troops were raised and fortifications erected near
Minhla. Within the palace massacres still continued
from time to time with unabated cruelty. Five sisters
of the Thongze Prince, the eldest of the Princes murdered
on 15th February, 1879, were executed, nominally for
being in correspondence with the Nyaungyan Prince in
Calcutta, but really because they had incurred the
jealousy of the chief Queen Supayalat. Supayagyi, her
elder sister and nominal chief Queen, became involved
in an attempt to poison Thibaw and Supayalat, which
cost not only her own life but also the lives of two
Punnas or Manipuri Brahmans, a sect much venerated
as soothsayers, and of their three Burmese attendants.
The palace had in fact become a pandemonium.

On 13th November, 1879, a fracas and riotous as-
sault took place on board the Irrawaddy Flotilla Com-
pany's stGSimQr S/iwe7nyo at Myingyan. Similar in nature
to those which had in April occurred here and at Sin-

50

THE BRITISH POLICY

byugyun, it was, however, more serious in degree, and
the Government of India demanded adequate redress
and punishment of offenders on account of infringement
of the protection provided for British subjects under the
existing commercial Treaties of 1862 and 1867. FaiHng
satisfaction within a reasonable time, they urged the de-
nouncement of these Treaties ; but, before taking such a
step, they desired to know the decision of the British
Government as to the future measures which might be
adopted. With their hands full in South Africa and
Afghanistan, it was almost a foregone conclusion that the
British Cabinet should temporize ; hence they questioned
the expediency of denouncing the treaties, and requested
first of all to be informed how the Burmese Government
replied to the demand for redress. After an interval of
over three months the reply came from Mandalay in the
form of a curt intimation that the case had been decided
by the Governor of Myingyan to the satisfaction of
both parties, and that under such circumstances it was
not the custom to try petty cases afresh. The main
points at issue were absolutely ignored. But Mr. Glad-
stone's Cabinet had taken office on 28th April, 1880;
and their policy was peace at any price. The Govern-
ment of India could not push matters without the consent
and approval of the British Government. They did what
they could in a despatch dated ist June, 1880, which
contained the following very emphatic statement of their
position, and of the policy they urged :

" All further proceedings upon the Burmese Minister's letter are
necessarily stayed until Her Majesty's Government shall have con-
sidered it ; and, in submitting the papers for orders, we may observe
that, unless the Government of India are eventually authorized to deal
with the case as an infringement of treaty, it must, in our opinion, be
silently dropped. But we consider that such a conclusion would be
very prejudicial to the honour and interests of the British Government,
and that the reasons upon which we determined that a demand must
be made now prevail manifestly with redoubled strength on the side of
prosecuting it to some distant issue, or at least to some understanding
in regard to the future. . . . We still adhere to the view that the
affair cannot be creditably passed over ; while we still desire to point
out to Her Majesty's Government that a plain, reasonable, and advan-
tageous course of action can be found in the procedure which . . .
we had the honour to recommend to Her Majesty's Government. It

51

BURMA UNDER BRITISH RULE

may be that the original affair is not, of itself, sufficiently important to
form the basis for a dissolution of our commercial engagements ; but
we wish to represent, what in previous despatches has already been
brought to the notice of Her Majesty's Government, that ever since the
accession to the throne of the present King the attitude of his Govern-
ment towards us has been one of open unfriendliness and of frequent
disregard of treaty obligations. And since we have every reason to
apprehend, from long experience of the conduct and character ot the
Burmese Government, from the recent behaviour in particular ot the
King and his Ministers, and from the fact of our having no representa-
tive at Mandalay for the protection of British subjects, that the Bur-
mese Government cannot safely be encouraged either in discourtesy to
our Government or in disregard to their engagements, we are most re-
luctant to leave this reply without some substantial rejoinder.

"We desire, therefore, permission from Her Majesty's Government
to inform the Mandalay Court that the answer given to our demand is
considered unsatisfactory, both in tone and substance ; that the case is
regarded as affecting our treaty relations; and that, having regard to the
whole state of our present relations with the King, we consider that the
honour and interests of the British Government require us to withdraw
altogether from our existing engagements with Upper Burma. We pro-
pose, however, ... to allow the Burmese Government an oppor-
tunity of fully considering the consequences that will follow our demand
for redress."

While this despatch was being prepared in Simla, the
British mail steamer Yunnan was, early on 26th May,
forcibly seized and detained by the Governor of Sale-
myo, the starting-gear being unshipped and an armed
guard of twenty men placed on board the ship. On the
evening of the following day the starting-gear was re-
turned and the guard withdrawn. Demands were made,
in the least exacting manner possible, for an explanation
of the affair ; but the reply from the Court of Ava was so
evasive and unsatisfactory as to preclude any prospect of
advantage from further correspondence on the subject.
It was not until after receiving further information that
the Secretary of State (Lord Hartington) in September
intimated to the Viceroy (Lord Lytton) the reluctant ap-
proval of the British Government in the words that they
were '' not prepared to dissent fro7n tite course^' which
had been adopted by the Government of India. This
cold consent, far from amounting to even lukewarm ap-
proval, was accompanied with the intimation that the
Secretary of State " was in the first instance disposed to
doubt whether the absolute rejection of the Burmese over-

52

DECISION OF BRITISH CABINET

tures, resultiiig in the return of the Embassy to its own
country, was altogether jitdiciousr

Using the outrage on the Ytmnan and the Burmese
treatment of the demand for redress as a suitable oppor-
tunity for once more urging their poHcy, the Government
of India, on 9th November, 1880, again asked for the
authority of Her Majesty's Government to denounce the
commercial Treaties of 1862 and 1867; and in reply
thereto the Secretary of State could only " express the
7'egret of Her Majesty s Govern7nent that, after full de-
liberation, they feel unable at present to accord their
sanction to it. . . . They do not gather that trade has,
as yet, been materially prejudiced by any action of the
Burmese Government, or that any political question of
urgency is pending at Mandalay. hi these circumstances
Her Majesty s Govermnefit consider that the attitude of
forbearance lately observed towards the King may be main-
tained for the present, and that the Government of India
should be slow to precipitate a crisis by measures of which
neither the political nor commercial effect can be estimated
with certainty^ This definitely settled the matter for
the time being ; for it was clear that the reasonable re-
quirements of the Government of India as to commercial
protection for British subjects and suitable reception and
treatment of a Resident at Mandalay could only be
secured in the event of Britain being prepared to enforce
these demands at the point of the bayonet.

The Zulu war closed in the summer of 1880, and the
Afghan war in the autumn of the same year ; but, before
the year 1880 closed, Britain had again become em-
broiled in warfare in South Africa through a rebellion of
the Boers in the Transvaal, which had been annexed in
April, 1877. The short campaign which followed was
disastrous, the British arms sustaining three several de-
feats before peace was concluded on 22nd March, 1881,
on an armistice proposed by the Boers. It was a humili-
ating instance of the impotence of Great Britain at the
moment ; but the Boers of the Transvaal and Mr. Glad-
stone's Cabinet saved King Thibaw, and maintained him
on the throne from which he was five years later to fall
with such a crash.

53

chapter III

POLITICAL AND COMMERCIAL RELATIONS BETWEEN
BRITISH INDIA AND UPPER BURMA FROM 1881 TO
1885 : THE CAUSES OF THE THIRD BURMESE WAR

THE incidents narrated in the latter portion of the
previous chapter may be summarized in a few-
words as an introduction to the trend of affairs gradually
leading to the third Burmese wat. After the withdrawal
of the British mission from Mandalay in October, 1879,
the attitude of King Thibaw's Government grew more
hostile. Unprovoked attacks were twice made upon
British mail steamers on the Irrawaddy river, and de-
mands for redress were replied to in so curt and dis-
courteous a manner, that the Government of India
recommended the renunciation of all treaty engagements
with the Court of Ava. The British Cabinet, however,
already embroiled in an inglorious war with the Boers of
the Transvaal within a few months of the conclusion of
the Zulu and the Afghan wars, were unable to accept the
policy urged by the Government of India, and deprecated
the precipitation of a crisis by means of which neither the
political nor the commercial effect could be accurately
gauged. Meanwhile the relations between the Govern-
ments of India and Ava were at a deadlock. Upper
Burma became completely disorganized, bands of armed
robbers roaming about at will and raiding at times into
British territory, and fresh atrocities occurring within the
King's palace.

In the spring of 1882 an Envoy from the Court of
Ava, bearing proposals for a new treaty, was permitted
to proceed to Simla. Notwithstanding the occurrences
which had characterized the proceedings of an abortive
mission that remained at the frontier of British Burma

54

KING THIBAW'S POLICY

for over six months in 1880, without being able to make
suitable proposals as a basis for negotiations, a most
friendly reception was accorded to the Embassy by the
Viceroy, Lord Ripon, while the utmost trouble and pains
were taken to brine the neg^otiations to a successful and
satisfactory issue. But the expectations thus raised of a
renewal of friendly intercourse between the two Powers
were frustrated by King Thibaw suddenly recalling his
Envoy.

Commercial progress was retarded and trade inter-
course interfered with by the King following the policy
of his predecessor in the matter of creating monopolies.
During the year 1881-82 the value of the international
traffic fell off greatly from this cause, but it recovered
again when the monopolies were restricted in compli-
ance with representations made by the Government of
India. In other matters also the attitude assumed by
the Burmese Government continued to be unmistakably
unfriendly, and even menacing. The hostility gradually
became more marked, and it was stimulated by the in-
trigues and machinations of foreign agents.

This policy of hostility in May, 1883, led the Court of
Ava to despatch a mission to Europe, ostensibly with the
object of gathering information relating to industrial arts
and sciences, but in reality for the purpose of seeking
alliances with foreign powers and of arranging political
and commercial agreements which could not but conflict
very seriously with established British interests, and
which could only lead to the encouragement of intoler-
able intrigues on the part of the foreign agents in Man-
dalay. So long as the kingdom of Ava occupied an
isolated position, its overt unfriendliness could be borne
with extreme forbearance by the Government of India ;
but when once the external policy of the Burmese
Government began to exhibit symptoms of desiring to
prosecute designs which, if permitted with impunity,
would result in the establishment of preponderating
foreign influence at the Court of Ava and throughout the
upper valley of the Irrawaddy, it became impossible for
the British Cabinet any longer to view the situation with-
out anxiety.

55

BURMA UNDER BRITISH RULE

While other European Powers held aloof and did not
seek to mix themselves up with the affairs of Burma the
absence of a British Minister in Mandalay, though mcon-
venient, was not attended with any very material disad-
vantao-e. But there were French agents, whose machma-
tions and intrigues chiefly required to be guarded agamst.
Already the stormy petrels of French diplomacy were m
Mandalay inaugurating the policy of ''pinpricks" agamst
Britain, which was in turn followed in Upper Burma,
then on the Niger, and again at Fashoda.

The Embassy thus deputed to Europe for about a year
to visit the principal countries and cities on the Continent,
remained there till the end of April, 1885, by which time
it had concluded treaties with France, Germany, and
Italy. The Ambassador was an Atwinwun, or Minister
of the Secret Department of the Court, who knew no
language other than Burmese; but the other members
of the Embassy consisted of a Wtmdauk, or Assistant
Minister, and a Sayddawgyi, or Clerk of the Great State
Council, both of whom had been educated in Europe
under the orders of King Mindon, and were conversant
with English and French. They had also been among
the members of the Embassy which visited Simla in 1882.
It was further accompanied by a French gentleman named
M. de Trevelec.

It will be recollected (see p. 38 in previous chapter)
that a treaty had been made by Burma with France on
24th January, 1873, which had never been ratified, owing
to the French Agent sent to Burma for this purpose
taking upon himself the responsibility of entering into a
fresh treaty, in 1874, of so objectionable a nature that pro-
mises were given by France to the British Government
that the latter would not be ratified. On the arrival of
the Burmese Embassy at Paris, in 1883, they desired to
renew negotiations regarding the unratified commercial
Treaty of 1873, and gave out that they intended staying
only about a month. Political subjects were not yet, so
far as was known, under discussion, although excuses for
broaching them lay close to hand. In April, 1883, the

Myingun Prince — who, after rebelling in 1866, killing his

uncle, the selected heir apparent to the throne, and

56

BURMESE EMBASSY TO FRANCE

nearlysucceeding in assassinating his father, King Mindon,
had fled to Lower Burma, and had since then been a
pensioner of the Government of India — escaped from
Benares (in Lower Bengal), where he was hving under
surveillance, and sought an asylum in the French settle-
ment of Chandernagore. Here he remained for a couple of
months, declining all the overtures made to induce him to
return to British protection, and hoping to utilize French
territory as a base for operations against the Government of
Upper Burma. In the absence of the Nyaungyan Prince,
who was still living under the protection of the British,
he was convinced that if once he could effect a landing in
Upper Burma his endeavours to overthrow Thibaw and
seat himself on the throne would secure many adherents.
In June, 1884, he contrived to elude the vigilance of the
police ordered to secure him if he should leave the French
settlement, and to make his way on a French steamer to
Colombo. He was promptly returned in the same ship
to Pondicherry, where he was detained under the super-
vision of the Governor-General of the French Settle-
ments in India.

But the Burmese Embassy stayed on month after
month in Paris, apparently disregardful of the study of
the industrial arts and sciences forming the professed
primary object of their mission. In the diplomatic con-
versations held during the summer and autumn of 1883
between Lord Lyons, the British Ambassador, and MM.
Challemel Lacour and Jules Ferry, the French Ministers
for Foreign Affairs, no opportunities were lost of impress-
ing upon the French Government the objections enter-
tained by the British Cabinet to the conclusion of any
agreement with King Thibaw containing stipulations
beyond those of a purely commercial nature ; and it was
understood that the British authorities desired that facili-
ties should not be given to the Burmese for the purchase
of arms. It was also particularly pointed out that in
consequence of its geographical position with regard to
British India, and of its political relations therewith.
Upper Burma occupied a peculiar position, giving the
British Government a special interest in all that con-
cerned the kingdom of Ava. To France the affairs of

57

BURMA UNDER BRITISH RULE
that country could only be of secondary interest, whereas
to Britain they were of the utmost concern, and, indeed,
of vital importance.

^ As the year 1883 was nearing its close. Lord Lyons
had again to make particular mention of the subject of
the Burmese Mission in Paris. It was pointed out that
they had presented no credentials to the President of the
Republic, or that at any rate no intimation of their having
had a formal audience had been notified in the Journal
Officiel, and that they had not, as was customary, called
upon the British Ambassador or the other members of
the diplomatic body, although they were admittedly in
direct communication with the Commercial Division of
the French Foreign Office, and were believed to be
negotiating a treaty of some kind. M. Jules Ferry
replied that the Mission had submitted various proposals
regarding commercial matters, but that no progress had
been made, as the Envoy had apparently not sufficient
powers to treat seriously, and that consequently, in the
meantime, no arrangements at all with Burma would be
concluded at Paris.

This was, however, mere diplomatic fencing and
equivocation. In April, 1884, the assurance was given
by M. Ferry that any treaties or conventions resulting
from the negotiations would be of an entirely commercial
or consular character, and that no facilities would be
given to the Burmese for obtaining arms. The Bur-
mese Ambassador was particularly anxious to obtain a
clause authorizing the free passage of arms into Upper
Burma ; but the French Government were absolutely
determined not to agree thereto, as they were by no
means disposed to facilitate the introduction of arms into
Tonquin. In May, 1884, M. Ferry was again informed
that the British Government would naturally entertain
the most serious objections to any special alliance or
political understanding between Upper Burma and any
other foreign Power. The notice of the Foreign
Minister (Lord Granville) was at the same time brought
to the fact that the Franco-Burmese Treaty of 1873,
which it was now for the first time contemplated to brino-
into operation, provided for a reciprocal appointment of

58

THE NOTE PRO MEMORIA

diplomatic agents of the two Governments. Endeavours
were consequently made to obtain from the French
Government a definite promise that the functions of any-
such agents who might be appointed would be only of a
commercial and not in any sense of a political character.
Such a promise would only have been in harmony with
the friendly assurances previously given by M. Ferry.

In the course of an interview in July, 1884, during
which Lord Lyons handed to M. Ferry a paper //'^ me-
moridy embodying the position taken up by the British
Government, the French Foreign Minister observed
that it was very difficult to draw any distinct line between
commercial and political functions. He thought it likely
a French Consul-General, or some agent of that kind,
would be stationed in Mandalay ; but whatever might be
his title, he must of course in practice have charge of
French interests in general. Reference was also made to
France and Burma becoming neighbours towards Ton-
quin. On Lord Lyons pointing out that the kingdom of
Ava could not be a neighbour to France in any sense at
all resembling that in which it was a neighbour to British
India, M. Ferry then asked if any special treaties between
Britain and Upper Burma precluded the latter from
entering into independent political relations with other
Powers. The obvious reply was at once made that, as
British interests preponderated so vastly in Upper Bur-
ma, the British Cabinet relied on all friendly Powers
abstaining from seeking any political alliance with Upper
Burma. About a week after the note pro memorid had
been handed in. Lord Lyons reminded M. Ferry of the
assurances desired by the British Government, and was
informed that the projected Treaty contained a stipulation
that each party was free to accredit diplomatic and con-
sular officers to the other. The present intention of the
French Government was to station only a Consul at Man-
dalay ; but the title given to such agent, would, after all,
be a matter of litde consequence as, whatever title he
bore, he would have to deal with general questions
between the two countries; and it was impossible to draw
an exact line between political and commercial functions.
For example, there might be question of voisinage re-

59

BURMA UNDER BRITISH RULE

garding- territories on the left bank of the Mekong river,
over which the King of Ava claimed suzerain rights
without exercising practical authority.

It was admitted by M. Ferry that the Burmese desired
a political alliance with France and asked particularly for
facilities for procuring arms, but he declared that the
French Government had no intention of forming with
Upper Burma any alliance whatever of a special char-
acter ; and a distinct assurance was given to this effect.

Trouble had meanwhile been brewing on the British
boundary between Manipur and Upper Burma. In con-
sequence of certain disturbances which had occurred on
this frontier, and of doubts regarding jurisdiction which
had arisen through the omission to demarcate precisely
the frontier line between Manipur and Upper Burma as
described in the Kubo Valley Agreement of 1834, the
Government of India, early in 1881, determined to depute
a Commission to mark out the frontier boundary. When
informed of this intention and invited to depute represen-
tatives to be present at the demarcation, the Court of Ava
intimated their opinion that fresh demarcation of the
boundary determined in 1834 was unnecessary. The
reasons rendering necessary the precise demarcation of
the frontier line were explained, and the Ava Government
were again invited to co-operate. Failing this, they were
asked to instruct the local officers to give reasonable assist-
ance to the demarcating party, which would reach
Sumjok, near the frontier, about 20th November, 1881.
In October, the Ava Government reiterated their opinion
that demarcation was unnecessary, and intimated that
they would neither agree to nor abide by any demarca-
tion which the British Government might persist in
making. In November, the Foreign Minister of Ava
was informed that the proposed demarcation would be
carried out and that the British Government would ex-
pect the boundary line thus laid down to be respected by
the chiefs and the people on both sides, to which commu-
nication he replied by intimating that he adhered to what
he had already said in his letter of October.

The demarcation of the actual frontier line was carried
out by the British Commission under Colonel Johnstone,

60

FURTHER FRONTIER TROUBLES

no representative af the Court of Ava being present. As
it was ascertained that certain villages hitherto supposed
to be in Burmese territory were actually on the Manipur
side, the local Burmese authorities were requested to with-
draw an armed post stationed at one of these villages.
The work of the Commission was approved by the Gov-
ernment of India and the British Government.

In February, 1882, the Foreign Minister of Ava inti-
mated to the Governor of India that the local Burmese
authorities had been directed to destroy the boundary
marks and to station Burmese officials on the spot for the
protection of Burmese subjects. In reply hereto the
Government of India expressed a hope that the intention
of demolishing the boundary marks would not be carried
out, as the consequences might be very serious; and the
suggestion was made that the matter might be left for dis-
cussion with the Envoy, then on the point of visiting
Simla. While at Simla, the Burmese Ambassador was in
August furnished with maps and records of the boundary,
and was informed that the Government of India in-
tended to maintain the boundary and to prevent inter-
ference with the boundary marks or encroachment beyond
the frontier line.

During 1883 it was asserted by the Court of Ava that
the Kongkal (Kaungkan) British outpost had been pushed
into Burmese territory, and that men sent to examine the
boundary line had not been permitted to reach the frontier.
Both of these statements were incorrect. The Ava Gov-
ernment were informed that there was no objection to an
examination of the frontier line being made, provided the
boundary was not crossed or disturbed ; and it was asked
that, if such a party were to be sent, intimation thereof
might be previously given.

About a year after this, in May, 1884, another letter
was received from the Foreign Minister of Ava expressing
astonishment at the boundary line demarcated by Colonel
Johnstone being referred to as binding between the two
Governments. Objections were raised to it, and it was
again threatened that the boundary marks and the Kong-
kal outpost would be destroyed if the British Govern-
ment omitted or delayed to comply with the request for

61

BURMA UNDER BRITISH RULE
their removal. The obvious reply to this threat was a
solemn warning to the Ava Government to reconsider
their decision ; otherwise, it any such demolition or en-
croachment took place under their orders, the consequen-
ces might be very serious. This was almost an exact
repetition of the warning given to them early in 1882.

It was not anticipated by the Government of India that
the Burmese Government would act in defiance of this
warning and attempt to carry their threats into execution ;
but as a precautionary measure the Chief Commissioner of
Assam was authorized to direct the Maharaja of Manipur
to resist the destruction or removal of the boundary marks,
and for this purpose a detachment of native infantry was
to be sent to support him, if necessary. That was the
last of this direct insult to the Government of India, whose
prompt and decisive action was approved by the British
Government.

During January, 1885, after the lapse of about six
months since the last exchange of opinions, Lord Lyons
had again to bring the subject of the negotiations of the
Burmese Embassy into diplomatic conversation with M.
Jules Ferry, the French Minister for Foreign Affairs, and
to ask what was the state of his relations with the so-
called Burmese Ambassadors. On being vaguely in-
formed that the negotiation " n avail pas encore aboutil'
the British representative had again to urge the views ex-
pressed in \ki^ pro meniorid of the previous July, when he
was met by the statement that, as France was now also
a neighbour of Upper Burma, it might be necessary to
make treaty arrangements with regard to the frontier.
The position thus taken up by France was most decidedly
unfriendly ; and it was pointed out that, while the Indian
Government had full means of bringing the Burmese
to a sense of their obligations and their proper position, it
would be very painful and very inconvenient that a question
of resorting to those means should be raised by a treaty be-
tween Burma and France. A few days later M.Jules Ferry
informed Lord Lyons that the Treaty which had been for
over eighteen months in negotiation at Paris, between the
French Government and the Burmese Embassy had at
length been signed on 15th January, 1885, but that this

62

THE ATTITUDE OF FRANCE

Treaty did not contain any political or military stipulations.
It was merely, he said, one of the common treaties stipu-
lating for rights of residence, intercourse, commerce, most-
favoured-nation treatment, and so forth. It was added
that a French Consul would now be sent to Mandalay,
but that the question of obtaining consular jurisdiction
over Frenchmen in Ava was still unsettled.

The duplicity and the covert hostility of France were,
however, afterwards apparent in a letter, also dated 15th
January, 1885, which came from Mandalay into the hands
of the Chief Commissioner of British Burma towards the
end of July, 1885. It was from the French Prime Min-
ister to the Burmese Minister for Foreign Affairs and con-
tained the following passage :^ " With respect to transport
through the province of Tonquin to Burma, of arms of
various kinds, ammunition and military stores generally,
amicable arrans^ements will be come to with the Burmese
Government for the passage of the same when peace and
order prevail in Tonquin, and the officers stationed there
are satisfied that it is proper, and that there is no danger y
This episode cannot be explained away ; it showed de-
liberate perfidy, and entire disregard of national honour
and good faith by France towards Great Britain.

There is no necessity for considering this Franco-
Burmese Treaty in detail. It is sufficient to remark that,
diplomatic pourparlers in Europe and acts in Burma
being duly considered in their mutual relations, unmis-
takable indications were not wanting that King Thi-
baw's Government were bent upon welcoming to the
upper valley of the Irrawaddy river foreign influence in
such manner as, if allowed to become established and
dominant, could not fail at some future time to trouble
the political tranquillity of British Burma, and to engender
complications extending beyond the British frontier.
The law of the Senate and the Chamber of Deputies
authorizing the President of the French Republic to
ratify the Franco- Burmese Convention of 15th January,
1885, was not passed till the 24th November, 1885. It
was published in the Journal Officiel of 26th November,

^ Vide p. 170 of the Parliamentary Blue-Book, on Correspondence re-
lating to Biirmah [C — 4614], 1886.

63

BURMA UNDER BRITISH RULE
the very day on which the Burmese Ministers were
begging an armistice from the British General off Ava.
It mayt however, be further remarked that this Franco-
Burmese Treaty and the somewhat unfriendly attitude
displayed during its negotiation by the French Govern-
ment rendered absolutely impossible, on the conclusion
of the third Burmese war, any question of deposing King
Thibaw in favour of the Nyaungyan Prince or of enthron-
ing any other scion of the royal house of Alaung Paya
This first deep " pinprick " by France, and the intrigues
of M. Haas, who reached Mandalay in May, 1885, as
Consul of France, though not the actual castts belli, may
therefore be looked upon as the direct and chief cause
of the annexation of Upper Burma to the British Indian
Empire, and of the extinction of the kingdom of Ava.
An international treaty existing between France and Ava
would have been binding on a King Nyaungyan ; but
its operation ceased, ipso facto, when Upper Burma be-
came part of the British Empire. Annexation, under
these circumstances, was the only way of completely
removing possible causes of friction between France and
Britain in this particular matter.

Having effected their object with France after a year
and a half's residence in Paris, the Burmese Embassy
had now at length leisure to think of the courtesy of
calling upon the British Ambassador in Paris. They
were received on 4th February, when they intimated their
intention of proceeding shortly to Rome, and then re-
turning to Burma. Thoroughly aware of their previous
extreme discourtesy in not having observed diplomatic
etiquette, they first of all asked the Italian Ambassador
at Paris, General Menabrea, to ascertain if Lord Lyons
would be willing to receive their visit.

At Rome the Embassy delayed longer than they
appeared to have anticipated, their stay there being
utilized in endeavours to negotiate a convention with
Italy on similar terms to the new Franco- Burmese
Treaty. A treaty already existed between Burma and
Italy, but it had been loosely drawn up by a naval
officer, and did not contain the usual most-favoured-
nation clause. The Italian Government declined to

64

POLITICAL POSITION IN 1885

enter into negotiations till they had been assured that
satisfaction had been given to the claims of two Italian
subjects employed by the Ava Government, and whose
salaries had remained unpaid for the last two years.
The Burmese Embassy was hurriedly recalled in April,
without any convention with Italy being agreed to ; but
the Italian Government fully acknowledged the impos-
sibility of the British allowing the transit of arms through
British Burma, which was forbidden by treaty. The
only result of the Envoy's stay in Rome was the conclu-
sion of a treaty with the German Government, negotiated
by Baron von Kendell, and signed on the 14th May. It
simply secured for Germany the treatment of the most
favoured nation, and entered into no details. There was
nothing in it which could clash with the precautionary
measures taken against the importation of arms through
British Burma.

■^^ For all the three countries chiefly concerned there
were storm-clouds above the political horizon in 1884
and 1885. For Britain, there had been very strained
relations with Russia over the Panjdeh incident, and the
crisis of 1885 was the turning-point. As the result of
the Afghan Boundary Commission, a line was drawn
beyond which Russian aggression would inevitably form
a casus belli, whatever might be the political complexion
of the British Cabinet in power. On 26th January, 1885,
Khartoum fell, and General Gordon was killed ; on 24th
June the Gladstonian Cabinet was replaced by one
formed by Lord Salisbury. France, still with her hands
sufficiently full in Tonquin, had undertaken a war with
China which was terminated in April, 1885, about a week
after the fall of the Ferry Cabinet. But it was over the
kingdom of Ava that the storm-clouds lowered darkest.

King Thibaw's misrule had become so great and
dacoity so prevalent by the end of 1883, that large
numbers of Upper Burmese crossed the frontier to obtain
the advantages of British protection. Early in 1884 it
was estimated that, within a few months, about a quarter
of a million people had thus flocked into Lower Burma,
while the stream of emigration was only checked by
detaining, as hostages, the wives and children of men

65 F

BURMA UNDER BRITISH RULE

who went down into British territory for temporary
employment. The kingdom of Ava had at this time
sunk to a condition of anarchy, and King Thibaw did
not dare venture beyond the inner enclosure of his palace,
where he was, to all practical intents, a prisoner. The
greater part of the feudatory Shan States, forming nearly
the half of the eastern portion of the kingdom, had been
for about three years in open rebellion. In March, 1884,
a serious revolt had also taken place in the northern
districts peopled by the Kachin hill tribes, which carried
fire and sword half way down to Mandalay. This rising
subsided during the rainy months, but was expected to
make head again during the open season commencing
with November. In addition to this, rumours were cur-
rent in Mandalay that the Myingun Prince had escaped
from French surveillance in Pondicherry, and made his
way to Bangkok, the capital of Siam, whence he intended
to accomplish Thibaw's downfall, with the assistance of
the rebellious Sawbwa of the Shan States. It was even
suspected that the scheme originated with some of the
Ministers, who were disgusted with the existing state of
affairs. The jails in and near the palace were at this
time filled with dacoits as well as political prisoners.
Headed by the infamous Taingda Mingyi, certain of the
Ministers went and told the King they believed some of
the bad characters in the jail were conspiring against
him, and they advised him to execute them, in order to
prevent their escaping and joining the cause of the
Myingun Prince. Some of the prisoners were insti-
gated to make an attempt to escape, and the jailer was
authorized to liberate certain of them. As soon as this
order was carried out, on 22nd September, 1884, the
jail-guard was called upon to quell the outbreak, the
Taingda Mingyi and other Ministers and officials ap-
peared at^ the head of troops from the palace, and the
work of indiscriminate massacre began. Orders were
given by the Taingda to set fire to the jail, and a con-
tinuous fire of musketry was kept up from the house of
his son-in-law, the Governor of the South Gate, on the
prisoners as they flocked out of the prison to escape from
the flames. Those who managed to get outside the jail

66

THIBAW'S FURTHER MASSACRES

were pursued and slaughtered in the streets of the city,
the gates being closed to prevent their escape beyond
the city walls. The slaughter was not merely confined
to the prison within the inner palace, to which fire was
set, but was likewise extended to the other two prisons
situated without the inner enclosure. Thibaw, alarmed
and excited, directed that all political prisoners were to
be killed, and that all who rebelled against his authority
were to be immediately executed ; while orders were
given to the rural Governors that all the prisoners con-
fined in the district jails should be sent to Mandalay.

The number of men, women and children thus brutally
massacred on the 22nd and following days is estimated
to have been between 200 and 300 in all. On the day
after the chief massacre, the corpses were carted out of
the city, and were exposed for some days in the burial
ground to the west. Here they remained, mutilated,
putrefying, and uncovered with earth, to show how
terrible a thing it was to incur the royal displeasure.
Hands and legs were hacked off to loosen the prison
irons, before the putrefying bodies were thrown, in heaps
of four or five together, into shallow graves and given
an insufficient covering of about a foot of earth. While
these atrocities were being perpetrated, and whilst pigs
and pariah dogs unearthed the corpses and battened on
the loathsome feast thus plentifully provided for them
by the inhumanity of the King, his consort, and his
Ministers, high festival was being held within the palace.
Theatrical performances were given continuously nio-ht
after night ; boats, containing musicians, were moored
along the banks of the river ; the King's steamers plied
between Mandalay and Sagaing, taking passengers free
of charge ; and everything was done to distract the
attention of the people from the awful horrors that were
being perpetrated round about them.

There is good reason for supposing that this wholesale
massacre was instigated by the Taingda Mingyi and
a few of the other Ministers, in order to save themselves
from the consequences that might ensue if some of their
followers, then in jail, should obtain their freedom by the
disclosure of facts implicating these high officials in the

67

BURMA UNDER BRITISH RULE

dacoities and intrigues which they had long been carrying
on. The ringleader of those who were instigated to
attempt their escape, and who were, therefore, the first
to be shot down, was a dacoit Bo, or chief, named
Yan Min, an infamous robber, whose hands had often
been stained with the blood of murdered victinis. When
captured some time previously, he had been liberated in
order to go and fight against the rebellious Shan chiefs ;
but, instead of doing this, he again began plundering, and
continued pillaging until his recapture was effected.

A public meeting was held in Rangoon on the nth
October, when feelings of indignation were expressed,
and resolutions passed memorializing the Government
of India to interfere immediately in Upper Burma, and
either annex the kingdom of Ava or constitute it a pro-
tected State under some other ruler than Thibaw. As
grounds for this removal were urged the misery and dis-
tress caused by King Thibaw's misgovernment and the
mutual interdependence of Upper and Lower Burma as
regarded tranquillity and property. But trade returns
showed that, notwithstanding King Thibaw's misgovern-
ment, the value of the total trade between British Burma
and Ava for the four years after Thibaw's accession
was, despite the previously mentioned fall in 1881-82,
when his monopolies were in force, considerably greater
than during the last four years of Mindon's reign, the
average annual values being respectively £'^,22^,Z\^
and 23,061,174.

In October, 1884, the Rangoon Chamber of Com-
merce had also memorialized to the same effect as the
public meeting, urging either annexation or a change of
king, the former for choice ; and undoubtedly trade had
for the moment become paralysed. At the time of the
public meeting being held handbills in Burmese were
posted and distributed throughout Rangoon, describing
King Thibaw as an inveterate drunkard and a monster
of cruelty, and declaring it was necessary to call upon
the British Government to annex Ava. Native mer-
chants and traders fell into a state of panic, and trade
naturally became stagnant until it was known definitely
what line of policy the Government of India intended to

68

INTERNAL CONDITION OF AVA

pursue. But it was obviously not in accordance with
modern ideas of international relations to interfere with
the internal government of a neighbouring country, or
to annex that country merely because commerce there-
with was not increasing so rapidly as British Chambers
of Commerce might wish.

To a certain extent the British Government were un-
doubtedly responsible for the existing state of affairs.
Had it not been for the preventive measures taken by
them, Thibaw would have before this time been de-
posed in favour of either the Ngaungyan or the Myin-
gun Prince. But King Thibaw was an ally of the
British. Though he had not proved a friendly ally, yet
he kept to the Treaty existing between the two nations.
The character and antecedents of his Government were
such that it was not possible for the British Govern-
ment to offer any assistance which might seat him more
firmly on his unstable throne; but, at the same time,
neither the atrocities which had marked his reign, both
shortly after his accession and also quite recently, nor
the internal condition of anarchy and misgovernment
within his realm, seemed to justify the armed interven-
tion of the British Government with a view of either
annexing the kingdom of Ava or of reducing it to the
level of a feudatory State, nominally governed by the
Nyaungyan or the Myingun Prince.

While these matters were still receiving the considera-
tion of the Governor of India, the town of Bhamo,
situated about 200 miles north of Mandalay and the cen-
tre of trade with Western China, was captured and sacked
by Chinese marauders on 8th December, 1884. Fortu-
nately there was no reason to believe that this seizure
was instigated by the Chinese Government, as this would
have introduced a still further complication into the al-
ready existing tangle of affairs. Under any circumstances,
however, it meant the strangulation of the trade between
Rangoon and Bhamo until the country around the latter
town was once more in a settled state. Between Man-
dalay and the frontier the country was overrun with
numerous and powerful bands of dacoits. No troops
could be sent against them, as all the rabble soldiery

69

BURMA UNDER BRITISH RULE

was required for the operations towards Bhamo. The
Governor of Mao^we was murdered by one gang, while
the Governor of Saldmyo was attacked in open court by
another, and narrowly escaped with his life. To avoid
attacks and international questions the commanders of
the British mail steamers were desired by rural Governors
to anchor their vessels in the river under steani at night,
in place of following the usual course of mooring along-
side the bank.

Of all these various matters the Government of India
had full cognizance. They were also aware of the sensi-
ble alteration which the conclusion of the Franco- Burmese
Treaty of 15 th January, 1885, made in the political situa-
tion, and they could not but be apprehensive that the
presence of M. Haas as Consul of France at Mandalay
was likely to increase their difficulties in dealing with the
Court of Ava. Hence they were of opinion that some-
thing should be done to restore British influence at
Mandalay.

The situation was surrounded with difficulties, the
satisfactory solution of which was far from easy. It was
not considered desirable to insist upon the reception of a
British agent at Mandalay. After the withdrawal of
Mr. St. Barbc in 1879, the Burmese Government were
informed that any overtures for revision of existing re-
lations, or for the return of a political officer, must pro-
ceed from them. And if, despite the altered circumstan-
ces, negotiations with either or both of these objects had
been opened by the Government of India, this would
have amounted to a cancellation of their intimation of
1879, and might easily have been misconstrued in Man-
dalay as a sign of timidity or even of actual weakness
on the part of the Government of India. It could hardly
be anticipated that a British agent would be suitably
received and properly treated save under pressure of an
authoritative demand supported by a display of armed
force, for action of which nature the season was inoppor-
tune. Again, if any secret political alliance, involving
ulterior designs inconsistent with British interests, had
been concluded between France and Ava, the reception
and courteous treatment of a British agent, while not

70

CHAMBERS OF COMMERCE PROTEST

necessarily re-establishing British influence, would have
the effect of embarrassing the British position if more
direct measures of interference became unavoidable.
Under these circumstances the Government of India
were unable to recommend to the British Cabinet any
specific course of action. They could only watch the
affairs of Ava with special care and anxiety, in the hope
that before long some satisfactory solution of the diffi-
culty might present itself. And such did present itself
most opportunely and satisfactorily within less than six
months from the time when this resolution of the Govern-
ment of India was taken in March, 1885. So desirous
were the Government of India to avoid irritating the
susceptibilities of King Thibaw and his Ministers that
they did not even send any letter of remonstrance re-
garding the September massacres as was proposed by
Mr. (afterwards Sir Charles) Bernard, the Chief Com-
missioner of Burma. There was no proof that British
subjects were sufferers in the course of the barbarities ;
and it was thought doubtful that a letter of protest
would have any useful result, even if it pointed out that,
by keeping away from Burma other claimants to the
throne of Ava, the Government of India were assisting
in maintaining Thibaw in undisturbed possession of the
crown.

The declaration of this policy of non-interference for
the present created much discontent in commercial cir-
cles, and the Rangoon Chamber of Commerce addressed
a circular letter to the various Chambers of Commerce in
Great Britain, practically desiring them to bring pressure
to bear on the British Cabinet. British Burma's geogra-
phical position, its ethnological conditions, its natural
wealth, and the undeniable fact that public works and
internal development were starved owing to more than
one-third of the revenue raised in Burma being appro-
priated by India, were all used as arguments for cutting
British Burma adrift from the Indian Empire and con-
stituting it a Crown colony. Their appeal closed with
the words : —

"Were British Burma a colony independent of India, not only

71

BURMA UNDER BRITISH RULE

would much more have been done by this time to develop its own
resources, but a firmer policy in connexion with the petty kings be-
yond British territory would have done much to extend British trade
through a large part of Indo-China, and have made Rangoon one of the
largest trade centres in the world."

This agitation for the constitution of British Burma as
a Crown colony would undoubtedly have been pushed
with vigour but for the favourable trend affairs took
later on in the year 1885.

The British Government, while concurring in the
opinion that the state of affairs in Ava did not justify
armed intervention, considered that, both for commer-
cial and political reasons, diplomatic representations
should be resumed at Mandalay. Under the Yandabu
Treaty of 1826, the Court of Ava were bound to receive
a British Resident with an armed escort of fifty men ;
and they were not cognizant of any communication hav-
ing been made in 1879 which need act as a bar to the
adoption of this measure whenever convenient. But the
time and the manner of resuming direct representation
were left to the discretion of the Government of India.

The apprehensions entertained as to the activity of
the French Consul at Mandalay in obtaining ^'concessions'^
of various sorts, and in generally creating a commercial
and political position for France quite incompatible with
the previously existing predominating British interests,
were almost immediately verified. Before the arrival of
M. Haas, the Consul of France appointed to Mandalay
in charge of French interests at the Court of Ava, a
French engineer, M. Bonvillein, was reported to be
negotiating for a lease of the whole of the ruby mines
at Mogok and Kyatpyin for fifteen years at an annual
rental of three lacs of rupees (^20,000 a year). But
the endeavours of Lord Lyons to obtain authentic
information regarding this reported concession were un-
successful.

M. Haas, who reached Mandalay in May, 1885, had
not been there a couple of months before abundant evi-
dence was forthcoming of the strong position which
he and other French agents were endeavouring to estab-
lish for themselves with a view to acquiring a predomi-

72

FRENCH MACHINATIONS IN AVA

nant influence in Ava, which might be utilized at some
future time in joining hands with the French possessions
on the upper reaches of the Red River. His first efforts
were towards the establishment of a French bank, hav-
ing a capital of twenty-five million francs, the running
of a French flotilla on the Irrawaddy, the working of
the ruby mines, and the opening out of a trade route
from Mandalay through the Shan States to Upper Ton-
quin. His main idea was to grant loans to the King and
in return therefor to obtain industrial concessions, on the
ground that, even if Britain should ultimately be driven
to annex the country, actual concessions to French sub-
jects would be respected. In pursuance of this policy
he urged upon the Court of Ava the necessity of avoid-
ing any collision with the British Government ; and he
also advised them to ask for a Resident, as otherwise
they ran great risk of having one forced upon them on
terms they would not like. This temporizing was de-
clined in favour of a continuation of the policy of pro-
crastination, for the more wilful and ignorant among the
King's advisers believed that if the tension with Russia
had led to actual war the British would have lost India,
and the kingdom of Ava would once more have extended
to the sea-coast skirting the Bay of Bengal. It was the
intention of the Burmese Government that, if the British
had at this time their hands full of troubles, the oppor-
tunity would have been taken to pick a quarrel with
them. M. Haas pointed out the folly of such a course
before the Court of Ava had strengthened their position
by forming alliances with other European nations. He
pressed the Ministers to profit by the present attitude of
the Government of India towards Ava informing treaties
with France, Italy, and Germany, and to get each of
these countries to proclaim Ava as neutral territory.
In pursuance of this astute advice the Pangyet Wun-
dauk, one of the Ministers of the State Council who
spoke French fluently, was accordingly despatched once
more to Europe during the second half of July, 1885.

Finding the Ministers reluctant to follow his views,
M. Haas, early in July, endeavoured to work upon the
King through the Thdthandbaing, or Buddhist Arch-

73

BURMA UNDER BRITISH RULE

bishop, who had frequent personal interviews with
Thibaw for enumerating the advantages to be derived
from a close and intimate alliance with France. M. Haas
offered to work with the Burmese Ministers in organ-
izing the finances and the general administration of the
country, promised the maintenance of the integrity of
Ava, and gave assurances that when Tonquin became
tranquil the Burmese would have free passage for any-
thing they required.

So far as concerned preliminary contracts for conces-
sions of a valuable nature, M. Haas' machinations were
successful. By the middle of July terms of contracts for
the construction of a French railway in Upper Burma,
and for the establishment of a bank in Ava, had been
arranged, and the preliminary contracts already signed
and completed in Mandalay, and before the end of the
month they were being taken by the Pangyet Wundauk,
or "chief of the glassboilers," then accredited as Am-
bassador Plenipotentiary to reside permanently in Paris,
for formal completion by the French Government. The
first contract related to the construction of a railway from
Mandalay to the British frontier of Toungoo — to the
chief town in which district a line had just then been
opened from Rangoon — at the joint expense of the
French Government and of a company to be formed for
the purpose. The capital was to be about ^2,500,000,
and the line was to be completed within seven years. The
concession was to last for seventy years, when the line was
to become the property of the Burmese Government.
Interest on the capital outlay was meanwhile to be at the
rate of 7 J- per cent, and its payment was to be secured
by the hypothecation of the river customs and the earth-
oil dues of the kingdom. The other contract was for
the establishment, by the French Government and a
company, of a Bank of Burma with a capital of rupees
25,000,000 (or ^1,666,666). Loans were to be made to
the King at the rate of 1 2 per cent., and other loans at the
rate of 18 per cent. The bank was to be administered
by a syndicate of French and Burmese officials. It was
to issue notes, and to have the management of the ruby
mines and the monopoly of Letpet or " pickled tea."

74

FRENCH MACHINATIONS IN AVA

If finally ratified and carried out, these agreements
would have given the French Government, or a syndicate
on which the French Government would have been
strongly represented, practically the full control over the
principal sources of revenue in Ava, and over the only
route open for traffic from British ports to Western
China. The consequences would have been disastrous to
British trade, and to the interests of British Burma. If
once firmly established in Ava, the French would, no
doubt, have tried to induce other European nations to
neutralize Ava and have the Mandalay river declared,
like the Danube, open to vessels of all nationalities. As
the proposed arrangements were still in an inchoate
state, there was yet time to take steps either at Paris or
Mandalay to prevent their conclusion, and the startling
discovery of the letter of 15th January, 1885, from M.
Jules Ferry to the Prime Minister of Ava, already re-
ferred to (page 63), thoroughly opened the eyes of the
Government of India and the British Cabinet to the un-
friendliness of France and the hostility of Ava. The
Government of India unanimously recommended that
the reception and proper treatment of a British Resident
at Mandalay, to whose advice in all matters of foreign
policy the Court of Ava should submit, ought to be
insisted on ; and that, if those terms were refused,
measures of coercion should he adopted.

In an interview at the Foreign Office in London on
7th August, Lord Salisbury informed M. Waddington,
the French Ambassador, of the information he had re-
ceived regarding a proposed concession to French capi-
talists, which would include the control over the Post
Office, railways, steam navigation, and various branches
of revenue ; and he pointed out that, if such an under-
taking were attempted to be carried to any practical
issue, the necessary consequence would be that the
British Government would have to intervene and ma-
terially restrict the liberty and power of the King ot
Burma. M. Waddington replied that he had no know-
ledge of the alleged concession, but promised to make
inquiries and communicate again on the subject. As no
such communication was forthcoming, Lord Salisbury

75

BURMA UNDER BRITISH RULE

on 9th September desired Sir J. Walsham, Chargi
cT Affaires at Paris, to bring to the notice of M.
de Freycinet, the receipt of reports from authentic
sources clearly indicating that the French consul at
Mandalay was pursuing a policy which British interests
could not permit, and that the King of Burma would not
be allowed to carry out any commercial projects which
could issue in the establishment of any preponderating
influence in Ava other than that of the Indian Govern-
ment. Before the end of September M. Waddington
was authorized to inform Lord Salisbury that the French
Government knew absolutely nothing about any such
agreements, and that they had given no kind of authority
for making them. If made at all, they must have been
made at the instance of some speculative company.
Early in October M. Haas was ''mis en disponibilitd pour
raison de santdl' and his machinations and intrigues in
Mandalay were at an end. M. Haas is now, or was until
quite recently. Consul of France at Chunking in Sze-
chuan, in the heart of the Yangtse valley — absit oJiien.

While these diplomatic representations were being
conducted an occurrence took place, most opportunely, in
August, 1885, which demanded even more prompt and
decided action, while at the same time it had the un-
questionable advantage of fixing the quarrel with the
King of Ava on an issue with which the French Govern-
ment could not under any circumstances possibly admit
themselves to be mixed up. Hence their keen national
susceptibilities could not in any way be touched by the
action now forced upon, and about to be taken by, the
British Cabinet.

For many years back the Ningyan teak forests
covering the low hills north of our frontier above Toun-
goo, and drained by the Sittang river and its tributaries,
had been worked by the Bombay-Burma Trading Cor-
poration, Limited, a large Bombay joint-stock concern,
whose chief offices and mills were in Rangoon, although
direct and ultimate control lay with the firm of Messrs.
Wallace Brothers, of Austin Friars, London. In April,
1885, representations were made by the Corporation to
the Chief Commissioner of Burma that their working of

76

THE CASUS BELLI

the forests was being seriously impeded by action which
was being taken on a charge, alleged to have been false,
of having bribed the Governor of Ningyan to connive at
the King being deprived of the full amount of revenue
due on the timber extracted. In reply to a communica-
tion addressed to him on the subject by the Chief Com-
misioner, the Foreign Minister stated that the Corpora-
tion's foresters had extracted 80,000 logs, while only
32,000 had been paid for. Facilities were given for the
examination of the Toungoo Forest Office records show-
ing the number of teak logs imported from Upper Burma,
and the Corporation were prepared to produce the ac-
quittances in full signed by their foresters. It was like-
wise pointed out that the apparent shortage in actual
revenue paid might be due to the fact of the working of
the forests having taken place under three separate con-
tracts. In 1880 the Corporation contracted to pay the
King at fixed rates per log for all full-sized logs ex-
tracted ; under another contract, of 1 882, they paid a lump
sum of one lac of rupees (;^6,666) for all the undersized
and inferior logs rejected under the contract of 1880;
and in a third contract, of 1883, they agreed to pay from
October, 1884, a lump sum annually of 3J lacs (^23,333)
for all full-sized logs and of one lac (^6,666) for undersized
and inferior logs. The records of the Forest Depart-
ment at Toungoo did not then make any attempt to
classify the logs as to size and quality ; and there was
nothing to show that any given log came under the cate-
gory falling under the contract of 1880, or of 1882, or of
1883. No reply was received to this letter, but the
Hlutdaw, or High Court of Ava, on 12th August, 1885,
delivered judgment that the Corporation had defrauded
the King of revenue amounting to nearly 1 1 lacs of
rupees (.2^73,333) and consequently fined them the double
of that amount, while they further decreed the payment
to foresters in the Corporation's employ of sums aggre-
gating about five lacs of rupees (^33,333). In deciding
thus the Ministers based their finding entirely upon the
figures of the Toungoo Forest Office returns, ignoring
the lump sum contracts of 1882 and 1883 and the
records maintained by the Ningyan officials. The Cor-

77

BURMA UNDER BRITISH RULE

poration were ordered to pay an amount of 23 lacs
(^153,333) in four equal monthly instalments, otherwise
their timber in the Ningyan forests would be seized to
the extent of the default.

The Corporation pleaded that under no construction
of their leases could such a sum as 1 1 lacs (^73-333) be
justly due from them, that they could not pay the enor-
mous fine demanded, and that they feared their leases
and their property then in the forests would be taken
from them and transferred to others. It was also stated
on good authority that the French Consul had offered to
take the forests if the Corporation's lease were cancelled ;
and it is certain that M. Haas and M. Bonvillein were
intimately concerned with the proceedings of the Bur-
mese Government.

These matters having been duly reported to the
Government of India and the British Cabinet, intimation
was, on 28th August, given to the Court of Ava that
the British Government insisted on British subjects in
the position of the Bombay-Burma Corporation receiving
a fair trial in place of being, perhaps unjustly, ruined by
the arbitrary imposition of an enormous fine, or by the
sudden cancellation of their leases. The suspension of
the realization of the decree of the Hlutdaw and of the
order as to cancellation of the Corporation's leases was
desired until the matter in dispute between the King's
forest officers and the Corporation could be fully in-
vestigated and adjusted ; and an offer was made to appoint
a judicial officer of experience to investigate the facts at
Ningyan and Toungoo, if the Court of Ava were willing
to abide by the decision of such an arbitrator.

It was not till the middle of October that a reply to
this communication was received from the Burmese
Government. They questioned the right of the Govern-
ment of India to raise the subject, and very definitely
declined to agree to the proposed arbitration or to sus-
pend action against the Corporation, whose rafts they
had begun to stop on 20th September, two days before
the first instalment of the heavy fine was demanded.
With the unanimous consent of his colleagues and the full
approval of Lord Salisbury's Cabinet, the Viceroy, Lord

78

BRITISH ULTIMATUM SENT

Dufferin, authorized the Chief Commissioner of Burma
to despatch an ultimatum to King Thibaw, demanding
the acceptance of certain definite proposals for the
settlement of existing disputes and the establishment of
satisfactory relations with Ava, and warning them that in
the event of the proposals not being accepted the Go-
vernment of India would take the matter into their own
hands. The terms of this ultimatum, despatched on
22nd October, were the suitable reception of a Resident
with free access to the King, the entire suspension of pro-
ceedings against the Bombay- Burma Corporation until
the arrival of the Resident, and the acceptance of a per-
manent Resident with a proper guard for his protection.
The Court of Ava were also warned that they would be
expected in future to regulate their external affairs in ac-
cordance with the advice of the Government of India
(as in the case of Afghanistan) and to grant proper
facilities for the development of British trade with
Western China through Bhamo. Simultaneously with
the despatch of the ultimatum, troops were moved over
from India to Burma in sufficient numbers to convince
the Court of Ava that the British Government were in
earnest, that any injury to British subjects or to their
property would not be overlooked, and that undisguised
hostilities to the British Empire would no longer be
permitted. The ultimatum was despatched by a special
steamer, the Ashley Eden, to Mandalay so as to reach
there on or before the 30th October, and intimation was
given that, if unmolested, she would remain there till
5th November, in order to bring back the King's reply.
She was to leave Mandalay without fail on the morning
of the 6th November; and, if she brought no satisfac-
tory reply to Rangoon by the evening of the loth, the
British Government would proceed to take such further
action as seemed fit.

King Thibaw and his Ministers little imagined that
during 1878 a plan of campaign against Mandalay had
been drawn up in the Military Department of the
Government of India and had been carefully corrected
and revised from time to time, that orders had already
been issued to Major-General Prendergast commanding

79

BURMA UNDER BRITISH RULE

the extraordinary troops in Burma to carry out these
military operations as soon as he received his orders to
cross the frontier, or that a poHtical officer had already,
during October, been selected, and four young civil
officers warned for service to accompany the army and
arrange for pacifying the country through the native
officials, under the orders of the military commandants.
The Burmese Government were utterly unprepared for
war, and never realized that the British Government
would really proceed to extremities.

The reply to the ultimatum was duly received on the
9th November. It was tantamount to a refusal or
evasion of the three terms. It declined to discuss or
negotiate the case against the Corporation, and said that
if the British Government wished to re-establish an
agent, he would '' be permitted to come and go as in former
times!' As for external affairs, they intended to manage
these for themselves, intimating boldly that '' frie7idly
relations with France, Italy , and other States have been,
are bei?ig, and will be mahitained'' \ while, with regard to
the opening up of trade between Rangoon and Western
China, commerce would " be assisted in conformity with
the customs of the country ^

Simultaneously with this announcement, King Thibaw
on 7th November issued a proclamation (see page 83)
throughout his dominions, calling upon all his officials
and subjects to expel the English, who threatened war
and intended to destroy the religion and the national
customs of the Burmese, and announcing his intention of
taking the field in person if the British attacked his
kingdom, of exterminating them, and of annexing their
territory.
^ On loth November the Viceroy telegraphed to the
Secretary of State, proposing, with the approval of the
British Government, to commence hostile operations at
once. Next day the short reply was flashed back,
" Please instruct General Prendergast to advance on
Mandalay at once " ; and the third Burmese war was
begun. Had action been delayed, a situation most preju-
dicial to the commercial and political interests of Britain
would have been created in Upper Burma, and with

80

WAR DECLARED

which it might hereafter have been difficult to deal. As
it was, the decree of the French Senate on 24th Novem-
ber, 1885, authorizing the ratification of the Franco-
Burmese Convention of 15th January, 1885 (which might
possibly have caused complications), was promulgated too
late to save King Thibaw from downfall. The ancient
kingdom of Ava was ultimately ruined, mainly through
French machinations, and through Thibaw leaning on the
broken reed of covert French political support. It was
not until the extremest limits of forbearance had been
exceeded that the declaration of war took place. Under
the circumstances there was no other course left open.
To have prolonged forbearance further, in the face of the
many provocations received, would have soon brought
about a crisis which would have had to be met under
conditions more embarrassing to Britain, and more likely
to curtail heavier sufferings upon the people of Upper
Burma than they were now about to be called upon to
endure. Major-General Prendergast was definitely in-
structed to remember that he was about to operate in a
country inhabited by a people kindred to our own
Burmese subjects in race, in religion, and in material
interests, and that he was not attacking a hostile nation,
but a perverse and impracticable Court. After the
attitude of France, and the machinations of M. Haas, the
French Consul, and other French subjects, nothing short
of annexation had become possible : for the Nyaungyan
Prince, the only member of the royal house of Alaung
Payd whose abilities and character would have de-
served serious consideration as to raising him to the
status of the ruler of a protected State, was now dead.

chapter IV

THE THIRD BURMESE WAR : FROM ITS OUTBREAK TO
THE ANNEXATION OF UPPER BURMA (13TH NOVEM
BER, 1885, TO 1ST JANUARY, 1886).

ON 2ist October, 1885, the Government of India
ordered an expeditionary force to proceed to
Burma in readiness for active service in Ava, if necessary.
It was under the command of Major-General (afterwards
Sir Harry) Prendergast, V.C., and was concentrated at
Thayetmyo, the frontier miUtary station on the Irra-
waddy river. On the 13th November the orders for its
advance on Mandalay were issued ; and on the 14th the
frontier was crossed, the line of advance being up the
I rrawaddy.

Early in November General Prendergast had been
made aware of the nature of the ultimatum despatched
to the Court of Ava, and had been warned to hold
himself in readiness to immediately carry out the plan of
operations prescribed by the Commander-in-Chief, Sir
Frederick Roberts, V.C. (now Earl Roberts, K.G.), in the
event of intimation being given that the reply from
Mandalay was unsatisfactory. From the moment of
entering Avan territory General Prendergast was in-
vested with supreme political as well as military
authority, while Colonel (afterwards Sir Edward) Sladen
and some junior officers of the British Burma Com-
mission were attached to the force as political officers
under his orders. Explicit instructions were given to
him that Mandalay was to be occupied and King Thibaw
dethroned, and that no offer of submission was to be
accepted which could affect the movement of the troops.
These facts were to be definitely made known to all the
Burmese authorities, and to the population, during the

82

THIBAW'S PROCLAMATION

progress towards the capital. In the event of annexation
being decided on, Mr. (afterwards Sir Charles) Bernard
would be directed to proceed to Mandalay and assume
civil control ; but, in the meantime. General Prendergast
was to garrison every important fort or town and leave
there a civil officer who should, under the orders of the
commandant of the troops, place himself in communica-
tion with the local Burmese officials, and through them
pacify and administer the country, giving assurances that
King Thibaw would not remain in power. As the objects
of the expedition were the occupation of Mandalay and the
dethronement of Thibaw, these results were to be gained
bloodlessly, if possible, by the simple display of force.
Any conflict with the population at large was to be
avoided, and everthing was to be done to try and secure,
without bloodshed, their acquiescence in the administrative
and political changes that would be found necessary.

While these instructions were being forwarded from
Calcutta to Rangoon, King Thibaw had uttered a feeble
but vainglorious war-cry throughout the kingdom of Ava.
Following immediately on his rejection of the British
proposals on 7th November, 1885, he issued a bombastic
proclamation to the following effect : —

" To the headmen of all towns and villages, heads of cavalry, chief
umpires and referees, shield-bearers, heads of jails, heads of gold and
silver revenues, mine workers, arbitrators, forest officials, and all the
subjects and inhabitants of the royal territories :

" Those heretics, the English Kala {i.e., non-mongolian barbarians),
having most harshly made demands likely to impair and destroy our
religion, violate our national customs, and degrade our race, are making
a display and preparation as if about to wage war against our State.
Reply has been sent to them in conformity with the usages of great
nations, and in words which are just and regular. But if these heretic
Kala should come and attempt to molest or disturb the State in any
way, His Majesty the King, watchful that the interests of religion and
of the State shall not suffer, will himself march forth with his generals,
captains, and lieutenants, with large forces of infantry, cavalry, artillery,
and elephants, and with the might of his army will by land and water
efface these heretic Kala, and conquer and annex their territories. All
the inhabitants of the royal kingdom of Ava are enjoined not to be
alarmed or disturbed on account of the hostility of these heretic Kala^
and they are not to avoid them by leaving the country. They are to
continue to carry on their occupations as usual in a peaceful manner.
The local officials are, each in his own town or village, to watch and see

83

BURMA UNDER BRITISH RULE

that there are no thefts, dacoities, or other State crimes. The royal troops
now being sent forth will not be collected, as formerly, by forcibly
pressing into service all who can be found : but the royal troops now
banded into regiments in Mandalay will be sent forth to attack, destroy,
and annex. The local officials are not to impress forcibly into service
any one who may not wish to serve; but to uphold the rehgion, the
national honour, and the country's interests, will bring threefold religious
merit— good of religion, good of the King, and good of the nation —
and will result in leading along the path of the celestial regions to
Neikban (Nirvana). Whoever joins and serves zealously will receive
money and royal rewards, and will serve in the capacity for which he
may be found fit. Loyal officials are to search for volunteers and
others who may wish to serve, and are to send lists of them to the
provincial governments."

General Prendergast was also, on the day on which
the advance was ordered, provided with a Proclamation
to be issued to all priests, officials, traders, agriculturists,
and other inhabitants of the tracts he passed through ;
but it was in a very different strain from Thibaw's
manifesto. After briefly narrating the circumstances
under which the Government of India had found them-
selves compelled to undertake the expedition, and their
consequent intention to dethrone him, it concluded by
saying : —

" It is the earnest desire of the Viceroy and Governor-General ol
India that bloodshed should be avoided, and that the peaceful inhabit-
ants of all classes should be encouraged to pursue their usual callings
without fear of molestation. None will have anything to apprehend so
long as you do not oppose the passage of the troops. . . . Your
private rights, your religion, and national customs will be scrupulously
respected, and the Government of India will recognize the services of
all amongst you, whether officials or others, who show zeal in assisting
the British authorities to preserve order."

The expeditionary force comprised a Naval Brigade,
under Captain R. Woodward, R.N., formed of detach-
ments from the ships of Admiral Sir Frederick Richards'
squadron, then lying at Rangoon, three regiments of
British Infantry, seven regiments of native Infantry, six
companies of Sappers and Miners, one Field Battery and
two Garrison Batteries of Royal Artillery, and one British
and two native Mountain Batteries. Its total strength
was 9,467 men, with "j^ guns, of which 27 were quick-
firing machine guns. Piloted by the river-steamer

84

OPERATIONS ON THE IRRAWADDY

I. M.S. Irrawaddy, the expeditionary force ascended In
twenty-four steamers and twenty-three flats chartered
from the Irrawaddy Flotilla Company. The land forces
were divided into three brigades, respectively com-
manded by Brigadiers-General H. H. Foord, G. S.
White, V.C., and F. B. Norman. The campaign com-
menced by the Irrawaddy, which crossed the frontier
about noon on the 14th November, engaging and
capturing a King's steamer, which was sent down to
Thayetmyo in charge of the launch Kathleen, while the
Irrawaddy brought down the two flats that she had
been towing. One of these had been prepared for sink-
ing in the river, and had rows of posts, each ten feet high
by six inches square, let into the deck and sharpened
into points which must inevitably have destroyed any
shallow-bottomed river steamer that ran against them.
When the steamer was shelled, and its deck cleared for
action, the crew jumped overboard and fled, accompanied
by Commotto, one of two Italian adventurers (Commotto
and Molinari) who had become the hirelings of the King.
Commotto had been allotted the task of blockinof the
river near the frontier, which he was on his way to
accomplish, while Molinari was charged with strengthen-
ing the fortifications below Mandalay. From the papers
left on the steamer by Commotto information was ob-
tained as to the King's military preparations, which
corroborated the news given by the commanders of the
last two Irrawaddy Flotilla Company's steamers which
had run the gauntlet of the forts in their latest trip
down stream. On the i6th November the Burmese
stockades erected at Nyaungbinmaw and Sinbaungwe,
positions held respectively on the right and the left
banks of the river, were carried without any serious
fighting. On the following day the forts of Minhla
on the right bank, and Gwegyaung Kamyo on the left
bank were captured after some sharp fighting. The
former was strengthened and garrisoned, while the latter
was demolished. The ordinary garrison of Gwegyaung
Kamyo was 700, but it had been reinforced by 1,000 men
three days previously. They fled on the appearance at
close quarters of the British infantry, who had marched

85

BURMA UNDER BRITISH RULE

seven miles through the jungle to the rear of the fort
On the right bank three native regiments landed, and
after breaking down two outer lines of defence stormed
Minhla fort after three hours' fighting. The Burmese,
well concealed, fired rapidly, and disputed every mch of
the way to the redoubt ; but, when once it was rushed,
they fled from the fort and their rout was complete.
The town of Minhla was burned down, being accident-
ally set fire to by the shells thrown at the redoubt.
This was the only place where anything like stubborn
resistance was offered to the British arms. Mr. Phayre,
who had been Assistant Resident at Mandalay until
October, 1879, was left behind as civil officer. The
people and the priests appeared to willingly accept the
new situation, though the high officials could not be
expected to submit till they knew that Mandalay had
fallen. At Magwe, on the 20th, Commotto and Molinari,
the two Italians who had guaranteed to Thibaw that
British troops would not be able to pass the frontier
forts constructed and fortified by them, surrendered
themselves as prisoners of war.

On 22nd November shots were exchanged with the
batteries at Nyaungu, just above Pagan, but the works
were soon abandoned by the Burmese and dismantled,
the guns being spiked. The Burmese soldiers, who
numbered 1,000, had been plundering and robbing all
the villages in the vicinity. At Pagdn another military
post was established, with a civil officer to initiate the
work of administration.

At Pakokko, which was passed on the 24th, about
1,000 soldiers from Mandalay had been stationed, but
they ran away on the approach of the British. That
same afternoon Myingyan, a large and important town
near the mouth of the Chindwin river, was reached. A
large Burmese force was reported to be holding the forts
there. While the big guns were engaging the batteries
on the river's bank, a body of about 2,000 men, dressed
in red, white, and magenta coats, and with chiefs havino-
golden umbrellas held over them, were seen on rising
ground some three miles inland. These were the head-
quarters and the reserve of the Burmese army, but the

86

MYINGYAN CAPTURED

force took no part in the fighting-. Before operations
could be resumed next morning the Burmese withdrew,
and the twenty- one guns forming the two batteries were
destroyed. On the previous evening the commander of
the Burmese forces, the Hlethin Atwin Wun, who was
considered to be the best of Thibaw's generals, tele-
graphed to the King that he had gained a great victory
over the British ; but the truth was soon known in the
capital. This easy capture of Myingyan, where 6,000
picked troops are said to have been sent, practically
decided the campaign ; for it was afterwards ascertained
that if the British had received any check here, the
Burmese intended to hold out at Ava and Sagaing, and
compel the expeditionary force to undertake siege opera-
tions. A garrison and a civil officer were left at Myin-
gyan. Many Burmese, who had previously fled from
the town while it was in the hands of Thibaw's troops,
came in to welcome the British arrival. The head
Pongyi (or religious recluse) said the town had been
an abode of miser)^ whilst the soldiery was there, that
two hundred ponies had been requisitioned for the King's
cavalry, that robber)- had been prevalent, that property
had been stolen, and women had been dragged from
their houses and ravished.

On the 26th November Yandabii, the extreme limit
of the advance of the British troops during the first
Burmese war in 1826, was passed, and on that after-
noon, near the village of Nazu, the State barge,
paddled by forty-four men, came flying a flag of
truce at the bow and the King's ensign at the stern.
Seated in the bows and wearinof enormous Shan
hats were the Kyaukmyaung Atwin Wun and the
Wetmasut Wundauk, who came as Envoys bearing a
memorandum from the Prime Minister. Coming on
board without their shoes, they delivered this document
to General Prendergast and Colonel Sladen. It was
unsigned by the King, but bore the royal peacock seal.
Beginning naively with the statement that the Burmese
Government were under the impression that the former
friendly conditions would still prevail, and that they
could therefore not believe the British would make war

BURMA UNDER BRITISH RULE

against Upper Burma, it declared the King of Burma
ready to grant all that was demanded in the ultimatum,
desired the cessation of hostilities, and offered to enter
into a treaty. Under the instructions upon which he
was acting, General Prendergast could only reply that no
armistice could be granted, but that if King Thibaw
surrendered himself, his army, and his capital, and if the
European residents in Mandalay were all found unin-
jured in life and property, the King's life would be spared
and his family respected. A reply to this was demanded
before 4 a.m. on the following morning. Meanwhile, the
fleet continued to advance, and was anchored for the
night off the village of Kyauktalon, about seven miles
below Ava.

As no answer was forthcoming, the fleet moved on at
daylight; and orders, with plans attached, were issued
for the attack on Ava. About half-past ten o'clock,
when the proposed landing place was in view, the State
barge was seen putting out with a Hag of truce. The
same Envoys this time brought a telegram from the King
conceding unconditionally all the demands made on the
previous day, ordering the Ministers conducting the
military operations at Sagaing and Ava not on any
account to fire on the British, and directing them to keep
all the troops quiet.

At Ava fort some 8,000 troops, only about two-thirds
of whom were armed with rifles or guns and the rest
with spears, swords, and bills, were collected to oppose
the advance of the British. General Prendergast insisted
on this portion of the army laying down their arms, but
the Commander of the forces, the Bohmu Kin Atwin
Wun, who was senior in rank to either of the Envoys,
refused to do so without a direct order from the King.
Some delay occurred in finding and buoying an opening
in the channel through the barrier, but by the time the
British fleet had been placed by signal in the best
positions in fighting order and the demand again pressed
for the immediate surrender of the arms, the royal man-
date had been telegraphed from Mandalay, eleven miles
distant. Most unfortunately only some 550 of the rifles
and muskets were then obtained ; for, as soon as the

88

ARRIVAL AT MANDALAY

King's orders for the surrender became known, large
numbers of the soldiers went off at once in all directions
before British troops could be landed to ensure the
disarmament of the whole force. The forts at Sagaing
and Thambayadaing on the right bank of the river
above Ava, likewise surrendered without a blow and
were disarmed, though here again only about 400
muskets were collected. From Ava fort 28 guns were
carried off as trophies ; while 32 were destroyed at
Sagaing, and 14 at Thambayddaing in dismantling the
forts and river bank batteries. With the exception of
three transports left with the troops ordered to land and
complete the disarmament of the forts and batteries, the
fleet moved on to Mandalay, and arrived there at 10
o'clock on the morning of 28th November, 1885.
Crowds of Burmese watched the arrival of the force
from the banks, and appeared only too pleased to obey
the royal mandate that had been issued prohibiting any
opposition to the landing. Information was at once
obtained that the King had been in the palace up to
nine o'clock in the morning, and that the city was quiet.

At eleven o'clock the arrival of the British force was
notified to the Prime Minister and intimation given that,
in accordance with the terms of the previous day's com-
munication received at Ava, the immediate surrender of
the capital and the King was expected. He was further
informed that, unless a reply was received by noon, the
troops would land and be employed as circumstances
might demand. As it was not until after midday that
the Kinwun Mingyi's reply was received, to the effect
that he would be on board the Doowoon to consult with
General Prendergast and Colonel Sladen, the troops were
landed at 1.30 p.m., all regiments being ordered to take
their colours and bands.

The royal city of Mandalay is situated about three to
four miles to the east of the Irrawaddy, with which there
is connexion through the outer town along four main
roads (still named A, B, C, and D roads) running due
east from the river. The first brigade, under General
Foord, marched by A road, and secured the southern
and eastern gates of the city. The third brigade, under

89

BURMA UNDER BRITISH RULE

General Norman, marched along C road, and secured
the western and northern city gates and the west and
north gates of the palace enclosure. The second brigade,
under General White, accompanied by Colonel Sladen,
proceeded by C road, entered the city by the south gate,
and secured the south and east gates of the palace en-
closure. At the five main gates of the city, from which
bridges led over the broad moat surrounding the city
wall, the guards were disarmed and allowed to go to
their homes, being replaced by British and native soldiers.
As the troops marched through the western suburbs the
population thronged the roads, gazing in quiet amazement,
as if looking on at some ceremonial festival.

Knowing the road. Colonel Sladen, who had been
selected as political officer on the strength of his having
long since been British Resident in Mandalay, rode with
guides ahead of the troops in the hope of meeting the
Prime Minister. Hearing that the Kinwun Mingyi had
taken another route. Colonel Sladen merely sent a
mounted scout to tell him to come as quickly as possible
to the southern city gate. Without waiting for the
Prime Minister, Colonel Sladen entered the southern
city gate at 3 p.m., and proceeded, without interference
or obstruction, through the city to the eastern or main
entrance of the stockaded palace enclosure, accompanied
only by Mr. Nicholas, his clerk and interpreter, and
Commander Morgan, of one of the Irrawaddy Flotilla
Company's steamers, who was well acquainted with the
interior of the city and the palace. When they had
waited here for a few minutes, the Kinwun Mingyi was
descried coming in full haste on an elephant. After a
formal greeting, he asked Colonel Sladen to accompany
him alone into the palace enclosure, and not on any ac-
count to let the troops enter. Leaving a note for
General Prendergast, asking that the troops should not
be ordered to enter before again hearing from him,
Colonel Sladen entered the HhUdaw, or Great Council
Chamber, and was shortly afterwards received by King
Thibaw in the Hall of Audience, as if at an ordinary
public reception. Queen Supayalat, who had been
watching the approach of the troops from a lofty wooden

90

THIBAW'S SURRENDER ARRANGED

outlook tower, at the south-east corner of the palace
buildings, and the Queen-mother (Dowager Queen Sin-
pyumashin) were present, while the usual palace guards
were in attendance. With very little preamble the King
surrendered himself and his kingdom ; but he asked to
be granted a day or two for preparation in place of
being taken away suddenly, and he proposed meanwhile
to leave the palace and go into a summer-house in the
royal garden within the enclosure. In reply he was
informed that General Prendergast was in supreme com-
mand to carry out the orders of the Government of
India, but that he would not be interfered with in his
palace that night, nor would the immediate palace pre-
cincts be interfered with ; and it was arranged that the
King should now consider himself a prisoner, and sur-
render himself formally to General Prendergast on the
following day. Thibaw having agreed to this, and the
Ministers guaranteeing to deliver him safely next morn-
ing or pay the penalty with their lives, Colonel Sladen,
about 5 p.m., returned to the eastern gate of the outer
palace enclosure and communicated the news of the
King's unconditional surrender to General Prendergast,
and his intention to surrender himself personally and
formally on the following day. The Hampshire Regi-
ment, the ist Madras Pioneers, and the Hazara Moun-
tain Battery, which had all come provided with three
days' provisions, cooking utensils, bakery, slaughter-
house establishment, and entrenching equipment, were
left under the command of Brigadier-General White to
guard the palace for the night, being ordered to enter
and occupy the outer enclosure as far as the Hlutdaw
and the royal Red Gate, or main entrance to the inner
palace. The rest of the troops returned to the transports
in the evening.

So far everything had gone well; but an inconceivably
weak permission was now accorded, which led to an
enormous amount of looting. At the instance of Colonel
Sladen and the Ministers, who requested that palace
women should be allowed exit and entrance through
the western gate of the palace enclosure leading to the
Queen's apartments. General Prendergast, against his

91

BURMA UNDER BRITISH RULE

first and better judgement, ordered that women were to
be allowed to go in and out of the west gate of the
palace. It was known that King Thibaw, in place of
carrying out his bombast as to heading his army and
effacing the British, had made arrangements for flight.
Fifty elephants, with trusty friends, were waiting for
him at Shwemaga, twelve miles north of Mandalay,
to convey him to Shwebo (M6ks6bo), the birthplace and
the burialplace of Alaung Paya, the illustrious founder
of the royal family, Moksobo being the dynastic strong-
hold of their race. It was probably only the con-
dition of Queen Supaydlat, then approaching a confine-
ment, that had hindered him from fleeing on the previous
day. Aware of this. General Prendergast pointed out
the danger which existed of the King passing out in the
disguise of a woman, when one of the Ministers calmly
proposed that the sentries should make personal ex-
amination of each individual passing in or out. In a
weak moment, however. General Prendergast gave the
required consent. The result was that, out of the 300
female attendants in the royal apartments, only seventeen
remained faithful until the next morning, while crowds
of common women from the city poured in and out all
night through, looting from the royal apartments every
valuable thing of small size they could lay hands on.
How such a proposal from the Burmese Minister could
have been supported by Colonel Sladen and sanctioned
by General Prendergast it is impossible to understand.
It was a blunder, and was subsequently admitted to
have been one.

Almost entirely abandoned by their attendants, — for
most of the guards of the previous evening had withdrawn,
as well as most of the maids of honour, — and seeing
the looting carried on by the female scum of the city,
the King and the Queens fell into a state of panic. Early
on the 29th Colonel Sladen, having passed the night in
the Hlutdaw, received a message from the Taingda
Mingyi, who had remained with a strong guard inside
the palace in charge of Thibaw. The Mingyi had
himself come to say the King was in a state of panic,
and fancied that soldiers would break into the palace and

92

THIBAW'S FORMAL SURRENDER

kill him. Proceeding into the palace, Colonel Sladen
found the King, Queens, and Queen-mother almost un-
attended, while women of low class were streaming in
through all the western portions of the palace. Whilst
Colonel Sladen accompanied the Queens and their Queen-
mother to see what was going on in their private apart-
ments, the King collected together a large quantity of
gold and jewelled vessels used on State occasions. For
their protection Colonel Sladen went to the palace gate
and called an officer and twenty-five men of the Hamp-
shire Regiment, who were dropped as sentries as each
of the several royal apartments was passed through.
Whilst this was taking place. King Thibaw, his two
Queens and their mother (Dowager-Queen Sinpyuma-
shin) retired to a small summer-house at the edge of
the royal gardens. A cordon of sentries was placed
round this little building, and the King remained a
prisoner here till his formal surrender in the course of
the afternoon. Abandoned by all his Ministers, and de-
serted by most of the personal attendants and servants
of the palace, the King complained bitterly.

At a quarter-past ten o'clock on the morning of
29th November, 1885, Major-General Prendergast, at-
tended by his personal escort of an officer, ten mounted
infantry and four orderlies, and accompanied by Brigadier-
General Norman commanding a brigade composed of the
Mounted Corps, theQ-ist (Cinque Ports) Royal Artillery,
the Royal Welsh Fusiliers and the 23rd Madras In-
fantry, proceeded to the eastern or royal gate on the
far side of the city, and marched through the latter to the
royal Red Gate or main entrance of the inner palace
enclosure, where he arrived at one o'clock. The four
Mingyi, or principal Ministers of the Great State Council,
were sent for, and accompanied the General, his staff
and Colonel Sladen to an interview with the King.

Headed by the Taingda Mingyi, who, though not
the Prime Minister, had been placed in charge of the
King on the previous evening, the procession wended
its way through the south-east corner of the palace
buildings, past the Hall of Audience, by the Queen's
watch-tower and through passages in the palace towards

93

BURMA UNDER BRITISH RULE

the little summer-house in the garden, near the south-
western corner of the royal apartments. Here the King
was found seated with his two Queens (Supayalat and
Supayagale) and the Dowager Queen Sinpyumashin, and
gave himself up to General Prendergast. The King was
told he would have to leave at once and go on board
a steamer. He begged for delay, which could not be
granted ; and preparations were made for immediate
departure. As soon as these had been completed, the
dethroned King walked with his two Queens and the
Queen-mother, the latter heading the procession, through
the palace buildings, down the stairs in front of the Hall
of Audience, through the royal Red Gate, and past the
HhUdaw to the main road outside the palace enclosure.
From the steps of the palace to the main gate of the
outer stockade the cortege passed through double files
of the Hampshire Regiment, and out on to the roadway.
Here two Burmese carriages, or box-like two-wheeled
carts, drawn by bullocks, had been provided for the King
and his suite, while the remainder of his very scanty
following, consisting of only a few female attendants,
either walked or were carried in doolies. This was the
first occasion on which King Thibaw had ever been out-
side of his palace since, more than seven years before,
he had been declared heir apparent by the palace intrigue
and coup d'etat of his mother-in-law, Sinpyumashin.

At the main gate of the outer palace enclosure
Brigadier-General Norman received the King and es-
corted him to the river. The procession consisted of
the 23rd Madras Infantry, leading, the 9-ist (Cinque
Ports) Royal Artillery, then the King and suite, while
the Royal Welsh Fusiliers closed the rear. A move
was made at half-past three o'clock, eight white or royal
umbrellas being held over the King and the Queens, in
place of the nine to which he had been entitled whilst
King of Ava. This still exceeded by one, however, the
number permissible to any of the reigning Sawbwa or
feudatory Princes of the Shan States. At first the
number of Burmese onlookers was small, and no de-
monstration was made. As darkness came on and
the river was approached, the crowds along the road-

94

THIBAW'S DEPORTATION

sides and at the corners of cross-roads became very
large. Here and there the waiHngs of women were
to be heard, and the crowd, in their anxiety to see the
royal prisoners, showed slight signs of impatience. No-
thing amounting to a demonstration was made, and
there was no attempt at a rescue. At a quarter-past
six o'clock the King and his retinue were safely placed
on board the steamer Thooreah (" the Sun "), the
river bank being lined with two companies of the
Liverpool Regiment and the Naval Brigade. On re-
ceiving its royal freight the Thooreah put out into mid-
stream, and left for Rangoon the following morning.
The escort for the voyage consisted of two companies
of the Liverpool Regiment under Colonel Le Mesurier.
The Kinwun Mingyi, the Prime Minister, other two
Ministers of State, and three Privy Councillors, were de-
ported to Rangoon along with the King ; but not one of
them all was willing to accompany his royal master
into exile. Without again putting foot on the soil of
Burma, Thibaw was transferred, with his two Queens, to
an ocean steamer at Rangoon on loth December, and
taken vid Madras to Ratnagiri fort on the Bombay
coast, where he still remains a prisoner of State. The
Dowager Queen was sent to Tavoy, in Lower Burma.

On the evening of 29th November the city and the
suburbs were much disturbed. The city, that is to say,
the portion of Mandalay lying within the moat and
walls, consisted of about eighteen to twenty thousand
houses, containing a population estimated at from ninety
to a hundred thousand souls; while about as many were
to be found in the suburbs, situated chiefly between the
city and the river on the west. Towards sundown
Brigadier-General Foord marched in command of the
2 1 St and 25th Madras Infantry from the transports to
the city for the purpose of holding the five gates facing
the bridges over the moat. Four companies were placed
on each of the four sides of the city walls, the guard-
houses were occupied, and strong patrols were constantly
sent out during the night through the city and suburbs.
Frequent shots were heard in all directions, but there
was nothing like any general rising. On entering the

95

BURMA UNDER BRITISH RULE

south gate of the city, about 9 p.m., the 21st Madras
Infantry were fired on, and returned the fire with section
volleys. The French and Italian consulates and the
neighbouring residences of Europeans, near the south-
west of the city, were protected by a company of native
troops. Besides the above precautions, the 12th Madras
Infantry, under Colonel Rowlandson, posted guards and
patrolled all night between B and C roads for the pro-
tection of the suburbs. That night a celebrated diamond
was stolen by the ex- King's troops from the forehead of
the great image of Gaudama in the Atumashi, or
" Incomparable " Pagoda, situated to the north-east of
the city at some distance beyond the British picquets :
while another large diamond and a valuable golden be-
jewelled necklace were also stolen from the Paydgyi, the
" Great " or Arakan Pagoda, between two and three
miles south-west of the city.

Next day, on 30th November, additional precautions
were taken for preserving order. The city and the
suburbs were patrolled day and night, and all men found
carrying arms were taken and delivered to the Provost
Marshal, whose quarters were at the southern city gate.
Orders were issued for observance in the case of in-
cendiary fires, and a committee was appointed to take
over and secure all property found in the palace. That
night the news of the almost bloodless victory was known
in London, and the Viceroy, Lord Dufferin, received the
congratulations of Her Majesty and Her Majesty's
Government for the success with which the immediate
objects of the military expedition had been attained.

On 1st December a proclamation was issued notifying
King Thibaw's surrender, dethronement, and deporta-
tion, and intimating that, until the will of Her Majesty
the Queen- Empress was known, the civil and military
administration of the country was vested in General
Prendergast, who desired to carry on the Government
with the aid of such of the Ministers, Governors, and
other officers of State at present in office as agreed to
remain and perform loyal service to the British Govern-
ment. This provisional Hlutdaw, or Council of State,
included two Mingyi or Ministers of State, four Aiwin-

96

TEMPORARY ADMINISTRATION

wun or Privy Councillors, and seven Wundauk or Under
Secretaries. Special notification was made that the
Pongyi or religious body would be protected, and allowed
to carry on their religious duties unhindered, and that
all religious buildings and their precincts would be pre-
served, while Buddhism would remain the national
religion, and would be respected. Provided they re-
mained quiet and peaceable, all were to remain un-
molested ; and all were to be permitted to engage in
their national sports and to follow the customs of the
country. The Governors of districts ( Wundauk, Wmi),
judges [Nakdn), town magistrates {Myook), village
headmen (Tkugyi), and the officers {Bo, Sitke), perform-
ing miscellaneous military-police duties, were provision-
ally and temporarily retained on condition that they
should faithfully discharge their duties under the orders
of the British civil officers, and should do their utmost to
suppress crime, allay public anxiety, and pacify the
towns and villages under their charge. Dacoits, robbers,
and vagrants were to be arrested and sent to the British
civil officer. The administration of the country being
thus temporarily vested in the Hlutdaw or State Council
of Burmese Ministers and officials, under the presidency
of Colonel Sladen and under the orders and control of
General Prendergast, their first act was to proclaim a
general disarmament of the civil population. None
except members of the Council and its staff were allowed
to possess other arms than the common Da or bill, in
ordinary use for all domestic, agricultural, and forest
purposes, unless they received special passes. The
inhabitants of Mandalay and its suburbs were called
upon to deliver up at once, at any one of the twelve
gates of the city, or of the four gates of the palace
enclosure, or at one or other of the several criminal
courts or guard-houses, any muskets, swords, spears, and
the like in their possession. Any one found disobeying
this order and retaining arms in his possession was to
be seized, and would be liable to be shot. Many arms
were given up ; but nothing like all of them. Encamp-
ments of British troops were formed round the city, and
guards were placed around the gun and powder factories

97 H

BURMA UNDER BRITISH RULE

and the royal workshops. In the gun and rifle factories
much valuable machinery of Swiss manufacture was found,
and ten submarine mines in course of construction. The
night passed quietly in the city, and tranquillity appeared
to be established. A number of robbers were caught
red-handed and made over to the Provost-Marshal, some
being shot and others flogged.

Being interviewed by Colonel Sladen on 3rd Decem-
ber, the Thdthandbaing or Buddhist Archbishop promised
to assist the British authority, and sent out proclamations
to all the Pongyi or heads of monasteries throughout the
country enjoining them to support all notifications coming
from the Hlutdaw under General Prendergast's orders.

On 7th December five Princes and two Princesses,
children of the Mindat Prince — who, being the heir
apparent nominated to succeed his brother King Mindon
on the throne, was assassinated when the Myingun
Prince attempted to kill his father also and seize the
throne in 1866 — were, at their own request and that of
the Hlutdaw, deported to Rangoon, after being relieved
from their imprisonment endured throughout the whole
of Thibaw's reign. On the 8th the royal albino elephant,
figuring in all royal proclamations as a true Sadddn
or white elephant of miraculous powers, died in the
palace of colic, and was dragged by parties of the
Hampshire Regiment, the Hazara Mountain Battery, and
transport coolies out of the palace and through the city
to the royal burial-ground north of C road, where a grave
had been prepared for it by the Burmese. The actual and
very real importance of this death, and of the ignominious
treatment of the carcase, can only be appreciated when
the childish superstition of the Burmese, individually and
nationally, is understood.

On loth December the headquarters of the Burma field
force were established in the palace, and on the 15th Mr.
Bernard, Chief Commissioner of British Burma, arrived
with a small staff from Rangoon in order to concert
administrative measures till the final policy of the British
Government could be declared. Throughout the whole
of this month armed parties were scouring the country
round about Mandalay in search of Thibaw's disbanded

98

THE MILITARY SITUATION

soldiery and of men in possession of arms ; movable
columns were operating against the bands of dacoits, often
large in number, formed of the runaway royal troops,
while the garrisons left at Minhla, Pagan, Myingyan, Ava,
and Sagaing were all busily engaged in operating against
the dacoits infesting every district, and in endeavouring
to assist the civil officers left at the three first- named
places in introducing something like decent adminis-
tration.

The military situation remained unchanged. There
was no comprehensively organized armed resistance to
authority ; but bands of dacoits overran the country in
all directions, and every possible opportunity was taken
to harass them and to destroy or capture them. The
telegraph line to the frontier was constantly being inter-
rupted, and the wires cut again as soon as repaired. No
communication had yet been established with Bhamo, as
British authority was only recognized as far as gunboats
had gone up the river, that is, for fifty miles north of Man-
dalay. Accordingly, on 19th December, General Pren-
dergast went with a strong force up the river to Bhamo,
a detachment from which occupied Shwebo. The
Governor of Shwebo sent in his second and third sons in
token of submission, and also a pretender to the throne
whom he had captured. Various other local authorities
gave in their adherence ; but the Sawbwa of Wuntho,
an influential Shan chief, refused to recognize the British
authority, and had to be dealt with later on. The
notorious Taingda Mingy i, who was responsible for
much of the misgovernment during Thibaw's reign, and
was known to be very hostile to the British, was also
transferred temporarily to India. He died in Rangoon
on 31st May, 1896.

On 19th December an expedition was also sent up
the Chindwin river, whence news had been received
of the murder of three of the Bombay-Burma Cor-
poration's European employes, in order to join hands
with another column marching down from Manipur.
On General Prendergast's arrival at Bhamo on 28th
December he found the town almost deserted ; but
the people, on being reassured, soon returned to

99

BURMA UNDER BRITISH RULE

their houses. The country along the river banks was
quiet, and the people generally expressed pleasure at
the advent of the British. The Governor of Bhamo
made a ready submission, and requested that his troops
should be disarmed and disbanded. Although an im-
portant emporium of trade with Yunnan, Bhamo was only
a small town of about 5,000 inhabitants — a motley mixture
of Burmese, Chinese, Shan and Kachin. Situated on
the left bank of the Irrawaddy, just below where this
receives the Taiping river from the east, its northern,
eastern and southern sides were protected by a stockade
of teak posts about fourteen or fifteen feet in height. No
Chinese troops were found in the vicinity, and there was
no reason to anticipate unfriendly operations on the part of
the Chinese. Only the usual small garrison was stationed
at Momein, beyond the frontier. After being a week
at Bhamo General Prendergast returned to Mandalay,
leaving Brigadier- General Norman behind in charge of
a strong force, and also a civil officer to organize adminis-
tration, with the support of the military.

The lawlessness and disorder prevailing in Upper
Burma had meanwhile communicated itself partially to
Lower Burma. In the Shwegyin district the Mayan
Chaung Pongyi, a Shan priest, preferring to act under
orders from Thibaw, raised a following of about 500
men. Troops from Rangoon and Toungoo managed to
scatter this little army, but it was long before the smaller
bands thus formed were completely suppressed and the
priest captured. On Christmas day Colonel Street,
Commissioner of Pegu, with a small body of sepoys and
police, had a pitched battle with a body of about 150
men marching on Pegu from the south with flags and
golden umbrellas. Twenty of them were left dead on
the field. But for this timely check the flam.e of in-
surrection would have spread like wildfire throughout
the whole of Lower Burma. As it was, the early months
of 1886 brought with them, in sympathy with the excited
condition of Upper Burma, a vast increase beyond the
usual tales of dacoities committed throughout the southern
districts.

On ist January, 1886, a proclamation was issued by

100

ANNEXATION OF UPPER BURMA

Lord Dufferin that the territories formerly governed by
King Thibaw had become part of the British dominions,
and would, during Her Majesty's pleasure, be administered
by such officers as the Viceroy might from time to time
appoint.^ The immediate objects of General Prender-
gast's expedition had thus been accomplished thoroughly
and completely, and almost bloodlessly. Even up to the
23rd of February, 1886, the number of those who died
on the field, or from their wounds, amounted to only
four British officers, seven British privates, and ten native
soldiers. But it was well known that this was merely the
preliminary towards the serious work of pacification
which had now to be faced and carried through.

Though nothing like so large in area or in population,
and though much more accessible, the work of pacifying
the province of Pegu, conquered in 1852-53, continued
for about eight years before the newly acquired territory
entered fairly on the path of peace and contentment.
Though carried out with the strong support of a very
large military force of local levies, and of gunboats which
could operate throughout the network of tidal streams
forming the delta of the Irrawaddy, and with a vigour
which exposed Sir Arthur Phayre to charges of excessive
measures brought against him in Parliament, yet at the
end of the first year of the occupation large districts were
still in the hands of insurgents and robber bands. At
the end of the second year great armed bands were still
at large, and vast tracts remained into which British
influence had not yet extended. During the third and
the following years parts of the new territory were still
much disturbed, and it was not until 1861 that the paci-
fication could be considered effected. But for the Indian

^ This proclamation, dated ist January, 1886, is probably unique in
its terseness among historical documents referring to the annexation of
large territories. It was as follows : —

" By Command of the Queen-Empress it is hereby notified that the
territories governed by King Theebaw will no longer be under his rule,
but have become part of Her Majesty's dominions, and will during Her
Majesty's pleasure be administered by such officers as the Viceroy and
Governor-General of India may from time to time appoint.

"(Signed) Dufferin."
lOI

BURMA UNDER BRITISH RULE

Mutiny, in 1857, the work of pacification would no doubt
have been much more rapidly effected.

The new territory that was now, on ist January, 1886,
incorporated into the British dominions had an area
of about 120,000 miles, and a population estimated at
about three and a half millions. A considerable portion
of this vast expanse was inpenetrable jungle of tree- forest
or scrub, and even in the least sparsely populated districts
there were no proper roads or bridges. During the
rainy season the difficulties of communication were much
increased by the sudden rise of the rivers, and of the
numerous streams intersecting the country in all directions.
Large tracts of country often remained under water for
weeks at a time. Though not a warlike race, the
Burmese had a traditional and hereditary love of desul-
tory fighting, raiding, gang robbery, and the like ; and
their inordinate national vanity preserved vivid recollec-
tions of the time when they were a conquering race,
driving the Shan, Kachin, and Assamese into the hills.
Villages had long-standing feuds with other villages, and
the gangs of robbers mixed up In these were recruited
from time to time by the young bloods from the villages
concerned. After a time such young men went back to
their usual occupations ; but those who liked the hard,
lawless life under a dacolt Bo could easily take to it
permanently as partisans of one or other of the profes-
sional bandits who were usually in open revolt against
the sovereign. This had been the case under all the
Burmese kings, and King Thibaw had proved himself to
be below the average of Burmese sovereigns in adminis-
trative capacity. One of the most notorious and formid-
able of these bandit chiefs. Bo Shwe, had for about twelve
or thirteen years back been defying with impunity the
authorities of Mandalay and levying blackmail from the
southern districts.

These various difficulties arising from the nature of
the country, the character of the people, and the existing
political organization, were rather Increased than lessened
by the suddenness of Thibaw's overthrow. When the
plan of campaign, matured years before in Simla, had
been almost bloodlessly carried through in a fortnight,

102

SCHEME OF ADMINISTRATION

it was found that the raw and undiscipHned levies hastily
called out to oppose our advance had dissolved and
spread themselves over the country in small lawless
bands. The very ease with which Mandalay was taken
and the King was deposed tended greatly to retard the
work of permanent pacification. Had there been any-
thing like a national army, its overthrow might have
cost much bloodshed at the outset ; but, once its opposi-
tion had been overcome, this would have swept away
the main difficulties and left a free stage for the intro-
duction of a better organized system of administration,
so that troops, treasure, and time would have been saved
in the long run.

Aware of these peculiar difficulties, conscious of the
state of anarchy which existed under Thibaw's rule, and
knowing the experiences in Pegu a generation before,
the Government of India quite understood the gravity
of the situation as well as the magnitude of the task
before them in undertaking the pacification of the new
territories. It was felt that the necessary measures
towards this end could only be satisfactorily concerted
on the spot in communication with those having local
knowledge and experience ; hence the Viceroy and the
Commander-in-Chief (Sir Frederick Roberts, V.C.) took
the earliest opportunity of proceeding to Burma in order
to draw up schemes for the future administration of the
country and for the further military operations still
requisite before a stable form of Government could be
established.

Until future measures could thus be decided on British
civil officers, supported by troops, were in command of
each of the five districts, Mandalay, Myingyan, Pagdn,
Minhla, and Ningyan, and were working through the
Burmese District Governors and headmen. The civil
and ordinary criminal jurisdiction was in the hands of
these civil officers, except where troops were stationed
or operating, when, the country being still under military
occupation, the Provost- Marshal's officers exercised some
jurisdiction. Outside of these five districts the rest of
the country was nominally governed by the Hhitdaw or
State Council, presided over by Colonel Sladen ; but

103

BURMA UNDER BRITISH RULE

for various reasons the orders and influence of this Hlut
carried little weight into the interior of these central
and northern districts. In some places the ordinary local
officials succeeded in enforcing partial order, but the
country at large was in a state of anarchy and dis-
organization. At Ava, Sagaing, Shwebo, Tagaung,
Myadaung, and Bhamo, on the Irrawaddy, and at some
points on the Chindwin river, military detachments were
stationed with civil officers in attendance, so that the
whole of the districts which had been actually ruled by
Thibaw were held in military occupation.

Though Upper Burma was now annexed to the
British dominions, it had not yet been incorporated with
British India ; hence Indian codes did not apply. The
civil officers were instructed, however, to proceed in
criminal cases on the lines of the Indian codes, except
that dacoity or gang robbery might be punishable with
death, that flogging was to be administered in place of
imprisonment on petty offenders physically fit for receiv-
ing such punishment, and that no appeal lay from
criminal sentences. Rebels in arms captured on the
field were liable to be shot, but the death penalty was
not to be enforced by civil officers otherwise than after
trial.

104

Chapter V

THE PACIFICATION OF UPPER BURMA (1886 to 1890)

WHEN Lord Dufferin and Sir Frederick Roberts
were in Mandalay, from 12th to 19th February,
1886, the importance of the matters requiring considera-
tion was only equalled by the difficulties connected with
them. During the seven years of Thibaw's weak and
incompetent rule dacoity had been permitted to over-
spread the country ; while the melting away of the
Burmese army on the British approach both strengthened
the dacoit gangs already in existence, and formed the
nuclei of fresh gangs of armed men in many cases
engaging in organized opposition to the new Govern-
ment. The main problems the Viceroy had to consider
first of all were whether the new dominions should form
a protected State under the Indian Government, or be
annexed outright and brought directly under the British
administration, and how good government could most
effectively and cheaply be introduced ; while the Com-
mander-in-Chief had to formulate the plan of military
operations, still necessary under any circumstances, and
on a largely increased scale, for the pacification of the
country in the event of annexation outright being
decided on.

Lord Dufferin's personal desire was that Upper
Burma should be converted into a protected or "buffer"
State like Afghanistan, the ruling Prince being left
perfectly independent in matters of internal administra-.
tion, while the Government of India would have exercised
the right of supervising all external relations. But, on
closer consideration after hearing the opinions of the
civil and military authorities in Burma, he found the
country so disorganized, the State Council and Ministry

105

BURMA UNDER BRITISH RULE

so discredited and lacking in influence, and the chance
of finding suitable candidates for the throne among the
Princes of the royal line so slight as to admit of no
possible rational alternative to direct administration of
the country by the Government of India. No Prince
who might be placed on the throne would have been
able, without great assistance from British troops, to
maintain his authority with any prospect of success
against the numerous rivals who would be sure to rise
up against him. Within a short time of Thibaw's down-
fall there were five such Princes, besides other pretenders
to the throne, wandering about the jungles with small
parties of followers. To keep on the throne a puppet
ruler would have landed the Government of India in
responsibilities almost as great as actual administration,
while the intrigues, procrastinations, and slights of a
Burmese ruler would probably soon again have become
insupportable. It would have been beyond reasonable
hope to secure a stable form of Burmese Government,
which would gradually establish and maintain tran-
quillity and fairly good administration, and which would
at the same time effectually exclude from the upper
valley of the Irrawaddy undesirable foreign influences
likely to produce at some future date the gravest political
consequences. The Nyaungyan Prince had recently
died, and his younger brother, the Nyaungok, still
under British surveillance in Bengal, was disobedient
to orders, unpopular in Burma, and otherwise unsatis-
factory. The Myingun Prince who fled in 1866 to a
British asylum after attempting his father's life and
killing the heir apparent, his uncle, and then, about the
time of Thibaw's accession in 1878, had escaped to
Pondicherry, whence he tried to carry on intrigues,
might perhaps, if put on the throne, have held his own
by killing off his rivals ; but he would have been almost
certain to have given trouble by falling into the hands
of foreign adventurers and concessionaries. Hence
Lord Dufferin decided to recommend the pure and
simple incorporation of Upper Burma with the Indian
Empire, and the British Government at once (i6th
February, 1886), acquiesced in the recommendation and

106

UPPER BURMA REGULATIONS

authorized him to proceed with the direct administration
of the country.

The attempt to restore order and to govern through
the Hlutdaw, or Council of State, was proving a failure.
Even the best of the Ministers, who had so ignominiously
failed to manage the country efficiently under King
Thibaw, had little influence, and could not be relied on
to use that little, under the new circumstances in which
they were called upon to act. It was therefore deter-
mined to abolish the Hlutdaw, and to make use of only
a selected few of the Ministers merely as a consultative
body to be associated with the Chief Commissioner, in
order that reference might be made to them, as occasion
might arise, on points connected with the late administra-
tion. This was rather a matter of policy, to attach the
more influential members of the late Ministry to the new
Government, and to show consideration to the more
deserving of the ex-King's servants, than an actual need
for administrative assistance. Two of the members of the
State Council, the Kinwun Mingyi, or Prime Minister,
and the Taunggwin Mingyi, two of the Privy Councillors,
the Pin Atwinwun, and the Shwedaik Atwinwun, and
one Assistant Minister, the Tabayin Wundauk, were thus
retained on salaries varying from rupees 500 to 1,000
per mensem (^^400 to ^800 a year) ; while small pensions
were bestowed on some of the other ex- Ministers.

It was first of all found necessary to substitute for the
existing arbitrary powers of the Viceroy an order in
Council under anno 33 Vict. cap. 3, sec. i, extending
that section to the whole of Upper Burma except the
Shan States. It thus became a scheduled district
removed from the operation of the statute law applying
to the rest of the Indian Empire. This enabled the
local administration of Burma to frame simple Regulations
with the approval of the Government of India, suitable
to cope with the actual state of affairs. These Regula-
tions differed from Acts in being issued by the Governor-
General In Council, Instead of being passed by the
Legislative Council of the Government of India; but In
their effect there was no practical difference between the
two. Mr. Bernard, Chief Commissioner of British Burma,

107

BURMA UNDER BRITISH RULE

was placed in charge of the whole of Burma, which was
consolidated into a Chief Commissionership in Sep-
tember, 1886; while Mr. Hodgkinson, one of the
Commisioners, acted as his Assistant in charge of Lower
Burma. Upper Burma was divided into fourteen
districts, with British civil officers and Police Assistants
in each. At first there were to be no divisional Com-
missioners or sessions Judges ; and district officers were
to work through indigenous local agencies, and according
to local methods, in matters of revenue and civil justice.
The village community system was thus retained as
being thoroughly in accordanc°: with the customs of the
country and least likely to be irksome or to disturb the
people, before the stability of the new administration
was felt and appreciated by the population at large.
Under this new system room was also found for the
best of the old Burmese officials. Many of these, far
truer patriots than the princely pretenders and the
brigand chiefs who carried fire and sword into all parts
of the newly conquered territories, in pursuit of no
definite policy and no political aim, rendered valuable
services to the cause of peace, and too often had to pay
for their loyalty with their lives. The Shan States were
to be treated as feudatory or tributary States, without
attempting to bring them under any direct administrative
control.

The Commander-in-Chief was at first inclined to
recommend some reduction in the military force ; but
after mature consideration had been given to the subject,
it was decided to send back one Madras regiment to
India, and to move down two Ghurka regiments from
Assam for work in the hilly districts.

The Upper and Lower Burma commands were united
under General Prendergast, with headquarters at Ran-
goon, while the headquarters of two brigades were
located at Mandalay (General White) and Bhamo
(General Norman). As troops had been drawn from all
the three Presidencies of India, the military administra-
tion of Burma was for the time being placed under the
Commander-in-Chief On 31st March General Prender-
gast vacated the command of the forces in Burma and

108

MILITARY DIFFICULTIES

the troops in Upper Burma were formed into a separate
command under Brigadier- General White, who received
the local rank of Major- General.

That a prolonged struggle was anticipated is clear
from Sir Frederick Roberts' recommendation that
free passages from India to England should be given
to the wives and families of all military officers detained
on field service in Burma, and that large rewards should
be paid to all officers and soldiers, European or native,
who learned sufficient Burmese to pass easy examina-
tions in the language. Nor were the wives of civil
officers permitted to reside with their husbands during
the most troublous period.

Without attempting to dictate subordinate military
arrangements from Calcutta and Simla, the Government
of India urged the desirability of first thoroughly domin-
ating the central area close to the main arteries of
communication, and thence gradually extending adminis-
tration and jurisdiction according to the means at
disposal and the opportunities occurring. The despatch
of spasmodic and disconnected expeditions into tracts
which could not be at once permanently occupied and
protected was deprecated. Such a method of procedure
could only disquiet and compromise peaceable and well-
disposed villages, because, if they showed themselves at
all friendly to the military detachments visiting them,
this only exposed them to subsequent ill-treatment and
plunder at the hands of rebels and dacoits as soon as
the British force had left. The difficulties and dangers
to health unavoidable during the hot months of April
and May were also humanely pointed out, and recom-
mendations were made to move the troops about as little
as possible during the hottest time of the year, and to
locate them as healthily as possible during the approach-
ing rainy season, even though this might for the moment
retard the progress of operations.

In accordance with these instructions, British authority
was first confined to the tracts bordering the Irrawaddy,
to the country around Mandalay and Bhamo, and to the
southern frontier districts of Minhla and Ningyan.
Military posts were distributed in different localities, and

109

BURMA UNDER BRITISH RULE

small movable columns were organized, capable of
marching in whatever direction circumstances required.
When in Mandalay, Sir Frederick Roberts laid down a
minimum strength for each post and column, and the
judiciousness of these arrangements was proved by the
fact of no post being forced. Although there was no
regular well-organized enemy in the field, and therefore
no particular objective requiring the concentration of
large masses of troops, yet the country was generally
overrun with armed bands. Five scions of the royal
line were pushing their claims to the throne in different
localities. The Myinzaing Prince, a son of Mindon,
held the Natteik pass into the Shan hills, and harried
the plains lying to the south-east of Mandalay ; while
a pretender calling himself the Kyimyin Prince was
troubling the districts to the south of that, as far as the
Toungoo frontier. At Chaungwa, in the Ava district,
the Chaungwa Princes, Yan Naing and Yan Baing,
whose father was massacred in 1879 by Thibaw, were
endeavouring to assert themselves ; while Prince Maung
Hmat Gyi, a son of the heir apparent killed in 1866,
had a large following in the Shwebo and Yeii districts,
north-east of Mandalay. Numerous dacoit leaders had
become nominal supporters of these pretenders, plunder-
ing villages and levying blackmail in their names. Some
of the dacoit Bo even went the length of themselves
becoming pretenders to the throne. Bo Shwe, who had
been harrying the Minbu and Minhla districts for the
last twelve or thirteen years, boldly proclaimed himself
King of Minbu, and appointed a Governor of the river.
The most influential of the other dacoit Bo at this time
were Nga Hlau, who had for years harried the districts
between the Irrawaddy and the Mu river, north-west of
Mandalay, the Thondatin Thugyi, Maung Min Po, in
the Pindali district, U Paung in Meiktila, and Budda
Yaza in Ningyan. The Myinzaing Prince even offered
a reward of 2,000 rupees for the head of Sir Charles
Bernard, the Chief Commissioner, and threatened to burn
the palace in Mandalay, which was being used for the
public offices and the residences of the civil and military
headquarters' staffs.

no

MILITARY POSTS ESTABLISHED

Incendiarism had become rife. Early in April several
fires occurred in the more crowded suburbs of Mandalay
city, and other fires broke out in the city itself about the
middle of the month, at which date the Burmese New
Year happened to fall in 1886. About 800 houses
within the city, and between 2,000 and 2,500 in the
suburbs were thus destroyed, chiefly by some thirty to
forty adherents of the Myingun Prince, who made an
organized outbreak and rushed one of the town police
stations. The citizens appeared to be demoralized for
the moment, the shops and bazaars were closed, and
business generally was at a standstill. PVom April
onwards large bodies of armed men harassed the whole
of the districts around the capital and all the principal
towns, and before the close of the rainy season it had
become very apparent that it was necessary to consider-
ably strengthen the troops in Burma. Hardly a day
passed without a skirmish taking place in some part of
the country ; and the guerilla system of warfare adopted
by them gave great advantages to the rebels and
dacoits.

General White soon found, from the experiences
around Mandalay, that mere visits from flying columns
to different parts of the country were quite insufficient
to maintain British supremacy, and that for the pacifica-
tion of the country and the suppression of dacoity
or other armed resistance, it was necessary to closely
occupy the country by establishing strong military posts
in each of the various districts of sufficient strength to
maintain order in their immediate neighbourhood, and to
afford contingents for flying columns to skirmish against
rebel bands. It was only when they saw the troops, and
felt they could rely on their protection, that villagers
could be expected to give information or assistance
against the rebel bands and dacoit gangs. It was only
thus that military ascendancy and prestige could be
secured, the main lines of communication by land and
water protected, civil authority and administration estab-
lished, and the population encouraged to render assist-
ance. In addition to posts along the Irrawaddy, others
were established along the route from Mandalay to Toun-

III

BURMA UNDER BRITISH RULE

goo. and from Toungoo across the hills to Thayetmyo ;
and the central part of Upper Burma was thus enclosed
in a roughly triangular series of strongholds forming bases
from which the further military operations were under-
taken. Near the eastern base line the construction of a
railway was being pushed on from Toungoo to Mandalay,
and with great success and rapidity under circumstances
of unusual difficulty and danger.

The expenditure on public works was intended to be
limited at first to barracks, obligatory military roads,
and telegraph repairs and construction ; but the great
importance of continuing the Rangoon-Toungoo railway
line to Mandalay was recognized and urged both on
political and military grounds. The Secretary of State
suggested that, in the meantime, it might be more
advantageous to make good roads, passable at all
seasons, between the various principal civil and mili-
tary stations. The arguments placed before the
Government of India by Sir Charles Bernard, Chief
Commissioner of Burma, were, however, so convincing
that sanction was given to commence construction in the
autumn of 1886. It was successfully urged by him that
a trunk road would be costly and unremunerative, that
the expense of moving troops and supplies would be
five times as great by road as by rail, while the time
occupied would be ten times as long, and that, in short,
the railway would be far more effectual in pacifying the
country, in promoting trade, and in strengthening the
position whether viewed from a military, a political, or
an administrative standpoint.

The position in Lower Burma had meanwhile become
such as caused much uneasiness. Partly through the
emissaries of the royal Princes pretending to the throne,
and partly in sympathy with the lawless feeling preva-
lent within the newly annexed territories, dacoity
sprang up to an alarming degree throughout the older
province. Troops had therefore also to be poured into
Lower Burma, while the garrison in Upper Burma was
being strengthened. In the summer of 1886 there were
17,022 troops in Upper Burma, distributed in forty-three
posts, and 7,162 in Lower Burma, occupying no less than

112

DIFFICULTIES TO BE OVERCOME

forty-seven posts on the Sittang river, and the Irrawaddy
with its delta. Everything resembling patriotic senti-
ment in the Burmese had become united with the
inherent strain of brutality and lawlessness running
through the national character ; and this combination
of innate forces found its expression in the bands of
armed men infesting the jungles all over the new
province. It was certainly not patriotism pure and
simple, while it was equally certainly not merely dacoity
in the true meaning of that word ; but it was armed resist-
ance to British administration, and as such it had to be
put down with a heavy hand. Lurking in jungle recesses
almost impenetrable for regular troops, these armed
bands were seldom to be met in the open field, though
bold and sudden in ambushes and surprise attacks on
military and police posts. As a matter of course they
were entirely dependent on villagers for food and other
contributions, their demands for which they enforced with
such barbarities as burning and devastating villages,
slaughtering headmen, crucifying or otherwise executing
men suspected of giving information to the British, and
inflicting disgusting tortures on other men and women.

The enormous difficulties of contending against wide-
spread revolt, rebellion, and crime of this sort can easily
be imagined. It was necessary to attack the root of the
evil by constantly harassing the armed bands so as to
keep them in a continuous state of apprehension and of
alarm, isolate them, cut them off from villages in which
they had friends or relatives, and deprive them of their
secret supporters. Experience showed that strong
bodies of insurgents, numbering sometimes from 2,000
to 4,000 men, could be assembled rapidly and secretly in
neighbourhoods not protected by military posts. Pillag-
ing and burning wherever they went, these bands of
freebooters reserved the refinements of their cruelties
for those who had given assistance or information against
them. Unless in the immediate vicinity of British
troops, the villagers were forced through terror into
compromise with the dacoits.

It had been at once recognized, however, that troops
alone could not suffice for the work of pacification, but

113 I

BURMA UNDER BRITISH RULE

that the special difficulties in Burma would be overcome
rather by the vigorous administration of civil government
and by the creation of an efficient police than by the
employment of military detachments scattered over the
face of the country. Reinforcements of troops were at
any time obtainable from India, but the available reserve
of efficient police was much more limited. As the
Burmese character is averse to discipline, and as the old
Burmese police were incapable of coping with the
dacoits and rebel bands, no time was lost in issuing
orders for enlisting, training, and sending over to Burma
a laro-e body of police recruited from the warlike races
of the Punjab and the North-Western Provinces of India.
In addition to 2,000 volunteers from the Indian police,
and to the ordinary native police force of Lower Burma,
6,530 trained recruits were sent to Upper and Lower
Burma during the rainy season of 1886; so that, with
the 24,184 troops already in Burma, the total of troops
and military police for service throughout the whole
province rose to 32,720.

The Irrawaddy Flotilla Company, which had rendered
such brilliant assistance in the advance on Mandalay,
did even more for the country after the annexation than
before. They put on express steamers, without cargo-
flats, to run once a week between Rangoon and Manda-
lay. They improved communication between Mandalay
and Bhamo by running regular weekly steamers. They
also instituted short services between Mandalay and
important points up and down the river, and began to
ply regularly on the Chindwin river. For these new
lines the Company received no subsidy, though they
obtained a large amount of Government work. Every
steamer contained a small guard of troops or disciplined
police for protection. A large flotilla of Government
steamers had to be placed on the rivers to facilitate the
movements of troops, to prevent the crossing of armed
bands of rebels or dacoits, to keep down river piracy,
and to patrol the rivers ; but the assistance received
from the commercial flotilla was indispensable.

For the civil administration of the district controlled
by the military posts a code of provisional instructions

114

DISTRIBUTION OF TROOPS

was issued in March, 1886. This was drawn up in
harmony with the spirit of the Indian codes, but at the
same time gave due consideration to estabHshed Burmese
habits and methods of procedure. On the whole these
instructions worked well and smoothly, proving a great
advance over the arbitrary method obtaining immediately
after the annexation. The establishment of this form of
just and simple administration, the gradual disarmament
of the people, the opening up of communications, and
the encouragement of trade were relied on, combined
with the abundant evidences of armed strength, as being
the shortest and the best way of attaining the eventual
cessation of military operations and the pacification and
settlement of Upper Burma. These measures involved a
large expenditure on the newly-acquired territory, but it
was borne in mind that the rich province of Pegu did
not pay its expenses for the first eight or ten years after
annexation. In August, 1886, a disaster occurred which
tested the state of order to which the town of Mandalay
had then been reduced under firm and judicious govern-
ment. The earthwork embankment protecting the
western suburbs burst from the pressure of a flood
higher than had been known for sixty years past. Much
destruction of property occurred, and some loss of life
resulted. Food was at once provided for the absolutely
destitute, and a regular system of relief distribution \yas
organized. But the night on which the inundation
occurred passed without the slightest disturbance.

The troops under General White in Upper Burma
during the summer of 1886 were divided into three
brigades, having headquarters at Mandalay, Bhamo, and
Ningyan (now called Pyinmana), near the Toungoo
frontier. The garrison was, however, further augmented
by three regiments of native cavalry, while nearly all the
corps and batteries sent in October, 1885, were relieved in
the autumn of 1886, and the command of future operations
was given to Lieutenant-General Sir Herbert Macpher-
son, V.C., Commander-in-Chief of the Madras army,
whose headquarters were to remain at Mandalay till the
conclusion of the military operations. The truth of the
matter is that the resistance encountered had proved far

115

BURMA UNDER BRITISH RULE

more widespread, and was likely to be much more con-
tinuous and obstinate, than was originally anticipated,
even although enormous difficulties had been estimated
and prepared for. Wherever rebels mustered strong, if
the local posts were not sufficient to operate against them,
the necessity had hitherto been met by sending troops
from whatever reserve could best spare them ; and this,
of course, led to much unsymmetrical distribution. On
the arrival of the reinforcements of three battalions, flying
columns were formed on a larger scale to supplement the
system of posts and form a stronger reserve in every
district. To render these columns as mobile and swift as
possible, a corps of mounted infantry was formed. Each
district headquarters had a mounted company composed
of twenty-five British and fifty native infantry, which
could be attached to the flying columns. The special rein-
forcements of cavalry were asked for, as this had proved
a very effective branch of the force. The rebel Bo were
always well mounted, and were usually the first to fly
on the approach of British troops, while mere mounted
infantry proved unable to overtake and capture them.
But in a country where only ponies are bred, the cavalry
horses seemed monsters to the superstitious people, while
the long reach and the short shrift of the lance paralysed
with fear the rebels in arms, as well as the general
population.

The opposition to the British administration which
was being felt during the second half of 1886 was as
nearly a national uprising as was possible among the
Burmese. Of a population numbering about three
rnillions, exclusive of the Shan States, more than seven-
eighths were agriculturists, while rather more than half
of the urban population was congregated in the city
of Mandalay and its suburbs. Throughout the whole of
the villages and hamlets on the plains held under military
occupation there was probably hardly a household whence
some male member had not issued to join one or other
of the rebel gangs, which were being hunted down with
all possible vigour. The bonds of relationship thus
existing between rebels and villagers, and the fear of
acts of revenge if information were given against dacoit

116

SIR HERBERT MACPHERSON'S DEATH

leaders, raised up a sort of passive resistance on the part
of the general population, which rendered it harder to
effect the seizure of the leaders of rebellion and increased
the difficulties of military operations in a country of itself
offering physical obstacles of unusual difficulty.

The reliefs and reinforcements for the Burma field
force were carried out towards the end of the summer
rains in 1886, and Sir Herbert Macpherson assumed the
supreme command early in September. But before the
cold weather operations for 1886-87 could well be said
to have commenced, he died of malarious fever, near
Prome, on 2nd October, 1886. In view of the large
number of troops in Burma, the extended operations
about to be undertaken, and the extreme gravity which
the situation had now undisguisably assumed — for during
the rainy season, when whole districts were rendered
impassable by swollen streams, and the troops and officers
suffered from ill-health, the rebels had made head
against the British power — the Commander-in-Chief, Sir
Frederick Roberts, was directed to transfer his head-
quarters temporarily to Burma and assume command of
the whole of the troops in the province. He arrived in
Mandalay on 17th November, and remained there till
1 2th February, 1887.

The forces then amounted to about 32,000 troops
and 8,500 military police, exclusive of the urban and
rural native Burmese police, whose organization and
discipline were being gradually improved. The Com-
mander-in-Chief was assisted by two majors-general in
command of divisions, and six brigadiers-general in com-
mand of brigades. To facilitate the free movement of
troops jungle clearings, each of 100 feet in width, were
made from post to post, and in other convenient places.

While measures were thus being concerted for putting
down rebellion and dacoity with a strong hand, the
necessity of directly and indirectly conciliating the people
at large was not overlooked ; hence punitive measures,
such as the burning of villages, harbouring or assisting
rebels, were prohibited ; an amnesty was offered to all
who should voluntarily submit within a certain time ; all
imports and duties impeding the free course of trade

117

BURMA UNDER BRITISH RULE

were abolished ; the village system was adhered to, and
the indigenous methods of administration were retained so
far as possible ; demands for the collection of revenue
were not pressed severely ; and various means were taken
to try and bring home to the people the fact that there
was no intention of undermining or interfering with the
Buddhist religion. Endeavours were also made to de-
velop the rich natural resources of the country. Agri-
cultural interests, besides having for years back been
hampered by dacoity, had suffered throughout the whole
of the dry central zone from the state of disrepair into
which irrigation works, dating from centuries back, had
been allowed to fall. The ruby mines, jade mining, coal
fields, oil wells, teak forests, and gold fields, were all
valuable natural resources, whose exploitation would be-
come of great importance so soon as the country began
to be somewhat more settled.

As a means of pacification and of advance towards
these desirable ends, the important step was taken of
disarming the country. Begun in the Mandalay district,
it was gradually, but without undue delay, extended
throughout the whole of the fourteen districts of Upper
Burma. All guns were called in from towns and villages,
and were only partially distributed under proper safe-
guards. After being marked with distinctive marks and
numbers, guns were only restored to licensees consisting
of respectable men living in well-behaved villages and
towns where there were at least five to ten armed
licensees. Villages with well-kept chevatix-de-frise, bam-
boo stockades, and proper watch and ward kept at the
small Kin or "guard-houses" placed near the gates,
were safer with ten or more guns in the hands of licensees
than they were before ; whereas hamlets with only two
or three guns would, under any circumstances, have been
unable to offer strong resistance to dacoit attacks, be-
cause experience showed that such small villages never
attempted to defend themselves. As soon as the mass
of the people living in the towns and villages on the
plains were deprived of their arms, it became no longer
possible for rebels and dacoits to replace guns lost in
action or given up on acceptance of amnesty. Insistence

ii8

THE CITY OF MANDALAY

was at the same time made that villages whose position
exposed them to attack should surround themselves with
substantial stockades, and that a proper watch should be
maintained there day and night. Wherever this proved
ineffectual, and in outlying tracts where military posts
could not be established, small hamlets were grouped
together to form a more easily defensible village, and
villao^es were moved to more suitable sites. Incon-
venience and a certain amount of hardship was insepar-
able from the latter measure ; but, as the houses in
Burmese villages are only constructed of posts, bamboos,
and thatch grass, easily obtainable from the neighouring
jungles, the inevitable hardships were reduced to a mini-
mum. Even in the royal city of Mandalay the houses
were mostly of the same flimsy and uncostly description,
and were worth only about fifty rupees (/^zi) apiece,
although some were, of course, much more valuable.
The six thousand houses located between the palace and
the city walls were also subsequently cleared out on
payment of compensation reckoned according to the
number of the posts supporting each house, and the house-
holders thus ejected on payment of compensation for
disturbance were granted building sites in the new extra-
mural town of Mandalay, while the old Shwemyodaw, or
*' royal golden city," was retained exclusively for the civil
and military servants of Government, and transformed
into Fort Dufferin.

With a credulous and superstitious race like the
Burmese, even trivial things often assume dimensions of
enormous magnitude. In 1887 one of the seven- roofed
Pyathat or ornamental buildings on the north wall of
the city was utilized as the central portion of a Govern-
ment House for the Chief Commissioner. This was a
mistake. If it had any ornamental spire at all, Govern-
ment House should have had nine graduated roofs to
indicate clearly that it was the abode of the ruler of the
province. Even the palaces of the Shan chiefs are
allowed to have a seven-roofed Pyathat, and to put
fewer than the nine representing supreme sovereignty,
while the Myenan or imperial palace, " the Centre of
the Universe," still stood among the palace buildings,

119

BURMA UNDER BRITISH RULE

showed great want of knowledge concerning Burmese
sumptuary laws, ceremonial etiquette, and national ideas.
It is not conceivable that there could have been any
deliberate intention in thus giving a certain amount of
hope to aspirants for the throne, or to rebel Bo and
leaders of large dacoit bands. But the work of paci-
fication in the immediate vicinity of Mandalay would
probably have been accomplished more easily and speedily
if the British Government had built for their represent-
ative a nine-roofed house, whose spire towered aloft
higher than the pinnacle of the Pyathat above the lion
throne in Thibaw's great Hall of Audience. The fact that
this symbol of authority still remained is said to have
been one of the causes leading to the great incendiary
fires which later on broke out in and around Mandalay
during April, 1892.

For the apprehension of noted rebel leaders and dacoit
Bo large rewards were offered, and dissension was sown
among their followers by liberal offers of pardon to the
less prominent members of the various bands, as well as
to the rank and file consisting of young or ignorant men,
more misguided than criminal. In dealing with these
rebels and dacoits there was neither extreme severity on
the one hand, nor mawkish sentimentality on the other.
Measures of repression and punishment were necessary to
crush the armed resistance, and no one in authority
shrank from the responsibility of inflicting them as the
only way of ultimately bringing peace and prosperity to
the disturbed and harassed country. The gangs were
hunted down continuously, and every effort was made to
capture the leaders. When captured or brought in as a
prisoner by villagers wishing to be rid of his oppression,
a dacoit Bo had a fair trial, and was hanged if convicted ;
but promises of pardon on voluntary surrender were per-
formed with a scrupulousness which sometimes thwarted
justice in favour of mercy. Proclamation was also made
that, while in the meantime no clemency could be shown
to those who were confined as prisoners in jails, the
question of liberating them or reducing their sentences
would be duly considered so soon as the state of the
country permitted Government to take this step.

120

THE SHAN CHIEFS

The attitude of the Shan Sawbwa or chiefs on the
hills to the east of the Irrawaddy was, fortunately for the
work of pacification, such as gave reason to hope that
the allegiance of these rulers would not be difficult to
obtain. The problem with these, and with the other far
less civilized hill tribes — the Kachin and Chin — on the
north and west, was quite different from that among the
Burmese on the plains, as they were all well-defined
groups of men living under the rule of tribal chiefs
whose authority was generally sufficient to preserve order
amongst them. It was not a case of dealing with dis-
integrated masses like the rebel bands and dacoit gangs,
but with large organized tribal units, each under the
moral and administrative control of an individual ruler.
At first there were some difficulties, but ultimately the
Shan chiefs willingly accepted the British supremacy
and agreed to preserve order among their people so long
as their rights and dignity of chieftainship were recognized
and troops were not quartered upon them. In return for
this they agreed to restrain their people from internecine
warfare and from raidingf down into the territories under
military occupation.

They were at once placed in a more advantageous
commercial position than under Burmese rule, for the
restrictions and imposts on Letpet or " pickled tea " were
removed, and this most valuable of the hill products
could be taken down to the plains. Under Burmese
Government about 7|- lacs of rupees of revenue (^50,000)
had annually been realized in connexion with the mono-
poly affecting the importation and sale of tea. Owing to
the disturbed state of the country no tribute was levied
in 1886-87, and thereafter the demand made was only
about half the amount fixed under Burmese rule, ^\ lacs
(^30,000). _

The first of the great Shan chiefs to render allegiance to
the British was Kun Saing, Sawbwa of Thibaw, one of the
principal Northern Shan States lying due east of Mandalay.
On 27th January, 1887, he came in person to Mandalay,
and was formally received at the eastern gate of the city
by Sir Charles Bernard. This was not the first time he
had had an interview with a Chief Commissioner ; but

121

BURMA UNDER BRITISH RULE

the circumstances were different. In 1884 the Thibaw
Sawbwa fled from his State through fear of King Thibaw,
and sought refuge in Lower Burma. He went to Ran-
goon to worship at the great Shwe Dagon Pagoda.
While residing there in one of the suburbs he executed
two of his followers, who had been guilty of some act of
commission or omission. Tried for murder by the Re-
corder of Rangoon, he was condemned to death ; but
the capital sentence was commuted to imprisonment for
two years, on account of his having had as Chief the
power of life and death in his own State. In Rangoon
jail he was treated like other convicts. His head was
shaved ; he had to wear the coarse canvas prison garb
stamped with the black broad-arrow, and he had to do his
daily task of hard labour in husking rice with a grinding-
mill worked by hand. It was while so engaged that Mr.
(afterwards Sir Charles) Crosthwaite, then Acting Chief
Commissioner, saw him on a prison inspection, and used
the Government prerogative in granting him a free pardon.
On King Thibaw's downfall Kun Saing recovered his
State, held aloof from the combinations and dissensions
of the other States, and took an early opportunity of
intimating allegiance to the British Government. As a
reward for this, the tribute payable by his State was
remitted for ten years, and the three petty States of
Mainglon, Thonze, and Maington were made sub-
ordinate to the Thibaw State.

It is not impossible that his experiences in the Ran-
goon jail in 1884 had some direct connexion with Kun
Saing's policy towards the British in 1886; but the
Thibaw Sawbwa has since kept his allegiance well, and
his lead^ was speedily followed by the majority of the
Shan chiefs, who had been in open rebellion during the
last three years of King Thibaw's reign. A digression
may here,^ perhaps, be permitted to mention that in 1890
he sent his two sons to England for the completion of
their education, that he himself came to see the country
in 1893, and that he was nominated a member of the
Legislative Council of Burma on its formation in 1897.
And once again he returned to England, in the summer
of 1 898, to present a rare gem to Her Majesty at Windsor.

122

THE THIBAW SAWBWA

Between confinement with hard labour in Rangoon jail and
a formal reception by the Chief Commissioner of Burma
at the principal gate of Mandalay city, or an audience of
the Queen- Empress at Windsor Castle, there are vast
differences. It surely speaks well for the British adminis-
tration of Burma that such things should have been
possible ; and it speaks better still for Kun Saing,
Sawbwa of Thibaw, that they actually took place.
When, in May, 1898, he showed me over his Haw or
palace, and did me the unusual honour of conducting me
into the private apartments, and introducing me to his
queens and princesses, then led me to his private chapel
and the look-out tower, I could not help, during my
conversation with him, thinking that I had been privi-
leged to make the acquaintance of a singularly magnani-
mous as well as a very intelligent and far-seeing
chieftain.

The wild, uncivilized tribes inhabiting the densely-
wooded hills flanking and separating the valleys of the
Irrawaddy and its tributaries were left to be dealt with
later on, by means of punitive expeditions, and by the
establishment of military forts in their midst, when once
the plains had been brought into a more settled con-
dition. Before Sir Frederick Roberts reached Mandalay
the short cool season with which the northern portion of
Burma is favoured had already begun, while the arrange-
ments for work had been practically elaborated by
General White and Sir Herbert Macpherson,and had been
approved by himself as Commander-in-Chief: but he lost
no time in issuing on 20th November general instructions
to his brigadiers, and to officers in command of flying
columns, for the conduct of operations throughout the
coming season. Columns sent out in pursuit of rebel
gangs were to be provisioned for ten days at least, depots
being laid down at convenient centres to supplement the
supplies obtainable locally from villages. When two or
more columns were acting in concert, communications
were to be kept up as constantly as possible by means of
signalling, scouts and patrols. Liberal rewards were to
be given to guides and those furnishing useful imforma-
tion involving risk to themselves. As the success of

123

BURMA UNDER BRITISH RULE
operations and the health of the troops depended so
much on the proper maintenance of commissariat ar-
rangements and transport, the careful treatment of pack
animals was enjoined on all officers. They were likewise
exhorted to see that the troops did not injure the property
of the people, or wound their susceptibilities, as it was of
importance to cultivate friendly relations with them and
gain their confidence, whilst putting before them evidences
of military power. Chief men of districts were to be
treated with consideration and distinction, and pains were
to be taken to eradicate the fear that the British intended
to overthrow the Buddhist religion and all the customs and
privileges dear to the people. In operations against
positions held by rebels in arms against British rule,
efforts were to be made to surround their positions so as
to inflict the heaviest loss possible ; for a severe lesson
promptly administered, even at the cost of some casualties
on the British side, was held to be the shortest and best
way of crushing organized armed resistance. Villages
and jungle retreats were therefore to be surrounded with
cavalry, and carefully beaten through by infantry. As
Princes, pretenders, and dacoit Bo would generally be
found heading the columns of fugitives, part of the
cavalry was to pursue them without wasting time over the
rank and file, many of whom were villagers forced, nclens
volens, into the gangs. Columns of occupation employed
in the pacification of tracts from which rebels and dacoit
bands had been dispersed were to make short marches
and halt at all towns and large villages, so as to give civil
officers opportunities of becoming acquainted with the
districts, and military officers time for making reconnais-
sances and sketch maps. When civil officers accompanied
columns, all prisoners were handed over to them for dis-
posal, otherwise the officer in command had ex officio
magisterial powers to inflict up to two years' imprisonment
or thirty lashes : if heavier punishment were considered
necessary, the cases were reserved till they could be dis-
posed of by a civil officer. In view of the malarious and
unhealthy nature of the climate to which they were un-
avoidably exposed during operations of this sort, and of
the extremely arduous fatigue which they were constantly

124

THE WAR CASUALTIES

being called upon to incur, every reasonable effort was
made, both in camp and on the march, to minimize the
risks to which the troops were exposed from those
scourges of the tropical jungles, malarial fever and
dysentery/ The number of officers and men who suc-
cumbed to these climatic diseases and to their sequelae was
far in excess of that mown down in the hundreds of skir-
mishes which took place before Upper Burma was pacified.
The little brick-walled cemeteries near Pagdn, Hlaingdet,
and other similar but now disused military posts, are filled
with the grave-mounds of British soldiers, who thus laid
down their lives to help pacify the new province. The
tooth of time has already gnawed keenly into the little
teakwood crosses upon which were inscribed the names
and regiments of the rank and file ; and in a very few
years all will be nameless graves save the spots where
officers rest beneath more enduring memorials of marble,
granite, or sandstone.

There was never a campaign in which so much initiative
was left to the junior officers, and the captains and subal-
terns nobly upheld the best traditions of the British army
as a fighting body. The improved education now given to
military cadets at Sandhurst and Woolwich made itself
very apparent in a practical way throughout the cam-
paign of pacification, lasting for five years after the an-
nexation. The country had never been surveyed, and
there were no maps : hence officers were required to send
in sketch maps, drawn to a fixed scale. These were
pieced together in Mandalay, and made into a very
serviceable map, from which operations and even com-

^ The casualties between 17th November, 1885, and 31st October,
1886, were :

Killed or died of wounds.

Died from disease.

Invalided.

Officers . . .
Men ....

II

80

II
919

76
1956

Total .

91

930

2032

125

BURMA UNDER BRITISH RULE

bined movements from different bases could be directed
at the headquarters of the Burma field force.

These operations were pushed on so vigorously during
the cold season, that by March, 1887, when Sir Charles
Bernard, whose health had suffered severely from the
strain of the previous fifteen months, handed over the chief
commissionership to Mr. (now Sir Charles) Crosthwaite,
the number of posts held in upper Burma by troops had
risen to 141. By this time seventeen districts had been
formed and grouped into three divisions, under Commis-
sioners who confirmed all capital sentences, and revised
and superintended the proceedings of district officers. The
civil officers were everywhere dependent on military
escorts, and could nowhere move about their districts
freely ; but the tide of affairs was already beginning to
turn. While, on the one hand, the officers commanding-
posts and parties of troops in the field were acquiring a
knov/ledge of the people and of the country, the rebels and
dacoits, on the other hand, were beginning to get tired
and disheartened with the continuous hunting down and
harassing. The constant pursuit of the cavalry and
mounted infantry was beginning to tell on both the leaders
and their followers ; and the tactics pursued tended to cut
them adrift from their bases of supply and their sources
of information as to the movements of British troops.

Despite the progress, however, affairs were still very
bad. The Mandalay district was to a great extent in the
hands of three or four Bo, who headed large gangs
and acted in concert so far as to recognize and respect
the limits of each leader's territorial jurisdiction for the
levy of blackmail on villages located therein. These
Bo professed to act on behalf of the Myingun Prince,
still a refugee at Pondicherry, and were kept together and
instructed how to act in combination by a relative of his
who styled himself the Bayingan or Viceroy. Sagaing
was terrorized by dacoits that habitually murdered village
headmen who refused obedience or neglected to pay
blackmail. Nga Hlau still overran the Shwebo and Yeii
districts. The Ruby Mines district remained quiet after
an expedition under General Stewart took possession of
Mogok, its chief town ; but in the country to the north

126

LEADERS OF DACOIT BANDS

of that a young- Shan named Kan Hlaing had assumed a
position of open enmity to the British, because of their
decHninor to assist him in estabHshing himself as Sawbwa
of the Shan States of Mohlaing and Momeik. The upper
portion of the Chindwin valley was fairly quiet. The
Sawbwa of Thaungthut had made his submission, while
the Sawbwa of Kale was not in open hostility, though he
had not yet declared his allegiance. The latter arrested
and handed over a pretender calling himself Buddha
Yaza, who was promptly tried and executed. In the
lower Chindwin there continued to be much disturbance
in the Pagyi country, a wild tract to a great extent
covered with inaccessible and unhealthy forests. The
Pagdn district was overrun with dacoits, who found refuge
in the tangle of scrub jungles and ravines clothing the
spurs extending into the adjacent plains from the remark-
able hill of Popa, lying to the north-east of Pagan and
about forty miles back from the Irrawaddy river. About
4,500 feet in height and conical in shape, Popa towers
upwards from the skyline, a solitary mountain peak sur-
rounded by a vast extent of plain, in marked resemblance
to the sacred Fujisan of Japan. The scrub-covered
spurs and ravines, which hid a good deal of cultivated
land in the hollows, had ever been a favourite resort of
dacoit gangs. The villagers were mostly cattle rievers,
who stored their beasts in large pens or enclosures in the
jungle lest they might stray back to their lawful owners.
Further to the south, between Taungdwingyi and the
old frontier, Bo Min Yaung was ravaging the country
with a large following, accompanied by ponies and ele-
phants.

In the south-eastern tracts drained by the Sittang
river four Bo, Maung Hmon, Maung Gyi, Maung Lat,
and Buddha Yaza still had their hunting grounds. Time
after time they collected their men, but dispersed again
into the hill jungles when hard pressed by troops, who
left them no rest by day or night, and who prevented
them from disturbing the country south of the old frontier.

On the right bank of the Irrawaddy, below the con-
fluence of the Chindwin, the country was not really under
administration. A pretender, calling himself the Shwe-

127

BURMA UNDER BRITISH RULE

cryobyu Prince, had a large following, while the wild Yaw
Tracts to the west of that were overrun by dacoits.
The northern part of the Minbu district was held by
Oktamd, while Bo Shwe swayed the southern portion
towards Minhla and Thayetmyo. Both of these leaders
had a strong organization and pillaged the country under
a more methodic system than any of the other dacoit
Bo. In the intervals between raids and forays into the
open country near the Irrawaddy, they withdrew into the
water-logged and densely forested tracts, reeking with
noxious exhalations, skirting the base of the Arakan
Yoma, the range of hills forming the western watershed
of the Irrawaddy and its tributaries. Here they re-
mained comparatively safe, finding a double protection in
the thick jungles traversed only by small footpaths, and
in the malarious climate deadly to those who had not
been hereditarily acclimatized to it. But Bo Shwe's influ-
ence was now already on the wane. He had long been
hunted vigorously by mounted infantry and Gurkhas, and
had more than once barely escaped with his life.

In the Upper Irrawaddy valley, the Katha district was
rendered fairly quiet except where the State of Wuntho
marched with it on the south-west. The Sawbwa of this
Shan State, comprising the hills between the Irrawaddy
and the Chindwin, refused to come in or acknowledge
allegiance to the British, and endeavoured to seize the
town of Mogaung on the north, which was held by a
Burmese town magistrate, acting nominally for the British
Government, but in reality " eating the town " as in the
old days. Between Mogaung and Bhamo the country
was undisturbed.

Such was the condition of the Irrawaddy plain, the
Chindwin valley, and the Sittang drainage, the three
great riverine tracts forming the central portion of Upper
Burma, in March, 1887, after Sir Frederick Roberts had,
on 1 2th February, returned from Burma to India, leaving
the Upper Burma field force under the command of
Major-General Sir George White. On ist April, 1887,
this force consisted of 20,791 troops, divided into four
brigades (Mandalay, Shwebo, Meiktila, and Myingyan),
and three smaller separate commands (Bhamo, Ruby

128

MILITARY ARRANGEMENTS

Mines, and Chindwin). The garrison in Lower Burma
was again formed into a separate force under Major-
General B. L. Gordon, and consisted of 2,106 Europeans
and 4,088 native troops.

During the following year satisfactory progress was
made in the work of pacification. Order was almost
completely restored in Lower Burma, while in Upper
Burma a large Military Police force of 13,244 officers and
men had been organized, and the work of maintaining
order, previously performed by troops, was now efficiently
carried out by these police, acting under the immediate
control of the civil officers. On ist April, 1888, the
purely military force was reduced to 16,602, and ceased
to be on the footing of a field force, while the number of
brigades was reduced to three. But the total effective
strength of troops and Military Police throughout Burma
rose from 31,830 to 34,712 ; for while the purely military
garrison of Upper Burma was reduced by over 4,000
men, the Military Police under civil administration rose
by 8,400.

The organization of the Military Police and the
establishment of Military Police posts, in place of posts
held by troops, contributed greatly towards success. So
soon as the pacification of any district was sufficiently
advanced, the military posts were withdrawn and Military
Police posts established. In time each district had its
own battalion, recruited from the warlike races of
Northern India, and officered by a commandant and an
assistant commandant appointed from Indian regiments.
These Military Police battalions were organized like native
regiments in all except the scale of commissioned officers.
Their duties were almost purely military. They supple-
mented the work of the regular troops by occupying
posts and maintaining patrols when once the first step
towards pacification, the breaking up and dispersal of
rebel and dacoit gangs, had been achieved. Subse-
quently, when the work of pacification was completed,
several of these battalions were bodily transferred to the
Indian army. At first the minimum strength of any
Military Police post was fixed at twenty-five men ; but
this was raised to forty in order that, when patrols of ten

129 K

BURMA UNDER BRITISH RULE

men or more were sent out, the force remaining behind
would always be strong enough to hold the post against
attacks, for experience showed that when troops were
withdrawn there was a tendency towards recrudescence

ofdacoity.

The district magistrate had control over both the Civil
and the Military Police in his district, and was responsible
for saying what posts should be occupied, and what the
strength of each should be. The general principle laid
down^for the guidance of civil officers in allocating the
force was that the most important and central posts
should be occupied by fairly large bodies of Military
Police, to each of which should be added a small number
of Burmese constables for the purpose of receiving
reports, investigating cases, and collecting information.
Stress was laid on maintaining constant systematic
patrols, and on training the men in musketry practice.
Between these protective Military Police posts inter-
mediate posts were held by Civil Police, consisting of
Burmese recruited locally. To enable long marches and
prompt pursuits to be made, thus the better to supply
the place of the regular troops whose work they had
taken over, from eleven to twenty per cent, of the men
in each Military Police battalion were mounted on small,
hardy Burmese ponies.

The hands of the district magistrates were much
strengthened, and the work of pacification greatly
assisted, by the passing of the Upper Burma Village
Regulation (XIV. of 1887). Designed to arrest that
disintegration of village communities, and to prevent that
undue centralization of authority which had resulted in
Lower Burma from abandoning the previous customs so
well suited to the Burmese character, the regulation gave
considerable power to local headmen, and enforced joint
responsibility on villagers in matters of police. Under
the village system of administration, local headmen had
been the foundation of the civil government, controlling
the villages, collecting revenue, deciding disputes and
dealing with petty crime. In Lower Burma, after the
second Burmese war, this excellent system had been
allowed to fall to pieces and it was likely to soon crumble

130

REBEL GANGS IN 1888

away in Upper Burma also, unless specially protected.
The Village Regulation secured, as nearly as possible, to
headmen the position and the powers formerly possessed
by them in Burmese times, and it enforced with much
strictness the joint responsibility of the village in criminal
matters. A great many petty criminal cases could, under
it, be disposed of by the village headmen, who were also
responsible for taking immediate action in, and for
reporting to the nearest police post, any case of serious
crime. Under its authority provisions were made for
the better defence of villages, and for deporting tem-
porarily to other parts of the country men known to be
in league with rebels or dacoits, or the friends and
relatives of those declared to be outlaws. This latter
measure contributed very specially towards the establish-
ment of order.

Before the end of the official year 1887-88, the Man-
dalay district was freed from all large or formidable gangs
of rebels or dacoits, and most of those in the Shwebo
district had been broken up and their leaders either killed
or captured. In Sagaing the notorious Hla U had been
killed by his followers, who broke up into small bands
and terrorized the forest tracts ; hence special measures
had to be adopted against these. In Ava Bo Tok and
Shwe Yan were killed, and the district reduced to
quietude. Of two pretender Princes in the Yeii district
one died of fever and the other was executed as a rebel.
The gangs troubling Kyaukse were pursued into the
Shan hills and dispersed, but subsequently rallied again
under a pretender calling himself the Setkya Prince, who
soon took refuge again in the hills. In the Chindwin
valley the rising of the so-called Shwegyobya Prince,
who had been a vaccinator in Lower Burma, was quelled
by most of the leaders being either killed in action or else
taken, tried, and executed, while the pretender himself
fled into the Chin hills. Serious Chin raids from the
hills also took place, which had to be dealt with later on.
Much was done to pacify Myingyan and Meiktila, but
gangs headed by Bo Cho and Ya Nyun still remained
unsuppressed, though their influence was on the wane.
In Pagdn the two chief leaders infesting the P6pa hill

131

BURMA UNDER BRITISH RULE
were accounted for, Tha Do being killed and Ya Kut
tried and executed ; while the Yaw country to the west
was settled and placed on a satisfactory footing. To the
south of this 6ktamd still defied all endeavours to crush
his power. He and his chief lieutenants were proclaimed
outlaws beyond the hope of pardon, but an amnesty was
offered to all minor followers, and over 1,200 of his
men surrendered with their arms on these terms. From
Minhla Bo Shwe was pursued in Lower Burma and
killed by the mounted infantry after a Robin Hood career
extending over about fifteen years. In Magwe Bo Min
Yaung was killed and Tok Gyi captured, while other
gangs were dispersed. North of Mandalay, the Ruby
Mines, Myadaung, and Bhamo districts were fairly free
from organized rebellion, and the Wuntho Sawbwa had
made his submission, though he sullenly refused to come
in personally or to receive British officers in a befitting
manner. A military column visited Mogaung and the
jade mines, and established settled administration there.

The results of the work achieved in Upper Burma by the
end of the first fifteen months of its administration as a
British province had, in fact, quite surpassed expectation.
Organized rebellion had been crushed in all except two
or three of the seventeen districts, although the more
sporadic occurrence of dacoity could only be expected to
cease, and even then by no means entirely, when once
public security and tranquillity had become more
thoroughly established. In every district the people
were becoming more accustomed and reconciled to
British rule, and more willing to assist in the maintenance
of order. One of the best signs of this was that on
various occasions villagers, tired of the oppression of
dacoits, resisted and killed them.

Several Acts of the Legislature were extended to
Upper Burma under the Scheduled Districts Act, and a
new Military Police Act was passed and applied to the
whole province. Among the special regulations enacted
for Upper Burma, the most important of all was the
Village Regulation, but others provided also for the
registration of documents affecting immovable property,
the establishment of municipalities, the administration

132

THE SHAN STATES

and control of the forests, the collection and realization of
arrears of revenue, the limitation of suits, the declaration
of the law concerning stamps, and the control of mining
and trading in rubies and other precious stones. In
May, 1887, the Chief Commissioner had resumed control
of both Upper and Lower Burma, and by the end of the
year the Secretariat establishments for both parts of the
province were combined at the headquarters of Govern-
ment in Rangoon.

The work of establishing authority firmly throughout
all the plains and central lands forming the valleys of
the Upper Irrawaddy, Chindwin, and Sittang rivers had
already been so far accomplished as to enable steps to be
taken towards dealing with the wild Kachin and Chin
tribes, who inhabited the hills on the north and west and
were continually raiding down into the valleys.

Things had meanwhile been progressing very favour-
ably in the great Shan States extending eastwards across
the Salween and the Mekong or Cambodia rivers, and
marching with China and Siam. The first steps for the
settlement of these States were taken early in January,
1887, when a mixed force of European and native troops,
under Colonel (now Sir Edward) Stedman, accompanied
by two civil officers, was despatched to Nyaungyw^ for
the relief of the Sawbwa there, who had taken an early
opportunity of intimating his allegiance to the British
Government. Like the Thibaw Sawbwa, he gained
greatly by taking this step ; for he was confirmed as
chief, although he was then in unjust possession of the
State. At the time of the occupation of Mandalay the
ruling Sawbwa, Saw Maung, was at the capital, whence
he at once returned to his State lying at the south-west
corner of the Shan tracts. Here he was attacked by the
supporters of the Limbin Prince and driven out, while his
half-brother. Saw Chit Su, was appointed Sawbwa. The
latter was attacked and expelled by another brother named
Saw On, who usurped the State, declined to join the
Limbin Prince's confederacy, tendered his allegiance to
the British, and implored them to assist his loyal efforts
to maintain himself as their tributary. In this he was
successful; but in July, 1897, Saw Maung had the subse-

133

BURMA UNDER BRITISH RULE

quent satisfaction of performing Saw 6n's obsequies at
Taunggyi.and of having the Sawbwaship bestowed on him
once again by the British Government. In October,
1885, the Limbin Prince (a son of the heir apparent
assassinated by the Myingun Prince in 1866), who had
Hved under British protection during Thibaw's reign,
escaped from Moulmein and placed himself at the head
of a confederacy organized by exiled chiefs in the Keng-
tung State for the overthrow of King Thibaw or the
establishment of an independent Shan kingdom. By
the time the Limbin Prince arrived and placed himself at
the head of the rebellion, the Burmese troops had been
withdrawn and the Kingdom of Ava had fallen, so that
only the alternative remained to attempt to establish a
Shan kingdom. The important States of Mone, Yat-
sauk, Maingpun, and Mawkme, and about a score of
minor States had joined the movement, while others held
aloof, probably from motives of personal enmity to one
or other of the allied chiefs, for, though many of the
rulers of these States were allied by ties of consanguinity
or by marriage, there were long-standing feuds always
liable to break out into internecine warfare at every
opportunity which seemed favourable. The most im-
portant States which refused to take part in the con-
federacy were the western States of Thibaw in the
north, and of Nyaungyw6 in the south. Their prompt
avowal of allegiance came opportunely for the British,
and was richly rewarded.

Early in February, 1887, the British force relieved
Nyaungywd, and a Superintendent was established with
a sufficient garrison at Maingthauk, to which the name
of Fort Stedman was given, on the north-eastern shore
of the Inle lake, a position suitable for the purpose of
asserting the suzerainty of the British Government, of
putting an end to the anarchy and internecine warfare
which prevailed, and of maintaining order and encourag-
ing progress in the various States. In May, 1887, the
rebel confederacy was broken up, and the Limbin Prince
was, on surrendering, at his own request sent to Calcutta
as a pensioner.

During the rainy months of the summer of 1887

134

REBEL GANGS IN 1889

anarchy prevailed throughout all the Shan States ex-
cept Thibaw ; but, as soon as the state of the season
permitted, two powerful columns were sent on tour
throughout the country. These operations were suc-
cessful in immediately obtaining the personal submission
of all the principal Sawbwa, of confirming them in their
positions as tributary chiefs, of settling their relations
with the Government and with each other, of fixing the
amount of tribute to be paid by each State, of placing
the administration of the States on a satisfactory foot-
ing, and of getting the Sawbwa to agree to refer tribal
disputes to the Superintendent in place of resorting to
warfare. This peaceful settlement of the States on the
great Shan plateau during the cold season of 1887-88
was obtained bloodlessly, and almost without a shot
being fired. The only interchange of shots was when
some men in the Taungbaing State attacked the rear
guard of one of the columns.

During the year 1888-89 lawlessness was stamped
out in Lower Burma, except in the north-western fron-
tier district of Thayetmyo ; while the progress of the
pacification of the internal portions of Upper Burma
continued to advance most satisfactorily along the same
lines of action as in the previous year. While the
suppression of dacoity was mainly left to the Military
Police, the troops were utilized chiefly in pursuing and
breaking up the few remaining bands of rebels still at
large in two or three of the districts ; and opportunity
was also at length taken to send punitive expeditions into
the hills to let the Chins and Kachins feel they had now
very different masters to deal with than under the old
effete Burmese administration, and to make them realize
that raiding and lawlessness would have to cease. The
Mandalay district remained free from organized crime,
although a dacoit leader, Nga To, gave a good deal of
trouble. From Kyaukse the Setkya Prince was driven
into the Shan hills, captured, tried for rebellion and
murder, and executed. Sagaing, Ava, and Shwebo
were reduced to order, the most formidable of the robber
gangs being broken up and their leaders either sur-
rendered or else were killed or captured ; but Yeii was

135

BURMA UNDER BRITISH RULE
still infested by Yan Gyi Aung and minor leaders, whose
gangs found refuge in the dense forests of this thinly
populated district. The Chindwin districts, being cleared
of dacoits, were free from serious crime by the end of
the year, and villagers who left their homesteads during
the disturbed times were returning. In Myingyan and
Meiktila Bo Cho and Ya Nyun were still at large, though
many minor leaders were disposed of. In Pakokku and
the Yaw country various leaders sprang up ; but the
chief Bo, Tha Do, Saga, and Nga Kwe, were killed,
and the whole of the district reduced to an undisturbed
condition by the end of the year. In Minbu Oktamd
and his subordinates Oktayd, Byaing Gyi, and others,
were still at large, but were being hunted down with such
untiring energy that their power was rapidly waning.
Yamethin and Meiktila remained undisturbed through-
out the year, and Pyinmand (the old Ningyan district)
was freed from organized crime ; south and west of these
districts Magwe was, however, more disturbed than any
other part of the province. Seven large and numerous
smaller dacoit gangs sprang up there during the rainy
season of 1888, and two pretenders, calling themselves
the Shwekyinyo Prince and Buddha Yaza, placed them-
selves in rebellion at the head of the gangs. En-
couragement was given to this movement by the repulse
of a party of military police in November. The troops
in the district were reinforced, the provisions of the
Village Regulation were worked vigorously, and amnesty
was offered to all except some of the prominent leaders
proclaimed as outlaws ; but the end of the year found
the Administration forced to admit that the state of
Magwe was a reproach to it.

In the northern districts the settled portions of Bhamo
continued quiet, but parts of Katha and the Ruby Mines
district were infested with dacoits. The Wuntho Sawbwa
paid the tribute demanded of him, but still declined to
come in and make personal submission. The leasing of
the Ruby Mines to an English company no doubt called
forth a recrudescence of lawlessness by exciting the ap-
prehensions and the ill-will of the resident miners who
had previously enjoyed the practical monopoly of digging

136

EASTERN KARENNI

and washing for rubies. In Mogaung a rebellion was
raised by Maung Po Saw, a former magistrate there, who
succeeded in exciting the hostility of the Kachin tribes
after the return of the military column which had visited
the jade mines. The trade route was blocked, and in
May, 1888, a determined attack was made on the stock-
aded town of Mogaung, where the rebels received severe
handling from the Gurkha Military Police. As the
Kachins siding with Po Saw refused to make formal
submission and deliver up the rebels they were harbour-
ing, punitive operations were undertaken against them
under the direction of Sir George White, in the dry
season of 1888-89, with complete success. Posts were
established at important points, and the tribes, almost
without exception, submitted and gave guarantees for
future good conduct. In the south-eastern portion of
Bhamo, lying between the Shweli river and the Chinese
frontier, a good deal of trouble was also caused by the
Pdnkan Kachins, incited to disturbance by Saw Yan
Hnaing, a grandson of King Mindon, and Kan Hlaing,
a dissatisfied claimant to the Shan States of Mohlaing
and Mong Mit. Ever since the annexation these Ponkan
Kachins had been a menace to the peace of the Bhamo
district, but they were effectually reduced to reason by
an expedition sent against them under Brigadier-General
{now Sir George) Wolseley in the spring of 1889, on
the return of the troops from Mogaung.

In the Shan States a military expedition had to be
sent against Sawlapaw, the chief of Eastern Karen ni,
who made an unprovoked attack on the State of Mawk-
me, expelling the Sawbwa, occupying the capital, and
devastating the country. In May, 1888, he retired before
the approach of a British force ; but, on their withdrawal,
leaving only a small garrison of native troops in the
town of Mawkm^, the red Karens returned in July and
again ravaged the country, burning villages, and plunder-
ing the people. The Karens were attacked by British
troops and forced to retreat with heavy loss. After two
insolent letters had been received from Sawlapaw and
returned to him by the hands of his own messengers, an
ultimatum was sent to him insisting, among other things,

137

BURMA UNDER BRITISH RULE

on his making personal submission to the Superintendent
at Fort Stedman. Owing to non-compliance therewith,
a strong column, under Brigadier-General H. Collett,
C.B., marched against Karenni from Fort Stedman,
while a second column, under Colonel J. J. Harvey,
operated from the southern valley of the Salween. After
encountering some resistance both columns reached Saw-
Ion, the capital, early in January ; but Sawlapaw had
fled before the arrival of the northern column. His
nephew and heir apparent, Sawlawi, was inducted into
the Sawbwaship of Eastern Karenni as a tributary state
in subordinate alliance with the British Government.
Apart from this expedition, the current of affairs ran
smoothly throughout the southern Shan States. Durbars
were held at Mone and Fort Stedman during May,
1889, and were attended by almost every chief of note.
The northern Shan States were not quite so peaceful
and settled, but nothing occurred which called for special
military expeditions.

On the western frontier an important series of opera-
tions was undertaken against the Chins inhabiting the
country bordering on the Yaw tracts, the Kale State,
and the Kiibo valley. The principal of these Chin
tribes are the Siyin, Sagyilaing, and Kanhaw on the
north, the Tashon in the centre, and the Baungshe on
the south. The central Tashon tribe is the most power-
ful. The suspicions of these tribes were aroused by
proposals to make a road across their hills from Burma
into Bengal, and the feelings thus excited were acted
upon by the Shwegyobyu pretender and the late chief
of Kale, who had been recently deposed by the British
Government for active opposition. Incited by these
two men, the Siyin and Sagyilaing raided into the Kiibo
valley, and the Baungshe into the Yaw country ; while,
in May, 1888, the Tashon swept down on Indin and
kidnapped the newly-appointed Sawbwa of Kal6. To-
wards the end of the rainy season further raids occurred,
and Kalemyo itself was attacked. A commencement
was made with the Siyin and Sagyilaing, all of whose
villages were destroyed after stubborn resistance in many
cases. The Kanhaw were next operated against, nearly

138

RAILWAY EXTENSION

every village belonging to the tribe being taken and
destroyed. In April, 1889, active operations were also
commenced against the Tashon, but had to be inter-
rupted on the advent of the rains. The results of the
punishment in course of infliction was, however, that
nearly 200 kidnapped captives were restored to their
homes, and that an exemplary lesson had been taught
the three tribes dealt with.

During February, 1889, the extension of the Rangoon-
Toungoo railway line to Mandalay was completed, and
on I St March it was opened to traffic of all descriptions.
Sanctioned during September, 1886, the surveys were at
once put in hand, and the construction of the various
sections took from sixteen months to two years to com-
plete. About 24,000 coolies, two-thirds of whom were
Burmese, were employed on the work during the greater
part of the time. The construction, at a cost of nearly
two million pounds, of these 220 miles of railway, run-
ning through a country infested during most of the time
with rebel bands and dacoit gangs, was a magnificent
achievement ; and, but for a severe epidemic of cholera,
during which the works were almost entirely deserted
over nearly a third of the line, it would have been open
to traffic by the ist January, 1889. Even before its
formal opening, so soon as trolleys and construction trains
could be run, it was found of great service in military
and police operations, and both directly and indirectly
its construction contributed in a marked degree towards
the pacification and settlement of the country. During
the open season of 1888-89 surveys were carried out to
the west of the Irrawaddy from Sagaing northwards up
the Mu Valley and through the Wuntho State into the
Katha district, so that similar advantages might soon be
secured to the northern districts in the direction of
Mogaung.

No fresh regulations were passed for Upper Burma
during the year, though several enactments were extended
to it under the Scheduled Districts Act ; but a Shan
States Act provided for the administration of these States
by the native chiefs subject to the control of the Local
Government exercised through Superintendents at Fort

139

BURMA UNDER BRITISH RULE

Stedman and Lashio. A Lower Burmese Village Act
was also passed, extending to the older parts of the pro-
vince provisions for the administration of the rural tracts
similar to those preserved for Upper Burma by Regulation
XIV. of 1887.

So satisfactory had been the progress of pacification
and settlement that it was considered unnecessary to
retain Upper Burma as a separate military command
after ist April, 1889. Sir George White therefore
handed over his charge to General (now Sir Benjamin)
Gordon in Rangoon, and the troops were once more
brought under the Commander-in-Chief of Madras. The
Burma command thus reorganized consisted of three
districts in charge of Brigadiers-General at Rangoon,
Mandalay, and Myingyan, and of six smaller commands
at other important centres. During the year the troops
in Upper Burma were reduced from 13,250 to 11,335;
but this apparent reduction was again,as in 1887-88, more
than over-balanced by the numbers of the Military Police
being raised from 13,244 to 17,880. The total strength
of troops and Military Police in Upper Burma thus rose
from 26,494 ill April, 1888, to 29,215 in April, 1889;
while throughout the whole province it increased from
32,890 to 34,446 men. In October, 1888, the whole of
the police forces of Lower and Upper Burma, which had
hitherto been separately administered, were amalgamated
under Brigadier-General Stedman as Inspector-General,
assisted by two Deputy Inspectors-General, one for Civil,
and one for Military Police.

By the end of the following year {1889-90) the troops
throughout Burma still numbered 15,608, while the Mili-
tary Police force aggregated 18,618, giving a total fighting
strength of 34,226 men. But matters had meanwhile
progressed so favorably that the six separate minor com-
mands directly under the Major-General commanding
were abolished, the troops being distributed among the
three district commands under Brigadiers-General at
Rangoon, Mandalay, and Myingyan, and the Chin ex-
peditionary force under Brigadier-General (the late Sir
William Penn) Symons. The energy with which rebels
were run down and dacoit gangs dispersed effected a

140

ORGANIZED RESISTANCE COLLAPSES

marked reduction in violent crime throughout almost
every district. Lower Burma had regained its normal
condition as before the last war. Mandalay was freed
from a troublesome gang, headed by Nga To, and district
officers no longer required escorts for their protection on
tour. In Kyauks^ a rebel band raised by Kyaw Zaw,
one of the late Setkya pretender s adherents, was dis-
persed. Pakokku, Yam^thin, Meiktila, Pymmand, and
Sagaing remained undisturbed throughout the year ;
while the Upper and Lower Chindwin districts, Katha,
the Ruby Mines, Shwebo, and Yeii were reduced to
order. In this last district the two remaining leaders of
note. Van Gyi Aung and Nga Aga, were induced to
surrender through the intermediation of the Gaing Ok or
Buddhist bishop of the district. The Sawbwa of Wun-
tho at length made his personal submission at Katha,
and sent his wife and his sons to visit the Commissioner
at Mandalay.

In Minbu Oktama was captured in June, 1889, while
most of his lieutenants and other independent dacoit
leaders either surrendered themselves or else were
killed or captured, and organized dacoity was practically
suppressed. For the reduction of the lawlessness and
disorganization of the turbulent Magwe district special
operations were undertaken with so marked success that
during the third quarter of the year only one violent
crime, a petty robbery, was reported.

As district after district became pacified and settled the
gradual replacement of military posts by Military Police
posts in the interior of Upper Burma was effected. At
the beginning of 1887 there were 142 posts held by
troops and 56 by Military Police; by the following year
the numbers had changed to 84 and 1 75 respectively ;
and early in 1889 only 41 were held by troops and 192
by Military Police. By the summer of 1889 organized
resistance to the British Government had collapsed so
thoroughly throughout Upper Burma that it was found
possible to reduce the number of Military Police posts
and to maintain smaller garrisons at those still kept up.
In all the more settled districts arrangements were there-
fore made to concentrate, as a strong and highly trained

141

BURMA UNDER BRITISH RULE

reserve, about half the strength of each battalion at the
headquarters of each civil district ; but this scheme of
course did not apply to districts like Bhamo, where the
Military Police had to protect extensive tracts against the
raids of wild hill tribes, or Katha, where disorder on
the borders of the Wuntho State still rendered such a
scheme impracticable. Changes were also made in the
organization of the Military Police by the amalgamation
of two or more battalions with the object of reducing the
strength and the cost of the large total force.

After General Wolseley's expedition in April 1889 the
Ponkan Kachins to the soutli-east of Bhamo gave no
further trouble, while that part of the district was also
relieved by the capture of the pretender, calling himself
Buddha Ydza. Kan Hlaing, the Mohlaing-Momeik
claimant, and Saw Yan Hnaing, King Mindon's grand-
son, were harboured by the Lwesaing-Tonhon Kachins,
and continued to cause trouble in the Sinkan township,
and on the borders of the Mong Mit State. Columns
were therefore sent against them in December, 1889, from
Bhamo and Mong Mit, which destroyed the village of
Lwesaing, received the submission of all the villages in the
Lwesaing-Tonhon tract, levied fines on all villages which
had harboured or assisted the pretenders, and brought in
some of the headmen as prisoners. The result of the
expedition was the complete submission of the Kachin
tribes in the Upper Sinkan valley, who were taught a
severe lesson ; but Saw Yan Hnaing and Kan Hlaing,
though expelled from their retreats, evaded capture and
managed to effect their escape into Chinese territory.

To the west of the Chindwin river the operations of the
previous season against the Chin tribes, which had been
interrupted by the rains, were also in December, 1889,
recommenced under Brigadier-General Symons. The
objects of the expedition were attained without any
serious resistance, The powerful Tashon tribes and the
Baungshe tendered their submission, gave up captives
they had kidnapped, paid the fines levied on them, and
promised compliance with the demands of Government.
The ex-Sawbwa of KaM surrendered himself from his
retreat among them, and was permitted to resume the

142

THE SHAN STATES

pension previously allowed to him after his deposition.
For dealing with the Chins, military posts with political
officers were established at Fort White among the north-
ern tribes, and at Hdka for the southern tribes.

The Shan States remained peaceful and undisturbed,
except for a petty abortive insurrection in North Theinni,
which was promptly stopped, on Kun Yi, the pretender,
being killed in action. The whole of these States were
now entirely garrisoned by Military Police. In the
southern and eastern Shan States the chief events of
the year were the submission of the Sawbwa of Keng-
tung, the most important of the Shan States lying to the
east of the Salween river, to the Superintendent, and the
work carried out by the Anglo-Siamese Commission
under Mr. Ney Elias, CLE., appointed by the Govern-
ment of India for the settlement of various territorial
questions on the south-eastern frontier of the Shan States
and Karenni. At the time of the expedition against
Eastern Karenni in 1888-89, Siamese troops occupied
tracts east of the Salween, which had long been inhabited
by settlers from Eastern Karenni. This territory was
claimed as part of the Siamese province of Chiengmai
(Zimme) ; new claims were also advanced to the trans-
Salween tracts of Maingmaw and Mesakon, appanages
of the State of Mawkme ; and old claims, previously
asserted, were maintained in respect of four small
States which had been made over to the Maingpan
Sawbwa late in 1888. The points in dispute were to
have been investigated by a joint commission, but finally
the Siamese Government declined to join in the enquiry,
which had accordingly to be carried out ex parte. The
two appanages were restored to Mawkme, and the four
small States made over to the Sawbwa of Maingpan and
Maingtun, while a report on the more important territorial
question was submitted for the orders of the Government
of India. It was not until 1892 that Sawlawi, chief of
Eastern Karenni, was, with the concurrence of Siam, re-
instated in his trans-Salween possessions.

In March, 1890, Sir Charles Crosthwaite, Chief Com-
missioner of Burma, visited the Shan States for the first
time and held a durbar at Fort Stedman, which was

143

BURMA UNDER BRITISH RULE

attended by nearly all the cis-Salween chiefs and the
notables of the eastern and southern States.

The only fresh legislation relating to Upper Burma
was the Land and Revenue Regulation, 1889, declaring
the law regarding rights of land, providing for the
assessment and collection of revenue, and formulating a
complete system of revenue law, based as far as possible
on the ascertained customs of the country.

By the end of 1 890 the work of pacification through-
out Upper Burma was complete, and there were fewer
violent crimes there than in Lower Burma during the
year 1890-91. Reductions ir. the strength of the gar-
rison could, however, not yet be ventured on, as much
still remained to be done in the frontier tracts. Three
battalions of military police, numbering over 3,000 men,
were converted from frontier levies into battalions of the
native army, and further conversions, affecting other
3,000, were under consideration and soon to be sanc-
tioned. Major- General Gordon made over charge of
the Burma command on 31st May, 1890, to Brigadier-
General Wolseley, who was relieved on 26th October
by Major-General R. C. Stewart, C. B. The troops
amounted to 18,763, while the Military Police numbered
16,506, representing a total effective strength of 35,269
men.

During the first year after the annexation the crushing
of organized rebellion and of armed resistance occupied
the attention of Government so fully that it was not
possible to introduce regular methods and systematic
administration, but in the succeeding four years every
district in Upper Burma was gradually reduced to order,
and organized crime had entirely disappeared from any
part of the whole province. The only remaining elements
of disturbance were the wild tribes inhabiting the forest-
clad hills of the northern frontier districts. Before the
end of 1890 no pretender, no rebel, or no dacoit Bo
having any considerable following was to be found
throughout what had formerly been the kingdom of Ava.
All such leaders who had not surrendered or died, or
else had not been killed or captured, were in hiding and
deserted by their former adherents. Except among the

144

SYSTEM OF ADMINISTRATION

Chin and the Kachin hill-tribes, district officers could
move about freely without escorts. In every case in
which organized rebellion or dacoity was suppressed,
terms were offered to all except the principal leaders and
men personally concerned in atrocious crimes ; and in
almost every district in Upper Burma large numbers of
released or surrendered dacoits were living under sur-
veillance, but otherwise unmolested, and engaging in
peaceful pursuits. The powerful and efficient body of
Military Police was in course of transformation into
battalions of the regular native army ; civil police had
been organized in every district, and real progress was
being made in the prevention and detection of crime ;
and the district administration had been gradually
assimilated to that obtaining in the older portion of the
province. But no encouragement was given to the
natural tendency of officers to attempt to arrange district
work after the pattern to which they had been accustomed
in Lower Burma. While purifying corrupt methods and
removing barbarous enormities, the maintenance of the
spirit of the Burmese administration was desired ; the
customs and prejudices of the new subjects were inter-
fered with as little as possible ; and particular care was
taken not to attempt to force upon them a brand-new
system of administration, inconsistent with their national
genius or habits. Special attention was given to the
maintenance of the village community system, which was
at the earliest possible opportunity placed on a secure
legal basis. In training the necessary subordinate staff
to provide for the administration of justice and the
collection of revenue, full use was made of loyal Burmese
officers, many of whom rendered conspicuous service.
Government public offices had been erected at the head-
quarters of districts, and suitable jails were constructed ;
while the judicial administration was under the control
of an experienced officer. In the larger towns a simple
system of municipal government was introduced, but no
attempt was made to extend the principle of self-govern-
ment beyond the limits which the circumstances of the
newly - acquired province rendered necessary. The
educational needs of the country were examined, and

145 L

BURMA UNDER BRITISH RULE

steps were being gradually taken to strengthen and
improve, while abstaining from needless interference
with, the simple elementary tuition in reading, writing,
and arithmetic at monasteries by the gradual introduc-
tion of a sound and practical scheme of public instruction.
Dispensaries were open at the headquarters of every
district, and during 1890 medical relief was afforded to
nearly 100,000 patients, representing more than one-
thirty-fifth of the total population. The revenue system
had been examined and put on a satisfactory footing,
with the result that it had increased to about 1 13 lacs of
rupees (^753-333) during 1890, or some 8 lacs (253.333)
more than the largest revenue which had ever found its
way in any year into the royal treasury at Mandalay ;
and this increase was effected without imposing any
fresh taxation or burden on the people, although during
the same time some obnoxious and oppressive imposts
had been abolished. In the dry central zone — where
denudation of the original forests in times past now
very seriously affects the rainfall, the humidity of the air,
and the water-storage capacity of the soil, where agri-
culture is consequently precarious, and where scarcity
often amounting almost to famine is liable to occur to a
greater or less extent every few years — the irrigation
works of former days, which had long since been allowed
to fall into disrepair, were examined with a view to the
repair of the old works and the construction of a new
irrigation system. The forests, containing the richest
supplies of teak timber in the world, which had been
worked in a most wasteful manner during the King's
time, had already been brought under systematic
management by the Forest Department, and consider-
able progress was being made in their examination and
survey, and in the selection of the better portions for the
formation of permanent State Reserves.

The material welfare of the people and the develop-
ment of the natural resources of the country had mean-
while not been neglected. Next to the establishment of
peace, the most urgent need was the improvement of
means of conimunication. There was a large expendi-
ture on public works. The extension of the railway

146

RAILWAY EXTENSION

from Toungoo to Mandalay provided the best possible
means of communication through a land-locked part of
the province, enabled food supplies to be easily poured
into the dry central zone liable to suffer from scarcity,
and gave the population there the means of going away
and settling in other districts where agriculture was less
precarious. So peaceful were the tracts between Man-
dalay and the old frontier that passenger trains were
now running through from Rangoon by night as well as
by day. To the west of the Irrawaddy the construction
of a line, begun in 1889-90, was being rapidly extended
northwards through fertile tracts rich in natural resources.
The open season of 1889-90 also saw the commencement
of reconnaissance surveys for a railway running east-
wards from Mandalay across the Shan plateau, through
Thibaw and Lashio, onwards towards the Kunlon ferry
on the Salween, whence important trade routes branched
northwards, eastwards, and southwards into Yunnan and
the eastern and the Siamese Shan States. Well-aligned
cart roads were opened out from Meiktila to Fort Sted-
man, the capital of the southern Shan States, and from
Mandalay to Thibaw on the way to Lashio, the head-
quarters of the northern Shan States ; while Mogok, the
centre of the ruby mining industry, was similarly brought
in touch with Thabeitkyin on the Irrawaddy river.
Telegraphic communication had existed from Mandalay
to Rangoon in the Burmese time, but the line had to be
reconstructed and maintained in spite of continual in-
terruptions occasioned by dacoits, who cut up the wire
to use as slugs. Now a network of lines connected the
heart of the Chin hills on the west, the centre of the
Shan States on the east, and Bhamo and Mogaung on
the north, with the lines converging on Rangoon and
extending everywhere throughout the older part of the
province. By the end of 1890 there were nearly 4,000
miles of telegraph lines and some fifty offices open in
Upper Burma, and over 700,000 messages were con-
veyed across them during that year. The work done
by the Telegraph Department contributed greatly to the
progress of the civil and military administration.

In the settlement of frontier affairs equally good pro-

147

BURMA UNDER BRITISH RULE

gress had also been made. Before the annexation, and
for about a year after it, the Shan States were in a
chaotic state of anarchy ; but now all the chiefs who
owed allegiance to the King of Ava had tendered their
submission and become peaceful subjects of the British
Government, whose influence had been extended across
the Salween river so as to bring Kengtung, the most
important of the trans-Salween States, into subordinate
alliance. Internecine warfare had been stopped, and the
paths of peace were open leading towards a prosperity
hitherto unknown. Eastern Karenni had been brought
under British protection, and satisfactory arrangements
made for its administration. On the northern and north-
western fringes of the province the Kachin tribes had
learned by drastic lessons that raiding and acts of violence
were no longer to be permitted ; while the more im-
portant of the Chin tribes on the western border had by
similar punitive treatment been brought to tender their
submission, and arrangements were being made for the
permanent occupation of their country, for the enforce-
ment of administrative authority, and for opening it up
by means of good lines of communication.

These admirable results were attained within five
years of the annexation of Upper Burma, or in about
half the time that had been required for the pacification
of Lower Burma after the second Burmese war. When
Sir Charles Crosthwaite handed over the Chief Com-
missionership of Burma to his successor, Sir Alexander
Mackenzie, on loth December, 1890, after nearly four
years of the heaviest responsibility that had fallen upon
any of the Indian administrators of that time, the founda-
tions of future prosperity and happiness were securely
laid for a people who had borne, with admirable patience,
contentment, and passive fortitude the misfortunes
brought upon them by the misgovernment of their King
and his Court, and by the crimes and barbarities of their
own fellow-countrymen. Since the days of the Indian
Mutiny, in 1857-59, neither civilians nor soldiery had
had such calls made upon their strength, energy, endur-
ance, and devotion to duty as during these five anxious and
eventful years of the pacification and settlement of Upper

148

COST OF ANNEXING AVA

Burma ; and these calls were responded to in a manner
befitting the heirs of the noble heritage to which English-
men are born, and worthy of the best and noblest
traditions of the Civil and Military Services in India.

What the third Burmese war and the pacification of
Upper Burma actually cost in money, incurred on purely
military expenditure, may partly be seen from the table
given below. Apart from the special expenditure, the
normal military charges incurred by Burma have been
raised from a little over ^190,000 for Lower Burma during
the year 1884-85 to somewhat over ;if 600,000 a year now
for the whole province. But the territory to be protected
has been increased by nearly 150 per cent, and the
frontiers have been advanced so as now to march with
those of Siam, French Indo-China, and China beyond
the new territories acquired to the north-east. Regarded
from a financial point of view, the conquest was abnor-
mally cheap at the price. The garrison on 31st March,
1900, consisted of only 10,324 troops (2,811 European
and 7,513 Native), but this was about 2,000 below the
normal strength of the previous year.

The war, and the five years

occupied in the work of

pacification.

The period of transition
to settled administration.

The normal garrison
of Burma.

Year.

L

Year.

c

Year.

£

1885-86

1886-87

1887-88 1

1888-89

1889-90

1890-91

635,600 1
1,230,000
(not obtainable)
657,334
653-334
749,334^

1891-92
1892-93
1893-94

864,6672

777,334
682,000

1894-95
1895-96
1896-97
1897-98
1898-993
1899-1900

648,000
636,667
620,667
610,000
) (not ob-
) tainable)

1 The figures for 1887-88 are still regarded as confidential.

" The decrease in 1887 to 1890 was due to the formation of the
Military Police, maintained from civil expenditure ; and the increase
beginning again in 1891 is due to the conversion of several battalions
of Military Police into regular troops as Burma regiments.

3 '* It is not possible to furnish the figures . . . showing separately
the military expenditure incurred in Burma . . . the military expendi-
ture is classified only under the heads of the four commands, viz. :
Punjab, Bengal, Madras, and Bombay" (India Office, f. 1022, dated
5 March, 1901).

149

chapter VI

CIVIL AND MILITARY ADMINISTRATION UNDER
BURMESE RULE

" y^HE Burmese Sovereign of the Rising Sun who rules
over the country of Thundpardnta and the country
of Tdmbadipd, with all the other great do7ninions and
countries, and all the Umbrella-bearing Chiefs of the
East, whose Glory is exceeding great and excellent, the
Master of the King Elephant, Sadddn, the Lord of many
White Elephants, the Lord of Life, the eininently just
Ruler'' — so ran the descriptive legend heading all royal
letters— was a despotic ruler. The King's power was
absolute : but the administration of the kingdom of Ava,
extending to about 120,000 square miles, scantily popu-
lated with some three and a half millions of inhabitants,
was carried on by means of Ministers whose number,
rank, and functions were defined by constitutional pre-
cedent. The details relating to their appointment and
duties were embodied in a book called the Lawka
Pyuha or Inyon Saok, which likewise described with
minute detail the ceremonies and etiquette of the court,
and might be considered the official code of Sumptuary
Laws.

Immediately after the close of the second Burmese
war King Pagdn was deposed by his brother, the Mindon
Prince, who, occupying the throne in 1853, ruled the
kingdom with a considerable degree of enlightenment
till his death in 1878. King Mindon, or Min Taydgyi,
" the great lawgiver," had strong commercial instincts,
which were allied to a desire to bring his country more
in a line with the position of the civilized nations of the
West. He was, for a ruler of Ava, a humane man. In
place of putting the Pagdn Min to death, according to

150

KING MINDON'S POLICY

ancient custom with regard to rivals in Burma, as in
most eastern countries, the deposed monarch's Hfe was
spared. He lived in his own house ; he survived his
successor on the throne ; and he finally died a natural
death in his bed. King Mindon was an enlightened
ruler. Though he professed no love for the British, he
recognized their power and kept on friendly terms with
them. So far as was compatible with the maintenance
of his own autocratic power, he was anxious to introduce
Western ideas and civilization into his kingdom. He
deputed envoys to Europe in order to study the indus-
trial arts, and sent young men of good families to Eng-
land, France, and Italy to learn the languages and
customs of those countries. Though his zeal was not
always tempered by discretion, he did much to improve
the revenues and promote the prosperity of his country.

The wisest of all the Burmese monarchs, Mindon kept
the reins of government firmly in his own hands through-
out the whole of the quarter of a century of his rule.
Though he held sway over much less territory than his
forefathers had done, yet he was deeply anxious to main-
tain untarnished their full regal splendour.

At the Court of Ava there were two classes of Bur-
mese Ministers. The authority and the responsibility of
one class were restricted to the palace, somewhat in the
manner of officers of the Royal Household, whilst within
the other class were included all the important administra-
tive offices of the State. During the latter days of the
kingdom of Ava, however, these original distinctions had
become materially obliterated for all practical purposes,
though the two classes of officials were still maintained
in separate categories so far as mere nomenclature was
concerned.

The first class comprised the officials of the Byedaik
(literally "bachelors' quarters"), the Privy Council or
Secret Department of the Burmese Court, whose public
offices were located in a part of the northern side of the
palace which had formerly been allotted to the King's
young men, and to which the King used sometimes to
go in order to see the royal elephants at exercise. The
second category formed the Hkttdaw or Great Council

151

BURMA UNDER BRITISH RULE

of State, whose functions combined those of a Legislative
Chamber, a Ministerial Cabinet, and a Supreme Court of
Civil and Criminal Justice. The State Council Chamber —
"for both the Council and the Council Hall were included
in the word " Hlutciaw'' meaning literally " the place of
release," or ''place du congi cCilire'' — was situated in the
outer court or esplanade between the Tagdni, the " Red
Gate," or royal entrance to the inner portions of the
palace on the eastern side, and the outer gate of the
palace enclosure. The offices of the various Ministers
of the Hint were enclosed near at hand within the same
£^ce.

The King was the nominal head of the Hlutdaw, but
on all ordinary occasions its meetings were presided over
by whomsoever happened for the time to be the most in-
fluential of the four Mingyi (" great rulers ") or Wungyi
(" those bearing the great burden "). These were the
highest officials in the kingdom, occupying posts some-
what similar to those filled by our Cabinet Ministers or
principal Secretaries of State. The offices were not
hereditary, being merely conferred from time to time
by the King. Each of these four chief Ministers had
his own portfolio or department, though at the same
time there was no hard and fast line drawn as to the
distribution of the work coming before the council for
disposal. Each Mingyi might have all sorts of adminis-
trative work to investigate and dispose of, and each had
his own separate departmental seal to affix to orders and
palm-leaf correspondence. The business demanding his
attention might range from questions relating to agri-
culture, forestry, finance or politics, up to the decision of
civil or criminal law cases, and might at times involve mili-
tary duty even to the utmost extent of personally taking
the field in charge of an army.

Lower in rank than the four Mingyi came two other
high officials charged with the performance of very mis*
cellaneous duties, as is almost implied in their designa-
tions, the Myinzugyi Wun, or " governor of the chief
cavalry regiment," and the Athiwun, or " governor of
those who are not in the royal service."

A grade lower still came the four Wundank, the

152

BURMESE OFFICIALS

Undersecretaries of State, or " sharers of the burden " of
the Mingyi, each of whom had one or more departments
of official business allotted to his care, here also without
any rigid lines being prescribed as to the distribution of
work. This title of Assistant was also often bestowed
honoris causd on provincial officials such as Governors
of Townships, much in the same way as appointments
are made in Britain to the Privy Council. This mark
of royal favour neither involved or authorized attendance
at the Hlut or Council of State.

All of these ten highest officials — four Mingyi, two
Wuft, and four Wundauk — in addition to possessing
various other grandiloquent titles, were usually known
by some territorial appellation having reference either to
a province or to a large district or town made over to
their special administration. The whole kingdom was
subdivided into districts called Myo or " townships,"
which were handed over to these and to less exalted
officials for administrative purposes. Each such official,
no matter what his higher title might be, was called a
Myosdy or " eater of a township " — a term which very
graphically hits off the manner in which the bad ones
among them squeezed the district of all the revenue it
was possible to lay hands on from a submissive, peaceful
and helpless peasantry. The great officers of the Hlut-
daw, resident close to the main gate on the eastern side
of the palace in Mandalay, could, of course, only perform
their duties as Governors of districts by means of depu-
ties, who remitted to them enough to pay the royal
revenue demand and to maintain themselves and their
establishments. All the Governors of these townships
had to pay in fixed annual contributions to the Shwedaik
or Royal Treasury, but whatever they could raise be-
yond this, by taxation or otherwise, they retained for
themselves. It was in this manner that they were able
to " eat a township." Each Myosd or " eater of a town-
ship," was in reality a local magnate paying tribute either
to his overlord the Mingyi, or to their suzerain the
King of Ava ; and within his own district he had enor-
mous power and influence. The vast distances of many
of the towns from Mandalay, the capital, the entire want

153

BURMA UNDER BRITISH RULE

of good roads, or of any other means of communication
except along the great water highway, the Irrawaddy
river, and the difficulties of travelling by jungle tracks
for the greater part of each year, all helped to strengthen
the semi-independence of their position. They were un-
controlled by telegraph lines or daily postal service, and
no public press existed to indicate any opinions held by
those under their rule. Instructions from the central
authority were often treated with indifference, and orders
from Mandalay did not necessarily carry the same weight
as attaches to similar missives in more civilized countries.
Even the execution of royal orders could sometimes only
be relied on as far as they could be carried out by armed
force.

Until the kingdom of Burma began to be shorn of its^
coast provinces by wars with the British;;^ach of the prin-
cipal provinces of Rangoon, Tenasserim, Martaban, and
Arakan was ruled by a Wun or Governor, who was in
reality a Viceroy appointed by the King with full civil,
judicial, fiscal, and military powers. So long as he re-
mitted the full amount of revenue to which his province
was assesse4 he was responsible only to the central
Government A Provincial Council, consisting of Myo
Sayd or " tow'h-writers," Nakd7idaw or "receivers of
royal orders," and Sitke or " chiefs of war," met daily
in the courthouse and made reports to the GovernoJ>_
The other chief officials at the seats of provincial govern-
ment were the Taung/imu or "jailer," the Aydtgaung
or " heads of quarters " of the town, and the Tagdhnii^
or "warden of the gates.'^The governorship was divided
into townships, each in charge of a township officer who
was called Myo Ok or " ruler of the town," if he were
only appointed to the office from time to time, but was
known as Myo Tkugyi, or "mayor of the town," if he_
held office by hereditary right. - The Viceroy of Pegu had'
more extensive powers than any of the other Governors,
but he could not interfere in any way with their authority
in their own jurisdiction. In addition to the usual
staff he had the special assistance of an Akunwun or
" revenue officer," 2Si Akaukwtui or " collector of customs,"
and a Y^mu7i or " conservator of the port," whose jurisdic-

154

INSIGNIA OF OFFICIALS

tion extended for a considerable distance inland on the
river Irrawaddy and in the country situated within the
immediate vicinity of its banks. Besides the fixed revenue
demand levied direct from householders, there were many
imposts of various sorts, including taxes on ploughs, on
palm trees, and on brokerage, transit dues, dues on sale
of cattle, on produce, and on fisheries, fees on lawsuits
and criminal fines, and special remittances annually as
presents for the King. The local officials received no
regular salary, but were paid by a portion of these fees
and dues, so that their interests lay in raising them as
high as they could or dared. They had just to feather
their nests as they best could. Whenever men were
called out to perform any particular duty, or to protect
the frontier, they had to be supported by the tract in

question ; and, finally, special royal demands had to be

met from time to time. Of these the most excessive was
probably that of thirty-three and one-third ticals of silver
per household levied by King Bodaw Paya in 1798,
which took two years to collect, and brought in sixty
lacs of rupees (^600,000) to the royal treasury.

When walking abroad, a red umbrella was borne above
an official, while his residence was marked by having a
cross-bar over the gate and the privilege of having it
painted red.

As the amounts fixed as tribute were comparatively
light it did not necessarily follow that the Myosd ground
down and oppressed the people in his township ; but, of
course, the various districts ruled over by the deputies of
the high officials of the Hlut had practically to satisfy
the demands of two "town-eaters." To be known as
possessed of much ready money was to become exposed
to the danger of being squeezed. This apprehension, no
doubt, acting in addition to the religious feeling of the
Buddhist and the desire to acquire benefits in the next
state of existence, impelled many, who might otherwise
have accumulated wealth, to be lavish in works of " re-
ligious merit," such as building monasteries, pagodas,
shrines, bridges, etc., and to spend surplus cash in feast-
ing priests or entertaining the country-side with public
theatrical performances. In a state of society such as

155

BURMA UNDER BRITISH RULE

existed in Upper Burma under Burmese rule, the repu-
tation of having money must, in a district governed by
a grasping, rapacious, or unconscientious official, have
always carried with it a sense of insecurity and even of
personal danger. The very obvious disadvantages of
such a system became fully apparent to King Minddn,
who abolished it and decreed that officials of all classes,
both civil and military, should be paid by fixed salaries,
while the plan of levying definite and regular taxes was
at the same time introduced. This was, however, only a
theoretical reorganization. The salaries were never paid
punctually, and often not at all ; hence the innovations
were of little practical effect. But, in any case, the title
of Myosd was retained by the district Governors as long
as the kingdom of Ava existed.

In the Hhitdaw the authority of the four Mingyi

I or Wiingyi was paramount, though it was partially
I shared by the Wundauk or Assistants. The King was
I nominally the President of the Council, or in his absence
1 the heir apparent or other member of the royal family :
I but, practically, the Prime Minister for the time being

\ presided. The latter bore the title Kinwun Mingyi,

vor " governor of the guard-houses." Under the term
Kin were comprised not only all octroi stations round the
capital and the chief towns and the "guard-houses " of all
descriptions, but also the places at which customs dues
were levied, and the military posts commanding all the
several trade routes crossing the administrative frontier.
Hence the honorary title borne by the Prime Minister
combined the idea of " Warden of the Marches " with
"Minister of Customs and Revenues." His departmental
seal was a " scorpion " (Ki?i).

All important business was submitted to the Mingyi
first of all, a large number of subordinates relieving them,
however, from the tediousness of troublesome details.
It might even happen, and as a matter of fact such occa-
sions were not infrequent, that for the time being a Wun-
dauk enjoyed the royal confidence in larger measure than
any of the Alingyi; and in such case his influence with
the latter, his direct official superiors, was always very
great. These eight Secretaries and Assistant Secretaries

156

THE MINISTRY OF AVA

of State, together with the eight Atwinwun, the Privy
Counsellors of the ByMaik or " Ministers of the In-
terior," who will be more especially referred to shortly,
formed the Ministry of the kingdom of Ava.

The chief officials in the departmental secretariats of
the Hlutdaw were the four Nakdndaw, the " royal
listeners " or " receivers of royal orders," who were
charged with the duty of conveying communications to
and from the King and the Council of State. As
insignia of their high office they bore large notebooks
with gilt covers within which the written orders or
counsels were inscribed.

Next to these in rank came the Say^dawgyi or
"great chief clerks." Of these there were originally
four, but in course of time the number was increased to
about twenty. They performed multifarious duties, and
were really officers of considerable importance. They
practically did the bulk of the executive work and of the
general business ; and as all the details were arranged by
them, little or no business of any sort could be gone
through in the Hlutdaw without their assistance. In
addition to this, they held all preliminary investigations
concerning any judicial matters of importance, and gave
judgment in minor civil or criminal suits, subject to the
approval and confirmation of the Mingyi.

The four Ameindaiuyd or " writers of the great
orders " ranked next in dignity and position. Their duty
was to prepare and issue the orders of Government after
all the necessary preliminary steps had been duly taken.
The handwriting of these Clerks of the Great Council
was very beautiful, and their inscriptions of royal orders
were really works of art — an art that is now likely to
become entirely lost.

After these came the Athonsay^ (lit. " writers of use ")
or Clerks of Works, to whom were entrusted the con-
struction and the repairs of all public buildings. Below
these, again, came two classes of correspondence clerks,
the Ahmddawyd or " recorders of orders," who drafted
the orders and letters to be issued by the Council of
State, and the Awiyauk (lit. " distant arrivals "), who
received and read letters coming from a distance before

157

BURMA UNDER BRITISH RULE

submitting them to the Ministers. Letters for the King
were received by two special ceremonial officers called
Thandawgdn, one of whose particular functions was to
open the letters of apology received from all such
feudatory Chiefs, Ministers, and other high officials as
could not, or would not, personally attend and do
homage to the King at each of the Kaddw Pwe or " beg
pardon festivals " which formed the royal levees held
three times a year in the palace at Mandalay. These
constituted the chief ceremonial gatherings of the year,
when tributary Princes from the Shan States, Ministers,
members of the royal family, and all court officials
appeared in the gorgeous apparel prescribed for their
rank or office, and when tribute and presents were sub-
mitted to the King in the great open Hall of Audience
surmounted by the lofty, glittering, and graceful nine-
tiered spire of the My^nan, held to be " the centre of
the universe," whose apex towers above the spot upon
which stands the Lion throne, the chief of the eight
thrones erected at various places within the palace
buildings.

Still lower down in the scale of officials connected
with the Council of State were three classes of cere-
monial officers. The highest of these were the Let-
saungsayd or " clerks of the presents," who read out
the lists of the offerings made to the King at the royal
levies. Next came the Yonzaw or " masters of cere-
monies," who had charge of all the arrangements con-
nected with durbars and audiences of the King. They
furnished the necessary intimation to the officers whose
attendance might either be specially commanded or was
required in the usual rotation, communicated to them
the nature of the business to be transacted, informed
them as to what particular kind of dress they were to
appear in, and gave any other requisite instructions.
The last or lowest class consisted of the Thissddawyd
or "recorders of great oaths," who administered the
oath of fealty to all who were about to enter the royal
service. ^ Such enlistment took place under a prescribed
ceremonial. After the oath had been written down on
paper, it was repeated verbally in front of an image of

158

OFFICERS OF PRIVY COUNCIL

Gaudama by the candidate for employment. The paper
was then burned, and the ashes were put into a cup of
water. After this had been stirred with a small stick
containing models, all tied up together, of the five
weapons of warfare used by the Burmese — bow, spear,
sword, musket, and cannon — the solution was finally
drunk by the person taking the ThissA or " oath.",^_

The highest officers of the Byedaik, the Privy"
Council or Secret Department of the Court, were the
eight Atwinwun or " Ministers of the Interior." Their
chief duties were to communicate the business of the
Hlutdaiv to the King ; but they were likewise charged
with the transaction of general affairs relating to the
interior of the palace. So far as precedence was con-
cerned, they ranked below the four Mingyi, but
somewhat in advance of the four Wundauk or Assistant
Secretaries of State, though the relative positions of
these two different classes of officers depended to a very
considerable extent on the amount of favour bestowed
on the given individuals by the King.

These eight Atwinwun of the Byedaik slept in turn
within the palace, two at a time, along with an equal
number of the high officials of the Hlutdaw. Thus
there were always four Ministers at the palace in attend-
ance on the King. The Atwinwun went to office in
the Byedaik at seven o'clock in the morning, and were
relieved at three o'clock on the following day. About
nine o'clock in the morning a Mingyi and a Wundauk
came in from the Hlutdaw, and for about half an hour
or so discussed with the two Atwinwun any business
under consideration before accompanying them to the
royal presence. Such ministerial lev^e was held by tlie
King every morning. Each afternoon another informal
audience was given by the King, which was termed the
Boskii because military officers {Bo) were then per-
mitted to accompany the Atwinwun into the royal
chamber. About eight o'clock every evening a third
reception took place, when members of the Hlutdaw
again presented themselves before the King in company
with the Atwinwun. It was then, in the still of the
evening, when, even in the longest days of June, the

159

BURMA UNDER BRITISH RULE

short tropical twilight had long since faded into the dark-
ness of night and the fierce heat of the day had passed
away, that the general affairs of the State were quietly
discussed from various points of view and settled, whilst
all business of a more purely formal or of any special
character was disposed of during the daytime. On all
sides of the palace there were small open lounges or
SamSk surmounted by spires of several tiers of roofs,
while the quaint and fantastic gardens and palm groves
immediately to the south-west of the royal chambers
afforded a cool and pleasant retreat in the evening where
the breeze from the south could best be enjoyed. Here
paths meandered along the edges of narrow artificial
watercourses, crossed here and there by quaint rustic
bridges, while steps led through grottoes and up and
down curiously contorted and grotesque rocks made
artificially with Portland cement. Even now, when this
little royal garden is no longer kept up as it once was, it
is the pleasantest spot in Mandalay during the long
arid and hot season of the year.

Next in rank after the Atwinwun in the Secret
Department of the Court came the Thandawzin or
" heralds," who were at the same time charged with the
performance of secretarial business. Their chief duty
consisted in attendance at audiences for the purpose of
noting the King's orders and forwarding them to the
Hlutdaw or Great Council for inscription ; but they also
discharged various ceremonial offices, such as carrying
forth royal letters in state from the palace.

After these heralds came the Shnitunhmu or " lamp-
lighters" of the palace, who were at the same time
responsible for performing the more important duties
of keeping a list of all persons sleeping inside the palace
and of intimating to those concerned when it might be
their turn to have the privilege of remaining out all
night beyond the palace enclosure. If any one whose
name was not on these lamplighters' lists happened to
be found within the stockade and the main gates of the
palace after dark, grave suspicion always fell upon him
or her, and punishment usually followed. To obtain
entrance after dark was difficult, unless the individual

1 60

TREASURY OFFICIALS

in question was entitled by position to exercise such a
privilege. King Mindon retained a number of spies,
called Ataukdazv or " royal assistants," to keep him
secretly informed of the illegal acts and general doings
of his Ministers and provincial Governors. Finding
these spies unreliable, he looked about for others in
whom he could place more trust, and came to the con-
clusion that he would best be served by monks who had
cast off their yellow robes and re-entered the world of
men. Enrolling one thousand men of this class i^Lu-
byandaw, " the great returned "), he thought it might be
a good thing to issue medals to those of them who dis-
tinguished themselves by meritorious service. These
medals, intended to be worn round the neck like a
locket, were to bear the effigy of a Chinthd or " lion " on
one side, and the inscription Vazamatika, " the King's
seal," on the other. But the King died before any were
issued. What may probably be a unique specimen of this
medal I had the good fortune to pick up in Mandalay
bazaar, in 1891, for the price of one rupee.

The lowest grade among the officials of the Byedaik
consisted of the Teindeinyanhmu or "caretakers" of
the palace furniture, draperies and other appointments,
whose functions were menial rather than administrative.

Apart from the Hlutdaw and the Byedaik, the Great and
the Privy Councils of the State, were the officers of the
Shwedaik, the "gold house" or Treasury, within which
were also contained the State archives and records of
various kinds, such as the genealogies of all hereditary
officials and the lists of the royal artificers, whose offices
were likewise hereditary, the head of each family being
one of the permanent Treasury officials. These latter
comprised the Shwedaik Wun or Chancellor of the
Exchequer, the Shwedaik S6 or " Governor of the
Treasury," the Shwedaik Kyat or " Superintendent,"
the Shwedaik Sayd or " clerk of the Treasury," and the
Shwedaik Thawgaing or " keeper of the key of the
Treasury."

When King Mindon swept away the wasteful and
oppressive system of allowing districts to be squeezed
by the " eaters of townships," and substituted for this

161 M

BURMA UNDER BRITISH RULE

ancient custom the levy of regular taxes and the pay-
ment of fixed salaries to officials of all descriptions, the
village community system was adopted as the basis of
the revenue administration of the Kingdom. Teak
timber, earth-oil, and precious stones of all kinds were
included in the royal monopolies, and all the revenue
from these rich stores was supposed to go direct into the
privy purse. Under this reformed system the principal
item of the State revenue was the Thdtham^dd^ or
house tax, which was levied in the form of a house tax,
but was in principle somewhat of the nature of an indirect
income tax. It was not a Latxd Revenue demand in the
true sense of this term. It was levied on all classes
throughout the whole country, with the exception of the
inhabitants of the royal city of Mandalay, who appear
to have been exempt from direct taxation of any kind.
The largest amount of revenue that ever reached
King Thibaw's treasury in any one year was about
I GO to 105 lacs of rupees (about ;!^700,ooo) ; and of
this total between 25 and 35 lacs (about ;^ 166,666 to
-^233,333) were the proceeds of customs, monopolies,
and transit dues. Classified as to their remunerative-
ness, the sources of royal income were Thdthamddd,
monopolies and imposts, rent of royal lands, irrigation
taxes, and tribute from the Shan States.

In the assessment and collection of this Thdthamddd
or house tax every district and town, except the capital,
was classified according to its situation, wealth, and
prosperity : and the total assessment for each such unit
was based upon this classification, so as to range from
about 6 to 10 rupees (9 to 15 shillings) per household.
But in the vast majority of cases the maximum rate of
10 rupees was fixed, so that the total demand falling on
a village of 50 houses would be 500 rupees (^33^).

^ Originally the term Thdtham'edd is said to have been Thattamedd,
meaning revenue levied by royal authority once in seven years (from
Saiiamd, "seven"). Subsequently such special demand was made
only once every ten years {Daihatnd, " ten "). Ultimately it became
an annual demand. It is not a tithe or tenth part, as might easily be
imagmed from the obvious similarity of the name with the PaU word
for ten.

162

THE HOUSE TAX

The highest assessment was levied upon villages situated
on rich stretches of fertile alluvial lands lying within
easy reach of the rivers forming the vast silent highways
along which all surplus produce was borne to market ;
for the Irrawaddy river and its tributaries, many of
which are themselves worthy of being ranked as large
rivers, formed the main arteries of trade and com-
munication.

The average quality of the soil and the proximity or
remoteness of given tracts from river communication
were the chief considerations which mainly influenced
the authorities in Mandalay in determining the incidence
of taxation in a general way. But the assessment might
vary from year to year, and it never became of the
nature of any Settlement extending at fixed rates over
lengthy periods. The basis for such a Settlement as
was introduced under Akbar by Todar Mull in India
had been laid by King Bodaw Payd in 1783 a.d. (1145
Burmese era), when the Shwedaik or Burmese Dooms-
day Book was compiled, containing a complete record
of the population and resources of the empire. But the
genius of the Burmese rulers did not run on similar
lines to that of the great Mohammedan conquerors of
India.

A bad harvest through insufficient rainfall during the
south-west monsoon in the summer months, or the
destruction of a village by fire, or any other of the
numerous causes which might affect the ability of the
villages to satisfy the demand of the tax levied, was
duly taken into account in assessing this Thdthmn^dd,
In order to guide the revenue officials at Mandalay in
such matters, fortnightly reports were submitted by the
district officials regarding any local circumstances likely
to affect the assessment.

This revenue demand was collected either by the
local officers or else by specially appointed tax collectors
called Thugyi or " headmen," the procedure varying
sometimes from year to year, and in other cases accord-
ing to the locality. Instructions under the royal
authority were issued from the Hlutdaw to the officials
concerned, the incidence of taxation per house being laid

163

BURMA UNDER BRITISH RULE
down for each local unit of assessment, and the exemp-
tions to be granted being specified in detail.

Provided thus with the tax lists, the collector levied
the prescribed contributions during the months of April
and May, after the winter crops had been harvested and
when inland communication from village to village was
easiest. On arrival at each town or village he
enumerated the houses. Multiplying this number by
the rate fixed per house, he easily arrived at the total
demand to be satisfied. On receipt of this revenue
assessment the Ywdlugyi or "village elders" met to-
gether in conclave, usually sitting coram Publico on a
wooden dais erected under the shade of some large and
spreading tree in the middle of the village ; and here
they arranged among themselves the amount to be con-
tributed by each individual householder towards the
entire satisfaction of the demands of the royal Treasury.
This local readjustment of the incidence of taxation by
the elders of the people rendered possible the distri-
bution of the burden in a fairly equitable manner among
those best able to bear it. Destitute persons and all
such as were incapacitated from work through age, sick-
ness, or accident were exempted from paying any share,
whilst the heads of the village community sought to
apportion the burden equitably among those most able
to contribute towards the payment of the full sum
demanded.

This was, of course, no difficult matter in villages
where each man and woman had a most intimate
acquaintance with the affairs of their fellow villagers.
Objections would naturally sometimes be made to this
informal sub-assessment ; and, when these differences of
opinion could not be amicably settled, the tax collector
frequently acted as arbitrator to settle the disputes.
Sometimes village assessors, called Thamddi, were
appointed by the elders, in which case they were
solemnly made to swear at the village pagoda that they
would be just in determining the sum payable by each
householder. Thus, so far as the Treasury was con-
cerned, the Thdthamddd was assessed and levied as a
house tax fixed mainly according to the remunerative-

164

THE HOUSE TAX

ness of the land or of trade ; while in being raised by
the local headmen it was collected practically in the
form of an income tax.

This redistribution of the tax having been made by
the village elders, the total revenue demand from the
village was usually paid in cash at once, though some-
times a concession was given permitting payment in two
or more instalments. The money thus collected was
remitted to Mandalay and paid into the Treasury, where
the taxation lists and the accounts were checked and
audited. Peculation was, however, rife. The lists of
houses on which the assessments were based were
falsified to such an extent that about a fifth of the
average annual revenue from this source went into the
pockets of officials instead of into the royal Treasury.
The prevalence of dacoity during Thibaw's reign also
affected agricultural interests to such an extent that in
some localities the revenue from this source had
dwindled away to a mere fraction of what it had
formerly been.

This principle, well suited to the Burmese character
and a natural evolution of their former political system,
was wisely retained in force after the annexation of
Upper Burma in 1886, though the village community
system upon which Thdtham^dd was based had been
abandoned in Lower Burma, after the annexation of
1852, in favour of a capitation tax and of a land tenure
more consistent with Western ideas. But even Govern-
ments profit by experience. To have endeavoured to
overthrow the Thdthamddd in favour of the capitation
tax and the land tax levied in Lower Burma would have
been raising up an even stronger opposition to the
imposition of British rule than that which cost, during
1886 to 1890, more than enough of good English blood,
of brave Indian troops, and of poor depreciated rupees.

The land-tenure system was not very precise or clear.
The cultivated tracts were either Crown lands, or else
lands held under various tenures of a feudal nature, or
private and hereditary lands. There were no great
landowners save the King. The Crown lands com-
prised the Ledaw or "royal fields," the Ayddaw or

165

BURMA UNDER BRITISH RULE

"government property," including islands, alluvial form-
ations, and lands subject to periodical change through
riverine action, and the Lamaijigmyd or tracts cultivated
by the royal predial slaves {Lamaing), large colonies of
whom were located in the irrigated tracts near the
Nanda and Aungbinle lakes or water reservoirs lying
to the north-east and south of Mandalay. Except as
regards the tracts cultivated by the predial slaves, these
Crown lands were let out to tenants at will, who had to
pay a fixed proportion of the gross produce, the actual
amount payable depending on the outturn harvested.
The rent was fixed by custom and was ordinarily one-
fourth of the gross produce. The tenant was liable to
eviction at any moment. In some parts of the country
evictions were common, while in other parts they were so
rare that the tenants had practically a fixity of tenure.

The tenures of feudal nature were those obtaining
with regard to all Chdmyd or land bestowed by the
King. It became the property of the recipient, but was
heritable only if it were so set forth in the royal order.
Such land was held either on condition of rendering
public service or as an appanage to, or emolument
of, a public office held by persons who actually or
nominally rendered, or were liable to render, service
to the King. Of tenures thus assigned for actual or
nominal service there were a great variety and a sur-
prising number ; but only a few of the principal varieties
need be noted as of interest. Some lands were assigned
for life, or for several lives, or for a given period to
members of the royal family {Minmy^) ; while the produce
of other lands (IVtmsd) was enjoyed by Governors of
rural districts (IVun), or it was "eaten" by revenue
collectors {Tkugyisd), or by the soldiers of the King's
cavalry (Sisd), or by foot soldiers, or by royal pages,
boatmen, litter bearers, carriers of the betel box, and
others employed in the royal service i^Ahtmlddnsd).
In point of fact, all the royal grants were really nothing
more than assignments, in actual practice revocable at
will ; for the sovereign could, and not infrequently did,
arbitrarily degrade subjects and escheat their possessions.

The Thugyisdmy^, or land bestowed by the King on

i66

LAND TENURE

a revenue collector as an appanage of his office, may be
considered more closely as a typical instance of the sort
of feudal tenure obtaining in Upper Burma. If such
land were mortgaged on account of having to provide
money for the King, the Thugyis successor in office was
bound to redeem it. But if mortgaged for the Thugyis
own private debts, then his children were bound to
redeem it either for one of themselves, if one of them
should succeed his father in office, or else for the new
incumbent. The sale of such land was illegal, and
consequently void. These revenue collectors were
usually appointed direct by the King, by whom alone
they could be dismissed after they had once taken the
oath of allegiance. They were included as a class
among the 80,000 Amdt or petty notables of the
empire. Apart from the royal house of Alaung Payd
there was no aristocracy whatever in the country.
Nor was there any leading class. Owing to the
monastic schools, all were of about the same low level of
education ; owing to the fear of oppression, there were
no rich men ; and owing to the sparseness of the
population, there were no poor. Any man might rise to
the highest offices under the Crown.

Private and hereditary lands were neither subject to
any incidents of service nor to the payment of land reve-
nue. Waste land or unreclaimed forest jungle could be
cleared without asking permission {Damdugyd). When
thus brought under cultivation, it became the private
property of the person who cleared and tilled it ; and
it could descend to his heirs or be disposed of by him
or them, by sale or otherwise. These, together with
lands granted under the written orders of the King,
comprised the Bobdbaing or hereditary lands " owned
by the father and grandfather " of the person in
possession. Along with these may also be classed the
Wuttagdn lands assigned to the maintenance of pagodas,
monasteries, and other religious institutions. For tenants
of such private lands there was neither fixity of tenure
nor legal limits as to rent. When let out for cultivation,
the produce was usually divided in equal shares between
the owner and his tenant. When private land was sold,

167

BURMA UNDER BRITISH RULE

it was customary, at the time of making it over to the
purchaser, to walk round the small ridges {Kazinyo)
dividing the ricefields. The unit of measurement of
agricultural land was the Pe of 1,200 square cubits, equal
to 175 acres. In some parts it was roughly computed as
the area covered by five baskets of paddy sown broad-
cast.

^From what has been said above it will be seen that
(he village was practically the unit for revenue purposes ;
andj'the general administration was also based on the
"vITTage system. Each village had a Thugyi or " head-
man " elected by its inhabitants, who had specific duties
to perform and certain responsibilities thrust upon him,
and who was invested with substantial powers to enable
him to discharge his functions efficiently, and to maintain
his authority. He could call upon the villagers to assist
him, and could, at his own instance, inflict punishment
for disobedience to his lawful requisitions. He was fre-
quently not only the tax collector, but also the village
magistrate ; and sometimes, in addition thereto, he per-
formed the functions of a judge. But the village was,
as a whole, held responsible for the payment of the
annual revenue demand, for its own general good order,
and for its own defence against dacoits or gang-robbers.
The whole village was held liable to fine if stolen
catde or other property were traced to its limits, if the
perpetrators of serious crime committed within its bor-
ders remained undetected, or if it could offer no reasonable
jexcuse for failing to resist an attack by dacoits.

The villages were surrounded by stockades consisting
of chevaux-de-frise of bamboos with sharp ends pointing
outwards, or formed of posts and thorny branches of the
zibin [Zizyphus jujtiba) and other prickly shrubs or
small trees growing even in the dryest parts ; and exit
therefrom could only be made at gates facing the cardinal
points. In the smaller hamlets there were usually only
two gates, but larger villages had four. In every case
each gate was guarded by a Kin or " watch-house," in
which two young men were always supposed to remain
at night keeping watch and ward. They were nick-
named Ki7ikwd or " watch-dogs," as it was their duty to

168

THE VILLAGE SYSTEM

hail all passers by, like a dog barking at any one passing
his kennel.

Under such a system, which united the village com-
munity both by common interest and local feeling, it was
of course necessary to maintain a careful watch over
the movements of strangers within the gate. Whoever
entertained any stranger was bound to report to the Thu-
gyi the arrival and departure of the guest. No one
could squat in the village lands, or settle in the village,
without the permission of the headman ; and he could
petition the Wun or Myosd in charge of the rural district to
order the removal of persons suspected to be of criminal
tendencies. The village lands were demarcated, and in
autumn, at the commencement of the dry season, rough
tracks were cleared by every village up to the wooden
posts fixed where the communal lands marched with
those of the adjoining villages. This was a simple and
tolerably effective means of communication, which cost
nothing to the administration. When officials travelled,
they were met at the village boundaries, and passed thus
from village to village during the whole course of their
progress.

The central authority controlling the Burmese system
of village communities was weakened to a considerable
extent during King Mindon's reign by innovations intro-
duced by him (see p. 1 56). And later on, during the seven
years Thibaw occupied the throne (i 878-1 885), the
rural Governors became less and less easy to control. It
was only in the broad plains of the Irrawaddy and its
main tributaries that orders could be enforced. In the
hills to the north and north-east, which were inhabited by
wild Kachin tribes, these nomads were very much left to
themselves. They had a reputation for blood-thirstiness,
from the fearlessness characteristic of most mountaineers.
The plains fringing the outskirts of most of the Kachin
country, near where the Meza from the west and the
Shweli from the east join the Irrawaddy river about
200 miles north of Mandalay, formed the Siberia of
Upper Burma. Subsequently Mogaung, a wilder and
more nearly inaccessible place much further to the north,
became the penal settlement. These were all highly

169

BURMA UNDER BRITISH RULE

malarious and unhealthy localities, banishment to which
was popularly considered as equivalent to a sentence of
death. In the north-west the hill tracts were peopled
by the equally wild Chins, who were likewise a terror
to the Burmese. All these hill tribes throughout the
northern portions of the country had for generations
been accustomed to find profit and pastime in raiding
villages on the plains, in pillaging travellers, and in levy-
ing blackmail from those within reach of their attacks.

Even in the more settled districts of the plains to
which the central authority extended in its fullest sense,
whole districts were overrun by bands of dacoits or
gang-robbers, some of which were actually in league
with and under the protection of high officials at the
Court. The notorious Taingda Mingyi, one of the
blackest of scoundrels, is known to have aggrandised his
income by sharing the spoils with the robber bands, and
to have protected them by giving timely information of
any expedition intended to be sent against them. In
1885 he instigated the massacre of the leaders of the
bands who were then in captivity in Mandalay, in order
to obtain the security which comes of dead men telling no
tales. These dacoit bands often included hundreds of
men, and sometimes assumed the proportions of small
armies.

Under the law of British India the term "dacoity " is
defined as gang-robbery by five men or more, but the
Burmese term Damyd simply means " many swords."
The dacoits of Upper Burma were bandits or free-
booters, who harassed more or less definite tracts of
country, like the brigands of Greece and Italy. Dacoity
was, in reality, a more or less organized guerilla system of
attack and defence, which had been customary from time
immemorial and had its origin in the village community
system of administration. In the absence of the strong
hand of a central government, it was the natural method
by which force could be repelled by force, and public
or private wrongs righted. The dacoit bands were
recruited from among the young men of the vicinity, and
no loss of social caste was entailed thereby. Each Bo or
leader of a band was a sort of Robin Hood, at once

170

INSURRECTIONS FREQUENT

feared and looked up to by the villages within his reach.
Subsidized by them, he became their protector and
defender against the raids and exactions of other Bo.

As the monarchy was not strictly hereditary, but here-
ditary only in the sense of being confined to the members
of the family of Alaung Paya, which had been in posses-
sion of the throne for the few generations since 1755,
each scion of the royal line considered himself justified
in raising the banner of insurrection whenever he thought
he had a fair chance of success. Generally he could plead,
if excuse were required, that the successful rival on the
throne had endeavoured to secure himself by putting all
his near male relatives to death. No King of Burma had
ever been able to suppress insurrections of this sort.
Some sovereigns of unusual energy obtained temporary
tranquillity by executing or imprisoning all formidable
rivals and by employing leaders who were able to break up
the larger bands of dacoits ; but these peaceful periods
were never of long duration, because the efforts to
organize a regular army and an efficient police were
always neutralized by the incapacity and procrastination
of the officials, and by the inherent dislike of all kinds of
discipline which is ingrained in the Burmese character.

The ease with which any Prince of the house of
Alaung Payd was able to raise a following explained not
only the jealousy with which the reigning monarch kept
his near relatives shut up within the palace enclosure,
but also the closely secluded position which he himself
maintained. It was seldom that a royal progress could
be undertaken to any distance, as there was always the
fear either of an attack outside of the palace, or of find-
ing the palace gate closed against him on his return. On
one of the rare occasions on which King Mindon went
forth to enjoy an outing in a royal garden in the vicinity
of Mandalay he was attacked by his own son, the
Myingun Prince, and barely escaped with his life by the
back door of the summer-house in which he was sleep-
ing ; while the King's brother, the Mindat Prince, had to
pay with his life the penalty of having been appointed
Einshd Min or heir apparent, and thereby nominated
formally as his brother's successor on the throne.

171

BURMA UNDER BRITISH RULE

The appointment of an heir apparent and successor
was one of the royal prerogatives. This want of strict
hereditary succession to the throne was the main cause
of much bloodshed, intrigue, and disorganization. The
Myingun Prince's insurrection occurred in 1866. He
escaped into British territory, and was for many years
maintained as a prisoner at Benares, in Bengal, but
ultimately escaped and lived under French protection
at Pondicherry. King Mindon seldom left his capital
after 1866, and King Thibaw was probably never once
outside of the palace enclosure during the whole of the
seven years of his reign.

In administrative capacity King Thibaw proved a
very degenerate son of Mindon. In fact, he was below
rather than above the average of Burmese sovereigns.
Placed on the throne, while yet a boy, by means of a
palace intrigue cleverly carried through by his prospective
mother-in-law, he was weak and excitable, his conduct
exhibiting the extremes of temerity and timidity. Many
stories have been told of his fearful drunkenness and
personal vices ; but they were partly false, and in any
case were gross exaggerations. Under the control of
Queen Supaydlat, and influenced strongly by ignorant
and unworthy favourites among his Ministers, he over-
threw Mindon's policy of keeping on good terms with
the British, and he suffered laxity and corruption to
canker the administration of the State : and for these
things he was in due time heavily punished by dethrone-
ment, exile, and the downfall of the ancient kingdom of
Ava.

During the closing years of the kingdom of Ava the
authority of the central Government had become so dis-
organized that anarchy prevailed throughout the country,
and officials of all classes did very much what seemed
good in their own eyes. So long as the Thdthaniedd
revenue was regularly remitted to the due amount, the
other details of administration were not very closely
watched. There was a stand of between 10,000 and
15,000 serviceable fire-arms in the royal arsenal, and an
army of about 13,000 infantry, 2,000 cavalry, and a few
artillery was maintained in and around the capital, but

172

MILITARY ORGANIZATION

these troops were next to useless. There was no real
military organization. The Ministers of State, Privy
Councillors, and Assistant Ministers were all generals of
sorts who might be ordered to take the field in charge of
an army ; but the only actual military ranks were the Bo,
or captain, and the Sitke, or lieutenant, who performed
duties partly of a military and partly of a police nature.
The rabble forming the army was recruited as circum-
stances required, the soldiers being paid on a sliding scale
according to the length of service agreed on. A military
rank abolished by King Mindon included the Thw^-
thaukgyi or ** great blood drinkers," who were captains ot
fifty, and to each of whom seven families were assigned,
together with lands for his maintenance.

The whole country was terrorized by the various
dacoit Bo ; all social and political bonds became loosened ;
villages and towns were burned ; and, not infrequently,
even the district Governors were murdered by dacoit
bands. Bhamo, the em.porlum of trade with China in
the north-east, was burnt by Chinese freebooters, and the
Kachin tribes were in insurrection ; while in the feudatory
Shan States, extending from the range of hills near
Mandalay eastwards to Yunnan, a league had been
formed to throw off the Burmese yoke, and many of the
Sawbwa or ruling Princes were in open rebellion. So
bad did affairs ultimately become that King Thibaw
actually ruled over little more than the royal city of
Mandalay and its immediate vicinity, and the tracts com-
manded by the main channels of communication ; and
even within this limited area there was always a vast
amount of maladministration. The case of the sack of
Bhamo, on 8th December, 1884, was a typical instance
of the way affairs were conducted in outlying parts of the
kingdom. When the Kachin hill tribes revolted and
attacked Bhamo, the Governor employed a number of
Chinese to help in defending the town, and promised
them a certain sum for their services. The Governor
failing to keep his promise, these Chinese free-lances
collected at a place called Matin and swooped down on
Bhamo, first of all looting it, and then setting fire to it.
The Chinese authorities had no hand in the matter. It

173

BURMA UNDER BRITISH RULE

was simply an act of Yannanese marauders, out of
personal revenge for being defrauded of the price agreed
on for their defence of the town against Burmese subjects
in revolt.

The Burmese Shan States extended over enormous
tracts of country beyond the Salween and Mekong rivers
till they marched with the Chinese province of Yunnan
on the north-east, and with the Siamese Shan States on
the east. They were mutually independent States, each
ruled by its own Prince or Chief, whose title might be
either Sdwbwa, Myosd, or Ngw^gunhmu, according to
the size of his State, and his power and influence. There
were some sixty to seventy of these chieftains, some of
whom were powerful and practically independent Princes,
forming the remnants of the great Shan nation which
centuries ago held the whole of Further India. The
name Shayi is a Chinese word meaning " mountain."
Some fifteen of the smallest Shan States formed the
Mydat, or " fallow tracts," bordering on the plains of
Burma, which, though of great fertility, had become
almost depopulated, owing to constant raiding and petty
warfare. But all the different States had their constant
feuds among themselves as well as with the Burmese on
the plains ; and during the last years of Burmese rule
they were torn and decimated by internecine struggles.
The Burmese Government asserted its supremacy over
the whole of these Shan States, and the King of Burma
appointed to each its chief. The States adjacent to the
Irrawaddy valley were controlled from Mandalay, but in
those lying far from the capital two Sitke or Military
Prefects, supported by garrisons of Burmese troops, were
established at Mond and Mobye for controlling the
general administration of the States. Although profess-
ing to decide disputes between the mutually independent
States, these Sitke left to the chiefs the management of
their domestic affairs. Since the time of King Mindon, if
not earlier, the western Shan States had regularly remitted
to Mandalay tributes assessed, like the ThdthamMd, on
the number of households ; but the suzerainty over the
eastern States beyond the Salween and the Mekong
was of a shadowy nature, and the tribute exacted was

174

THE SHAN STATES

rather of a nominal and purely formal kind than of any
really substantial value.

The administration of the Shan States, as of other
parts of the kingdom of Ava, fell into great disorder
when Thibaw succeeded King Mindon. The tribute
payable by these amounted nominally to about ^30,000
a year, only a small portion of which was latterly paid.
But about ;^5o,ooo were collected by means of imposts
and restrictions on the importation and sale of Letpet or
"pickled tea," which formed the most valuable product
brought down from the hills.

In 1884, six of the Sawbwa became embroiled with
the Burmese Government, and had to seek refuge in the
Kengtung State east of the Salween, whose powerful
Chief, remote from Mandalay, enjoyed a large measure
of independence, and was for personal reasons thoroughly
disaffected towards the Court of Ava. In this asylum
the exiled Sawbwa entered into a plot either to over-
throw King Thibaw or to establish an independent
sovereignty in the Shan States. The Prince selected to
be their leader was the Limbin Prince, a son of the heir
apparent who was killed in 1866, when the Myingun
Prince attempted to kill both his father (Mindon) and his
uncle (Mindat) and usurp the throne. On Thibaw's
accession the Limbin Prince escaped to Lower Burma,
where he was employed as a Myo Ok or magistrate in
charge of a subdivision of a district. Removed from
this appointment for incompetency, and for abusing his
liberty by trying to organize rebellion in Upper Burma,
he was living under nominal surveillance in Moulmein
when he received the invitation from the exiled Sawbwa,
and hurried away to accept it, in October, 1885, just
before the outbreak of the third Burmese war. The
end of this futile insurrection has, however, been else-
where told (p. 134). It is mentioned again here merely
to illustrate the condition of anarchy into which the
kingdom of Ava had fallen under Thibaw's rule.

175

Chapter VII

LAW AND JUSTICE UNDER BURMESE RULE

UNDER their own King the Burmese were not
Htigious. Differences of opinion were for by far
the most part settled amicably by the parties themselves,
or else by one or more arbitrators {Aminydtd Kun\
jointly appointed, or by official arbitrators {Ktcndaw)
appointed by the King, who formed a class enjoying
considerable judicial reputation.^ To those who were
dissatisfied with the awards of such arbitrators, or for
cases between parties not both resident in the same
place, the court of the Myowun, or district Governor,
was open ; and if satisfaction was not obtainable there,
suits might be filed in one of the five civil courts in
Mandalay. The ultimate court of appeal was the
Hlutdaw, to which also direct application might be
made in more important cases. In this highest court
the King usually appointed the heir apparent or one
or two of the senior Princes of the blood royal to decide
the cases in consultation with the four Mingyi. From
the decision of the Hlutdaw there was ordinarily no
appeal ; but, in specially important cases concerning
hereditary, territorial, and other claims, the parties to the
suit were sometimes brought before the royal presence,
after having petitioned through the Hlutdaw for such
privilege, when the case was either re-heard or the Min-
gyi were invited to explain the reasons of their decision
before the latter was either confirmed or reversed by the
final judgment of the King.

^ Among the alterations made in the judicial administration during
King Thibaw's time the practice of appointing Kun to try cases was
abolished, and civil courts were constituted of different grades as to
powers, jurisdiction, value of suits, appeals, etc.

176

THE LAWS OF MANU

In the Dammathdt, or Laws of Manu, an ancient civil
and criminal code existed, which was followed to a cer-
tain extent ; but, as there was no authoritative code of
procedure, the arbitrators and judges acted very much
on lines of their own. They administered justice rather
by equity, according to their own lights and ideas, than
by law : and this naturally often led to the civil suits
being settled by a compromise. Nor was impartiality
one of the ruling characteristics with which Burmese
judges were usually credited. Oaths were not adminis-
tered on ordinary occasions, because an oath was re-
garded with a deep-rooted, semi-religious dread as a
kind of solemn ordeal ; hence they were only resorted to
when one of the parties to the suit agreed to be bound
by the effect of his adversary's statement made on oath.

When the ordeal by oath was decided on, it was, like
most solemn ceremonies in Burma, made the occasion of
a festival. The litigants and their friends, all dressed in
the gayest of garments and accompanied by a band of
music, proceeded to a sacred edifice, where the statement
upon oath was made in front of an image of Gaudama.
Four forms of ordeal might be resorted to with regard
to lawsuits. The other three comprised the ordeal by
water, the ordeal by molten lead, and that by candle.

In the first of these the plaintiff and the defendant
went into deep water : their heads were pushed under
water with poles, and right lay with him who could
remain longest under water. As this ordeal could be
performed by deputy, it seems to have been one of the
most unsatisfactory description, which could only be re-
sorted to by a childishly superstitious race such as the
Burmese undoubtedly are. The ordeal by molten lead
consisted in plunging the forefinger of each party into
molten lead after the finger had been so tied round with
feathers that only the tip remained exposed. If one
party came out of the ordeal with less injury to his finger
than was sustained by his opponent, he won the suit :
otherwise the inflamed and damaged fingers were pricked,
and the glorious uncertainty of the law decided in favour
of him from whose badly burned finger-tip the less
amount of serum flowed. The ordeal by candle took

177 N

BURMA UNDER BRITISH RULE

place, like the ordeal by oath, in a sacred edifice and in
front' of an image of the Buddha. Two candles, equal
in every respect, were lighted after the usual formula of
pious invocation had been repeated, and the suit was
lost by that party whose candle first burned out and
becfime extinguished.

^^he Myoimin, or Governors of districts, practically
exercised full civil and criminal jurisdiction in all ordinary
suits. As there was no authoritative penal code through-
out the land, punishments were awarded according to the
discretion of the judge ; but his zeal, or whatever other
more appropriate name may be given to the character-
istic of his mind at the moment, often outran his dis-
cretion. The quality of mercy might or might not be
strained, yet appeals were extremely rare in criminal
cases. The real explanation of this is, however, that, if
any successful appeal were made, the village to which the
appellant belonged could be harassed and annoyed in so
many ways which were open to no appeal that finally
the mischief-maker would be turned neck and crop out
of the village in order to promote peace and welfare
once more. It was recognized that there was no use in
fighting when one had only the very thin end of the stick.
Monetary fines were usually inflicted, though cruel pun-
ishments were often adopted when the frequency of crime
began to be specially noticeable. Whenever dacoity
became so prevalent as to call for remonstrances from
Mandalay, prisoners caught red-handed were usually
crucified to serve as a terror-inspiring example. When
undue or habitual severity on the part of a rural
Governor was brought to the notice of higher authority
at the capital, the ready explanation was given that the
zeal of the Myowun had outrun his discretion, or, as
the Burmese equivalent puts it, " his hand had reached
further than he intended." Even at the capital, inhuman
punishments were common for trivial offences. Thus,
disobedience to a royal order might entail the slitting
of the mouth and cheeks with a knife, after the jaws had
been stretched wide open with a wooden instrument.
To have ordered the death of any man or woman would
have been an unpardonable sin in a Buddhist ; hence the

178

THE LAWS OF MANtJ

pronouncement of the death sentence by the King was
in the formula, " Let his property be confiscated, and let
him travel by the usual road." In Thibaw's time (1878-
1885) it is said to have been more tersely summed up in
a mere wish not to see the person again.

The chief civil and criminal Courts of First Instance in
Mandalay were situated, like the Hlutdaw, at the Red
or King's Gate on the eastern side of the palace, but
beyond the stockade or external inclosure. The Civil
Court decided important suits arising in Mandalay, and
considered appeals from provincial and subordinate
courts. But as, theoretically, no civil case was beyond
the jurisdiction of the Hlutdaw, all appeals concerning
landed property and hereditary offices were brought
before the latter. All criminal appeals were also brought
before the Hlut, whilst the Criminal Court merely dis-
posed of cases which occurred at the capital.

The Dammathdt or Laws of Manu, the great primary
judicial code forming the Institutes of Law in both civil
and criminal matters, consists of fourteen sections. It is
a theoretical guide to the statute law, in which the pre-
cepts are very frequently illustrated by means of parables,
according to ancient custom throughout all the East.
Some of the sections are practically confined to one
subject, and are more or less complete, as, for example,
the third section, dealing with borrowing, lending, and
debts ; the seventh, detailing the laws of slavery ; the
tenth, laying down the law of inheritance ; and the thir-
teenth, treating of betting ; but there is a general want
of anything like codification or systematic collection of
different subjects under groups in logical sequence. So
far as any system in the arrangement can be traced the
Dammathdt begins by dealing with the boundaries of
land, for *' Cursed is he that removeth his neighbour s
landmark " found a foremost place in the ancient laws
of all eastern nations. It then goes on to deal with
movable property, with laws relating to pledges, hiring,
master and servant, taxes and contracts, with theft and
assault, with the law of husband and wife, with laws
relating to other men and women, with slaves and slavery,
with rights in land, gifts, borrowing, lending, and hiring,

179

BURMA UNDER BRITISH RULE
with miscellaneous matters connected with persons and
personal property, with inheritance, with divorce and the
partition of property on separation, and with betting ;
finally it ends with miscellaneous matters chiefly regard-
ing the Upazd or " precincts " of houses, monasteries,
villages, towns, etc., and the law of trespass by huntsmen,
fishermen, gatherers of honey, marriage parties, and
funeral processions.

Some of the matters dealt with are very amusing.
Thus, in the fourth section there are laws ''regarding
one person kicking another',' or " when one person pulls
another s hair I' and ""when a dtgraded person points with
the finger at a respectable one',' as well as " the law by
which men are divided into three classes — excellent,
middling, and depraved, — and each of these is also sub-
divided into three classes." Again, in the eighth section,
laws are laid down regarding borrowing clothes and
going to a funeral in them, or unthinkingly wearing
them whilst washing the head in order to avert the evil
influence of the stars. The section following this con-
tains the laws when a father-in-law assaults his son-in-
law, and vice versa, also when the property of a visitor is
lost whilst he is residing as guest in any house, or when
the property of the house-owner is lost during the guest's
stay ; and the laws relating to the seven kinds of witches
or wizards, and their trial by ordeal of water.

The perusal of these Laws of Manii is of considerable
assistance in arriving at a true comprehension of the
Burmese national character. They have a strictly re-
ligious basis. Though the laws take cognizance of mur-
der and homicide, wilful and otherwise, and the killing
of animals, yet they do not prescribe or sanction the
infliction of capital punishment; and in this they differ con-
siderably from the more ancient laws in other parts of
the East, which demanded a life for a life, an eye for
an eye, and a tooth for a tooth. Thus, —

The la\y relating to murder is that, from any man who has killed
another with a sword, spear, bow and arrow, or any other instrument,
it is proper to demand restitution in an increased number of men; it is
not proper to put him to death. If a dog bite a man's foot, it is not
proper for that man to bite the dog's foot; nor is it right to put any

i8o

THE LAWS OF MANU

man to death because he has killed another. A king who does not put
a murderer to death will be praised by the good spirits and all good
men, and will be supported and assisted by them ; while all evil beings,
who have no respect for the laws, will keep afar off. The country ruled
over by such a king will be pleasant to dwell in, and the inhabitants
thereof will be prosperous and happy.

No mention whatever is made of imprisonment, the
punishments prescribed for offences invariably taking the
form of compensations or fines, either in kind or else in
silver or gold, commensurate with the amount of injury
inflicted and with the manner or intention of inflicting
it. Under certain circumstances slavery was a punish-
ment for debt ; and of the sixteen kinds of slaves four
became so from this cause. Impartiality on the part of
judges was exhorted as essential for the proper adminis-
tration of justice, and for their guidance it was duly
recorded that ''the unjust judge shall suffer punishment
in hell with head downwards, while the just judge shall
ascend to the land of spirits and attain Neikban " i^Ni}^-
vana\ Truthful^evidence, ranking equally in importance
with impartiality in the judge, is enjoined under pain of
immediate degradation, the " law of evidence " being
tersely summed up thus : —

Oh, King! if any man, whether produced as a witness or not, who
habitually prevaricates in place of speaking truthfully — who calls the
elder the younger, and the younger the elder ; the greater the less, and
the less the greater ; the good bad, and the bad good — when examined
as a witness between two parties, does not tell the truth, and the
case is decided in consequence of his false evidence : let this false
witness be taken before the house of him who hath thereby suffered
damage, and let him there beg for ten to fifteen days, with his face
blackened with soot, with his body whitewashed with hme, naked,
and holding in his hand a potsherd ; and then let him be turned out
of the country, and called a degraded fellow, whose word cannot be
believed.

The laws of husband and wife, of divorce and partition
of property on separation, and the laws of inheritance, are
given with very full detail, and are much more practical
and concrete than the above theoretical treatment of
perjury. Marriage consists in a man and a woman being
given to each other by their parents, or being brought to-

i8i

BURMA UNDER BRITISH RULE

gether by the intervention of a go-between, or by coming
together by mutual consent ; but, in each case, living and
eating together out of the same dish constitute the legal
outward sign of marriage. The seven kinds of wives are
enumerated and described both in the fifth and the twelfth
sections of the Dammatkdt, the title of the latter section
being The Seven Kinds of Wives, the Three Ways of
Co7itracting Marriage, and the Law of Divorce. The
descriptions of the seven kinds of wives afford so good
an insight into certain phases of Burmese character
and of domestic relations that they are worth quoting at
length : —

I. A Wife like a Mother is this : — A mother takes care that no bugs,
gnats, mosquitoes, or horseflies bite or sting her child. If he be in
charge of any other person, she fears he will receive hurt or get im-
proper food, that they do not love him, or that they love and hate him
at the same time. If he cries, she thinks he is being beaten. If others
give him the best of food, she thinks there may be poison in it, and
wishes him to eat only what she herself selects. If he be asleep or
doing nothing, she is happy and contented ; and no matter how he is
dressed, she thinks him handsome. Lest anything befall him while
asleep, she will not leave him till he wakes. If he walks out in the sun
or rain, she is anxious lest he be sunstruck, or slip and fall. Though
she may have neither rest nor food, she is happy if her child has ; and
if she can hear his voice, even abuse and bad language sound pleasant,
though kissing him she gently chides him, and bids him not repeat such
bad words. When alone, so that others cannot hear, she makes known
to him the proper time for going or for tarrying, for coming or for stay-
ing away, for remaining or not, for sleeping or for waking, for eating or
for fasting, and various other matters. She repeatedly warns him
against the five sins of taking life, stealing, committing adultery, lying,
and drinking, and reminds him that only the three precious gems — the
Buddha, the Law, and the Assembly — are worthy of reverence. She
places him with a good teacher for instruction, and rejoices if he earn
praise from his teacher and wishes to become a probationer for the re-
ligious life. But if he wish to live the life of a layman, her heart's
desire is that he should only espouse a girl of good family, and that she
should tend him till the end of her life. In childhood, when she holds
him to her bosom, he pulls at her, scratches her face, bites her, tears
her breasts, and pulls at her mouth, yet she is not annoyed.

A wife who thus loves her husband as a mother loves her child, who
reflects that her husband has been given to her by her parents, or that
her marriage was arranged by a go-between, or that she chose him of
her own free will, will only eat when he eats and sleep when he sleeps.
She will say to herself, " My husband is a man; and matihood is a great
gift, which can only be attained by a woman after much striving" ; and
she will think her husband comely in dress and well-behaved in eating.

182

THE SEVEN KINDS OF WIVES

When he goes to festivals or assembhes, she will so dress and bedeck
him that he may outshine others, and will wish to know why he goes
and when she may expect him back. She lays out his dress for him,
and prepares his food. If he hanker after another woman, she does
not publish this fact to every one, but conceals it, and only in the
privacy of their chamber she discusses whether philandering in this
way be right or not. A wife who thus considers the good of her husband
and his affairs, and is filled with kindly sentiments towards him, is a
wife like a mother ; and such a wife is deserving of love.

2. A Wife like a Sister is this : — When a sister grows up, she is be-
comingly modest and timid. In her comings and goings, in her con-
versation, in dress and in adornment, from the soles of her feet up to
the crown of her head, she is circumspect, being careful not to expose
herself immodestly even before her brother. In laughing and talking
with her brother she is bashful, and speaks with downcast countenance.
A wife who thus tries at all times to appreciate the position of a
husband, to behave with becoming modesty and reserve towards him,
and to do all she can to make him happy and fill his heart with sweet-
ness, is a wife like a sister.

3. A Wife like a Friend is this: — When one arrives on a visit to
a good friend, after the interchange of greetings, he brings water to
wash one's feet and hands and to refresh one's brow and face, and pre-
pares a pillow, a bed, tobacco, betel, tea, sweets and sours good for
eating. Then he offers pleasant greetings to the guest, addressing him
with a joyful countenance. A wife who thus looks after her husband's
wants, who feels kindly disposed towards him, and talks to him
affectionately and in moderation, who, in his comings and goings, in
his friendships, and in the great and the little affairs of life continually
assists and works for him like a good friend, who looks cheerful when
she sees her husband and talks pleasantly to him, who wishes to wash
and dry his feet, to lay out his clothes and his food, to prepare his
resting-place, to give him sweet foods and sour in due season, and
to look after his comfort, is a wife like a good friend.

4. A Wife like a Master is this : — A master makes his slave give
him his sandals and his fan, prepare his pillow and his couch, get ready
water for bathing, accompany him on journeys, and bring him inform-
ation as to what is going on. If the slave fails to do these things
properly, the master does not chide him gently, but passionately ex-
claims in pride and haughtiness, " Hey I you ugly brute, you fool, you
son of poverty-stricken parents plunged in debt and reduced to slavery I"
He pulls his servant's front hair, punches him with his elbow, beats
him with whatever he happens to get hold of, and kicks him, unheeding
that the poor fellow works for him without getting good food or clothing,
and without being well cared for. A wife who thus haughtily addresses
her husband, saying, "Hey/ you ugly fellow, you dirty, low brute/" who
reviles his parents and other relations, who, in distributing clothing and
food, keeps the best clothes for herself and leaves the rest for her
husband, who, first of all, eats the tit-bits and gives him only the
leavings, and who will not allow him to say a word although she herself
speaks far more than she ought to, who sleeps on the best and most

183

BURMA UNDER BRITISH RULE

comfortable part of the bed, and makes her husband sleep on the lower
part, and who does not consider the feelings of her husband but only
thinks of herself, is a wife like a master.

5. A Wife like an Enemy is this: — An enemy's thoughtis todo vio-
lence whenever he sees the object of his enmity, or to contrive his death
or ruination. If he cannot attain this, he feigns affection, and gives
him poison, when pretending to give him good things to eat and drink.
If this be discovered, he bribes others to destroy his enemy by means
of spells or charms. If these cannot affect his person, he tries to ruin
him by killing his buffaloes, cattle, horses and elephants, or by secretly
getting others to set fire to his house, garden, granary, and property ;
and, while he speaks as if he loved him, he intends his death or ruin-
ation. The origin of such intention may have been the refusal of some
animate or inanimate object that has been desired, which has occasioned
anger and has changed the former friendy feeling into the deadly hate of
an enemy. When a wife acts in something like the above manner, wish-
mgto have another lover, and desiring to attain this object by compass-
ing the death of her husband by means of poison or charms, reviles
him and his parents, his grandparents and his other relatives, she is a
wife like an enemy.

6. A Wife like a Thief is this: — A thief plots day and night how
to get things that belong to others. Stealing secretly himself, he also
gets others to steal for him. Changing marks, he misappropriates
articles, substitutes bad for good, or steals in other of the twenty-five
ways enumerated in the sacred precepts. A wife who thus acts without
the knowledge of her husband, secreting things and giving them away
without her husband's consent, is only fit to be called a wife like a thief:
and she is a wife like a thief.

7. A Wife like a Slave is this : — She lays out her husband's clothing
and sees to it being in proper order. Having considered what is best
for her husband to eat and drink, she prepares his food nicely and
places it before him like a slave serving her master in trembling and
respect. When he arrives from a far journey, she receives her husband
respectfully by kneeling down, sitting upon her feet, and folding her
hands, and gives him water for washing his feet, for bathing, and for
drinking. If he should happen to find fault about any household
matter, she does not speak back, but is afraid of ruffling his temper still
further by saying a single word in a cross manner. She does not
venture to eat and drink while her husband is still eating and drinking,
but waits till he has finished and then eats what is left. Such a wife is
a wife like a slave.

Oh, wise judges ! Of these seven kinds of wives, a wife like an
enemy and a wife like a thief should, if their shortcomings are clearly
proved, receive judgment as if they were enemies and thieves.

Of these seven kinds of wives, the wife like a mother, the wife like a
sister, the wife like a friend, and the wife like a slave ought not to be
put away by any man, but should be lived with for life. But the three

184

MARRIAGE AND DIVORCE

others, the wife Uke a master, the wife like an enemy, and the wife Hke
a thief, may be put away even if they have borne ten children : they
need not be lived with even for one day longer. Of these seven kinds
of wives, the wife like a slave will not be disappointed should she pray
to become a man in the next state of existence, for her desire shall be
fulfilled, and she will attain Neikban (Nirvana) before any of the others.

Marriage was not a union irrevocably binding. Divorce
was obtainable by mutual consent, or at the instance of
either party ; and the partition of property on separation
was provided for in about fifty laws taking cognizance of
the reasons for separation and the social status of husband
or wife.

The simplest form of divorce was the separation by
mutual consent of a husband and wife, both born of
parents who were freemen. In this case the husband and
wife were each allowed to take their personal clothes
and ornaments. Any property acquired by the husband
alone, or by the wife alone, was to be divided into three
portions, of which the person who had separately ac-
quired it took two, while the third went to the other
party ; but property acquired by joint endeavour, or
where both had an equal share in the capital, was equally
divided. If the clothes or personal ornaments of the
one were much more valuable than those of the other,
they were to be valued and the difference made good.
With regard to children of the marriage, the father took
the boys, unless they were too young to be taken from
the mother, and the mother took the girls. If debts had
been incurred during the period of cohabitation, they
were to be borne equally. After separation and division
of the property, each party had full right to form any
new connexion in marriage.

When only the husband or the wife wished to separate,
but the other party did not consent to a divorce, and no
particular cause was specified for dissolution of the
marriage, but merely the broad generalization of incom-
patibility from ''their destinies 7iot being cast together',' all
property, animate or inanimate, went to the non-consent-
ing party ; while the party wishing for a divorce only
retained his or her clothes and ornaments, and had to
pay any expenses incurred in obtaining the separation.

185

BURMA UNDER BRITISH RULE
When there was no property beyond clothes and house-
hold articles to dispose of, if the man wished to separate
he could only take away with him one turban, one jacket,
one loin-cloth, and one Da or bill ; while the wife, if
suing for the divorce, in addition to her jacket, loin-cloth,
and kerchief, could also remove the cloth woven and
rolled up on her loom, the loom, the shuttles, and the
other implements belonging to it.

When a divorce took place by mutual consent, each
party had to pay an arbitration fee of fifteen rupees
\£i)\ but otherwise this fee had only to be paid by the
party seeking the dissolution of the marriage.

If a husband, having taken a lesser wife, abused and
beat his first wife and oppressed her, they were to try
to live again on good terms ; but if this conduct were
repeated, the chief wife could, under the special circum-
stances, claim a divorce on the same terms as if both
parties were consenting, even though the husband de-
clared his unwillingness to separate.

Certain improprieties in conduct on the part of a wife,
being regarded merely as gross breaches of wifely eti-
quette, did not form legal grounds for a divorce ; while
she was further protected by law with specific reasons
justifying her abusing her husband and imprecating evil
on him — a license which many wives freely availed them-
selves of. The fivefold improprieties which a wife might
thus exhibit without affording adequate grounds for a
divorce included impropriety in dress, in eating, in
relations with other men, in property, and in be-
haviour.

Improprieties with regard to Dress are these : — If any woman, whether
well or sick, goes inappropriately dressed to a festival or even where there
is no public entertainment, or inconsiderately goes to the house of the
dead in other than the customary dress, or if, not having clothes of her
own, she pays more than she ought to for clothes to bedeck herself with,
or has many more clothes than she requires and overdresses herself day
and night, or if she hides her dresses from her husband and only puts
them on for the sake of being praised by others, or if she gets into debt
by buying clothes and will even go the length of selling her children
into slavery for the sake of dress, or would have herself better dressed
than her husband, such a wife acts with impropriety in regard to dress.

Improprieties with regard to Eating are these : — If any wife eat before
her husband has eaten, or eat frequently without his knowledge, or take

i86

IMPROPRIETIES IN WIVES

the good things for herself, so that her husband only has the coarser
food, or continually overeats to a dangerous extent, or who, being a
woman, eats raw meat with the blood in it such as is fit only to be eaten
by a man, or, contrary to custom, wants to eat at all sorts of times even
in presence of others, she is a woman without shame or fear, and is
guilty of impropriety in eating. Men may eat of many dishes that may
be succulent, sweet, astringent, bitter, sharp, or sour ; but if a woman
wishes to eat ^thus from many dishes, or heaps all sorts of food into
one dish for herself, this is excess in eating. Whether she eat openly
before others or secretly, whether with her husband's knowledge or
without it, the woman who eats thus commits an impropriety in eating.
Or when several people are together at food, it is improper for a woman
to be always dipping her fingers into the dishes, or to be continually
rising up and then sitting down again, or standing and making faces :
these are all forms of impropriety in eating.

Improprieties with regard to Men are these : — If any woman assumes
a smiling countenance on seeing other men than her husband, if she
take men by the hand and seem delighted, if she call any man to her
to make friends with him or ask men passing by to stop and sit down,
if she seek acquaintances only among men rather than among women,
these are all improprieties with regard to men.

Improprieties with regard to Property are these : — If any woman place
in the outer portion of the house things that ought to be in the inner
room, or vice versa, if, having but little to live on, she spend a good
deal for the sake of display before others, if she give presents without
her husband's knowledge, if she intentionally put in prominent places
things that should be kept out of sight, or if she be continually showing
off and talking to others about her own things, she is a woman guilty of
improprieties as regards property.

Improprieties with regard to Behaviour are these : — A self-respecting
woman should behave with decorous reserve on hearing the voice
of any other man than her husband, or even without hearing any man's
voice. If she look out from the entrance of her house beyond the
fence, if she be continually looking up and turning her eyes and her
face in all directions, or if, when she goes out, she be constantly turning
and looking at men whom she sees, or whose voices she hears, such
a woman is guilty of impropriety in conduct.

Though a wife could not be divorced for any or all of
these improprieties, the Dammathdt laid down that the
husband had a right to inflict personal chastisement on
her. If, after frequent chastisement, she still continued to
be guilty of improprieties in conduct, a divorce was obtain-
able, each taking the separate property held at the time
of marriage, and the husband taking also what had been
acquired during the period of cohabitation. It was
further laid down that for drinking, want of order or
neatness in household arrangements, scolding her hus-

1S7

BURMA UNDER BRITISH RULE

band or reviling him when absent, gadding about and
talking in other people's houses, and lolling about the
front of the house, similar chastisement should be inflicted
for at least three times before the husband should^ be
justified in seeking divorce from such a wife. If he failed
to master her, and she continued her former habits,
divorce was obtained on similar conditions to those above.
For excessive pride about family, personal appearance,
or property, or for running down her husband's family or
friends, personal correction was also prescribed to be
inflicted thrice before separation became justifiable. And
the method of chastisement wa3 duly prescribed : —

In chastising his wife the husband is not to beat her with his elbow
or fists, or with a doubled rope or a thick stick, or kick her on the
breasts, or tread on her neck, which is only treatment fit for a slave or
an adulterous wife ; but he may whip her with a thin wand, or with
the palm of his hand, on the loins, buttocks, or feet.

A wife had the right to abuse her husband and impre-
cate evil upon him for any one or other of eight specific
causes. If they were very poor, and he could not
contrive anything for their subsistence ; if he were sorely
afflicted with disease, and unable to work ; if he were
ignorant of, or cared nought for, the ** three precious
gems : the Buddha, the Law, and the Assembly" ; if he
were a fool, who did not know a good man from a bad ; if
he were skilled in handiwork, or could talk well, but was
lazy and would not exert himself to work ; if amorous to
excess ; if he were apt to frequent loose places ; or if he
were much given to betting and gambling, she could
abuse him without being held guilty of anything justifying
a divorce. If the husband were, however, subjected to
such continuous nagging that married life became in-
supportable, then a divorce could be obtained as by
mutual consent, the property being equally divided on
separation. According to the Dammakdn, or Sacred Law,
it is wrong for a woman to abuse her husband for faults
that she sees in him ; but according to the Dammathdt,
or Judicial Law, there is no justification for a husband
separating and taking all the property simply because
his wife may be abusive.

A wife having long moustaches or whiskers, small feet

1 88

HUSBAND AND WIFE

and large hands, who walks with irregular steps, and
who has no well-developed breasts, may be divorced as
a woman with whom it is improper for other people to sit
on the same level, or to converse on religious subjects ;
because these personal defects are the result of bad deeds
done in a former state of existence. This religious idea,
indeed, underlies the Burmese legal aspect of divorce.
The proper term for divorce, Akaungkun, literally means
" a cessation of the coalescence of the destinies of a married
couple^' although, colloquially, the word Kwa, " to sepa-
rate," is almost invariably used. A childless wife, or
one who has borne several daughters but no son, could
also be separated from ; and for these and a great many
other concrete cases the partition of property was duly
regulated by law.

The extreme case of divorce was that in which, after
husband and wife had lived together very happily, the
wife committed adultery. In this case, if she had no
property, her husband had the right to sell her.

As a matter of fact, divorce or separation, an event of
somewhat common occurrence, is far more frequently
claimed by wives than by husbands. Slippering of hus-
bands is much more common than beatinsf of wives ; and
violent, foul abuse of husbands is often heard issuing
from the mouths of wives who have worked themselves
up into a frenzied state of fury. It cannot be denied
that the Dammathdt does not hold anything like an even
balance between husband and wife ; but then, according to
Burmese Buddhism, the wife occupies, and herself admits
that she occupies, a very inferior position to a man upon
" the ladder of existence " leading upwards to Neikban
or annihilation. As a woman, however, she can play her
part well, and thereby earn religious merit ; for in these
Laws of Manii it is recorded that —

Even a man is worthless if he have no good habits ; while a woman
may be excellent if her conduct be good. . . . If a wife assist in
<07npleting her husband, her conduct gives her the advantage of good
deeds throughout future existences. Though she may not approve her
husband's habits, yet, if she respectfully yield to his wishes, she is
worthy of being called an excellent wife. She thereby frees herself from
hell, and is brought upon the road leading straight towards the land of
spirits.

189

BURMA UNDER BRITISH RULE

In addition to the Dammaikdt, or Statute Law, there
is also a small collection of ancient precedents in law
known as the Pyatdon or "decisions" of Princess Thu-
dammasari, somewhat in the nature of a very brief
compendium of Common Law perpetuated in the form of
narratives according to the ancient Eastern style.

As these fundamental Institutes of Law had from
time to time undergone various modifications, a new
compilation of the laws actually administered was under-
taken during King Thibaw's reign by the Kinwun
Mingyi, the Prime Minister, after consideration and
comparison of all the available texts. This compilation,
known as the Attasankhepa Vannand Dammathdt, was
first printed in Burmese in 1882. Since then it has
always been recognized as an authoritative statement of
the Burmese Buddhist law ; although under British
administration it, of course, does not form the ultimate
authority in legal cases.

In this latest edition of the Dammathdt the original
Institutes have been altered to suit the necessities of latter-
day life, although the principles underlying the new version
remain unchanged. The law of inheritance and partition
is exceedingly complicated, and this alone requires no less
than a hundred and thirty-five sections in its enunciation,
while marriage and divorce have as many as one hundred
and twenty-three sections allotted to them. These latter
developments of Burmese law are exceedingly interesting
both as complements to the extracts above given from
the ancient Manii Dammathdt, and also as exhibiting
the evolution of legal ideas regarding the family tie and
domestic union. They possess so many points of pecu-
liar interest in these regards, and are at the same time so
illustrative of national habits and ideas, that a compre-
hensive summary of the last thirty-five sections relating
to divorce deserves to be given. It will accordingly be
found as an appendix at the end of the present volume.

Of prison administration there was next to none.
There were jails at the chief towns of districts; while
at Mandalay there were three, namely, one inside the
palace and two outside. It was not the custom for the
Burmese Government to feed convicts. They were fed

190

BURMESE JAILS

by their relations, and a certain number of those who
had no friends willing or able to support them were al-
lowed to go out and beg for food or to earn it by carry-
ing water, collecting firewood, or doing other odd jobs.
The jails were loathsome and insanitary, and the pun-
ishments inflicted were barbarous in the extreme. In
criminal cases torture was often freely applied both to
the accused and to the witnesses, while the sentences
varied from fines and a few stripes with a cane up to
imprisonment, slavery, and death. If condemned to
slavery, the serf and his descendants became slaves, who
were allotted to pagodas as sweepers of the precincts.
The taint of slavery of this sort could not be cleansed
away : even if a freeman took the daughter of a pagoda-
slave to be his wife, their children were serfs.

Those condemned to imprisonment usually had to
undergo great sufferings. For safe custody, their feet
were tied to a long pole or bamboo ; and at night this
was often raised by blocks so that only the shoulders
and head rested on the ground, and the whole weight of
the body was thrown on them. Or, if they wore fetters,
a bamboo would be passed between the legs of several
prisoners, and then raised in similar manner. The
capital sentence was usually carried out by decapitation
or disembowelment, but in the case of royal prisoners
the head was drawn back and blows inflicted on the
throat with a bamboo. In 1879 a sister of the Nyaung-
yan Prince was thus executed, and as she was a strong
young woman it took seven blows to kill her. Thrown
into prison along with her mother on the Nyaungyan's
escape to Lower Burma in 1878, they were for some
time supported by alms sent from the British Residency;
but, when rumours of a rising by the Nyaungyan Prince
reached the palace, the go-between grew alarmed and
fled, and the Princess and her mother were fed by the
mother of Thibaw's Queens till the order was given for
execution. Sometimes such victims were trodden to
death by elephants, as happened in the case of the
widow of King Bdgyidaw, who was put to death by
King Tharrawaddi in 1840. The disembowelment of
heinous offenders usually took place on crucifixes, con-

191

BURMA UNDER BRITISH RULE

sisting of two or three upright posts with crossbars in
the shape of a St. Andrew's cross, which were fixed^ at
places of punishment. Sometimes, too, after decapitation
the corpses were lashed to these cru ". • s, and in either
case the bodies hung there till the Hl ' i been torn off
by vultures, and the bones fell to ...o ground.^ This
punishment was often inflicted on dacoits. It is pei-
haps only fair to add that although the apparently in-
evitable massacres which took place when he deposed
the Pagdn Min in 1853 could not have been unknown to
King Mindon, yet throughout his reign but little blood
was shed with his sanction or previous knowledge ; when
executions of criminals took place, the facts are said to
have been carefully kept from him.

Judicial business was conducted with great solemnity
and ceremonial within the Hlutdaw. When the
Council was presided over by the heir apparent, or
by any other member of the royal family acting as vice-
president — for the King was the president ex officio —
only the suitors or their advocates were permitted to
appear, the cases being heard in chambers, as it were.
The members of the Council always wore a uniform
proper to the occasion. This consisted of a loose robe
of muslin thrown over a tight-fitting white coat made of
cotton, whilst a narrow fillet of rolled white muslin was
bound round the head and tied with the ends pointing
upwards. Both parties to the suit had to wear the dress
considered suitable for such an occasion ; but, previous
to their being allowed to appear, they were robed in
long loose white coats and then capped, the plaintiff's
cap being green and the defendant's red. These dis-
tinctive articles of dress were usually worn by the ad-
vocates only. They were provided from the public
purse and kept at the Hlutdaw in place of being, like a
barrister's wig and gown, the private property of the
individual advocate.

Whether one gained or lost, a lawsuit was always an
expensive matter. Fees, presents, and bribes were un-
avoidable, not only in law matters but whenever officials
of any high degree were approached on business. When
presents were offered to the King, as, for example, when

192

TRIAL OF LAWSUITS

concessions were asked for regarding extracting teak
timber, or mining earth-oil — and without such douceurs
no petitioner had the slightest chance of success — a pre-
sent of half th'^^'.rn'jLe was also made to the Minister,
who urged, or. ' oout to urge, the grant of the con-
cession. The \^.M.ie administration in all its branches
\:as rotten with corruption and bribery, while the judicial
system in particular was lax and corrupt to a degree.

The institution of a civil suit was made by presenting
a written petition or plaint to the judge, who thereupon
appointed his Nakdn, or assistant (lit. "listener") to
report after holding preliminary enquiries among the
parties to the suit and their witnesses. Together with
this report the plaintiff and defendant submitted their
pleadings, respectively setting forth in detail the causes
of action and replying thereto with full statements of
defence. A day having been fixed for hearing the case,
advocates were chosen and the suit came on in due
course. Guided by the investigations and report of the
Nakdn the issues of fact were fixed by the judge, who
ordained that the plaintiff must prove certain issues, and
that the defendant must, if he could, in like manner
prove given points. After the examination of witnesses,
judgment was pronounced. If the parties to the suit
consented to accept the judge's decision, they ate pickled
tea {Letpei) in token of being satisfied with the decision
of the court, and the judgment thereby became binding
and final. Whether before arbitrators, or in the courts
of the district Governors, or in the civil courts at the
capital, the eating of Letpet was the formal acceptance
of the judgment by both parties ; and refusal to eat it
meant an appeal to the next higher court. The judg-
ments of the Hlutdaw being final, however, there was
no custom of eating Letpet upon their decisions being
declared.

It not infrequently happened that when the non-con-
senting party proved contumacious and unreasonable in
the eyes of the judge, such contempt of court led to his
being cast into prison, a not very comfortable place under
the best of circumstances in Upper Burma in those days,
and he was kept there until his frame of mind became

193 0

BURMA UNDER BRITISH RULE

sufficiently mollified to induce him to eat tea and thus
accept the verdict pronounced by the court. Like
criminals, such persons were not maintained by the
State, but had to depend on relatives and friends for
their daily food.

It appears to have been a sort of fundamental axiom
with the civil courts of Ava that, when suits were insti-
tuted, both parties probably had a certain amount of
right on their side, but that both were at the same time
more or less in fault. A happy compromise, therefore,
usually seemed to the judge the best and most satis-
factory way of terminating the differences of the suitors.
Though devoid of anything like a legal basis, this guid-
ing principle seems to have contained a good deal of
sound common sense. But the character of the judges
for impartiality was held rather at a discount, and the
rich suitor with an open purse had a better chance of
obtaining satisfaction than his poorer rival. At the eat-
ing of tea after the judgment the Letpet was almost sure
to taste sweeter to the former than to the latter. Bitter,
indeed, it must often have proved to the poor man un-
jusdy sued for malicious motives, and mulcted in money,
cattle, or land by the inequitable judgment bought with
the wealth of his enemy.

For the trial of civil suits between European British
subjects and Burmans a mixed court was held in the
palace at Mandalay, where the British Resident, or the
Assistant Resident, sat about once a week to try cases
along with a Burmese judge. This custom of course
lapsed when direct diplomatic relations were broken off
by the withdrawal of the British representatives in Octo-
ber 1879.

194

Chapter VIII

THE ROYAL GOLDEN CITY: "THE CLUSTER OF GEMS"

EVEN before King Mindon ascended the throne,
early in 1853, he had two dreams which impressed
him greatly. In the first of these he saw a large city
lying at the foot of Mandalay hill, a few miles to the
north-east of Amdrapiira. In the second dream he was
riding a white elephant which took him to the foot of
Mandalay hill, where he dismounted. Here two women,
calling themselves Ba and Ma, took hold of his right and
his left hands and led him to the summit, where a man
offered him a handful of scented grass, and told him that
his elephants and horses would always thrive if fed with
the grass that grew round about the hill.

When Mindon became King, he had to follow the cus-
tom prescribed for the maintenance of a line of sucession
having the pure blood royal. For this purpose one of
the King's daughters, always known as the Tablndaing
Princess, remained unmarried in order to become the
wife of the next monarch. In case of any accident be-
falling the Tabindaing with regard to producing heirs, the
second available Princess nearest of kin to the royal blood
was also wedded to the new King. The former became
the "chief" Queen {^Nanmaddw), and the south palace
( Taungnyd) was assigned to her use ; while the latter
became the " middle " Queen [Alenandaw), in contradis-
tinction to any and all inferior wives raised to queenly
rank. Thus Mindon received his step-sister and his
cousin as royal consorts. This had now become nothing
more than the survival of an ancient custom, since the
throne did not descend by direct lineal succession, but
was filled by any prince, usually a brother or a son,

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BURMA UNDER BRITISH RULE

who had been nominated as heir apparent by the King.
The only requisite quaUfication was that he should be a
son of one of the four chief Queens of a King.

Now it happened that these two Princesses, who became
Mindon's chief Queens, had each been born on a Thurs-
day and had therefore, for reasons elsewhere explamed
ivide chapter xxi.), received names beginning with Ba
and Ma. This apparent confirmation of part of his
second dream made Mindon ponder over the desirability
of founding a new capital on the level plain stretching
towards the south-west from the base of Mandalay hill.

Many religious recluses of saintly reputation, many
men of light and leading, and the royal astrologers were
made to assemble and consult on this matter ; and they
almost unanimously advised that a new capital should be
founded. Only two men, a recluse and an astrologer,
dissented from the consensus of opinion, and urged that,
for all practical purposes, Amdrapura lay near the foot
of Mandalay hill. But Mindon was bent on having a
new capital, so, in 1857, the foundations of that city were
laid which became known to the English as Mandalay,
although to the Burmese it was always, previous to the
British annexation, Shwemyodaw, " the Royal Golden
City," or else Yadandbon, " the Cluster of Gems." King
Mindon, though a very pious Buddhist and strongly
averse to the shedding of blood, was, like the vast
majority of Burmese, simply saturated with superstition.
So in founding the new city he acted on the advice of
his chief astrologer, and a pregnant woman was slain one
night in order that she might become the guardian spirit
of his palace. Throughout the whole of his reign offer-
ings were openly made in the palace by the King to the
spirit of the murdered woman, which was supposed to be
incarnated in the body of a snake. This is a strange
and strong proof of animistic worship on the part of
one who was unquestionably a most religious Buddhist,
and the most enlightened of all the monarchs of the
Alaung Payd dynasty.

Small spirit-houses {Natsin), like dove-cots, are still to
be seen on the tops of all the remaining buildings in the
palace ; and in the King's apartments there are holes in

196

THE CITY WALLS

the roof which were made in order to allow the resident
spirits to visit him whenever inclined.

At all the gates in the city walls, and at the four
corners, male victims were also done to death — being
buried alive, it is said, along with large jars of oil — ac-
cording to the ceremony known as Sadd, for the purpose
of providing guardian spirits to keep watch and ward
over all the lines of approach to the city. Small, white-
washed, pagoda-like tumuli outside the gates and the
corners of the outer walls still form the abodes of these
guardian spirits of the city (^Myozadd).

As the city was founded in 2,400th year after the
death of Gaudama, the city walls were made to measure
in all 2,400 Td (of irii feet), each one of the four
sides of the perfect square being thus a little over a mile
and one- third in length. Including their battlements
they are 28|- feet in height, are built of red brick, and
are flanked with a broad earthen rampart. The walls
face due north, east, south, and west.

On each side at regular distances ot sixty Td, they are
(or originally were, for some have now succumbed to
decay) surmounted by ornamental spires (Tazdung,
Pyathat) richly painted with cinnabar and profusely
gilded. Those over the four main gates have nine roofs,
the number allowed to be erected only over the King's
palace and above monasteries. Often, however, some
difficulty is to be found in counting the whole of the nine
roofs, even in cases where they all really exist, as two or
even three partial false roofs are sometimes introduced
to simplify construction. The two minor gates on each
side of the city wall are topped by seven- roofed spires,
the number allowed by the Burmese sumptuary laws to
tributary chiefs like the Sawbwa of the Shan States ;
while all the other smaller Tazdimg have only five roofs.
Some of these have already fallen down through decay
and neglect. Outside, the city was surrounded by a moat,
which is fed by springs preventing the water from stag-
nating ; for the three requisites of a Burmese city {^Myd)
were a bazaar, a fortress wall, and a moat.

Within these city walls, which enclose what is now
known as Fort Dufferin, the capital was laid out in a series

197

BURMA UNDER BRITISH RULE

of squares and blocks, whose sides were parallel to the
outer defences. In the centre were the grounds and the
palace of the King, forming a square fortified enclosure,
each side of which was somewhat over three furlongs in
length, defended by an outer palisade of sharp-pointed
teak-posts, about sixteen feet high, which was neither
loop-holed nor provided with flank defences. About
sixty feet behind this, separated by a clear space, came
an inner brick wall, which has now been almost entirely
removed, though portions may still be seen (1898) near
the north-east corner. Another inner wall, now almost
entirely destroyed, enclosed the private apartments of
the royal family and the state rooms.

Around the palace, outside the stockade, were grouped
the residences of all the great Ministers of State, with
one exception. Each was in the centre of a block,
the outer portions of which were crowded with the huts
of their retainers and by persons keeping petty shops or
stalls. The only building of this sort now remaining
(1898) is that occupied by the ex-Kinwun Mingyi, to the
south-east of the palace. No masonry buildings were
allowed to be erected save within the palace grounds, so
that the royal city was, for the most part, a rude collection
of wooden houses and bamboo huts. The solitary ex-
ception above noted was the notorious Taingda Mingyi,
a ferocious, bloodthirsty ruffian, who was directly respon-
sible for some of the massacres during Thibaw's reign,
and indirectly responsible for the third Burmese war and
the extinction of the kingdom of Ava. He lived in a
house, now totally destroyed, near the southern gate of
the inner palace enclosure.

Outside the walls of the city, a straggling native town
stretched southwards towards Amarapura and westwards
to the Irrawaddy. Settlements here were encouraged by
King Mindon, not only because they naturally meant in-
crease of trade and traffic, but also because the embank-
ments rendered necessary for the protection of these
suburbs prevented, as he thought, the possibility of the
palace ever being shelled from hostile war-vessels that
might lie at anchor in the river.

All the main roads, both in the city and the suburbs,

198

THE PALACE

were well planted with avenues of trees. The latter were
mostly tamarind, which thrives well in that dry climate.

In 1886, there were close upon 6,000 dwellings within
the city walls, and about 24,000 forming- the various
suburbs, containing a total population of about 180,000
souls. Most of the houses were built merely of bamboos
with mat walling, and their worth could not exceed about
fifty rupees each (^3 6s. Sd.), even on a liberal estimate.
The houses within the walls were cleared away on the
British occupation, and the populace transferred to blocks
well laid out to the south and west of the city, liberal
compensation for disturbance being paid on a scale vary-
ing according to the number of posts in each building.

King Mindon's new capital was occupied in i860. His
palace is a strange mixture of barbaric art and matter-of-
fact utility. It Is a maze of buildings of all sorts and
sizes chiefly constructed of teak-wood, richly carved and
thickly gilded, or else resplendent with looking-glass
mosaic of showy, tawdry description, though crudely
effective from a distance. All these profusely decorated
wooden bulldinsfs are roofed with corrupfated Iron.

The principal entrance to the palace stockade was at
the Tagdni or " Red Gate " on the eastern side. This
was never opened except on great state occasions, and
entrance could only be effected through a small door In
the same, whereby one was forced, nolens volens, to bow
the head In the direction of the palace as if making
obeisance to the great central spire above the chief
throne.

Immediately to the left of the Red Gate stands the
tower enshrining the sacred tooth of Gaudama received
long ago as a gift from the Emperor of China. In front
of that Is the Hlutdaw or Great Council Hall and Hio^h
Court. At some distance to the south is the miniature
monastery, a gem of looking-glass mosaic work, to which
Prince Thibaw withdrew for a time in order to perform
the term of monkhood or religious retreat obligatory on
all male Burmese. To the north of the main gate Is the
bell-tower [Pahozin), from which the time of the day
and night was told every third hour by beat of drum-gong.
A little further on stand the three pagoda-like tombs of

199

BURMA UNDER BRITISH RULE

King Mindon and his two chief Queens, whose names
were indirectly the cause of the foundation of this last
capital of the kingdom of Ava.

Of the palace buildings within the innermost wall the
chief, occupying the most easterly position, is the My^
Nandaw or Imperial Palace, best known to Europeans
as " the Centre of the Universe." This is a lofty nine-
roofed spire {Pyatkat) with graduated roofs, ascending
above the Lion throne at the end of the Great Hall^ of
Audience {Yondaw). The only other very lofty erection
among the palace buildings is the look-out tower to the
south of the Centre of the Universe, built by Thibaw's
Queen, Supayalat, where she used to enjoy the cool
breeze in the evening, and from which she witnessed the
entry of the British troops into the south gate of the city,
at the close of November, 1885. A. little to the west
of this tower, and adjoining the garden, was the open
pavilion [Mandat), roofed only, but without any walls,
where theatrical performances took place.

The main buildings themselves were the various
palaces of the King and his Queens, and the private
apartments of the dowager-Queens and the maids of
honour. They are now used as Government offices.
The most artistic and the most interesting of all the
buildings is the western hall containing the Lily throne,
where ladies were received in audience. This now very
appropriately forms the ladies' room of the Upper
Burma Club. Here, on the further portion of the gilded
doorway to the north of the throne, are the four finger-
marks which have given rise to the story that they are
bloodstains from one of Supayalat's victims. That she
was jealous, cruel, and remorseless is a matter of fact ;
but these red finger-prints have no connection with that.
They are merely the effect of some incautious person
coming from behind having opened the right-hand half of
the door before the gilding had become thoroughly set
and hardened, and ever since then the red grounding of
cinnabar has shown through wherever the gold came
partially away. However, this Burmese story of the
palace tragedy is quite as good in its way as Rizzio's
bloodstains in Holyrood, or as the stains made on the

200

THE ROYAL THRONES

wall in the Wartburg at Eisenach when Luther threw
the inkpot at the devil's head. There were only too
many real tragedies of blood in the palace, without in-
venting mere twaddle of that sort about any of them.

To the north and the south of the western portion of
the palace, which formed the ladies' apartments, there
were ornamental gardens with spring-fed ponds and
canals. Here, amid palms and umbrageous evergreen
trees, the royal family took the air in the evening, while
gliding along the canals in the royal barge or wandering
through the grottoes and labyrinths strangely and won-
derfully made of Portland cement. Quaint in every re-
spect as to its rocks, its trees, its tiny lakes and canals,
and the rustic bridges crossing these, the royal gardens
form a charming lounge at any time of the day, and at
any period of the year. But, to appreciate them to the
full, one must visit them in the evening in April or May,
when the thermometer has all day long been registering
above ioo° in the shade.

Within the palace there were eight thrones of carved
teak wood, richly gilded, while a ninth occupied the
central position in the Hlutdaw or State Council Cham-
ber. The Lion throne at the western end of the great
Hall of Audience, above which towers the lofty spire of
the Centre of the Universe, was the principal throne
occupied on solemn ceremonial occasions ; while the
seven others were each used for special purposes.
Seated on the Duck throne, placed further westward in
the interior of the royal apartments and behind the Lion
throne, the King received foreigners in audience. Be-
hind that again, nearer to the centre of the royal cham-
bers, stood the Water Festival throne used at the
beginning of each new year in April. From the
Elephant throne, in the Byedaik, the royal elephant was
watched at exercise. The Snail throne, situated some-
what southwards from the Duck -throne, was used only
when the King signed a warrant for the appointment of
an heir apparent who should succeed him on the throne.
At the Deer throne, on the north side of the palace, the
royal white elephant was met by the King on great
occasions ; while directly opposite this, on the southern

201

BURMA UNDER BRITISH RULE

side of the palace buildings, stood the Peacock throne,
from which the royal horses were inspected. The Lily
throne, by far the most beautiful and most artistic of all,
in front of which ladies were received, was situated at
the western extremity of the palace. All of these
thrones were elevated between four and five feet above
the ground, so that their occupant should be raised well
above the level of those receiving an audience and
making obeisance on the floor below. In front of the
Judgment throne in the Hlutdaw the floor was punctured
with -|-" holes at fixed distances for the Ministers and
other great officers of state, and for lesser notables sitting
round the edge of the chamber. These small cross-holes
were for passing up long pipe-stems to the lips of those
seated on the floor, while the bowls were fed and lighted
by attendants below ; for the building was raised seven or
eight feet above the ground on piles. To have smoked
cigars or the huge Burmese cheroots in the royal pre-
sence or before the throne would have been a breach of
etiquette, but the concession made in the Great Council
Chamber showed how necessary smoking was appar-
ently considered.

The British Residency lay some distance to the west
of the city, and the Resident was only permitted to enter
the city walls by the western or " accursed " gate, through
which corpses were conveyed, and the passage through
which by any King meant the open avowal of abdication.
The Residency was the property of the King. Apart
from the British flag flown from the roof-top, there was
nothing whatever to mark it with any of the importance
which ought to have been attached to Her Majesty's
representative at a foreign court. The compound or
ground surrounding the house was roughly fenced in
with bamboo matwork, supported by a framework of teak-
wood, but it formed no defence capable of resisting any
persistent attack. The gates were guarded by Burmese
soldiers, who were in reality rather a band of spies
making daily reports to the palace than a guard of
honour.

The whole of the Residency staff resided within this
buildmg, which also comprised the post office and the

202

THE WHITE ELEPHANT

mixed court wherein, according to treaty all cases involv-
ing British subjects were tried by a bench consisting of
a British magistrate and a Burmese official.

Intercourse between the townspeople and the Resi-
dency was limited owing to the system of espionage in
force ; and access to the palace was difficult, even when
matters of importance required personal discussion.

The services of the Residency Surgeon were some-
times, however, invited in serious cases, but usually only
after the patient had advanced to an almost moribund
condition, and had been given up by the Burmese
medicine men. Practice of this sort was not hankered
after. In most cases, the doctor arrived too late to be of
any use; and practice did not always prove lucrative.
F'or example, after curing one of the Ministers of a
severe internal disease, a doctor who was Residency Sur-
geon for several years told me he was sent a gift of two
cocoa-nuts and a bunch of plantains in return for his ser-
vices. He had from time to time, however, opportuni-
ties of seeing strange sights within the inner precincts
of the palace. Thus, on one occasion, during King
Mindon's time, about 1875, he saw the white elephant
receiving its morning draught of human milk. About
twenty women having been placed in a row, the elephant
went behind each, put the tip of its trunk over the
woman's shoulder, and sucked each breast dry of its
milk. It was a disgusting sight, he said, to see the
nervous state into which the women fell as the huge brute
slowly made its way down the line. So nervous and
excited did they become, that the milk even spouted from
their breasts before these were touched by the big beast's
trunk. But this feeding of the celestial Sadddn elephant
was an act of great religious merit, and there never was
lack of mothers to earn this for the sake of their souls in
the next incarnation.

A curious zoological fact with regard to a Burmese
white elephant is that its skin need not necessarily be
white. This may even be perfectly black ; but there'are
other signs whereby the true nature of this pearl among
brute animals may be known, despite any mere superficial
shortcomings. Among these invariable signs one is

203

BURMA UNDER BRITISH RULE

the presence of a boss on the nape of the neck, just
where this is joined on to the back of the skull.

All ceremonies connected with royalty and court
etiquette were duly prescribed and were carefully
attended to in every particular, except on the part of the
King, who followed antecedent customs only in so far as
suited his convenience. When a King was pleased to
ascend to the land of spirits— so ran the phrase for his
demise — the royal white umbrella was broken, and the
great drum-gong on the bell-tower at the eastern gate of
the palace enclosure was perforated. These two customs
were omitted on Mindon's death in 1878, as the parties
intriguing to place Thibaw on the throne wished to com-
plete all their arrangements before proclaiming the death
of the late King.

A white umbrella, the sign of sovereignty, was only
carried over the King and his chief Queen. The white
umbrella {Tipytt) was, in fact, one of the five articles
reckoned as regalia, the other four being the crown
(Makd), the sceptre (Thanlyet), the sandal [Chenin), and
the fly-flap {Thdmyi Yat\ On receiving these insignia
a new King was blessed by the Brahmins, and water was
poured out, this ceremony [Adeiktheik) being the equiva-
lent of the ancient custom practised elsewhere of anointing
with oil.

The use of golden umbrellas was permitted to the
members of the royal family, the tributary chiefs, and the
highest officials ; while officials of lower degree were
allowed to have red umbrellas and large fans of a par-
ticular shape borne over them. When high officials or
members of the royal family passed along the streets, the
way was prepared for them by lictors (Letyddaung) armed
with stout long rattans, which they took much pleasure
in using on any one within their reach.

When any great personage went abroad, the whole of
the roads along which he made his progress were fenced
in trellis with " royal lattice-work" (Yazahmai) of bamboos
or laths in front of all the houses, and the people were
not permitted to approach from behind that. Indeed, it
was considered much safer to retire altogether within
their houses, and to peep only between the chinks of the

204

THE ROYAL PLOUGHING

bamboo-mat walls rather than allow themselves to be seen.
It was not altogether safe for men, and often very unsafe
for women if they happened to be young and good-look-
ing, to fall under the eyes of great Princes or powerful
Ministers.

The King himself, however, never went abroad of
late years. Possession of the palace meant possession
of the throne. If the King left the inner palace in-
closure, he could never be quite sure that on his return
he might not, in place of obtaining re-admission, have to
flee through the western gate of the city in token of ab-
dication. After the attempt on his life by two of his own
sons, in 1866, King Mindon seldom went abroad from
his palace, and King Thibaw probably never ventured
outside of the fortified inclosure during the whole of the
seven years of his reign. Thus the prescribed annual
festival of breaking ground with the plough in the royal
fields to the east of the city — " the blessed ceremony of
ploughing" {Mingaldtun) — upon which the copiousness
of the rains during the months of June to October was
supposed to depend, fell into abeyance : and naturally,
the people said, this led to the more frequent recurrence
of years of insufficient rainfall, and of scarcity and
grievous want among the people all throughout the dry
zone. Thibaw never performed this ceremony, similar
to that annually observed by the Emperor of China
and by the Minister of Agriculture in Siam ; and this,
the people said, was why drought became chronic and
severe during his reign.

The ladies of the royal household and their apart-
ments were in charge of eunuchs {Memmas6)y who were
only to be found at the capital and nowhere else in the
country. None of the inferior Queens were permitted
to reside within the main palace buildings when the time
of their accouchement was at hand, but were removed to
special apartments (Einneing) reserved for this pur-
pose. When they went abroad to visit religious shrines,
or for any other purpose, their mode of progress was in
richly carved box-like carriages mounted upon two cart
wheels. As these were small and had no springs, and
as the roads were bad, unmetalled and full of deep ruts,

205

BURMA UNDER BRITISH RULE

a drive to any pagoda in the suburbs was hardly a
pleasure. Men of high degree or filling great offices of
State usually rode on elephants.

Many of the royal ceremonies were peculiar, and all were
directly or indirectly connected with the national religion.
Two of these may perhaps be briefly mentioned as
examples. Twice annually, at the great religious festivals
of the new year in spring and of the termination of lent
in autumn, the King's head was ceremoniously washed
in water which used to be specially brought for this pur-
pose to the capital from " the head wash island " {Gaung-
zd-Gyun) between Martaban and Moulmein, near the
mouth of the Salween river. This custom was continued
till after the second Burmese war, when purified water
from the Irrawaddy was used. It was then that the two
greatest of the levies or receptions known as the Kaddw
or " beg pardon " were held, when the court was en fete
and all who were in any way connected with it, or had
anything to hope from it, laid tribute or presents at the
"golden feet" of the King. Every day the King wore
a new silk waist-cloth {Pas6\ and as each was discarded
after being once used it was lacquered in red, richly orna-
mented with gold, and then cut into strips upon which
the Pali text of the ordination service for monks [Kam-
mawd) was written in Burmese characters with black
varnish (Thitsi).

So long as Mindon was able to hold the reins of
government in his own hands matters within the royal
city went on fairly well, although direct intercourse be-
tween the British Resident and the King had even then
for about three years been interrupted on account of the
" shoe question " elsewhere referred to {vide page 30).

There was, however, one ever-threatening cause of
political disturbance connected with the succession to the
throne. Early in his reign Mindon appointed as heir
apparent his brother, to whom he was much attached.
As the King's sons grew up, they deeply resented this
nomination of their uncle ; so two of them, the Myingun
and the Myingundaing Princes, rose in rebellion in 1866,
and attempted to seize and dethrone their father while
he was residing for a few days at a royal pleasure garden

206

RIVALS FOR THE THRONE

situated about a couple of miles to the south-east of the
city. The King managed to escape, but the heir
apparent was killed along with three of the King's sons
and the Myadaung Mingyi, then Minister of War. The
attempt thus proving futile, the rebel princes fled into
British territory. For some years they were kept under
supervision in Rangoon, till the Myingun Prince tried to
escape, when they were both transferred for greater safety
to Fort Chunar in Bengal.

After that, King Mindon felt nervous about appointing
an heir apparent, and his nervousness was not in any
way dissipated by another of his sons, the Prince of
Katha, heading an attempt to dethrone him in 1870.
But although he must have known that his action was
not what could be regarded as constitutional, Mindon
would not appoint his successor. He had no lack of
sons, duly qualified by blood, to choose from. His family
by chief Queens, inferior Queens, and mere concubines
numbered about a hundred, and about thirty of these
were sons. But the number of Princes who had any
special chance of finding sufficient support upon which
to base aspirations to the throne was practically limited
to about half a dozen. These were the Thonze, Mek-
kayd, Myingun, Myingundaing, Nyaungyan, Nyaungok,
and Thibaw Princes. The two first-named, the eldest,
were unsuitable from their cruel and overbearing dis-
position, while the next two had been outlaws and
refugees under foreign protection since their dash for
the throne in 1866. Hence the real issue as to succes-
sion lay between the Nyaungyan, the Nyaungok, and
the Thibaw Princes.

It had always been understood that, rightly or wrongly,
there were some doubts as to the parentity of the last
named. Mindon had consequently often expressed his
intention that this particular member of the royal family
should not succeed him on the throne. Actuated either
through personal fear, or else hoping to avert fratricidal
bloodshed, he put off the nomination of an heir apparent
till too late. By the middle of 1878 he was so ill as to
be unable to exercise any real authority over affairs, and
as early as August rumours of his decease had already

207

BURMA UNDER BRITISH RULE

begun to find their way into the various districts. The
palace now became the scene of continuous intrigue by
various parties, but definite action was taken early in
September by the party then in power.

It is said that, while on his deathbed, Mindon actually
nominated the Nyaungyan Prince as heir apparent and
successor. This seems to have been, in fact, by far the
most suitable selection that could have been made. He
was of pure royal blood, was very popular throughout
the country, and was much esteemed and trusted by
Mindon both on account of his intellectual qualities and
his humane disposition. But It was now too late. The
chief Queen had three daughters, Supaydgyi, Supayd-
lat, and Supayagale. The young Thibaw Prince, son
of a Queen of Shan extraction, was known to be ena-
moured of one of these ; so Queen Sinpyumashin, an
ambitious and crafty woman, resolved to secure the
throne for him, raise all her three daughters to the
highest queenly rank, and be the guiding hand control-
ling the destiny of affairs through these, her puppets.
The Taingda Mingyi, the most powerful of the Ministers,
fell in with these plans ; and even the Kinwun Mingyi,
the Prime Minister, was won over to the plot. A forged
order, purporting to come from the King, was sent to
all the royal Princes and Princesses, who were therein
summoned to appear before his Majesty to hear his
nomination of a successor and his last words of formal
farewell. As they came to the royal apartments they
were one by one seized and placed in confinement. Thus,
on the 1 2th September all the Princes of the royal
blood had been secured save two, the Nyaungyan and
Nyaungok Princes, who, warned either by instinct or
by some friendly hint, fled to the British Residency for
protection. Opposition thus removed, Thibaw was pro-
claimed heir apparent, and by ist October, when
authentic news of Mindon's death had been received,
he had ascended the throne without opposition.

Following the usual custom. King Thibaw made Su-
payagyi, one of the late King's favourite daughters, his
chief Queen, but she absolutely refused to be his consort
in anything more than name. So her sister, Supaya-

208

QUEEN SUPAYALAT

lat, virtually became chief Queen ; while later on Supaya-
gale, the youngest, was likewise raised to queenly rank.
These Princesses represented the purest of the pure royal
blood. Their father was a son of King Tharrawaddi,
while their mother was a daughter of Nanmadaw Me
Nu, chief Queen of Bagyidaw.

But the Dowager Chief Queen had miscalculated. No
sooner had she succeeded in crushing anything like power
and authority in the case of the Kinwun Mingyi, Minister
of Foreign Affairs, than she found herself checkmated in
her ambitious designs and forced into the position of an
absolute nonentity by her daughter Supayalat. Master-
ful to a degree, ambitious, and jealous in every possible
way, Supaydlat very soon showed that she intended to
domineer over her lord and master and to rule the palace,
and consequently the national affairs, without permitting
either King, Queen Dowager, or Ministers to have very
much to say in the matter. And, as might have been ex-
pected with such a woman, her opinions and actions were
far more influenced by the brutal and ruffianly Taingda
Mingyi than by any of the more reputable of the nominally
responsible Ministers of the King.

The political situation of the British Resident had by
this time become unduly strained. The treaties in force
were not respected, while British subjects and their com-
mercial interests involved in Upper Burma were wan-
tonly injured, redress for wrongs being tacitly refused.
Everywhere throughout the country affairs had run riot,
and life and property were insecure.

In February, 1879, Supayalat had obtained Thibaw's
consent to the " clearance " of many of the Princes who
were of political importance, though no conspiracy of
any sort was on foot. On the 15th, i6th, and 17th men,
women and children of royal blood, all the near relatives
of the King and the Queen, were massacred in cold blood
at Supayalat's instigation, prompted by the Taingda
Mingyi. Neither infancy nor old age afforded protec-
tion from the bloodthirstiness suddenly developed. The
aged uncle of the Nyaungyan Prince, an old man stand-
ing on the brink of the grave, who had been Governor
of Pegu in 1852, was among the victims, but these also

209 p

BURMA UNDER BRITISH RULE

included children of the tenderest age. Infants were even

torn from their mothers' arms, and their brams dashed

out against the wall before their parents' eyes. And

" all this was effected tinder the superintendeiice of the

personal followers of the Kingl' as Mr. Shaw, the British

Resident, reported officially to the Government of India

The women and children were buried in the jail yard

within the palace precincts, but eight cartloads of corpses

of Princes of the royal blood were borne, wrapped in red

velvet sacks, through the "accursed" western gate and

thrown into the river Irrawaddy according to precedent

and custom. In September more massacres occurred,

and in November of 1879 they were continued, as all

the scions of the royal stock had not yet been cut off.

Among those then released from confinement and thus

freed from their present human incarnation was poor

Supayagyi, the nominal chief Queen by virtue of haying

been the Tabindaing Princess on Thibaw's accession.

Apparently all along in love with the Nyaungyan

Prince, and maybe the one who sent him a friendly hint

to flee, she had recently attempted to administer poison

to Thibaw and Supayalat, her own half-brother and

sister. But failing in this attempt to stop bloodshed,

butchery, and general oppression, she had to pay forfeit

with her life ; for Supayalat was not a person likely to

spare even her own sister after that sort of crime.

While the walls within the inner palace enclosure were
thus being stained red with royal blood, everything was
done to provide mirth and amusement for the citizens
and the suburban population, and to distract their attention
from ruminating over the reports that leaked out about
the carnage going on within the palace. These reports
could not be stifled. The ghastly procession of carts
with the corpses of the murdered Princes could not but
tell its own horrible tale, and corpses of common folks
were even intentionally exposed to public view.

Within the palace the state of affairs was desperate,
and Thibaw, "the Excellent King of the Rising
Sun and Lord of the White Elephant," bullied by the
termagant Supayalat and no doubt horrified by the
bloodshed ordered in a moment of terror, or of alco-

210

KING THIBAW

holic excitement, or of both, was probably one of the
most miserable of all the men within his kingdom, for at
this time, though he had been a Patama Byan, or graduate
with the highest possible honours in theology, he fell far
below the usual standard of Burmese Buddhists with
regard to abstinence and self-denial. A few years before
he had attained, as a novice, the highest honours at the
public examination in religious philosophy held annually
in the Thudamd hall ; and as King he was virtually the
head of Burmese Buddhism. Hence, if he had any
belief at all in the doctrines enunciated by Gaudama, he
must have felt convinced that in the next state of exist-
ence he was doomed to fearful torments in one of the
lowest regions in hell. No wonder he was dismayed
and despairing about his future existence, as well as
wretched and miserable about the rung he now occupied
in the " ladder of existence."

So he lost faith in everything. Even the Weza or
soothsayer in whom he placed most confidence fell into
disgrace during the spring of 1879, was degraded, and
had to flee from the wrath of the King, while the attend-
ant or disciple whom he left behind was thrown into
prison. On his flight a rival soothsayer of Minhla, near
the frontier, boldly declared that this previously much-
honoured personage was no seer at all, but merely a
common demon who had been enabled to assume the
form of a man by means of the arts of a sorcerer ; and
this sorcerer was, the new authority affirmed, no other
than the supposed disciple now in the royal prison. So
the poor unoffending servant was executed at the sug-
gestion of the new soothsayer, who also strongly advised
a change of capital back to Amarapura. But this was
out of the question, for obvious reasons.

Thibaw became almost demented with terror when the
British Resident withdrew from Mandalay in the autumn
of 1879. Knowing that the political and commercial
courses he was pursuing must sooner or later bring him
into conflict with the Government of India, he suddenly
developed frenzied proclivities for soldiering, which his
Ministers were unable to check. And even if he had
recollected sufficient of the ancient Jewish Old Testament

211

BURMA UNDER BRITISH RULE

history— for, when about twelve years of age, he was sent
to be taught EngHsh and western wisdom at the Manda-
lay Mission School of the Society for the Propagation
of the Gospel— to know that Jehosaphat was promised
the throne of Israel for four generations because, in
slaughtering the seventy sons of Ahab, ''he had done
that which was right in the sight of the Lordl' yet he
must have known quite well that that piece of ancient
history could hardly be considered as parallel with the
massacre, in the latter part of the nineteenth century, of
about four times as many innocent victims who were his
own nearest relatives.

So the state of affairs within the heart of the Golden
City was dreadful. Thibaw's mother appealed to the
Dowager chief Queen, beseeching her to stay the ruth-
less follies of Thibaw and Supayalat ; but in vain. Tlie
royal couple were now quite incapable of being restrained,
and the only advice they seemed to listen to was the
fatal promptings of the ignorant and brutal Taingda
Mingyi, urging them on to conflict with the British.

The story has been told in another chapter of how
political and commercial matters gradually drifted from
bad to worse within the golden city, and how intrigues
with foreign powers, and blunt refusal to submit to proper
judicial enquiry certain grave charges raised against an
influential trading corporation, ultimately led to the third
Burmese war in 1885. How strange it was that the
first procession which Thibaw and his Queens made
through their capital was when, driven in a cart passing
between files of British troops and furnished with a guard
of honour of British soldiers, they passed, for the first
time since the summer of 1878 and for the first time
during Thibaw's reign, through the Red Gate at the east
side of the palace enclosure and were conveyed by the
southern gate of the golden city westwards to the river
bank for embarkation on board the Thooreah ( Thuryd),
"the Sun" — appropriate name for the steamer which
was to bear the King of the Rising Sun away from his
dominions into lifelong exile in a foreign land.

While thus reaping the fruits of his own wickedness
and folly, Thibaw was spared the deepest indignity of

212

THE "ACCURSED" GATE

being made to pass through the "accursed" western
gate of the city. But his cup of bitterness and remorse
was full enough without that, although the degrading
insult of being forced to come and go by that gate had
from time immemorial been thought good enough treat-
ment for the various British Envoys and Residents who
had visited any of the capitals of the kingdom of Burma
during the previous century and a quarter.

213

chapter IX

THE BRITISH SYSTEM OF ADMINISTRATION IN BURMA

AT the end of 1899, for the first time in her history,
Burma was absolutely free from organized dacoity ;
not a single dacoit gang was known to be in existence
within the boundaries of the province. Before that,
although the main efforts for the pacification of Upper
Burma could be considered as crowned with success by
the end of 1890, it was not to be expected that all
trouble was then at an end. There still remained a
great deal to be done among the frontier tribes inhabit-
ing the forest-clad hills all round the northern borders
marching with Siam, China, Assam, Manipur, and
Bengal.

Early in 1891 the chiefs of the Shan States 01
Wuntho and Kale, lying west of the Irrawaddy and
west of the Chindwin, conspired with a view to a
general rising along with Manipur, and the Wuntho
Sawbwa broke into open rebellion. Both were deposed,
and their States were incorporated into the existing
districts of Upper Burma.

In the Chin hills raids continued to occur, which
necessitated the infliction of severe punishment on the
Kanhdw and Baungshe tribes. In 1891 many of the
Chin chiefs were brought down to Rangoon to be
shown the wonders of civilization, and the power and
extent of British rule ; but some of them were so little
impressed thereby that they broke into revolt soon after
their return to the fastnesses within their native hills.
Columns were therefore sent to explore and subjugate
the whole of the Chin tracts, levying and fixing tribute,
recognizing or appointing tribal chiefs, releasing slaves

214

THE HILL TRIBES

kidnapped in raids, imposing fines or burning con-
tumacious villages wherever necessary, and opening out
mule tracks. The only real difficulties encountered by
the military were the physical obstructions offered by the
mountainous nature of the densely forested country
operated in ; for the rainy season, during which opera-
tions had to be suspended, came early and was late of
ceasing, so that an expedition could seldom complete its
work effectively during one short field season. Thus,
when, in October, 1892, the Siyin and Nwengal tribes
revolted, and, ambushing a party, killed a Burmese
magistrate and eleven of his men, operations promptly
taken at a cost of casualties exceeding seventy on the
British side crushed the rebellion : but the operations
had to be continued in the following open season before
the rebel leaders were all captured and the tribes
thoroughly disarmed and subjugated. This was, how-
ever, effected in due time, and the Chin hills were
brought under the jurisdiction of a political officer
stationed at Faldm. In all, about 7,000 guns were
taken from the tribesmen. In 1894 a battalion of
military police was substituted for the military garrison
of the northern posts, and in 1896 a similar change was
effected in the Southern Chin hills ; while the increased
security for life and property was naturally accompanied
by an expansion of trade and greater freedom of inter-
course with the adjacent districts on the plains.

Among the Kachin tribes much also remained to be
done. Early in 1891 the Kaukkwe valley was quieted,
and a post was established at the Jade Mines, while
columns were also sent south-eastwards from Bhamo to
reduce to order the wild tribes dwelling in the forests
north of the Shweli river. To the north-east of the
Bhamo district nothing had yet been done to bring the
hill tribes under control ; but repeated outrages com-
mitted by the Kachins, the Alsatian character that this
tract had acquired as a refuge for outlaws and bad
characters, and the necessity of preventing the importa-
tion into Burma of illicit opium, liquor, and arms from
Yunnan, involved operations being undertaken in the
open seasons of 1891--92 and 1892-93. As the result

215

BURMA UNDER BRITISH RULE

of these expeditions, some of which met with consider-
able resistance, strong posts of military police were
established along the Chinese border at Namkhan on
the Shweli river, and northwards at Nampaung, Sima,
and Sadon, or Fort Harrison, as the last was called after
an officer who defended it with great gallantry when the
small garrison there was besieged by a large number of '
Kachins. After the military operations civil officers
moved about the hills with moderate escorts, collecting
tribute, settling disputes, and meeting with little or no
opposition.

In 1894 the policy to be adopted in the Kachin hills
was definitely fixed. The point where the Malikha
("good water") and the Maikha ("bad water") join to
form the Irrawaddy river, about twenty- five miles north
of the flourishing new town of Myitkyina, was taken as
the northern limit of active administration, which was to
include all the tracts lying south of the Maikha to the
east of the Irrawaddy, on its left bank, and on the right
bank all the country lying south of a line drawn from the
confluence of the Malikha and the Maikha westwards
through the northern limit of Labdn, including the Jade
Mines. So long as the tribes to the north of this
administrative boundary abstained from raiding into the
tracts south of it, it was notified to them that they would
not be interfered with. In order to carry out this
scheme a new district, Myitkyina, was formed in 1895,
while the Kachin Hill Tribes Regulation was passed to
legalize the procedure previously in force, and was
extended to various hill tracts throughout the northern
districts. Since then the establishment of law and
order has proceeded regularly and satisfactorily, and con-
siderable progress has even been made in the extremely
difficult matter of settling disputes between Kachin
tribes on different sides of the frontier line separating
Burma from China.

Throughout the northern and the southern Shan
States satisfactory advances continued to be made in the
matter of introducing more orderly methods of adminis-
tration than had previously been in force. During the
open seasons of 1890-91 and 1891-92 the two Super-

216

THE SHAN STATES

intendents were busy with the work of revenue in-
spection and house-counting^, with a view to making
better arrangements for the assessment of tribute, in
bringing the distant State of Manglun under regular
control, and in visiting Kengtung with a view to placing
matters there on a satisfactory footing — for the young
Sawbwa was proving far from amenable to the control of
the Superintendent. In 1891 the customary law of the
Shan States was modified by a short and simple set of
rules designed to serve the purpose of Penal and
Criminal Procedure Codes among a primitive people.
In 1892-93 the demarcation of the boundary between
the southern Shan States and Siam was accomplished
satisfactorily as far north as Kengcheng, the Siamese
Commissioners working in perfect accord with the
Superintendent ; while in the northern States an ex-
pedition was made into the wild Wa country. In the
following year a partial demarcation was made of the
boundary between Kengtung and Kengcheng, an assistant
political officer was stationed at Kengtung, and steps
were taken to promote cordial relations between that
State and the Siamese tracts on its borders. As affairs
in Kengtung continued unsatisfactory, it was in 1894-95
reduced from occupying a position of subordinate alliance
with British India to precisely the same status as the
other Shan States, a small garrison was established at
the capital, and it was connected with Fort Stedman by
a telegraph line and by a mule track capable of being
used throughout the year. The young Sawbwa, who
had married a daughter of the Thibaw Sawbwa, died in
1895; and the State of Kengtung, which had recently
been enlarged by the m- Mekong districts of Kengcheng,
was provisionally placed in charge of the late chief's
brother till the succession could be decided. The Keng-
cheng territories thus attached to Kengtung accepted the
new situation loyally, and the partition of the State to
the west of the Mekong river led to no difficulties
with the French, who thereby became our neighbours.
Cordial relations were maintained with Siam, and there
was no trouble with the Chinese of Kenghung and

Mong Lem.

217

BURMA UNDER BRITISH RULE

The maintenance of peace and order and the abroga-
tion of tolls were already bearing fruit in a considerable
expansion of trade throughout the Shan States. In
1894-95 the southern Shan States exports and imports
amounted to over /36,666, having more than doubled
themselves within the last year or two, and the several
chiefs were beginning to take an intelligent interest in
the development of the resources of their States.
Among other reforms introduced, the financial arrange-
ments of the States were placed on a sound footing.
Budget estimates were drawn up and revenue registers
kept in specific forms ; unauthorized demands were not
to be made ; and the inhabitants of each village or circle
were to know exactly how much they were required to pay.

In May, 1895, Sir Frederick Fryer, who had acted as
loaim tenens from 23rd May, 1892, to 2nd May, 1894, and
had substantively succeeded Sir Alexander Mackenzie in
the Chief Commissionership of Burma on 3rd April,
1895, held a durbar at Taunggyi, to which the head-
quarters of the Superintendent had recently been
removed from Fort Stedman. Here, for the first time,
chiefs from all parts of the southern Shan States, from
the territories beyond the Salween, as well as from cis-
Salween tracts, and all the chiefs of Karenni came
together. Early in 1896 he also held durbars at Tiddim,
Falam and Hdka in the Chin hills. Many of the more
important of the Shan chiefs, as well as a number of
Chin chieftains from the western mountain range, had
also been present at the durbars held in Rangoon and
Mandalay, when Lord Lansdowne visited Burma towards
the end of 1893, before laying down his viceroyalty.
Representative Kachin chiefs from all parts of the
northern hills had also been presented to His Excellency
at Bhamo.

Throughout the whole of the more setded and the
regularly administered portions of the province a steady
advance was being made such as had characterized the
province of British Burma before the annexation of the
kingdom of Ava. The decennial census taken on the
night of 26th February, 1891, was carried out over the
whole province without difficulty or disturbance, and

218

CENSUS OF 1 89 1

probably afforded a fairly accurate record of the popula-
tion. The enumeration gave a total of 8,098,014 souls,
of whom 4,658,627, occupying- 869,132 houses, were in
Lower Burma, 3,063,426 in Upper Burma, and 375,961
in the northern and southern Shan States. The
population of Lower Burma had increased from 2f
millions in 1872, to nearly 3f millions in 1881, and 4%
millions in 1891 ; but the maximum and the minimum
density of population were both to be found in Upper
Burma, with 178 to the square mile in Mandalay
district and only 5*23 to the square mile in the wild
forest district of the Upper Chindwin. A not incon-
siderable share of the increase in Lower Burma was due
to immigration from India, especially from Madras, and
from Upper Burma, from which large numbers fled during
the troublous times following the annexation ; but now
that the northern portion had been brought into a settled
condition, emigrants to Lower Burma flocked back
across the frontier to secure to themselves the rights
to the land which they had formerly possessed. The
removal of restrictions on trade and liberty now also
operated naturally to check the stream of emigration
from Upper Burma, while the abolition of exemption
from capitation tax formerly granted to the newly-
arrived immigrant into Lower Burma assisted in the
same direction.

When Lord Lansdowne in November and December,
1893, paid a viceregal visit to Burma, towards the close
of the tenure of his high ofiice, it was practically decided
that the position and importance of the province was
such as to render necessary its transformation from a
local administration to a local government. After the
first Burmese war the ceded sea-board provinces of
Arakan and Tenasserim were administered by Commis-
sioners, and after the annexation of Pegu, in 1852, the
new territory was also placed under another Commis-
sioner until it had been reduced to order and quietude.
On 31st January, 1862, these three commissionerships
were amalgamated and formed into a local administration
called British Burma, Lieut. -Colonel (afterwards Sir
Arthur) Phayre being made Chief Commissioner and

219

BURMA UNDER BRITISH RULE

Agent to the Governor- General in Council. It was then
placed on the same level as the Central Provinces of
India ; but, from early in the seventies, the exceptional
importance of Burma as a local administration was shown
by the fact that the ablest among the coming men in
India were sent to administer the province. The first
two Chief Commissioners, Colonels Phayre and Fytche,
were members of the Indian Staff Corps; but, from 1873
onwards, the appointment was filled only by covenanted
members of the Beno^al Civil Service. The roll of Chief
Commissioners included successively the men who
achieved Indian fame as Sir Ashley Eden, Sir Augustus
Rivers Thompson, Sir Charles Aitchison, Sir Charles
Bernard, Sir Charles Crosthwaite, and Sir Alexander
Mackenzie. All of these, — with the exception of Sir
Charles Bernard, the breakdown of whose health under
the strain of the troublous times immediately before and
after the annexation of Upper Burma prematurely termi-
nated his brilliant Indian career, — after holding charge of
Burma, were subsequently promoted to seats on the Vice-
regal Council and to lieutenant-governorships of Bengal,
the Punjab, or the North- West Provinces.

That the province, now greatly increased by Upper
Burma, and the Shan States, stood on quite a different
plane from the other local administrations under the
Government of India, and involved under higher responsi-
bilities than the other chief commissionerships, had been
previously acknowledged by raising the pay of the ap-
pointment from 50,000 rupees to 80,000 rupees (^^3,333
to £s>33Z) P^J" annum, thus giving it emoluments equal to
those drawn by members of the Viceregal Council, and
by granting to Burma the practical status of a local
government with regard to powers of sanction and the
control of financial matters in various departments of
Government. Financial pressure intervened, however,
to prevent the Government of India from taking the
necessary steps towards moving the Secretary of State
to sanction the transformation of the chief commissioner-
ship into a lieutenant-governorship, and to have the
necessary legislation carried through. It was, there-
fore, not until ist May, 1897, that Burma became a

220

THE FIRST LIEUTENANT-GOVERNOR

lieutenant-governorship, having a separate Government
and a Legislative Council of its own.

The first Lieutenant-Governor, Sir Frederick Fryer,
had originally been sent down from the Punjab to Upper
Burma in 1886, as soon as it had been decided to incor-
porate the kingdom of Ava with the British possessions,
and bring it under direct administration. After filling
for some time a divisional commissionership, he had
been selected for the financial commissionership on that
appointment being formed in June, 1888, but had subse-
quently returned to his old province, the Punjab. From
May, 1892, to May, 1894, he had officiated as Chief-
Commissioner during the absence of Sir Alexander
Mackenzie on long leave to Europe, and on 3rd April,
1895, he had substantively succeeded to the appointment,
after acting for some time as a member of the Viceregal
Council. For a term of five years from May, 1897, the
province now became assured of an administrator who
had a much more intimate knowledge of the province
and its people than had been brought to the task of
government by any of his predecessors since the days
of the two military proconsuls, Phayre and Fytche.

At the head of the Administration is the Lieutenant-
Governor, who exercises the powers of a local govern-
ment in respect of all the territories forming the province
of Burma as constituted by the Upper Burma Laws
Act, 1886, and who exercises political control over the
wild tribes of the Chin hills and over Karenni, a small
independent State in subordinate alliance with the British
Government.

The disposal of Secretariat business is conducted by
three departments controlled by a Chief Secretary, a
Revenue Secretary, and a Secretary, together with
Under Secretaries. From these various departments
business is transmitted by the Secretary-in-Charge for
the orders of the Lieutenant-Governor; but in place of
proceeding back direct to each department, the boxes of
records filter through the Chief Secretary, who is thus
kept in constant touch with what is passing in the other
two departments, and has the opportunity of making any
suggestions which may occur to him.

221

BURMA UNDER BRITISH RULE

The various secretaries and the heads of departments
have each a specified morning for waiting upon His Honour
the Lieutenant-Governor, while in residence at the head-
quarters of Government, Rangoon, for reporting upon
current business, and receiving his instructions as to its
disposal. Other responsible officials who have no fixed
days for discussion of business can always, when necessary,
arrange for a special interview through the Private
Secretary. Once a week, at noon, officials at large are
afforded an opportunity of bringing before His Honour's
notice any matters in which they are personally interested ;
for, of course, apart from personal matters, the official
communications of subordinate officers with the Local
Government must proceed through the prescribed
channel, the head of the department and the Secre-
tariat. A Private Secretary and an Aide-de-Camp
assist the Lieutenant-Governor in the transaction of
business which does not pass through the Secretariat,
and in the arrangements for the social, the sumptuary,
and the ceremonial duties attached to this highest office
in the province. Like all Orientals, the Burmese love
ostentation and ceremonial observances not only on public
occasions, but even in the every-day routine connected
with the high officials ruling over them. In this respect
it is far easier for a mistake to be made in the way of
omission than by paying strict attention to ceremonial
and official display.

For legislative purposes connected with the province
the Lieutenant-Governor is assisted by a Legislative
Council consisting of nine members, five of whom are
appointed by him as official members, and the remaining
four are non-official members, selected from among
merchants and others. Bills affecting local requirements
passed by this Council became law on receiving the
sanction of the Governor- General, without being re^rred
to the Indian Legislative Council; though, of course,
the functions of the Council are limited strictly to purely
provincial matters.

Owing to differences in legislative status, the primary
administrative division of Burma is into Lower Burma,
and Upper Burma (including the Shan States). Ex-

222

BRITISH OFFICALS

elusive of the Shan States, Upper Burma is a scheduled
district. While the law in force there is being gradually
assimilated to that applied in Lower Burma, there are
still considerable divergrences. For the executive ad-
ministration of the province, exclusive of the Chin
hills and the States on the Shan plateau, there are eight
Commissioners of Divisions, under whom are the thirty-
six Deputy Commissioners in charge of districts. As
throughout India, the district forms the real unit of
administration in Burma. The thirty-six districts are
divided, for judicial and revenue purposes, into eighty-one
subdivisions, held by Assistant Commissioners and extra
Assistant Commissioners; and these again consist of
townships, each under a Myo Ok or " town magistrate,"
forming the smaller units of regular civil and revenue
jurisdiction. Lower Burma is divided into four com-
missionerships, including twenty districts, with thirty-nine
subdivisions ; while Upper Burma also has four com-
missionerships, comprising sixteen districts, with forty-
two subdivisions.

The chief civil officer ranking next in position and
authority below the Lieutenant-Governor is the Financial
Commissioner. He is, subject to the control of the
Lieutenant-Governor, the Chief Revenue Authority, and
also undertakes the duties of Chief Customs Autho-
rity, Inspector-General of Registration, and Commis-
sioner of Excise and Stamps. His most important work
is connected with land revenue and agriculture, in
which he is assisted by a Settlement Commissioner, two
Secretaries, and a Director of Land Records and Agricul-
ture, with a Land Records Departmental Staff.

As the methods of collecting the land revenues and
the system of survey and settlement are elsewhere
described (in the chapter on " Land Tenure and the
Revenue Settlement") no details need here be given
concerning these matters.

During the official year, 1899- 1900, the collections
of civil revenue in the departments controlled by the
Financial Commissioner amounted to ;^2,878,298, and
it exceeded this two years earlier. The principal item
towards this total is the land revenue proper of Lower

223

BURMA UNDER BRITISH RULE

Burma yielding ;^928,488, while customs bring in
^643,318. Except when years of scarcity occur in the
dry central zone of Upper Burma, the Thdthamddd or
house tax yields over ;/^ 390,000, while the capitation tax
in Lower Burma, assessed at five rupees a head for
married men, three rupees for widowers, and two rupees
for adult bachelors, brings in nearly ^300,000, levied
from considerably over one million men. Exemptions
from payment of this latter tax have to be made when
calamities occur locally from flooding of crops or other
causes, and on the average over a hundred thousand
persons are thus exempted annually. The incidence of
assessment connected with land revenue levied directly or
indirectly cannot be correctly stated. The incidence of
land revenue per acre of cultivated land is just over
two rupees (2^. 8^.) in Lower Burma, while it is close
upon two rupees in Upper Burma, or between three
and four rupees (45'. to ^s. 4d.) per head of population
in the tracts assessed. Fisheries in Lower Burma, chiefly
in the /u or " lakes " formed throughout the low-lying
deltoid tracts after the summer monsoon floods have
receded, realize from ^120,000 to over ^130,000
annually. They are usually disposed of by auction,
being let for several years to tenants who manufacture
on a large scale the Ngapi or salted fish, the national
condiment eaten with curry and rice. This dainty,
beloved by the Burmese, is a loathsome and evil-smelling
moist preparation of fish, pickled and pressed with coarse
salt; and it is very largely imported along with Nga-
chdiik, or sun-dried fish, into Upper Burma and the Shan
States, where the supply of salt is not so favourable as
throughout Lower Burma. Opium, imported from
Bengal, though also grown by the Shans in Upper
Burma and the Shan States, brings in over ^180,000,
and excise (including salt) over ^190,000. Rents from
State lands in Upper Burma, the old " royal fields,"
bring in upwards of ^131,000, while nearly ^100,000
more are classified as miscellaneous land revenue. By
far the greater portion of this latter sum, over four-fifths
of it in fact, is realized from Upper Burma, on account
of revenue from fisheries, water rates from irrigated

224

OPIUM REGULATIONS

tracts, and royalties from the Ruby Mines and from the
petroleum wells of Yenangyaung and its vicinity.
Stamps produce an income of nearly ^130,000, and
income tax ^70,000, of which one-fourth consists of
deductions from the salaries of officials. With the
exception of the town of Mandalay and of civil officers,
residents in Upper Burma are exempt from the operation
of this unpopular tax, which might well be remitted for
all that it brings in. Officials in any case might be
exempted, for Burma is admittedly the most expensive
province to be stationed in, and the days of exceptionally
rapid promotion in any of the civil departments are now
at an end ; nor are they likely to return again till some
further political move takes place like the Administra-
tion of Yunnan, or the Protection of Siam.

Traffic in opium is regulated by the Opium Regulations
of 1894. As a general rule the possession of opium in
any part of Burma, except for medical purposes, is
forbidden to Burmese ; but those who have become
habituated to the drug were permitted to register them-
selves as opium consumers, for the purpose of getting
certificates authorizing them to obtain and possess the
drug in small quantities. The registration of such
Burmese opium consumers was carried on from Feb-
ruary, 1893, to the end of June, 1894, when the registers
were closed. Since the latter date no Burmese have been
registered except such as can show sufficient cause for
the omission of registering themselves while the registers
were open, such as, for example, absence from Burma
during the period allowed for registration. Persons of
other than Burmese race are permitted to possess opium
in small quantities.

Concurrently with the registration of Burmese opium
consumers a census of non- Burmese consumers was also
taken, and the twofold data thus obtained were used as
a basis for making a rough estimate of the total quantity
of opium annually required to supply the requirements
of those legally entitled to purchase and possess opium.
On this basis the maxima quantities of opium are fixed
which may be issued to the twenty-six retail vendors
licensed in different parts of the province. These opium

225 Q

BURMA UNDER BRITISH RULE

shops are mostly in Lower Burma. Those in Upper
Burma are only in the chief towns, and along the frontiers,
where they are absolutely required to meet the needs of
non- Burmese consumers. Even with these arrangements
illicit opium traffic is rife along the northern frontier, for
opium is grown largely by the Shans and much more
largely still throughout Yunnan. The retail-vend licences
are sold by public auction in the Deputy Commissioner's
court, and are entirely in the hands of Chinamen. The
licensed vendor may from time to time obtain from the
Government Treasury as small supplies of opium as he
pleases, but the total quantity to be supplied to him
during the year must not exceed the estimated maximum.

As many opium consumers live in places remote from
any licensed retail shop, steps have been taken to provide
such persons with the means of obtaining opium legally
by permitting the sale of opium at the Government
Treasury by, or in the presence of, a gazetted officer to
those permitted by law to possess opium. Previous to
April, 1894, the maximum quantity of opium permitted
to be possessed by any individual consumer was ten tolas
(3f ounces), but this was then reduced to three tolas (i-|-
ounces), and the possession of opium by Burmese doctors
and tattooers for professional purposes was legalized.
Early in 1896 the price of Bengal opium was raised by
one rupee per sir (2^ lb.), and the duty on Chinese and
Shan-Chinese opium by two rupees a viss (3'65 lb.).
To defeat a combination of Chinamen the retail shop at
Tavoy was closed, and retail sales were made to legal
consumers from the Treasury. Stringent measures are
everywhere taken to prevent opium smuggling, and the
Opium Regulations have been framed and worked so as
to prevent Burmese from becoming consumers of the
drug ; but it is still doubtful if the consumption of opium
has really been diminished by the restrictive measures
taken.

The Commissioners of Divisions are responsible to
the Lieutenant-Governor for the working of every de-
partment of the public service, except the Military
Department and the branches of the Administration
directly under the control of the Imperial Government.

226

THE DEPUTY COMMISSIONER

They are also ex-officio Sessions Judges in their several
divisions, and have civil powers under the Lower Burma
Courts Act, 1889, and Upper Burma Civil Justice Regu-
lation, 1886, in addition to powers as revenue officers
under the Land and Revenue Act, 1876, and the Upper
Burma Land and Revenue Regulation, 1889. The
Commissioners of the Mandalay and the Meiktila divi-
sions, in Upper Burma, also supervise certain of the
minor Shan States adjoining the eastern boundaries of
their divisions.

The Deputy Commissioners perform the functions of
District Magistrates, District Judges, Collectors and
Registrars, and the various miscellaneous duties which
fall to the real unit representative of Government. Each
has not only his own special and onerous duties as a
judge in civil and criminal cases, and as the chief
authority in revenue matters, but he has also the control
of the Police, the Public Works, and the Forest business
throughout his district ; for it is laid down that the
District Superintendent of Police, the Executive En-
gineer, and the Deputy Conservator of Forests are the
assistants of the district officer in their special depart-
ments. There is practically nothing whatever connected
with the administration from which the unfortunate
Deputy Commissioner escapes responsibilities, some
nominal, but others real and heavy, either by direct pro-
visions of the Acts or Regulations, or else by some
resolution or executive order of Government. Even if
the day were to consist of forty-eight hours in place of
merely twenty-four, and if he could toil incessantly
throughout the whole of these day after day, it would be
next to impossible, except in a few of the lighter district
charges, for the Deputy Commissioner to do personally,
in anything like a satisfactory and conscientious manner,
the multifarious duties prescribed for him. And, of
course, the tendency always is to increase these in place
of lightening the burdens already put upon him.

Burma is a non-regulation province, that is to say, the
Commission is recruited, as in the Punjab and the
Central Provinces, by young covenanted civilians ap-
pointed from England, by the selection of young military

227

BURMA UNDER BRITISH RULE

officers from the Indian Staff Corps, and by the nomina-
tion of others not belonging to any covenanted or com-
missioned service; whereas in the regulation provinces
of Bengal and the North- West Provinces appointments
are now limited solely to the members of the Indian
Civil Service.

Before the annexation of Upper Burma, the Burma
Commission consisted of 62 officers, but its strength was
gradually raised to 123 by the end of 1889. Prospects
of promotion in the Burma Commission are now less
favourable than in any of the other provinces, as the
Commissioners and Deputy Commissioners are all com-
paratively young men. This is the natural result of the
floodtide of promotion which set in after the annex-
ation.

The Myo Ok or township officer is the ultimate repre-
sentative of Government who comes into direct and
close personal contact with the people. Below these in
the towns there are headmen of wards and elders of
blocks, an arrangement of recent origin and modelled on
the Upper Burma village system ; while in the rural
tracts the village headmen are assisted in Lower Burma
by SHngaung or rural policemen in charge of ten
houses, and in Upper Burma by elders of various de-
signations. In Lower Burma the village system is in a
state of transition. Up till 1889 the collection of land
revenue and capitation tax was entrusted to Taikthugyi
or headmen of revenue circles, each comprising several
villages, and the headman was remunerated by com-
mission, fixed according to a sliding scale, on the amount
of revenue collected within the circle. In the discharge
of his revenue work and of various miscellaneous duties
the Taikthugyi was assisted by the KyMangyi or
village headman ("tax collector") and by rural police-
men {YazawiU-Gaung^y each of whom was in charge of
several villages. Under this system it was found that
the village headman had gradually degenerated into
something little better than a village drudge. To im-
prove matters the Lower Burma Village Act was passed
in 1889, with a view of bringing affairs more in a line
with the village system which had been so successfully

228

JUDICIAL ADMINISTRATION

retained in Upper Burma as being most in accordance
with the national customs and character of the Burmese.
While the TaiktJmgyi are being gradually abolished
and the office of YazawiU-Gaiing has been done away
with, the position of the village headman has been re-
habilitated by making him a collector of revenue, giving
him power to decide petty civil and criminal cases, and
securing for him the assistance of rural policemen subor-
dinate to his authority. In Upper Burma the village
headmen {Yivci TJmgyt) had always been associated with
the collection of revenue.

The judicial administration has only recently been
improved by the formation of a High Court for Lower
Burma. When Lord Lansdowne visited Burma in 1893,
strong representations were made by the mercantile
community and the Bar concerning the establishment of
a High Court for Burma. It was, however, at that time
decided that the matter was not one of the most urgent
needs of the province. During Lord Elgin's tour in
Burma, in November and December, 1898, the subject
was once more considered, and with more favourable
results. Proposals for a High Court could not be enter-
tained, as this would have necessitated legislation by the
English Parliament. But the establishment of a Chief
Court for Burma, to consist of a chief judge and three
puisne judges, two being barristers and the other two
members of the Indian Civil Service, has been sanctioned
by the Secretary of State from ist April, 1900.

Previous to that the purely judicial officers of the
province had been the Recorder of Rangoon, the two
Judicial Commissioners for Lower Burma and for Upper
Burma, the Additional Sessions Judges for the Pegu and
the Irrawaddy divisions, the Judge of Moulmein, the
Civil Judge of Mandalay town, and the Judges of the
Court of Small Causes in Rangoon. The Recorder was
a District and Sessions Judge in the town of Rangoon,
and a High Court for all Burma with regard to criminal
cases in which European British subjects were accused.
He had original jurisdiction in all such civil cases in the
town of Rangoon as were not within the powers of the
Court of Small Causes. In civil and criminal matters

229

BURMA UNDER BRITISH RULE

the Judicial Commissioners exercised the powers of a
High Court for appeal, reference, and revision of all
cases except those for which the Recorder was the High
Court. For the disposal of references transferred to it
by either the Recorder or the Judicial Commissioner
for the trial of such original cases and appeals as were
transferred to it by the Local Government, and for the
decision of appeals from decrees in civil cases passed by
the Judge of Moulmein, a "Special Court" might be
formed at Rangoon by the sitting together of the Re-
corder and the Judicial Commissioner of Lower Burma,,
with whom might also be associated the Judge of Moul-
mein if the Local Government so directed in any par-
ticular case. In practice this Special Court was found
to be a poor substitute for the High Court required by
Burma.

Within the limits of his jurisdiction the Judge of
Moulmein is a District and Sessions Judge, and has the
powers of a Civil Court for the adjudication of any suit
without restriction as to value. The Civil Judge of
Mandalay has jurisdiction in all civil suits arising in
Mandalay town, and in such as may be transferred to it
from the district. He has also the powers of a Small
Cause Court for the trial of suits up to 500 rupees
(£33^) in value. The two judges of the Court of Small
Causes in Rangoon dispose of cases up to the value of
2,000 rupees {£133^), except as regards cases specially
excepted from the cognizance of such courts. At
Rangoon, and in some of the other large towns, there
are benches of honorary magistrates exercising powers
of various degrees. In the different military canton-
ments there are cantonment magistrates.

In Upper Burma the highest court is that of the
Judicial Commissioner, who exercises both original and
appellate jurisdiction.

In the administration of the Shan States a successful
experiment has been tried. Now, as under the King of
Ava, the Shan uplands, extending over more than forty
thousand square miles and with a population exceeding
375,000, are divided into a large number of mutually
independent States, each ruled by a Sdwbwa or Chief

230

THE SHAN STATES

appointed by Government, and most likely to become an
hereditary appointment whilst good management con-
tinues in any given State. Each chief, though no longer
a feudatory but a British subject, has the power of life
and death, together with an almost unlimited authority
in the internal management of his State, so long as this
is not characterized by oppression, or cruel and barbarous
practices. Two civil officers, called Superintendents, are
posted at Taunggyi in the south, and Lashi6 in the
north, to exercise a general control and supervision over
the chiefs, their administration, and their relations with
each other. There are five large States under the super-
vision of the Superintendent, Northern Shan States, and
thirty-nine under the Superintendent and Political Officer,
Southern Shan States. Certain sources of revenue, such
as teak timber and minerals, are reserved by Govern-
ment, as in the time of the kingdom of Ava ; but the
extraction of timber on liberal terms is permitted to the
chiefs in whose States teak forests are to be found. The
revenue or tribute payable by each State is fixed at a
lump sum, being assessed roughly on the basis of the
number of houses. The chief is responsible for payment
of the tribute, which he can easily raise without resorting
to illegitimate means.

The total assessment is now about ^18,000, as com-
pared with a demand of about ^30,000 under the
Burmese Kings. But there is this difference, that,
whereas in 1885 King Thibaw obtained the tribute only
from a few of the States adjacent to the plains, the
whole amount now comes into the treasury without any
difficulty or leakage.

Tribute is paid with commendable punctuality, and in
many instances a portion of it is remitted in considera-
tion of expenditure on works of public utility, such as
road-making. A simple regulation secures attention to
ordinary legal forms and procedure, and debars the
infliction of excessive or cruel punishments. The law
thus administered in these States is, subject to the exten-
sion to them of specific enactments in force in the rest of
Burma, merely the customary law of the State so far as
it is in accordance with justice, equity, and good con-

231

BURMA UNDER BRITISH RULE

science, and is not opposed to the spirit of the law in
force throughout the rest of British India.

The administration of the chiefs is not the best
possible; but it is at once cheap, effective, and better
suited to the Shan people than any more elaborate
system modelled after the districts in charge of British
officers. There is very little crime of any serious^ de-
scription. The principle of local responsibility is strictly
enforced. When the offenders in a serious case are not
detected, the State in which the crime is committed has
to pay compensation. Communications are being rapidly
improved, agriculture is flourishmg, new crops like wheat
and potatoes have been successfully introduced, medical
relief and vaccination are being extended, and provisions
are being made for veterinary aid and the training of
veterinary assistants in the cattle-producing tracts.
Though they can hardly be regarded as altogether an
El Dorado, the Shan States have shown remarkable
improvement under British rule, and present a fair field
for future development agriculturally. Internecine war-
fare has ceased, agriculture is spreading normally at a
quick rate, caravan traffic is increasing year by year, the
population is growing quickly, and the Shan plateau is
now traversed by a railway. The short record of the
Shan States is one of peace, prosperity, and progress,
which will continue to develop rapidly as communications
are opened out by means of railways and roads.

The administration of the Chin hills on the north-
western frontier has been since 1892 in charge of a
political officer at Faldm. After the disarmament, com-
pleted in 1896, of the numerous and powerful hill tribes
inhabiting these mountain tracts, the conduct of the tribes-
men remained for some time satisfactory, and a partial
re-issue was made of the guns called in, marked guns
being given to licensees on a scale of about one gun for
every ten houses for purposes of defence. Serious crimes
were now for some time of seldom occurrence, raiding
was suppressed along the whole of the frontier, and there
was little or no political disturbance within the hills
themselves. During 1897 and 1898, however, arms were
successfully smuggled in, and disarmament had again

232

J

THE MILITARY GARRISON

to be carried out, about 2,000 guns being seized by the
end of May, 1899. A serious rising taking place in con-
sequence of this, the garrison in the hills had to be re-
inforced ; yet on the whole the condition of the Chin
hills is as satisfactory as frontier districts usually are.
Statistics of trade with the valley of the Chindwin are
wanting ; but the traffic is believed to be increasing con-
siderably, while the Chins have begun to show readiness
in providing labour for transport and public works. The
tribute amounts only to a nominal sum of about ;;^ 1,200,
which is easily levied. The Chin hills have been de-
clared to be a part of Burma ; but they constitute a
scheduled district, for the administration of which a
Regulation was passed in 1896. The Political Officer
and his Assistant are invested with powers to enable
them to keep the peace and to exercise supervision over
the chiefs, who are allowed to administer their affairs so
far as may be in accordance with their own tribal customs.
Since 1897 the Chin hills have been garrisoned en-
tirely by military police.

The Military Garrison of the province had been reduced
to 10,727 men in 1898, of whom 4,234 were Europeans,
and 6,493 natives. It was increased again to 12,309, of
whom 4,656 were Europeans and 7,653 natives, during
the following year, but has fallen again to 10,324 in
April, 1900(2,81 1 Europeans and 7,513 natives). Of the
latter, seven battalions are Burma regiments raised for
permanent service in Burma by transformation from
military police. These regiments, consisting of Gurkhas,
Sikhs, and Pathans, are distributed throughout the Shan
States and the northern part of Burma.

The Burma district command forming a first-class dis-
trict, is held by a Major-General directly subordinate to
the Lieut.-General commanding the Madras forces. It is
divided into two second-class districts held by Brigadiers-
General at Rangoon and Mandalay, while the native regi-
ment at Kengtung and the detachment at Fort Stedman
in the Southern Shan States are under the separate com-
mand of a Colonel on the Staff. The total cost of the
garrison during 1897- 1898 amounted to a little in excess
of ;^ 60,000, which may fairly be taken as about the normal

233

BURMA UNDER BRITISH RULE

cost of the regular troops maintained within the pro-
vince, now that everything is tranquil. In addition
to these regular troops there are close upon 2,500
efficient volunteers in the various towns and on the rail-
way lines, who form a valuable addition to the military
forces.

The Police Department had a force of 13,545 civil
police and 15,667 military police in 1898, costing up-
wards of ;^530,ooo a year. It is administered by an
Inspector- General of Police, assisted by Deputy Inspec-
tors-General for Civil Police, Military Police, and Police
Supply and Clothing. For the control and management of
the executive duties of the civil police there is a District
Superintendent of Police for each of the thirty-six dis-
tricts of Burma, while fifty-nine Assistant Superinten-
dents are in charge of the more important subdivisions.
The special duties of the military police are controlled
by twelve Battalion Commandants and twenty-seven
Assistant Commandants, whose services are lent, for
periods of five and two years respectively, from the
Indian Staff Corps for this specific purpose. The Dis-
trict Superintendents of Police have certain magisterial
powers, but in all essential respects they are directly sub-
ordinate to the Deputy Commissioner as District Magis-
trate. Apart from political uniforms worn by members
of the Government, political officers, and certain ad-
ministrative officers having political duties, the police is
the only civil department in Burma whose officers are
required to wear a uniform.

The military police is in reality a regular military
force with only two European officers in command of
each battalion ; and it is recruited entirely from among
the warlike races of northern India, with the exception
of a small battalion of between six and seven hundred
men raised by enlistment from among the Karens
inhabiting the forest-clad hills throughout the central
portion of Lower Burma. None of the other hill tribes
seem to be suited for enlistment, while both the work
and the discipline of this special branch of the Police
Department are unsuitable for the Burmese. At Mo-
gok, in the Ruby Mines district, Panthay or Yunnanese

234

VIOLENT CRIME

Mohammedan recruits were enlisted, but proved so
unpromising that they had to be disbanded. A similar
experiment now being made with the Kachin hillmen
may perhaps turn out more successful.

So averse is the Burmese character to discipline and
control in petty matters that it is impossible to get really
suitable men to enlist even in the civil police. About
twenty per cent, of the whole force is illiterate. Training
schools have been established in nearly every district,
where recruits are grounded in their future work before
being drafted into the police force. A feature of the
civil police administration is the maintenance of a beat
patrol system, one of the principal advantages of which
is that it enables the police to keep in touch with the
village headmen in rural tracts, and with the headmen of
wards and elders of blocks in towns, thus enabling in-
formation and assistance to be given by these at a mini-
mum of inconvenience.

The number of crimes of violence in 1897 consisted
only of 540, which seems a remarkably low total for a
population then probably numbering nearly ten millions.
Of these no less than seventy occurred in one district,
Tharrawaddy, which has ever been turbulent and inclined
to lawlessness. Cattle theft is common (3,442 cases occur-
ring in 1899), though the beat patrol system helps to keep
it in check.

Persons suspected of bad livelihood can be called upon
to show cause why they should not be made to furnish
security for good behaviour. Of 4,574 such cases
brought before magistrates in 1897, 3,660 were actually
called upon to furnish security. The provisions of the
enactments under which villages can be fined, or have
punitive police quartered on them at their own special
cost, for harbouring criminals or neglecting to take due
measures for their arrest, are now freely used in Lower
Burma, with the result that much is now done by vil-
lage headmen and villages to assist the police and pre-
vent anything like the organization of crime. In the
matter of ensuring the recognition of offenders previously
convicted the Bertillon system of anthropometry was
formerly in use, but has now given place to the method

235

BURMA UNDER BRITISH RULE

of identification by finger-prints, the police being charged
with the duty of thus identifying criminals.

The control of the Jail Department is vested in an
Inspector- General, who at the same time performs the
duties of Sanitary Commissioner, Superintendent of Vac-
cination, and Head of the Civil Medical Department.
The two central jails in and near Rangoon are in charge
of special medical officers as Superintendents ; but in all
other cases the Civil Surgeon at the headquarters of any
district is ex-officio Superintendent of the jail there.
Thus all the jails throughout Burma are in charge of
officers of the Indian Medical Service, except at small
stations where the post of Civil Surgeon and Superin-
tendent of Jail happens to be held by a member of the
subordinate medical service.

In Upper Burma there were no regular jails till 1887,
when one was opened at Mandalay. At other district
headquarters a mere lock-up was provided for the ac-
commodation of prisoners, and large numbers of escapes
were made from these insecure and inadequate buildings.
A scheme was afterwards drawn up for the construction
of a central jail holding 1,000 prisoners at Fort Dufferin
(Mandalay city) and at Myingyan, with smaller jails at
other district headquarters. At that time, too, the jails
in Lower Burma became overcrowded and liable to
dangers of epidemics. After the wave of crime rose, in
1885, the central jail in Rangoon became chronically
overcrowded with nearly 4,000 prisoners, many of whom
were men of desperate character. The pressure on
sanctioned accommodation was partially removed in 1891
by the release of over 1,500 men, some on security, and
some unconditionally, who had been convicted during
the disturbed times, and it became further obviated by
the opening in 1892 of a jail to hold 2,000 prisoners at
Insein, a few miles to the north of Rangoon. There is
total jail accommodation throughout the province for
over 15,000 prisoners distributed over seven central and
twenty-five district jails, and the average daily number
in prison throughout 1899 was 12,547 (of whom 12,416
were males, and only 1 3 1 females), but the accommoda-
tion, still somewhat insufficient, is being enlarged. To

236

THE CRIMINAL CLASSES

prevent overcrowding special batches of long-term con-
victs are from time to time sent from Rangoon to the
penal settlement on the Andaman Islands, while, since
1895, the normal annual number of prisoners transported
to the Andamans has been raised from 75 to 200.
Close upon 18,000 convicts were committed to prison
during 1897. This represents the enormous proportion
of about one convict to every 550 of the total population.
Of these 18,000 commitments close upon one-sixth were
prisoners charged with bad livelihood, nearly 3,000 of
whom were imprisoned for failure to give security for
good behaviour. In committing these prisoners to jail the
courts classified altogether 3,227 as "habitual criminals,"
either because they were convicted of offences punish-
able with three years' imprisonment after having been
previously convicted of an offence similarly punishable,
or else because they were believed either to depend on
crime as a means of livelihood or to have attained pe-
culiar skill in crime. Out of 20,000 prisoners committed
to jail in 1896, over one-eighth of the total number
committed to prison confessed to the habit of consuming
opium, and more than nine-tenths of these were found in
the prisons of Lower Burma. In 1899, 16,917 convicts
were sent to jail. Of these, 3,459 were habitual offenders,
and all but twenty-seven of them were identified before
conviction.

Serious outbreaks in any of the jails are of compara-
tively rare occurrence, as the discipline maintained is
distinctly good. Among the minor punishments inflicted
for breaches of discipline are the treadmill, shot drill,
and the loss of good marks leading to curtailment of the
time to be served. Whipping was formerly frequently
inflicted, but is now had recourse to only in compara-
tively rare cases, when exemplary punishment is really
necessary. One of the most effective punishments
for maintaining discipline is solitary confinement with
reduced diet. For juvenile offenders a reformatory is
attached to the central jail at Insein.

As the sanitary arrangements of the jails are infinitely
better than prisoners have previously been accustomed
to, the health of the jail population is usually good,

237

BURMA UNDER BRITISH RULE

although the larger jails from time to time become
infested by the obscure forms of fever and other kinds
of disease peculiarly liable to break out where large
numbers of men are confined together in a small space.
The daily average number of sick is usually about forty
per thousand of the average strength, and the death rate
is ordinarily only about eighteen per thousand. In 1896
the death rate was below that (i 7-93) and sixty per cent, of
the prisoners gained in weight during their incarceration ;
but in 1897 it increased to twenty-four per thousand, in
consequence of cholera breaking out in three jails at towns
having defective water supply. It was 1873 in 1899.

The gross expenditure on jails amounted in 1899 to
;^5 2, 506, which was reduced to the extent of ^22,200
by the gross cash earnings from work done by the
convicts. This reduced the cost per head from a gross
charge of £4. 35'. per annum to a net amount of ;C2 8j.,
while it does not take into consideration prisoners' labour
employed upon jail extensions and gardens. A garden
is attached to each jail for providing anti-scorbutic vege-
tables to the ordinary prison diet of curry and rice. The
jails are employed to the fullest possible extent in meet-
ing the wants of Government departments in furniture,
clothing, food, and other articles ; and the problem of
finding useful and remunerative employment for the ab-
normally large percentage of criminals is continually
under consideration.

The Public Works Department is under the control
of a Chief Engineer, who is ex-officio Secretary to the
Lieutenant-Governor in that department. The admin-
istration is carried out by five Superintending Engineers
in charge of circles, four of whom have charge of general
works such as roads, buildings, and canals, while one is
specially charged with the irrigation works and surveys
throughout the central dry zone of Upper Burma.
Within these five circles the works are in charge of
twenty- three Executive Engineers holding divisions,
assisted by Assistant Engineers as subdivisional officers.
Appointments to the Public Works Department are
mainly made from the Indian Engineering College at
Cooper's Hill, in Surrey, though young officers from the

238

PUBLIC WORKS DEPARTMENT

Royal Engineers and the pick of the students at the
Thomason Engineering College at Rurki, N.W. P., also
receive a small number of nominations. The subordi-
nate service, consisting of Sub-Assistant Engineers and
Overseers is recruited mainly from the army and from
the lower grade engineering schools of India.

So far as possible the circles of the four Superintend-
ing Engineers charged with general works are conter-
minous with the eight civil divisions held by Commis-
sioners, but they also include the Shan States and the Chin
hills. In like manner the divisions in charge of Execu-
tive Engineers are conterminous with the one or more
civil districts held by the Deputy Commissioners to
whom they are in certain matters directly subordinate.
Since 1894 all military works except the special defences
of Rangoon have been transferred from the Madras
Military Works to the Local Government.

When the various portions of the province came under
British administration the only means of communication
were the tidal creeks of the delta, the rivers and their
tributaries, rough jungle paths, and the temporary cart-
tracks across the fields when once the crops had been
reaped and harvested. Anything like good roads did
not exist. Perhaps the nearest approach to highways
was the ancient Minlan or " royal road " cleared
through the jungle following the two belts of laterite
running north and south along both sides of the Pegu
Yoma, which forms the watershed between the Irra-
waddy and the Sittang rivers. Crossed by scores of large
streams and smaller watercourses, it could only be used
during the dry season ; and its reputation was so bad
that part of it running through the Tharrawaddy district
was known as the Tkakolan or " thieves' road." Even
down to 1877, after Pegu had been in British possession
for a quarter of a century, there were exceedingly few
roads ; and none of these were complete with bridges
and metal. The only important trunk-road bridged
throughout, though not metalled, was one running north
and west from Rangoon to Prome, and thence on to the
military frontier station at Thayetmyo. Another, going
north-east to Pegu and then turning northwards to

239

BURMA UNDER BRITISH RULE

Toungoo, the frontier fort on the Sittang side, was un-
bridged at all the larger streams, and was therefore
only a fair-weather track. The old military road from
Toungoo to Moulmein, the extension of the trunk road
from Chittagong to Akyab, and that across the Arakan
hills from Taunggup to Prome, had been allowed to fall
into such disrepair that they could hardly any longer be
called roads.

The first real impetus towards the construction and
the proper maintenance of fairly good metalled roads
was felt about the time of the opening of the Irrawaddy
Valley Railway line from Rangoon to Prome in 1877.
The necessity for feeder-roads became then, of course,
at once apparent. The growing wealth of the agri-
cultural population and the rapid extension of perma-
nent rice cultivation throughout all the central portion
of Lower Burma necessitated the construction of roads
to enable the surplus grain of land-locked areas to be
brought within easy reach of the rice mills at Rangoon,
Moulmein, and Bassein. The impulse thus given to
road construction has never been relaxed. After the
annexation of Upper Burma the funds for road-making
were granted much more freely by the Government of
India than previously, with the result that of the 6,220
miles of road maintained by the Public Works Depart-
ment in 1900 more than one-half are in the northern
portion of the province.

While the internal requirements of the country are
satisfied as fully as funds permit, the Government of
Burma are anything but unmindful of the desirability
of improving existing trade routes and opening up new
tracks for the facilitation of traffic and commerce with
the countries beyond the frontiers of Burma. More
especially with regard to trade routes leading eastwards
into Siam and Yunnan the Government of Burma are
doing as much as is possible, under the financial limita-
tions imposed upon them by the Government of India,
in the way of constructing roads and caravan tracks
without neglecting the more immediate and pressing
requirements of the internal portions of the province.
From Myitkyina to Sadon, and from Bhamo up the

240

ROADS AND TRADE ROUTES

Taiping valley to Loikaw, roads run to the frontier,
whence the tracks converge on Momein. Namkhan, the
frontier mart on the Shweli river, has now good road
connection direct with Bhamo. From Myitson, lower
down the Shweli but separated from Namkhan by a
long and unnavigable stretch of rocky obstructions, a
fair cart-track leads to Mong Mit, and from Mong Mit a
good mule-track ascends to Mogok, the headquarters of
the Ruby Mines, whence a good cart-road descends west-
wards to Thabeitkyin on the Irrawaddy river, while an-
other mule-track trends southwards through Mainglon
to Maymyo and Pyaunggaung on the Mandalay-K union
railway line. Running parallel to this line of railway a
good fair-weather road, complete as to bridges or ferries
as far as Lashi6, a distance of 1 78 miles, leads from
Mandalay across the Northern Shan States towards the
Kunlon ferry on the Salween river ; and from this trunk
road feeders extend north and south into the Shan
country. From Thazi on the Rangoon- Mandalay rail-
way line a cart-road leads eastwards to Fort Stedman
and to Taunggyi, the headquarters of the Southern Shan
States, and for seventy miles beyond that to Napok,
thus bringing the whole of the Southern Shan States in
the neighbourhood of Mong Nai (Mon^) in direct com-
munication with the railway line. And when Mong Nai,
in the course of a few years, becomes linked up with the
Mandalay- Kunlon line by a branch railway from Thi-
baw, this improvement in communications is certain to
be immediately followed by a considerable increase in
the prosperity of the States, marked as the progress of
these has already been since the Shan country came under
British rule. From Napok a good mule-track, which is
gradually being improved into a fair-weather road,
extends eastwards across the Kengkham ferry on the
Salween to Kengtung, where a Burma regiment forms the
garrison near the Chinese, Siamese, and French frontiers.
Some of these roads have proved enormously expen-
sive. Thus the Ruby Mines cart-road from Thabeitkyin
to Mogok, 61 J miles in length, had cost considerably
over ;^6o,ooo for construction and maintenance by the
end of March, 1894. The metalling of this road is now

241 R

BURMA UNDER BRITISH RULE

in course of completion, and when that is done the total
cost of this difficult hill road will be close on ;^8o,ooo.

The actual outlay on communications, exclusive of
supervision and tools, in 1899-1900 was £i73>350'
of which about two-fifths were for original works and
three-fifths for maintenance.

The railways in Burma were originally constructed by
a special (Imperial) branch of the Public Works Depart-
ment; but they have, since ist September, 1896, been
transferred to the Burma Railways Company, though the
workino- of the open line was carried on by Government
on behalf of the Company till February, 1 897. The total
capital expenditure on construction up to 31st March,
1898, amounted to ^5,9 15,340, of which ^5,127,860 had
been incurred by Government before the Company took
over the railways in 1896. The total length of line open
to traffic on 31st March, 1900, was 993 miles. Further
consideration need not, however, here be given to rail-
ways in Burma, as they form a subject specially dealt
with in chapter xvi.

Among the principal of the earlier Public Works was
the construction of the seven lighthouses erected for
the protection of shipping along the dangerous sea-coast.
One of these unfortunately had an insecure foundation
on the Krishna shoal off the middle of the delta, and
consequently disappeared one night in August, 1877.
Another of the greatest of the Public Works was the
embankment of the extreme north-western portion of the
Irrawaddy delta by a bund running along the west bank
of the main river and along the east bank of its offshoot
the Ngawun river, which, after flowing past Bassein,
enters the sea near Cape Negrais. It formed an A-
shaped embankment running with a cross connection for
about sixty to seventy miles along each bank of the apex
of the delta on the western side of the Irrawaddy, and
was designed to protect the land in the upper portion
from disastrous floods occurring annually in July and
August. The embankment was completed in 1878 at a
total cost of nearly ;^2 70,000; but the results realized
have hardly been as good as were anticipated. When
the settlement of the land revenue was made in the

242

THE DRY ZONE

Bassein and Henzada districts, in 1884, it was found
that while eighteen square miles of cultivated land were
protected by the embankment nearly 130 were not pro-
tected, and of this area about fifteen square miles (9,500
acres) had been thrown out of cultivation in consequence
of the operation of the embankment.

While the rice lands situated in the delta and along
the sea- board from Cape Negrais to the Gulf of Mar-
tabun are thus liable to inundations capable of some-
times seriously affecting the crops, the whole of the cen-
tral portion of Upper Burma is exposed to considerable
danger from drought, unless a sufficiency of soil-moisture
be provided by irrigation.

The central portion of Upper Burma naturally forms
a dry zone comprising the whole of the districts of
Myingyan and Meiktila, together with portions of
Yamethin, Magwe, Minbii, and Pakkoku on the south,
and of Lower Chindwin, Sagaing, Shwebo, Mandalay,
and Kyaukse on the north. The moisture-laden winds
coming from the Bay of Bengal during the summer
months, when the south-west monsoon prevails, deposit
the great bulk of their moisture either on the Arakan
hills between the Irrawaddy and the Bay of Bengal, or
on the Pegu Yoma between the Lower Irrawaddy and
the Sittang River, while copious rainfall is at the same
time provided by them for the lower portions of the
valleys of these two rivers. As these comparatively
cool winds, saturated with moisture, travel northwards
in the direction of the dry central zone their tempera-
ture becomes gradually raised ; consequently their rela-
tive humidity decreases and precipitations of rain are
less frequent and less abundant. Thus, from a rainfall
of between 200 and 250 inches on the coasts of Arakan
and Tenasserim, and of about 100 inches in Rangoon,
the precipitations in areas lying to the north gradually
become less till the dry central zone is reached, within
the different portions of which the average annual rain-
fall varies from about fifteen to thirty inches. North
of this again, throughout the hilly and densely wooded
districts of the Upper Chindwin, Katha, Ruby Mines,
Bhamo, and Myitkyina, the temperature is also lower

243

BURMA UNDER BRITISH RULE

than what prevails in the dry zone ; consequently the re-
* lative humidity of the air increases once more, and the
result is frequent copious rainfall varying up to over
ninety inches. During the winter monsoon season,
when the winds set from the north-east, the rainfall
throughout Burma is not much affected, the inconsider-
able amount of rainfall due to this particular cause being
mainly confined to the thickly-wooded northern districts
of Myitkyina, Bhamo, and the Ruby Mines.

The essential climatic features of this central zone are
therefore a high summer temperature, with strong, dry
winds prevailing from April till October, which but
infrequently bring up rain-storms. The only possible
means of contending against these natural disadvantages
of geographical position throughout the great central
portion of the Irrawaddy valley would obviously have
been to preserve large tracts under forest, in order to
act as huge natural reservoirs for the storage of soil-
moisture and to increase the relative humidity of the
air for the benefit of agriculture. These scientific pre-
cautions were naturally enough neglected in Burmese
times. Instead of being preserved, the once existing
forests throughout the dry zone have been destroyed,
and the result is that, to climatic features already un-
favourable for agriculture, there have been added the
physical drawbacks that the soil, unprotected by forest
growth, gets washed away during heavy rainfall, and
that the rain-water is not retained within the soil for the
feeding of streams and the effecting of other results
beneficial to agriculture. Hence only irrigated portions
of the dry zone can be relied on to yield crops with
certainty year by year ; and rice cultivation within it is
confined to tracts obtaining a good supply of water by
means of irrigation. Apart from such more favoured
portions the food crops grown by the peasantry con-
sist chiefly of maize, millet, and peas, whilst cotton and
sessamum are also raised for sale.

As a net result of these climatic disadvantages and of
wasted physical features, years of scarcity are of fre-
quent occurrence in this dry zone. Seldom does any
year pass without complaints of want in some part of

244

IRRIGATION WORKS

it. In several of the years since the annexation the
scarcity has been so great and widespread as almost to
verge on famine, and to necessitate the commencement
of irrigation works, road-making, and railway earthwork
as famine relief measures. Actual famine, however, is
hardly now possible, even in the driest parts of Burma,
though the memory of the Thaydwgyi or " great scar-
city" which occurred in 1792, during the reign of Bodaw
Paya, still lives in tradition.

In olden times many irrigation schemes had been
hatched, and some of them were even undertaken ; but
when the kingdom of Ava was annexed, most of these
works had long since been allowed to fall into disre-
pair, and the people were left to their own devices as
regards the storage of water for agricultural and other
requirements. The chief irrigation systems were in
the Kyaukse district and the Salin subdivision of
Minbu. These works were some hundreds of years
old, but it was hoped that much could be done in the
way of improving them by draining the hollows be-
tween the canals, strengthening the weirs and main
canals, and reducing their number, improving the open-
ings for distributing water so as to prevent wastage,
making the larger canals more conveniently navigable,
and bringing a much larger area under irrigation.

As soon as the state of Upper Burma permitted it,
an officer of the Public Works Department was, in
1890, deputed to examine and report on the existing
irrigation works and their condition. As 1891 and 1892
were years of great scarcity a large number of old Bur-
mese irrigation projects were taken up and put in order
to provide work for the distressed agriculturists, and in
the Meiktila and Yamethin districts a fair amount of
work was done in the way of making tanks and weirs.
In 1892 an irrigation circle was formed, and extensive
works were commenced in the Mandalay and Shwebo
districts, the irrigation canals of the Kyaukse district
being already well supplied with water from the hills
immediately to the east. These were followed by other
large works in the Myingyan and Minbii districts, and
by improvements in the existing works in Kyaukse,

245

BURMA UNDER BRITISH RULE

Meiktila, and Yamethin. The Nyaungyan Minhla tank
in the Meiktila district has been restored at a cost of
^30,000, and the Kyaukse tank in the Yamethin dis-
trict has been formed at an outlay of over ;^33,ooo ; while
large sums were spent on railway earthwork from Meik-
tila to Myingyan in 1897 as a special famine relief work.
This has now been open to regular railway traffic since
November, 1899.

In other districts, where irrigation can take place by
means of canals fed from large streams, more costly
operations have been undertaken on major works. These
include a project for irrigating 72,000 acres in the Man-
dalay district at a cost of over ;^ 200,000 ; another in the
Shwebo district to cost more than ;^ 3 3 0,000, and irrigate
130,000 acres, together with other works in the Minbu,
Mandalay, and Shwebo districts for the irrigation of
other 100,000 acres. These last works are estimated
to cost over ^310,000, of which nearly ^^ 180,000 have
been expended between 1896 and 1900. When all these
schemes have been carried out, about 420,000 acres or
close upon 670 square miles of land will by irrigation be
capable of sustaining permanent cultivation irrespective
of the rainfall upon the tracts producing the crops.

The total outlay on the various public works through-
out Burma during the last five years has averaged more
than ^600,000 ; and the new territory of Upper Burma
has very properly had by far the lion's share of this ex-
penditure. It amounted to ;/^623,485 during 1899-1900,
exclusive of ;^i 17,648 for payment of salaries, etc., of
Public Works officers.

The Forest Department, administering the enormous
natural wealth represented by the forests of Burma, is
controlled by four Conservators of Forests, two in Lower
and two in Upper Burma, whose circles are conterminous
with the civil divisions held by Commissioners, while the
Shan States are also included within the southern circle
of Upper Burma. The controlling staff consists of
thirty-six Deputy Conservators of Forests, whose divi-
sions are, so far as possible, conterminous with one or
more civil districts. There are also fourteen Assistant
Conservators of Forests, most of whom are drafted into

246

THE FOREST DEPARTMENT

divisional charges, — consequent on the inadequacy of the
sanctioned staff to cope satisfactorily with the constantly
expanding work of the department, — as soon as they have
qualified for this by passing the prescribed examinations
in the Burmese language, forest law and procedure,
and land revenue. These officers form the Imperial
branch of the Indian Forest Service, to which appoint-
ments are now made only after a three years' course
of study at the Indian Engineering College, Cooper's
Hill, Surrey, including a few months' instruction on the
Continent. The provincial branch, or Burma Forest
Service, consists of nine extra Deputy Conservators
holding minor divisional charges, and twenty-two extra
Assistant Conservators for subdivisional work. They
are appointed by selection from among the senior
Forest Rangers, most of whom now receive their first
appointments after undergoing a two years' course of
training in the Forest School at Dehra Dim, N.W.P.
The Subordinate Forest Staff consists of 687 Forest
Rangers, Deputy Rangers, Foresters, and Forest Guards
on salaries ranging from twelve to one hundred and fifty
rupees per mensem. Appointments are almost entirely
confined to natives of Burma. A Vernacular Forest
School was opened during 1899 for the purpose of giving
selected junior members of the Subordinate Staff elemen-
tary instruction in forestry and in departmental work as
it is done in beats and ranges.

The Conservators of Forests are responsible for, and
have complete control over, all professional, depart-
mental, and financial matters throughout their circles,
while the Deputy Commissioner is responsible for the
general management and protection of all the forests
in his district. For this purpose the divisional forest
officer is the Deputy Commissioner's assistant in all forest
matters.

As compared with other branches of the Adminis-
tration, the Forest Department in Burma labours under
the great disadvantage of having no real head responsible
for controlling the whole of the provincial forest affairs and
for submitting matters direct to the Lieutenant-Governor
for orders. Each of the four Conservators is an inde-

247

BURMA UNDER BRITISH RULE

pendent head of department in matters affecting his
own circle ; and he is directly responsible to the Local
Government, with which he communicates through the
Revenue Secretary. For all matters concerned with
questions of general administrative policy, forest settle-
ments, contracts, finance, and matters of routine, the
Revenue Secretary exercises an effective control over
the four Conservators ; but he is no more qualified to
criticise or to advise the Lieutenant-Governor on purely
professional matters connected with scientific forestry
and technical questions than he would be to scrutinise
and report on engineering projects submitted by the heads
of circles in the Public Works Department. It conse-
quently often occurs that, when important suggestions
are made by any one Conservator, the opinions of the
other three are taken ; and if it should happen that two
are for and two against the proposals, the matter is
shelved indefinitely.

In other respects efficient and economical, the Forest
Department will never be on a really sound footing
until, like the Public Works Department, it has a Chief
Conservator of Forests controlling the administration of
the four Conservators and ex-officio Secretary to Govern-
ment for the disposal of forest business. A department
whose gross earnings in Burma for 1 898-1 899 were
^556,726, and showed a net surplus revenue of ;^399,256,
can surely well afford the creation of such a controlling
administrative appointment ; and to refrain from creating
it now is, for various important financial and technical
reasons, not an economy.

The work of the Forest Department throughout India
has been much abused on the one hand, and much belauded
on the other. There can be no doubt that the work of
forest conservancy, so essentially important for Indian
agriculture, has usually to be carried out under conditions
imposing unwelcome restrictions on the wasteful and
irrational customs which formerly prevailed. In Burma,
however, the opposition to the work of the Forest
Department has been considerably less than throughout
most of the other parts of India. District officers have
on the whole, and more especially since the commence-

248

RESERVED FORESTS

ment of Sir Charles Bernard's administration as Chief
Commissioner of British Burma in 1879, been favour-
able to proposals for the formation of reserved forests
selected either for financial or for other economic reasons.
Men who formerly scoffed at the departmental efforts
made for the formation of forest reserves, after seeing
the swiftness with which total clearance of forest growth
can be accomplished and the evils following as its result,
have, personally, recently urged that the last remnants of
the forests in the lower delta should be preserved for
timber and fuel production. Moreover, Burma is at once
the most thickly forested and the most thinly populated
province in India ; and the work of selecting, settling,
and demarcating the forest areas set apart as permanent
reserves could, without any undue pressure on the people,
be carried out much more freely in the thinly populated
jungle tracts than would have been possible in any other
province of India.

The careful manner in which existing rights of the
people, even of nomadic cultivators practising the waste-
ful system of Taungya or shifting hill-cultivation, are
safeguarded in dealing with such proposals for forest
reservation will be found described in chapter xvii.
treating of Burma's forest wealth.

The reserves already sanctioned up to the end of
1 899-1 900, aggregated 17,153 square miles, or just over
ten per cent, of the total area ; but the process of selecting
reserves will continue for many years yet, especially in
Upper Burma. Only in the Hanthawaddy, Pegu, and
Tharawaddy districts of Lower Burma has this important
work been completed, where about two-thirds of the
existing forest-land still at the disposal of Government
have been reserved. Outside these reserves enormous
tracts of tree-forest and jungle still remain for clearance
and cultivation, reservation being for the most part
confined to forest land unsuitable for permanent self-
sustaining cultivation.

Even in the Shan States attention is now also being
given to this matter. The Sawbwa of Thibaw, acting on
my advice in 1898, requested the Local Government to
depute a forest officer to begin the work in his State, first

249

BURMA UNDER BRITISH RULE

of all by the examination and reservation of the best
teak-producing tracts, and then by the selection of other
wooded areas to be reserved for reasons more particularly
connected with the absorption and retention of soil-
moisture for the benefit of agriculture and pasturage. As
the early result of this prudent policy, the Kainggyi
Forest Reserve in Thibaw, the first created in the
Northern Shan States, was constituted during the official
year i 899-1 900.

Notwithstanding"a departmental reorganization in 1896,
the progress of forest operations is much hampered by
the paucity of officers of all ranks. Classified as a
" ^^/^^/-commercial department," the Forest Department
is worked mainly on financial principles ; and the increase
in the number of administrative, controlling, and executive
officers is not taking place pari passu with the rapid
expansion of departmental operations and of the hand-
some revenue resulting therefrom. Several new divisions,
which it would be advantageous to create, cannot be formed
for want of officers, and all three branches of the forest
service will soon have to be increased unless the capital
value of the enormous forest wealth contained in the
province is to remain partially unutilized or to run the
risk of suffering permanent damage by neglect of the
economic possibilities otherwise attainable. Even as-
suming, though it is nothing like the reality, that the
whole of the revenue-producing teak and other forest pro-
duce were harvested solely from the reserved areas, this
would merely indicate an average annual rate of growth
far less than should be obtained under intensive treat-
ment with adequate supervision. The ^399,256 of net
surplus revenue earned in 1898-99 certainly do not
represent more than i to i J per cent, of the capital value
of the forests, which may consequently be roughly esti-
mated at from ^30,000,000 to ^40,000,000 ; and if a
fair proportionate share of the net earnings were to be
granted annually for the important works of fire protection
of reserved forests, for improvement fellings for the benefit
of teak and other valuable trees, and for cultural operations
m connection with their growth and development, there
would be every probability of both the annual returns

250

THE CUSTOMS DEPARTMENT

and the capital value of the forests increasing consider-
ably in course of time. A property of this sort having
a present actual marketable capital value of at least
;^30,ooo,ooo to ^40,000,000 sterling seems worth de-
veloping and improving to a greater extent than has
hitherto been the case.

The Ports and Customs, under the Financial Com-
missioner as Chief Customs authority, are administered
by a Chief Collector of Customs at Rangoon, assisted by
an Assistant Collector and Superintendent of Preventive
Service, and by Collectors at the ports of Moulmein,
Bassein, and Akyab. At Rangoon, through which eighty
per cent, of the total trade of the whole province passes,
there are a Port Officer and an Assistant Port Officer ;
but at the other ports the Collector of Customs is also
Port Officer. The total value of the sea-borne trade of
Burma amounted to ;^20,8 19,992 in 1899- 1900, of which
about two-fifths were imports and three-fifths exports. Of
the exports over ^4,000,000 worth are annually shipped
to Europe, the principal articles being rice, teak timber,
cutch, and hides. Internal trade between Burma and
Siam, Karenni, the Shan States, and Western China
amounted to ^2,047,314 in 1 899-1 900. Altogether, the
trade of the province (see chapter xiv.) is in a healthy,
expansive condition, and is bound to develop normally
with the extension and ramification of the railway net
and the increase of population and of cultivation.

The Education Department is under a Director of
Public Instruction, while the work of school inspection is
carried out by four Inspectors, assisted by numerous
Deputy Inspectors and Sub- Inspectors. Formerly edu-
cation was almost entirely in the hands of the Pongyi or
"religious" at the monasteries. Lay schools existed
here and there, kept by old men leading a semi- recluse
life ; but these were few and far between. Every male
Burmese has, in order to acquire the religious qualification
distinguishing him as human and not a mere brute, to wear
the yellow robe of a recluse during some portion of his
youth ; and before he can enter a monastery as a Maung
Shin, or acolyte, he has previously to receive instruction.
As this has always been the case from time immemorial,

251

BURMA UNDER BRITISH RULE

the monasteries became the national schools of the
country, where elementary education was given gratis by
the monks (or religious recluses, to speak correctly), who
thereby added to their Kutho or " religious merit," the
attainment of which was their object in leading the
humble mendicant life of a " religious." But it was not the
custom of the country for girls to receive any education
of this sort. As no woman can ascend the path leading
towards Neikban (Nirvana) till her soul has become
incorporated in the body of a man, it would have been
premature and altogether unnecessary to inflict upon her,
or endow her with, even elementary education. That
would all come naturally in due time when once such an
amount of merit had been attained by her good works as
would enable her to revisit this world in the shape of a
boy.

When a small boy enters the Kyaung or monastery
at about seven or eight years of age, he is given a
papier-mache slate [Parabdik), or a blackened wooden
board ( Thinbori) shaped like the pointer of a roadway sign-
post, and a pencil roughly cut from steatite or soap-stone.
These Thinbon are usually made of the light white wood
of the Yaman6 tree (Gmelina arbored). On his board
he is taught to write the vowels and the consonants of
the alphabet, and is made to repeat them aloud so as
to imprint them on his memory. Each day the boards
are blackwashed with finely powdered moistened char-
coal, and a fresh lesson is set. Having mastered these
foundations, advances are gradually made to simple
combinations of letters, and then to more complicated
words of the language.

There is a regular stereotyped gradation from
the simplest consonants to the most difficult syllabic
combination in Burmese and Pali : for the language is
monosyllabic, and in words apparently consisting of
more than one syllable each portion is separate and
complete in itself. The course of instruction follows
the Thinbongyi or " great basket of instruction," beginning
with the initial letters of the alphabet— A'^^^'/ (" big K "),
Kdgwd (" crooked K "), etc.— and gradually proceeding up
to the most involved combinations of vowels and conson-

252

ELEMENTARY EDUCATION

ants. The alphabet is interesting, as the consonants have
all descriptive names, referring mostly to their shapes.
Thus, in place of our bald A, B, C to X, Y, Z, the Bur-
mese youngster learns to know his letters as " hump-
backed B," "little G," "pot-bellied T," "elephant-fetter
T" (aspirated), "capped P," "water-dipper D," and the
like, so that the mastering of the alphabet is not alto-
gether uninteresting and unattractive. Having in some
cases four, including aspirated, forms of a consonant
almost similar as to sound is, however, rather a draw-
back to its easy acquisition by the adult European. It
also renders correct spelling somewhat difficult in the
Burmese vernacular.

Repetition is the basis of the system, and the boys
intone their tasks monotonously over and over again
in chorus at the top of their shrill, high-pitched voices.
Morning, noon and night these lessons go on for a
considerable time, thrice daily. After setting the daily
tasks the monks can only close their eyes in the calm-
ness of soothing meditation while the Babel of young
voices keeps up in full cry. Quietness usually means
idleness and probably mischief on the part of the boys,
who lie face downwards on the floor each with his
own slate in front of him containing the task for reci-
tation. But for this discordant chorus, which is peculiarly
irritating about five o'clock in the morning and again
during the hottest part of the afternoon, monasteries are
fairly comfortable places of residence for officers on tour,
as they are generally cleaner and more commodious than
any other buildings in the jungle villages. No matter
how small it may be, each village usually supports at least
one monastery.

This gradual progress of elementary instruction in
reading and writing, combined with very simple and
rudimentary arithmetic, lasts for about two to three
years, by the end of which time the boy is able to read
ordinary manuscripts, including the religious books
written with an iron style on dried palm leaves cut into
strips of about fifteen inches long and two and a half
inches in breadth. These palm-leaf manuscripts are
formed into volumes by means of two boards of teak-

253

BURMA UNDER BRITISH RULE

wood of similar size, usually lacquered in vermilion and
often richly ornamented with designs in gold. In these
books the leaves are kept in place by two bamboo pegs,
which pass through from board to board, the leaves
between which are thus impaled and kept in position.
To prevent displacement of the boards the whole is tied
up with cords, or with narrow strips of cotton into which
sacred precepts are often interwoven. As the books
read in the monastery, and the oral instruction given
in connection therewith, are invariably of a religious
nature, the elementary education given by the monks is
essentially religious in its character. Religious notions
are gradually imbibed by the young pupils, who thus
become generally acquainted with the creed of Burmese
Buddhism, and more particularly with the Zattagd
(Jataka) or " birth-stories " relating to the penultimate
and the last existences of Gaudama.

When the British came into possession of the various
parts of the province, this simple monastic system of re-
ligious education prevailed, and it still exists so far as the
monasteries are concerned. There were certain centres
of higher instruction in Pali and religious philosophy, of
which Mandalay was latterly, and still is, the chief : for
in all branches religion was the basis of the nationaliza-
tion of gratuitous education. The Patamd Byan, or
highest examination in Pali and philosophy, was held
annually at Mandalay until the overthrow of the king-
dom of Ava ; and it has been reinstituted by Government
since 1896, although at first the proposal met with some
opposition from the leading monks in Mandalay.

The first efforts of the Government to improve edu-
cation on systematic lines were made by Sir Arthur
Phayre in 1866. For centuries back Roman Catholic
missionaries had been at work in Burma, and early in
the present century American Baptists also began
labouring in the same field, to which they were followed
by the servants of the Society for the Propagation of
the Gospel. These missionaries, who taught the children
of converts while endeavouring to convert adults, had
long received grants in aid of education, but nothing
had been done to raise the level of education among the

254

EDUCATIONAL DEPARTMENT

people at large who were taught by the monks. No
plan had any chance of success if it was likely to inter-
fere with the time-honoured national system of elemen-
tary instruction, or if it tended to arouse suspicion or
hostility on the part of the monks or the people. It
was therefore decided to distribute, to such monasteries
as would receive them, elementary works on arithmetic,
geography, and land-surveying, and to appoint teachers
to go round and assist the monks, with their permission,
in teaching the new wisdom ; while a Director of Public
Instruction was appointed to supervise the work of the
lay teachers and report on its progress.

The experiment was at first confined merely to the
principal towns ; but even there it languished so much
that, in 1868, it was proposed to supersede it by the
establishment of lay schools. Finally it was decided
that both systems should be worked simultaneously, and
gradually both monastic and lay schools were brought
on a similar footing under the supervision of the
Educational Department.

The general scheme of education which thus evolved
itself led to the encouragement and development of
native lay and monastic schools, partly by lending
assistant masters trained in Rangoon, partly by payments
of grants in aid or rewards based on the results of
inspections or examinations by the Inspectors of schools
and their subordinates. Town schools, supported from
municipal, town, or district cess funds, were established
in all the towns and larger villages, for the purpose of
imparting a somewhat higher class of education, partly
in Burmese and pardy in English, between the mere
primary instruction given at lay and monastic schools
and that imparted at middle-class schools maintained by
the State. Any head of a school could apply to have
his school visited and the pupils examined ; while, once
a year, examinations were held at district headquarters
for primary scholarships tenable for two years at a
Government middle-class school.

In 1880 the scheme of education was revised, annual
provincial examinations being instituted under a special
departmental Board of Examiners. There are now nine

255

BURMA UNDER BRITISH RULE

standards of instruction, and the classes in schools
correspond with these standards, while the classification
of the school itself depends upon the highest class it
contains. These standards are respectively termed
lower primary, upper primary, lower secondary or middle,
and upper secondary or high. Beyond the ninth
standard, which is the matriculation examination of the
Calcutta University, collegiate instruction, imparted in
arts only, is obtainable at the Rangoon College affiliated
to Calcutta University. Scholarships are now given
only for middle English and University courses, except
in the case of upper primary scholarships confined to
Upper Burma schools.

The gratuitous monastic schools, for boys only, still
form the backbone of national instruction throughout
all the rural districts, and particularly throughout Upper
Burma. There is a special set of standards for these
indigenous vernacular schools, none of which teaches
beyond the seventh or lower secondary standard. In
order that such may earn grants-in-aid from Government
they must have a working session of at least four
months, and an average attendance of twelve pupils,
of whom at least four must be able to read and write
their vernacular according to the second lowest standard.
Non-indigenous schools, mostly established by mission-
ary societies, receive grants-in-aid only when they
comply with certain rules as to qualifications of teachers,
rate of fees, admission of pupils, accommodation, and
discipline ; but in no case is any grant given in excess of
the amount contributed from private sources during the
previous year for the maintenance of the school.

Educational work was begun in Upper Burma in
1890, as soon as the pacification of the new territory
had progressed sufficiently to enable such a step to be
taken, and the whole of the departmental rules under
which Buddhist priests and other heads of schools may
look for assistance from Government were embodied in
an education code published in 1891. The policy of
Government is rather to assist, regulate and inspect
schools maintained voluntarily by monks, laymen, muni-
cipalities, or other associations, than to found and

256

EDUCATION

manage schools of their own ; and the work of the
officers of the Educational Department is mainly con-
cerned with such inspection and regulation. Commis-
sioners of Divisions and Deputy Commissioners of
Districts are generally responsible for the state of
education in their respective jurisdictions, and are
expected to do all they can for its promotion. But upon
the four Inspectors of schools rests more particularly
the responsibility for the state of instruction in their
circles, and for the efficiency of the work done by their
subordinates. For the special supervision and encourage-
ment of indigenous primary education in monastic or in
lay schools each circle of inspection is divided into sub-
circles corresponding with one or more of the civil
districts, and each sub-circle is in charge of a Deputy
Inspector or Sub- Inspector of schools. In Lower Burma
a portion of the district cess fund is allotted to the
support of indigenous schools, and is divided among
the village schools by the Deputy Commissioner, who
manages the fund and distributes the grants-in-aid
according to the rules laid down in the education code.
In the towns of Lower Burma a portion of the muni-
cipal fund is similarly allotted to education, and in 1882
the schools formerly managed by Government were,
with the exception of the Rangoon High School, handed
over to the municipalities. Some of the chief of these,
however, make a fixed assignment to the Director of
Public Instruction for the maintenance of the schools
under technically trained supervision, in place of directly
administering: and controlling- them. As there are no
cess funds in Upper Burma, all educational grants are
paid from imperial funds ; and the only municipalities
which are directly connected with education in the towns
are those of Mandalay and Sagaing.

The only special Government schools which exist in
Burma are the five Normal Schools, where pupil teachers
are trained for municipal and aided schools, two Survey
Schools in Rangoon and Mandalay under the control of
the Director of Land Records and Agriculture, an ele-
mentary Engineering School established at Rangoon in
1895, arid a Vernacular Forest School for the training of

257 s

BURMA UNDER BRITISH RULE

subordinates, established on my recommendation, and
opened at Tharrawaddy in August, 1899. There is a
law class at Rangoon College, but those desirous of
studying medicine have to go to India. The Dufferin
Maternity Hospital in Rangoon, however, trains women
as midwives, and has thereby inaugurated a work of
enormous future importance, considering the barbarous
Burmese birth customs.

An Educational Syndicate was established in 1881,
consisting of a committee appointed by the Chief Com-
missioner, and representing all educational interests.
In 1886 it became incorporated to enable it to hold
property in trust for educational purposes. The deli-
berations of this syndicate, which is presided over by the
Director of Public Instruction, are not merely confined to
the management and economy of the Rangoon College
and High School under its immediate control, but are also
directed towards the furtherance of education generally,
and more particularly towards improvements in the
conduct and scope of examinations. It advises the
Local Government regarding all standards of instruction
below those prescribed by the Calcutta University, and
undertakes the management of the middle school (seventh
standard) examinations, and the educational tests for
advocates, township officers (Myo-Ok), land revenue col-
lectors {Thugyi), and clerkships in Government offices.

Of late years the progress of education throughout
Burma has been rapid and continuous. The total num-
ber of schools of all sorts has risen to i 7,050, affording
instruction to 287,987 children. Nearly three-fourths of
these are private elementary schools, while the remain-
der, slightly exceeding one-fourth, is chiefly composed
of primary schools ; but the attendance at the former is
considerably less than at the latter. Secondary educa-
tion, imparting instruction beyond the standard fixed as
the qualifications for clerkships in Government offices,
is limited to seventeen schools attended by 5,093 pupils
in 1900. The progress of university education in Burma
is slow, the average attendance at Rangoon College being
eighty-nine in 1900. From time to time there has been
talk of establishing a university for Burma, but the pro-

258

EDUCATION OF GIRLS

vince is far from ripe for such a new departure. The
Rangoon College, affiliated to Calcutta University, and
the Baptist College founded at Rangoon in 1895 (with
an average daily attendance of nine in 1900), afford quite
adequate facilities for all the existing needs in this
direction.

A hopeful feature for the future is that the attitude of
the monks towards secular education is gradually be-
coming more favourable, although the method of teach-
ing at monasteries or at village lay schools is of course
not ordinarily in conformity with any of the standards of
the Education Department. There are 341 girls' schools,
and the total number of girls receiving instruction is
32,468, or more than one-eighth of the total number of
children attending schools. It is hardly possible to over-
rate the importance of this advance ; for the women of
Burma are the true heads of the households, are naturally
gifted with keen trading instincts and business acumen,
and are probably, as a rule, considerably better endowed
with intellect and mental power than the men, notwith-
standing the higher rung occupied by the latter on the
" ladder of existence " according to Buddhistic religious
philosophy. The movement towards the education of
girls is, as might be expected, most noticeable in the more
thickly populated parts of Lower Burma.

The expenditure on education amounted in 1899- 1900
to ;^i07, 197, of which ;^72,257 were contributed by
Government, the largest share in the cost of develop-
ments being borne from the provincial revenues. Pro-
gress in primary and middle vernacular education has
been somewhat hampered by the want of good text-
books, but steps are being taken under a Textbook
Committee to substitute carefully prepared translations
of sound books of instruction for the rather badly
arranged and unskilfully compiled works hitherto in use.
The Shan, Kachin and Chin hill tribes have hardly as
yet been touched by the operations of the Education
Department ; but Tamil schools for the children of
Madras immigrants have been brought under inspectors,
and education has made marked progress among the
Karens, mainly under missionary guidance.

259

BURMA UNDER BRITISH RULE

The Accounts Department is under a Comptroller-
General, assisted by five Assistant Comptrollers. For
the regulation of financial matters between the imperial
Government of India and the provincial Government of
Burma, a contract is entered into every five years. The
provincial Government receives for its own requirements
fixed proportions of the revenues as derived from various
sources, and has to transfer the remaining portions to the
Government of India for imperial purposes. When un-
foreseen calls upon provincial funds occur, the financial
equilibrium is restored temporarily by advances from the
imperial revenues ; but such advances are repayable.
From the very outset this provincial contract system,
which began to operate on ist April, 1882, proved dis-
advantageous for Burma, as had been predicted by the
local Administration, because the proportions of revenue
allowed were insufficient to meet the rapidly expanding
requirements of a young and prosperous province.
During three out of the first five years the provincial
balance sheet closed with a deficit, which had to be made
good from the imperial share of revenue. For some
years before the annexation of Ava, Lower Burma had
each year to hand over to the Government of India more
than a crore of rupees {£666,666) ; and this gave rise to
the outcry of the merchants that British Burma was being
made a "milch cow" for India, and that money which
ought to have been spent on roads, railways, and other
communications in Burma was being misappropriated
through bestowal on other provinces. Out of gross
revenue receipts amounting to over ;^i, 820,000 in
1885-86, the imperial net surplus share, after deduction
of expenditure for liabilities, was nearly ^743,000, against
a total provincial allotment of only ^828,000 (which
proved insufficient), the remainder being local and muni-
cipal rates excluded from the terms of the provincial
contract. In 1886-87 India claimed a net revenue of
over ;^900,ooo as her share under the contract, leaving
only ^966,666 to cover all provincial expenditure.

With the expenditure of the third Burmese war to be
provided for, Burma of course had to receive special
imperial assistance. From military outlay amounting to

260

THE "PROVINCIAL SETTLEMENT'*

;^ 190,000 for Lower Burma in 1884-5, ^^^ charges for the
troops in Upper and Lower Burma in 1885-86 bounded
up to ^635,000; and they increased to ;!^i, 230,000
in the following year. But the purely military expen-
diture incurred on the pacification of Upper Burma, and
the cost of the garrison during the following years, have
already been shown in a footnote at the conclusion of
chapter v. (see p. 149).

As affairs were still in a state of transition when the
first provincial contract lapsed in 1889, a provisional
contract, following the lines of the previous one but with
certain modifications, was made for one year on slightly
fairer terms for Burma as estimated by a Finance Com-
mittee. In 1888 this provisional contract was extended
for another year with new modifications, and then con-
tinued for other three years without further change. A
new provincial contract was made with Lower Burma
for five years from April, 1892; but it was considered
that the time had not yet come for extending the pro-
vincial contract system to Upper Burma, where large
special outlay had to be incurred on railways, roads, irri-
gation, buildings, and other public works of various de-
scriptions.

At length, in 1897, a new quinquennial contract, called
the " Provincial Settlement," was made with the Govern-
ment of India. Hitherto Upper Burma finances had
been purely imperial, the annual excess of expenditure
over revenue being met by the Government of India
and not by the local Government of Burma ; but now
Upper and Lower Burma were amalgamated and unified
for financial purposes.

Under the terms of this settlement the provincial
share of land revenue and excise, hitherto one-fourth,
was raised to two-thirds and one-half respectively, to
permit of enhanced outlay for the development of the
province being met from the expanding receipts under
these two chief sources of revenue.

During the first year of its operation, in 1897-98, the
net outcome of the provincial transactions under this
new settlement resulted in a surplus of ^i 13,513, after
remitting to the Imperial Treasury its full share of the

261

BURMA UNDER BRITISH RULE
total sum representing the net revenue of the province
for the year.^

Adding to the whole Civil Expenditure the total
Military Expenditure disbursed from Imperial funds by
the Government of India, as shown in the table previously
given at the end of chapter v. (see p. 149), it will be
seen that Burma has already more than recouped all the
outlay expended upon it from imperial and provincial
sources since the third Burmese war. Since the end of
1 89 1, indeed, it has more than paid its own way; and
for the last few years it has been again yielding a large
and rapidly expanding surplus revenue. Moreover, the
expenditure includes the cost of State railways through-
out Burma, which up to the 31st August, 1896, when
they were transferred to the Burma Railways Company,
represented a capital outlay of ;^5, 248,334, yielding a net
return of 4*4 per cent, a year.

^ The financial prosperity of the province may be gauged from the
following abstract of revenue and expenditure since the annexation of
Upper Burma (converted at rate of is. 4^. per rupee) : —

Year,

Revenue, in Pounds Sterling,

Civil Expenditure (including State

Railways and all other Public Works), in

Pounds Sterling.

Surplus, in
Pounds

Lower
Burma.

Upper
Burma.

Total

Lower
Burma,

Upper
Burma.

Total.

Sterling.

1886-87
1887-88
1888-89
1889-90
1890-91
1891-92
1892-93
1893-94
1894-95
1895-96
1896-97
1897-98
1898-99
1899-1900

£
2,266,000
2,252,000
2,186,667
2,625,334
2,838,667

2,901,334
3,190,000
3,045,334

3,267,334
3,494,667
3,338,666

(Amalga
Dit
Ditt

£
148,667
334,667

551,333
746,666
808,000
804,000
798,000
852,000
916,000
924,000
875,334

mated)

0

0

£
2,414,667
2,586,667
2,738,000
3,372,000
3,646,667

3,705,334
3,988,000

3,897,334
41183.334
4,418,667
4,214,000

4,564,704
5,212,913
5,241,619

£
1,259.334
1,317,333

1,477,333
1,604,000

1,535,333
1,592,000
1,748,667
1,910,667
1,956,667

1,935.334

1,864,667

(Amalg

D

D

£

518,666
1,096,667

1,245,334
1,338,000
1,292,667
1,339,334
1,243,333
1,263,333
1,172,667
1,194,666

1,351,333
amated)
itto
itto

£

1,778,000
2,414,000
2,722,667
2,942,000
2,828,000

2,931,334
2,992,000
3,174,000

3,129,334
3,130,000
3,116,000
2,989,864
3,253,140
3,420,407

£
636,667
172,667

15,333
430,000
818,667
774,000
996,000

723,334
1,054,000
1,288,667
1,098,000
1,574,840

1,959,773
1,821,212

Totals

54,183,906

40,820,746

13,363,160

;^54, 183,906

262

MUNICIPALITIES

The Comptroller- General is also Commissioner of
Paper Currency, for which an office was first opened at
Rangoon in August, 1883. The notes are issued for
sums of five, ten, twenty, fifty, one hundred, five hundred,
one thousand, and two thousand rupees, but the circula-
tion is of course almost entirely confined to pieces up to
one hundred rupees (^6f). Considerably more than
one-half (83,304) of the 148,720 notes in currency in
1900 were for ten rupees. Owing to extensive forgeries
of five-rupee notes in 1891 the circulation of these
became very limited, and seems to show little sign of
improvement (7,916 in 1900).

The District Cess Fund in Lower Burma and the
District Funds in Upper Burma, derived from
bazaar rents, ferries, and the like, form incorporated
local funds taken into consideration in the provincial
contract ; while Town, Cantonment, and Port Trust
funds are excluded therefrom. A commencement was
made with municipal administration in 1874, when the
Municipal Act was passed and applied to several of the
larger towns. There are now forty municipalities
throughout Burma, to which members are nominated by
the Lieutenant-Governor, except in the case of twelve
towns where a portion of the members is returned
by election so as to represent the various sections
of the community. In Rangoon the President of the
municipality is a senior Government official, whose
services are lent specially for five years, while members
are elected to represent Europeans, Burmese, Chinese,
Madrasis, Hindus, and Mohammedans, in addition to
the members nominated by Government. In all the
other municipalities the Deputy Commissioner, the Sub-
Divisional Officer, or the Township Officer is elected
President, according as each municipality happens to be
the headquarters of a district, subdivision, or township.
The twenty-five municipalities in Lower Burma are
administered under the Burma Municipal Act, 1898,
while the fifteen in Upper Burma are under the Upper
Burma Municipal Regulation, 1887.

The Rangoon municipality has an income and an
expenditure each over /" 200,000 a year, but is burdened

263

BURMA UNDER BRITISH RULE

by a debt of ^2 72, 167 (In 1900) incurred chiefly on water
works and on the installation of the Shone sewage
system. In 1884 large water works were opened in the
anticipation that they would prove sufficient for many
years to come ; but for the last ten or twelve years, con-
sequent on the rapid growth of Rangoon after the
annexation of Upper Burma and the introduction of the
Shone drainage system, the question of providing a
further supply of water has been forcing itself more
and more prominently on public attention. Experi-
ments have been made with artesian tube wells for
temporarily augmenting the water supply, though
without obviating the necessity for heavy expenditure
on additional water works. The construction of high-
pressure works has mitigated the inconvenience of a
short supply since 1893, and in 1896-97 the pumping
engines raised 766 million gallons of water. The other
municipalities have incomes aggregating about ;^ 140, 000
a year, which is a sufficient revenue to cover their ex-
penditure. The incidence of municipal taxation is a
little over five rupees (or 6^. Sd.) per head in Rangoon,
and about one and one-seventh rupees (or is. 6^d.) in
the other municipalities.

In seven of the smaller towns in Lower Burma, Town
Committees are appointed to consult about local affairs
and the utilization of the town funds. Curiously enough,
considering the Burmese character, some of these show
a disposition to hoard the incoming money in place of
expending it on useful works.

The Telegraph Department is administered by a Chief
Superintendent in Rangoon, and two Superintendents in
Akyab and Mandalay, assisted by Assistant Superinten-
dents in charge of subdivisions. In 1898 there were
5,183 miles of telegraph lines open, with 12,786 miles of
wires. From 118 Government offices, 76 of which are
combined post and telegraph offices, 666,983 messages
were despatched in 1899- 1900; but there are also 144
railway and canal offices, and 154 smaller offices
not open for paid telegrams. The maintenance of
communications often involves exceedingly arduous
work for the telegraph officers and subordinates, as

264

POSTAL ARRANGEMENTS

interruptions from windfall trees are frequent on many
of the jungle lines during the south-west monsoon
period.

Postal affairs are administered by a Deputy Post-
master General, assisted by seven Sub-Superintendents
and three Inspectors. In addition to the railway mail
service, inland mails along the Irrawaddy and its chief
affluents are also served by the Irrawaddy Flotilla
Company under a five-years' contract running from ist
August, 1896; and since ist October, 1896, the weekly
ocean mail service between Rangfoon and Calcutta,
performed with great efficiency and punctuality by the
British India Steam Navigation Company, has been
supplemented by an extra steamer in each week. Mails
to and from Europe could be expedited if a quicker
steamer service were arrano-ed for between Rang-oon
and Madras ; but the British India Company, to
which no inconsiderable share in the development of
Burma's prosperity has been due, has not yet been
induced to place upon the Madras run for this pur-
pose a better class of steamer with a higher rate of
speed. A direct mail route from Rangoon via
Colombo to Naples or Marseilles will no doubt come
in time as the commerce of Rangoon expands, but it
is hardly yet a matter of urgency.

Even in the outlying portion of the province
postal arrangements are decidedly good. A daily
service of runners passes from the railway line to
Lashio, the headquarters of the Northern Shan States,
and four times a week mails proceed from Thazi railway
station by cart for about thirty miles to the foot of
the Shan hills, and thence by mules to Taunggyi, the
headquarters of the Southern Shan States, whence they
are despatched further eastwards to Kengtung and
Mong Hsing, Mogok, the headquarters of the Ruby
Mines, has its mails brought up by mules thrice a week
from Kinu on the railway line; and during 1899 a
service by runners was initiated between Bhamo and
Talifu, the trade emporium of the central Yunnan
plateau.

During the year 1899- 1900 nearly eighteen and a

265

BURMA UNDER BRITISH RULE

quarter million articles were delivered through the 287
post offices ; and of the fourteen and a half million letters
and postcards therein included, nearly one-fourth were in
Burmese and Chinese characters. There is probably
no place in the world where a more polyglot corre-
spondence has to be dealt with than that passing
through the Rangoon Post Office. During the same
year money orders were issued to the extent of
^1,748,135, and were paid to the sum of ^727,925.
Upwards of ten per cent, of these latter issues are in the
shape of telegraphic remittances, a convenient system
which has long been customary throughout India. Under
the orders of the Government of India, the system of
paying money orders in sovereigns was introduced into
Rangoon in March, 1900.

Another postal convenience arising from the con-
ditions of Anglo-Indian life is the system of value-
payable parcel post, by which articles ordered of trades-
men can be received through the post on payment of
cash before delivery, the Post Office paying the declared
net value to the sender after collection. This is a very
doubtful benefit, as obvious drawbacks are inherent in
the system. Savings banks have been opened at 173
of the post offices, and showed balances amounting to
-^550.768 in 1900. Another benevolent use made of
post offices is for the sale of small packets of five-grain
doses of quinine to counteract the effects of malaria.
Made at the Government factories, the quinine is thus
distributed at a price of one-third of a penny, which a
little more than covers the cost of manufacture and con-
tingencies; and in 1899- 1900, 148,384 such doses were
purchased. The sale is increasing largely each year, as
the Burmese know and appreciate the properties of the
Sdkd or " bitter medicine " in warding off and curing the
malarious fever so prevalent in all jungle districts during
the spring and autumn.

Ecclesiastical matters are administered by the Bishop
of Rangoon, assisted by an Archdeacon, the diocese
having been formed in 1877. There are eleven
Chaplains on this provincial branch of the Bengal
Establishment, while five clergymen of the Additional

266

MISSIONARY SOCIETIES

Clergy Society receive allowances from Government for
holding religious services at places where, there being
no European troops, chaplains are not stationed. The
Roman Catholic Church, whose missionaries, at work
in Burma since the fifteenth century, are scattered all over
the country and farther north-east into China, is repre-
sented by Bishops at Rangoon and Mandalay ; while
the American Baptist Mission, the Society for the
Propagation of the Gospel, and the Church Missionary
Society have their teachers resident in many of the
healthier parts of the province.

267

Chapter X

LAND TENURE AND THE REVENUE SETTLEMENT

UNDER the ancient and original land system among
the Burmese, as detailed in the opening portions
of the eighth section of the Laws of Manu, the complete
title or " perfect proprietary right " was restricted either
to land given to soldiers and royal servants, or to grants
and assignments made by the monarch in measured allot-
ments for the support of civil officials, or else to land
which had descended by hereditary succession, had been
long in the possession of the family, and was now in use
for the cultivation of food-grain. Such areas were called
MyHhc\ while all others were My^shin lands having an
incomplete title or " imperfect proprietary right, liable to
dispute." These latter comprised lands received in gift,
land purchased from those in whose family it was here-
ditary, land reclaimed from the forest, abandoned land
cultivated for upwards of ten years with the knowledge
and tacit consent of the owner, and land allotted to culti-
vators by civil officials or village headmen. In any of
these cases the title held good during the lifetime of the
buyer or cultivator ; but the land could be redeemed by
the original owner, or by his heirs, on the decease of
the person temporarily in possession or on his wishing
to dispose of it.

Theoretically and legally the Kings of Burma were
not, like most of the sovereigns in ancient India, absolute
lords of the soil. They received a share of the produce
of the land ; but to the land itself the people could origin-
ally obtain a clear title conveying absolute proprietorship,
subject only to contribution for the purposes of the State,
by the clearance and cultivation of forest tracts. The
title to land was therefore essentially allodial. The

268

OLD LAND TENURES

Burmese agriculturists were peasant proprietors. The
land was held in fee-simple, and the right and title vested
in the original occupier, and his heirs and assigns, as
owner. To this general allodial possession, however, there
were two exceptions, although they really did not apply
to anything like vast extents of cultivable land. These
were the Crown lands, and the lands held under the
various kinds of service tenures. Apart from these two
classes of land, the Kings of Burma laid no restrictions ^
on the cultivation of waste land. Any person was at
liberty to make a clearing in the jungle ; and on bring-
ing this under cultivation, he became its owner. In this
case there was no tenure, no holding from an overlord.
Clear primitive titles of this sort could, of course, only
be obtained in a country where the amount of cultivable
land was far In excess of the requirements of the popu-
lation. But this right of private property in land de-
scended In Burma as unaltered, as certain, and as absolute
as could be expected under any oriental despotism, and
under the rule of autocratic Kings upon whose will the
lives and property of their subjects were practically
dependent.

The feeling of attachment to the land is strong within
the Burmese peasantry, and so long as the members of
a family continue to reside in the vicinity of their an-
cestral holdings they will not willingly relinquish the
claim they have upon the title to it. Even if a holding
were temporarily abandoned, the Burmese customary
laws sanctioned its being claimed again by the original
clearer, unless the party in possession could prove that
he had been in undisputed enjoyment of it for ten years
of constant occupation. Thus, from ancient times down
to the present, sales of land outright have never been
customary. Though agricultural lands were frequently
conveyed from one person to another for valuable con-
sideration, through a transaction much more closely re-
sembling a sale than any mere mortgage, yet there always
existed a right of re-purchase, and a disability on the
part of the purchaser to re-dispose of the land without
the consent of the original seller. What seems at
first sight to clash with any deep-rooted affection tor

269

BURMA UNDER BRITISH RULE

hereditary lands is the fact that, in the great majority of
cases, the holdings of peasant families do not usually
date back for many generations. This is, however, easily
accounted for by the constant state of anarchy and mal-
administration, and the slackness of the control exerted
over the provincial Governors for centuries back. Thus
the normal course of residence, generation after genera-
tion, on the family holdings originally acquired by clear-
ing in the primeval forest was, probably time after time,
interfered with by social disorders necessitating the aban-
donment of lands already cleared and migration to fresh
clearances, which were at all times very easy to make.
But, at the same time, the Burman has no sense of duty
towards the land. A creature of whim and caprice, he
will often only cultivate a part of his holding, leaving the
rest untouched. The Upper Burman is particularly
uncertain in this respect. He may take it into his head
to try Lower Burma for a year or two, sell off his plough
cattle, and abandon his fields for a time ; or he will go
down to the delta, and work as a coolie for a season ; or
he may rush improvidently to the opposite extreme of
hiring labourers and trying to cultivate an area altogether
beyond the means really at his disposal.

The existing land system found in force when the
Burmese Empire crumbled away during the last three-
quarters of a century, and fell piece by piece under
British rule, consisted, therefore, either of Crown lands,
the property of the King, or of service- temcre lands, set
apart as appanages in support of officials of various ranks,
or oi petty allodial properties, held in private ownership.^
All the rest was waste land, either in the shape of un-

^ The monasterial and pagoda lands ( Wuttagdn) are so compara-
tively small that they may practically be left out of account. Regarding
the tenure of such lands, some doubt exists as to the holder in trust
under the State. Lands, buildings, and gifts of all kinds to the re-
ligious body, may be dedicated in three different ways. The formula
used may apply only to an individual recluse {Pagalika), or to several
monks conjointly {Ganika), or else to the whole religious body present
and future, and for public use {Singika). Pagodas, chapels, and rest-
houses are invariably, while monasteries and monastic lands are usually,
dedicated in this last way {Singika) ; and in this case the holder in
trust may be presumed to be the Saddw, or chief of the religious body

270

NEW LAND TENURES

reclaimed forest jungle or of land which, after having
been cleared and occupied, had been abandoned and
allowed to revert into jungle.

On the annexation of the provinces of Arakan and
Tenasserim in 1826, and of Pegu and Martaban in 1852,
the first two classes of land were allowed to disappear,
their occupiers being placed on precisely the same foot-
ing as the cultivators of other lands ; but after the
annexation of Upper Burma in 1886, the British Govern-
ment took possession of the Crown lands and service-
tenure lands, and introduced a law regulating the pro-
prietorship and the tenures of all classes of land, State
or non-State. Waste lands thereupon became the pro-
perty of the British Government, and the acquisition of
new land for cultivation thenceforward took place by
means of tenure direct from the State.

The practice which sprang up in Lower Burma, after
1852, was based on the customary law of the country
as to the clearance of waste lands being open to any new
comer. Any one could select a piece of land at his
pleasure, clear it, and cultivate it, paying the Government
land revenue demand upon it when the time came for the
circle Thugyi or Revenue Collector to measure it for the
annual assessment of land revenue. If the clearer and
cultivator desired to hold the land free of revenue for
some years, until it was brought into a thorough state
of cultivation, he could make written application to the
Thugyi for a grant up to five acres, to the subdivisional
Magistrate if above five and under fifty acres, and to the
Deputy Commissioner in charge of the district for an
area over fifty acres in extent. The grants applied for
usually varied from about five to sixteen acres. After
the land had been surveyed, a grant was issued, cultiva-
tion being allowed rent free for a term of years, varying
according to the nature of the jungle which had to be
cleared and the obstructions to be overcome in bringing

in the district, who usually appoints a head monk to the monastery in
case of the death of its occupant. Under either of the first two forms
of dedication {Pagalika and Ganika), the giver and his heirs and re-
presentatives are in practice considered the holders in trust of such
property.

271

^

BURMA UNDER BRITISH RULE

the soil into a state of thorough cultivation. For rice
cultivation the period of exemption varied from one to
seven years, the latter being in high tree-forest, the roots
of which took long to rot and were hard to remove ;
while for orchard cultivation rent-free tenure was per-
mitted up to a limit of twelve years, in proportion to
the trouble of clearing and the time when the fruit-trees
would begin to yield returns. Special periods of exemp-
tion were also permissible in the case of land requiring
extra expenditure beyond mere clearance, as in tracts
needing irrigation works to make them productive, or
needing embankments to protect them from inundation.

The modes of acquiring ownership of land in the
rural tracts of Lower Burma are prescribed in die Burma
Land and Revenue Act, 1876, which gave the force of
law to the above system based mainly upon the custom-
ary modes of acquisition found current when the province
came under British rule. Under this enactment, owner-
ship in land may be acquired either by squatters' rights,
exercised over the same piece of ground for twelve years
without interruption, or by a specific grant from the
State made through the district officials and to the ex-
tent above indicated. The first of these modes of
acquisition prevails in all the more settled parts of the
country, where permanent villages and hamlets have long
maintained their position, and where there is consequently
a more advanced state of cultivation ; for under such
circumstances the margin of waste land still available
continually tends to decrease, and the holdings of indi-
vidual cultivators are gradually increased by extending
the existing clearances for permanent cultivation. When
single households or small communities of two or three
families cut themselves adrift from their old associations,
and go elsewhere to make fresh clearances in the forest
with a view to permanent cultivation and residence, the
exercise of squatters' rights is also a not unusual method
of acquiring a title to the land cleared ; but, in the
majority of cases, new settlers in remote jungle tracts
usually secure the speedier and more formal and direct
ownership by obtaining a Patta or grant from the State.
As clearances of this sort are almost invariably under

272

LAND GRANTS

five acres per individual holding, the great bulk of the
ordinary grants for new cultivation were formerly issued
by the Thugyi of the revenue circles into which each
township of a district is subdivided ; but under new
rules, sanctioned in 1897, all power of making grants
has now been withdrawn from Thugyi, whose position
exposed them to the temptations of land-jobbing. The
tendency of these new rules was to prevent unnecessary
applications for land grants, and to secure a more exact
scrutiny of the terms upon which land is granted, care
being taken to try and check acquisition by mere specu-
lators. During 1895-96, 70,150 acres (109 square miles)
of land were granted free of revenue for a term of years
under the Act in Lower Burma ; while in the following
year the areas granted fell to 34,070 acres (53 square
miles), mainly in consequence of the check then given to
land speculation, and of greater care in issuing grants.
In 1898-99 the grants rose again to 55,870 acres (87
square miles), and in 1899-1900 they increased to 68,534
acres (107 square miles).

Larger grants of land, amounting actually in some
cases even to upwards of thirty square miles in extent,
had formerly been made by Government throughout
Arakan, Pegu and Tenasserim, with the object of
enabling capitalists ( ThuU) to bring these great estates
{ThuU My^ or "rich man's land") speedily into culti-
vation by means of imported labour. All such grants
were made under the old Waste Land Rules, which were
superseded when the Land and Revenue Act came into
force in 1876. The results anticipated by Government
in creating estates of this nature were, however, not
realized, even although exceedingly liberal terms of
exemption from rent or revenue had been attached to
these tenures. In some cases the grantees applied for
and obtained great stretches of forest land apparently
rather for the purpose of working out the existing stock
of mature timber — other than teak, the proprietary right
over which vested solely in Government — than with any
bon^ fide intention of investing capital in trying to bring
their grant-lands speedily into permanent cultivation.
This endeavour to create large agricultural estates proved

273 T

BURMA UNDER BRITISH RULE

rather a failure. Many of the grants were from time to
time voluntarily surrendered, or were resumed owing to
non-compliance with the conditions under which they
were held, such as failure to bring a certain proportion
under cultivation within a certain period, or failure to
pay the revenue demand when the land in due time be-
came assessable thereto. In 1897 the number of existing
grants, dating from the time of the Waste Land Rules,
was one hundred, the total area held under which
amounted to 159,859 acres, or 250 square miles. All
these have already become assessable to land- revenue
except nine grants ; and, of these nine, four will ulti-
mately become assessable, while five were granted under
conditions exempting them from such liability.

The provisions, above sketched, for the extension of
permanent cultivation throughout the plains do not apply
to the shifting Taungya or temporary "hill-clearings"
practised for rice-cultivation by the Karens and other
jungle folks inhabiting the low, forest-clad hills of Lower
Burma — a wasteful, primitive, nomadic system, which is
elsewhere described in detail {vide chapter xvii.). Sub-
ject to the payment of an annual Taungya tax, these
hill-men can migrate from year to year, clearing, burn-
ing, and cultivating patches of forest not included either
within State Reserved Forests, or in tracts preliminarily
notified for inquiry and settlement, with a view to pro-
posed reservation. The killing or injury of teak and
certain other reserved trees, and permitting fire to spread
into Reserved Forests are also prohibited, and are made
punishable under the forest laws ; but the latter are, in
these particular respects, applied only with leniency and
discretion. In many of the Reserved Forests Taungya
tracts have been set apart exclusively for the practice of
this form of agriculture by the Karens located in or near
these at the time of reservation and settlement. Thus,
of the 17,153 square miles of Reserved Forests through-
out Burma in 1900, 865 square miles were burdened in
this manner with Taungya rights or privileges.

In some parts of the country, as, for example, among
the inhabitants of the higher hills between the Sittang
and the Salween rivers, the pressure of population has

274

LAND AND REVENUE LAWS

led to the tacit recognition of definite tribal or communal
tracts within which shifting cultivation is carried on with
a definite and regular system of rotation. The Land
and Revenue Act recognises the necessities of the jungle
tribes with regard to this hereditary mode of cultivation,
and provides for Taungya tracts being formally assigned
to communities which make application to this effect in
order to keep newcomers away from the localities where
the applicants have been accustomed to exercise Taungya
rights. The importance of this shifting hill cultivation
in Burma may be estimated from the fact that about six
per cent, of the total male population is engaged in it.
Endeavours are being made, by offers of land and of ad-
vances for the purchase of plough cattle, to induce the
hill-men to take to permanent cultivation on the plains
fringing the hills. In course of time many will thus
change their habits ; but in a country like Burma there
will always remain a large number who prefer the freer
and rather romantic nomad life in the forest to the more
monotonous existence in villages surrounded by perma-
nent cultivation on the plains.

When the lines were fixed upon which the adminis-
tration of Upper Burma was to be conducted, the law
regulating the land system was embodied in the Upper
Burma Land and Revenue Regulation, 1889, which
differs in many respects from the Act in force in the
older portion of the province. A primary division of
all land was made into State land and non-State land.
The former included all the Crown lands of different
denominations [Ledaw, Ayddaw, Lamaingmy^ — as pre-
viously described in chapter vi.), all lands held under
service-tenures of various kinds, all waste and forest
land, and all land which had been abandoned after being
brought under cultivation, and to the ownership of which
no claim was preferred within two years of the enforce-
ment of the Regulation, i.e. up to 13th July, 189 1. The
non-State Land comprised all lands held in private
ownership, and included pagoda or monasterial lands
(Wuttagdii), hereditary lands (^Bobdbaing) in possession
of the descendants of persons who cleared them, or of
those who obtained them by purchase from the original

275

BURMA UNDER BRITISH RULE
owner (clearer) or his descendants, or the ownership of
which had been conveyed under a written grant from
the King, and lands cleared and reclaimed {Dantdg^cyd)
before the enforcement of the Regulation and still in
the possession of the person who thus brought it into
cultivation. These non-State lands are allodial posses-
sions already alienated from the ownership of Govern-
ment. They are consequently held as freeholds, and
not under tenure of any description, the peasant proprie-
tors of all hereditary and reclaimed lands being merely
burdened with the ThdtliamMd or house-tax as their direct
contribution towards the support of the Administration.

In the case of the Crown lands and the lands held
under service-tenures, the British Government simply
assumed the rights previously enjoyed by the Burmese
Kings. But with regard to all waste lands, and lands
which had been allowed to revert into jungle after once
being cleared for cultivation, they did much more than
this in declaring all such waste land to be the property
of Government and decreeing that no such land may be
cultivated except in accordance with rules framed under
the Land Regulation. A system of land-tenure was thus
introduced in place of the previously existing allodial
peasant proprietorship. These rules provide for the
grant of leases of waste land for any period not exceed-
ing thirty years, and for the grant of permits to occupy
such land temporarily. Cultivators wishing to occupy
waste land can adopt either of these methods of acquisi-
tion. The rules, modelled on those in force in Lower
Burma, provide for the levy of revenue on areas leased
and occupied, and for the temporary exemption from
revenue of areas which have first to be cleared of grass,
scrub, or tree-jungle before they can yield remunerative
crops. In 1895-96 leases of waste land were granted
only to the extent of 9,806 acres (15 square miles) in
Upper Burma, as the majority of new cultivators pre-
ferred to do without leases. In the following year the
area leased sank to 6,154 acres (9f square miles) owing
to the rules being amended by a provision expressly
prohibiting the transfer of any lease of State land to a
non-agriculturist or a non- Burmese without the permission

276

TENANTS IN UPPER BURMA

of the township officer; for the Upper Burman was thus
paternally protected against usurers of his own race and
the more rapacious Indian money-lenders. In 1898-99
the area rose to 1 1,236 acres (17^ square miles), and it fell
off again to 9,761 acres (i5:|- square miles) in 1 899-1900.
Some of these State lands were put up to auction for
sale of the occupancy rights. Thus, in 1896-97, 4,163
acres of rice land were sold in the Mandalay district ;
but such sales of the right of occupation are now infre-
quent, owing to the restrictions applied with regard to
the transfer of the tenant's interest.

It will thus be seen that while a simple uniform land
system sprang up in Lower Burma under British ad-
ministration, a more complex system is in force through-
out Upper Burma. In the latter case there were not
only large stretches of Ledaw or " royal lands " let out
to tenants of the Crown paying a rental varying in
amount up to one-fourth of the produce, at which share
it was usually fixed, but also a class of landowners in
the persons of those, or of their descendants, who had
received grants of land through the special favour of
the King. Tenancy under landlords was therefore, and
still is, much more common throughout Upper than in
Lower Burma, The tenants occupying State land have
the incidents of their tenure, and their rights and privi-
legfes, laid down in the rules under the Land Regrulation.
Fixation of rent is provided for on a consideration of
the market value of the produce and of the amount of
the customary rent. Provision is also made for the
eviction of tenants after notice and on payment of com-
pensation for improvements, or on further additional pay-
ment for disturbance in default of due notice to quit.
Tenancy under private landlords is not privileged with
any fixity of tenure, nor are there any legal limits to the
rents which may be demanded. In these respects the
position of tenants of private individuals is similar to
that of tenants in Lower Burma.

Although the normal condition of the Burmese agri-
culturist is that of a peasant proprietor, yet the number
of tenancies which have recently sprung up in the centres
of rice-production is already considerable, and the class

277

BURMA UNDER BRITISH RULE

of tenants appears to be growing quickly. It is mainly
recruited from persons who have formerly possessed the
land but have had to part with the ownership owing to
debt, and who now occupy as tenants the holdings they
originally held in fee simple. Other tenancies are often
also held, particularly in the deltoid tracts, by newcomers
from other districts and by young men setting up house ;
for on marrying it is still not unusual for a young man
to live for two or three years in the house of his parents-
in-law and to work for them, or to be a tenant on a portion
of their land, before he and his wife found a separate
household of their own.

As registration of transfers of land is not in every case
compulsory, a precise estimate cannot be made as to the
extent to which land is being year after year transferred
from its original owners to their creditors. But such
transfers are annually increasing in all tracts within easy
reach of trading centres in Lower Burma, and there is
a corresponding steady increase in the area of land
cultivated by agriculturists who have descended to the
position of tenants having no statutory rights. As a
cultivator acquiring land under the Land Revenue Act
has transferable rights in his holding, borrowing money
on mortgage of these is thus rendered easy in all locali-
ties where land has obtained a market value ; and
money-lenders are usually to be found ready to make
advances by means of which they can ultimately secure
to themselves the ownership of land which they will
probably be able to let at six rupees (eight shillings) or
more per acre, the former owners being often left in
possession as tenants. The condition of tenants is on
the whole prosperous, even although they have no fixity
of tenure and there is no legal limit to rents. The only
safeguards against rack-renting, and they have hitherto
proved efficient, are the facts that there is a considerable
competition for tenants, that a fresh tenancy is not diffi-
cult to obtain, and that in most districts fresh land for
cultivation under direct holding from Government can
generally be had on easy terms by moving elsewhere to
less populous tracts.

The rent fixed by custom in parts of the Bassein and

278

I

LAND MORTGAGES

Henzada districts in the extreme west of the Irrawaddy
delta is ten per cent, of the gross produce, measured
after harvest, p/iis the land revenue. Under this custom
the tenant only pays rent on the crop he has reaped.
As the actual amount of the rent is thus only known
after the harvest, partial relief is practically afforded to
the tenant in case of any circumstances operating to pre-
vent him from obtaining the full quantity of crop usually
yielded by the land, and any loss thus arising is distri-
buted between landlord and tenant.

Increase of population and increase of cultivation in
all the districts within easy reach of the centres of the
rice-export trade naturally tend to diminish the area of
cultivable waste land capable of being reclaimed for
permanent cultivation ; and this of course tends to estab-
lish a marketable value for land, which is much more
likely to rise in the future than to remain stationary or
to fall. It is naturally therefore in tracts of this descrip-
tion that foreclosures on land mortgages are most
numerous. Creditors usually prefer to make further
advances to their debtors in order to induce the latter to
hold on to their fields, rather than foreclose and take
possession of land which they cannot cultivate them-
selves, and for which it is at present difficult to get
tenants. A decided movement is, however, gradually
taking place in the direction of tenancies throughout the
richer portions of Lower Burma, where nearly twenty-
one per cent, of the whole occupied area is now held by
tenants. This tendency may be seen from the following
statistics, even though these data are not complete : —

Area occu-

Average

Year.

Land Sold.

Mortgaged.

No. of

pied by

Rent per

Acres.

Tenants.

Tenants.

Acre.

Acres.

Rs.

1887-88

106,037

36,202

30,791

_

_

1891-02

263,686

63,326

46,971

—

—

1895-96

304,580

96,237

—

1,112,510

6-88

1896-97

338,983

89,289

—

1,229,917

7-83

1898-99

—

—

—

1,459,386

1899-1900

473>768

—

—

1,560,942

8-15

279

BURMA UNDER BRITISH RULE

The improvidence of the Burmese tends to drive agri-
culturists into the hands of money-lenders ; and this has
resulted in the formation of a class of non-agriculturist
landlords, which now numbers over eighteen thousand in
Lower Burma. But at the same time agriculturists with
money at disposal are purchasing holdings largely, so
that it cannot at present be said that the land has yet
passed to any large and serious extent out of the hands
of the ag^riculturist class. Yet in some districts, as in
Tharrawaddy, such a danger exists ; and an experimental
Tenancy Bill is now under consideration with a view to
checking abuses of their rights by landlords.

As the rent is usually paid in kind, the rental value of
land fluctuates from year to year with the current price
of paddy or of the other crop raised. Thus the apparent
increase in average rental value of rice lands, which rose
from 6"88 rupees in 1895-96, culminated in 1898-99,
and then decreased slightly to 8*15 rupees in 1899- 1900,
was solely due to fluctuation in the price of paddy, and
not to any variation in the actual rental value of land
from competition among tenants. A favourable market
for paddy also enables landlords to find tenants for land
which would otherwise remain uncultivated if the price
of paddy seems likely to be low during the next ship-
ping season. The market value of land became tem-
porarily reduced a few years ago, partly on account of
lower prices for paddy being anticipated, and partly also
through Government assessing at full rates all fallow
lands held by non-cultivators, for the purpose of impos-
ing a check on land-jobbing and the wholesale transfer
of land to non-agriculturists in the deltoid districts. The
more careful application of the rules concerning the fallow
rate has on the one hand deterred professional money-
lenders and traders from being too eager in acquiring
the proprietorship of land, while on the other it has
impelled them to seek tenants for such land as they hold
already. As uncropped land belonging to an absentee
landlord is now assessed at the full rate of revenue
instead of at the fallow rate, it has thus been rendered
less profitable for money-lenders to hold large areas of
cultivable land as a mere speculation for a rise in price.

280

LAND SURVEY SYSTEM

The enforcement of a stricter practice with regard to
fallow rates has further had the very beneficial effect of
inducing some persons to relinquish land which they
were unable to cultivate themselves, and has thus thrown
open areas for occupation by other cultivators who take
up the land under direct tenure from Government.

Land in towns in Lower Burma is held partly
under grants or leases made in accordance with rules
promulgated from time to time, and partly by squatters ;
and there is no law under which fresh rights in town
lands can now be acquired. In Upper Burma there is
also no special law on the subject of town lands, though
rules modelled on those in force in Lower Burma were
issued in 1890 for the grant of leases and were extended
to the principal towns.

The land survey system adopted about twenty years
ago by the Agricultural Department in Lower Burma
was a cadastral survey consisting of an exterior survey
by theodolite, in connection with which there is an
interior field-to-field survey. The country under survey
being first of all divided into large circuits or polygons,
the geographical position of each of these is carefully
fixed and the included area ascertained. Each circuit is
subdivided into minor polygons, whose geographical
position and area are likewise carefully determined.
Within these minor circuits come the Kwin or local
circuits of cultivation, forming polygons rarely exceeding
one to two and a half square miles in area, which are
dealt with in a similar exact manner as to boundaries,
position, and area. These Kwin are simply compact
blocks of rice cultivation and waste land of convenient
size, situated near each village or hamlet, — the word
Kwm, meaning "a cleared plain" or also "a circuit, a
ring," having from time immemorial been used to denote
something like the village or communal lands, as if
enclosed in an imaginary ring-fence.

When the accuracy of the survey has been proved by
repeated check processes, resulting in the perfect agree-
ment of the smallest, the intermediate, and the largest
circuits, the field {Le) is entered upon it as the unit of
survey. This is a square or rectangular piece of paddy

281

BURMA UNDER BRITISH RULE

land enclosed by low ridges thrown up for the purpose
of keeping in the water, upon a large supply of which the
rice-cultivation is dependent. These ridges are called
Kansinyb, which literally means " straight walls forming
a water-tank." The fields thus divided vary in extent
from about a quarter of an acre in the drier districts of
Prome and Thayetmyo, above the apex of the Irrawaddy
delta, to about an acre in extent throughout the great
moist alluvial plains within the deltaic zone. Until the
aggregate of the field areas corresponds with the area of
the Kwin polygon, the field survey is not accepted as
correct. Accuracy of detail is thus guaranteed by the
cadastral survey, before further operations can be com-
menced for the settlement of the land revenue.

The experience acquired during the last twenty years
has shown that the adoption of the field as the unit of
survey was a prudent measure, for the field-to-field survey
is the most efficient and the cheapest method that could
be adopted. Any attempt to artificially enlarge this
convenient and practical, though small, unit would only
increase the cost of the detailed survey without being
compensated either by greater rapidity in survey or
greater precision. As the field is after all the practical
unit of cultivation, and of all movement and change in
cultivation, no artificial limitation or determination of the
unit of survey could prevent the field from stamping
itself as the main practical unit on the map. Even with
fields averaging only one-third of an acre in area, a
cadastral survey party can in a working season turn out
field-maps for from seven to eight hundred square miles
of country. Begun in 1879, the cadastral survey has
now been completed throughout all the districts in Lower
Burma.

In the maintenance of the cadastral maps and the
settlement registers from year to year a supplementary
survey is employed, whose operations cover the whole
area surveyed, and consequently extend to almost the
whole of the regularly cultivated tracts throughout the
older portion of the province.

When any part of a district has been surveyed and
settled, it is transferred to the charge of this Supplemen-

282

REGISTRATION OF LAND

tary Survey and Registration Department, which under-
takes the survey and mapping, on fresh copies of the
original village maps, of all changes and extensions ; and
it also prepares and maintains registers showing the areas
of these changes and extensions, holding by holding, and
their resultingf chano-es in the assessments. The
methods adopted are similar to those of the cadastral
survey and the settlement, so that the work of this
department practically consists in an annual revision of
the areas and the assessments of the old cultivation,
together with an annual survey and assessment of the
new cultivation.

Apart from the administrative advantage of having, in
a conveniently arranged form, the mass of well estab-
lished facts which this department is constantly collect-
ing year by year, its operations are rendered necessary
in consequence of the law and custom governing the
acquisition, cultivation, and assessment of land in Burma.
As the land is free, any person can, after obtaining the
requisite permission, and without further let or hindrance,
take up practically as much new land as he or she pleases
and is able to bring under cultivation. Old fields may
be surrendered in whole or in part, or may be left fallow,
or may be let out to tenants. The Government, as over-
lord of the land taken up under grant, does not interfere
with regard to movement in any of these directions.
The revenue demand depends on the area of land
actually cultivated or from which profit is derived, fallow
rates being imposed, as previously mentioned, only in the
case of land-holding non-agriculturists, and for the
express purpose of trying to check land-jobbing by
speculators. In order to adapt the assessment to this
custom of free cultivation, the entire area under cultivation
has therefore to be annually examined, each and every
change in the old cultivation that can effect the revenue
demand being carefully noted, and the assessment for the
current year modified accordingly. The ground broken
for new cultivation has also to be examined, surveyed,
and plotted on the maps ; the respective areas have,
holding by holding, to be computed ; and the new assess-
ment rolls have to be prepared.

283

BURMA UNDER BRITISH RULE

The system of settlement for the assessment of the
land-revenue demand was also begun in 1879, and has
since then been carried out continuously, until it has
now been almost completed for Lower Burma. The
principle adopted consisted in acre rates based upon the
ascertained productivity of the chief varieties of soil and
fixed for a term of years, in annual survey of the changes
taking place in area, and in corresponding adjustments
of the assessment on each individual holding. Thus,
while the rates remain unaltered throughout a term
usually fixed at fifteen years, the assessments on indi-
viduals may vary from year to year with changes in the
areas of their holdings.

Settlement operations are conducted by selected junior
members of the Commission, who remain for several
years deputed on this special duty. The control and
administration of operations are vested in a Settlement
Commissioner, who is directly subordinate to the Finan-
cial Commissioner. At the time of the settlement, the
holding of each cultivator is registered field by field, and
a record is made of the cultivator's status, in which it is
shown whether he be a landholder by prescription (from
original squatting rights), a grantee, a lessee, a tenant, or
a mortgagee. The area of each field and the total area
of each holding are also noted. All these details are
entered in a principal settlement register, which practi-
cally forms a basis for all subsequent statistics as well
as for readjustments of the assessments on each holding.
This settlement register, in fact, represents the exact
state of each holding during the year in which the settle-
ment takes place.

In the year following that in which the settlement is
carried out, the duty of maintaining the land records is
assumed, as already described, by the Supplementary
Survey and Registration Department, which ascertains
any changes that have taken place in the state of each
holding, and records them in a register which is the
counterpart of the original settlement register. Should
it happen that the cultivator has enlarged his holding by
bringing some of the existing waste land under the
plough or by purchasing a field from a neighbour, he is

284

THE REVENUE SETTLEMENT

assessed on the increased area, while a corresponding
reduction is made in the case of a cultivator who has
meanwhile sold or surrendered any portion of his former
area under cultivation. The original settlement and the
subsequent annual supplementary registers and assess-
ments thus record from year to year the entire history
of each holding. By this simple process of addition
and subtraction each holding should, at the end of
the term for which the rates have been fixed, be found
just as correctly recorded as the original holdings
were when the settlement operations were first
carried out.

The rates of assessment fixed at the time of settle-
ment are arrived at after careful inquiry by the settlement
officers over wide and varied tracts, and are based on
the actual quality and productivity of the land as ascer-
tained by careful harvesting and measurement of the
grain in several hundreds of fields. The results thus
obtained in kind are then transformed into their money
valuation at rates deduced from the average prices of
produce for several years back. Wherever substantial
differences are found in the quality or crop-producing
power of the soil, the patches of inferior land are marked
off from those of superior quality, and separate rates are
fixed in proportion to the ascertained differences in pro-
ductive capacity.

Until within the last few years it had been the custom
in Lower Burma that the cultivator should only pay the
full assessment rates on the area actually under crop.
He could leave uncultivated as much of his holding as
he liked, and on this uncultivated portion a merely
nominal rate of assessment of two annas or twopence an
acre was imposed as a sort of quitrent, upon payment of
which the cultivator retained all his rights in the land.
It was thus fallow only in the obsolete meaning of this
agricultural term, because it was unsown and neglected ;
but it was not ploughed and left an open fallow as the
term is now used in England. A fallow field in Burma
is one that is left untouched after a paddy crop has been
reaped from it, and remains unploughed till the cultivator
feels inclined to take another crop from it. The usual

285

BURMA UNDER BRITISH RULE

reason for letting land lie idle in this way is that the
owner is either unwilling or unable to cultivate it. This
low two-anna rate on so-called fallows is still maintained,
though the extent of its application has been considerably
curtailed owing to the increase in the value of land and
the growth of a landlord class. The two-anna rate is
consequently now only levied on the whole or any part
of a holding which is left uncultivated either for the
purpose of allowing the soil to recover from slight
temporary exhaustion or because the owner is unable to
cultivate it through causes beyond his control, such as
illness, deaths in his family, loss of cattle, or the like.
An assessment varying from two annas per acre up to the
normal rate for cultivated land is, at the discretion of the
Deputy Commissioner, now levied from land left unculti-
vated for grazing purposes, or which remains uncultivated
in any year after having been generally sublet during the
previous five years, or which, after having been granted
with exemption from revenue for a term of years, has not
been brougrht under cultivation within a reasonable
period, or which has otherwise been a source of profit to
the owner during the year of assessment. That full
rates of assessment have within the past few years, with
the view of checking land-jobbing, been demanded on all
fallows held by non-agriculturists and all uncropped land
belonging to absentee landlords, has already been
mentioned.

When crops have been wholly or partially destroyed
by inundations, or drought, or any other cause beyond
the cultivator's control, remissions of land revenue are
granted. No remission is made unless the damage to
the crop causes a loss exceeding one-third of the esti-
mated average full crop of the holding. If the whole, or
nearly the whole, of the crop has been destroyed, the
whole of the revenue is remitted ; but, otherwise, the
remission is proportioned to the extent of the partial loss.
Though quite distinct from abatements on account of
fallows, the two kinds of remission often coincide in
practice.

The system of settlement thus sketched has been
carried out in strict accordance with the agricultural

286

THE CADASTRAL SURVEY

usages of the province, the customs of the people being
duly recognized and placed on record. While no
restrictions, not previously imposed, have been placed on
the free exercise of their rights and privileges, all that is
traditional and of advantage to the peasantry has been
maintained and properly regulated. A villager may
cultivate as much land as he likes ; but he only pays land
revenue on the area which he crops, or from which he
derives rent or other profit or advantage. The system
of annual supplementary survey and registration intro-
duced ensures prompt adjustment of the assessment
according to changes in the area cultivated each year ;
and by thus ensuring due elasticity in. the land-revenue
demand, it also permits of free exercise of the individual
right to extend or curtail cultivation according to personal
circumstances for the time beingf.

In Upper Burma the system of survey is practically
the same as in the lower portion of the province, the
field being again taken as the unit. The only important
difference is that, in place of a Kwin, the unit of assess-
ment is the Ywd or " village," consisting of the collection
of houses forming the hamlet or village proper, together
with the land belonging to the villagers and under the
jurisdiction of the village headman.

The work of the cadastral survey in Upper Burma
was commenced in the Kyaukse district in November,
1889, under considerable difficulties. The native Indian
subordinates, new to the country, and in constant fear of
being attacked and cut up by dacoits, were most reluctant
to venture out of their camps, and large numbers of the
surveyors and chainmen were unable to work owing to
malarial fever. The nature of the country and the
novelty of the peculiar circumstances under which work
had to be done also retarded progress at first ; for the
village boundaries were usually irrigation channels, the
banks of which were clothed with a thick fringe of dense
scrub jungle, while all through the dry season the rice-
fields were flooded by irrigation.

The system of supplementary survey and registration
in Upper Burma is practically the same as in Lower
Burma, but the system of settlement differs considerably

287

BURMA UNDER BRITISH RULE

owing to the local circumstances and customs. In Lower
Burma one settlement officer deals finally with an area
of about six hundred square miles in each year ; but in
Upper Burma, aided by several assistants, he deals with
an area of three to four times that extent, over which his
operations extend for three years. During this time he
and his assistants record tenures, harvest and measure
crops from sample areas, and collect agricultural statistics
over the whole area, fresh test measurements and fresh
statistics being collected over the same area in each year.
At the end of the third year the settlement officer sub-
mits his report embodying the information collected and
the conclusions drawn by him therefrom, and proposing
rates for assessment.

With respect to details in procedure the work of the
settlement officer also differs considerably from the
practice in force in Lower Burma, being much more diffi-
cult and varied. In Lower Burma there are practically
only one agricultural season, from June till December,
only one kind of crop, paddy or rice, and only one kind
of tenure, peasant proprietorship, to be dealt with ; and
the field operations of the settlement officer are restricted
to the dry season from December till April or May, while
he has no direct concern with the non-cultivating classes
of the people. In Upper Burma, however, there are
at least three separate agricultural seasons for rice-culti-
vation alone — the Kmikkyi or ordinary rainy season crop,
grown on land watered by rainfall or irrigation ; the
Kaukti, grown on irrigated lands, usually as a second
crop on the Kaukkyi land, between February and June ;
and the Mayin or hot-weather crop, grown on swampy
land and reaped in May. There are also many varieties
of field crops (rice, maize, chillies, peas, grain, wheat, etc.)
and several kinds of land tenure to be considered ; and
in most districts, owing to the comparative lightness of
the rainfall, field operations can be conducted throughout
the whole twelve months of the year. And, finally, an
important part of the work is to adjust, with reference
to the non-agricultural classes, the Thdtham^dd or house-
tax to be levied from the trading and non-cultivating
portion of the population.

288

THE THATHAMEDA TAX

This tax, introduced by King Mindon into Upper
Burma, was retained by the British Government on the
annexation, and still forms the principal tax there. Its
incidence usually amounts to ten rupees (13^". ^d.) per
house, though in exceptional cases it is less than this.
Thus, the Shan communities in the Bhamo district pay
only five rupees (6s. 8d.) per household, in consequence
of this special rate having been fixed in Burmese times.
Residents in two townships of the Kyaukse district were
accustomed to be assessed at a reduced rate of six rupees
(Ss.) per house, owing to their being required to turn out
and repair breaches in canals without receiving remunera-
tion for their labour ; but this unsatisfactory system was
abolished in 1893. Those cultivating above seven acres
of royal land were altogether exempt from the tax.
Throughout the hill tracts inhabited by Karens in the
Yamethin district the rate varies from three to four
rupees (4s. to 5^. ^d.) per house.

The tax is now assessed in much the same manner as
formerly. The Thugyi or village headman reports the
number of houses in his village. This statement is
checked by the My6 Thugyi or headman of a circle, in
districts where there are such officers, or else by the
My6 Ok or township magistrate, the Akunwmt or native
revenue officer of the district, and the district ofificer and
his subdivisional assistants. The sum due from each
village having been fixed, Thamddi or assessors (lit.
" ascertainers of truth "), corresponding to the village
elders, determine the amount to be contributed by each
householder ; and, as a rule, there are no serious objec-
tions raised to the individual incidence of the tax under
the operations of the assessors. Special exemptions are
given during years of scarcity, or whenever exceptional
reasons exist for not demanding the usual full amount ;
while religious recluses, public officials, and all persons
incapable of earning their own livelihood are exempt
from any contribution.

The revenue law of Upper Burma provides for the
levy of Thdtha7nMd on all classes of the population, for
the assessment of rent on State land, and for the assess-
ment of revenue on non-State land. But as no revenue

289 u

BURMA UNDER BRITISH RULE

was assessed on land of the latter class by the Burmese
Government, the British revenue law recognizes this fact
by authorizing that when revenue is levied on such land
the owners of the same may obtain exemption from or
reduction of the Thdtham^dd. The work of the settle-
ment officer in Upper Burma is therefore threefold,
namely, (i) to draw up a record of rights and occupation
in land, (2) to propose rates for the assessment of all cul-
tivated lands, in the form of rent for State land and
revenue for non- State land, and (3) to submit proposals
for the adjustment of the ThdthamMd on the non-agricul-
tural classes and on those classes whose livelihood
depends only partly on agriculture and mainly on other
sources.

The first section of these settlement duties includes
the ascertaining and recording of the exact area of land
owned or occupied by each person, and the kind of tenure
upon which it is held or occupied. These facts are
entered in registers and become the records-of-rights
which have under the Land Regulation to be maintained
throughout Upper Burma.

The assessment of rent and revenue is based upon
deductions drawn from the information collected as to the
productivity of the soil, the cost of cultivation, and the
value of the produce. With reference to the final section
of the settlement officer's duties, information is collected
as to the occupations and means of livelihood of the
people with a view to determining what amount of
Thdthamddd can equitably be demanded from them after
revenue has been assessed on non- State land. The main
principles that have been laid down for his guidance are,
firstly, that persons dependent solely on agriculture are
to be exempted from the house-tax ; secondly, that
persons who, though partly dependent on agriculture,
derive the substantial portion of their income from
other sources, are to pay ThdthamMd at a reduced rate ;
and, thirdly, that persons who derive the whole of their
income from other sources than agriculture are to pay the
house-tax to the same extent as before the settlement.

Following these principles, the settlement officer
utilizes the statistics he has carefully collected in drawing

290

SETTLEMENT RATES

up proposals for exempting the purely agricultural section
of the population altogether from the Thdthamddd, for re-
ducing it in amount in the case of those partially dependent
on cultivation of the land, and for assessing to the full
amount those earning their livelihood by trades, handi-
crafts, and the like. The rates thus fixed at settlement
include the rent rates assessed on State land, the revenue
rates assessed on non- State land, and the house-tax rates
assessed on income derived otherwise than from aericul-
ture. These rates vary from about one rupee to three
rupees (i^. \d. to \s.) per acre on the different qualities
of rice lands, due consideration being of course given to
the various localities and their lines of communication
with the great centres of the rice export trade.

The proposals made by the settlement officer for the
assessment of the land revenue are not accepted without
the most careful scrutiny, or without measures being taken
to safeguard the interests of the people on the one hand
and of the Government on the other. The settlement
officer submits his report to the Commissioner of the
division, who forwards it with his remarks and criticisms
to the Settlement Commissioner. Here it is again scruti-
nized very carefully before being submitted for the con-
sideration of the Lieutenant-Governor and for the
requisite orders as to notification in the official gazette
when sanction has been accorded to the proposals. How
great is the care bestowed on this important work may
be judged from the fact that the settlement pro-
posals for the Mandalay district, in which operations were
begun in 1890, were only sanctioned at the very close
of December, 1896 ; and before sanction had been
accorded the whole matter had been twice submitted by
the Chief Commissioner to the Government of India,
once in the form of a minute by Sir Alexander Macken-
zie, and again in the shape of a note by Sir Frederic
Fryer. And when finally sanctioned, the rates of assess-
ments were only approved for a term of five years in
place of the usual fifteen years for which the settlement
is generally fixed.

In this case of the Mandalay district, however, special
conditions and circumstances obtained. It was the first

291

BURMA UNDER BRITISH RULE

district coming under settlement in the new province ;
and it was the first time in the history of the land-revenue
settlement that what might be called a precarious tract of
country had to be dealt with, where the rainfall is ordi-
narily small and capricious, and where, except in a
comparatively limited area under irrigation, a remunera-
tive paddy crop could only be reckoned on once every
two or three years. And yet so strong is the hold of
custom on the Burmese cultivator that he prefers persist-
ing in the effort to grow paddy rather than change to the
cultivation of other cereals, for which the climate and the
physical conditions of the soil are really much better
adapted, and for which a fair market demand exists.
Save in the alluvial tracts and the lands'under permanent
irrigation, the condition of agriculture throughout the
Mandalay district was therefore at the time of the recent
settlement little better than chaotic and uncertain. The
average size of the holdings was extremely small, ranging
from about three to five acres only, and in consequence
of this the mass of the peasantry found themselves forced
to supplement their earnings from agriculture by other
occupations. Thus, in the vicinity of Mandalay, the
cultivators would in bad years readily abandon their
fields for work of any description, such as earth-work on
roads or embankments, cartage, grass-cutting, and
fuel-chopping.

The care and consideration given to the first settle-
ment operations in the Mandalay and the Kyaukse dis-
tricts were necessitated by the fact that the Government
recognized the land-revenue settlement to be at the time
a matter of vital and permanent importance to the people
of Upper Burma. The general standard of living had,
of course, to be carefully considered. This not only
varies greatly from year to year, but also fluctuates from
week to week, being highest just after the harvest has
been reaped and garnered. On the whole, however, it
is below the average standard throughout the settled
tracts in Lower Burma. In 1891-92, when several dis-
tricts in Upper Burma suffered from scarcity of food
owing to insufficient rainfall, the standard of living in the
poorer townships of the Mandalay district fell to a very

292

TIME OF SCARCITY

low level indeed. There was no actual starvation, for a
district with so many resources as Mandalay could
hardly sink to anything like complete destitution, but the
effects of a succession of poor harvests were nevertheless
distinctly noticeable. In the rural parts of the Lamaing
and Amarapura townships luxuries had to be eschewed,
silk clothes being dispensed with, and but little betel or
tobacco being consumed ; while in the poorer tracts the
peasantry were driven to live on the very margin of sub-
sistence. The rice for food was eked out by adding one-
fourth to one-half of millet ; and to this change of fare the
chief objectors were the Pongyi, or monastic body of
religious mendicants wearing the yellow robe of poverty
and professing contempt for all the material comforts of
life. The people themselves bore their trials well ; and
the mixture of millet and rice was in itself palatable
enough. By 1893 the standard of living had again risen,
though not to the fair degree of comfort which is reported
to have obtained while King Mindon held court in
Mandalay, the time to which the high level record is
ascribed. During Thibaw's reign fluctuations took place
from year to year according to the rainfall and the
harvest. The revenue settlement and the irrigation
works now in course of construction should, however,
raise the general standard considerably above what it
has ever been.

Reference has already been made to the transfer of the
land, particularly in the deltaic tracts of Lower Burma,
from the hands of agriculturists to those of traders and
money-lenders, which may be looked upon as practically
synonymous terms, for these men never cultivate the
land themselves. Within the richer tracts opened up and
brought within easy reach of large towns by railway and
river- steamers, a standard of luxury previously unknown
has gradually been asserting itself. Though still as
frugal as formerly in his food, the Burmese cultivator is
now more lavish in his expenditure on clothes and
household comforts. Besides his cheap cotton garments
for ordinary work-a-day use, he invariably has one or
more holiday suits, always of silk and often of rich pattern
and costly texture, while his wife and children are

293

BURMA UNDER BRITISH RULE

decked with gold ornaments on holidays and festivals.
In place of a bamboo house roofed with thatch-grass,
he laudably endeavours to build a substantial wooden
house, and often roofs it with corrugated iron ; but he
makes the mistake of generally becoming tainted with a
tendency towards humble imitation of English manners
and customs, in which respect he is merely following the
lead of his more advanced relatives in the towns.
Though the peasant has not yet taken to wearing socks
or stockings and patent leather shoes, like most of the
up-to-date Burmese in Rangoon and the other great trad-
ing centres, yet he apparently feels impelled to acquire
tables, chairs, bedsteads, lamps, glasses, and the like, for
the adornment of his house. Curiously enough, this
tendency is nowhere more noticeable than among the
Pongyi or religious body, the ultra-conservative devotees
of Buddhism vowed to a life of poverty and extreme
simplicity, whose monasteries are often filled with articles
of luxury, the use of which was formerly quite unknown
to the Burmese.

Though as a rule happy, contented, and fairly well off
on the whole, the Burmese agriculturist can seldom be
said to be in anything like affluent circumstances. As
soon as he sells the surplus of his crop he spends his
money freely, either in works of religious merit for his
own personal benefit in the next life, or else in jewellery,
clothes, amusements, or gambling. He rarely forms any
reserve of savings to fall back upon when temporarily
embarrassed, and usually has nothing in the shape of
capital except his land, his house, and his plough- cattle.
The rest of his possessions, such as agricultural imple-
ments and household chattels, have little or no market
value. Very frequently the best evidence of the pros-
perity of the Burmese cultivator is to be found in the
number of cattle he possesses ; for he can always hire
them out at substantially profitable rates during the
ploughing season, if he does not require them for his
own land. The Karens who have settled on the plains
in the Bassein and Thongwa districts are of a much more
saving and careful disposition. This is no doubt mainly
owing to their being mosdy converts from spirit- worship

294

LOANS AND INTEREST

to Christianity, neither of which involves the expenditure
of large sums on works of religious merit so essential to
the equanimity of the Buddhist Burmese, Besides
lavish outlay on priests, monasteries, pagodas, shrines, etc.,
and on dress, the prosperous Burmese agriculturist will
generally soon dissipate his ready money in theatrical
performances in the open air during the period immedi-
ately following the garnering of the grain between
December and February. At this season boats and
carts conveying troupes of performers are everywhere to
be met travelling from village to village. They obtain
as much as 300 to 400 rupees (^20 to ^26f) for two or
three nights' entertainment at villages or hamlets, which
at a cursory glance might be described as poverty-
stricken collections of huts. Throughout the country
generally the appearance of a village is no criterion of its
wealth, squalid houses being found as frequently in the
richer as in the poorer tracts.

Thus, even when otherwise really well off, the Bur-
mese agriculturist suffers from a chronic want of ready
money, occasioned partly by his hereditary improvidence,
vanity, and love of amusement, and partly by his
religious impulses. When in want of cash to pay
labourers, to meet the capitation- tax during the rainy
season, or to purchase commodities like salt, salted fish,
tobacco, and so forth, he finds little difficulty in borrow-
ing from traders, brokers, or professional money-lenders
{Chetties). Interest is usually at the rate of four to five per
cent, per mensem, although in some localities loans
can be obtained at a lower rate consequent on the
facilities for borrowing offered by a larger number of
traders. The lowest rate of interest, about three per
cent, per mensem, is obtainable on deposit of gold
ornaments exceeding in value the amount lent. In such
a case the creditor can easily obtain an additional profit
by lending out the pledged gold ornaments at a remu-
nerative rate on holidays and festivals. Cattle disease,
inducing exceptional mortality, is often the direct cause
of indebtedness, as well as extravagance and gambling ;
but the great facility with which loans can be obtained,
even although at an exorbitant rate of interest, is in

295

BURMA UNDER BRITISH RULE

itself, next to the hereditary and characteristic improvi-
dence of the Burmese, the chief cause of indebtedness.

These inordinately high rates of interest even induce
speculators to borrow from capitalists on pledge of gold
at thirty to forty per cent, for the purpose of lending out
to cultivators on mortgage of land. Self-denial and
thrift finding no place in the Burmese character, if the
cultivator wish for money he will pay an exorbitant
rate of interest for it. As money can be laid out in
many ways with certainty of excellent profit, there is
practically no competition among small money-lending
capitalists ; and so long as this state of affairs exists the
usual percentage is little likely to confine itself within any-
thing like reasonable limits. The rates of interest
sanctioned by the Laws of Manii, the ancient statute law,
were one per cent, for poor agriculturists, two per cent, for
cultivators in general, four per cent, for those who were
well to do, and five per cent, for traders in any large way
of business.

The average amount of indebtedness among the
majority of agriculturists who are unable to make both
ends meet during any given year varies from about lOO
to 150 rupees {;C^3 to ;^io). Though not in itself a
large sum, this is just sufficient to hamper them consider-
ably, through the high rate of interest current. Where
the land is fertile, the cultivator can usually easily
extricate himself from his difficulties, because a good
harvest enables him to discharge the liabilities incurred
during the previous year. If he cannot manage to free
himself in one year, two or three good harvests should
see him again unencumbered. But when the soil is
poor, or when there is heavy mortality among cattle,
matters become complicated. The land then hardly
yields enough to support the cultivator and his family,
and there is no surplus crop available for the clearance
of debt. Renewal of the old loan, and perhaps even the
additional burden of a new advance, weigh him down
more heavily in the following year, and he gradually falls
into a chronic state of indebtedness from which he can
only escape by giving up his property to his creditors, or
by abandoning his lands and home and making a moon-

296

REPAYMENT OF LOANS

light flitting to break fresh ground in another part of the
country in the hope of there being free from his creditors.
But cases of absolute insolvency are fortunately, how-
ever, of exceptional occurrence. In this respect Burma
happily differs essentially from the more thickly popu-
lated portions of India. Such cases of hopeless in-
debtedness as do occur, and mostly for comparatively
small amounts, are generally due to illness of the
cultivator and his family, loss of cattle through disease,
and gambling, or to a combination of these or similar
circumstances.

As yet the Burmese agriculturists have practically no
legal protection against the usury of money-lenders.
Excessive as the customary sixty per cent, rate of interest
is, the money-lenders not infrequently make their
creditors sign extortionate bonds acknowledging the
receipt of sums amounting even to three or four times
the money actually advanced, and the usurers thereupon
proceed to register these documents under the Registra-
tion Act. After the harvest the creditors generally
obtain repayment as soon as the paddy is threshed, before
the grain is removed from the threshingfloor, the rate per
hundred baskets having been determined beforehand.
Thus, the results of inquiries made about December or
January invariably show a much smaller proportion of
indebtedness than statistics collected before the harvest-
ing and threshing of the paddy crop in these months.
If the seizure of the crop in this way leaves little or no
margin for the requirements of the cultivator, the
creditors will often promise to lend money for the
payment of the land-revenue demand and other ordinary
expenditure. But when the time of collection comes, they
refuse to fulfil their promises ; and the cultivator, having
no crop to sell, either sinks deeper into debt or sees his
land sold up to satisfy the rapacity of the money-lender.
Owing to want of ready money, to loss of credit, and to
the inconvenience of leaving their homes at harvest-
time, the agriculturists generally refuse to apply to the
civil courts for redress ; for they believe that the false
and extortionate bonds signed by them must have, in
consequence of registration by the usurers, received the

297

BURMA UNDER BRITISH RULE

formal sanction of Government, so that they cannot be
disputed or cancelled. Moreover, such a procedure
would hardly be consistent with Burmese notions, for the
Burmese peasant has hereditary and intuitive knowledge
of the enormous difficulty of proving a negative. It
would seem much easier and far more reasonable to him
to bring a dozen or a score of witnesses to prove that he
repaid the money with interest to his creditor, than to
attempt to show that he had actually received only one-
fourth or one-third of the amount for which the money-
lender forced him, under pressure of want of money, to
sign a receipt or to make his mark by way of acknow-
ledgement.

In the interests of the Burmese peasantry it is much
to be regretted that the Registration Act in Lower
Burma should have been extended to the interior of
districts where the rural population is exceedingly
ignorant and quite incapable of understanding the objects
of such an enactment. Its effects have certainly been to
enable unscrupulous men of the trading and money-
lending class to enforce fraudulent contracts against their
more ignorant neighbours and other borrowers.

To obviate fraud in this way and to enable the
cultivators to obtain advances for specific purposes, as,
for example, the purchase of plough cattle after loss
through epidemic disease, agricultural advances are
obtainable from Government at a low rate of interest.
But much more than that is required to place matters on
a sound footing. There can be no doubt that the
greatest blessing which could be bestowed at present
upon the Burmese peasantry is, in addition to the
Tenancy Bill now under consideration, a well managed
Land Mortgage Bank duly approved by Government, and
owned and conducted by Englishmen, from which loans
could be obtained by approved applicants at a fair rate
of interest considering the circumstances of the country.
In all the settled districts, where each man's holding and
the nature of the tenure are at once clearly recorded in
the Land Record Registers, a business of this sort could
easily and profitably be worked on a sound and secure
basis. Operations would of course have to be first of all

298

TENANCIES

confined to selected portions of the districts immediately
in communication with the centres of the rice export
trade, for it is only in such favoured localities that the
requisite security could be found justifying business on a
large scale at a moderate rate of interest. Conducted by
men thoroughly conversant with the Burmese language
and character, personally known and trusted by the
Burmese, and personally acquainted with the rural
conditions of the districts forming their particular sphere
of operations, such a Land Bank would prove the greatest
and most undisguised blessing to agriculturists while
giving good returns to the shareholders. It probably
would, within the course of a few years, become a potent
factor in connection with regulating the market price of
paddy, in which respect it might also perhaps contribute
in no inconsiderable degree towards obviating fluctua-
tions in the onward progress and development of the
province.

During the settlement of the Bassein and Tharrawaddy
districts it was found that, although tenancies were
numerous, there was hardly what could be called a
tenant class in contradistinction to an absentee landlord
class ; but there were distinct indications that such
classes had already begun to form themselves even
seventeen or eighteen years ago. In most cases, how-
ever, the tenant of one holding was generally the owner
of adjacent land, and was not a man of separate class or
different social standing from his landlord. Tenants of
this sort usually held only for one year, and paid a rent
of ten per cent, of the gross produce of the fields in
addition to the land revenue. When yearly tenancies
of this sort ran on for several years, the tenants were
generally relatives of the landowners, sons paying rent to
their parents, or one heir paying rent to the co-sharers of
the unpartitioned estate. Temporary illness, the death
of his wife, a lawsuit, or any circumstance of this
description is considered by the Burmese quite a
sufficient reason for reposing from his labours for a year,
provided he can find any neighbouring cultivator who
will work his fields upon payment of the land-revenue
demand and giving him a share of the grain harvested.

299

BURMA UNDER BRITISH RULE

Some such system would be almost certain to spring up
wherever the owners of the soil are peasant proprietors :
but it is probably found to a greater extent in Burma
than elsewhere, owing to the peculiar disposition and
characteristics of the people. The growth of a landlord
class consisting of traders and money-lenders must of
course naturally be slow in a rich but thinly populated
country, where the still large amount of cultivable waste
enables tenants to be very independent.

In Upper Burma tenants of ancestral land {Bobdbamg)
usually pay a rent of one-fourth of the gross produce,
which corresponds with the nominal land revenue fixed
for State land i^Ayddaw). But as under Burmese rule
the measurement of the private areas generally ap-
proached nearer to accuracy than in the case of the
royal lands, the rent of leased tracts was consequently
in effect higher than the revenue on Ayddaw. No
provision was made against partial failure of the crop,
and the tenant had just to take the risk of this. In the
majority of cases, however, a reasonable remission was
made during bad years. The water-rate for irrigated
tracts was usually paid by the landlord out of the rent,
unless a special arrangement had been made about this
matter. As the relations between the owner of large
ancestral lands and his tenants were very much the same
as between the State and the tenant of royal lands, the
agriculturist's preference for Bdbdbaing or Ayddaw hold-
ings was mainly dependent on his relations with the
landowner in the one case, or with the village headman
and assessors in the other. Up to the present date
there is litde or no rack-renting with regard to ancestral
lands ; for the tenant can always move to State land, of
which an abundance is still available for cultivation.
Hence there is as yet no urgent necessity for protecting
the tenant against his landlord, although matters are
inevitably tending in this direction.

Land is seldom sold outright in Upper Burma. The
usual conditions of mortgage are that the borrower shall
not disturb the mortgagee's possession for a period of
three to five years, after the expiration of which term the
mortgage may be redeemed. The price fixed for re-

300

LAND MORTGAGE

demption is usually the same as the amount originally
advanced, the usufruct of the land being considered as
the equivalent of interest. Mortgages of this sort are
occasionally converted into bona fide sales by payment of
a small additional sum of money. In the vast majority
of cases the mortgagee is an agriculturist. When this is
not the case, the mortgagor usually works his own hold-
ing as the tenant of the former. Interest is, however,
paid when the mortgage is merely an advance of money
without the ownership and possession being temporarily
pledged ; and here again, as in Lower Burma, a poor
man without substantial credit generally has to pay
about sixty per cent, while the man with a good holding
can pledge his possession temporarily, paying merely
rent as a tenant but nothing in the shape of interest on
the loan. Within the last eight or nine years the custom
of recording these transactions on stamped paper has
gradually sprung up. Having occasionally been taken
in through not understanding the status of such local
tenures, Chetties of the Indian money-lending class are
now very cautious about accepting mortgages of land in
the vicinity of Mandalay.

While it is as yet difficult to form any clear idea as to
the extent to which land has been, and is being, trans-
ferred by sale or mortgage from the persons with whom
the revenue settlement was made to others, yet it appears
certain that in the neighbourhood of the large trading
centres such transfers are frequent, and that the area of
land cultivated by persons in the condition of tenants
paying rent to middlemen is already extensive. And it
is rapidly increasing. Bengalis in Akyab, Chetties and
Burmese brokers and money-lenders in the neighbour-
hood of Rangoon, and Chetties and Chinamen in Moul-
mein, are to a certain extent displacing the original
landowners. Considering the facilities for borrowing,
and the improvidence of the Burmese people, this result,
though much to be regretted, is perhaps inevitable.

The incidence of the total demand for land revenue,
capitation tax, and export duty on rice taken together
amounts merely to between three and four rupees (45. to
5 J. 4d.) per acre. Land cultivated with paddy pays, on the

301

BURMA UNDER BRITISH RULE

average, less than two rupees (25. 2>d.) direct revenue per
acre, and the incidence of the export duty on sea-borne
rice comes to a little over one rupee (i^. 4^.) for the
produce from the same. This duty, being paid only
when there is a surplus for export, varies on the total
cultivated area with the gross quantity exported. The
rice crop in Burma is certainly as abundant as that
produced from the best irrigated land in Northern India;
yet for this the cultivator will pay his landlord a rent of
at least between five and six rupees {6s. Sd. to Ss.) per
acre, although he has to bring from the canals of the Ir-
rigation Department, at a further cost of six rupees {Ss.)
an acre, the water which the Burmese agriculturist obtains
gratuitously from the rain-clouds driven inland from the
sea by the south-west monsoon winds. Rain-water is
also more fertilizing and stimulating than water of irriga-
tion.

The Government land-revenue demand in Burma is
therefore nothing more than a light rate, which does not
amount even to one-half of the actual rental value of the
land. As the cultivator has transferable rights, it would
be unreasonable to expect that under such circumstances
he would refrain from borrowing ; nor is it surprising
that well-to-do neighbouring cultivators, as well as paddy-
brokers, traders, and general money-lenders of the trading
centres, are able and eager to acquire large areas of land
which they can probably let to the former owner at a
rent of six to eight rupees {Ss. to 10s. Sd.) or more per
acre, while they have only to pay the Government land-
revenue demand, amounting to less than one-third of
that : for the capitation-tax and the export duty on rice
do not affect the landowner. In point of fact, the land-
revenue demand in the rich tracts of Lower Burma is
extremely light; and, indeed, the financial loss thus
voluntarily incurred by the State is hardly compensated
by any permanent gain to the actual cultivator.

302

Chapter XI

AGRICULTURE AND RURAL CUSTOMS

THE cultivation of the land is by far the most im-
portant industry in Burma. Less than twelve per
cent, of the people can be classified as urban. ^ Nearly
two-thirds of the total population are either directly or
indirectly engaged in agriculture, or else are dependent
for their livelihood on the occupations immediately con-
nected with it ; and nearly one- third of the whole popu-
lation is classifiable under the heading of land occupants
cultivating, including dependents. The overwhelming
predominance of the agricultural class may be gauged
from the fact that the category next in importance, which
comprises fishermen, grain-dealers, fruit and vegetable
sellers, butchers, and a whole tribe of petty bazaar stall-
keepers, distributed among about forty separate occu-
pations concerned with the preparation and supply of
food, amounts only to a little under ten per cent, of the
population. The butchers comprised in this latter class
are principally Chittagonians and other non- Burmese
nationalities, as the slaughter of living animals for food
is a deep offence against the Buddhist religion. Being
a hunter or a fisherman, or being engaged in rearing
silkworms and harvesting the cocoons, is hardly looked
on as following a quite respectable calling ; but to breed
and fatten cattle for the slaughter-house is a pursuit that
no self-respecting and consistent Burmese would admit
to be the occupation upon which he depends for his
livelihood. He will gladly eat his bullock if it happen
to die a natural death, and will even feast gloriously on
the carcass of a dead elephant ; nor does he feel any

1 The data given here and in the following chapter as to population
and its distribution follow the census of 1891, as the results of that of
1 90 1 are not yet available.

303

BURMA UNDER BRITISH RULE

compunction or inconsistency in partaking of fish, flesh,
or fowl that has been caught and killed by another. He
is not his brother's keeper, and his religious principles
involve neither personally nor indirectly any responsibility
for the sins of another.

The rural population is distributed in villages having,
on the average, forty-three houses, each occupied by
seven souls, this proportion being remarkably equal both
in Lower and Upper Burma. The total area under
actual crop-cultivation throughout Burma in 1 899-1900
was 10,556,104 acres, which is rather less than one- fifth
above the acreage under corn crops alone in the United
Kingdom. But there are still more than 24!- millions of
acres of land suitable for permanent cultivation, which
only await the advent of population by natural increase
or by immigration from the congested areas in India.
Nearly two-thirds of the cultivated area are situated in
Lower Burma (6,857,898 acres), and of this total over
ninety per cent, are under rice crops (6,277,678 acres);
while less than fifty per cent, of the total area under
crops in Upper Burma (3,698,206 acres) are devoted to
rice cultivation (1,818,962 acres), rather less than one-
third being under millets, maize, and pulses .(1,141,955
acres), about one-seventh under sessamum and other
seeds for the manufacture of oil for cooking purposes
(527,825 acres), and between four and five per cent,
under cotton (153,734 acres). Wheat is not cultivated
in Lower Burma ; and, although the climate and soil are
suitable, only 15,813 acres are as yet cropped with it on
the plains of Upper Burma. Its cultivation has also
been successfully introduced into the Shan States, where
enormous stretches of good land could be made to
produce wheat if any favourable market existed for its
sale.

For the cultivation of the lands on the plains oxen and
buffaloes are used, the former for ploughing the higher
lands with light soils, and the latter for the heavy wet
tracts and marshy lands. Throughout the greater por-
tion of Upper Burma bulls and bullocks form the bulk
of the plough-cattle ; but in all the central and deltaic
tracts of Pegu, Martaban, and Tenasserim buffaloes, which

304

AGRICULTURAL STOCK

here obtain splendid development, form a very large
proportion of the agricultural stock. Massive, unwieldy,
and slow, buffaloes are less suited than oxen for cartage
purposes along roads, but they can be used on fairly level
ground for dragging timber and supplementing the work
of elephants, as well as for ploughing the fields. A pair
of ordinary buffaloes in their prime is worth between
150 and 200 rupees (^10 to ;^i3i) on the average.
Fine, heavy, well-grown animals, however, run up to
three to four hundred rupees (;^20 to ;^26f ), which is a
far higher price than is ever paid for a yoke of bulls or
bullocks, except for cart-racing purposes.

Of the whole mature agricultural stock of Burma,
aggregating, in 1900, nearly three million oxen and
buffaloes fit for the plough, about one-fourth consists of
buffaloes, and considerably over two-thirds of the total
number of these are to be found in Lower Burma. As
the returns of the Agricultural Department show about
nine hundred thousand ploughs and harrows to be in use,
this gives one such implement for every iif acres, and
one yoke of cattle for every seven to eight acres, allowing
for a small proportion of the transport required for the four
hundred thousand carts in the country being withdrawn
altogether from agricultural employment. The young
immature stock is estimated at nearly a million and a
quarter. With the exception of the cattle in the Akyab
district, which are of a very inferior breed, and, being
specially ill-cared for, contrast badly with those in other
parts of Burma, the agricultural stock is decidedly good
in quality.^ The buffaloes, which, like the elephant, form

' AGRICULTURAL STOCK RETURNS.

1899-1900.

Bulls

and

Bullocks.

Cows.

Bull
Buffaloes.

Cow Young
Buff.iloes. Stock.

Ploughs

and
Harrows.

Carts.

Lower Burma .
Upper Burma .

576,127
687,823

317,358
697,439

276,620
109,953

231,588 594-034
98,581 638,724

478,388
415,630

199,181
239,101

Total . . .

1,263,950

1.014,797

386,573

330,169 1,232,758

894,018

438,282

Grand Total

2,278,747

716,742 1,232,758

894,018

438,282

305

BURMA UNDER BRITISH RULE

rather a link with the pleistocene geological age than a
characteristic type of the existing fauna, are constitution-
ally much more delicate than might be expected in the
case of such powerful and finely developed animals.
They have comparatively little faculty of resisting disease,
and can hardly be reckoned on for use throughout more
than from three to four or five seasons on the average
owing to the abnormally heavy percentage of mortality
from epidemic diseases. Otherwise, a buffalo may be
calculated to work for about fifteen years. This delicacy
of constitution is also peculiarly characteristic of the
larger and more powerful elephant.

Burm.ese buffaloes are by no means of a gentle dis-
position. In the deltoid tracts, where they attain their
finest development, they are often suspicious and prone
to attack the European even though unprovoked. This
may probably be more due to fear than to natural savage-
ness of disposition. The appearance of any unusual
object, like a European riding on a pony across the fields
in which they are grazing, will excite them, causing them
to raise their nostrils, sniffing suspiciously, and to move
towards the object of fear or dislike, gradually quicken-
ing their pace as they approach. When once buffaloes
begin to scent in this manner there is no way of obviat-
ing the impending attack except by either riding away
quickly or else charging the still hesitating herd and
emitting a war-whoop, a manoeuvre that is usually suc-
cessful. As a Burmese pony is fleeter of foot than a
buffalo, one can in such cases easily escape with only the
risk of a false step on the broken ground bringing the
rider within reach of further inconvenience. Any little
Burmese urchin near the buffaloes would, however, be
easily able to restrain the animals from an attack, as
they would then retain equanimity in the presence of
the unknown object. At the same time they have a
certain strain of innate savageness, which is even culti-
vated in Tavoy and the other southern districts of
Tenasserim in training the animals for buffalo fights.

The oxen, though small, are hardy and active. They
belong to the Zebu or humped class, having a large, soft,
fleshy protuberance above the tips of the shoulder-blades.

306

TREATMENT OF CATTLE

They are well-shaped, and have good clean limbs.
When anything like well cared for, their short coats are
sleek and glossy. In the Amherst and Thaton districts
of Tenasserim selected pairs are trained to race in light
carts, and can travel very rapidly over the rough roads.
Few or no attempts are made to improve the breed by
the selection of good sires, the breeding taking place
promiscuously, as also in the case of buffaloes, while the
cattle are pastured on the grazing grounds. The stock
of oxen is largely recruited from the Southern Shan
States and Siam, where the upland pastures are well
suited for cattle-breeding. But the plains of Burma are
very favourably adapted to the raising of cattle, if the
people would only bestow attention on the matter. The
supply of ponies is also mainly obtained from the Shan
States, but elephants are bred in a state of semi-captivity
in the eastern tracts of Tenasserim bordering on the
Siam frontier.

Notwithstanding their utility in general, their actual
necessity for agricultural operations, and the fact of
buffaloes and oxen being perhaps the fairest standard by
which their owner's prosperity can be measured, the
Burmese peasant bestows but little care on his cattle.
The hire of a yoke of buffaloes for the season is usually
at the rate of lOO to no baskets of paddy, though it is
sometimes as much as 200 baskets, or nearly ten baskets
an acre for the area they can plough ; and this is not
very far short of the market value of an ordinary pair.
But the hire is paid in grain on the threshing floor, and
an actual purchase means ready money early in the year.
All risks considered, the cultivator often prefers to hire
the cattle rather than borrow money to purchase them
outright.

From August till January, or between the ploughing
and the threshing seasons, the cattle are driven out into
the grazing grounds, generally at some distance from the
village. Here they are nominally herded by a villager,
who gets paid five baskets of paddy for each animal.
After the crops have been cut in December, the herds
are allowed to stray over the fields foraging for them-
selves. When the wisps of soft rice straw and the

307

BURMA UNDER BRITISH RULE

herbage on the fields get dried up and burned off during
the hot spring months, the cattle have often difficulty in
picking up a sufficiency of food, unless there is scrub
jungle in the vicinity of the village, or unless grazing
grounds have been set apart for providing shade, shelter,
and forage during the hottest months of the year. Such
grazing grounds have been extensively formed during
the last fifteen to seventeen years, and the work of selec-
tion and demarcation is still going on. Originally it was
endeavoured to provide for grazing in the fuel reserves,
administered by the Forest Department, in the vicinity
of the railway lines ; but such provision was found to be
quite inadequate, and to be opposed in several ways to
the interests of the peasantry. The grazing grounds now
being formed for the benefit of villages in their vicinity
are scattered as equally as possible over the different
districts, and are under the direct control of the Deputy
Commissioner. Unfortunately, in many of the richest
parts of the province steps were not taken in this direc-
tion till most of the tree- forest, which formed the original
covering of the soil, had been denuded. Hence, with
regard to some of the grazing grounds, it will take many
years before a new grov/th of trees will spring up spon-
taneously— for planting would be too expensive — and be
capable of affording suitable shade and shelter during the
hottest period of the year. When the " mango showers"
in March, and the first rains in April and May cause a
rank flush of coarse, unnutritious grasses, the poor
hungry animals are allowed to gorge themselves with the
succulent, toothsome food. The most the cultivator does
in the dry season is to fire his fields and the surrounding
jungle of Kaing or elephant grass, so as to bring out an
early growth of young grass during April.

This want of shade and shelter, combined with in-
sufficiency of food and of water from February till May,
is the main cause of the grievously heavy mortality
among cattle in Burma. The death rate is indeed quite
abnormally high. In Lower Burma alone the mortality
was 69,424 during 1894-95, estimated at 22^ lacs of
rupees in value (^150,000), and in the following year it
was recorded as 116,794 : but this apparent enormous

308

DISEASES OF CATTLE

increase was stated to be partially due to improvements
in the system of registering deaths of cattle, and not
solely to the virulence of infectious diseases.

The chief forms of cattle disease are dysentery, an-
thrax, rinderpest, and foot-and-mouth disease ; while in
the Akyab district in particular sheer debility, caused by
absolute neglect of the poor animals, contributes very
largely to the annual bill of mortality. During 1895-96
and 1896-97 the loss of cattle in Akyab district alone
amounted to over 60,000. When once anthrax effects a
foothold in any locality, it is exceedingly difficult to pre-
vent the recurrence of the disease during the following
years, as the bacillus infects the grasses to the height of
about two feet around the spots where carcases have
rotted. To secure anything like immunity from infection
it would therefore be necessary to cut fodder for cattle at
the height of more than two feet above the ground : and
it would indicate total misconception of the Burmese
character to think of such trouble being habitually taken.
Even elephants engaged in timber operations frequently
succumb very rapidly to anthrax if they happen to graze
near such infected spots.

The Burmese have of course their own fantastic notions
as to the causes of disease. Thus they say that cattle
turn seriously ill when they happen to eat a sooth-
sayer insect or praying mantis along with their food, and
that ponies die if, while grazing, they happen to nibble
grass upon which frogs' spawn has been deposited.
The most common treatment given to cattle and ponies,
when in bad condition from over-exposure, is to inject
into the eye a mixture of betel-leaf, cloves, tobacco, and
salt, which is specifically known as " eye-medicine."

To try and curtail this big annual bill of cattle mortal-
ity, which weighs heavily on agricultural prosperity and
on the more rapid extension of permanent cultivation,
Government in 1896 framed rules for the prevention of
cattle disease, and enforced them for several districts in
both Lower and Upper Burma. A Veterinary Depart-
ment has been at work on a small scale since 1876, and
sixty-four trained assistants were employed throughout
the province during 1900. But a more hopeful sign

309

BURMA UNDER BRITISH RULE

reo-arding the practical utility of the department than can
be represented by mere statistics is the fact that villagers
are now beginning to apply for the services of veterinary
assistants whenever cattle disease breaks out epidemically.
The benefits which this small department can bring to
the people would be hard to over estimate, since cattle
murrain may cause the entire savings of the more thrifty
to disappear in the course of a single season.

The abnormally heavy mortality among stock would
no doubt be very considerably lessened if the people
could be induced to take more care of their cattle.
Allowed to forage for themselves during the scorching
months of the dry season, and so poorly nourished that
their strength becomes reduced before the coarse fresh
grasses spring up on the advent of the early rains, the
cattle blown out with large quantities of new grass
during May, and out of condition in every respect, are
put to the plough in June and worked heavily for several
hours a day. When not yoked to the plough they are
turned out to graze, without shelter being afforded from
the rain or dry ground being assured to them for lying
upon. Immersed knee-deep and often more in mud and
water, they soon fall into a condition little capable of
resisting diseases of a febrile or dysenteric nature. Large
numbers of oxen die off from these causes, but the
buffaloes are less liable to be affected by exposure to
damp and immersion in water.

Many portions of the Pegu and Hanthawaddy districts
are almost treeless tracts of which the parts not actually
under cultivation are overgrown by coarse elephant grass
[Kaing : Saccharum spontaneum), twelve to fifteen feet
in height, and with a stem about an inch and a quarter
across, which dries and hardens in the hot season. These
tracts become arid except where watercourses traversing
them here and there still retain some water in their
channels, while during the rainy season the whole of the
plains are covered with water to such an extent that in
July and August one can proceed in a bee-line across
country in boats. Vast stretches of country are then
often inundated for weeks at a time. Men and boys fish
with rod and line in the ditches on each side of the Public

310

CATTLE IN RAINY SEASON

Works roads, and large boats of forty or fifty tons
capacity are poled along their ditches in places where
during the hot weather no water is ever seen except what
is drawn up from deep wells for domestic purposes.

At midsummer the villages on the plains are inundated
unless they happen to be built on rising ground, and pro-
gress from house to house is by means of canoes. This
is one of the main reasons why houses in Burma are
always built on piles, like the ancient lake-dwellings of
Switzerland. Here one frequently finds the buffaloes and
oxen tied on small mounds raised above the level of the
water, usually without any protection from the wind or
rain. In the centre of the mound there may be a
smouldering fire of damp wood, whose smoke helps to
keep off the swarms of mosquitoes, but that is about all
the protection afforded to them. In the Pantanav/ and
Yandon townships of the Thongwa district, notorious for
their plague of mosquitoes, the buffaloes are habitually
placed at night in open sheds and protected by the smoke
of fires, while the oxen are kept in closed sheds walled
in with bamboo mats plastered with mud, within which
fires are kept smouldering. The more careful cattle-
owners even place their bullocks and cows under large
bamboo frames covered with muslin to protect them from
the fretful irritation caused by the myriads of mosquitoes.
In parts of Thongwa liable to be flooded during July and
August the cattle have, when the river is highest, to take
refuge on ant-heaps, hummocks, and knolls in order to
get above the floods. In places where standing ground
of this sort is not available, they have sometimes to
remain for days together in the water.

Things are better now at Maiibin, the headquarters of
the Thongwa district, since the island was embanked ;
but twenty years ago it was, on account of the insect
plague, the most horrible of places to have to reside in
even temporarily. The Deputy Commissioner and the
Superintendent of Police were the only two European
officers then stationed there. To escape from the awful
torments of mosquitoes, the former dined before sun-
down in a framework of muslin mosquito-netting, and
remained inside this room within a room till it was time

311

BURMA UNDER BRITISH RULE

to go to bed, there again to be protected in similar man-
ner, as is usual all over Lower Burma ; while the latter,
living in a wooden house built on piles like the ordinary-
Burmese dwelling, had a fire of green wood lighted below
his dining-room, the smoke from which came up through
wide chinks between the floor planks and, filling the
room, drove off large numbers of the mosquitoes that
buzzed around. The Deputy Commissioner's pony had
even to be protected by a framework of mosquito-netting
to enable it to obtain sleep. These are no mere myths,
but actual facts within my personal knowledge.^ Maiibin,
so called from a tree {Sarcccepkalus Cadamba) was
selected in 1874 as the chief station of a new district by
Mr. (afterwards Sir Ashley) Eden : and it soon gained
an unenviable reputation as " the Garden of Eden."

Further north, in the Prome and Thayetmyo districts,
and throughout the dry zone forming the central portion
of Upper Burma beyond that, the climate is drier. There

^ This perhaps seems like making a mountain of a mole-hill, or, at
any rate, a great fuss about a mere flea-bite. But all of the European
officers first stationed at Maubin became eccentric, and some even com-
pletely unhinged in mind. Here, too, is the much earlier description
given by Major Symes in his Embassy to Az'a, 1800, pp. 452, 453 —

" We had now reached the place where in going up we had been so severely teized
by mosquitos, and again felt their venomous influence ; they even assailed us in the
daytime, and in such numbers that we were obliged to fortify our legs with boots, and
put on thick gloves, whilst by continually flapping with an handkerchief we endeav-
oured to defend our faces. But no sooner had darkness commenced, than these
troublesome insects redoubled their attacks in such multitudes, of such a size, and so
poisonous, that I am persuaded if an European with a delicate skin were to be ex-
posed uncovered to their ravages for one night, it would nearly prove fatal ; even the
Birman boatmen, whose skins are not easily penetrated, cannot repose within their
action ; and my Bengal servants actually cried out in torment. I lay in boots with
my clothes on, and a double napkin over my face, and even thus could procure no
rest."

Some twenty years ago an artillery officer told me that when, under
his charge, a draft on the way up to Thayetymo first halted for the
night in the delta, the torment of mosquitoes was so bad that one of
the men jumped overboard in frenzy and was drowned. On the
following night, higher up the river, fireflies flitted about when it be-
came dark, and the wit of the draft exclaimed : " Be jabers, here's the
bloodthirsty villains following us with their lanterns now." Only a strong
word will adequately express the torture which myriads of mosquitoes
can cause : and that particutar word must vary in each several case
according to the personal equation of the individual as to forcible
language.

312

KINDS OF CULTIVATION

the oxen thrive well, and are much healthier. It is too
dry indeed for buffaloes, which are only to be found in
the villaofes alonor the banks of the main rivers and their
tributaries.

These climatic variations from constant annual rainfall
exceeding 200 inches near the coast to a precarious tithe
of that in the centre of the dry zone, the nature and
extent of which have already been elsewhere referred to
(chap. ix. p. 243), of course necessitate great differences
both as to the modes of agriculture and the crops raised.
As all the methods of cultivation are, however, simple
enough to be classed as rather primitive, and as the im-
plements used are much the same all over the country,
there is no great variety in agricultural operations. The
permanent cultivation is everywhere known as fields {Le),
in contradistinction to the shifting cultivation, {Ya, or on
hills Taungya) practised for one to three years on land
cleared for the purpose and then abandoned and allowed
to revert to jungle. Another class of temporary but
more or less recurring cultivation [Kaing), principally of
tobacco, tomatoes, chillies, and other garden produce, is
that taking place on the rich and fertile banks of mud
deposited along the inner bends of streams, which are
planted up when the waters subside after the rainy season.
But all garden produce of these and other varieties, and
orchards of fruit trees grown on permanent holdings on
the high ground are included within a specific term {C/yi7i)
applied to all lands enclosed with bamboo fencing for
such purposes. There are no hedges separating field
from field, but merely small ridges of earth [Kazinyo) to
retain water for cultivation.

Throughout the whole of the moister parts of the pro-
vince the agricultural season is the wet period of the
south-west monsoon, which sets in towards the middle of
May, and usually extends till November ; and the bulk of
the crops consist of rice. In some parts of Lower Burma
a hot-season crop {Mayin) is also grown with the assist-
ance of irrigation during the spring months ; but this is
not nearly so widespread a custom as in those districts of
Upper Burma which have only a comparatively light or
precarious rainfall.

313

BURMA UNDER BRITISH RULE

In the moist localities comprising the rice-producing
tracts par excellence, the fields are ploughed in June or
early in July, as soon as the thirsty, sun-baked, and
deeply fissured soil has become so saturated and soaked
with rain that a layer of water covers the surface of
the field. In many localities, however, it is sometimes
delayed from one cause or another until early in August,
so that the ploughing may be taken to extend over about
two months. The ridges [Kazlnyo) round each field are
carefully repaired to prevent the off-flow of this surface-
water, which is essential to the healthy development of
the rice-plants.

The first ceremony of all is to consult the village sooth-
sayer (BMin Sayd) and ascertain from him the most auspi-
cious day for the commencement of ploughing operations.
For each individual every month has two very unlucky days
on which it is dangerous for him to set forth on a journey
or to undertake any new work. These the astrologers
can divine from his horoscope, and it is inadvisable for
him to break soil with the plough while these unlucky
days are in the ascendant. Nor must land be ploughed
upon the days when evil spirits lie beneath the earth,
which can also be revealed by astrological calculations
{Pyetkadein). To make up for these two unlucky days
each month contains one gloriously auspicious "royal day"
( Yelyazd) upon which it is most proper that the chief en-
terprise of the year should be entered upon. If for any
reason it be inconvenient to await this day of days, then
at all events the phase of the moon must be awaited in
which this lucky day is in the ascendant.

Until within the last twenty or twenty-five years the
implement used throughout the wet tracts near the coast
for breaking up the soft rain-soaked soil was a primitive
harrow ( Ttmdon or " plough- log") rather than a plough. It
consists of a stout round pole or transverse bar, about
seven to eight feet long, usually with seven broad
tough wooden teeth made of Cutch wood, or Padauk for
preference, fixed in at intervals of about nine or ten inches
and long enough to stir up the surface soil to about the
same depth in buffalo ploughs, and about two inches
shorter in bullock ploughs. The former is used on heavy

314

BURMESE PLOUGHS

marshy land, the latter in lighter soils and on higher
ground. A tough bow was bent over the top of this from
near one end to the other, so as to form an arch against
which the cultivator could lean when driving the bullocks
or buffaloes, thus sparing himself the fatigue of wading
through the oozy mud, while adding his own comparatively
light weight towards rendering the work of the harrow
more effective by weighing down the teeth into the soil.
The two buffaloes or oxen are loosely attached to a long
thin pole fixed in the centre of the "plough-log," being
united by an easy yoke stretching across this and over
their necks. The guiding is done by means of a thin
rope attached to a hole made in the nostrils of the cattle.
There being no metal work about it, the whole harrow
could easily be made by a peasant in less than a day,
without any assistance. In and around the central zone
of precarious rainfall, where the constant annual struggle
with nature naturally led to the use of better implements
in preparing the soil for the reception of seed or plants,
a primitive but fairly effective form of plough {Te) has
long been in use for breaking up the soil before using
the harrow. This has gradually been introduced into
many parts of Lower Burma for turning the sod in the
preliminary operations, without, however, driving out of
general use the harrow with which alone the soil has been
lightly and superficially worked from time immemorial.
Another implement introduced from Upper Burma is a
clod - breaker [Kyandon), consisting of a number of
straight thin iron blades revolving on a common axis,
sometimes used for the preliminary breaking up of the
soil. The Te has a share consisting of a piece of iron
raised in the middle with slightly curved edges, terminat-
ing in a point, and fixed to a shaft. The simplicity of
this plough may be imagined by the fact that the iron
share only costs about a rupee (li'. 4^.) locally, while
those taken down to Burma are sold at about two and a
half rupees (35-. 4^^.). Efforts have been made by Gov-
ernment to introduce a light kind of metal plough (the
" Kaiser " plough), but in view of the force of hereditary
custom and the enormous vis inertiae with which the
Burmese can resist innovations not resulting directly in

315

BURMA UNDER BRITISH RULE

amusement, the introduction of improved agricultural
implements and ot more advanced agricultural methods
can only be expected to be very gradual. The Te is
certainly an improvement for the first and second courses
of ploughing in so far as it partially inverts the soil,
in place of only scraping and stirring it up slightly like
the Tundon or harrow.

It would be of vast economic benefit and would give
a great impetus to the more rapid extension of per-
manent cultivation if the use of any light plough for the
first breaking up of the soil could be made general,
and if strong, light, simple harness could be used, such
as is in common use for plough oxen throughout Upper
Bavaria. This only costs about five shillings a set, and
could surely be locally reproduced more cheaply in Burma;
while, yoked with it, a single buffalo or bullock, exerting
its strength through the steady pressure applied to the
padded band passing across its forehead just below the
horns, would perform work more quickly and effectively
than can at present be achieved by a pair of loosely
yoked cattle. Specimens of these could very easily be
obtained through the British Consul in Munich, and
experiments in this direction are certainly worth a
trial.

An auspicious day having been fixed for the com-
mencement of operations, the plough is drawn across the
field in parallel straight lines either from east to west or
from north to south, according to the advice of the
astrologer. When this has been done, the plough is
then turned at right angles to its former track, and the
whole area again ploughed in parallel lines, thus throwing
it into small squares {Ldgwetcha) like those of a chess-
board. Young buffaloes are then turned into the
fields and driven up and down *' to stir up " the soil
{HmwHhi) till it becomes worked into a mass of soft
mud. In the Amherst and Tavoy districts, where the
wet season sets in early with heavy rainfall, it is no
uncommon sight about the beginning of June to see
twelve or fifteen buffaloes being thus driven in a line
up and down the fields. After this the land is again
ploughed twice diagonally (Daimgdan) to the original

316

PLOUGHING OPERATIONS

lines, and buffaloes are once more turned into the field
to stir up the mud. Again the plough is drawn across
the field still more slantingly (Ki^^?^«^), and the young
buffaloes turned in to liquefy the soil and obtain a
smooth surface of mud on the water- sodden field. If
the cultivator has no young buffaloes to stir up the mud,
ploughing is again performed at still another angle
(Ndnsatm^) before the ploughing operations are con-
sidered to be completed.

There are thus eight complete courses (Sat) of plough-
ing for each field, four being in given directions, and the
other four at right angles thereto, every operation
comprising two courses or Sat, having each its own
technical name. When young buffaloes are turned in to
assist in preparing the soil only six Sat are performed ;
but otherwise the whole eight are usually carried out.
In low-lying tracts, however, it often happens that only
four Sat are ploughed. Sometimes even less trouble
than that is taken in very wet tracts, while on rather
drier land as many as ten or twelve courses are
adopted. Working with the customary Lower Burma
plough, the Ttmdon or harrow, two Sat or courses at
right angles to each other can easily be accomplished
over an acre during one forenoon's work lasting for
about five to six hours. The preparation of the soil
consequently claims a total of about four days' work per
acre of the holding cultivated ; but intervals are allowed
between each two courses to kill off the weeds by
immersion. Sometimes after the fourth or the sixth
ploughing, when much water is standing on the field,
this is drained off after the weeds have been killed
and before the remaining courses of ploughing are
carried out.

Ploughing operations being completed, the seed is
sown broadcast, after being steeped for two days in water
and allowed to germinate, or else the field is planted up
with paddy transplants raised in nurseries. Broadcast
sowing between the middle of June and the middle of
July is of course cheaper than transplanting, but the
latter method gives a much larger crop. A basket of
paddy sown broadcast over the fields is said to yield

317

BURMA UNDER BRITISH RULE

fifty to seventy baskets at the harvest, according to the
soil ; whereas each basket sown in nurseries gives from
eighty to a hundred bundles of transplants, and each
bundle will yield one basket of paddy.

Simultaneously with the ploughing a few fields are
prepared as nurseries {Pyogin) for the paddy plants.
Without any knowledge of vegetable physiology, the
Burmese cultivator knows by experience that the medium
class of land, neither the wettest nor the driest in his hold-
ing, is that most suitable for selecting as nurseries for raising
the healthiest and most vigorous transplants. These nur-
series are ploughed first, and in some very few cases are
even manured with cowdung, before the seed is sown
broadcast thickly over the soil. In some parts the best
sheaves harvested are kept for sowing in the following
season, being stored in bamboo baskets coated and
closed with mud and cowdung to keep it dry. When
required, it is put into a large basket and covered with
straw, which is kept wet till germination begins ; then
it is sown broadcast. As a general rule, however, no
attention whatever is given to the selection of good
seed, the only precaution taken being to see that the
seed grain is of one uniform kind, as there are many
individual varieties of paddy which each require different
periods of time for their development and ripening.

Transplanting usually takes place in July or August,
by which time the whole of the ploughing opera-
tions are at an end and the young paddy plants in
th(; nurseries have grown to about a foot or eighteen
inches i!i height. When rainfall is late in coming in
sufficient quantity, when the first planting is destroyed
by inundations in August, or when agricultural opera-
tions cannot be taken in hand till after the floods subside,
transplanting is continued during September, and some-
times even into October ; but fields planted so near to
the end of the rainy season seldom yield a good crop.

When wanted for transplanting, the young plants are
pulled in wisps out of the soft wet mud and tied
together in bundles [Pyolei) containing about 1,300
plants each, which are carried away on bamboo poles
and distributed over the fields to be planted up. Here

318

i

PLANTING RICE

they are inserted with the right hand into the soft mud
at distances of about a foot apart, two or three plants
being inserted each time in the soil. Roughly speaking,
it may be estimated that about 100,000 paddy plants
are required for planting up each acre, and that these
are put in at a foot apart (43.560 wisps per acre). As
this work is continued from earl)- morning until evening
with an inter\'al for a meal, t.t: about ten hours' actual
work, as it takes hve women nearly a whole day to
plant an acre, and as the planting hire is a basket
of paddy a day with the morning meal thrown in. the
cost ot planting an acre with hired labour costs about
hve baskets of paddy. Transplanting is usually done
by the wife and children of the cultivator, assisted
perhaps by neighbours, or else by hired hands ; for it
would really be too much to expect the cultix-ator
himself to incur the fatigue o( constantly bending down
to dibble in the young plants. As holdings are small,
there is only a ver\' slight proportion of the population
which can be classified as regular farm labourers : but
field-workers, crop-watchers, and reapers, who are hired
by the job, number close upon 700,000

For some time after being transplanted the young paddy
wilts, turning yellow and sickly in appearance. With
abundance of water, however, it gradually recovers and
assumes a fine, healthy, deep-green colour. When wilting
appears to be due to insufficiency of water, any neigh-
bouring ditch is dammed up and the water scooped into
the field with a big shovel made of bamboo matting.
Little or nothing is done in the way of weeding. Rank
vegetation is often allowed to grow up with the paddy
to the prejudice of the future crop. The most that is
done in this direction is to hack down with a long bill
the high grass that rises above the water, till the paddy
sown broadcast comes up. In all such important matters
as selection of seed, manurinof of soil, and weeding- the
crop, the Burmese cultivator is exceedingly negligent
and apathetic, whereas such Karen and Shan as have
left the hills to settle on the plains are much more
diligent cultivators, ploughing their fields carefully and
taking great trouble to keep the crops clear oi weeds.

319

BURMA UNDER BRITISH RULE

Although for long essentially hill tribes, and dependent
entirely on shifting cultivation {Taungya), the Karen
have come down in fairly large numbers to found
villages and engage in permanent cultivation in the
various districts abutting on the hilly ranges. The
original, or at any rate very early, inhabitants of many
portions of the delta, they had first to retreat before the
Peguans and were completely driven into the hills by
subsequent Burmese incursions. Now, however, they
are distinguishable by language into the two main
branches Pwo or Taking Karen and Sgaw or Burmese
Karen. Both are good cultivators. As the former
select their clearings in heavy tree jungle, they obtain
the most fertile land ; but they are often compelled to
part with it later on, owing to their unfortunate pro-
pensity for drinking and gambling. Nominally they
are Buddhists, but in reality they are very superstitious,
and chiefly worship spirits to whom they make offerings
at different seasons of the year. The Sgaw Karen,
though less fond of heavy work in clearing their holdings,
are more intelligent and enterprising than the Pwo.
Most of the Sgaw tribe have been converted to Christ-
ianity by American Baptist or Roman Catholic mission-
aries. Their villages are generally well laid out, their
houses spacious and substantial, and the cultivators
themselves thrifty and careful.

The Taking Karen make offerings of fowls and
liquor to the spirit of the field at the time of ploughing,
and again when the paddy has been planted out. These
offerings are continued for three years in the case of new
land, when the spirit is supposed to be propitiated and
willing to watch over the crops. When the threshing
ground is being prepared, offerings of eggs are made
during the first year, of fowls in the second, and of pigs-
in the third year, to secure the continuous goodwill of
the spirit. Though only deemed essential for three
years, it is considered politic to make the offerings every
year ; and the practice even finds much favour in the
eyes of the Burmese cultivator. The festivals during
which these spirit-offerings are made usually last for
three days, throughout which no food can be carried

320

SUPERSTITIOUS IDEAS

out of the cultivator's house nor any guest allowed to
depart therefrom.

They have also many superstitious ideas as to the
shape of their fields. They object to their land touching
that of any cultivator living in a different village, even
though he be one of their own race ; and unploughed
fallow strips are left to prevent such holdings touching
each other. They likewise object to the field of a
neighbour forming an acute angle with their own land.
In a small field such a projecting piece is left untilled,
but if the field be large a plough's breadth of land
is left between the two holdings to avert the evil that
might otherwise ensue. Not altogether so unreasonably,
he also objects to his holding being situated between
those of near relatives, such as father, uncle, brother or
sister, son or daughter, and nephew or niece, an objection
which is shared by the Burmese, and, even more reason-
ably still, applied to houses in towns with regard to the
nearest degrees of relatives.

Another of their curious customs is the payment ot
Ashaung or compensation for certain acts supposed to
be productive of evil consequences. If any cultivator
or his cattle cross fields on which an offering to the
spirits is deposited, he has to pay Ashaung to the owner
of the field. For various other acts which would not
appear objectionable to an ordinary individual, but which
fall under something like the Taboo of the Maoris, this
sort of compensation or fine has to be paid. Thus there
is an Ashaung for happening to let a knife or bill drop
in another man's house, or for descending from his house
without touching the last step of the ladder. The
compensation is usually only of some such trifling amount
as a fowl or four annas (6^.), but it is paid without
demur even by Christian Karen or Burmese who may
profess not to believe in the evil influence of the act.
The heaviest Ashaung is demanded when a cart happens
to touch a house or a heap of paddy. Then it varies
from five to thirty rupees (65. M. to £2) in amount, being
supposed to be equivalent to the value of the house
or of the paddy. The evil influence thus roused can
be dispelled if the cart-driver will allow the owner of

321. Y

BURMA UNDER BRITISH RULE

the house to pour water over his cart ; but the man at
fault is hardly ever bold enough to face the unknown
possibilities which might lurk behind so mystic a cere-
mony, and almost invariably prefers to pay a fine.

Most Burmese cultivators, and the unconverted Sgaw
Karen, have similar superstitious ideas with regard to
the shape of their fields. They also believe implicitly
in the evil influence of a cart colliding against the posts
or other portion of a house, but they affect disbelief
in most of the other kinds of Ashaung. Fines for
careless driving were even prescribed in the Laws of
Manu. If the cart struck the posts of the steps, or of
the landing near the steps, the posts were merely to be
replaced ; but if any of the eight chief posts of the main
portions of the house were to be driven against, new
posts were to be put in and three tickals of silver
forfeited " to promote the flow of the pure waters of
friendship." The propitiation was the same in the case
of driving against the steps, because the steps are a
material part of the house. " But if the owner of the
house shall throw water on the cart, nothing shall be
paid as forfeit." If cartmen driving at night in a walled
royal city ran against a house, they were to suffer the
infliction of forty stripes with a rattan in addition to
punishment as above. Such was the ancient statute law
of the Burmese.

After transplanting, little more is done until the grain
is in ear, when the fields are watched by the cultivator or
by his children, or else by hired hands, who sit on raised
platforms in the fields and drive away the flocks of
sparrows, green parrots, and other birds that feed on the
tender crop. Occasionally one sees conventional scare-
crows made of a bamboo cross covered with rags to
impersonate a human being, but the most usual method
is for children to fire small mud-balls, like diminutive
marbles, from a pellet-bow into the flight of birds. And
there^ is naturally a good deal of shouting in the fields at
this time of the year.

A very ingenious method of scaring birds from the
crop is to be seen in the Tau7igva or shifting cultivation
of the Karen and other hill tribes. Surrounded by the

322

THE KAREN ORACLE

tree forest in which the clearing is made for the year,
these patches of temporary paddy land are liable to be
preyed upon to a very injurious extent by enormous
swarms of green parrots. While the grain is ripening
the cultivator usually resides on his clearing in a small
hut raised high enough above the ground to be secure
from night attacks of tigers, which infest most of the
thick jungles. To scare birds effectually, and to accom-
plish this desirable object with the minimum of effort,
but the maximum of effect and of conservation of
energy, the wily Karen constructs a system of thin cane
lines, like telephone wires, from his hut as a central
point and radiating in all directions towards the limits of
his clearance. These thin wire-like canes are loosely
supported on long bamboos stuck into the ground, and a
kick with the foot or a tap with a stick instantly sends
them swaying and jangling for some time, and throwing
off scintillating flashes of reflected sunlight from the
glossy surface " smooth with nature's varnish." This
simple and ingenious method is a most effective means
of scaring away the parrots, which are not very timid
birds.

The manner in which the Karen selects the patch of
forest to be cleared is peculiar and interesting. During
the month of January or early in February each culti-
vator prospects and fixes on what seems a suitable
locality, two or three cultivators usually selecting their
patches together in small areas of about three to five
acres per man. Before commencing to clear the heavy
tree-jungle, the traditional oracle has to be consulted to
find out if the spirits of the air, the earth, and the
forest approve the cultivation of the spot selected for
the particular year. The oracle for this is the Kyetyotd
or " puncture of the fowl's bone," as it consists in trying
to pierce the larger end of the thigh-bone of a fowl with
a small sharpened piece of bamboo. If the piece of
bamboo can be inserted and driven home into the bone,
the spirits approve the clearance and cultivation, but
otherwise the patch selected must remain uncleared, and
fresh areas sought till the approval of the spirits has
been won. As the fowl is sacrificed and boiled before

323

BURMA UNDER BRITISH RULE

the oracle is consulted, it practically rests with the
operator to decide whether he is personally in favour of
the patch selected being cleared or not. This oracle is
consulted with much secrecy. Although for very many
years my work in the forests lay among the Karen and
was specially connected with their Taungya cultivation,
yet I never was encouraged to ask if I might be pre-
sent at a consultation : nor have I ever heard of any
brother officer being witness of the ceremony. Perhaps
a D6, or a Tkw^tkauk who had "drunk blood" — the
equivalent of the beer " Bruderschaft " of German stu-
dents— might be allowed to be present without vitiating
the solemn procedure.

The area selected being approved of by the spirits,
the trees and bamboo jungle are felled and left for a
few weeks to dry. Towards the end of March or early
in April this mass of inflammable matter is fired, and the
operation repeated to make the clearance as effectual as
is practicable. Thus richly manured, the rice sown at
the advent of the rains yields a good return.

On the Shan hills another effective form of scarecrow
consists of a tailed windmill, which is set automatically
by the breeze in such direction as will enable two
wooden hammers to play upon a small hollow trough
of wood like an inverted cattle bell. It makes a harsh,
unpleasant noise, but is of course inoperative except
when there is a certain amount of breeze, which, how-
ever, seldom fails on the pleasant Shan uplands.

Except as regards crop-watching, the cultivator has
little or no call upon his time between the seasons of
transplanting and harvesting. Those who have small
holdings, or whose crops have been damaged by floods
or destroyed by drought, occasionally cut fuel or bam-
boos for sale, or catch fish for their own consumption.
Those who are more fortunate, as often as not pass the
time in gambling away what remains of their last year's
gains ; but the really industrious and frugal can often
earn thirty to sixty rupees {£2 to £^) by cartage.

About the end of November in the earlier and drier
tracks, and elsewhere in December, the harvest com-
mences. The crop is cut with a sickle, bound in

324

THE THRESHING-FLOOR

sheaves, and left for a few days to dry, before being
brought to the threshing-floor on sledges or on carts.
In the Talaing tracts of the delta before reaping com-
mences an effigy of straw covered with a woman's gar-
ments and bearing a pot of cooked rice is placed in a
cart and driven round the fields to propitiate the
Pomnaso Nat or "guardian spirit of the earth." The
rice is then eaten by the village children, and the effigy
is placed on the grain shed.

The threshing- tloor {Kauktaliit) is generally made in
the fields, or on the outskirts of the village in the case
of cultivators whose lands are close by. The ground
being smoothed off for a space of about twenty feet
square or more, this is covered over with cow-dung and
beaten to a hard surface, in the centre of which a stake
is driven into the ground. The grain having been
brought on sledges or carts to the threshing-floor and
piled in a stack near it, the rows of sheaves are laid
two or three deep, and with their heads together in
circles round the central stake. Then cattle are driven
round and round this to tread out the grain. Slowly
the heavy buffaloes or the bullocks toil round the stake,
pressing out the grain from the ear, and lazily lifting up
a few straws which they chew as they perform their
circuit. For the ancient law of the East, recorded by
the Israelites for their own national guidance close upon
thirty-five centuries ago (Deut. xxv. 4), still holds — even
like this primitive method of threshing itself — by imme-
morial custom the position of an unwritten law among
the Burmese, " Thou shalt not muzzle the ox when he
treadeth out the corn."

When the weary rounds of the cattle have been con-
tinued to a sufficient extent, the grain is winnowed.
The simplest process consists in one man throwing it up
into the air from a large shallow tray of light bamboo
mat-work, while five or six others stand around and fan
away the chaff with similar trays before the grain falls to
the ground. Another common method is to raise a
platform of bamboos at a height of five or six feet above
the ground, and to shoot the paddy into the air, the
good grains falling on a sloping mat and settling in a

325

BURMA UNDER BRITISH RULE

heap while the chaff and straw dust are wafted away by
the light breeze which usually springs up in the morning
and towards evening. In some of the more advanced
tracts of the delta the use of hand-winnowing machines
{Hdt) of simple construction has during the last twenty
years or so been gradually spreading ; for the Burmese
cultivator does not object to any useful innovation which
has the great advantage of reducing his personal labour
while bringing material benefits at the same time. Any
innovation which causes him individually more trouble
is, however, a violation of the unwritten law of " custom,"
and a thing to be avoided arid opposed. The hand-
winnowing machine consists of fans fixed to a revolving
spindle, and enclosed in a light casing of wood. Poured
in at a hopper on the top the heavy grain passes down
between the revolving fans, driven swiftly by an outside
handle, and comes out clean from a bell-shaped spout at
the lower end of the machine, while the light grain and
straw are blown out of the open ends.

As soon as winnowed the paddy (Sabd) is ready for
sale or for storing in the granary [Sabdgyi). But first
of all the wages of any labourers employed in ploughing,
transplanting, or reaping have to be measured out, for
these are usually paid in kind. Debts to creditors are
also generally paid on the threshing-floor at rates per
lOO baskets as previously agreed on ; and only the sur-
plus that then remains forms the cultivator's net return
for the year.

Out of this balance a sufficient quantity is laid aside
for the food of the family and of next year's agricultural
labourers, and is stored in small granaries consisting of
a large round frame-work of woven bamboo bedaubed
with a thick waterproof coating of cowdung and mud,
the whole being raised on posts about three feet above
the ground, and roofed in with thatch to protect it from
wet. As a rule cultivators do not store up their sur-
plus grain, but sell it to the paddy-broker on the thresh-
ing-floor, and the latter makes his own arrangements for
carting it to the river or the railway. When the culti-
vator sells the paddy with delivery at a stream or a rail-
way station, he can always, if he likes to take the trouble,

326

DAMAGE BY CATTLE

earn about four to six rupees (55. 4^. to Ss.) per 100
baskets over the rate obtainable on the threshing-floor.

When the grain is being removed either for storage in
the village or for transport to one of the great rice-con-
suming centres, the fields gradually become cut up by
small temporary cart-tracks, when once the ground is
dry and hard enough to permit of sledging or cartage.
The small ridges or embankments formed round the
edge of each field to keep in the water during the period
of growth are cut through to allow the easier passage of
the cart, and gradually a more defined and better worn
track becomes formed as the manifold trails converge
on the village. It is thus, too, that in the purely rural
districts cart-tracks are formed from village to village
each dry season, which soon become entirely obliterated
and impassable during the following rains.

Throughout the ploughing and planting season, from
June to October, the buffaloes are let loose near the
fields during the day without any herdsman, and are
allowed to wallow in what is called the grazing ground,
even although it may be inundated with water ; but
they are tied up at night near the cultivator's house. As
every cultivator is employed on his fields in the day-
time, he is supposed to watch his own interests, and to
drive away cattle that stray near his land. It is conse-
quently not customary among cultivators to pay compen-
sation for damage done by cattle during the daytime, as
the negligence is attributable to the landowner not driv-
ing off the animals ; but damage done by night is com-
pensated, as the fault lies with the cattle-owner in having
neglected to tie up his beasts securely. The buffaloes
are not sent to the grazing-ground, properly so called,
till the ploughing is finished ; and they are left there
until the reaping is over, when they are required to tread
out the grain upon the threshing-floor. While at the
grazing-ground, a good deal of promiscuous breeding
takes place, though nothing is done systematically for
its improvement by the selection of good sires. After
the threshing the cattle are turned loose to graze in the
fields.

In accordance with a generally recognized custom,

327

BURMA UNDER BRITISH RULE

cultivators of holdings surrounded by other fields have
a temporary right of way through the holdings of their
neighbours surrounding them. Until the end of the
planting season a path must be left open of a width
sufficient to allow a yoke of buffaloes to pass abreast
along it. As the planting season approaches its end the
strip is planted up, so that no material loss is caused
to its owner. Great doubts have arisen as to the
validity of this custom owing to decisions of civil courts ;
but without some consideration being shown in such a
matter it is difficult to see how the owners of interior
fields could otherwise reach their holdings for cultural
purposes. The want of any definite modus operandi in
such cases is often the cause of frequent quarrels among
cultivators.

During the dry season the clayey or stiff loamy soil
becomes fissured with deep cracks through the sun's
heat. Towards March, when the hot season is com-
mencing, the tufts of paddy straw left standing to
the height of about a foot or more are set fire to in
accordance with immemorial custom, and the atmosphere
becomes hazy, oppressive, and laden with tiny bits of
charred straw which ascend and are carried long dis-
tances with the currents of air. A good deal of this
burned rice-straw finds its way into the cracks in the
soil, and this, together with the casual droppings of the
cattle grazed there after the harvest, constitutes all the
manuring ever given to the fields. The burning of the
straw seems, however, to be customary rather with a
view to speeding the plough than to enriching the soil ;
for, though soft and perishable, the wisps of straw do
not decompose rapidly enough with the first showers of
rain to prevent them catching in the teeth of the harrow
and interfering with its progress when ploughing opera-
tions are commenced.

When the fields have been fired in this manner, the
glare of heat reflected from them is intense, while the
hot haze rising from the ground makes objects at any
little distance appear as if they were quivering in the
fierce tropical heat. Survey and levelling operations
during March and April are consequently difficult ; for

328

IRRIGATION BY WATER-WHEELS

the numbers on the levelling staves look as if they were
dancing about in never-ending restlessness.

In low-lying lands, which form lakes during the rainy
season till the water runs off at the beginning of the
dry weather, the land is cultivated for a dry- weather
crop (Mayin). The soil is ploughed about November, and
the paddy reaped during March or April. The fields
have no marginal bunds, only small spaces of un-
ploughed land being left to separate them.

Apart from the dry central zone of Upper Burma,
where cultivation is either partially or solely dependent on
water from irrigation channels, a hot- weather crop is also
obtained in the tracts having only a comparatively small
rainfall for Burma, by a simple temporary system of
irrigation either through damming up a stream and
diverting its flow, or else through the use of a self-acting
water-wheel driven by a large, deep stream. These
water-wheels (Yehdt, Yit) are only to be found in the
Thayetmyo and Toungoo districts of Lower Burma, but
they are not uncommon in the Katha district of Upper
Burma, the former Shan State of Wuntho ; while their
use extends across the Shan country into Siam. They
seem thus to be a Shan method of cultivation only
infrequently practised in Burma. Except the Y-like
posts and the axle resting on them, these water-wheels
are made entirely of bamboos, lashed with cane where
joints have to be tied. Unless the current of water
in the stream be strong enough, the wheel has to be
worked by a man. It is about twelve feet in diameter,
— though this, of course, varies with the height of the
bank above the water-level, — and consists of a double
row of bamboos, each about three feet long, a node
forming the base and the top end being open. The open
mouths of this double row of bamboo buckets point up-
wards towards each other at an angle of about 40°. As
the wheel is moved in the direction of the flow of water,
the bamboo buckets descend empty into the stream, fill
themselves, and are borne upwards on the other side. In
tipping over again on reaching the top, the bamboos
empty themselves of their contents, the water falling
into a hollow palm-stem or wooden trough which feeds

329

BURMA UNDER BRITISH RULE

the irrigation channel that leads off the water to the
fields.

The total area of the land irrigated in Lower Burma
is extremely small, amounting only to 5,069 acres, or
less than eight square miles ; whereas in Upper Burma
the area irrigated extended in 1899- 1900 to 799,021
acres, or 1,248 square miles. Over two-thirds of this
latter total is irrigated from private canals, tanks, wells,
and other sources ; but when once the Government
canals are completed and in operation, the area under
irrigation will become enormously increased {vide chap,
ix. p. 246).

Throughout the dry tracts with precarious rainfall in
central Burma the methods of cultivating rice are in the
main similar to those above described for the moister
localities. From climatic causes, however, the varieties of
rice grown are not only much more numerous, — numerous
enough though they be even in Lower Burma, — but the
range of different crops is also much greater. Black,
red, green, white, and yellow kinds of paddy are sub-
divided into long, short, round, rough, or smooth
varieties, according to the peculiarities of the husk or
the grain ; and each has its distinctive name. Of the
other crops grown, millets, peas, sessamum, and cotton
are the chief.

Speaking broadly, three agricultural seasons may be
distinguished in the central dry zone, but it should be
borne in mind that they are all in ordinary years to a
greater or less extent dependent on irrigation, while in
years of abnormally light rainfall they are practically
entirely dependent on such artificial water supply. The
Kaukgyi, or " rice which takes long in growth," the
south-west monsoon crop corresponding to the paddy
grown throughout moist localities during the rainy
season, is cultivated from June or July to December or
January. The fields are then left fallow for about two
months or more, before being utilized for the hot-weather
crop of Kaukti, or "rice that soon ripens," which is
harvested in June. The successful cultivation oi Kaukti
depends on an uninterrupted flow of irrigation during the
months of March, April, and May, and on early mon-

330

YIELD OF RICE CROPS

soon rain in June. Where irrigation is not obtainable,
dry crops of millet, peas, etc., are grown during the four
to five months when the land is not required for the
Katikgyi, the chief crop of the year.

As in Lower Burma, the Mayfn or dry-season paddy is
generally grown in swamps within the line of river floods
subsiding in October and leaving bare the land near the
marshes. When water is not available from the swamps
it has to be obtained by irrigation from tanks or dammed-
up streams, or by means of a water-lift. The approved
method of cultivating Mayin is to give water frequently,
but in small quantities. The hot sun of early spring
is apt to make the plants run to straw, but this tendency
can be checked by cutting off the water supply and
leaving the base of the plant bare for a few days.

The outturn of rice, even in the best irri^^ated
tracts, is not so manifold as in the more fertile tracts of
the Irrawaddy delta. For Katikgyi the average crop
yielded varies from about thirty to sixty nine - gallon
baskets per acre ; for Mayin it is from thirty to forty,
and for Kaukti only about thirty baskets. That is to
say, the hotter the season of the year and the lower the
atmospheric humidity, the smaller is the outturn in grain
yielded by the crop then in cultivation. And these
smaller results, too, are only obtained with better agri-
culture than is practised in the districts blessed with
never- failing copious summer rainfall. Inverted first of
all with a plough {Te\ broken up with a clod-crusher
(Kyandon), worked with a harrow {Tundon), diligently
weeded with hoes [Pauktii) and spades (Taywin\ and
sometimes also manured with cowdung, burnt straw,
and wood ashes, the soil is altogether poorer and less
productive, even when abundant supplies of water are
available, than the rich fertile alluvial deposits forming
the lower portion of the Irrawaddy valley near the sea
coast. There is a struggle with nature which is unknown
to the careless cultivator of the richer tracts, which are
not only endowed with greater productivity as to soil,
but also enjoy more favourable climatic and physical
conditions for the cultivation of rice. And in conse-
quence of this struggle the agricultural methods of

331

BURMA UNDER BRITISH RULE

central Burma are better and more intensive than in
the wet tracts.

Without ever having heard of nitrogen or having
been told that in its descent rain carries down from the
atmosphere small supplies of nitrogen, oxygen, carbonic
acid, and ammonia dissolved from chlorides, sulphates,
and nitrates of sodium, calcium, and ammonium — without
having any technical education in agriculture, or any
knowledge of agricultural chemistry — the ignorant
cultivator in the dry zone of Upper Burma knows, from
his own observation, that rain-water is, measure for
measure, more valuable than irrigation water, and that
at certain stages of the growth of the paddy-plant rain-
fall is particularly beneficial, namely, when the ear is first
forming inside, and when it is on the point of bursting
from its covering sheath. Throughout the whole
country a proverb is current that " Tazaungmon
(November) rain is worth one hundred thousand ticals
of pure gold." When once exposed to the air, the ear
does better without rain. He has also learned from
experience that the more labour he expends in tillage of
the soil, the larger will be its yield. The good effects of
thorough ploughing, harrowing, and weeding are more
prominently conspicuous than the advantages of manur-
ing-

Before breaking up the land it has to be irrigated
with about five inches of water, and as each double
course of ploughing and cross-ploughing or harrowing
takes place a similar additional supply of water has to
be provided. All the lower-lying and favourably
situated land is planted, while broadcast sowing is
adopted in the case of land that is higher and more
remote from the irrigation channels, as on these lands
the season of growth is shortened by the later arrival of
the water supply.

When the transplants are set out in the fields, a
dressing of about four or five inches of water is given
to the soil, and subsequently flushes of about the same
depth are given every seven to ten days as required.
A clear sky, a hot sun, and a drying wind of course
necessitate more frequent demands for irrigation by

332

THE VARIOUS RICE CROPS

causing rapid evaporation of the water and stimulating
transpiration in the plants. Sometimes, however, it is
necessary to withhold water temporarily in order to
check any tendency to run to straw, but this expedient
has only to be adopted on the best classes of soil.

In Kaukgyi crops the ear begins to form about sixteen
to nineteen weeks after planting. A fortnight later it is
clear of its protecting sheath ; and three weeks after that
it is ripe. The last irrigation is given while the ear is
forcing itself clear of its case, about twenty-five days
before harvest, and after that the field is allowed to dry
up gradually as the time for reaping approaches.

The total quantity of water required for ploughing
and harrowing five times in double course, and for
watering once every eight to nine days during four and a
half months of growth, — flushes of water being each
time given to the depth of five inches, — amounts to
between lOO and 105 inches.

For the Kaukti or hot- weather crop nurseries are
planted near the main irrigation channels or large tanks.
These are at their lowest water-level during February
and March, and remain low till they are filled up again
from the second half of April onwards by the early
rains falling on the hills forming the water catchment
area. Transplanting takes place during March, or broad-
cast sowing a little earlier. The great solar heat,
the hot winds, and the low relative humidity of the
intensely dry atmosphere during the fiercely hot months
of April, May, and June, cause the Kazikti paddy crop
to make large demands on the water supply. On the
average an inch of water is required daily during the
seventy days which elapse between transplanting and
the final disuse of irrigation water ; and during the
three to four months it occupies the soil, the total
demand for water made by the crop amounts to about
ninety inches.

Taking the average rainfall in the precarious tracts as
being twenty inches a year, distributed in about the
ratio of twelve inches during the Kaukgyi and eight
during the Kaukti season, those crops would appear to
require about 1 14 and 98 inches of water, or an annual

333

BURMA UNDER BRITISH RULE

total of 212 inches for the land cultivated. About one-
third of this being irrigation water supplied from
December to the middle of May, there remain about 140
inches of combined rainfall and irrigation water neces-
sary for paddy cultivation during the south-west monsoon
period, lasting from about the middle of May till the end
of November. If the rainfall be deficient, the success
of cultivation must mainly depend upon such shortage
of water being met by supplies from irrigation canals.
Allowing for the rapid evaporation caused by hot dry
winds, and for the enhanced transpiration of the paddy
plants induced by isolation, chese 140 inches of water
just about represent the equivalent of the 90 to 120
inches of rainfall which the south-west monsoon bestows
gratuitously upon the fields in many of the most pro-
ductive portions of Lower Burma.

As in other parts of the country, various tracts have
their own superstitions and ceremonies with regard to
cultivation. Formerly the Kings of Burma performed,
along with the Princes and Ministers, a ploughing cere-
mony [Letun Mingala) in the month of Waso, or
" beginning of Lent " (about June or July) in each year,
as is still done by the Minister of Agriculture in Siam,
and also in China. But the practice fell into abeyance
during King Mindon's time, and was entirely discon-
tinued after his death, for King Thibaw never had
courage to leave his palace for any such ceremonies.
The royal ploughing took place in a portion of the
Ledawyd, or " royal fields," a little to the east of the city.
Its object was to secure a favourable rainy season for the
rice-crops.

Around Mandalay, where transplanting from the
nurseries into the fields is often delayed till late in
August, owing to scarcity of rainfall and uncertainty as
to irrigation being secure from the large neighbouring
tanks or lakes, planting operations take place to the
accompaniment of clarinet, gong, and cymbals. The
cultivators can, or will, give no other explanation of this
except merely to assert that it assists in making the
subsequent harvest abundant ; but the idea of pro-
pitiating or scaring away evil spirits seems very distinctly

334

KACHIN KOW CHOW

indicated in the din and clamour thus raised. Fre-
quently, too, in accompaniment to this rude music, a
woman sways to and fro in an excited, semi- frenzied
state, being apparently worked up into this condition for
the purpose of providing an asylum for the evil spirits,
as once of yore in the case of the herd of swine. In
other parts, the women adorn themselves with flowers
and sing whilst planting the fields, and rough practical
jokes are played upon any stray members of the male
sex who may chance to come near them while thus
employed.

A peculiar system, known as Kow Chow cultivation, is
practised by the Kachins on the alluvial lands in the
Mosit valley (Bhamo district) during every year
following one in which the harvest has been bad.
The tall elephant grass being cleared and fired, the roots
are also cut out and burned, and the soil is roughly gone
over with a small iron pick attached to a bamboo handle.
With the pick in his right hand, and grain in his left,
the cultivator stoops down and makes a series of rapid
strokes in front of and to each side of him, the seed-strain
being dropped into each hole as it is made. Advancing
with short quick paces, he kicks up his legs at each step,
much in the manner of a hen scratching in search of food,
and keeps shrieking and yelling all the while. The out-
turn from this method of cultivation is only about twenty
to twenty-five baskets of paddy per acre, as compared
with thirty to thirty-five commonly yielded there by the
ordinary Taungya cultivation ; but the harvest is reaped
within four months under Kow Chow, whereas five
months are requisite before Taungya grain is ripe for
cuttinsf.

On the whole, paddj^-crops enjoy comparative immunity
from fungous diseases and insect enemies, though the
latter sometimes cause considerable damage, particularly
during the month preceding harvest, in seasons during
which the growth of the crops is less vigorous than usual.
Some of these insects, attacking either the root, the stalk,
or the leaves of plants standing in deep water, can be
got rid of by cutting through the marginal bunds and
letting the water run off temporarily ; while others, later

335

BURMA UNDER BRITISH RULE

on, gnaw through the stalk or attack the ear and the
grain. Small land-crabs also at times do a great deal of
damage in the dry zone by nipping the paddy-stalks, as
well as by burrowing through the small mounds dividing
the fields and thus letting the water out. The great
ally of the cultivator against the enemy is the crow, which
hunts the crab and pecks a hole in his back. In some of
the districts fringing the sea-coast myriads of other small
crabs come up out of the sea, and spread over the land,
destroying the seed-grain while it is germinating or the
young plants which have sprouted from it. They infest
the fields during June and July, before returning to the
sea in August. The cultivators affect to believe that
paddy sown in fields infested by these crabs will not
germinate ; but in any case it is necessary to get rid of
them by running or, if necessary, baling off the water
from the fields and carefully repairing the marginal
bunds. Wild elephants, wild pigs, and deer often do
much damage in tracts abutting on forest jungle. Large
herds of elephants sometimes devastate the cultivation
and terrorize the villaofers to such an extent that rewards
have to be offered by Government for their slaughter,
even though there is an Elephant Act in force in Lower
Burma for the special protection of these animals, so
useful for timber-dragging and commissiariat transport
purposes.

The usual size of agricultural holdings varies con-
siderably in different parts of the country and even in the
different parts of the several districts forming each civil
division. Thus the Revenue Settlement operations show
that in some localities the average size of the holding
does not exceed ten to fifteen acres, while in other places
it varies from fifteen to twenty, and in others again from
twenty to twenty-six acres. In that portion of the Tharra-
waddy district which was setded during 1882-83 the
average holding was found to be as low as 6J acres : but
this is about the most thickly populated part of rural
Burma, and the people do not look to agriculture alone
as a means of livelihood. Taking the statistics for the
whole province, the average holding would be about
sixteen acres.

336

BURMESE CHILDREN

Throughout most of the villages in the rural tracts
men, women, and children all take part in the agricultural
occupations, although in riverine villages whole families
often support themselves from the retail sale of petty
commodities and eatables.

The average number of the cultivating family is five
souls, consisting of the cultivator, his wife, and three
children. To be barren is a reproach, and the laws of
Manii lay down that a childless wife should be divorced.
Only less despised is a woman who bears no more than
one child. A woman who has two children enjoys a fair
measure of respect, but it is not until she bears her third
child that the Burmese matron is considered to be both
praiseworthy as a wife and crowned with honour as a
woman. As the birth customs are rather barbarous, this
probably explains the fact that more than three children
are seldom to be found in Burmese families. More are
born, but owing to want of care and to bad food the
mortality among children is high.

Up to the age of six or seven years the every-day
attire worn by small children consists only of a pair of
silver anklets worth a few rupees or a silver amulet of
nominal value hung round the neck by a piece of dirty
string, but more commonly they are allowed to run
absolutely stark naked. On ceremonial days, holidays,
and festivals, however, they are gaily clad in tiny gar-
ments like those worn by their parents. Thus attired,
they for the time lose their natural gaiety, and look
like preternaturally solemn little caricatures of grown-
up people. During the rainy season the children
play about in the rain and the water to such an extent
that it seems marvellous how any of them escape death
from fever or dysentery. Perhaps it is owing to such
Spartan treatment that the Burmese are, on the whole,
a remarkably sound and healthy race ; for the weaklings
must either get killed off or else become strengthened in
constitution. For the next six or seven years, up to about
twelve years of age or so, the village children usually wear
the cast-off clothes of their parents, cut down to suit them ;
but as the whole costume only consists of a waist-cloth,
a cotton jacket, and a handkerchief turban, the question

337 2

BURMA UNDER BRITISH RULE

of every-day clothing is extremely simple. After
performing his religious duty as a Mating Shin or
novice at the village monastery, the young lad comes
back to worldly life as one fitted to enter in due
course upon the duties of manhood. Young men usually
marry about the age of sixteen to eighteen, and then
either go to reside for a time with their parents-in-law, or
else found a new household and begin cultivation on their
own account. The girls generally marry about the age
of fourteen or sixteen.

Formerly the custom universally adhered to was that
the son-in-law should get broken in to the yoke of
married life by residing for two or three years under the
roof-tree of his father-in-law, working for him till the
time arrived when, sanctioned by usage, he and his wife
could build a house for themselves and the firstfruits of
their marriage, and set up on their own account. The little
expense which setting up house and beginning cultivation
necessitated was easily covered by the share of the out-
turn from the fields which was earned by the young man
for the assistance given to his father-in-law. A gift of
cattle, money, or land was also commonly made by the
parents-in-law. Like many other old national customs,
this ancient usage is now rapidly falling into desuetude,
especially in the more civilized localities near the sea-
board and the trading centres, where young couples are
now apt to show a preference for assuming at once the
responsibilities of a separate household and an indepen-
dent existence. There is thus, as a rule, now only one
male adult cultivator in each household ; and this explains
the fact that the extensive employment of hired labour is
necessitated wherever the holding exceeds about twelve
to fifteen acres, this being the average area which the
ordinary family is able to cultivate without assistance.

The preparation of the soil with plough and harrow
being completed by the agriculturist, his wife and children
assist in the cultivation of the holding by taking the
young paddy plants from the nursery and transplanting
them in the fields in midsummer and by reaping and
winnowing the grain five or six months later.

In the towns the standard of living has risen, as might

338

MODE OF LIVING

naturally be expected, and it is still rising ; but in the
interior of the country the mode of living remains un-
changed as yet in its extreme frugality so far as food is
concerned. This consists simply of boiled rice, with
salted, fresh, or dried fish, salt, sessamum-oil, chillies,
onions, turmeric, boiled vegetables, and occasionally meat
of some sort from elephant flesh down to smaller animals
and fowls, by way of condiment. Even the secundines,
or after-birth of cattle, are often eaten, and this is some-
times referred to in disputes as proof of the ownership of
the animal. The staple article of diet is boiled rice
{Tamin), while all the rest of the meal is classed as curry
or condiment (Hin), and " to eat rice " is the only expres-
sion used with regard to a meal. The rice is produced on a
man's own land, the vegetables are grown around his house
or are simply wild herbs gathered in the jungle, and the
fish are often caught by himself or his children ; so salt,
salted fish, and curry stuff are all he needs to buy. His
every-day clothes and those of his family are made of
coarse cotton, and are generally woven by his wife or
daughters. The only articles of apparel bought in the
bazaar are, as a rule, the silk waist-cloth and the gaudy
silk kerchief worn as a turban on high days and holidays.
His house is built with posts and beams of common
jungle-wood or bamboo, with plank or bamboo flooring
and walls, and a thatch-grass roof. In most cases the
cultivator builds it himself, and he generally cuts the
grass ( Thekkd ; Imperatum cylindricum) and prepares
the thatch and other materials for its repair from year to
year. Except his cart and his strong, steel-faced, iron
Dd or bill, without which the rural Burmese seldom goes
abroad, his agricultural implements are simple and of
little value, and are generally both made and kept in
repair by himself.

The Burmese agriculturist usually has two meals a day,
the first about nine o'clock in the morning, and the other
between three and four o'clock in the afternoon. At
these times all the members of the household eat together,
squatting on the floor around the large flat lacquered tray
{Bydt) whereon the potful of freshly boiled, well steamed
rice has been poured and the dishes of curry and

339

BURMA UNDER BRITISH RULE

condiments stand, from which they help themselves
with their fingers. Rice is rarely eaten cold except when
some member of the household is late in coming to the
meal, or when travelling. For the use of those making a
journey "rice-sticks" {Tamindok) are prepared by filling
a piece of bamboo tightly with a specially glutinous and
nutritious kind of rice, and then roasting it. When required
for use, the woody-fibrous covering of bamboo is torn
away to the length required, while the thin inner cuticle
adheres to the cooked rice and gives the "rice-stick" the
appearance of a thick white sausage. Milk is not used as
an article of diet. This may perhaps in some measure
account for the general excellence of the cattle under
somewhat hard circumstances as to fodder during the hot
months of the year.

Thecleanrice is obtained from the paddy by huskingwith
pestle and mortar made of hard wood and worked either
by hand or foot. This task is invariably performed by
the women of the household. The white rice thus pre-
pared is preferred to that husked by machinery in the steam
rice-mills of the European firms ; and in many villages
the women carry on a large retail trade in white rice
prepared in excess of their own household requirements.
The amount of rice consumed is estimated at one nine-
gallon basket a month for each male adult, one half
basket for each woman, and one quarter basket for each
child. As two baskets of paddy yield, when husked,
one basket of rice, the average family consisting of five
souls would, during the course of the year require from
fifty-four to about seventy baskets of paddy according to
the age of the children.

The average actual cost of living to the agriculturist
varies, of course, very considerably in different parts of
the province. Concerning this, one might say that it
varies in the inverse ratio of the distance of any given
locality from any of the great trading centres, and that
it probably amounts to 90 or 100 rupees (^6 to £6^) a
year in the poorer rural tracts, and 125 to 150 rupees
{£^^ to ;^io) in the richer districts, exclusive of the
land-revenue demand. The average value of the paddy
required for rice will be about forty to fifty rupees {£2%

340

COST OF CULTIVATION

to £33) locally, though higher near the large towns ;
salt and salted fish, curry stuffs, and oil, and tobacco and
betel will cost from twenty to thirty rupees (^ij to
£2). Clothing will usually range from about fifteen
to fifty rupees (^i to £3^) ; while the capitation
tax of five rupees {6s. Sd.) for each married adult
male, religious offerings, and contingencies may be put
down at about fifteen to twenty rupees (£1 to ;^ij).
To provide for such subsistence, and for the payment of
land revenue, the requisite minimum holding is one that
will yield about three hundred baskets of paddy ; and,
allowing for fallow, this will usually be an area of about
nine or ten acres of land of average quality. For a twenty-
acre holding the cost of living would probably be at
the rate of a little over six rupees (Ss.) per acre, or about
130 rupees {£S^) in all. Where the holding is less
than about ten acres, as in some parts of the Tharra-
waddy and the Prome districts, other means of livelihood,
such as cartage, fuel-cutting, or petty trade, must be
adopted to make both ends meet and to maintain the
cultivator in a solvent and secure condition.

On such a ten-acre holding the actual cost of cultiva-
tion would be about five rupees (6^. Sd.) an acre,
exclusive of any monetary estimate being made as to
the wage-earning capacity of the cultivator and his
family. The cost of cultivation depends chiefly on the
amount of hired labour which the cultivator has to
employ for his assistance. Some labourers are employed
for the whole period of cultivation extending over about
nine months from the commencement of ploughing
operations to the storing of the grain. In this case two
men are usually hired, the skilled hand who ploughs the
land getting about 150 baskets of paddy, and the help,
who cuts the long grass, weeds the fields, and herds the
cattle during the ploughing season, getting 100 baskets,
in addition to his food during the time of service. For
labourers employed only for the four to five months
which cover all ploughing and planting operations the
hire is generally about too baskets for a skilled man and
fifty to sixty for ordinary hands. For the reaping season,
to the storage of the winnowed grain, the pay is usually

341

BURMA UNDER BRITISH RULE

fifty baskets of paddy. For daily labour the rate is a
basket of paddy and the morning meal. Where the
holdings are large and the cultivator has to hire both
cattle and labour, the cost per acre may rise considerably
above what it is where the holding is small and the
whole of the work can be done without hiring cattle,
ploughmen, planters, and reapers.

All items of necessary expenditure being taken to-
gether, the total cost of rice cultivation throughout Lower
Burma varies from about twelve to twenty rupees (165.
to /ii^) an acre, distributable between cost of living at
six to eight rupees (85. to lOi". Sd.), cost of cultivation at
five to nine rupees {6s. Sd. to 12^.), and land revenue at
one to three rupees (i^. 4.d. to 4s.) per acre. Whatever
outturn in paddy the land yields beyond the quantity
required, calculated at current local rates for grain to
cover such outlay, therefore represents the profit derived
from cultivation. This surplus is soon converted into
money and spent, the family expenditure easily becoming
doubled in any year when the harvest has been good.

In the dry zone of central Burma the standard of
living is lower, while the actual cost is higher owing to
the frequent scarcity of rice. It may perhaps be taken
at about 120 rupees (;^8) as the bare cost of food and
clothes, even though the usual size of the family is
rather smaller than five souls. The average cost of
cultivation is also higher than in Lower Burma, varying
from about six to twelve rupees [Ss. to i6i'.) an acre;
while the outturn, despite the more laborious and in-
tensive methods of agriculture, falls far short of what is
yielded by the fertile land of the delta.

On the whole, the condition of the Burmese agricul-
turist can fairly be considered prosperous and comfort-
able. Taxes and land revenue are light ; markets for
the disposal of produce are constant, and prices good ;
while fresh land can still in most districts be obtained on
easy terms by those wishing to increase their holdings.
These favourable conditions, combined with the careless,
happy-go-lucky, amusement-loving character of the
people, make Burma anything but a distressful country.
In comparison with any of the other provinces of the

342

BURMESE FRUITS

Indian Empire, with perhaps the sole exception of
Assam, which resembles Burma in several important
respects, the lot of the Burmese peasantry is one that
may well be envied, and more especially by those
crowded together in the congested districts of India.
To assist them to tide over bad times loans are made
to agriculturists on easy terms by Government. In this
way nearly ;,^2 5,000 were lent in 1897-98, nearly the half
of the advances being made in the eastern portion of
the dry-zone districts in order to enable cultivators to
purchase seed and replace the cattle which they had lost
during the time of scarcity from deficient rainfall. These
advantages are fully appreciated by the people. With
one or two favourable seasons there should be no diffi-
culty in paying off such advances.

With regard to minor forms of cultivation of the land
there are over four hundred thousand acres or six hundred
and forty-four square miles of orchards and gardens,
nearly nine-tenths of which are to be found in Lower
Burma. The great bulk of these are for the cultiva-
tion of plantains, while the betel-palm or areca-nut is
largely grown at the base of hills where water can easily
be procured for irrigation. The cultivation of succulent
fruits consists chiefly of large pine-apple groves and
orchards near Rangoon, and of custard-apple [Anona
squamosa) plantations on the hills near Prome, which,
seen from the deck of a river steamer, remind one of the
vineyards on the Rhine. The other chief fruits are the
Guava {Psidiwn guyava), the Durian {Durio Zideihinus)
of Tavoy, which tastes like a fine custard spoiled by an
after flavour of garlic, and the Mangosteen (Garcinia
mangostana) of Mergui. Oranges of excellent quality
are grown largely on the Karen and the Shan hills, and
in Mandalay fine grapes for table use are produced in
the gardens under the supervision of the French and
Italian missionaries. Wild apricots, peaches, and quinces
grow all over the Shan hills, and fruit culture can easily
be carried on there extensively whenever the Shans may
see that it will be profitable.

Experimental gardens have been established by
Government at Taunggyi and Maymyo on the Shan hills

343

BURMA UNDER BRITISH RULE

for the cultivation of European and selected Indian
fruits, the demand for which would be large on the
plains of Burma if good supplies could be sent down
regularly at reasonable rates. The vegetables required
by the European community are chiefly obtained from
gardens cultivated near the large towns by Chinamen,
but better and more varied supplies should soon become
available now that the Shan hills have been brought into
direct communication with Rangoon by railway.

344

Chapter XII

MINOR RURAL INDUSTRIES

ONE ot the most characteristic sounds heard in the
morning or towards evening in any Burmese
village is the dull thud of the wooden pestle and mortar
with which rice is cleaned for domestic consumption.
The raw paddy is first of all husked by being ground in
a hand-mill or quern [Kyeikson), consisting of a heavy,
solid, round block of wood, cone-shaped and grooved at
the top, and ending in a central pole. Fitting over the
top of this is a hollowed block of wood, whose base, also
grooved, fits upon the upright cone of the solid block.
This upper portion is either moved to and fro horizont-
ally by straight wooden handles at the sides of the upper
movable block, or else kept turning continuously in one
direction by means of an arm about seven or eight feet in
length fixed to the top of it. For easy working this long
arm is supported from above by a rope fixed near the end of
the handle, so as always to maintain it at about the same
level. The raw paddy is poured in at the top of the
upper hollowed block and issues husked at the sides
when it has been slightly crushed and rubbed by the play
of the movable upper block upon the fixed lower one.

The roughly husked paddy is then placed in a large
wooden mortar, and is beaten with a heavy pestle, also
made of wood, to complete the hulling process. The pestle
may be worked by hand, or the mortar may be fixed in the
ground and the pestle worked by foot through the leverage
obtained by treading on the short arm of a horizontal
wooden bar, also fixed near the ground at its fulcrum, to
the long end of which the pestle is attached, like the head
of a hammer. By treading with the foot on the short end

345

BURMA UNDER BRITISH RULE

of the lever the pestle is raised by the weight of the body ;
and on the latter being removed, the pestle descends
again heavily into the mortar filled with grain.

For working the hand-mortar, hollowed out of a block
of wood about two and a half feet high, pestles of about
three feet long, narrowing in the centre to give a good
hand-grip, but symmetrical above and below this for
greater effectiveness, are raised up high with both hands
and brought straight down with considerable force. Very
frequently these hand-mortars are worked by two women,
whose pestles alternately ascend and descend in rapid
strokes like the piston-rods of a steam-engine.

Rice-cleaning with the foot pestle fixed in the ground
below the house is a comparatively easy sort of work, with
which smoking and gossip can be combined ; but the use
of the hand-quern means hard exercise, unlightened by
frivolity. Stripped to the waist for freedom in using the
arms, the rapid alternate rise and fall of the long wooden
pestle means hard work for the young women. The
rough-husking is sometimes, though not usually, done by
men ; but the rice cleaning and pounding with the pestle
is almost invariably women's work, quantities far in ex-
cess of domestic requirements being often prepared for
sale. There is a large trade in half cleaned rice (Londi)
and white rice (^Sdn) along all lines of communication by
road or river, the hand-cleaned rice being, as an article of
food, much preferred to the white rice turned out by the
steam-mills at seaports.

The fact that no inconsiderable retail trade in hand-
cleaned rice still maintains itself throughout the rural
tracts,despitethecompetitionof machinery andof improved
communications, is mainly due to the strong trading in-
stincts with which Burmese women are endowed. As
regards petty trade of all sorts, they are keen and eager,
though, of course, they have a leaning to those branches
in which their natural volubility of speech is likely to give
them any advantage. The men are less gifted in this
respect, although even with them the trading instinct is
in some ways strangely apparent. For these, however,
the trading operations must, as a rule, be untrammelled
by personal exertion entailing bodily fatigue. That

346

SIFTING FOR GOLD-DUST

" time is money " is an aphorism which would be com-
pletely devoid of sense to the Burmese mind, for all the
hereditary ideas and personal notions and experiences on
the subject have never trended in the direction of equat-
ing or in any way correlating these two factors. Another
consideration having great weight with the male
Burmese is his love of independence, and his dislike
of being tied down to perform specific duties at
or within given times. It is therefore by no means
uncommon to find him engage in trading opera-
tions which, measured by their monetary gains, some-
times appear hardly worth the time and trouble ex-
pended upon them. For example, he will sift the sands
in the beds of streams for gold-dust, even though this
does not yield him half the amount he could easily earn
by a comparatively light day's work as a labourer. But
then he would not be his own master, and that makes all
the difference to him. While engaged in these and vari-
ous other operations with a like object he will often
undergo much personal inconvenience and physical dis-
comfort, provided always that it is not combined with
really hard muscular exertion. To digging, in any shape
or form, the Burman has a strong objection, the digging
of a well being classed as one of the most laborious of
tasks.

There are not, and there never have been in Burma,
any guilds connected with trade. Nor is there any re-
striction, either legal or social, requiring given classes or
individuals to pursue certain callings, trades, or profes-
sions. There is absolute free will and free trade in this
respect, although heredity and custom exert strong power
in the matter. In all Burmese towns there were specific
streets or quarters in which handicraftsmen following,
almost invariably hereditarily, one branch of trade were
located ; and even in the anglicized municipal towns this
is still traceable in streets whose names, when translated,
mean "potters' quarter," "blacksmiths' row," "carpen-
ters' row," and the like. In similar manner there is
•' China Street" and a " Shan quarter," wherever traders
of these nationalities carry on their avocations in or near
the chief towns.

347

BURMA UNDER BRITISH RULE

One of the great minor industries followed throughout
the whole province is weaving. This is carried on entirely
by the women-folk, and forms more particularly the work of
the girls of the household. Seated at the loom under the
house, there is good opportunity for looking around and
gossiping with any passer-by, whilst lightly throwing the
shuttle across the warp by hand and plying the treadle
by foot to cross the strands and fix the thread of the
woof. It is an occupation of the day time, after the rice
has been husked and the morning meal has been pre-
pared and partaken of.

Under Burmese rule every household had its own
loom, for nearly all articles of clothing were practically
home-made, and the loom was the absolute and inalien-
able property of the wife. The Laws of Manu even laid
down that if a woman unreasonably insisted on separating
from her husband without having any just cause of com-
plaint against him, she was still entitled to take away, as
her personal effects, a skirt, shawl, jacket, and loin-scarf
as clothing, together with cloth woven and rolled up on
the loom, the loom itself, the shuttles, and other imple-
ments belonging to it. The loom is a very simple
wooden framework, of comparatively slight monetary
value. Flowers and petty offerings to the spirits are
often hung on it in order to speed the shuttle.

The introduction of cheap cotton and silk fabrics has
dealt a blow to hand-weaving from which it can never
recover, and weaving is no longer so profitable as it once
was. It still may, however, be ranked as one of the
chief occupations of women in the rural tracts. Both silk
and cotton cloths are, though coarser in texture, more
durable when home-made ; and the mother engaged in
housework knows her daughter cannot be up to much
mischief while the monotonous click-clack of the loom is
heard without interruption from below the house. As a
means of livelihood weaving now brings in but a mere
pittance, so that it is still followed far more as a means of
occupying spare time than for any actual profit derivable
from it.

Although silkworm breeding and cotton production
form occupations among the Yabein class of the Burmese

348

SILK-WEAVING

peasantry, yet raw silk and cotton yarn are largely im-
ported for weaving. Thus, in 1S98-99, the imports of
raw silk amounted in value to £i2T,,gio, in addition to
;^268,677 worth of pure and mixed silk piece-goods,
while cotton twist and yarn was imported to ^298,019
in value, besides nearly ^740,672 worth of cotton piece-
goods, and woollen goods to the extent of ^247,728 in
value. And under some of these headings the imports
had been larger in the previous year.

The best silk- weavers are to be found at Amarapura,
near Mandalay. There large numbers of people follow
this occupation as their sole means of livelihood, whereas
silk and cotton weaving throughout the province generally
is carried on mostly by girls and women whilst unoccu-
pied by other domestic duties. Rich, heavy, brocade-
like silks are produced by Manipuris who have settled in
the Henzada district of Lower Burma. Since the down-
fall of the Court of Ava the trade in high-class silks has
been in rather a depressed condition. Made to order,
strong and very beautiful shot silks, consisting of warps
of red, green, or yellow woofed with lighter tints, or with
white, cost about sixteen rupees (^i i^. 4^'.) per piece
measuring eight yards long and twenty-two inches broad.
Silks woven in blue are not common, for they contrast
badly with the dark olive Burmese complexion ; while
certain definite mixtures, like light green and dark green,
are never made on account of being unlucky. Pink, and
especially rose-pink, is the predominating colour in silk
manufactures, and next to it comes yellow.

It is seldom, however, that only a single shuttle is
used, as in the case of shot silks made to order for
European tastes. To suit the native idea, fond of bright-
ness and variety, the pieces woven arc usually bright with
patterns of gay colours forming tartan-like checks or wavy
zig-zaglinesof variouscoloursand shades. Someof the Lou
Paso or short wavy-lined waistcloths worn by men, though
only about fifteen feet long and two cubits in breadth,
cost anything up to two or three hundred rupees {/^i^i
to ^20) according to the intricacy of the pattern and the
number of shuttles (Lon) used in making them. But the
woman's waistcloth {Tamein\ a single piece composed of

349

BURMA UNDER BRITISH RULE

a narrow upper part, a broader lower portion, and a border
of different patterns, measuring in all about four and a half
feet long by a little over five in breadth, lends itself even
more effectively to elaboration of wavy-lined patterns and
deft shuttlework.

The handweaving of artistic silks, as most of the
many-shuttled cloths unquestionably are, is one of the
first rural industries which feels the ebb and flow of
agricultural prosperity. When times are hard the demand
for rich and costly waistcloths for men and women at once
falls while the cheaper and usually gaudier inferior import
silks hold the market. A bumper harvest in Lower
Burma will, however, as in 1896-97, bring back a revival
of prosperity for the time being to the looms of Amarapura
and give a fillip to home silk-weaving throughout the
province.

But fashion in women's dress is now becoming subject
to change even in so conservative a country as Burma.
There has been a marked tendency of late years, especi-
ally in Lower Burma and more particularly in the vicinity
of the seaport towns, towards the adoption of uniform
colours such as maroon, brown, olive, and dark green for
women's skirts or waistcloths, in place of the bright
variegated Loit Tamein of stiff, heavy texture. Though
neat and not unpleasing in effect, this change in fashion
as regards the national costume for women seems only
one of the many indications everywhere noticeable of the
gradual decay of art-feeling which appears to be the
inevitable outcome of contact with western civilization.

A curious custom obtains among the Kachin hill
tribes with regard to weaving the narrow dark blue
cotton cloths which constitute one of their principal
articles of dress. The women sit on the ground with
their legs fully extended, the threads of the warp being
fixed to a piece of bamboo held in position by their
toes, while the other end is passed round their waists.
The body itself thus forms the loom, the shuttles being
plied by the hands across the warp extended between
the loins and the feet.

The decline of hand-weaving has naturally led to cur-
tailment in the preparation and use of dye stuffs which

350

DYES AND DYE-STUFFS

abound throughout the province. The rural agricultural
population still use barks and other simple forest products
for dyeing their cotton of home growth, but to a certain
extent the native vegetable dyes have been displaced by
gaudy aniline dyes, the imports of chemical products and
dye stuffs amounting to ^^30,404 in value during 1899-
1900. Formerly, for the weaving of finer cloths, the raw
floss-silk was bought locally, wound off, twisted into
thread, boiled in soap and water, then dyed and reeled off
again for use ; but now the silk yarns imported are
coloured and ready for immediate use on the loom.

The principal colours used in dyeing are red, yellow,
and green of different shades, orange, and pale blue,
while light blue, dark blue, brown, and black are also in
use among the forest tribes and the Shans. White silk is
largely used both in the piece for jackets, and for variety
in check and other patterns. I f white thread is wanted, the
thread is boiled in a lye of soap and water, or of earth
containing potash, and then beaten clean on a slab of
smooth wood or a flat stone. For red, the thread is
dipped into boiling water in which powdered stick-lac has
been thrown, or seeds of the tamarind tree, or chips of
the wood of the Thitsi or black varnish tree {Melanorrhoea
usitata). For yellow and orange, saffron (turmeric) and
the wood of the Jack-tree {Artocarpus integrifolia) are
largely used, the latter being exclusively employed for
dyeing the robes of the monks or religious. A soft and
very beautiful shade of reddish orange is obtained by
rubbing the seeds of the Thidin or Panbin i^Bixa orellana)
between the palms of the hand in cold water and then
boiling it. This shrub used to be largely grown around
houses for this specific purpose. Green is obtained by
boiling yarn, already dyed yellow, in a decoction of the
leaves and twigs of the Men we creeper i^Marsdenia
tinctorid). Blues are obtained from wild indigo and
similar plants, and black from decoctions of the berry of
Diospyros mollis (Shan black), the drupes of Terminalia
chebula, and other trees. When necessary for fixing the
dyes, the chief mordants are alum, lime juice, tamarinds,
and barks of trees or shrubs, including species of
Terminalia, Eugenia, Kaiidelia. The printing of patterns

351

BURMA UNDER BRITISH RULE

on cotton, so common in Upper India, is almost unknown
in Burma, and the cotton pieces woven are all thicker than
what is known as the muslin type.

The forest wealth of Burma includes vast quantities of
dye-stuffs and tanning materials, which are at present
waste products of the woodlands without marketable
value. Of other waste products one may perhaps be de-
serving of notice, as it is obtainable free of cost in con-
siderable quantities at the sea-ports of Moulmein, Tavoy,
and Mergui. This is the large, thick fibrous skin enclos-
ing the dainty succulent seeds of the Mangosteen (Gar-
cinia maitgostand). Enormous quantities of these husks
are thrown away as refuse during the spring of each year ;
and it seems at any rate worth ascertaining their com-
mercial value for tanning by having them artificially dried
and sent home for chemical analysis and for experimental
tests of a practical nature.

The total number of people engaged in the manufac-
ture and conversion of textile fabrics of any description,
including clothing, silk, cotton, flax, coir, etc., amounts
(according to the last census figures available) only to
about 375,000, or rather less than one-twentieth of the
population ; and nearly three-fourths of those thus
employed are of the female sex. The fact that, despite
its far lower total population, about twice as many are
classifiable in this category throughout Upper Burma as
are to be found in Lower Burma, gives some idea of how
much more rapidly as compared with the tracts far inland
the people in the delta are abandoning what once ranked
next to agriculture as the chief rural industry in the
country, and are now supplying their requirements with
the produce of the steam-power looms of Europe and
Japan. From this movement, onward in a commercial
sensebut downwardasto artistic effect andaesthetic feeling,
there can be no retrogression ; for the time must gradu-
ally come when the plying of this ancient handicraft will
be a thing of the past, and the click of the weaver's
hand-loom will only be heard in lonely hamlets amid the
recesses of the jungle.

The manufacture of pottery forms another rural in-
dustry, which, though only giving employment to some

352

POTTERY

forty thousand people, or less than one-half per cent, of
the population, is very widely carried on. The women
employed in this trade also outnumber the men following
it, although not to any overwhelming extent. As might
be expected from the nature of the articles manufactured,
the bulk of which are thin pots or jars for holding water,
cooking rice, and so forth, potters are to be found distri-
buted over the whole of the plains of Burma, though
most numerous, of course, in the more thickly populated
tracts of the delta. In Upper Burma, Sagaing and
Shwebo are the chief seats of the industry, while in
Lower Burma, Bassein, at the western limit of the delta,
has attained the highest position in this branch, and pro-
duces large numbers of terra-cotta articles which may be
classified as art pottery. These latter productions may,
however, more appropriately be referred to along with
wood-carving, lacquered articles, brass ware, and silver
work in the chapter dealing with art and art- work. The
manufacture of porcelain is unknown, only earthenware
being made.

The pottery manufactured for general use varies, of
course, according to the specific purpose to which it is to be
put. The chatties or pots for carrying water and boiling
rice are only about one-sixth of an inch in thickness be-
low, though thicker and stronger towards the grooved
neck and wide open mouth. Consequently they are
rather brittle, and become very much so after long usage.
The clay used is carefully selected, and a little fine clean
sand is added to strengthen the puddle. Similar pots for
boiling brine and S/ia-chips in the manufacture of salt and
cutch are much thicker and contain a greater proportion
of sand. Still larger vessels of the ordinary jar shape are
made for holding crude earth-oil and similar substances
while in transit, and these are usually glazed with a mix-
ture of rice-water and galena. Some of these, known as
" Pegu jars," have a capacity up to over a hundred and
fifty gallons.

The puddled clay being placed on the potter's wheel,
this is turned rapidly by a pedal while the pot is fashioned
by hand. After being sun-dried, the pots are built up,
mouth downwards, in the form of a cottage- shaped kiln

353 A A

BURMA UNDER BRITISH RULE

covered in with bricks and mud, the kilns usually being
about twenty feet or more in length by about twelve
feet in breadth and ten feet high along the central line.
During the process of firing large numbers of pots get
cracked or broken owing to their thinness and fragility.

Fisheries and fish-curing, both along the sea-coast and
in inland tracts, afford employment to over sixty thousand
adult males, and yield the means of livelihood to about
one hundred and seventy thousand souls, or considerably
over two per cent, of the total population ; while rents
for fishery leases and licences for fishing bring in a
revenue exceeding ;^ 150,000 a year. As salted fish
forms, along with boiled rice, one of the chief articles of
food among the Burmese, this rural industry continues
to flourish and to yield a steadily increasing revenue
even although the rapid spread of cultivation, the pro-
tection of low lands by embankments, and the drainage
of water-logged swamps tend to very materially reduce
the area of the tracts worked as closed fisheries {In).
The reduction in the area of the swamps is leading to
improved methods of working the fisheries ; and as the
price of salted fish is gradually rising with the prosperity
and purchasing power of the population generally, this
industry is on a very sound basis. As might of course
be expected, the extent and value of the fishing industry
is much greater throughout the delta and along the sea-
coast of Lower Burma than in the inland tracts of Upper
Burma. The chief seat of the industry is in the
Thongwa and Bassein districts, where the income from
the leased fisheries on individual streams and their
tributaries sometimes amounts to between six and seven
thousand pounds a year.

A Fishery Act in Lower Burma and a corresponding
Regulation for Upper Burma regulate the sale of fisheries
and the license of nets and traps. Net fisheries, v/orked
by license-holders in the principal rivers and along the
sea-shore, are not nearly so valuable or so profitable as
the closed fisheries (In), which are from time to time
sold by auction for fixed periods of years. Fishery and
fish-salting can only be carried on during the dry season
of the year. For sea-fishery a funnel-shaped bamboo

354

FISHERIES

trap {Dajnin) secured by a rattan rope to a stake fixed
in the mud, is chiefly used ; while for inland river
and lake fisheries weirs [S^) are formed, thin bamboo
screens ( Vin) being extended from side to side to keep
back the fish while allowing the water to pass through.
About September, towards the end of the rainy season,
whilst the low-lying tracts of country are still swamped
with water, the Inthugyi or lessee of an inland fishery
erects a strong weir across the main stream of the fishery
near its lower end in the case of a stream, or near its
outlet if a lake. This weir usually consists of strong
posts, firmly fixed in the mud and held in position by
stout struts, to which longitudinal poles are lashed.
Aofainst this solid framework the loose screens made
with narrow strips of split bamboo, woven together with
stout twisted cord, are lashed tightly so as to withstand
the pressure of the current. The lower portions of
the screens rest on the bottom of the creek or lake,
while the upper part rises about three or four feet above
the water-level in order to prevent the large fish jumping
over and escaping. Towards the centre of the weir a
long projecting trap, with a sloping floor of split bamboo,
is fixed about the water-level, and as this forms the only
exit downwards from the waters above, the fish are here
easily caught and taken ashore. In some cases, how-
ever, the weirs erected across the beds of streams consist
of solid earthwork thrown in between retaining walls
formed of stout posts and bamboo wickerwork.

These weirs and screens are kept in position till
nearly all the water has drained off, leaving a number of
shallow pools simply swarming with fish which can be
easily taken by net or thrown out by means of shovels
made of split bamboos. Large inland ponds are often
divided into smaller sections by low mounds at this
stage, the water being baled out if necessary for the
more effective capture of the fish.

As the water gradually disappears through evapora-
tion and percolation during the dry season the fish
remaining uncaught become embedded in the mud and
remain dormant there till the following rains flood the
country again, while cattle are grazed on the now dry

355

BURMA UNDER BRITISH RULE

plain. It seems otherwise impossible to account for the
undoubted fact that as soon as hollows, absolutely
parched and dried up in the hot months from March to
May, become filled with rain-water early in June they
abound with fish which cannot have been brought by
river- water into the swamps ; because these latter are
often entirely cut off from direct communication with
streams till the high flood season sets in during July
and August. The spawn of very large numbers of such
fish must also be laid on the mud or around the roots of
coarse grasses, for the first heavy showers of rain call
countless myriads of tiny fishlets into active existence.

Certain of the lake fish of Burma, of somewhat perch-
like general appearance, are endowed with locomotive
powers by land, though probably incapable of exercising
them over any distance exceeding a few hundred yards.
Once, during the hot weather of 1884, whilst taking a
morning ride round the Royal Lake, near Rangoon, I
was astonished to see, at the extreme north-east end of
the lake, a fish of about five or six inches in length
crossing the road, then thick with fine pulverized dust,
and making its way slowly and with exhausting efforts
towards the water of the lake. Over the shoulder of the
low hill which extends to the north-east at this part there
is a shallow pond which becomes dried up during the
hottest time of the year, and presumably this fish had
instinctively made an effort to reach the big lake distant
about two or three hundred yards down hill ; for in this
case there was probably little or no mud, as in large
swampy tracts, in which any natural process of embed-
ding could take place for a fish of that size. The
locomotive process could hardly be termed walking.
The fish, lying on the ground, laboured to inflate
strongly its swimming bladder, and as soon as this was
accomplished it moved with something of a seal-like
motion, combined with jumps and jerks, for about two or
three feet before the inflation of the air-bladder gave out
and re-inflation became necessary for further progress.
Although perch-like in general appearance, such
peregrinatory fish may possibly belong to the smooth-
skinned cat-fishes [Siluroidae), which usually have their

356

A PEREGRINATORY FISH

home in muddy surroundings and are characteristically
long-lived after being taken out of water. ^

I should hardly venture to narrate this personal
observation but for the fact that an exactly similar
phenomenon was again noted during April, 1888, on the
road which skirts the southern side of the lake to the
west of Toungoo ; and as regards this latter occasion
corroborative evidence to the fact can be given by those
who were with me at the time — my wife, and Surgeon-
Major G. B. Hickson, A. M.S., then in medical charge of
the British troops at that station. Many other strange
phenomena relative to wild life observed in the jungles
could be given as having come under my own personal
observation ; but some of them might appear so improb-
able that, in the absence of unquestionable corroborative
evidence, the description of certain wonderful provisions
of nature will remain untold.

The inland fisheries vary greatly in value, and in the
manner of working them. Some are only small ponds or
stream-channels, workable merely for a short time at the
beginning of the dry season, whilst others are large lakes,
creeks, and navigable channels, worked by complicated
systems of weirs, screens, and nets. Many fisheries in
the creeks of the delta, though small in area, are of
specially high value from including the spots where fish
collect in large numbers in burrows {Tti), whence they
can be removed without difficulty. These burrows are
supposed to be made first of all by eels ; but fish soon oust
the latter from them, and then enlarge the originally
small and tortuous excavations so as to suit their own
peculiar requirements. Some of these burrows extend
inland for a considerable distance from the bank of the
streams, air-holes being opened at short intervals to the
surface for supplies of fresh air. Profiting by this
peculiarity of the fish, fishery lessees enlarge and

^ The peregrinatory fish above referred to is not a known species of
either of the genera Antennarius or Haliaitaea of the family of walking
fishes {Pediculati). These are marine genera, both of which are found
on the coast of Burma ; whereas the two cases here referred to con-
cern a land fish, which could not by any possibility be migratory from
or to the sea at any time of its existence.

357

BURMA UNDER BRITISH RULE

improve the burrows, though this sometimes leads to
quarrels and litigation with the neighbouring cultivators,
whose interests lie in a different direction.

Heavy rainfall during October considerably affects the
remunerativeness of many of the inland fisheries. Be-
coming suddenly filled with water, the channels empty
themselves a few days later with equal rapidity, the
strong current carrying away many fish. But when the
waters subside gradually and normally towards the close
of the rainy season, the fish collect in shoals and seek
the quiet waters as feeding and spawning grounds ; and
then the catches are heavy and profitable.

Agriculture and inland fisheries are in many respects
antagonistic. And, of course, in the struggle that must
ultimately ensue, the former is bound to maintain itself as
the supreme interest ; while the latter will become con-
fined more and more to perennial lakes, tidal creeks, and
the sea-coast Earthen weirs and bamboo screens have
a very injurious effect when thrown across the beds of
streams. By checking the flow of the water they cause
the bed of the stream to become silted up, and are thus,
in low-lying tracts, often responsible for changes in the
direction of the river-bed. This is more particularly the
case in places like the plains lying to the west of the
Sittang river (Pegu and Toungoo districts), where the
silt-laden streams issuing from the hills gradually raise
the level of their beds and of their banks until the latter
are higher than the plains on either side of them. Any-
thing which tends to favour rapid silting up of the bed of
the stream is at the same time very likely to lead to
diversion of the current and the flooding of cultivated
tracts situated below where the outbreak occurs.

A survey, made about twenty-five years ago, from north
to south between the Sittang river and the Pegu Yoma
range of hills showed that the highest land was invariably
the banks of the large streams flowing eastwards in
parallel lines from the hills to join the main river ; and
some of these, the Yenwe in particular, were in the habit
of every now and again becoming silted up, and over-
flowing their banks in search of a new channel. Fallen
trees forming snags, dead bamboos, reedy grasses, and

358

SILTING OF HILL-STREAMS

other jungle rubbish were usually the natural causes of
such deviations, but they were also often occasioned
solely through the weirs erected for fishery purposes.
The closure of timber-floating streams in this manner is
prohibited under the forest rules, but this prohibition
alone would not be effectual to prevent the silting up of
the hill-fed fresh water streams flowing through the plains
if it were not actively assisted by the drifting and float-
ing operations of the departmental timber contractors.
Everything in the shape of snags or rubbish is likely to
cause silting ; and silting of the bed of the stream means
obstructions, which must be removed before the floating
and extraction of timber can be profitably effected. It
is mainly owing to the regular and extensive floating
operations of the Forest Department that the streams
throughout the rich Tharrawaddy district of Lower
Burma are kept free from silting, and from con-
sequently overflowing their banks from time to time
and doing much damage to rice-crops and agricultural
holdings.

The lower portion of the delta was formerly well
wooded, the banks of the tidal creeks and rivers being
lined with a deep fringe of trees which stretched back to
where the forest had been broken into and cleared for
agricultural occupation, temporary or permanent. As
permanent cultivation began to extend, however, the
tree-forest was gradually cleared away and long stretches
of almost treeless fields took its place. Along the banks
of the streams a fringe of trees and shrubs, chiefly man-
groves, growing on muddy land, too low and too much
subject to inundation to be selected for clearance, pro-
tected the banks from erosion and formed valuable
spawning grounds for the migratory kinds of fish which
came up from the sea for their breeding season. To
arrest the rapid process of denudation and to protect this
valuable fringe of jungle against fuel-cutters, agriculturists,
and even the fish-curers themselves, a rule was made a
few years ago prohibiting the cutting of trees within two
chains of the banks of streams.

Sometimes the damming up of a stream and the
poisoning of the waters so as to catch the fish more

359

BURMA UNDER BRITISH RULE
easily form an annual festival in which the whole popula-
tion of the country side takes place. Such used to be,
and probably still is, the case on the Thaukyegat river,
a very large and important tributary of the Sittang
coming from the hills to the east and joining the main
river about five or six miles below Toungoo. This
river, the name of which means " whence the drinking
water is drawn," is a broad, pellucid stream, with a
shingly bottom, flowing between beautiful hill ranges
whose covering of tree-forest is only broken here and
there by the Taungya or "hill cultivation" of the
Karen tribesmen.

During the month of April, when the stream, then at
its lowest level, had sunk to about three feet in depth, a
strong weir of wooden posts and bamboo screens was
thrown across it at the lower end of a fine long reach of
deep water about half a mile in length, just above the
village of Chaungmagne, " where the main stream
narrows." In this weir, stretching from bank to bank,
numerous exits were made at the water level, each
ending in traps whence the fish could be easily lifted as
soon as caught.

Here, at the full moon of Tag^t (about April), the last
and hottest month of the dry season, the whole of the
hill-tribesmen and the villagers from all the hamlets in
the vicinity collected and commenced a slaughter of the
fish for the purpose of supplying themselves with a stock
of dried fish to last throughout the whole of the next
twelvemonth. For three nights — the night before the
full moon, the night of the full moon, and the night after
it — the catch continued, large fish being leistered while
smaller ones and half-grown fishlets were caught in the
traps. During the daytime and the afternoon the waters
of the long reach above the weir were poisoned with
lime, pieces of a woody climber called Hon (Anamirta
cocculus), the bark of the scandent Suyit [^Acacia pennata),
and barks and roots of various kinds of trees, shrubs, and
other climbers.

After sundown hundreds of men went in canoes to the
top of the reach, and torches, made of chips of wood and
wood-oil, were lighted. Then the waters were beaten

360

BEATING THE WATERS

with rods, and the half-stupefied, drugged, and terrified
fish were driven down stream into the traps of the weir
or speared in the torchHght by the men in the canoes.
For three nights this leistering and wholesale destruction
went on from about seven o'clock in the evening till far
into the small hours of the morning, the lighted boats
plying to and fro, and the men at the bamboo-traps in
the weir busy lifting out fish measuring up to a couple of
feet and more in length. Many of these were mahseer, or
Indian salmon, a fish that gives first-class sport to the
fly-fisher. It was a weird, beautiful sight to see the
broad river, enclosed between the thickly-wooded hill-
sides, bearing the vast moving mass of torchlit boats and
almost nude figures, while the whole scene was flooded
with the silvery light of the full moon shining in an
intensely clear and cloudless sky. In the warm, relaxing
air of a tropical April evening it might have seemed more
like a scene in fable or fairyland than anything else, but for
the ceaseless shouting and chatter of the men, and more
especially of those who lifted the fish from the traps and
handed them to boatmen on the lower side of the weir
for transport to the shore as soon as each canoe was
filled. Gutted, scraped, and salted in the daytime, the
fish were soon dried by exposure to the scorching rays of
the fiercely hot April sun.

The Ngapi, or salt fish condiment, made at the regular
fisheries is extremely offensive in smell and altogether
loathsome to western ideas. Immediately after being
caught and brought to land the fish are either scaled by
hand or have the scales roughly brushed off with a frayed
bamboo, and are then thrown into a wooden trough, the
larger being gutted and deprived of head and fins.
After being rubbed with salt they are packed in baskets
and pressed down by means of a board weighted with
large stones. Next morning they are unpacked and
again rubbed with salt, then spread out on thin bamboo
mats to dry in the sun until the afternoon of the following
day, when they are packed alternately with layers of
coarse salt in large earthenware jars placed in the shade.
To retard the process of liquefaction of the salt, the
powdered bark of the Ondon tree {Tetranthera lauri-

361

BURMA UNDER BRITISH RULE

folia) is mixed with it; but, during the three to five
weeks this rough method of pickHng is allowed to
continue, the oily brine oozing to the top and evapor-
ating, sometimes becomes so full of maggots before drying
up that fresh supplies of salt have to be added. The
scaleless siluroid mud-fishes are those most easily treated
in this way.

Greater care is taken in the preparation oi Ngathalauk
(Clupea palasak), the Hilsa of Indian rivers, which are
simply gutted, but not otherwise cleaned, and then salted
and sun-dried before being spread between thin bamboo
mats and pressed for about three days. These dried fish
i^Ngachauk), the daintiest of Burmese condiments, are
both in preparation and in transport handled separately,
whereas the stinkingly offensive Ngap{ is sold in bulk,
in baskets and sacks. Both varieties are cooked by
roasting or frying when used to flavour the meal of
boiled rice.

Along the Tavoy and Mergui coast a finer quality of
fish- paste is made with shrimps and prawns, which are
worked up with salt when half-dried in the sun. As
this is eaten uncooked, it is termed Seinsa or "raw food."
The more carefully prepared paste, made with selected
small prawns, is frequently used with curry and rice as
a chutney by Europeans all along the Malay coast, where
it is known as Balachong\ and of recent years it has
competed with caviare as a bonne bouche in the boulevard
restaurants of Paris.

Extensive though the salt-fish industry be, it fails to
supply the existing demands of the population ; for
in 1897-98, nearly 12,500 tons of Ngapi vj^tq imported
from the Malay Peninsula, although home production is
protected by a duty of six annas (sixpence) per maund of
80 lbs.

Within a couple of years of the annexation of
Tenasserim, in 1826, divers were brought from Madras
to test the resources of the pearl fisheries which were
known to exist among the islands of the Mergui
Archipelago ; but as only seed-pearls were found, the
fisheries were abandoned as unlikely to yield the large
revenue which had been anticipated. The fisheries

362

EDIBLE BIRDS' NESTS

continued, however, to be worked in a very primitive
and spasmodic way by the Selungs or Salones, an
aboriginal tribe inhabiting the islands, and subsisting
chiefly by fishing and by the collection of edible birds'
nests formed by a glutinous exudation from the mouths
of swifts (Peale's Swiftlet, Collocalia spodiopygia\ C. escu-
lenta, and others), and used for the preparation of soup as
a delicacy for rich Chinamen. But it was not till 1892
that the pearl-oyster beds began to be worked on any
considerable and systematic scale, when divers with
scientific apparatus were em.ployed on the work, with
capital raised in Singapore. In the autumn of that year
the pearl fields were divided into five blocks and leased
for three years at a rental of ^^ 1,784 for the first year,
and ^2,217 for each of the two succeeding years. The
services of an expert from Queensland were then obtained
to examine the fisheries, and work is now carried on
under lease by Australians and Manila divers ; but the
industry can hardly be said to be in a flourishing
condition. In 1895, three pearl-beds were discovered oft
the Bassein coast, only to prove unremunerative after a
couple of years' working. The pearls found in the
Mergui Archipelago are of good colour and fine lustre,
but the fishery season only lasts for about five months
owing to the exposed nature of the coast and the very
early advent of the south-west monsoon winds.

Salt-boiling is an ancient industry all along the coastline,
and until about thirty years ago this trade formed the
principal source of the salt supply for Burma. Brine-
wells occur in the Katha, Shwebo, and Sagaing districts
of Upper Burma, where salt-boiling forms the occupation
of the poorest of the poor ; but the northern part of the
province, together with western Yunnan, has ever been
practically dependent on Lower Burma for this essential
commodity. Since about the middle of the sixties,
however, salt of home production has been in great
measure supplanted by imports from Europe, cargoes of
salt being brought in place of ballast by ships coming
under charter for rice or teak timber.

Local salt production is taxed by a duty on the
vessels used in its manufacture, which is intended to be

363

BURMA UNDER BRITISH RULE

equivalent to the import duty of one rupee (i^. 4^.) per
maund (80 lbs.) levied on foreign salt arriving at any
seaport. In this branch of import trade Rangoon
possesses a practical monopoly, as most of the salt used
in Arakan and Tenasserim is of local production, although
in the rest of the province foreign salt is now almost
exclusively used both for domestic consumption and fish-
salting. The endeavours made to equalize the rates of
composition for salt duty with this customs import duty
are rendered very difficult through the power which the
local industry possesses of increasing production so as to
meet increases of rates on vessels used. In 1895 the
rates on cauldrons and pots were revised and enhanced,
and in 1897 salt-boiling was limited merely to specific
tracts in certain districts. The only result of this
restriction, which would be unintelligible but for the
very poor quality of the home-made product, was to
reduce the number of pots and cauldrons used, and to
throw the industry almost entirely into the hands of
professional salt-boilers, without seriously affecting the
gross outturn ; for salt-boilers were led to improve their
methods of manufacture in order to make up for the
enhancement of taxation. During 1 899-1 900, over
22,000 tons of salt were manufactured locally, upon
which the salt-excise revenue demand was ^15,883,
while import duty amounting to ;^8i,6i4 was collected
on clearance from bond of portions of the 49,703 tons of
foreign salt imported. In 1899 fully one-third of the
salt consumed was of local manufacture, while the
sources of supply of the remaining two-thirds were almost
exclusively England and Germany, and respectively in
the proportions of twenty-seven and thirty-four per cent,
of the total amount. German salt is cheaper than
English; and in Upper Burma the former is said to be
preferred to the latter. The whole revenue actually
received from salt in 1899 amounted to ^96,414.

Along the sea-coast iron cauldrons are used for
boiling sea-water and brine from land flooded by the
sea, until the contents have evaporated into dryness. In
the inland tracts, where the soil, the subsoil water, and
the streams are brackish, fields are divided into compart-

364

WOOD-OIL TORCHES

ments, ploughed, pulverized, and levelled, then filled with
water which is afterwards drawn off into large tanks
before being evaporated in great, thick earthenware jars
kept over a steady fire. Operations are confined to the
months of February, March, and April. The salt thus
crudely manufactured is apt to be much discoloured and
of poor quality, and cannot possibly compete on anything
like equal terms with the foreign imports.

Twenty years ago the chief luminant used after dark
throughout the rural tracts, except those of the dry zone
within easy reach of the central petroleum fields, was a
small torch about a foot and a half long made of chips of
dead wood and the resinous oil of the Kanyin or
wood-oil tree {^Dipterocarpzis alatus, D. tu7'binatus) rolled
in palm-leaves. Known in Chittagong and Bengal
under the name of Gurjan oil, this oleo-resin was ?t one
time used as a specific for leprosy. It can also be used
as a thin varnish for interior woodwork, but turns white
on exposure to wet. These Kanyinsi torches were sold
in bundles in every bazaar. While burning they emitted
incessant smoke and a strong oily smell, pungent and
differing vastly from the European idea of fragrance.
At one time the manufacture of these torches formed an
industry wherever the wood-oil trees abounded ; but
now, in consequence of improved communications and
of large imports of kerosine at low rates, torch-making is
only betaken to in jungle tracts in order to eke out the
means of livelihood during bad years, when the shadow
of misfortune darkens the household. Although of the
541,076 acres of sessamum or til {H^ian), nearly
nineteen-twentieths are cultivated in Upper Burma, yet
there are comparatively few villages which have not
their own oil-press {Sizon), as this is the only means of
preventing adulteration with the cheaper oil obtained
from ground-nuts, and largely imported from Madras for
this very purpose. The seed is stored up till the hot
weather, when it is warmed in the sun for a few days
before being pressed by mortar and pestle, worked by a
bullock. A large log having been sunk deep into the
ground so that only about four feet of it remain above
ground-level, it is hollowed out for nearly a couple of feet

365

BURMA UNDER BRITISH RULE

in such manner that a heavy revolving pestle can press
closely round the sides. The upper end of the long
pestle is fixed to a wooden cross-bar, to the extremity of
which a bullock is yoked and made to trudge round the
mill. The oil is either run off through holes in the side
of the mortar, or obtained by the very primitive method
of dipping cloths into it and wringing them out when
saturated with oil.

Sugar {Thagyd) or Jaggery {Tannyit) is largely made
from the juice of the toddy-palm {Tan ; Borassiis flabelli-
formis), which grows all over the province and is
sometimes planted solely for this purpose, from below
Prome northwards to the mouth of the Chindwin river.
The manufacturing process simply consists in boiling the
juice till it becomes thick, and then spreading it out on
thin bamboo mats to harden into a dry brown cake.
A superior kind of tablet of brown sugar (Kyantagd) is
made in similar manner from the juice of the sugar-cane
(Kyait) after this has been pressed out in wooden presses
like those used for extractinof sessamum-oil. The sugrar-
cane is grown on the rich alluvial deposits left on river
bends when the summer floods subside, but the total
area thus cultivated only amounts to about 12,500
acres, nearly half are in the district round about
Moulmein.

The toddy-palm, whose juice is collected in earthen-
ware pots fastened to the spadices of leaves where these
have been cut through to tap the sap in flow, gives
employment to over 26,000 adult males, and affords the
means of livelihood to about 90,000 souls. About half
of those dependent on this industry are to be found in
the Myingyan and Pakokku districts of Upper Burma.
Allowed to stand and ferment, toddy soon becomes an
intoxicating drink, but the great bulk of it is formed into
jaggery. The smooth stems of the tall palms, which run
up to fifty or sixty feet before bearing their coronal tuft
of sparse fan-shaped leaves, are ascended by means of
small thorny bamboos lashed to the stem. A certain
monkey-like agility, combined with a cool head and good
hands and feet, is required for their ascent; and the
Burmese are adepts at this kind of tree-climbing.

366.

FELLING TIMBER

It is, however, perhaps in woodcraft and the extraction
of timber that the Burman excels most of all. With
regard to this, although he is careful to put himself to no
unnecessary personal exertion, he cheerfully undergoes
a vast amount of continuous exposure under troublesome
and depressing circumstances. He possesses a consider-
able natural bent in this direction, united to hereditary
association with jungle work. For the felling of the
largest trees he uses no implements save a heavy bill
(Da), an axe {Pauksein), and a sort of chisel-axe {Kyet-
taung) having a movable head. The Da has a slightly
curved blade of about a foot and a half in length, which
varies up to one-fourth or one-third of an inch in thickness
along the back, and is fixed firmly into a rounded slightly
convex wooden handle of nine or ten inches in length. A
heavy and well balanced bill, it is a very effective instru-
ment, used for everything in the way of cutting, from the
whittling of a small shred of bamboo for a toothpick up
to the felling of giant stems from three to five feet in
diameter. The Pauksein are usually flat-headed axes
with straight shafts, as improved English and American
instruments find no favour with the woodmen. The un-
doubtedly greater effectiveness of the latter is dependent
solely on greater personal exertion in using them ; and
this is a fatal drawback in the eyes of the Burman. The
Kyettaung or "fowl's feather" is an extremely interest-
ing implement, because it forms the hitherto missing link
between the methods of the stone age and those of
modern advances and developments. It consists of an
iron head about nine or ten inches in length, the upper
part of which is conical and tapering to a point, while
the lower steel- faced portion becomes broadened and
flattened like a thin chisel having a cutting edge of
about two inches or slightly more. This chisel-axe is
fastened to a long slightly curved handle made from the
branch and stem of a sapling Kyetyo {Vitex alata) or
other light, tough tree, the branch forming the shaft and
the short section of the stem being hollowed out to form
a bed for the lower half of the conical top of the chisel-
axe. The latter is held in position by being firmly
laced down with strips of cane. The peculiar advantage

367

BURMA UNDER BRITISH RULE

possessed by this quaint and very effective implement is
that the cutting edge can be set at any angle desired, by
simply displacing the head and turning round the conical
portion in its casing of cane and wood. While easily
moved and fixed in any new position, there is no practi-
cal danger of its flying out of the case during use.

No Burman in the rural tracts ever goes out of the
house without his Da in his hand, and at an early age
he acquires marvellous dexterity with it, while the effec-
tiveness of these simple tools is heightened by means of
almost universal ambidexterousness in their use.

With these primitive wood- cutting implements many
hundreds of thousands of trees are annually felled for
extraction and sale, or for the mere clearance of the soil
for temporary rice-cultivation by the hill tribes. When
large trees are strongly buttressed near the base, as
often happens on steep hill-sides, the wood-fellers erect
a bamboo stage some feet above the ground and work in
a leisurely manner at the part where the girth seems to
them of more reasonable dimensions. Stumps of large
trees containing valuable timber are thus often left from
five or six to ten or even twelve feet high, greatly to the
vexation of the Forest Officer. The foresting contracts
stipulate that felling is to take place within three feet
above the ground ; but this clause cannot always be
enforced in hilly country where labour is difficult to pro-
cure.

The more economic process of felling by use of axe
and saw is only now being found capable of introduction
under the immediate supervision of European foresters ;
and even for the logging of felled stems the Burman
will naturally prefer to use his bill and axe unless forced
to cross-cut with the saw. Hereditary custom possesses
enormous force in this, as in other matters, among the
Burmese. Time is to him of far less consideration than
the avoidance of innovations which seem to entail more
personal exertion ; and as for the greater economy with
regard to timber, that is absolutely the very last idea
with which he would trouble his mind. As an example
both of what can be done with such simple implements
and of the waste of good timber in so richly wooded a

368

TEAK TIMBER

country as Burma, I may record, as having come within
my own personal knowledge, the felling and logging, with
such small bills and axes only, of an enormous hard
Pyingado or ironwood tree {Xylia dolabriformis) in the
Bassein district which yielded a log measuring sixty feet
in length and having a girth of thirteen feet measured at
the middle. This was rough-hewn or wastefully chipped
away at the sides so as to form merely one long thick
plank for use as the keel of a sea-going boat. All the
rest of the timber was wasted ; and this is a fair sample
of the sort of thing that goes on all over the country.

The most important forest work is connected with
the teak timber (Tectofta grandis), for which Burma
is renowned. When felled it is logged in as large
dimensions as can be extracted under local circumstances,
for the value of sound logs increases largely with their
dimensions. The largest recorded teak log was one of
82|- feet in length by lo feet mean girth, which was
launched into a tributary of the Shweli river, in 1898, by
Messrs. Darwood & Co., foresting there under a pur-
chase contract with Government. It girthed over 12
feet at the base and over 7 feet at the top end, and
contained 517 cubic feet or 10^ tons of timber. Logs of
anything like even two-thirds of that length are, however,
exceptional ; and the great bulk of the timber extracted
varies from about 20 to 30 feet in length. Logging
of stems is partly dependent on the formation of the bole
and the occurrence of large branches, but one of the
main considerations guiding the timber contractor has of
course reference to the dragging power at his command.

On fairly level or merely undulating ground buffaloes
are used extensively for dragging. Yoked together in
pairs by means of a stout wooden beam, from which a
chain is attached to dragholes cut in the log, from one to
four or five yoke of strong buffaloes drag the timber to
the floating stream or to collecting places whence it can
be conveyed on rough little timber carts {Gindeik). To
make dragging easier it was, and to some extent unfor-
tunately still is, the wasteful custom in Upper Burma to
*' snout " the thick end of the logs with the axe so as to
make them offer less resistance in being dragged along

369 BB

BURMA UNDER BRITISH RULE

the ground. Logs thus fashioned are called Ngahl
Gamig, from their resemblance to a carp's head (Ngalii ;
Labeo angra)

The timber-carts are small strong tumbrils consisting
merely of two broad wheels and a large central block of
wood hollowed to form a bed for the log and keep it
from rolling off on either side. Loading takes place by
the laborious though ingenious method of raising the
butt end of the log by means of a chain suspended to
stout poles attached to the yoke at the end of the cart-
shaft and resting on the wooden block above the axle-
tree. The end of the shaft is raised high up in the air
when the chain is passed under the head of the log ; and
on men pulling it down again the leverage obtained with
the axle as fulcrum enables the head of the log to be
brought on the cart. It is then easily levered forward
with poles so as almost to balance, when it is lashed
down to the shaft. A huge well-balanced log can thus
easily be carted by a pair of buffaloes. Work of this
particular kind by buffaloes is of course confined almost
entirely to the dry season and the early part of the rains.

Wherever the local configuration of the soil is unfavour-
able for buffalo-dragging, as well as during the height of
the wet monsoon months, and for all work in the floating
streams, elephants are required ; and powerful tuskers
now command prices varying from two to three thousand
rupees (;^i33 to £20)6). Females are also largely em-
ployed ; but they have neither the weight and strength
of the males, nor can they without tusks " handle " the
logs in the way the males are taught to do. The intel-
ligence of elephants — and the Burmese elephant is no
doubt about the cleverest, though perhaps the smallest
of the genus — seems much overrated. The apparent
intelligence in handling timber is solely due to training
and to the guiding of the mahout or Uzi, " the man
riding on the head," who directs movements by voice,
knee and toes, and enforces his directions with the pointed
arguments of a sharp heavy iron spike fixed to a thin
wooden handle about two and a half feet long. The spike
is curved or slightly hooked, so that it can be hung over
the elephant's ear in more peaceful moments.

370

ELEPHANTS WORKING TIMBER

As a matter of fact the elephant hates dragging and
hard work just as much as his Burmese master does ; and
when made to exert all his strength in moving heavy logs
sticking fast in the mud, he trumpets and roars as loudly
as ever he can. For timber extraction during the rainy
season, however, when the ground is a mass of deep mud,
elephants are indispensable, though in course of time some
other motive power will have to be introduced owing to
the gradual diminution in their numbers. Large wild
herds still roam about many of the forests and lay waste
cultivation in parts of the more thinly populated districts ;
while breeding is carried on among animals maintained
in a semi-captive state in the forests of eastern Tenas-
serim and western Siam ; yet the steady increase in the
price of elephants has arisen not only through competi-
tion for their possession, but also from failure of the supply
to meet the growing demand. And as timber operations
are expanding throughout the province, this demand is
certain to become enhanced throughout the great forest
tracts of the country.

For dragging work the elephant is lightly harnessed
with a broad breast-band made of twisted liber of the
Shaw tree {Sterculia villosa), to the ends of which the
heavy iron dragging chains are fixed, the latter being
held up in position by another Shaw rope passing over
the back behind the shoulder-blades. The backbone is
protected by a skeleton saddle of wood or by rounded
blocks of light wood resting upon a thick pad of folded
skins and Shaw bark. Logs of ordinary size — about
twenty to thirty feet in length and six to seven feet in
mean girth — can be dragged by one elephant ; but for
long large-girthed timber two, three, or more are set to
work simultaneously on alternate sides of the log. In-
cluding dragging, launching into the creeks, and bringing
into the fair channel such logs as have got stranded or
stuck, an elephant can work out from about 70 to 1 50 logs
a year according to the class of animal and the given local
conditions under which the work is done.

The work of felling, logging, and dragging commences
in November or December, and is continued till the
great heat and the want of water — for all except the main

371

BURMA UNDER BRITISH RULE
streams dry up during the hot season — bring work to an
end with the month of March. The early rains find the
lumberers again at work; and dragging, drifting, and
floating operations continue all through the rainy season,
the largest deliveries of timber at Rangoon taking place
between November and February.

Logs are launched singly into the bed of a floating
stream and allowed to drift along as each heavy fall of
rain brings down a freshet. Near the sources of the
small tributaries, and even in many of the main channels
having broad, shallow, sandy watercourses, these rises and
falls occur very suddenly, and cannot be utilized to full
advantage unless elephants are at hand near the launched
logs to push them into the main current. This is done
by the elephant applying its head, just above the root of
the trunk, to the end of the log and making the latter
slide forward over the wet mud or sand into the deep
water, or into the position required. To aimg or " over-
come " obstructive logs in this way the aid of the elephant
is essential ; buffaloes are of no use for the purpose.

It not infrequently happens that in drifting down loosely
in the floating streams logs get stuck in shallows or ob-
structed by snags or jungle rubbish and drift refuse from
the forest ; for the banks of the streams are much sub-
ject to erosion, when trees and bamboos growing at their
edge fall into the current and are swept down till their
course is perchance arrested by snags, or through the sub-
siding of the waters. Care is therefore taken to patrol
the floating streams and keep them clear of snags and
jungle refuse ; but sometimes in the course of a single
night large obstructions are formed by the jamming of
hundreds of logs. For the breaking up of such obstruc-
tions ( Talk) formed of logs and jungle drift {Taikthaydw)
elephants are again essential, and both animals and their
intrepid drivers incur no little danger while loosening the
logs and setting free the vast masses of firmly wedged
timber and bamboos that dam up the waters behind
them.

Many streams give a vast amount of trouble in this
respect. The most troublesome are perhaps three large
streams draining an extensive forest area along the western

372

TIMBER-FLOATING OPERATIONS

slopes of the Pegu Yoma in the Tharrawaddy and Prome
districts of Lower Burma. After reachin^r the phiins
these streams all converge near the boundary between
the two districts and form the Myitmaka or Hlaing river
leading direct to Rangoon. During the flood months of
July to September the Myitmaka meets here with the
flood waters of the Irrawaddy, which then rise and inun-
date the whole of the country from Myanaung, on the
western river bank, eastwards to within four or five miles
of the Rangoon and Prome railway line. As the hill
streams come into the slack water thus formed during
floods the heavier sandy portion of the silt becomes
deposited and a bar or sandy obstruction is formed which
tends not only to impede timber-floating operations, but
also to cause inundation of the surrounding rice-lands,
destruction of crops, and deviation of the watercourse.
After nearly a quarter of a century of wrangling between
district and forest officers, and of repeated consideration
of this problem by the Engineering Department, it has
been proved that the best and indeed the only practic-
able way of obviating these annually recurring dangers
at this particular locality is to maintain a clear water-
course and to keep it open by timber extraction. This
necessitates the cutting in each dry season of a narrow
channel about two or three hundred yards in length
through the sandy bar, and keeping it open continuously
by means of elephants dragging or "^«;/^"-ing logs
across.

At the end of each rainy season all the floating
streams are examined, and stranded logs are placed in a
favourable position for being drifted down with the early
floods of the following season.

On reaching the main rivers the drift-logs are caught
at convenient centres and formed into rafts, which are
floated down to the great timber marts of Rangoon and
Moulmein. The method employed is simple and effective.
A thick rattan cane (of the genus Calajuns) is stretched
loosely across the stream and firmly fixed at each end.
Being run through the drag- holes of a series of logs,
it is kept just on the surface of the water, and forms a
boom {Kyodan, "rope line") to catch the drifting timber,

373

BURMA UNDER BRITISH RULE

which is taken out from below by men in canoes and
removed to where the rafts {Paimg) are made up.
Though varying much in size, the rafts are all con-
structed on the same principle. The logs of about equal
length are arranged in sections, being lashed together
fore and aft by transverse poles fixed with split rattan to
the drag-holes of the logs, and each section is connected
by strong twisted rattan to the sections before and behind
it. On the Sittang river, where floating operations begin
early and the current is very strong, the rafts consist only
of forty to fifty logs in about four to six sections, while
on the Irrawaddy river the rafts from Mandalay, which
do not start on their 500 miles' river journey till early in
October after the flood period is at an end, are three
or four times as large.

The number of men employed specially in the
extraction and handling of timber in the rough cannot
be estimated with any approach to accuracy, but the
extraction and preparation of forest produce afford
employment to between fifty and sixty thousand adult
males and yield a livelihood to over a quarter of a million
souls or about three per cent, of the total population.
These bald figures, however, hardly bring home to one's
mind the national and economic importance of Burma's
vast forest wealth. This may perhaps be better exempli-
fied in the statement that the outturn of timber and fuel
in 1897-98 amounted to 58 millions of cubic feet, whilst
157 millions of bamboos were extracted, besides minor
produce of various sorts. The gross income from forests
during 1899-1900 was .;^556,726, while the net surplus
revenue was £2>99^'^5^'

One of the chief of the jungle industries connected
with the utilization of minor forest produce is cutch-
boiling. Three men usually work together in one camp.
One of them fells the Ska or cutch trees (Acacia
Catechi) and drags them to camp, while another hews
off the pale sapwood and cuts the dark red-brown heart-
wood into small chips of about an inch square and a
quarter of an inch thick, and the third looks after the
boiling of the chips in earthenware pots and iron
cauldrons. Round earthenware pots, of about three

374

CUTCH-BOILING

gallons capacity, and to the number of about twenty or
twenty-four, after being tightly packed with chips and
filled up with water, are placed over narrow earthen
trenches in which fires are kept constantly burning.
Near these trenches are placed the central fires in holes
dug in the ground, above which iron cauldrons of about
twelve gallons capacity are hung. By the time the
pots full of chips have boiled for nearly twenty-four
hours the liquid they then contain has been reduced to
about half its original quantity. From the pots it is
next poured into the iron cauldrons and boiling is
continued, with stirring, till the liquid attains a viscous
consistency. After the removal of the cauldron from the
fire stirring has to continue so as to let the cutch cool
equally throughout its whole mass in place of forming a
hard solid cake on the top. When cool enough to be
handled, it is poured out in moulds, like brick moulds,
lined with large leaves to prevent it from sticking to the
sides. Fresh chips are used each time the earthenware
pots are filled and placed on the trench fires. During
the rainy season boiling takes place under an awning of
thatched grass, to protect the fires from the rain. The
method is crude and wasteful, for a cubic foot of Sha
wood weighing between sixty and seventy pounds only
yields on the average about 3f pounds of cutch when
thus primitively treated.

Cutch-boiling forms the chief means ot livelihood of a
large number of the poorer classes in the Prome and
Thayetmyo districts of Lower Burma, who work for
Chinese that furnish them with the money for obtaining
licenses. But it also affords to many more in these
districts, and in the Upper Burma districts of precarious
rainfall, a subsidiary means of eking out a subsistence
during times of scarcity. In some of the driest portions
of the central zone, as in Pakokku, Myingyan, and
Meiktila, where the cutch tree does not attain the
same dimensions as in tracts blessed with a rainfall of
about forty to sixty inches, recent years of scarcity have,
combined with improved communications by the railway
opening out the land-locked interior, effected the
exhaustion of marketable trees within the cutch-pro-

375

BURMA UNDER BRITISH RULE

ducing area. It grows quickly, however, and reserves
and plantations are being formed by the Forest Depart-
ment for the provision and maintenance of future supplies
of this valuable tree.

Of recent years the reputation of Burma cutch has
been lowered through adulteration, and measures have
been taken by Government to try and obviate this. The
chief adulterants are bark extracts made from various
kinds of trees, and more especially from those of the
genus Terminalia. Astringent to a degree, these bark
extracts are perhaps worthy of commercial attention for
the preparation of tanning extracts ; but their admixture
depreciated the cutch trade.

Charcoal-burning forms the occupation of compara-
tively few, and it is followed in a most wasteful manner.
Open pits are dug, fire is placed in these, and wood
thrown on which is allowed to char. The preparation
of charcoal is generally confined to the wet season, as
otherwise the wood would be completely consumed,
leaving only the ashes as the product of combustion.
As it is, the outturn is of course of a very poor descrip-
tion, and consists mostly of small pieces.

Conversion of timber at all seaports, and at a few mills
in the forests, takes place by means of steam power, but
hand-sawing is still general in all the towns and larger
villages, and even in the heart of the jungle, throughout
the province. There does not exist, however, within the
whole length and breadth of the country any sawmill
driven by water-power ; nor has the Burmese mind
apparendy ever risen to the possibility of utilizing water-
power in this manner.

With continuous progress in the formation ot perma-
nent roads since the British occupation, the manufacture
and the use of carts have increased enormously. There
are now 438,282 carts in the province, or about two for
every five households on the plains. Radical changes
have also at the same time been made in their con-
struction, to suit them for roads metalled — when metalled
at all--mosdy with balls of burned brick apt to be easily
pulverized during the hot season. Good greenstone
road-metal is only to be found in the seaports and

376

COUNTRY CARTS

their immediate vicinity, where it is obtainable from ships
that have brought it out as ballast from Europe.

In former times, before the era of road-makin<,S the
country carts had to be so constructed as to be capable
of travelling over very rough ground. The cart-tracks
began in the fields whence the grain was brought on
sledges or carts to the hamlets and villages, and gradually
those single threads converged to form the main lines of
communication, as small tributary streams are gathered
together in the main watercourse.

Two heavy, round, convex-sided, untyred wheels about
three feet in circumference, made out of a solid block of
hard wood, or else in two or more frequently three pieces,
having^ been fashioned and fitted to a hard tougrh axle-
tree, a shaft is formed of two poles extending in an
upward curve for some feet behind this and reaching
forward for about ten or twelve feet. These being
lashed together at the front end, the bed of the cart is
formed either of boards or of stout bamboo strips loosely
interwoven, the sides being a rough wooden framework
let into the poles forming the shaft. From the yoke,
fixed by a leather thong to the front part of the two-
poled shaft, the framework slopes down to the axle-tree
and then curves up behind, thus necessitating the selection
of poles with symmetrical bend. For ornament the poles
jut out behind, and to finish off the cart in front a piece
of wood pointing upwards is lashed to the end of the
shaft and carved to represent the neck and head of a
paddy bird or white heron {Herodias alba). Even
when no attempt is made to adorn this piece of wood it
is always called the Hgnetyok or " image of the bird,"
and to it is always fastened the wisp of flowers, the ears
of grain, or the simple twigs placed as an offering to the
spirits of the air when carting home the harvest or
setting out upon any journey by road.

The carts drawn by buffaloes are larger and heavier
than those meant for bullocks, but in all essential features
the indigenous form of Burmese cart formerly used all
over the country, though now only to be met with off the
beaten tracks of main communication, differed only in
dimensions and not as regards the lines upon which they

377

BURMA UNDER BRITISH RULE

were constructed. There is no metal work about them.
Wheels, axle-boxes, axle-trees, lynch-pins, shafts, body,
and sides are all made of wood, and are jointed,
mortised, and tenoned with wood, wherever necessary.
For the wheels Padauk {Pterocarpus indicus) is the wood
preferred ; and as creaking is considered melodious
instead of being looked on as a defect, a fine well-toned
pair will fetch as much as thirty rupees {£1). The
favourite woods for axles are the hard, tough Gyo
{Schleichera trijuga), Petwun {Berry a mollis), Cutch
{Acacia Catechu), and Ironwood or Pyingado (Xylia dola-
hriformis), while Yindaik {Dalbergia cultratd), Petwun,
and Mangroves in the tidal districts are most prized as
shafts.

Such primitive carts were well enough suited to the
extremely rough work for which they were required
before the country began to be opened out by permanent
roads. They could stand very rough work better than
carts of more complex construction, and could be repaired
without the aid of any blacksmith or wheelwright. But
they soon cut up the earthen roads, and by the middle
of the hot season, when all the moisture had completely
evaporated from the soil, the ruts became so deep that
the carts sank nearly up to the axle in the pulverized
earth. This did not matter much, however, as the roads
became impassable during the rainy season and were
opened anew each year when traffic overland became
once more practicable.

Whenever a string of carts passed along, a thick cloud
of fine dust was raised which hung long in the hot air.
From afar off the monotonous, high-pitched creaking
and groaning of the wheels against the broad wooden
axle-boxes could be heard increasing in intensity as they
approached, and then passed, and gradually lessened and
faded away, something like the well-known arrangement
of the " Turkish Patrol." During the hottest season,
from the middle of March till the middle of May, when
cartmen go by night to avoid exposing their cattle and
themselves in the daytime, sleep was almost out of
the question to the unfortunate traveller whose camp
happened to be on any of the much frequented tracks.

378

CARTS AND BOATS

To protect the driver and the load from the effects of
sun, dew and rain a thin bamboo mat is often stretched
across the top of the cart in the form of a semi-circular
awning. When thus slowly wending their way along at
less than two miles an hour the cartmen take the leading
position by turns, and the driver of the first cart is
supposed to keep awake and guide the party while the
rest enjoy repose in sleep. The wakefulness of the
leading cartman is usually, however, merely nominal ; he,
too, generally goes to sleep, and the bullocks wander
on just as they list.

With the formation ot municipalities and the licensing
of carts plying for hire in urban districts, it soon also
became necessary to insist on the use of spoked and iron-
tyred wheels for traffic along Government roads. The
use of country carts with solid wooden wheels has not been
exactly suppressed in rural districts, but under Public
Works Departmental orders they are supposed only to go
along the iDerme, leaving the prepared roadway, whether
metalled or unmetalled, for carts of improved construc-
tion. Wooden wheels get worn away unevenly and then
jolt fearfully, throwing much extra work on the buffaloes
or bullocks. Hence the gradual disappearance of this
picturesque remnant of primitive Burma is hardly a matter
for regret. Carts of light and graceful construction are
used for bullock-racing in the Thaton district ; while
light single-pole carts, with enclosed sides and a consider-
able quantity of carving around them, do duty as carriages
in Mandalay.

Boats, however, approach much more nearly than carts
to being an essential requisite of life in Burma, and
especially so in the delta and in all districts having heavy
rainfall. For two or three months of the year vast
stretches of country are deep under water, and loco-
motion is confined to boats. Many of the villages on
the plains become inundated so that movement even
from house to house has to take place in canoes ; and
during July and August large boats can be poled up, far
inland from the streams, in the ditches at the side of the
Public Works roads.

Except as regards the comparatively few sea-going

379

BURMA UNDER BRITISH RULE

craft built with heavy keels of ironwood, boat-construction
follows very much the same main lines, no matter whether
a small fifteen to eighteen feet canoe or a large boat for
transport of earth-oil or rice be in consideration. The
former consists simply of a "dug-out" or hollowed stem ;
while in the latter a dug-out forms the hull or base upon
which ribs and crooks are fixed for the support of wash-
boards and side-planks. The country boats are con-
sequently of shallow draft, and can be easily lifted or
poled off when they happen to run on any mudbank or
sandy shoal.

The most highly prized ana valuable hulls are those
made of Tkingan (Hopea odorata) or Teak {Kytln ;
Tedona grandis), which are said to last about thirty years.
Pyinma (Lagerstroemia flos reginae) and Lesa (Z.
tomentosd) are also much in demand ; but the largest
number of canoes is made from the less durable In
{Dipterocarpus tuber cidatus), which is the most abundant
tree throughout Burma and can easily be obtained of
large girth and free from branches to the required length.
Under the Forest Rules timber, except teak and a few
other reserved kinds, can be cut free for boats required
for bona fide domestic and agricultural use, though all
such as are made for trade purposes have to pay
revenue.

The green log having been roughly hollowed out, with
due consideration to the future shape of the hull when com-
pleted, a light fire is applied all round it and the sides are
gradually stretched outwards by means of wooden hooks
and strong wet cords fixed to stout pegs in the ground,
which contract slightly in drying. More hollowing out
then takes place, and further stretching apart ; and so on
till the sides are fully opened out, and the work of adzing,
smoothing, and fashioning the dug-out can be completed.
The operations extend over a considerable time, to
obviate any cracking which would render the hull practi-
cally worthless.

When large boats are built, the bows are kept low,
while the stern runs up behind to form an elevated stage
for the helmsman, which is often very richly ornamented
with carving in teak. Some of the carvings on the

380

THE " LAKE-DWELLERS "

sterns of large boats on the Irrawaddy are of a liigh
artistic order, though somewhat rough in execution.
The helm consists of a huge paddle lashed to the port-
side and moved by a short handle from the steersman's
bench. The Penin who " treads on the stern " is the man
in authority on board ; and this term is often applied to
the petty officials in up-country hamlets. The oarsmen
row standing up. They generally have small foot-rests
against which they press with one foot when giving the
weight of their bodies to the stroke, while they remove
this foot and give it a backward swing when bringing
forward the oar again for another stroke.

Among the Intkd or " lake-dwellers " around the Inle
lake near Fort Stedman in the southern Shan State of
Nyaungywe, the men row their canoes standing up with
the leg wound round the long oar which passes down
the inner side of the knee, then across the tibia, and past
the outer side of the foot.

For rowing small canoes, and long Laung or racing
skiffs, used also in conveying priests from place to place
and generally kept under the village monastery, light,
pointed paddles with long narrow blades are used, while
the steersman guides the boat with a long and broad
sweep. Paint is not used on boats or canoes, which are
smeared from time to time with dark-brown crude earth-
oil to preserve and beautify them. The racing skiffs
form, however, an exception, as they are almost invari-
ably coated over with black varnish both inside and out-
side.

On the Irrawaddy enormous lug sails of thin white or
light-brown cotton are used to carry the boats up stream
during the hot weather and the monsoon season, when
strong winds usually blow inwards from the sea-coast.
The mast is formed of two giant bamboos ( IVabo : Dcn-
drocalamiis Brandisit) bolted and lashed to the hull, and
spliced together in the top portion. On this a yard con-
sisting of bamboo is raised having pulleys at the ends
through which cords pass, so that by hauling these the
sail extends by running on rings along the smooth bam-
boo yard on both sides of the mast. As the boats are
smooth-bottomed, without any ridged keel, and the sails

381

BURMA UNDER BRITISH RULE

are only adapted for running straight before the wind,
little or no tacking is possible. When the wind fails or
is unfavourable, rowing in slack water or poling along
the bank must be reverted to. When not in use, the
mast is lowered down on to the roof of the arch covering
the dwelling part of the boat.

During April, May, and June, before the Irrawaddy
becomes so swollen with flood water as to have a swift
current, the wind blowing up stream is often so strong as
to impede the progress of large boats making the down-
ward journey, and water- sails are then lowered to catch
the under-currents and carry the boat down stream in
spite of the wind. A fleet of large Irrawaddy boats
sailing up stream under their enormous expanse of white
or light-brown sails, forms a very pleasing and graceful
addition to Irrawaddy river scenery often extremely pic-
turesque and beautiful in itself.

For the conveyance downwards from Yenangyaung of
crude earth-oil, carried in large glazed earthenware jars,
boats {Peingaw) of special construction are built. They
usually consist of two broad, straight, punt-like dug-outs
lashed together, and have a bamboo gallery extending
along both sides to facilitate poling up stream whenever
the bamboos have to be taken in hand for this purpose.
These Peingaw are not to be met with except on the
Irrawaddy. The royal barge or " great golden raft " at
Mandalay — which was never used after the Myingun
Prince's rebellion in 1866, because the King was afraid
to leave his palace and go on the river — was of this class.
It was profusely decorated with tinsel, coloured glass,
and gilding, and was finished off fore and aft with wild
leogryphs picked out in gorgeous colours, the gilded
and glass-mosaiced pavilion occupying the central posi-
tion being surmounted with a seven-tiered pagoda-like
roof.

For some distance immediately in front of the steers-
man's perch the hind part of the ordinary Burmese river-
boat is covered with an arched awning of bamboo mat
so as to form the dwelling-place of the crew. Here the
cooking is done on a shallow box filled with earth, and
here the men sleep at night. The deck of the boat is

382

MAT-WEAVING

formed by thick bamboo mats or coarse framework placed
over the cargo, for loading does not take place above the
gunwale.

Notwithstanding the competition of railway and
steamers, there is still a vast amount of petty and local
traffic conveyed by boats ; and the floating population
employed in this, as well as in timber-rafting opera-
tions, includes no small proportion of the worst classes
of thieves, gamblers, and opium-smokers to be found
among those of pure Burmese nationality.

In all jungle hamlets, and in most villages, a man
builds his own house, his neighbours helping him to raise
the posts and place them in position. It is only in larger
villages that the assistance of a carpenter {Letthama) or
"handy man" is required for house-building. In the
heart of the jungle, indeed, the houses are made of poles,
bamboos, and grass, without any rails or iron-work being
required in their construction.

Mat-weaving with thin strips of bamboo is universal,
but the preparation of a fine quality of mat from the
outer portion of the Thin rattan {^Maranta dichotoma)
forms a speciality in various parts. They are often
woven in patterns with strips dyed black for this purpose
in a decoction of the bark and leaves of the Zibytc tree
(Zizyphus jujuba), the work of this finer class forming
the occupation of women. The best mats are made at
Daniibyu in the Henzada district, where mat-making has
almost entirely displaced the weaver's hand-loom. The
mats known as Thinbyu are used all over the country
for sleeping on, a Burman's bed consisting merely of a
blanket or cotton coverlet {Satmg), and a small pillow
rolled up in one of these flexible mats and tied with
string. The Thin grows in great abundance throughout
the lower delta. After being steeped in water it is split,
and the rind is peeled off in two layers which are woven
separately. The smooth outer strip forms the fine
upper portion of the mat, while the rougher inner rind
is plaited for the coarser lower part. When stitched
together, the finished mat, consisting thus of two layers,
mitigates the discomfort of sleeping on the ground or on
a flooring of plank or bamboo. A Thinbyu mat spread

383

BURMA UNDER BRITISH RULE

on a bed is the coolest resting place during the hot season
of the year.

The heart of the Thin rattan is used for rope-making.
But there are many excellent fibres of far better quality
suitable for this and for other textile purposes, many of
which have as yet no marketable value. All along the
coast coir or cocoa-nut husk is extensively picked and
twisted into cordage for mats and ropes, and this forms
an important industry in all the large jails. But in the
rural tracts tree-fibres are in general use, the most impor-
tant being supplied by species of Shaw {Sterculid). On
the rope- walk a simple wooden framework containing
spindles worked by a crank handle is all the machinery
that is employed for turning out well twisted, stout
cordage and ropes. The fibre-yielding shrubs and grasses
may become of considerable economic importance in the
future, but thus far the other resources of the province
have proved so abundant and remunerative that little or no
attention has yet been given to the former commercially.

Blacksmiths are to be found plying their trade all over
the country, though their number is very limited. Of the
less than 6,000 males following this occupation, the great
majority find employment in the manufacture of Da.
Apart from the shorter heavy bills {Dama), varying up to
about four pounds in weight, used by agriculturists and
wood-fellers, sword-like blades [Ddshe or " long Da,"
and '' Dalwe'' or ''Da suspended from the shoulder"),
considerably lighter, though of greater length, are made
in large numbers. These latter, as well as short daggers
{Damydung) are cased in a sheath formed of two pieces
of light wood slightly hollowed and bound together with
fine cane, or with bands of brass or silver. The finest
blades are manufactured at Pyawbwe, at the base of the
Shan hills near the eastern limit of the great central dry
zone. Some of these, beautifully damascened, are really
works of art. The blacksmith's crude bellows consist of
two sections of a large bamboo or of cylinders of wood,
up and down which loosely fitting pistons are moved to
expel the current of air from small holes at the base.
It seems almost incredible that there should be so few
blacksmiths among a population numbering y^ millions ;

384

m

WOODEN SANDALS

but, except as regards their Da^ the Burmese have very
few requirements in this respect. As a nation they
possess no mechanical abiUty. Of the 894,018 agricul-
tural implements in the country classifiable as ploughs,
probably less than a mere tithe have any iron-work about
them ; while everything in the shape of nails, except the
largest mushroom-headed spikes {Hmo) used for house-
building and other constructive purposes, are imported
from foreign countries. As the Burmese do not use
brass or copper vessels for cooking, the few brass-founders
and coppersmiths in the province are almost entirely
employed in art- work, such as founding images of Gau-
dama, making gongs and similar articles.

As a rule the people go about bare-footed when at
work, but almost every man, woman, and child has at
least one pair of sandals {Pandt)y and the number of
sandal-makers is about three-fold that of blacksmiths.
The sandals are usually made of soft, light, white wood,
Yamand (Gmelina arbor ea) being the most highly prized,
though thick dyed felt is also much used in the towns.
They are kept in place by two thongs meeting between
the big toe and extending thence, the one behind the ball
of the toe and the other round the base of the instep to
the sides. The wooden sandals are merely clogs, the
middle portion of the lower part of which is cut out,
except near the toe and the heel, so as to keep the feet out
of the mud and water on the ground. Priests and Shan
travellers most frequently wear leather sandals ; and
wayfarers as a rule walk barefoot in order to save their
sandals. On entering a house or a monastery, or when
approaching any religious shrine to make obeisance and
repeat the religious precepts, the sandals are invariably
doffed in token of respect.

In the towns the use of patent leather shoes, and also
of hose or socks, has for years past become the customary
attire of the up-to-date young Burman, and this is more
particularly the case among petty officials and clerks ;
but that is merely a very minor item among the many
changes, which are often anything but improvements,
taking place among the Burmese coming more direcdy
in contact with western civilization.

385 ^'^

BURMA UNDER BRITISH RULE

Paper being imported from India in large quantities,
though of course the finer qualities come from Europe,
the native manufacture is now confined mainly to the
preparation of Parabaik, or paper-slates used at monas-
teries, and of umbrellas. The inner fibre of soft bam-
boo shoots or the bark of the Mahlaingox paper-mulberry
{Broussonettia papyri/era) being pounded into a pulp
with water, and half its weight of lime being then added,
it is boiled with water until nothing but the pulp is left.
This is pounded and spread thinly over a coarse cotton
muslin framework, and allowed to dry in the sun. It
now forms a rough grey parchment, about a cubit in
breadth, which is folded up in alternating folds of about
nine inches wide. When coated with finely powdered
charcoal dust mixed in glutinous rice-water, it is ready
for being written upon with pencils of steatite or soap-
stone.

Umbrellas are made of the same sort of parchment-
like paper, glued to spokes of thin split bamboo, and
fastened to a stem made of the Tiyowa or " umbrella-
handle bamboo" (Thyrsostachys Siamensis). They are
usually coated with an oily waterproof varnish which
gives them, when open, a diaphanous yellow appearance ;
and such alone may be held over priests and other "re-
ligious ; " but, for umbrellas used by ordinary folks, a
coating of black varnish is often preferred as forming a
better protection against the sun. Workers in the fields
and the jungle frequently wear shield- like coverings
i^Kadii) for the head and shoulders, made of leaves and
cane, or else large conical Shan hats (Gamauk) with
broad convex rims, about a couple of feet in diameter.
Made of bam.boo node-sheaths stitched together with
cane, these are very light. Completely waterproof, they
act both as sunshade and umbrella. The Burman does
not mind getting wet so long as his hair is kept dry, but
he feels sure he will be attacked with jungle fever if he
allows that to get damp ; for his coarse black locks, long
as a woman's, are not easily dried.

Most of the paper umbrellas in use in the more popu-
lous parts near the sea-board are of Chinese manufacture,
imported from Singapore, yet the umbrella-making in-

386

BURMESE CHEROOTS

dustry Is still largely followed up country, and particu-
larly around Mandalay. The tide of fashion has here
also begun so to modify and alter past custom that cheap
umbrellas of European make are gradually ousting the
still cheaper indigenous article. But the young Burmese
woman of a few years ago, with her wavy-lined Tamein
and a paper umbrella, had a more attractive and artistic
picturesqueness than her present successor, wearing a
dull maroon skirt and carrying a black umbrella, or a
red or green parasol.

No short account of the minor rural industries can
be considered complete without reference to cheroot-
making. Every Burmese female can roll a cheroot, and
all throughout the province cheroot-making Is followed
either as a profession or else to eke out other means of
livelihood.

Though tobacco of good quality Is grown on alluvial
deposits in the bends of streams, and though cultivation
is capable of extension far beyond the 71,015 acres now
under this crop, yet most of the tobacco consumed is
imported from Madras. Before use it is damped and
softened with cocoa-nut water, which mellows the other-
wise highly saltpetrous leaf.

The cheroot {Sdeik, " rolled tobacco ") made entirely
of tobacco is, however, an Innovation of comparatively
recent date. The real Burmese cheroot consists mostly
of other Ingredients. It is a mixture of finely chopped
wood, — the dry, dead wood of the Okhne tree (Strebltis
asper) being preferred wherever available, — ^jaggery,
chopped tobacco, and other herbs, rolled up in a casing
of leaves or of the thin, soft inner skin of the sheaths
growing round the nodes of large bamboos. Some
of these cheroots are eight to nine Inches In length
and four t6 six Inches In circumference at the thick
end. They have a harsh, dry, pungent flavour, a liking
for which can only be an acquired taste. But the
Burmese are Initiated to it at the earliest possible age,
and it is not altogether an uncommon sight to see suck-
lings being given a smoke Immediately after having been
fed at the breast. Altogether, however, the Burmese
infant receives peculiar treatment. Kept at his mother's

387

BURMA UNDER BRITISH RULE
breast so long as she is able to nurse it, or till its place
is usurped by a later arrival, the child is not infrequently
passed from breast to breast round a circle of matrons
when chatting of an evening, just as the cheroot is
passed on from mouth to mouth for a whiff to assist the
flow of conversation.

When a half-smoked cheroot is not required for im-
mediate further use, the lighted portion is quenched, and
the stump stuck like an ear-ring in the loose pierced lobe
of the ear, if the Burman should not happen to be wear-
ing a jacket containing a pocket ; and when at work he
is seldom encumbered in this latter way.

Even the primitive Burmese cheroot of chopped
wood and tobacco is probably doomed soon to become
a thing of the past. The consumption of cheroots of
pure tobacco has been gradually extending during the
last twenty years ; and now at all the large towns
throughout the whole length of the land, from Rangoon
to Bhamo, small cigarettes, onomatopoeiacally called
SdgaU, are being made with shag and tissue paper and
sold in the Bazaars and at the corners of the streets.

Tobacco was originally introduced and regarded purely
as medicine, as its name {Sd) indicates. But other nar-
cotics are also euphemiously covered by the same term.
Thus, while the smoking of tobacco is "drinking medi-
cine," *' inhaling " and " eating medicine " are polite
terms for smoking and eating opium, — opium (Bein :
Senet) being called " black medicine," and ganja or
Indian hemp (Bin: Sdchatik) being spoken of as "dry
medicine." Fortunately, however, the preparation and
sale of these drugs cannot as yet be numbered among
the rural industries followed by the Burmese, though
their neighbours on the north-east, the Shans and the
Yunnanese, grow the white opium largely as a field-crop
and are habituated to the use of the drug. Nor can the
preparation and vend of fermented or distilled liquors be
classed in such a category ; for the whole of the traffic
in such stimulants is in the hands of Chinamen and
natives of India, although the Chins and some other hill-
tribes brew a sort of rice-beer {Kaung), which is largely
consumed at their tribal festivals.

388

Chapter XIII

MINERAL RESOURCES

BURMA is rich in minerals of various kinds, though
the two which usually form the surest foundations
of national prosperity, coal and iron, have as yet nowhere
been found in large workable quantities or of superior
quality. Down both sides of the Pegu Yoma range
of hills, extending northwards from near Rangoon for
more than two hundred miles, and skirting the Paung-
laung hills to the east of the Sittang river, there run
broad belts of ferrugineous laterite which have in past
times been worked for iron. These abandoned workings
can still be seen in the forests, and in some cases — as at
Thanseik, " the place for shipping iron," about twelve
miles north of Shwegyin on the Sittang river — the
names of villages sometimes seem to imply that there
was formerly a regular trade in iron from them. But
imports of iron are so cheap, and the requirements are
.altogether so slight with regard to this commodity, that
l\the iron ores which have been found in various parts of
the province have never proved of economic impor-
tance. Nor have the Burmese apparently ever acquired
the art of transmuting iron into steel.

Coal is found in the Thayetmyo, Upper Chindwin, and
Shwebo districts, and in the Shan States, as one of the
Eocene or early Tertiary rocks forming the Nummulitic
group, whose chief economic products are petroleum,
limestone, coal, and brine. It also occurs in Mergui in
the Tenasserim group of rocks of doubtful age, though
probably belonging to the Tertiary period. The fuel
of the country has always been wood, coal never yet
having been utilized for any purpose by the Burmese
themselves. King Mindon apparently gave some pass-

389

BURMA UNDER BRITISH RULE

ing attention to possibilities with this product, for in
1886 a Shan chief and a village headman assured Sir
Charles Bernard, the Chief Commissioner, that they had
seen large specimens of coal taken from a pit on the
Panlaung river (Sittang) and carried to Mandalay. ^

As yet no great trade has sprung up in coal-mining,
though efforts have from time to time been made on a
small scale. The best coal-tracts are probably to be
found amid the limestone hills of the Shan country, and
will be brought to light when the tracts are traversed
by the railway lines now under project and in course of
construction. During the past t .velve or thirteen years the
coal-mining work carried on has not yielded very satis-
factory results, nor has it in any perceptible degree freed
the province from its dependence on sea-borne coal, im-
ported in 1 899- 1 900 to the extent of 33,998 tons, valued

at;^35.9i4-

In 1886 negotiations, begun three years earlier, were
entered into with a Calcutta company for a coal-mining
lease for thirty years in the Thayetmyo district, the
company covenanting to pay a nominal rent on the land
actually worked and a royalty of two annas or twopence
on every ton of coal extracted after ist January, 1895.
After very feeble attempts work was abandoned in 1888.
Though renewed in 1894, negotiations in a similar direc-
tion led to no results.

A more energetic attempt was made at the Lingadaw
or Kabwet coal-fields in the Shwebo district, which were
leased to a local syndicate in 1891. Work was begun
about four miles to the east of the Irrawaddy, with
which connexion was opened by a tramway, and the
[Burma Coal Company was formed in 1893 to develop
the fields. The coal was used on the Burma State
Railway, and on the steamers of the Irrawaddy Flotilla
Company and of Government, The output reached
23,000 tons in 1896, but was reduced to the half of that
in 1897 owing to work being interfered with by flooding.)
Declining still further, the outturn was only 6,975 ^^^^
in 1898, and 8,105 in 1899. The coal is of fair quality,
and the fields have an advantageous position with
regard to rail and river. The average selling price is

390

COAL DEPOSITS

ten rupees (135. 4^.) a ton. The young industry is
hampered, however, by want of capital.

Most of the coal-fields discovered as yet have some
drawback or other to their profitable working. In the
Chindwin district, the Kal6 fields, on the Myittha river,
yield an excessively friable coal ; while those on the
Nantabin and Paletwa drainage have the seams embed-
ded in soft clay, and are therefore difficult to work.
What is obtained from the Panlaung river, east of
Yamethin, at the foot of the Shan hills, yields a dull
flame, making it unsuitable for furnaces. In the
Lashio and Namma valleys, in the Shan State of North
Theinni, now approached by the Mandalay-Kunlon rail-
way, seams have been found up to thirty feet in thick-
ness ; but unfortunately the deposits resemble lignite
rather than true coal, being very light and liable to
crack when dry, so that they cannot be considered of
the first quality. In the Laikha State lignite deposits
have also been found.

So far as mere reports of officers of the Geological
Survey are concerned, the Tenasserim valley in the
Mergui district appears to be one of the richest locali-
ties in coal deposits. Examined in 1892-93, coal was
found of two distinct ages, belonging to the upper
Carboniferous and the Tertiary systems. The former,
though the more widely distributed, is economically
worthless ; but the Tertiary coal, found at two places
(Kyamithwe and Kamapyin) on the western bank of
the river, is said to be of very superior quality, and is
estimated to be capable of yielding close on a million
tons. There is no market for coal in that immediate
vicinity, however, and the labour difficulty would be so
great that coal from Bengal could probably be laid down
in Rangoon or Moulmein cheaper than the produce of
mines up the Tenasserim river.

More recently still a perhaps more important discovery
of coal of good quality has been reported from Lawksawk
in the Yatsauk territory of the Southern Shan States, a
tract drained by the Zawgyi river and within compara-
tively easy reach of the Rangoon and Mandalay rail-
way line. The coal is said to lie near the surface, and

391

BURMA UNDER BRITISH RULE

to extend over a large area. As Lawksawk consists
mainly of a table-land varying from 2,500 to 3,000 feet
above sea-level, the climate is said to be exceptionally
good for this part of the world, the heat, even in the
hottest season, not being excessive for Europeans.

Petroleum occurs in various parts of the province, the
Arakan oil being clear and limpid, while the Upper
Burma product is dark, thick and viscous. The Kyauk-
pyu oil-fields of Arakan were the first to be worked
directly by European agency. About 1878 the Boronga
Oil Company obtained concessions in the Kyaukpyu
district, and commenced operations on a large scale in
the low hills a few miles from that small coasting port.
Experts were brought over from Canada, and the work
of boring into the rock was pushed on in the face of
many discouragements. In a climate notoriously malari-
ous for more than the half of each year, the Canadian
miners, during intervals between attacks of fever, pushed
downwards with the deep borings through rock. In
June, 1880, when I visited these oil-fields, they were
working with tamping-rods at a depth of nearly 800
feet without having struck an oil- flow, while natives
working with rude appliances in comparatively shallow
pits near at hand were having an output up to twenty
barrels a day. Despite patient, persevering efforts, and
the outlay of a very considerable amount of capital, the
Company had to go into liquidation in 1885. Since
then operations in Kyaukpyu and Akyab have been
carried on merely by local agency and with varying
success. The largest yield was in 1892, when 308,091
gallons were obtained ; in 1899 it was 167,227 gallons.

Sometimes eruptions of petroleum, accompanied by
spontaneous combustion, take place in the sea off the
Arakan coast. Of one such I was an eye-witness early
in April, 1882, whilst being rowed out from Sandoway
to the mail steamer moored in the offing. Far north
on the horizon, in the direction of the island of Cheduba,
a vast pillar of fire burst suddenly from the sea, shooting
up for an immense height and ending in great volumes
of dense smoke. This phenomenon continued for about
four to five minutes before the column of fire subsided.

392

THE PETROLEUM FIELDS

The Upper Burma oil-fields, scattered over the Magwe,
Minbu, Pakokku, and Mylngyan districts, which form
the south-western portion of the central dry zone, are
partly the property of hereditary well-owners {Tiuinza or
"well eaters"), and partly the property of the State.
Earth-oil royalties formed one of the seven main heads
of revenue in the time of the Burmese Government,
the trade in this product being in the hands of a
Rangoon firm, which bought the oil from private well-
owners and worked the royal wells by direct agency,
paying a royalty of eight annas (8^:'.) per 365 lb. in the
former case, and of one rupee twelve annas (2s. \d.) in
the latter. This contract lapsed in 1891, but was
renewed for another twenty years to the Burma Oil
Company on payment of a fixed royalty of eightpence
per 365 lbs. (100 viss).

The most important of the Upper Burma oil-fields are
those near Yenangyaung (*' where earth-oil flows "), and
Yenangyat {** earth-oil barren "), situated along the left
bank of the Irrawaddy in the Magwe district. Estimated
to extend over about eighty square miles in all, this oil-
tract forms a fairly level plateau, ranging from 260 to
300 feet above the low- water level of the Irrawaddy,
but much intersected by deep, narrow ravines. The
strata consist for the most part of laminated and clayey
sands, while pebbly beds occasionally occur along with
layers of sand or gravel cemented into rather a hard bed
of conglomerate. The Yenangyaung fields yielded
22,111,514 gallons in 1899, and the Yenangyat
10,030,790 gallons, while the whole output for Burma
was 32,309,531 gallons, yielding a revenue of ^27,179.

Within the tracts leased to the Burma Oil, Minbu
Oil, and Burma Petroleum- Producing Companies in the
Magwe, Pakokku, and Minbu districts, the rights of
native workers owning wells in the vicinity of State
wells have been duly secured by the publication of rules
defining the areas within which the native workers may
work, and the rights which they possess. The richness
of some of the tracts is shown by the fact that experi-
ments made in 1893 at Yenangyaung showed that new
wells can be sunk at a distance of sixty feet from exist-

393

BURMA UNDER BRITISH RULE

ing wells without reducing the output of oil from the
latter.

Large oil-producing tracts are still available for leasing,
and the fixation of the rate of exchange at i^. ^d. per
rupee has now placed this industry in a much more
hopeful position than formerly. But speculative it must
always remain to a certain extent, as the sinking of a
deep shaft does not invariably result in a flow of oil.
A boring sunk to a depth of 700 feet in the Minbu field
by the Burma Oil Company in 1896 failed to strike the
oil known to exist there. Further borings made by the
Minbu Oil Company to a much greater depth proved
equally unsuccessful, and the field was abandoned in 1899.

About a couple of miles from the town of Minbu are
the well known curious mud volcanoes or "dragons'
scratching pits " i^Nagagyit Dwm). From about fifteen
to twenty feet in height, they continue in a ceaseless
state of mild activity, throwing up small quantities of
hot liquid mud with gaseous exhalations which can be
ignited. The whole country round about there exhibits
indications of oil-producing strata in the rocks below the
surface.

■ The Burmese method of working the oil-wells is very
primitive, and has undergone little or no change for
generations past. A shaft of about four feet square is
sunk at what is considered a likely spot, though the
upper soil gives no practical indication of what may be
expected deep down below the surface. Propped with
posts of cutch [Acacia Caiechti), which yields excellent
timber though of rather small dimensions in the dry
zone, the shaft is sunk till the oil-bearing stratum is
tapped or boring has to be abandoned. Above each
well and supported by two side posts is a crossbeam,
having a central wheel over which a rope passes attached
to an earthenware pot that is let down to fill itself with
oil. When first brought up, the petroleum is a thin,
watery fluid, but it soon thickens and becomes viscous.
It is of a dirty-brown colour, with a somewhat greenish
tinge, and has a pungent odour, as is pointedly indicated
in its Burmese name, Vendn or "foetid water." The
majority of native wells vary from about 200 to 250 feet,

394

TIN MINING

and the deepest are only slightly in excess of 300 feet ;
but the output is largest from deeper wells worked by
European agency. The oil-bearing stratum itself is
known to be about 200 feet in thickness at Yenangyaung,
although it may perhaps be considerably thicker.

The bulk of the outturn from the petroleum wells of
Burma finds its way to the refining works of the Burma
Oil Company in Rangoon, where it is prepared for the
market. Rich in paraffin wax, Burmese petroleum is of
great technical value as a lubricator. / Most of it is con-
sumed in India, as the foreign exports in wax and oil only
amounted to ^114,159 in 1899, and that was a large
advance on previous exports. As a luminant it cannot
compete in purity with Kerosine, of which 4,740,657
gallons, mostly from America, valued at ^167,052
were imported into Burma in the two years 1898- 1900.

Tin, found in the granite of the Tavoy and Mergui
districts, has lotvg been worked. Over three hundred
years ago it is said to have been exported largely to
India.; Operations in more recent times have been
carried on with varying results, though on the whole
with comparatively little success. The mine-workers
are mostly Chinese. Owing to want of an adequate
water supply during the dry season, work is chiefly con-
fined to the unhealthy rainy months ; and this, added to
want of capital and inability to control the truculent and
quarrelsome labourers efficiently, has hitherto proved an
insurmountable difficulty to anything like real progress in
the industry. The Maliwun mines near the southern
extremity of Tenasserim were leased to a Rangoon firm
for fifteen years from 1873 ; but after three years the
lease was resigned, the physical difficulties of the
country, the malarious nature of its climate, and the
absence of communication with the civilized world for
weeks at a time during the busiest season of the year all
proving serious drawbacks to successful enterprise. In
1892 a lease was granted for five years, with provision
for extension for other twenty-one years, a royalty of five
per cent, being paid on the value of tin exported. This
advantage was not claimed, however, and mining had
again to be carried on merely on a small scale by native

395

BURMA UNDER BRITISH RULE

workers. A lease of 400 acres has recently been given
to a European firm which proposes to introduce hydraulic
appliances. The industry is of no great commercial
value, however, the largest output having been 1,339 cwt.
in 1897, valued at about ;^4.345- As tin is also worked
in Karenni, north-east of Toungoo, from ore similar to
that obtained in Mergui, it seems not improbable that
the stanniferous belts of granite may be found occurring
all throughout the hills between the Salween and Sittang
rivers : and if this can be proved, the fact may perhaps
become of considerable commercial importance.

Silver and lead have been v/orked from time imme-
morial, as there was no coinage in Burma until after the
annexation of the coast tracts of Arakan and Tennaserim
(A by the British in 1826. Till the reign of King Mindon
'^ ( (185 2-1 878) the kingdom of Ava had no coinage, pay-
ments being made in bullion of gold, silver, and lead.
Even within the last twenty years payment was made
almost everywhere north of the capital i,n ingots and
bullion of recognized standards of quality.) The whole
of the trade at Bhamo with Shan an<l Yunnanese
caravans was adjusted by such means, in addition to
direct barter of goods. Mindon endeavoured to introduce
both a silver and a gold coinage, modelled on the rupee
and the sovereign respectively ; but the attempt was on
the whole a failure, as there was no security for the
quality of the metal, and as this currency was not made
legal tender. Hence the bulk of commercial transactions
were regulated by the weighing and assaying of silver. .
Silver was practically the standard, gold being con- "^
. sidered about seventeen times as valuable, while lead had )
I only about one-five-hundredth part the value of silver^
Payments to the royal treasury took place in "flowered
silver" (Gnw^bwin), the purest description of silver
bullion containing only from two to five per cent, of
alloy. This derived its name from the flower-like
crystallization setting in on its surface when cooling after
being poured out of a crucible. There were various
recognized degrees of impurity, varying up to about
twenty-five per cent, of alloy. The weighing and the
assaying of gold and silver were in the hands of Pweza

396

SILVER AND LEAD

or " brokers," and each assay reduced through fees and
wastage the capital value by two and a half per cent.
Hence forty mercantile transactions sufficed to dissipate
any given capital under this crude substitute for a minted
coinage.

In many parts of the Shan States, and in Karenni,
this primitive system still obtains, and interesting speci-
mens of the " flowered silver " used in place of coinage
are often procurable in the bazaars. In bargaining, silver
to about the amount required is poured out from a
crucible on to a flat stone, and during the process of
haggling perhaps a few drops more are added after the
quantity originally poured out has cooled, these drops
remaining as round blobs or excrescences. In the next
transaction a piece may perhaps have to be cut off, if a
smaller payment has to be made. The red Karen and
Shan who used to come in from their forest wiids to
Toungoo bazaar about ten years ago, generally brought
well-wrought bowls of silver, which they exchanged
against their weight of British rupee coins in order to
enable themselves to make their purchases in a market
where barter was no longer the method of trade.

Galena, rich in silver, is obtainable in various parts of
the Paunglaung range of hills immediately to the east of
the Sittang river, but the chief lead and silver mines
worked of recent years are those at Bawzaing in one of
the Southern Shan States. After the annexation of
Upper Burma this industry dwindled, as the miners could
find no market for the lead in consequence of the prohi-
bition of its import into the plains of Burmah whilst the
work of pacification was in course of progress. Since
1890 this restriction has been removed, and the mines are
worked to a small extent by a Chinese lessee, who pays
a royalty of three rupees (four shillings) per 365 lb.
(100 viss).

There are many localities throughout the province
which are capable of yielding gold, yet the great bulk of
this metal used in Burma for making jewellery, gilding
pagodas and sacred shrines, and for other purposes,
comes from China in the shape of leaf-gold. This is
bought in the bazaars at ever- varying current rates, and

397

BURMA UNDER BRITISH RULE
is melted down to form heavy solid articles like bangles,
necklaces, and ear cylinders.

Gold is washed down in small particles by many of
the streams, and in several places the sifting of gold
dust from the sands forms an industry on a small scale,
yielding rather a meagre and precarious livelihood. The
washings are generally carried on in the beds of hill
streams, the alluvial gold-bearing deposit being panned
out in the crudest manner possible in shallow round
wooden trays.

All over the country local names are met with which
indicate at any rate past operi:.tions with regard to gold
washing. Shwegyin, a large town on the eastern bank
of the Sittang, receives its name from the "gold sifting"
still carried on in the bed of the Shwegyin river. In
various parts of the country are to be found hills called
Shwedaung or " hill of gold," and inquiries will invariably
elicit reliable information that gold was formerly worked
there either by merely washing the dirt from alluvial
deposits or else by sifting earth dug out of shallow pits
and trenches. Thus, at the Shwedaung near Tavoy, gold
deposits were found by a Ceylon planter who settled
there some years ago. Neglecting his plantation for the
gold which he had not capital enough to work, he died in
poor circumstances in 1897, rendered miserable by the
knowledge of gold being within his reach while he was
without the means of actually obtaining it. Searching for
the matrix of gold-bearing quartz and digging into the
solid rock appear to have been methods quite beyond
the Burmese, whose acquaintance with minerals is alto-
gether extremely scanty, even as compared with the
knowledge of metallurgy obtaining among their near
neighbours, the Shan.

It is by no means improbable that, as regards the
precious metals, the greatest mineral wealth in Burma
will be found in the Paunglaung range of hills forming the
eastern watershed of the Sittang river, and spreading
thence northwards and eastwards across the Shan hills.
Tin, copper, and gold have been found at various local-
ities throughout the range. I have myself found gold-
bearing quartz, in outward appearance and structure

398

THE WUNTHO GOLD-FIELDS

closely resembling the matrix of the Mysore gold-fields,
in a locality within easy reach of the Rangoon and
Mandalay railway line, and with abundant supplies of
water close at hand for all possible requirements.

In the Shan hills gold deposits are also known, and
fields of great magnitude and richness (o7mte ignotum pro
magnified) are said to occur further to the north-east, in
the wild Wa country, which will be brought within some-
what easier reach when once the railway line has been
opened from Mandalay to Lashio, on the way to the
Kunlon ferry on the Salween river.

The only place where gold-mining is as yet being
carried on in any practical business-like manner is at the
gold-fields in a portion of the Katha district, which
formerly formed the Wuntho Shan State, lying to the
west of the Irrawaddy river. Since December, 1895, the
quarrying and crushing of gold-bearing quartz has been
in progress at the Kyaukpazat Mine, situated about
twelve miles from the Nankan station on the Mandalay
and Myitkyina line of railway. Abundance of wood
and water being procurable, operations were begun with
the erection of a ten-stamp mill worked by a portable
engine of sixteen nominal horse-power. The yield has
hitherto been small, only 1,196 ounces being obtained in
1899 ; but this yield will now be increased by the intro-
duction of the cyanide process, in 1900, for dealing with
the tailings. The outturn could, however, be very
largely increased if the capital of the small company
were sufficient to enable operations to be conducted on a
much more extensive scale.

The Wuntho gold-fields extend over a considerable
area, the different tracts having specific names derived
from neighbouring streams or villages. After visiting
the Kyaukpazat Mines in 1898, I also examined portions
of the Panzit and Legyin tracts further to the north.
Here also gold-bearing quartz is undoubtedly obtainable.
** There's gold there, lots o' gold," said one of the pros-
pecting licensees — a working miner and philosopher, more
richly endowed with experience in toiling for the gain of
others than with lucre and worldly possessions of his
own — after he had shown me over the spots where he

399

BURMA UNDER BRITISH RULE

had struck the ore within the area of which he wished to
acquire the lease, " but to work it properly needs at
least two lacs of rupees (£13,333); ^^d if I had two
lacs of rupees, I shouldn't be here looking for gold in
Burma."

This is a very correct indication of one of the two main
reasons why gold is not already worked to a large extent
in Burma. Beyond doubt there are many parts of the
province rich in gold ; but it nowhere exists in large
pockets and nuggets, in a form which permits of wealth
being literally picked up. It will have to be quarried in
subterranean mines, and crushed and won at considerable
expense. Capital is requisite, and the industry may be
safely expected to yield a fair interest for concerns of this
nature, say about ten to twelve per cent.; but there is little
likelihood of shares in any such concern rushing up to
enormous value in consequence of immense harvests of
gold easily and inexpensively won from the rocks.

Without being undertaken in a solid, business-like
manner supported by a sufficiency of capital, gold-mining
is never likely to make much progress in Burma ; but
otherwise it should soon be able to establish itself on a
sound footing as a profitable business resting on a much
safer basis than most mining enterprises. Hitherto,
however, most of the mining leases taken out in Burma
have been applied for by speculators who never had any
intention of working them except by floating companies
for drawing other peoples' money into their own pockets.
During 1899- 1900 several exploring and prospecting
licenses were issued, and four syndicates, each formed
with a capital of ;^5,ooo, began prospecting operations.
The gold is there ; of that there can be no doubt.

Another cause tending to operate very forcibly against
the establishment of gold- mining on a proper basis in
Burma has been the limitations of the mining rules.
Under the mining rules obtaining in 1898 no lease could
be given for more than 160 acres, or one quarter of a
square mile. The practical effect of this is that, for
example, in the Panzit and Legyin tracts, it would be
impossible to find a sufficiency of water for crushing and
other requirements on the leased area or within reason-

400

PROSPECTS OF GOLD MINING

able distance of it. Both at Panzit and at Legyin,
although convinced that the rocks were auriferous, I was
equally convinced that gold-mining could not be profit-
ably carried on as an industry on a large scale unless the
1 60 acre restriction were cast aside, and one lease given
for each area. If this were done, then crushing works
could be located on large main streams having an ample
perennial supply of water, and the ore could be brought
by tramways from the various mine-shafts to the crushing
mills. It is only thus that Government can reasonably
expect capital to be attracted towards and invested in
gold-mining in Burma ; and it is only thus that such
investments can be made to yield a fair dividend of about
ten or twelve per cent.

With more liberal rules, however, there are various
auriferous localities in the Pegu, Toungoo, and Katha
districts, within easy access of existing railway lines,
which could yield remunerative returns in gold if reason-
able inducements were offered to attract capital for the
introduction of this industry on a considerable scale.
The new Mining Rules of May, 1899, revised the royalties
on gold and silver, and reduced them to y^ per cent. ; but
it is equally important that they should authorize the
Government of Burma to deal more promptly and liberally
than hitherto with syndicates having bona fide intention of
investing capital in mining enterprises, because this must
be the first essential step towards making mining opera-
tions possible under conditions favourable for utilizing
the great mineral wealth known to exist in Burma.

Jade-stone, which formed another of the many mono-
polies of the Burmese Government, and was retained as
such by the British, is found in large quantity about the
headwaters of the Chindwin and the Mogaung tributaries
of the Irrawaddy between the twenty- fifth and twenty-
sixth parallels of latitude. The mine-workers are wild
Kachin tribesmen, while the dealers in and users of jade
are Chinese merchants ; and the exports, averaging some
4,000 cwt. a year, valued at nearly ;^50,c>oo, are almost
all shipped to Singapore, for distribution thence to
Chinese and Japanese ports. Very small pieces of jade
of the purest colour and best quality sometimes fetch

401 D D

BURMA UNDER BRITISH RULE

fancy prices, while great blocks of inferior quality have
little or no value in the connoisseurs' eyes.

The most celebrated of all jade deposits is a large cliff
called the Nantelung or " difficult of access," overhanging
a tributary of the Chindwin river at a place distant about
nine days' journey from where the latter receives the
waters of the Uru from the north-east. But the guardian
spirits there have been ill-disposed for nearly a genera-
tion back, in consequence of which work has long
remained in abeyance. The most productive mines at
present are those in the country of the Merip Kachin
tribe, where some of the largest quarries run up to about
fifty yards in length, by forty in breadth, and twenty in
depth. Quarrying operations are confined to the dry
season, being undertaken from November till May.
Even then the best quarries are generally flooded, which
greatly increases the labour of working out the stone.
During February and March, when the floor of the
quarry or pit can be kept dry for a few hours by means
of hard baling, large fires are lighted with wood at the
base of the stone. Despite the tremendous heat evolved,
a careful watch is kept to detect the first signs of splitting
in the rock. As soon as these become noticeable, the
Kachins attack the stone with pickaxes and hammers or
insert levers in the cracks and thus detach portions of the
rock. Mortality is high among the jade-workers, as the
heat is almost insupportable and the labour severe ; but
the Kachin are jealous of their sole right to quarry the
stone. Burmese and Shan brokers arrange prices for the
quarried stone between the Kachin miners and the
Chinese traders, all payments being made in coined
silver. From the quarries the blocks of stone are carried
by coolies to Nanyaseik, whence it is transported by
water in dug-out canoes to Mogaung, on the railway line
leading southwards to Mandalay and Rangoon.

When the British began administering this part of
Upper Burma, the Burmese system of annually farming
the right of collecting duty on jade was continued, the
sale realizing ;^3,333 for 1887-88. The local chief of the
jade-producing tract levied 3^. ^d. on every load of jade
leaving his territory, and also received from the miners

402

JADE MINING

ten per cent, of the sums they obtained from the jade-
purchasers. The headman at Nanyaseik levied 15. ^d.
on each load, and the farmer of the right of collection for
the year claimed an ad valorem duty of 33^ per cent.
In 1893 this system was slightly altered by extending
the period of farming the collection of duty from one to
three years, for the business was found to be of so
speculative a character that even Chinamen, addicted as
they are to all forms of gambling, hesitated to pay a long
price for holding the pool merely for one year. The
revenue had consequently sunk to only ^^2,400 a year,
but at once rose to ^3,474 on a three years' lease being
sold by auction.

The blocks of jade are mostly taken to Mandalay to
be sawn up. There has always been a good deal of
smuggling of stone, to evade payment of the heavy
royalty to the farmer of the duty. To try and check
this, a subordinate officer on the temporary establishment
of the Forest Department was stationed on the railway line
between Mogaung and Mandalay during 1898 — for jade-
stone is classed as "minor forest produce," though the
revenue obtained from it is credited to " land revenue."
The salary of this temporary Forest Ranger was disbursed
from money lodged by the farmer of the jade revenue ;
but, as the Forest Regulation and Rules permit no power of
search extending to goods, luggage, or persons in transit,
it is difficult to see what useful purpose he could serve.
The jade-farmer himself desired this, however, after
extensive smuggling had been discovered in 1897.
Moreover, he particularly requested that the post should
be filled by a Baungbe Wut or " trouser- wearing man "
and not given to any mere Burmese, Shan, or Chinaman,
who, though infinitely better fitted for detective purposes,
would not fill the hearts of the smugglers with awe and
dread, or show so clearly that the revenue-farmer was
determined to put an end to such malpractices.

The way in which the large blocks of jade are mani-
pulated may be seen any time one drives along China
Street, the long road leading from the southwest corner
of the walls of Mandalay city southwards to the Arakan
pagoda. They are sawn through by hand with piano-

403

BURMA UNDER BRITISH RULE

wire, strung tightly across a bent piece of wood, under
the action of water constantly dropping from a vessel
hung above the block. To assist the process fine sand
is strewn on the stone where the wire-saw works. The
exterior of the blocks is oxidized to a greyish-brown
colour, but the ooze trickling down on both sides of the
stone as the saw passes backwards and forwards is of
the green colour that one would expect from jade. The
exterior of the block seems to give absolutely no indica-
tion of the quality of the jade lying at its core, and in so
far the traffic in rough blocks is about as complete a mer-
cantile example of buying a pig in a poke as can be
imagined.

The Ruby Mines and their produce also formed another
of the monopolies of the Burmese King, which was like-
wise retained for the State under British administration.
Rubies and spinels are found in several parts of northern
Burma, as near the jade mines above Nanyaseik in the
Myitkyina district, and at Sagyin, about twelve miles
north of Mandalay. But the country around Mogok, the
headquarters of the Ruby Mines district, is by far the
richest ruby-producing area that has yet been discovered.
As the inhabitants of this tract were said to possess cer-
tain undefined rights of working the mines, subject to
their selling all the outturn to Government or to farmers
of the royal monopoly, one of the first duties of the civil
officer on the occupation of the district at the end of 1886
was to verify what the rights or privileges of the people
actually were, and to ascertain in how far these could be
supported by acknowledged custom or by actual con-
cessions from past rulers of Ava. All rubies above a
certain weight were claimed as royal perquisites, and this
led to the secretion or breaking up of the largest and
most valuable stones. The Ruby Regulation was passed
during 1887, and rules were framed under it for the
control of mining for rubies and precious stones generally,
and for fixing and realizing the revenues obtainable from
such sources.

The great Ruby Mines, forming the Mogok, Kyatpyin,
and Kathe circles of the Ruby Mines district, are situated
at an elevation of about four to six thousand feet on the

404

RUBY MINING

southern face of a spur trending westwards from the
rnain watershed between the Irrawaddy and the Sal ween
rivers, and forming the drainage between the ShweH on
the north and the Myitng^ on the south, both tributary
to the Irrawaddy. At the time of the British occupation
the ruby-producing tracts were found to be inhabited by
a motley crew of Burmese, Shan, and Chinese, together
with local hill tribesmen of Chinese extraction called
Palaung and Lishaw. Whilst the measures to be adopted
for the future working of this tract were under considera-
tion, they were allowed to mine for rubies by their own
customary methods on payment of small fees for licenses.
Operations were primitive, resolving themselves into
three different methods. A Hmydw Dwin or " cutting
made by the flow of water " might be formed on a spot
chosen on any hill-side, a stream of water being led over
it and a gully formed in which the ruby-bearing soil
(Byon) that collected was carefully turned over and
searched. Or miners would go down a Lu Dwin or
" man pit " formed by a natural fissure or a small cave in
the hills, and dig out the soil at the bottom of this, a
method confined solely to the dry season of the year.
Otherwise Twinlon or " dug pits " were sunk to a depth
varying from about twenty to thirty feet, so as to tap
the stratum of Byon or ruby gravel in the low-lying
alluvial deposits where this is found.

The mining is purely a matter of chance. Whoever
turns over and carefully examines the largest amount of
Byon or ruby matrix has the best chance of reaping a
harvest of rubies and spinels, though chiefly the latter.
The whole of the small plain of Mogok is dotted over
with the Twinlon of the native miners, while the hill-sides
are scored and marked by the water-channels of the
Hmydw Dwin. In some cases water for these latter is
brought from a considerable distance, and at a small
village called Kyaukpyatthat, near the extreme west of
the ruby-producing tract, a piece of very interesting rough
Burmese engineering may be seen in the construction,
with bamboos alone, of a primitive aqueduct conveying
water from one hillside to another across a miniature
valley between the two slopes. The intervening space

405

BURMA UNDER BRITISH RULE

from the water-trench on the northern hill to that on the
southern is bridged over with a trestle-work of big bam-
boos lashed together to form a series of scaffold- like
supports upon which bamboos, with the solid internal
divisions at the nodes perforated, are laid as water-
pipes, the thin end of each being fitted into the thick end
of the next bamboo. There is a good deal of leakage,
but the water is conducted across in sufficient quantity
to serve the purpose required, so that the object in view
is attained. Speaking merely from recollection, this
rough bamboo aqueduct must be about a couple of hun-
dred feet in length, and from forty to fifty feet high
where the gully below was deepest.

Towards the close of 1 899 arrangements for working
the Ruby Mines were completed by Government, a con-
cession being granted for seven years at an annual rental
of four lacs of rupees (;^26,666) to five licensees, who
floated the Burma Ruby Mines, Limited, on the London
market. The concession was in the form of a lease
granting the right to mine rubies by European methods
and to levy royalties from native miners working by
indigenous methods. It was some considerable time
before work could be advanced beyond the preliminary
stages, much time and labour being spent in the first
year in bringing up machinery to the mines. From
Thabeitkyin, on the Irrawaddy, to Mogok, a distance of
sixty miles, the road passes for the most part through
heavy jungle, pestilential with malaria from the time the
first showers of rain fall in May until the soil dries up
towards the close of the year. The road is not yet com-
pletely metalled, but up to the end of 1S97-98, only two-
thirds of it had been metalled, and cart traffic had to be
suspended from May till October. During these months
drafts to or from Bernardmyo — a small military station
ten miles to the north of Mogok, where the left wing of
a European regiment is stationed for the protection of the
Mogok and the Ruby Mines district generally — are not
allowed to proceed up or down the road on account of
its unhealthiness and of difficulties connected with trans-
port. There is no danger to the Europeans in Mogok
from having the troops at some distance, for the Govern-

406

THE RUBY MINES

ment officers and the Company's European employe's
form a volunteer company having a strength of over
forty and well able to defend themselves temporarily in
case of necessity. In the early days of 1889-90, when
the Ruby Mines Company began their operations, these
drawbacks and difficulties of communication were much
greater than they still are ; for the district was unsettled
by bands of dacoits, headed by Paw Kwe, a late official
of the Burmese Government and a man of great local
influence. Even when these organized gangs were
broken up, dacoities and robberies on the road were still
unduly frequent. And at Mogok and Kyatpyin, the
centres of the industry, the initial operations of the
Company not unnaturally excited the apprehensions
and the ill-will of the native miners who had hitherto
held a practical monopoly of the working of the
mines.

During the first year of their lease the Company ex-
perienced considerable friction with the native miners ;
but, about the end of 1890, better relations were estab-
lished through an arrangement being come to by which
the latter were freed from most of the restrictions on the
traffic in rubies, in return for fixed monthly payments to
be made by them to the Company. A license system
was then introduced under which, subject to certain re-
strictions, the licensed miners could dispose of rubies
and spinels to whom they pleased in return for monthly
license fees paid to the Company as Government lessee
of the whole mining tract.

From various causes the results of the Company's
working were not so remunerative as had been antici-
pated by those who competed eagerly for shares when
the lists were opened for subscription in London.
Experience had to be bought and dearly paid for, and
several years passed before so important a primary con-
dition of success as the determination of the best system
of mining had been fully considered and acted on. In
1895 the system of boring mines into the hill-sides, in
order to tap the pockets or strata of ruby earth found
there, was discarded in favour of open quarries from
which the By on was extracted. Under this method the

407

BURMA UNDER BRITISH RULE

whole of the surface soil is removed over considerable
areas till the matrix of ruby earth is reached at a depth
of about twenty feet, when this is dug up, trollied to the
steam cleansing-mill, washed, sieved, sorted, and ex-
amined, so that the rubies and spinels may be extracted
from the clean gravel. The machinery used for washing
is similar to that employed in the African diamond mines.
Abundance of water for washing away the clay and dirt
from the Byon, and fuel to feed the mill-furnaces or other
motive power, are essential requisites for the industry.
As the forests around Mogok and Kyatpyin have been
much exhausted by fuel-cutters, — for at an elevation of
4,000 to 6,000 feet natural regeneration and reproduction
are not vigorous, — the maintenance of an adequate fuel
supply has hitherto been both expensive and difficult,
even although steps were early taken by the Forest
Department to provide for present and future require-
ments by the reservation of the areas still under forest,
and by working them on a simple plan. To minimize
these drawbacks, and to work in the most economic
manner possible at Mogok, the headquarters of the
mining industry, waterworks have now been constructed
in the neighbouring hills to provide for improved pump-
ing machinery as well as for the generation and installa-
tion of electricity on a scale sufficient to supersede the
use of wood-fuel and luminants to any considerable
extent, This now enables the central mill to work day and
night, because the chance of reaping a rich harvest of the
precious stones is directly proportional to the quantity of
ruby gravel washed and examined. Operations have
thus been extended considerably, while working has at
the same time been made more economical.

When the picked stones have been sorted in flat
trays according to size, the work of closer scrutiny and
classification goes on in the offices. The rubies are
distinguished from the mere spinels by means of an
ingenious small instrument, like that used by surveyors
for measuring offset angles, in which each stone is placed
for examination. The ray of light passing through the
stone, being polarized in the instrument, comes to the
eye as a pure red ray in the case of a true ruby, whereas

408

THE RUBY MINES

the less valuable, though equally beautiful, spinel exhibits
a blue tinge.

Although the Ruby Mines of Burma are perhaps the
most productive in theworld, the number of pure stones
found of good quality and high value appears to be
singularly small judging from the official returns. Thus
the whole of the export of unset precious stones and
pearls to Great Britain amounted in value only to ;!^2,c)oo
in 1896-97, and was nil in 1897-98, the total exports to
foreign countries for these years being respectively
;^3,38o and ^540, although the stones found in 1897 by
the Company alone, exclusive of the outturn by native
licensed miners, were valued at ;^5 3,497. The only
exports of unset precious stones and pearls from 1898 to
1900 were to Singapore and to quite small amounts of
;^842 and £2^26^. Practically, therefore, the whole of
the output from the Ruby Mines, with the exception
merely of a fine stone now and again, is absorbed by the
Indian market, or is at any rate despatched to India, for
distribution thence to other countries, so that these gems
are not recorded among the exports from Burma. The
necessary consequence of this is that the prosperity of
the ruby mining industry ebbs and flows in accord with
the prosperity and the general economic conditions of
India.

The impoverishment of the general population, and
the dislocation of trade throughout India on account
of plague, famine, and frontier warfare in 1897 and 1898,
reacted at once on the industry in Burma by causing
cessation in the demand for low-grade stones. This
depression became at once appreciable through the fees
drawn by the Company from licenses to native miners
sinking from ;i^2 7,370 in 1896 to ;;^9,9i9 in 1897, but
they soon rose again to ;^i4,292 in 1898, and ;^ 18, 265
in 1899.

On the expiration of the Company's lease in 1896 this
was renewed for a term of fourteen years at a rent of
£21,000 plus a share of the profits. Since this arrange-
ment was entered into the new mining rules of May, 1899,
have been issued, revising royalties and fixing those on
precious stones at thirty per cent, on the net profits

409

BURMA UNDER BRITISH RULE

annually. Under new arrangements concluded in 1899
the whole of the debt owed by the Company to Govern-
ment, amounting to ;/^26,666, has been wiped off and the
rent reduced to ^^"13,333 a year, while the Government's
share of the Company's net profits has been increased
from twenty to thirty per cent. This seems a very
profitable arrangement for the Company, as in normal
years the fees received from licenses amount to consider-
ably more than the annual rent covenanted to be paid to
Government. The dividend of five per cent, announced
at the eleventh ordinary general meeting of the Company
in London on September 25, 1S99, was the first dividend
declared, and the chairman then announced to the share-
holders that he thought they might reasonably anticipate
a dividend twice as large next year, as all the Company's
difficulties had at length been overcome. This predic-
tion has been amply verified by a twelve and a half per
cent, dividend in 1900. The value of the stones won
by the Company reached ;^90,848, including three very
valuable rubies, one of seventy-seven carats being valued
at ;!^26,666.

Except in so far as their operations are on a much
smaller scale than the Company's work, the licensed
native miners have an equal chance with the latter in
discovering stones of value ; and, as a matter of fact, the
largest ruby that has ever been known at Mogok was
found in a native mine early in 1897. Speaking from
memory, this stone was, as I saw it in May, 1897, rhom-
boidal in shape with a superficies of about 2^ by 2 inches
and a thickness of about f inch. It seemed good in
colour, but was so cracked and flawed that it could only
be expected to yield a comparatively small stone of good
quality. No value could be attached to it locally, as no
stone of that size had ever been previously seen or heard
of in Mogok. On my asking the owner why he did not
send it to Europe to ascertain its value, he said there
was only one man in the province whom he would trust
to take it there, and that was the Lieutenant-Governor
of Burma ; but, he added thoughtfully, at times he didn't
feel at all sure that he could trust even him with it.
And yet this priceless ruby was kept, wrapped up in

410

CHIEF MINERAL PRODUCTS

many rags of dirty cotton, in rather a casual way in the
owner's house.

TourmaHne is found in the Shan States of Mong Mit
and Mainglon (Thibaw), immediately to the north and
south of the Mogok ruby tracts, and plumbago and mica
are worked in the Twinng6 township of the Ruby Mines
district. But these are, — like the ruby and the amber
mines of Nanyaseik, the alabaster quarries of Sagyin
near Mandalay, the marble rocks of Amherst and the
islands of the Mergui Archipelago, the steatite quarries
in the Chin hills and near the An pass crossing the Arakan
Yoma from Minbu to Akyab, and the limestone pits
worked at many places throughout the province, — mining
industries of so trivial a nature as to be unlikely ever to
affect the material wealth of the country to any appreci-
able extent. Nearly all of these mines and quarries are
in places where labour is scarce and dear.

The province is rich in mineral resources, of which the
chief are petroleum, coal, and gold ; and now that fixation
of the rate of exchange has been achieved, mining pro-
spects are of a much less speculative nature than was
previously the case. The important amendments made
by the Government of India during 1899 in the mining
and prospecting rules now afford reasonable facilities to
all persons, syndicates, and companies really desirous of
operating, while the widely increased powers granted to
local Governments in dealing with applications obviate
the delay which had before then been unavoidable. By
granting permission to transfer prospecting leases and by
the revision of the royalties, so that gold and silver will
pay seven and a half and precious stones thirty per cent,
on the net profits annually, Government appear to have
shown their desire to facilitate the development of India's
mineral resources generally ; and Burma seems worthy of
receiving a fair share of the attention which private enter-
prise may feel disposed to bestow upon mining con-
cerns.

In its three chief mineral products — earth-oil, coal, and
gold — Burma offers a very fair field for enterprise, but
nothing more. It is not the inexhaustible treasure-land
that will attract those who hanker after untold mineral

411

BURMA UNDER BRITISH RULE

wealth extending beyond the dreams of avarice ; for its
main weahh Hes — as in the past, so also in the future —
in its fertile alluvial plains, its damp climate and copious
rainfall during the summer monsoon months, and its vast
forests, rather than in its carboniferous deposits or the
auriferous rocks of its hill ranges. At the same time,
however, there can be no doubt that the more liberal
policy of the present Viceroy and Governor-General of
India, Lord Curzon of Keddleston, should attract capital
towards Burma with regard to mining enterprises, as
well as in respect of various other commercial openings
— such as branch railways, timber, rubber-plantations,
cotton, a Land Mortgage Bank, and many other schemes
— offering fair prospects of reasonable profit, and capable
of achieving great success under good, prudent manage-
ment.

412

Chapter XIV

TRADE AND COMMERCE

AS might of course have been expected from a fertile
tropical country traversed by an enormous river
like the Irrawaddy, Burma has throughout all historic
times carried on a considerable amount of trade with
foreign countries.

In the earlier periods Arab dhows and other native
Asiatic craft maintained traffic with it, while direct
contact with Europe was introduced by the Portuguese
before the close of the fourteenth century, although
Marco Polo had previously visited Burma before the
end of the thirteenth century. During the fifteenth and
sixteenth centuries the country was visited by Russian
and Italian travellers. The first English trader who
visited Burma, in 1586, was Ralph Fitch. More recent
details of trade and of the country generally are given
in the well known Account of the Burman Empire^
by Father San Germano, a Barnabite priest, who lived
in Burma from 1783 to 1806.

^ The trade possibilities offered by the natural fertility
of the rich delta of the Irrawaddy were, however,
incapable of being taken proper advantage of owing to
the internecine warfare almost constantly being waged
there since the beginning of the fourteenth century,
which was indeed one of the main causes of the present
scantiness of population throughout this fine alluvial
tract.

The first trading connexion between Burma and any
European country was in 1 5 1 9, when a treaty was con-
cluded by Antonio Correa, on behalf of Portugal, with

413

BURMA UNDER BRITISH RULE

Byanyaran, King of Pegu, for the establishment of fac-
tories at Martaban and Syriam (a corruption of Tkanlyin),
a few miles to the south-east of the present city of
Rangoon.; Towards the close of the sixteenth century,
or early in the seventeenth, the Dutch obtained a footing
on the island of Negrais, at the extreme western point of
the Irrawaddy delta, and subsequently also established
factories at Syriam and at old Bhamo [Bamdw) on the
Taiping river, some distance above the present town
situated just below the confluence of that tributary with
the Irrawaddy.

Early in the seventeenth century (1612) the East
India Company established factories / and agencies at
Syriam, and gradually extended their business with
branches at Prome, Ava, and Bhamo. Disputes soon
sprang up between the trading agents of different nation-
alities, and between these and the Burmese ; and about
the middle of the seventeenth century all the European
merchants were expelled in consequence of a quarrel
between the Burmese Governor of Pegu and the Dutch
agent. In 1680 and 1684 unsuccessful overtures were
made by the English for the re-establishment of factories,
and in 1687 they took temporary possession of Negrais.
In 1688 the Governor of Syriam invited the British
merchants at Madras to re-establish a factory at Syriam,
but it was not till 1698 that factories were rebuilt at
Syriam and agencies established at Bassein and Negrais.
The Dutch and the Portuguese never returned. The
French, however, settled at Syriam, and became the
rivals of the British merchants.

During the first half of the eighteenth century trade
went on briskly between Syriam and the British factories
at Bengal and Madras, even although this was a period
of warfare between the Burmese dynasty of Ava and
the Mon Kings of Pegu. During the short period of
Mon supremacy trade was less hampered than under the
Burmese rule of Ava. But on a new Burmese dynasty
being founded by Alaung Payd, in 1755, he succeeded
in uniting his countrymen and overthrowing the Peguan
monarchy during the following year. The Peguans or
Mon were thereafter called the Talaingox " down-trodden

414

TRADE IN EIGHTEENTH CENTURY

race " as a term of contempt, a name they still bear and
apply to themselves instead of their proper racial desig-
nation. At the same time, to commemorate the victory
of the Burmese arms, he founded a new capital, in place
of Syriam, near the great Shwe Dagon pagoda, and
called it *' Rangoon," pronounced Yangoit in Burmese,
which means " the conclusion of the war."

As Alaung Paya would not permit the establishment
of any factories within his territories, trade at once be-
came much restricted. Towards the end of the eighteenth
century it began to spring up again, though under some-
what unfavourable conditions : for the export of gems
and precious metals was prohibited, while commercial
transactions were burdened with vexatious transit dues,
port charges, and commissions.

During the war between the Burmese and the Mon,
both the British and the French had tried to run with
the hare and hunt with the hounds. The British mer-
chants at Syriam on the whole gave the larger share of
their encouragement and assistance to the Burmese,
while the French took the opposite course and pinned
their faith on the ultimate ascendancy of the Mon ; but
the rival merchants all tried to keep on favourable terms
with the other side whenever events seemed to show
that this might ultimately prove the successful party in
the struggle for dominion throughout Pegu. Unfor-
tunately for the French, Alaung Payd's arms were
victorious. In 1756, after Alaung Payi had returned to
Ava, the Takings revolted and attacked Rangoon ; but
the Burmese King returned, invested Syriam, and rased
the town to the ground, leaving unscathed only the
golden pagoda and the other sacred buildings.

While the conqueror was endeavouring to crush out,
with a terrible outpouring of blood, the last efforts of the
Talaing resistance in the Syriam district, he found that
the French had been assisting them with warlike stores,
so he put all the Frenchmen to death. Though it was
discovered that they also had at times assisted the
Talaings, the English received more favourable treat-
ment, being permitted to occupy the island of Negrais
and to establish a factory at Bassein, in consideration of

415

BURMA UNDER BRITISH RULE

their having furnished Alaung Payd with munitions of
war during the two previous years. In 1758 the
Talaings again revolted in the south-western portion of
the delta, and in October of the following year the
factories at Bassein and Negrais were destroyed, and
the English agents and employes massacred, on sus-
picion of having been in communication with the rebels
and having supplied arms to them.

On the death of Alaung Paya, in 1 760, the English
obtained permission from his successor, Naungdaw-
gyi, to re-establish a factory at Bassein ; but redress
for the massacre of the previous year was refused
point-blank.

The ports which were then open along the coast of
Burma are those which still exist. Commencing from
the north-west, Akyab, at the mouth of the Koladdn
river is the chief seaport in Arakan, the other two being
Kyaukpyu and Sandoway lower down the coast.
Bassein, about sixty miles up the Ngawun river, the
most westerly branch of the Irrawaddy delta, and
Rangoon, about thirty miles up the Rangoon river, the
most easterly branch of the delta, are the two ports of
Pegu. Moulmein, near the mouth of the Salween,
Tavoy, about thirty miles up the Tavoy river, and
Mergui, on the coast further south, are the seaports in
Tenasserim. Rangoon, Moulmein, Bassein, and Akyab
are the principal ports, which are all good harbours
affording safe anchorage.

From its position, however, Rangoon was naturally
bound in course of time to become the greatest trading
centre. Even under the Burmese rule Rangoon con-
sequently became not only the principal port, but also
the only one of any real importance for foreign export
trade. Early in the last century Rangoon was a sort
of Alsatian emporium, resorted to by desperate and
reckless adventurers of almost every nationality. Euro-
pean countries were represented by a few English,
French, and Portuguese residents, along with whom
Armenians, Parsis, and Moguls shared the trade : but
all were looked down upon, harassed, and greatly
restricted in their operations by the Burmese.

416 /

TRADE IN 1826

The chief articles of sea-borne commerce consisted
then of imports of sugar and muslin from Bengal, of linen
and white and coloured kerchiefs, used as headdresses,
from Madras, and of miscellaneous iron, brass, glass,
and woollen goods from Europe ; while the chief exports
were teak timber, lac, cutch, petroleum, and vegetable
oils. ' Of these teak-wood, valuable on account of its
essential oil, which preserves iron or steel embedded in
it in place of corroding it like the tannic acid contained
in oak timber, was by far the most important. Large
quantities were exported as planks for shipbuilding, and
|two or three shipbuilding yards had been established at
Rangoon by Englishmen and Frenchmen. This in-
dustry, and the export trade generally, was perhaps
stimulated by the curious prohibition against export of
specie from Burma. Import duty was charged at the
rate of twelve per cent., ten of which were supposed to
go to the royal treasury, the remainder being divided
as commission, in lieu of salary, among the local officials'N
The export duty on timber was only one per cent., but
on all other exports it amounted to five per cent, ad
valorem. In the early part of the century the number
of ships annually sailing from Rangoon averaged less
than twenty-five. This had doubled by the time Tenas-
serim and Arakan were ceded to the British in 1826.
But, as Pegu was then restored to the Burmese, the
trade of Rangoon advanced much more slowly than
would otherwise have been the case. From 1826 to
1852, the period between the first and the second
Burmese wars, the average number of sea-going craft
of all sorts arriving at and departing from Rangoon
annually was merely 125. Of these only twenty were
European ships, the rest being coasting schooners,
Chinese and Malay junks, and Kattu or native craft. 'V

When Arakan and Tenasserim came under British
rule in 1826, they were both found to be in a very
thinly populated condition. Towns which had formerly
been large and populous had either become reduced to
the status of mere villages and hamlets, or only existed
as ruins.
(After Akyab became a free port, in 1826, British ships

\ 417 EE

BURMA UNDER BRITISH RULE

soon began to bring cargoes of muslins, piece-goods,
cutlery, and crockery from Bengal, carrying away rice,
hides, and horns on their return voyages ; and the
seaport soon became regarded as the chief town instead
of Myohaung, the "ancient capital," inconveniently
situated far inland on the Lemru river. Restrictions on
trade being removed, and security for person and pro-
perty being assured under British rule, the inhabitants
soon returned to cultivate their holdings on the rich
alluvial plains watered by the Koladdn and the Lemru
rivers, from which they had been driven by their
Burmese conquerors. As these fertile plains, producing
the finest rice in Burma, are intersected by a labyrinth
of tidal creeks, their produce could easily be brought down
to the seaport by the cultivators. Akyab therefore soon
multiplied its trade, and became the centre of the rice
export business from Burma. A large trade also sprang
up there in salt, which was purchased from local manu-
facturers and stored in Government Gola or sheds until
it could be shipped to Bengal.

At Moulmein, on the other hand, trade had to be
created. Previous to the cession of Tenasserim, the port
on the Salween river had been at Martaban, of which
province (comprising the present Thaton and Toungoo
districts, and part of the Pegu district) the Burmese
retained possession until 1852, when they lost both Pegu
and Martaban, and with these provinces the whole of
the sea-board. The kingdom of Ava thus became a purely
inland country, the mere Hinterland of British Burma.

For many years previous to 1826 English ships had
ceased to visit Martaban ; and in establishing a port at
Moulmein, a little lower down on the opposite or left
bank of the Salween, there was practically no trade in
view except what could be created. Although located
in a very favourable position near the mouth of the
Salween — a river considerably longer than the Irra-
waddy, which rises in Thibet, traverses Yunnan from
north to south, and receives the drainage from north-
western Siam — and although the other portions of
western Siam are watered by the Thaungyin, Gyaing,
and Atardn rivers, which join the Salween above the

418

Ik

TRADE IN 1852

new seaport, Moulmein has, owing to the rocky obstruc-
tions which render water communication with upper
Siam, the Shan States and China impossible by way of
the Salween, none of the great natural advantages pos-
sessed by Rangoon as a seaport and as an emporium
for the collection and distribution of commercial produce.
The trade which developed at Moulmein was at first
mainly confined to teak timber. Sawmills sprang up,
and shipbuilding yards were established, 123 vessels
being launched therefrom during the quarter of a century
between 1830 and 1855. Shortly after 1830 a com-
mencement was also made with the exportation of rice ;
but, when the second Burmese war led to the acquisition
of Rangoon and Bassein by the British, the staple
export trade of Akyab was in rice and of Moulmein in
teak timber. There was no export of teak from Akyab,
as the teak tree is not indigenous to any part of Arakan.

After the annexation of Pegu and Martaban in 1852,
trade increased rapidly at all the ports. The chief
impetus to commerce, however, was given at Rangoon,
through the removal of obstructions to free mercantile
transactions. The whole of the seaboard having been
lost to the kingdom of Ava, Rangoon and Bassein
became almost the only outlets for the produce of the
interior of Burma, and the only inlets by which mer-
chandise could reach the upper valley of the Irrawaddy,
the Shan States, and western China. 'Trade therefore
soon increased, woollen articles, cotton and silk, piece-
goods, iron-ware, salt, and miscellaneous articles being
imported ; whilst rice, teak timber, cutch, petroleum,
hides, and horns formed the principal exports^ In 1854
the Sea Customs Department was established, and from
I St January, 1855, dues were levied at all the seaports,
while the import and export returns then established
soon showed how great was the lion's share of trade
Rangoon had even then secured against all the other
seaports combined. And this was bound to be the case,
considering the extremely advantageous position occupied
by Alaung Paya s town nestling at the foot of the Shwe
Dagon pagoda.

Rangoon, from being a small and comparatively in-

419

BURMA UNDER BRITISH RULE

significant place, has within less than half a century risen
to be the third seaport in British India, being only sur-
passed by Calcutta and Bombay in the volume and
extent of its trade. At the census of 1891 it had a
population of 180,324 souls, showing an increase of
over one-third on the previous decennial census returns ;
and its present population is now 232,236, according to
the preliminary return of the census of February, 1901.

The approach to the Rangoon river, the main eastern
branch of the Irrawaddy delta, from the sea is not
difficult or dangerous at any season of the year. The
southern sea-face of the province, from Cape Negrais
eastwards past the Rangoon river, up to the estuary of
the Sittang, and down to Amherst below the mouth of
the Salween, is nowhere rocky or dangerous from
numerous sunken reefs. Flat and shelving, the shoal-
banks off the mouths of the main branches of the delta
are the chief sources of danger to shipping, and these are
guarded against by a good service of lighthouses and
lightships. After passing the Eastern Grove lighthouse
marking the entrance to the Rangoon river, the approach
to Rangoon, situated about thirty miles up stream, is
easy. The town lies on the left or northern bank of the
Rangoon river, just above where this receives, on the
same bank, the waters of the Paziindaung river from the
north and the Pegu river from the north-east, which unite
in debouching almost at the same point into the main
stream. In consequence of this a huge silt deposit,
known as the Hastings Shoal, is formed, which hinders
the entrance or exit of large ships during the ebb-tides.
This is not, however, anything like so dangerous an
obstruction as the notorious James and Mary Shoal in the
Hooghly river, while the distance between Rangoon and
the sea is only about one quarter of that between Cal-
cutta and the Bay of Bengal. Nor are cyclones and
dirty weather anything like so prevalent around the
approaches to Rangoon as they are along the ocean
tracks leading to the capital of Bengal. Above the
Hastings Shoal, within the port of Rangoon, there is
good accommodation for a large number of steamers and
other kinds of shipping. From where the Pegu and the

420

I

RANGOON

Paziindaung rivers join the Rangoon river the port
itself extends upwards in a gentle curve for seven or
eight miles to where the Hlaing river from the north,
joining the Panlaung creek from the north-west, forms
the Rangoon river. Throughout this stretch the river is
about a mile to a mile and a quarter in breadth, so that
during the busiest season of the year, lasting from
December to April, large quantities of shipping can be
accommodated without danger or inconvenience. And
the anchorage is also good and safe throughout the
south-west monsoon.

The original Rangoon founded by Alaung Payd has
during its recent expansion absorbed all the small
villages lying to the north-west and south-east of it, which
have now become incorporated as sections of the city ;
while the settlements on the right bank of the river have
also been transformed into busy suburbs, resounding with
the ceaseless clang of machinery, the noise of hammering
in the shipyards, the dull droning whirr of rice-husking,
and the higher-pitched hum from the timber sawmills.

No other point in Burma could have such unrivalled
advantages for trade and commerce as are enjoyed by
Rangoon. The anchorage is better than could be obtain-
able off Syriam, near the mouth of the Pegu river, the
seaport in Peguan times.

Good, broad, deep, and easily negotiable tidal creeks
bring to Rangoon the produce from the Irrawaddy, itself
navigable up its main branch for upwards of a thousand
miles, and gathering in through its tributaries the whole
of the trade possible throughout an enormous extent of
rich territory. From the rice-producing districts to the
north-east and east grain naturally found its way to
Rangoon down the Paziindaung and Pegu rivers ; and
even from the valley of the Sittang it could be brought
by means of the Kayasu creek joining the lower portions
of the Sittang and Pegu rivers, and navigable for large
country boats whenever the fortnightly flood-tides were
in flow. Thus, even before railways had been opened in
Burma, Rangoon had been able to expand its commerce
far beyond what was possible in the case of any of the
other seaports. In 1899- 1900, out of a total trade for

421

BURMA UNDER BRITISH RULE
the province valued at ^20,819,992, ^16,239,884, or
eighty per cent.^ passed through Rangoon. Since the
opening of the first short railway from Rangoon to
Prome in 1877, thanks to the construction of amain trunk
line of nearly 800 miles in length, opening up land-locked
areas in Upper Burma, the commerce of Rangoon has
far more than trebled itself in extent, while the normal
expansion of trade at other ports has not done very much
more than double itself.

The first view obtained of Rangoon, on approaching it
from the sea, gives but little idea of the busy port that is
soon to be entered. About halfway up the Rangoon
river the golden spire of Syriam pagoda is observable a
little to the east, that having of course been spared from
religious motives when the Mon capital was destroyed
by Alaung Paya. Soon after this the great golden pile of
the Shwe Dagon pagoda is seen right ahead to the north,
surmounting the knoll overlooking Rangoon, while the
town itself is more or less hidden by trees, above which
the smoke from the steam mills is wafted by the breeze.
When the forts and submarine defences have been passed,
and the Hastings Shoal is being rounded, the tall
chimneys of the rice-mills and the corrugated iron roofs
of their outbuildings, and of the many other hideously
ugly and unromantic shrines of industry, become more
plainly visible. Rounding the Hastings Shoal and near-
ing Monkey Point, the tip of the tongue of land forming
the south-eastern limit of Rangoon, the rice-mills can be
seen dotting the Paziindaung river, extending northwards
along both banks, and sending out long wind-borne
streamers of dirty smoke from their chimneys. Above
this, Botataung is soon passed with its rice and timber
mills, its earth-oil refinery, and the many wharves and
yards having river frontage. Approaching the heart of
the city, the central portion on the river's bank, within
which are congregated the chief shops and merchants'
offices, the great municipal Bazaar, the Customs House,
Treasury, banks, post and telegraph offices, law courts,
and Government offices, the din and noise afford very

^ All monetary data have been converted into sterling at the rate ot
one shilling and fourpence per rupee.

422

RANGOON

apparent indication of the traffic and bustle of a great
city. Before the steamer has been brought alongside of
any of the numerous quays, or the harbour-master has
had time to assign to it moorings out in the stream,
opportunity is given of looking around from the centre of
the port and noting the evidences of commercial activity
that everywhere surround one. Where Alaung Payd, in
1755, built a few rows of starveling houses or mat huts
on a swampy mud bank, which each ebb-tide left exposed
as a foetid mass of oozy slime, there now stands a stately
and opulent city, whose broad streets are lined with large
solid brick buildings, and whose river frontage is dotted
with quays and wharves, from which merchandise can
either be stored in huge " go-downs " or else be at once
loaded on railway trains for despatch into the interior.
In this central portion, this heart of Rangoon where the
pulsation of business is strongest, there are no mill yards,
as land has long since become too valuable for that. On
the annexation of Upper Burma, the value of land in the
business centre of Rangoon increased with an enormous
bound. A small piece of land in Merchant Street occu-
pied by a ramshackle one-storied building, which changed
hands in 1885 for between five and six thousand rupees,
was sold within a year for over fifty- five thousand rupees :
but this unhealthy phenomenal unearned increment fortu-
nately soon abated, although of course the value of land
has increased and must continue to rise normally as the
city grows in commercial importance.

In all the suburbs the whole of the available river
frontage is occupied by mills of one sort or another ;
while up, and down, and across the river steam launches
are continuously conveying merchants' employes or
messengers to and from the mill-yards. All along the
left bank of the Rangoon river, from Pazundaung and
Botataung past the city itself, and northwards beyond
Alon to Kyimyindaing, where the central Government
timber depot is located, — a distance of about eight miles
— there is no frontage available which is not taken up by
wharves, or mills, or buildings of some sort ; while on the
opposite bank, the Dalla side, in addition to rice-mills
there are the great timber yards of the Bombay- Burma

423

BURMA UNDER BRITISH RULE

Trading Corporation and other firms, and the docks and
shipbuilding yards of the Irrawaddy Flotilla Company,
whose large fleet of magnificent river steamers has done
so much for the expansion of the trade of Rangoon and
the development of commerce over all the river-highways
of the province. During the busy season, which com-
mences when the new rice-crop begins to come in about
the end of December and lasts till the burst of the south-
west monsoon in May, the pool forming the port of
Rangoon presents a busy and a noisy scene, unsurpassed
and even unequalled in any other port of India except in
the Hooghly river off Calcutta.

Equally characteristic as the river-steamers and flats of
the Irrawaddy Flotilla Company are the black funnels
with two narrow white bands indicating the British India
Steam Navigation Company's steamers, which throng
the port of Rangoon and practically monopolize the
interportal trade along the coast of Burma and with
British India. This powerful Company, possessing one
of the largest fleets of mercantile steamers in the world,
has grown pari passu with the development of Burma,
towards whose material progress it has assisted in no
small degree, and with the coasting trade of which in
particular the Company's interests have been most inti-
mately associated. They have the mail contracts between
Rangoon, the ports along the Burma coast, Calcutta,
Madras, and Singapore, which are all worked with
exemplary regularity. Twice a week good steamers ply
between Rangoon and Calcutta at a fair rate of speed ;
and, if sufficient inducement were offered by Government,
no doubt the energetic Company would soon organize a
better service direct with Madras, which is a far prefer-
able passenger route to Bombay than that via Calcutta,
with its ascent of the Hooghly and the longer railway
journey across the Indian continent.

For many years this was the only ocean steamship
company which had any direct connexion with Burma or
did anything for the development of the trade of the
province. And even now the only competitors it has
are the Asiatic Steam Navigation Company, which has
run between Calcutta, Rangoon, Port Blair (Andaman

424

I

RAILWAYS

Islands) and Madras for the past twelve years, and the
Bibby line of steamers running once every three weeks
direct to and from England by way of Colombo and
Marseilles.

Though only of metre gauge, the Burma railways are
well suited to the present requirements of the country,
and should easily cope with a much larger amount of traffic
than they have yet been called upon to convey. Although
enormous quantities of rice are now brought down from
Rangoon by railway from land-locked areas, yet the
auxiliary methods of bringing this raw produce to market
by means of country boats have hardly been appreciably
interfered with by competition. The rapid expansion in
the trade of Rangoon during the past twenty years is,
however, beyond doubt mainly due to railway construc-
tion, and not merely to the addition of Upper Burma
and the Shan States to the British territories ; and as the
railway net expands and ramifies throughout the province
and beyond its frontiers, so will the trade of Rangoon
increase and multiply. Rich and opulent though Burma
may already be considered, yet its future prospects are
brighter still by far. As each decennial census will record
a steady growth in population, so, too, will the trade
statistics of Rangoon mark a continuous development of
commerce commensurate therewith and with the activity
in railway construction.

From early in January till late in April the streams
and tidal creeks leading from the rural districts to the
various seaports are thronged with boats of from below
twenty to about fifty or sixty tons capacity, all heavily
laden with ** paddy " for delivery at the rice mills. Here
the grain is measured out in baskets and poured in great
heaps on the floors of the grain sheds, in a comparative
silence only broken by the tally-men calling out " cko"
whenever a notch has to be made in the Gay 6 or " tally-
stick " of split bamboo to mark the pouring out of every
tenth basketful of rice. Enormous piles of grain are thus
brought daily into the " go-downs " or sheds of the mill-
yards, and the whirr of the machinery goes on ceaselessly
day and night all through the week, except for the
twenty-four hours succeeding midnight on Saturday.

425

BURMA UNDER BRITISH RULE

The Sabbath day of rest, during which the noise of the
husking machinery is stayed, is utih'zed in examining and
overhauling the engines and mill-plant.

The scores of thousands of teak logs converted in the
timber yards of Rangoon and Moulmein are almost
entirely brought down by river in rafts of forty to sixty
logs or more. They frequently take two or three, and
sometimes even four years or longer to float out from the
small streams in the forests into main channels, whence
they can be more easily extracted during favourable
freshets. During floods they are allowed to drift down
the smaller water channels till they reach collecting
stations on the larger streams, whence they can be formed
into rafts and floated down to the timber yards. Both in
dragging logs away up in the forests, as well as in ar-
ranging them in the timber depots and in stacking the
converted timber in the mill-yards, elephants perform
tasks that seem wonderful to the casual observer. It is
one of the sights of Rangoon to see these huge animals
at work in the timber yards.

Teak trees have always in Burma been royal property,
and the ownership of all teak trees growing in any of
the forests, reserved or unreserved, is vested in the
Government. Even the chiefs of the various Shan
States containing teak forests have no proprietary fight
over such trees, but can only work out teak timber either
on payment of royalty to Government as lessees, or else
merely as contractors of the Forest Department, which is
closed as a " quasi-commercial " branch of the Revenue
Department of the Government of India.

Trade in teak timber from Burma on any large scale
first of all sprang up in Moulmein, and until recent years
the exports of this staple from Moulmein continued in
excess of those from Rangoon. But as the forests of
Siam, Karenni, and the Southern Shan States drained
by the Salween river are now, after decades of reckless
felling, gradually approaching exhaustion, while those
lying within the drainage of the Irrawaddy and its
tributaries are being worked on strictly conservative
principles and in accordance with the provisions of defi-
nite working plans, the export of teak timber from

426

TEAK TIMBER EXPORTS

Rangoon was naturally bound in course of time to come
level with that from Moulmein, and ultimately to exceed
it considerably. The high-level marks of the Moulmein
timber trade were reached in 1888-89, when 93,465 tons
of teak valued at nearly ;^5 15,000 were exported, and
in 1892-93, when 106,850 tons, valued at ;^483,ooo, left
the port. The statistics of the teak export trade for the
seven years ending on 30th June, 1900, are as follows : —

From Moulmein.

From Rangoon.

Total.

Average

Year.

Value in

Value in

Value in

Value
per Ton.

Tons.

Pounds

Tons.

Pounds

Tons.

Pounds

Sterling.

Sterling.

Sterling.

£

£

£

£ s. d.

1893-94

85,722

402,628

85,623

438,698

171,345

841,226

4 18 2

1894-95

84,456

391,235

106,810

555.644

191,1-26

946,979

4 19 0

1895-96

84,363

389,614

120,494

626,869

204,857

1,016,483

4 19 3

1896-97

75.298

406,588

115.854

656,668

191,152

1,063,256

5 II 3

1897-98

65,986

361,433

207,405

1,229,165

273,391

1,590,598

5 16 4

1898-99

66,002

373,647

202,281

1,142,970

268,283

1,516,617

5 13 3

I 890-1 900

62,983

365,628

209,303

1,159,169

272,286

1,524,797

5 12 0

There will probably be a temporary check, and most
likely even for some years a falling off in the exports of
teak from Rangoon, owing to causes which will be sub-
sequently referred to ; but this will be followed by a
steady expansion of the trade on a sounder basis than
now exists, and the future exports will to a certainty be
far In excess of what they now are.

The rise of the teak trade in Burma possesses an
interest of its own apart from the purely financial and
commercial aspect. Owing to the impetus then given to
shipbuilding, both mercantile and naval, the supply of
oak timber for the dockyards of Britain began to get
exhausted throughout Scotland and England towards the
end of last century, and great difficulty was felt in supply-
ing the demands of the naval dockyards. This drew
attention to the good qualities of teak timber for ship-
building, and regular supplies of it were drawn into the
dockyards of Bombay from the forests along the western
coast of India. In a comparatively short space of time
these first sources ran dry, but soon the cession of

427

BURMA UNDER BRITISH RULE

Tenasserim to the British, in 1826, opened out fresh
opportunities, which British merchants were not slow to
avail themselves of. Many firms obtained leases of
forests on payment of low rates of royalty ; and the
timber thus extracted was supplemented by what was
brought down from the Siamese, Shan, and Karenni
territories drained by the Salween. Most of these leases
within British territory lapsed in 1896, and the great
bulk of the timber now converted in the Moulmein saw-
mills consists of what is rafted down the Salween by
Shan and Siamese foresters. This is, however, supple-
mented by auction sales of timber extracted by direct
Government agency through contractors of the Forest
Department. At Kado, a few miles above Moulmein, a
large depot is maintained by Government, in which all
timber arriving is stored until it is sold by the owners
and cleared from the depot after payment of the Govern-
ment royalty, or after the levy of a duty of seven per
cent, ad valorem on all such teak timber as has been
imported from foreign territory.

, As soon as free trade was rendered possible at Ran-
goon by the annexation of Pegu and Martaban, in 1852,
the British merchants who established themselves in
trade there soon turned their attention to timber opera-
tions. As in Tenasserim, they here also obtained leases
for forests on payment of a small royalty per ton to
Government, and floated down the logs to their mills.
Simultaneously with this system direct Government ex-
traction was also introduced by means of contractors
usually resident in the vicinity of the forests, who de-
livered their timber at the central Government depot
near Rangoon on payment of contract rates varying
according to the dimensions of each log. Frauds in
connexion with girdling operations, for the seasoning of
the teak trees before felling, having resulted on a large
scale about 1870, the Government of India in 1873 pro-
hibited the issue of fresh leases ; but, owing to the
circumstances obtaining with regard to the working of
the Upper Burma forests on the annexation in 1886, by
far the greater portion of the teak milled in Rangoon
was until 1900 extracted from tracts still held under

428

GOVERNMENT TIMBER DEPOT

lease. While these leases, chiefly held by the Bombay-
Burma Trading Corporation, were current the Govern-
ment found it expedient to allow other European firms
to obtain contracts for working certain forests at com-
paratively low rates of royalty so as to enable them to
compete at all, though even then on very unequal terms,
with this wealthy Corporation. While these leases and
purchase contracts were still concurrent in Upper Burma,
most of the forests throughout Lower Burma drained
by the Irrawaddy and the Sittang rivers were worked by
direct departmental agency with contractors for extrac-
tion, and this system is also being gradually introduced
into Upper Burma.

The timber thus extracted by contractors in Lower
Burma, and the best of what is brought out from the
forests to the north of Mandalay, are chiefly disposed of
by public auction at sales held monthly in Rangoon ; but
the very pick of the finest logs goes, as it ought to go,
for the supply of the Bombay dockyard and for other
Government requirements in Calcutta and Madras.
What seem the best logs are carefully put on one side
on arrival in the Government depot at Rangoon, and are
subsequently examined very carefully so that only the
best timber of the year is issued in supplying the dock-
yard and other Government indents ; while tenders are
usually called for with regard to the sale of the remainder
as selected batches of first-class timber. About 25,000
tons of teak are thus annually disposed of from the
Rangoon Government Timber Depot, but this amount
is not sufficient to supply even one-tenth of the quantity
now annually exported from Rangoon. Under the leases
granted to it in 1887, in continuation of those held from
King Thibaw, the Bombay- Burma Trading Corporation
was in the happy position of being able to secure enor-
mous quantities of timber at such extremely low rates of
royalty as did not leave other firms paying considerably
higher rates of royalty any fair chance of carrying on a
successful and healthy competition. This abnormal state
of affairs terminated when the Corporation's lease for
the Chindwin forests lapsed on 31st December, 1900,
though extraction at the exceptionally low rate of royalty

429

BURMA UNDER BRITISH RULE

is permitted till the end of 1901 under the agreement;
but it will not be until the vast stock of teak timber
accumulated at abnormally low and favourable rates by
the Corporation in their great timber depot at Dalla has
become exhausted that the timber trade of Rangoon will
stand on a really sound and healthy commercial basis.
When this takes place, the position of the teak timber
trade will probably be that the leading firms will do a
certain amount of foresting work under purchase con-
tracts with Government, while the supply of timber thus
obtained will have to be supplemented by purchases
made at the monthly auction sales held at the Govern-
ment timber depot, the bulk of the extraction taking
place by the contractors of the Forest Department. The
timber trade that will probably be thus conducted is
capable of great expansion in the future, and it should
always remain free from the taint of mercantile gambling
with which the rice business is infected.

But rice has long been, is, and will always continue to
be, the great staple export from Burma. At first the
work of the mills was confined merely to rough husking
and the preparation of what was called " 5-parts cargo
rice," in which the proportion of the husked grains was
only one in five; but gradually the treatment improved, the
cargo rice showed only about one unhusked grain in five,
and finally millers engaged largely in the preparation of
white rice. In consequence of the local development of
the white rice business large quantities of rice bran are
now exported as manures, 135,642 tons, valued at
;^2i5,494, having been shipped to foreign countries
during 1 899-1900. Large quantities of rice of all sorts
are now usually exported annually to Europe, America
and Singapore, the regular course of the trade in which
is only liable to be temporarily deflected during periods
of famine such as have recently occurred in India and
Japan. Thus, during 1900, over one million tons of rice
were shipped to India owing to the famine there. The
magnitude of the steady expansion of the existing trade
in this staple may be estimated from the following
returns of exports of rice from Lower Burma during the
last twelve years : —

430

RICE

EXPORTS

Year.

To Europe and

America.

Tons.

To InJia, China

and Singapore.

Tons.

To Upper Burma.
Tons.

Total.
Tons.

1889

708,930

245,129

58.504

1,012,563

1890

749,564

430.079

53,838

1. 233.481

189I

852,799

303.423

77,840

1,234,062

1892

824,151

242,367

152,804

1,219,322

1893

778,223

523.453

116,678

1.418,354

1894

729.965

594.504

36,531

1,361,000

1895

801,450

450,999

25,447

1,277,896

1896

768,242

435.199

102,974

1,306,415

1897

698,273

837.499

not recorded

1.535.772

1898

843.037

975.904

.,

1,818,941

1899

-867,415

684,016

.1

1,551.431

1900 (for 10 months)

708,804

1,197,934

II

1,906,738

England takes by far the greatest share of Burma rice,
though large quantities are also consumed in Germany,
at Bremen and Hamburg, while France, Belgium, and
Holland likewise absorb a considerable amount. More
than half of the quantities annually exported, however,
are cleared as bound for Egypt, where, in passing
through the Suez Canal, instructions are issued to the
captains as to the final destination of the cargoes. Even
then, more frequently than not, the usual instructions are
"to the English Channel for further orders." The total
quantity of rice exported to foreign countries during
1895-96, the last year before the Indian famine, amounted
to close on one and a quarter millions of tons, valued at
;^5, 827,000, and bringing in a revenue of ^425,000 in
the way of export duty.

The development of the rice trade has naturally
resulted in increased value of the raw produce itself.
For the three years preceding the annexation of Pegu
(1849-52) the average price of "paddy" or unhusked
rice was only fifteen rupees per hundred baskets of about
nine gallons in capacity. On the occupation of Rangoon
it rose to thirty- five rupees, and during the following
three years it averaged forty rupees per hundred baskets.
Now, during most years, the average price per hundred
baskets ranges from about 100 to 1 10 rupees (^6 1 3^. ^d.
to £y 6s. Sd.) at Rangoon and Bassein, and from 95 to
100 rupees (;(^6 6s. Sd. to ;^6 i^s. /\.d.) at Akyab and
Moulmein. Prices are, however, always liable to fluctua-

431

BURMA UNDER BRITISH RULE

tions dependent on heavy speculations by local traders,
on willingness of the producer to sell early or desire on his
part to hold back the grain and await an advance in
price, on the requirements of the rice millers, and on the
various contingencies affecting all such mercantile trans-
actions. Thus, for example, when the paddy crop of 1896
began to reach the seaports prices in Rangoon opened
at no to 115 rupees per 100 baskets, consequent on the
strong demand for India in addition to the usual export
business. The harvest bringing in a bumper crop,
prices fell to ninety rupees in February, but regained
their former level during March.

Large quantities of grain are brought down to the
seaports independently by the producers and sold to
the best advantage ; but by far the greater portion of
the paddy required for maintaining the mills in full
work is arranged for during the previous rainy season,
before the rice crops have ripened. Each of the rice-
milling firms has several brokers or middlemen
[Pwha) in their employ, to whom large advances are
made. These men, proceeding up country, make
advances to the cultivators on mortgage of the
growing crops, securing in addition to interest on the
money lent the prior right to purchase the grain at
current market rates when the producer sells the paddy
harvested. Formerly such advances generally carried
with them conditions as to the sale of a certain quantity of
paddy at a stipulated low rate per 100 baskets; but the
Burmese peasants in the chief rice-growing districts are
no longer so simple as formerly, and even this brokerage
business is, like other mercantile operations, subject to
the automatic action of the law of competition. The
largest and richest firms, however, command the services
of the most influential middlemen, and can consequently
rely on procuring the largest supplies of paddy throughout
the working season. Hence even with a growing trade
still capable of enormous expansion there is the natural
and inevitable tendency for the large capitalists to crush
smaller firms or new enterprises out of profitable com-
petition in the rice business.

It has been above remarked that the teak timber

432

THE RICE TRADE

business, though not yet in the healthy condition it
will most likely attain in the course of the next few
years, is at any rate free from the spirit of gambling with
which the rice trade is tainted. As the ports of Burma
lie off the beaten track of ocean tramps and sailing vessels
seeking cargoes, arrangements have almost invariably to
be made for chartering vessels long before the paddy
begins to come down to the rice mills. At the same
time forward sales of rice are also made to a great
extent. If paddy be plentiful and cheap, large gains
result ; but if it be scarce and dear, then the shipments
must still be made, although every bag of rice shipped
means a certain loss to the shipper ; and the fluctuations
of the market for rice in Europe can easily under such
circumstances convert a prospective gain into a dead
loss. A rise or a fall of sixpence a hundredweight on the
wholesale price of cargo rice in Mark Lane means a
difference of one thousand pounds in the market value
of a steamer-load of two thousand tons.

Simultaneously with the rise in the market value of
the raw, unhusked rice, the area under cultivation has
expanded greatly ; and although the prices paid for
labour and for necessities of life have risen in response
to a much enhanced prosperity, yet the power of pur-
chasing luxuries and imported articles has been con-
tinuous. Nor has this agricultural prosperity as yet
anything like approached within even distant view of the
ultimate limits to which the expansion of cultivation is
possible. Although 6,277,678 acres are under rice in
Lower Burma, or over 90 per cent, of the total area
cropped (6,857,898 acres) — leaving out of consideration
the rice cultivation in Upper Burma (1,818,962 acres in
1899), which is insufficient to meet all local demands of
that portion of the province — yet there are still enormous
tracts of land suitable for permanent cultivation as rice
fields whenever population increases sufficiently, either
by immigration or by natural growth, to provide labour
for breaking fresh ground, because the total extent of
cultivable waste amounts to 24,619,662 acres, or three-
fourths of the total area of England. So far as the
possibility of future supplies for export are concerned, the

433 FF

BURMA UNDER BRITISH RULE

rice trade of Burma may still be considered as merely
in a state of normal development ; and the nearly two
million tons now exported will increase and be multiplied
according as Burma's greatest want, population, is sup-
plied.^ During the last twenty years the area under
rice cultivation has far more than doubled ; but there is
still plenty of good uncleared land affording scope for
further expansion at even a more rapid rate in the
immediate future, though of course the first comers have
already secured the best tracts within easy and cheap
communication of the existing centres of the rice trade.

Without exception all the rice mills in Burma are at the
seaport towns. Out of a total of 141 factories, all worked
by steam, coming under the Factory Act of 1881 in
Lower Burma, and employing upwards of 19,000 daily
operatives, the vast majority of them are either timber
or rice mills ; and of these all but a few small timber
mills, are situated in or near the four chief seaports.
Akyab and Moulmein each draw in the surplus produce
from over half a million acres, Bassein that from about a
million acres, and Rangoon the lion's share from about
three million acres of rice cultivation. Communications
are as yet nothing like good enough to enable the surplus
produce of many inland tracts to be brought to the coast.
No rice mills have yet been erected in any of the inland
centres of rice- producing districts, and there seems no
tendency for such an innovation to be attempted either
by existing firms or by fresh enterprisers.

^ The preliminary figures for the recent census show the following
results : —

Population.

1891

1901

Increase.

Lower Burma

Upper Burma

4,408,466
3.362,428

5,371,328
3.849.833

21 "84 per cent.
I4"49

Total, Burma Proper ....

7.770,894

9,221,161

i8-66

Northern Shan States

Southern Shan States

Chin Hills

Other Hill Tribes

\ 375.691 f
) estimated (,

319.643

809,429

87,101

12,287

Grand Total

—

10,449,621

—

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(O 4-1

BURMA UNDER BRITISH RULE

THE *' PADDY RING" OF 1893

A sudden and rather a serious temporary check was
experienced during the year 1893 in the flowing tide of
agricultural and commercial prosperity, which is indicated
in the above statistical tables. About four-fifths of the
whole trade of the province passes through Rangoon.
There the European merchants owning the rice mills, in
which the vast surplus produce of the great rice tracts
of the lower Irrawaddy valley and the delta are prepared
for export, combined to cause a fall in the price of
" paddy " or raw, unhusked rice. From 92 rupees per
100 baskets in 1891, the market rate rose to 127 rupees,
and even stood as high as 138 rupees in April, 1892, in
consequence of competition among the merchants and
of heavy shipments to Europe, where the market stood
high. By the end of 1892, when the rice crop was ready
for market, prices in Europe had already fallen, and the
rice millers of Rangoon, in order to obviate the risk of
loss, had entered into a combination not to pay above an
average of ']'] rupees per 100 baskets for the different
classes of rice throughout the approaching shipping
season. Prices consequently ruled between 76 and 79
rupees per hundred baskets in Rangoon, and the market
rates there regulated the course of prices at the other
seaports. Such a combination had been tried fourteen
or fifteen years before in Moulmein, but collapsed when a
suspension of work at the mills was threatened through
the cultivators keeping back their rice till prices advanced.
During the first half of 1893, however, the Rangoon
rice millers held together and maintained their compact,
with the result that, in spite of the low rates ruling in
Europe, they were able to carry on an exceedingly
lucrative export business. Now, the vast majority of
Burmese agriculturists take advances early in the year at
high rates of interest, which they clear off after selling
the surplus paddy grown on their lands. As rice is
rather a perishable commodity in such a hot, damp
climate as that of Lower Burma, the struggle between
the merchants and the cultivators was altogether an
unequal contest. As the merchants happened on this
occasion to keep faith with each other, the paddy had
ultimately to come to the rice mills on the buyers' own

437

BURMA UNDER BRITISH RULE

terms. The consequence was that the rice millers cleared
a net profit of four annas, or fourpence, on every basket
of rice milled, and some of the larger firms were for
some time milling 80,000 baskets a day, and making a
clear profit of ;^ 1,333 daily. Under these exceptionally
favourable conditions firms that were considered rather
shaky at the end of 1892 retrieved a very sound position
in 1893, and those that were previously flourishing made
enormous gains. But the cultivators suffered a very
serious reduction of income, and the effect of this be-
came at once noticeable in a depressed state of general
trade. Exports of rice decreased largely, and there was
a considerable diminution in imports of metals, hardware,
and woollen goods. Heavy losses were incurred by
the import merchants, for the sudden fall in the value
of paddy seriously affected the power of the people,
throughout the richest and most populous tracts in the
province, to buy luxuries. After the first season the
merchants' combination collapsed. Certain of the firms
insisting on having as their share a larger percentage
of the paddy purchased than was under the previous
arrangement allotted to them in the spring of 1893 ; but
this new proposal was not consented to by the wealthier
firms, who had then had the lion's share of the raw grain.
With this collapse of the " paddy ring " the law of supply
and demand came into natural play again in 1894, al-
though it was some little time before the trade of the
province recovered entirely from the depressed state into
which it had suddenly been thrown by the rice millers'
combination.

Long before the grain ripens, as soon as calculations
seem justified, an official forecast is made, which is modi-
fied from time to time if necessary, as to what the total
yield of the coming harvest will probably be, and as to
the surplus which may be expected to become available
for export. Expressed in terms of the rupee, a sixteen-
anna crop means that the average quantity may be
expected per acre, while a twelve- anna crop would mean
that only three-quarters of the usual yield may be
anticipated.

Next in importance to rice and teak timber among the

438

CUTCH AND CAOUTCHOUC

exports to foreign countries is cutch, a very dark-
coloured solid extract obtained from boiling chips of the
Sha tree {Acacia Catechu), which grows abundantly
throughout all the tracts still under forest in the central
dry zone. Its finest and most vigorous development is
obtained, however, in the Thayetmyo, Prome, and Thar-
rawaddy districts of Pegu. It is thus a tree character-
istic of the areas of comparatively light rainfall, for
Burma ; and as cutch-boiling has been habitually resorted
to by the peasantry during the years of scarcity, which
have been of frequent occurrence of late, the supply of
mature cutch trees capable of yielding the extract in
remunerative quantities has in portions of the cutch
tracts become temporarily diminished. Besides exces-
sive production, other causes have also been simultane-
ously operating to affect the export trade, but the value
of cutch as one of the best of known dyeing stuffs will
probably always secure for it a favourable market at
remunerative rates. Of late years the reputation of
Burma cutch has sunk considerably on account of adul-
teration with other wood and bark extracts (from various
Terminalia and other trees), but measures have recently
been taken by the Government which should operate
successfully in effecting the discontinuance of such fraudu-
lent practices by the cutch -boilers. Cutch dyes a rich
dark brown, and is extensively employed in dyeing
canvas, fishing nets, yarn, etc. As yet no aniline pro-
ducts have been discovered which can be used as cheaper
and at the same time effective substitutes. From 7,827
tons, valued at ;^2 23,000, in 1895-96, the export sank
very considerably during the following years ; but it is
beginning to revive again, 6,301 tons, valued at ^162,274,
having been exported in 1 899-1 900, and the trade is
capable of considerable expansion in future.

Another article of minor forest produce suffering from
temporary depreciation is caoutchouc or india-rubber, the
sun-dried milky sap of the Ficus elastica. This tree is
only to be found growing indigenously in the dense moist
subtropical forest tracts to the north of Myitkyina,
Mogaung, and Indawgyi, and in the similar tracts in the
upper portion of the Chindwin drainage. It is collected

439

BURMA UNDER BRITISH RULE

by the wild Singpho or Kachin tribesmen, from whom it
is purchased locally by Chinese pedlars, and brought
down to Bhamo or Mogaung on the Irrawaddy side, or to
Kindat on the Chindwin, for collection of the Govern-
ment royalty before being further transported to Rangoon.
The trade in this commodity, now in great and increasing
demand in Europe, has also, like that in cutch, decreased
owing partly to unrestrained over-tapping of the trees
and partly to adulteration. The Chinese pedlars, who
go up trading into the Kachin tracts, swindle the wild
Kachins with false weights, while the latter try to over-
reach the pedlars by putting stones, earth, and bits of
bark in the balls of rubber to make them heavier. Of
late years, too, a large proportion of the inner part of the
rubber, which is rolled up like cordage into balls of about
seven or eight inches in diameter, has usually been made
up of "root-rubber," lighter in colour and inferior in quality
to the rubber obtained from the stem and branches. As
the tapping of the roots at the same time speedily leads
to the exhaustion of the tree, endeavours are being made
to stop this pernicious practice by cutting open every ball
on its arrival at the forest revenue station and charging an
enhanced rate of royalty on such proportion of the contents
as clearly appear to be root- rubber. At the same time
large forest reserves are being formed for the special pro-
tection of the india-rubber tree, and plantations will be
commenced so soon as such reserves have been legally
secured to the control of the Forest Department. Dur-
ing 1 899- 1 900 the total exports of caoutchouc were 291
tons, valued at ;^8o,562, including rubber of all descrip-
tions. The stock of Ficus elastica is much more limited
in Burma than in the adjoining province of Assam, and
there is little prospect of increased supplies becoming im-
mediately available. There are, however, various climb-
ing members of the Apocyneae family of plants common
throughout the forest tracts of Pegu and Tenasserim,
whose sap yields caoutchouc, or a substance almost
identical with it. From one of these, Kyetpaung
{Chavannesia esculenta) or " Tenasserim caoutchouc "
used to be collected and sold in the Shwegyin bazaar
more than twenty years ago, while Talat?igno {Parameria

440

RUBBER PLANTATIONS; COTTON

glandulifera), common in the tracts still under jungle to
the north of Rangoon, also yields a similar substance.
In view of the demand now existing for caoutchouc,
these possible new sources of supply seem well worthy
of attention.

To meet the requirements of the future, and to make
revenue from them, large rubber plantations have
recently been made in Lower Burma by the Forest
Department. There can be little doubt that if any
wealthy syndicate were prepared to form further exten-
sive plantations of this kind they would yield very
handsome returns within eight to ten years, while the
Local Government are probably prepared to offer facili-
ties for such enterprise by giving land on liberal terms
to suitable parties.

The export trade in raw hides and horns is one that
flourishes and shows signs of continuous expansion.
During the last twenty years it has almost trebled in
value, and now sometimes amounts to nearly half a
million hides, and close on 250 tons of horns, aggregating
nearly ;!^ 140,000 in value. When the Shan States, and
particularly the Southern Shan States, are more opened
out by the expansion of the railway system, this trade
should become much enhanced in volume.

Raw cotton is also an article of export which, already
extensive, should develope considerably in future years.
Unfortunately the cotton produced in Burma is short in
the staple, and therefore unsuited for the production of
the finer classes of twist and yarn ; but it is largely
exported to Japan, and also into western China byway of
Bhamo. The cotton-fields are situated in the heart of
the central dry zone of Upper Burma. The chief centres
of the industry are the tracts lying between Meiktila and
Myingyan, and the area situated to the north of the
Chindwin river near its confluence with the Irrawaddy.
As both of these land-locked areas have recently been
opened out by railways, this should give a stimulus to the
trade in raw cotton by bringing the produce within easy
reach of trading centres. Besides this, cotton for home
consumption is grown on the hill-clearings all over the
province. The cotton-seed is sown along with the rice, and

441

BURMA UNDER BRITISH RULE

the crop is collected after the grain has been harvested.
What is thus grown, however, is entirely consumed in
the jungle districts for weaving waist-cloths and other
articles of personal and domestic requirement. In
1 899- 1 900 the export of raw cotton to foreign countries
amounted to 4,386 tons, valued at ;^ 140,05 2.

Hitherto the cotton export business has been conducted
in the most primitive manner imaginable. No mill
existed in any part of the cotton-producing districts till
an enterprising Chinese firm established one at Mahlaing,
about halfway between Meiktila and Myingyan, in 1898.
The cleaning of the crop was done by hand-gins worked
by women and girls, the right hand being employed to
turn the handle while the narrow wooden rollers were
fed with the left hand.

The cotton trade is almost entirely in the hands of
Chinamen. Advances are made through their agents to
the cultivators during the spring, and the latter bind
themselves to deliver during the autumn, after the harvest-
ing and ginning operations have been completed, fixed
quantities of clean raw cotton at stipulated rates. From
personal inquiries made on the spot during the autumn
of 1896, I found that for every hundred rupees advanced
in spring the lender obtained during the following
November and December raw cotton to the value of
about one hundred and seventy rupees. He thus
secured interest amounting to seventy per cent, within
less than a year, leaving out of consideration the trade
profit which would accrue to him from the sale of the
produce thus bought. Even though rainfall be precari-
ous and uncertain in the main cotton-producing tracts,
yet this business is on the whole safe as well as highly
lucrative. If bad debts are sometimes made, there is
really very little risk in the long run. The recent open-
ing up of the Meiktila-Myingyan and the Sagaing-A16n
tracts by branch railways ought to bring very apparent
advantages to the cotton growers, while leading to possi-
bilities of improvements in the quality of the cotton
produced, if the use of Egyptian and American seed be
encouraged. It seems rather surprising that this cotton
trade has not yet succeeded in attracting the attention of

442

PARAFFIN; JADE; PIECE-GOODS

European firms. After making the personal inquiries
in 1896 I brought the subject up in conversation with a
partner in one of the large European firms in Rangoon,
but was astonished to hear that, even with the profits
attached to it, the cotton business was thought not to be
worth their attention.

A large and expanding export trade is also carried on
in paraffin and wax manufactured in refineries at Rangoon
from the " earth-oil " drawn from the wells in the Myin-
gyan and Minbu districts. This petroleum is said to
contain a larger percentage of paraffin than any of the
mineral oils of Russia or America, and is therefore of
great technical value as a lubricant for machinery. The
exports of lubricating oil and paraffin wax amount to
;^ii4,i59 in value, while large quantities of refined oil
are used locally for illuminating purposes. But the exist-
ing oil-wells of Burma are unable to supply the demands
of the country in the latter respect, for since 1896 over
two million gallons of kerosene are annually imported,
chiefly from America, for this purpose.

The only other article of export on any considerable
scale is jade, from the jade mines north of Mogaung,
which is annually shipped to Singapore and China to the
extent of about 200 tons, valued at more than ;i^47,5oo.
This trade is entirely in the hands of Chinamen, and is
of rather a speculative nature ; for there is nothing on
the exterior of the rough blocks to indicate the quality of
the jade in the heart of the stone.

Of the imports, amounting in i899-i900to ^^8,391,029
in value, less than one-half consists of direct shipments
from foreign countries, the bulk arising from the British
Indian coasting trade.

By far the largest of the direct foreign imports are
cotton, silk, and woollen piece-goods, which amount to
about one million pounds a year, while cotton, twist, and
yarn average over ;^300,ooo. Manufactured silks are
imported to the extent of over ^^ 200,000, besides raw
silk to the value of over ;^ 100, 000. During the last
few years silks of Japanese manufacture have gradually
been supplanting English silks in a marked degree.
Silk is also grown to a fair extent in the country of a

443

BURMA UNDER BRITISH RULE

strong though rather coarse fibre, silkworms being prin-
cipally cultivated by tribes calling themselves Yabein,
which are scattered over the hilly tracts of the central
portion of Lower Burma. As the taking of life involved
in the process of getting the silk from the cocoons is
offensive to the principles of the Buddhist religion, these
Yabein are considered an outcast race. Silk-weaving by
hand-looms is still largely carried on near Mandalay, the
finest productions being from the looms of Amdrapura,
though this industry has been languishing ever since the
fall of the kingdom and court of Ava. The yellow robes
worn by the priesthood are still mostly made of native
silk dyed by means of boiling with chips of the jack-tree
(ArtocarpMS integrifolid) ; but for by far the greater part,
and especially in the more thickly populated districts
near the seaports, the silk articles of clothing now mostly
worn are the cheaper, gaudier foreign machine products
specially made for the Burma trade.

Among minor imports matches amount in value to over
;i^50,ooo a year. Formerly Swedish matches were to be
found in general use, and would be met with away far up
in the hill jungles when one had even got beyond the
range of coming across empty beer bottles used for hold-
ing oil and regarded as household treasures ; but now
the cheap fire-producing "Taendstickor " have been in
turn supplanted by similar and even cheaper articles of
Japanese manufacture.

In the trade with this portion of Britain's own territory
British goods are being undersold by those of foreign
manufacture. Most of the glassware, lampshades, etc.,
are made in Austria. Practically the whole of the many
hundreds of thousands of small wax candles, burned in
enormous numbers before sacred shrines and during
religious festivals, are imported either from France or
Belgium ; and in any bazaar, if one takes up teacups
bearing in gold letters inscriptions like " Forget me not "
or *• Remember me," the stamp below, enforced by the
Merchandise Act, will show that they have been " Made
in Germany." In Burma, as in most other parts of the
world, British trade in small miscellaneous articles is
being supplanted by foreign countries, which give more

444

SUGAR AND SALT

attention to petty details calculated to attract the
purchaser and to readily suit his convenience or his
peculiar taste.

For the rice trade large quantities of gunny bags are
requisite, which are all imported from Calcutta, as jute
is not grown in Burma. Though the obtaining climatic
and other physical conditions throughout the Irrawaddy
delta are suitable for its cultivation, yet the scarcity and
the high price of labour as compared with Lower Bengal
would hardly yet make any enterprise in jute remunera-
tive. The same drawbacks operate against the produc-
tion of various other commodities for the growth of
which the soil and the climate of the province are
otherwise well adapted. Thus sugar-cane grows well,
and is cultivated to a certain extent in the Amherst and
Thaton districts of Tenasserim ; but endeavours made
about a quarter of a century ago to work sugar-mills by
steam at Amherst and Martaban resulted in failure.
The cane is crushed in wooden presses and the juice
boiled down and formed into Kyantagd or cakes of
brown sugar, very much like coarse, inferior toffee in
appearance, which are sold throughout all the local
bazaars in the country. Wild indigo grows freely in
most of the Ponzo or weedy jungles, which spring up on
all temporary hill- clearings after the rice crop has been
harvested, and indigo is cultivated to a trifling extent
for domestic use in dyeing silk and cotton yarn. The
use of indigenous dyes and yarns is, however, being
restricted through cheap imports coloured with gaudy
aniline dyes. Salt-boiling is still carried on all along the
coast and at various places in Upper Burma, but large
imports from Europe and India are required to satisfy
the demand. Within the last twenty years the import
duty on salt has increased from ^3,300 to over ^80,000 a
year. Tobacco of excellent quality is largely grown on the
rich alluvial deposits left in the shape of mud- banks
thrown up on the inner bends of streams when the water
falls after the summer flood season. But the art of curing
is not properly understood ; and for the manufacture of
cheroots large quantities of tobacco leaf, inferior in
quality to what could be grown locally, are annually

445

BURMA UNDER BRITISH RULE

imported from Madras. The future possibilities of these
industries, and of others for which the soil and climate
of Burma are equally well suited, at present remain
undeveloped because of the scantiness and the high cost
of labour. These are drawbacks to commercial develop-
ment which cannot be obviated or removed merely by
the influx of capital into the province, while at the same
time they operate very strongly against attracting it.

If sound measures could only be devised for importing
large quantities of labour at fair rates, there would then
be no reason why tea and coffee gardens under European
supervision should not be opened out with good remu-
nerative prospects on the Shan hills, or why Burma
should not also have a share in the expanding export
trade to Europe in these commodities now almost con-
fined to Assam and Ceylon. Coffee of excellent quality
is produced at Thandaung, near Toungoo, at an elevation
of about 4,200 feet. Great quantities of Letpety or
" pickled tea," consumed largely by the Burmese, are
produced by the Shans at Pase and other places on the
northern Shan hills. Hitherto this has been conveyed
by coolies and bullocks to Mandalay, but henceforth this
carrying trade will fall to the new railway line. Within
easy reach of this Mandalay- K union railway — as, for
example, around Pyaunggaung — there are large tracts
of high lands very suitable, so far as soil and climate are
concerned, for tea production ; while perhaps even better
sites for the growth of finer qualities of tea are obtainable
further south on the range of lofty hills, within a short
distance of the base of which the Rangoon- Mandalay line
of railway runs parallel.

As pursued on the Shan hills at present, this industry
is followed in the most uneconomical manner. The
shrubs are annually stripped of leaves to an excessive
extent without being manured or tended : hence they
are mostly in a chronic state of enfeeblement, the
branches and twigs being often thickly covered with
lichens and beard- mosses whose production is favoured
by the cool elevation and the damp foggy climate during
a great part of each year.

The following extract from the ofticial diary of the

446

THE SHAN STATES

forest officer in charge of the Southern Shan States
Division may perhaps convey a good idea as to the
suitability of some of the available highland tracts for
tea cultivation under resident European supervision : —

2T^rd April, 1898. — Moved camp to Mene Taung village, at an
altitude of 5,800 feet. This village is situated on the high range to
the west of Pindaya, and is only seven miles from that place. It was
reported on by Lieutenant Pottinger some years ago as being a very
suitable place for a sanatorium, and our short experience there confirms
his opinion. It was most delightfully cool up there, so much so that
we sat out in the sun till midday.^ There is no lack of water, and to
the south there is any amount of level ground. The uncleared portions
are covered with high dense evergreen forests of oaks, chestnuts,
magnolias, laurels, the Siibo (dwarf Zizyphus) Cedrela Toofia, and a great
many other trees. The hill-sides are clothed with wild strawberries
and violets, and two species of roses are also very common. Ivy is
found growing on the stems of most of the trees, and two or three
varieties of it were noticed. The inhabitants of this village are
Taungthus, who live chiefly by indigo cultivation ; but to the north
are several Palaung villages, some of them at an elevation of 7,000 feet.
The Palaungs go in chiefly for poppy cultivation (opium). There is a
nice substantial Zayat (native rest-house) here, and a good Pdngyi
kyaung (monastery). Mene Taung is situated on what used to be the old
trade route into Burma via the Natteik pass, and it is only forty miles
from the railway. To the north of the village the hills gradually get
higher and higher till they culminate in the Momachot Taung at an
altitude of 7,800 feet, some four miles from Mene Taung.

The inland trans-frontier import and export trade
with Siam, Karenni, the Shan States, and Yunnan,
registered at nineteen stations in Upper Burma and nine
in Lower Burma, amounted to .^2,047,314 in 1899-
1900. Improved communications by road from Myit-
kyina, Bhamo, and Namkhan into Yunnan, the growing
prosperity of the Shan States under peaceful administra-
tion, and the construction of the Mandalay-Kunlon
railway, all point to the certainty of a continuation of the
expansion of trade in these directions, although the
possibilities of such expansion must, of course, be
confined within far narrower limits than may ultimately
be prescribed for trade in the staple products of Burma
itself.

The caravan routes between Burma and Yunnan are

1 April is the hottest month in Burma. 7aw«^ means a hill, a mountain.

447

BURMA UNDER BRITISH RULE

the northern tracks by Momein (Tenyuehfu) and Talifu,
and the southern track by Namkhan, and thence vii
Sawadi, Mansi, Maingma, and Lunghin to Yungchang.
The old estabHshed route to Momein was from Bhamo,
up the Taiping river, navigable for about 120 miles, to
Mamo (Sikaw), and thence via Manwaing ; but, with the
recent extension of the railway line to Myitkyina, a new
track has now been opened out by way of Sadon.
Though shorter, this new track is reported to be steeper ;
and, in any case, there is little probability of the traffic
down the Taping river to Bhamo being extinguished
by total deflection to Myitkyina. In 1889— 1900 the
total trade with Yunnan amounted to about ;^2 90,000.

Previous to the annexation of Upper Burma, and for
two or three years after that, the chief import into
Bhamo from Yunnan was opium. This is the staple
product of Yunnan, and with it that province was
accustomed to pay for the whole of its imports. After
the annexation the transport and sale of opium were
absolutely prohibited in Upper Burma, but in 1888 the
Opium Act was introduced to provide for the require-
ments of Chinese and natives of India, and to regulate
the traffic in this drug amongst the non- Burmese
permitted to use it. The Excise Act was also applied to
Upper Burma in the same year. Between 1886 and
1888 the sale of opium, except to Chinese, its transport
in quantities of more that three tolas (of 180 grains each),
and the keeping of opium shops were prohibited, while
the licensing of excise shops was permitted only where
a real necessity existed for liquor to be consumed by
Europeans, Indians, or Chinese. After the introduction
of these Acts no excise licenses or opium shops were
allowed in any place where the non- Burmese portion of
the population was not considerable, and reasonable
measures were taken to restrict the sale of intoxicants
to Burmese. The import of opium from Yunnan
was permitted on payment of a duty of thirty rupees per
viss of 3-65 lb., which was enhanced by two rupees a
viss in 1896-97, and a purchaser might buy ten tolas of
opium, whereas in Lower Burma only three are obtain-
able by a single purchaser. Imports of Chinese and Shan-

448

TRADE WITH SIAM

Chinese opium soon, however, became supplanted to a
large extent through Government imports of the Bengal
drug of better quality ; but a considerable amount of
smuggling no doubt takes place on the part of the trade
caravans. Handwoven silks were also brought down in
small annual quantities from Yunnan, but this too has
been gradually driven back by the cheaper sea-borne
supply. At present the chief articles of import are
mules, cordage, fruits, honey and wax, iron, brass, and
copper articles, tea, leaf-gold and orpiment ; while the
exports consist mostly of raw cotton, salt, piece-goods,
jade, betel-nuts, cutch, and petty articles like matches,
soap, and candles. The trade is in the hands of
Yunnanese or Shan-Chinese, a fine stalwart race ot
rosy-cheeked men, picturesquely clad in coarse light-blue
cotton clothing, but usually filthy to a degree, who would
probably provide excellent raw material for troops if
found amenable to soldierly discipline. The caravan
trade to Bhamo and Myitkyina is carried on with mules
and bullocks.

Trade with the Shan States is entirely in the hands ot
Shans, and is carried on by means of pack bullocks and
ponies. The imports consist mainly of cattle, ponies,
hides, leather and metal articles, large-brimmed flexible
straw hats, pickled and dry tea, stick-lac, black varnish,
gums, ginger, cigar leaves, chillies, limes, and til-seed ;
and the exports include twist and yarn, piece-goods,
petroleum, salted and dried fish, salt, tobacco, oranges,
betel-nuts, matches, candles and the like.

Except as regards the import of teak timber, the trans-
frontier trade with Siam is of much the same minor class
as with the Shan States. Trade with Siam amounted in
1899-1900 to about ;!^355,ooo; but in considering this,
as also the trade with the Southern Shan States and
Karenni (^211,000), it must be recollected that the
statistics include the value of teak timber imported into
Moulmein by the Salween river, and that this ranges
from ;^2 50,000 to ;i^300,ooo in value annually.

The greater portion of the inland trans -frontier trade
is with the Northern and Southern Shan States,
respectively amounting to ;!^6i6,667 and ^575,556 in

449 G G

BURMA UNDER BRITISH RULE

1 899- 1 900, which are British possessions ; and it is there
that the best prospects exist of extending commerce by-
means of opening up the country with railways. The
relative merits of the Southern Shan States and Yunnan
in this respect have, however, been elsewhere discussed
{vide chapter ii. vol. ii.).

The management of affairs connected with the port of
Rangoon is in the hands of a Port Trust, consisting of
merchants elected by the Rangoon Chamber of Com-
merce and of officials nominated by Government.
Apart from the Chamber of Commerce, there is no
general or special organization for the conduct of
business affairs. There is no central mart or exchange,
even in Rangoon. Commercial transactions are mostly
conducted by brokers of different nationalities who go
about from office to office ascertaining how they can
most advantageously place orders they have received for
the purchase or sale of produce of all kinds. To obtain
a proper knowledge of the import business and to keep
in touch with its pulse, it is essential that merchants and
their assistants should maintain themselves au courant
with what passes in the " bazaar," the eastern equivalent
of " the city " in its mercantile sense. This is a very
comprehensive term, including not merely the municipal
and other local bazaars for the retail vend of articles ot
every description, but also the whole of the business
quarter of any town.

The petty bazaar trade of the country is still largely
in the hands of Burmese — and more especially of Bur-
mese women, who are endowed with very keen trading
instincts. Most Burmese women keep a stall in the local
bazaar at some time of their lives, where they trade in
commodities suited to the capital they can command,
and varying from cheroots and petty articles of food up
to costly silks and satins. But at all the large centres of
trade Burmese women have now to undergo a very keen
competition from Parsis and other natives of Upper
India from Bengal to Bombay. Burmese men would
have no chance against the latter. Above all other
things the Burman loves dolce far niente, and principally
in the form of smoking and sleeping. For such lazy,

450

PETTY BAZAAR TRADE

inert male competitors the subtle, watchful, greedy and
alert Bengali, — the Graeculus esuriens of the East, — the
Parsi, or the Mogul is far more than a match : but the
Burmese girl or woman holds her own, and will still hold
it for some time yet, in the bazaar arts of persuasion and
of bargaining for the sale of her goods.

Except in so far as concerns brokerage and dealings in
up-country produce, with regard to which their intimate
knowledge of and relations with the producers give
them peculiar advantages, the Burmese are gradually
but surely being ousted from trade by natives of India
and by Chinese. Both of these latter show great busi-
ness capacity, and both intermarry very largely with
Burmese girls. The children of Indian and Burmese
unions, termed " Zerbaddi," are a handsome, sharp-witted
race, but the purely Mongolian offspring of mixed
Chinese and Burmese parentage is physically superior.
Between them, however, Indians and Chinese are bound
in course of time to rake into their hands most of the
bazaar trade which is still held by the Burmese in the
seaport towns.

Among the European merchants changes have also
been gradually going on during the last twenty or thirty
years, and the most notable of these is the manner in
which German firms have sprung up and secured a very
large share in the commerce. In many respects they
have supplanted the old class of Scottish merchants, who
were the great pioneers of eastern trade in former days.

This invasion of British seaports and this conquest of
a large and influential share in their trade are not con-
fined to Burma, for a precisely similar state of affairs
is also distinctly observable in Calcutta and Singapore ;
but it is unmistakable at all the four chief ports of Burma,
and more particularly with regard to the export business
in rice, the great staple product of the province. The
chief reason for this seems to be that the assistants in
the German firms come out better equipped for their
work, and are more assiduous in their duties, than the
young lads who are sent out to join the English and the
Scottish firms. These latter are fond of cricket, tennis,
riding, boating and other outdoor sports, and are natur-

451

BURMA UNDER BRITISH RULE

ally very pleased whenever, their daily task being com-
pleted, they can leave office or mill-yard to join in these
healthy pastimes ; whereas the young German assistant
is invariably ignorant of cricket, generally bad at tennis,
and only learns to ride, after a fashion, on his arrival in
Burma. But, from the moment of his advent in the
province, each young German assistant at once takes
the interest of a prospective partner in the affairs of his
firm, and thinks much less of amusement and of outdoor
exercises than of business.

Which of these views of life may be the preferable
when looked at from the broad human standpoint is
entirely beside the question ; but there can be no dis-
puting the fact that these essential differences with regard
to their assistants are most probably the chief causes
which have enabled German firms in Burma to acquire
a preponderating influence that seems disappointingly
strange in a British possession.

Some of these German merchants, after having been
local partners in the Burma firms for a given time, return
to the Fatherland, while the services of others, selected
for special business capacity, are transferred to the head
offices in London. The German rice firms of Burma
consequently become and remain English houses of
business ; but the home partners, the local partners, and
assistants are all Germans — and they remain so, unless
they happen to be selected for settling down permanently
in London as partners of the head firm controlling and
directing business affairs.

It is marvellous how ignorant the great majority of the
merchants and their assistants are about Burma and the
Burmese in general. Very few of them ever travel
throughout the country, except along some of the main
routes of railway or river communication ; and compara-
tively few of them would be able to make their way into
the interior without an interpreter, or to make personal
inquiries or obtain information affecting even their own
particular line of business. At all the trade centres
commercial transactions are usually arranged through
the medium of the English or the Hindustani language,
and a colloquial knowledge of Burmese is hardly any

452

POSITION OF GERMAN FIRMS

longer essential. But it of course stands to reason that
if merchants could, and would, equip themselves effi-
ciently in this respect, and would take the trouble to
travel about acquiring a personal knowledge of the possi-
bilities of the country and the requirements of the people,
this would naturally lead to the probable expansion of
trade at a quicker rate than will otherwise in any case be
bound to accrue.

But even in this matter the young German distinctly
excels his English and Scottish competitors. Though
not naturally more gifted with linguistic ability than the
average Englishman, by sheer assiduity he acquires an
earlier and often a better acquaintance with Hindustani,
and sometimes also of Burmese to an extent useful for
business. Hence he obtains success, as he deserves to,
because he works hard to achieve it.

Both financially and commercially Burma is in a
thoroughly sound position, and is developing in a
healthy and normal manner. Despite the Bay of Bengal
— that curse of Burma, cutting it off from direct touch
with the supreme Government in Calcutta or Simla — the
province is already one of the brightest jewels in the
Imperial diadem of India; and its lustre will increase in
proportion as inducements are offered for the influx of
the capital and the labour necessary for more rapid
development in the immediate future. And through the
recent fixation of the rate of exchange the first and main
step has been taken towards encouraging the inflow of
capital required for developing the rich natural resources
of the province.

453

APPENDIX

Summary of the last thirty-five sections of the Prime Minister's
Attasankhepa Vannand Dammathdt, or Institutes of Burmese Law
(1882), referred to in chapter vii., page 190 {q.v.) : —
T/i£ seven kinds of ivives are ^ —

a wife like a murderess, who is liable to be divorced although

she may have borne many children ;
a wife like a thief, who is liable to be divorced although she may

have borne many children ;
a wife like a master, who is liable to be divorced although she

may have borne many children ;
a wife like a sister, who should be cherished throughout her life ;
a wife like a mother, who should be cherished throughout her

life;

a wife like a slave, who should be cherished throughout her life ;

a wife like a friend, who should be cherished throughout her life.

Of the three kinds of wives that may be put away and the four kinds

of wives that may be cherished, the one that is like a slave is the most

excellent.

The wife who should not be put away.

The wife who respects her husband and looks after his material
comfort, shall not be put away, although she may be laid up with illness
for a length of time.

The six kinds of blemishes of a woman are —
taking intoxicating drinks ;
failure to take an interest in household affairs and in her duties

towards her husband, and idleness ;
finding fault or quarrelling with the husband ;
frequenting the houses of others ;
intimacy with another man ;

habitually sitting in the doorway of the house and looking at
other men.
The five kinds of improprieties of a woman are ^ —
impropriety with regard to property ;
impropriety with regard to dress ;
impropriety with regard to other men ;
impropriety with regard to looking ; and
impropriety with regard to food.

' Other details have already been given on page 182.
^ See also the fuller details already given on page 186.

454

APPENDIX

The four kinds of pride of a woman are —
pride of connexion ;
pride of birth ;
pride of property ; and
pride of beauty.
Treatment of a wife possessing any of the six kinds of blemishes, five
kinds of improprieties, or four kinds of pride —

If the wife possesses any of the six kinds of blemishes, five kinds of
improprieties, or four kinds of pride, the husband shall not divorce
her, but shall continue to live with her, checking her conduct with
instruction according to law.

The five kinds of tuives ivho may be put away —
If a man and wife have lived together eight or ten years and have no
children, the wife is a barren woman, and the husband may put her
away, but their conjugal relations need not be discontinued. They
may live together as usual, but, for the sake of offspring, the husband
may take a lesser wife. If the wife wishes to separate, let her take all
the property she brought to the marriage ; but, if there be no such
property, let the wife take one-tenth of the jointly acquired property
together with her wearing apparel. Let the husband take the remainder
and let them separate. A wife, who has had eight or ten female
children and no son, may be put away. She may not be put away by
the discontinuance of conjugal relations : their status as man and wife
may continue, but, for the sake of male issue, the husband may take a
lesser wife. If they wish to separate from each other, let the animate
and inanimate property be equally divided between them.

If a man, knowing a woman to be afflicted with leprosy, takes her to
wife, let him have her cured, and perform the rites of burial in a proper
manner on her death. If the husband wishes to divorce the wife, let
her take all the property that is in his possession. If the leprosy,
through her ill-fortune, appears after their marriage as first husband and
first wife, and not before, and if the wife wishes to separate, let her take
a suitable amount of property and separate. If the husband wishes to
separate, let him give her one-half of the property. If a wife commits
adultery, the husband may put her away in disgrace and may retain
all the animate and inanimate property. If a woman sullies the good
name of her family, the husband may take all the property and put her
away in disgrace.

The eight kinds of husbands whom the wife has the right to abuse are —
one who is excessively lascivious ;
one who is ill for a length of time ;
one who is very poor ;
one who is very stupid ;
one who is infirm ;
one who is very old and sluggish ;
one who is very lazy ;
one who is physically incapable.
If the wife loses patience and abuses or reviles any of the said kinds
of husbands, let her have the right of doing so.

The three kinds of husbands who may be put away are —
a man of bad or immoral character ;

455

APPENDIX

a man who is very lazy ; and
a man who is mad or imbecile.
If the wife loses patience and puts away any of such husbands, let
her have the right of doing so.

The two kinds of husbands whom the wife has the right of putting
away are —

one who is afflicted with leprosy, and
one who is frequently incontinent with the wives of others.
If the wife loses patience and desires to put away any of such hus-
bands, she shall have the right of doing so, but she shall not have the
right of taking the property.

The obligatory duty which a man and wife should specially observe is —
If either husband or wife is very ugly in appearance, or is afflicted
with leprosy, or has been ill for a length of time, he or she
shall be tended and supported by the other. The failure
of such duty shall be punished with forfeiture of property
and three months' imprisonment. If the wife has been ill
for a long time, and the husband wishes to enjoy the society
of a lesser wife, he shall first ask permission of his invalid
wife, who must accede to his request.
The twelve qualifications of a good wife are —
skilfulness in cooking ;
skilfulness in preparing betel and tobacco ;
skilfulness in washing the clothing of her husband in time ;
skilfulness in house-keeping ;
skilfulness in weaving ;
getting up from bed before the husband ;
retiring after the husband ;
eating after the husband ;
communicating all matters to the husband ;
suavity and affability in speech ;
not visiting the houses of others without cause ; and
obedience to her husband's commands.
The husband has no right to beat or abuse the wife who possesses
these twelve qualifications ; if he does so, he shall be liable to undergo
a heavy punishment. But those who do not possess these twelve
qualifications, may be corrected by beating or abusing them within the
hearing of the public.

The five qualifications of a good husband are —
striving to increase his wealth ;
providing a good house ;

tending and maintaining the wife with care and tenderness ;
looking after the cattle with care ; and

supporting the relations of both husband and wife without dis-
tinction.
The wife has no right to abuse the husband who possesses these five
qualifications ; if she does so, she shall be liable to undergo a heavy
punishment. But the wife has the right to abuse the husband who
does not possess these qualifications.

* * * * *

456

APPENDIX

The law of separation, with mutual consent, between a husband and
wife of the ruling class neither of whom has been married before —

If the husband and wife separate from each other with mutual con-
sent, let the wearing apparel of the wife be taken by her, and let that
of the husband be taken by him. Should the wearing apparel of one
party be more valuable than that of the other, let the former pay to the
latter the difference in value.

Further, as regards the three kinds of property, namely, property
brought at the time of marriage, property given by the King, and
property acquired through one's own skill or industry, let the party who
brought or acquired it take two shares, and the dependant one share ;
but, if the relative position of husband and wife in the acquisition of
such property be equal, let the said three kinds of property be equally
divided between them.

The debts shall be liquidated in the same proportion.

With regard to the children, let the father take the sons, and the
mother the daughters, and let each parent have the right of selling the
children thus obtained by an award at the time of separation. If a son
be sold by the mother, let her give half the proceeds to the father,
and if a daughter be sold by the father, let him give half the proceeds
to the mother. But the mother has the right of seUing the son on the
death of the father, and, on the death of the mother, the daughter may
likewise be sold by the father.

If, after separation, the parents contract another marriage and incur
debt for their subsistence, each of them may sell the children of the
former marriage who were allotted to him or her at the time of separa-
tion, provided that there are no children of the second marriage.

If there are children of the second marriage, and if the son (of the
former marriage) is sold by the mother, let the share which the step-
father would have received be given to the natural father ; and, if the
daughter is sold by the father, let the share which the step-mother
would have received be given to the natural mother.

The law of separation between a husband and wife of the ruling class,
neither of whom has been previously married, when only one party consents
to the separation —

If either husband or wife desires to separate from the other, let the
party wishing to separate take only his or her own wearing apparel, and
any property given by the King {Thinthi), and let hirn or her also bear
the law expenses. The other party not wishing to separate shall enjoy
all the property other than that mentioned above. If there be no debt
and no other property than property given by the King, the party wish-
ing to separate shall give to the party not so wishing compensation,
according to the status of such other party. With regard to any pro-
perty given by the King, let the receiver of the gift retain it.

The law of separation between a husband a7id wife of the ruling class,
neither of whom has been previously married, tvhen either of them is guilty
of a {matrimonial) fault —

If separation between the husband and wife takes place owing to the
commission of adultery by the wife, she shall be sent away with only
the clothes on her person, after being made to pay her husband the
price of her body and damages in the sum of forty ticals of silver for

457 H H

APPENDIX

the offence committed ; all the debts contracted shall be borne by her,
while the property, animate and inanimate, which belonged to both,
shall be enjoyed by the husband alone.

If separation occurs owing to the husband taking a lesser wife or
concubine, all debts contracted shall be paid by him, and he shall be
sent away with only the clothes on his person, while all the animate and
inanimate property which belonged to both, shall be enjoyed by the
wife alone.

It does not necessarily follow that a decree for separation should be
given on account of a single act of ill-treatment of the wife by the
husband ; on the contrary, they should continue to live together as man
and wife, a definite bond being executed by the husband to abstain from
the repetition of such ill-treatment. But if the wife refuses to continue
to live with her husband, let separation take place as in the case of
mutual consent. On the other hand, if, after their re-union, upon the
execution of the bond above-mentioned, the wife is dissatisfied with her
husband, and again desires to separate, let separation take place as in
the case of mutual consent. If, however, the husband refuses to be
bound by a bond and desires to separate, let separation take place in
accordance with the law of separation governing the case where the
husband is the offender. So too, if, after the re-union upon the execu-
tion of the bond, the husband fails to abide by its conditions, let there
be separation in accordance with the law of separation governing the
case where the husband is the offender.

The three kinds of Imvs of separation between a previously married
couple of the ruling class —

If there is separation, with mutual consent, between a previously
married couple of the ruling class, let the property originally brought
to the marriage be taken by the party who brought it ; and let the jointly
acquired property and debts be made into three portions, and let two
be assigned to the worker for enjoyment and liquidation, and one to
the dependant. If their relative position as worker and dependant is
equal, let an equal division be made. If there are children, let the
sons be taken by the father, and the daughters by the mother.

If, however, only the husband or the wife desires separation, let the
original property brought to the marriage be taken by the party who
brought It, and let the party wishing to separate take his or her wearing
apparel together with the Thinthi property given by the King, and let
hira or her pay the debts contracted by both and also bear the law
expenses. Let the party not wishing to separate, take all the jointly
acquired property. If there is only property given by the King and no
jointly acquired property, let the property given by the Kmg be retained
by the receiver of such sift- Let the party wishing to separate also pay
the other party, not so wishing, compensation according to the status of
such other party.

The law of separation between a previously married couple of the
ruling class, wheji either of the parties is guilty of a fnatrimonial offence,
is as follows —

If the separation takes place because of the wife's adultery, let the
property originally brought to the marriage be taken by the party who
brought it, and let the husband take the jointly acquired property

458

APPENDIX

together with property given by the King, and let the wife pay all the
debts contracted by both. Let her also give her husband the price of
her body as well as damages for the offence of adultery. If the separa-
tion takes place because the husband takes a lesser wife or concubine,
let all the debts contracted by both be paid by the husband, let the
property originally brought to the marriage be taken by the party who
brought it, let all the jointly acquired property, together with property
given by the King, be taken by the wife, and let the husband leave the
house with only the clothes on his person.

The law by which the three kinds of property are distinguished, showing
which is original property and which is jointly acquired —
The three kinds of property are as follows —

(i) original property brought to the marriage by the husband or
the wife ]

(2) property given to either of them by the King {Thinthi) ; and

(3) property inherited by them during married life.

These three kinds of property are original property, and property
accruing therefrom is acquired property.

A previously married man, 7iot lotig after his marriage with a maiden,
divorces her before any property has bei7i acquired —

If a previously married man, not long after his marriage with a maiden,
desires to divorce her before any property has been acquired, let him
give her as compensation the value of a pair of earrings because of the
deception on his part. This rule applies when the status of the husband
is inferior to that of the wife. If the status of the husband and wife is
equal, all the bridal presents and gifts made at the time of marriage
shall be taken by the wife. Should there be no such property, let the
husband give her one slave as compensation. Should the wife be preg-
nant, let the husband give her one male and one female slave. Should
he be related by blood to the wife, let him give her one male and one
female slave, whether she is pregnant or not.

A previously married woman, after her marriage with a man who has
not previously bee ft married, divorces him —

If a previously married woman, after her marriage with a man who
has not previously been married, divorces him, let her give him a suit
of clothes and a slave. If they separate before any property has been
acquired, let them do so with mutual consent.

The law of divorce between a husband and wife who have set up house —
If a husband and wife who have set up house separately (from their
parents) have effected a divorce, and if the wife does not return to the
house of her parents, but continues to live in the same house, she may
be treated as having no guardian, and the husband has the right of
resuming conjugal relations with her provided that he has obtained her
previous consent. If, on the other hand, the wife does not remain in
the house of her husband, but returns to her parents, let him not have
the right of resuming conjugal relations with her, even with her consent,
unless permission has been previously obtained from her parents, be-
cause she has again passed under their guardianship.

459

APPENDIX

A vian says to a woman having a husband, or a woman says to a man
having a wife, " Divorce your husband or wife, and I will marry you " —

When a man says to a woman having a husband, or a woman says to
a man having a wife, " Divorce your husband or wife, and 1 will marry
you," and the promisee, relying on the word of the promisor, does so,
but the promisor breaks the promise and refuses to marry, then all the
law expenses shall be borne by the party who so refuses.

The law forbidding the transfer of the property of one wife to another —

It is improper to transfer the property of the chief wife to the lesser
wife, or that of the lesser to the chief wife, or to mix up the property of
both. He, who does so, shall be punished, and the property that has
been transferred shall be restored to the rightful owner.

Marriage having been contracted between a previously married couple,
the law declaring the right to give away, without permission, to ivhom-
soever he or she pleases, the property which he or she has brought to the
marriage —

Marriage having been contracted between a previously married
couple, each party is entitled to give away, without the permission of
the other, to whomsoever he or she pleases, the property which he or
she has brought to the marriage. But this right shall not be exercised
in favour of a concubine or paramour, and shall not extend to the whole
of the property. Such right may only be exercised when the portion
given away is of reasonable quantity. The husband is, however, the lord
of the wife, and the wife is the mistress of the house, atid the most satis-
factory way is for one to give away such property, in reasonable quantity,
only with the consent of both.

liii'.lcr & Tanner, The Selwood Printing Works, Frome, and London.

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