With the Jungle Folk. A sketch of Burmese village life ... Illustrated by a Burmese artist

Preface

A former book on Burma was so kindly received that my indulgent critics must be held responsible for the appearance of this commonplace story of Burmese village life. Imagination has little part in it, save in the dacoit chapters. If I have made mistakes in these passages, correction by any one having dacoit experience will be gratefully received. I have no desire to " inform," but wish still less to misinform. For many useful hints and suggestions I have to thank Moung Gyee, son of Moung Kheen, and Pho Thin. I beg indulgence for my artist, who, as a " son of the town," is at a disadvantage in por traying jungle scenes. By the advice of my publishers, the majority of the pictures have been reproduced exactly as drawn, in order to preserve their character. vi

PREFACE.

Lest they should mislead the reader, it seems advisable to point out that this method of re production also serves to Ulustrate a conspicuous trait in the character of the race to which my artist belongs. His houses in many cases are disproportionately small : this is not because jungle vUlage houses are very minute, but because it is less trouble to draw a httle house than a big one. I had requested the artist, moreover, to represent one or two night scenes to correspond with the text, but he objected that as you could not see things in the dark you could not paint them. The light of day is therefore shed upon a few incidents which occurred at night. E. D. C. LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS Mah Pan at the Loom . . Frontispiece Out on the Kniins . . . To face page 6 " On Urgent Private Affairs " . . „ SO Bewitching the Water ... ,,62 The Sixteen Animal Game . . . „ 70 Propitiating the River Spirits . . „ 100 Ko Moung Galay's Gallant Defence of Myothit „ 156 Boh Tah's Visit to Nyounglay . . „ 22J). The Old Kyoung . . . „ 261,. Mah Tsay . . . . ,,298 The Funeral Obsequies of Oo Yan . . ,, 308 The Bridegroom .... „

Chapter I

Moung Pho Lone squatted on the platform of the little watch-hut puffing his cheroot, while he gazed blankly over his knees at the night. Before, and on either hand, the whispering grain waved in moonlit billows through deepening dusk to the jungle outlined black and ragged against the purple sky, a grey sea murmuring in the night wind. Now an owl chased its shadow over the paddy as it ranged for rats ; now a beetle boomed past ; and now the pariah curled up on the ground below the hut growled in his sleep as if the sambhur beUing on the wooded hills behind disturbed him. A bunch of thin coir ropes tied round a bamboo at Pho Lone's feet starred away like limp telegraph lines on the poles which carried them over the paddy ; and the moon picked out the dangling bamboo clappers which by day scared birds from the ripe ears.

Pho Lone, swathed in his pasoh, his arms on his A knees and his chin on his arms, stared out at the skyline. " You do not sleep," said a drowsy voice inside the hut. " Why do you not sleep ? " Pho Lone took his cheroot from his mouth, and without turning his head, answered that he did not wish to sleep yet. " It is courting time," said another voice, also drowsy, " therefore Pho Lone must remain awake." Pho Lone shifted his feet uneasUy, and said, laughing, that Moung Yeik was one of the wise men who could tell what another's thoughts were. But the creaking of the bamboos showed that he was roused from those thoughts whatever they might be. You could not move in the hut without making it creak and tremble all over. It was only required for two or three weeks while the grain was ripen ing, and a bundle of bamboos and some brushwood serve to build a hut that will give shelter from sun and dew ; it was not much larger than a big dog-kennel and was perched on a platform as high as your hand could reach.

" I think Moung Maw is now in Mah Hehn's house sitting at Mah Pan's side," said Mouug Yeik presently. " I think so too," said Pho Lone ; but the bamboos creaked again and louder. " Nevermind, my friend," yawned Moung Yeik, " when the field work is finished, I will go with you every evening to Mah Hehn's and sit with deaf ears." Pho Lone replied that it was very good, and that he should remind Moung Yeik of his promise ; then to escape more teasing he got up and crept in to his mat. The night was chiUy, and he was glad to draw his old red blanket over his head ; but for long after the others were snoring he lay awake think ing jealously of Mah Hmway Pan and Moung Maw. He could imagine them sitting side by side in her mother's house, while young Tha Tway, Moung Maw's brother, squatted on the verandah looking another way.

Last year Pho Lone had enjoyed the weeks spent guarding the paddy before harvest as much as any one. It is pleasant to lie all day in the shade smoking and chewing betel, with nothing to do except give the clapper ropes a puU now and again ; and as birds come to feed only in the early morning and evening, the watcher may sleep all through the heat of the day. But last year Pho Lone was not in love with Mah Pan, and that made aU the difference. The hut was a great way from Myothit village, and the baying of the pariahs sounded quite faint in the distance. By daylight one might walk nearly in a straight line to the village along the low bunds which divide the fields, or go round through the shady jungle, which was the pleasanter way though three times as far. Neither path was good after AVITH THE JUNGLE FOLK dark ; the bunds were full of holes in which you might break your legs, and it is not weU to walk in the jungle at night because of demons and evil spirits.

In any case it was too far to go merely to see a girl, and Pho Lone only felt that it was bad luck Moung Maw's being able to visit Mah Pan at young man's time, while he himself could only see her hy day when women are not sweet. How ever, in a week or so the paddy farthest from the village would be cut and he should be able to live at home again, when he would make up for lost time. But the paddy must be protected : how late it was now, the moon shining in through the chinks like that. Moung Maw must certainly have left Mah Hehn's now ; it was a pity Moung Maw was a carpenter ; if he had been a cultivator he would have to come and guard his crops. Pho Lone was asleep. The deer stole hke ghosts from the blackness of the jungle and stood in the shadows snuffing and pricking their ears ; only the complaining screech of the owls above the scream of the crickets dis turbed the night, and they stalked slowly down the grass slope and across yesterday's stubble to eat their fill of the standing grain.

Then the wild swine, like the shadow of a cloud, came out for their share. There was plenty for all, but two young hogs fell to quarrelling and woke the pariah, who ran out and barked both deer and pigs back to the forest before Moung Yeik shouted to silence him. Then the owls and crickets had the moonlight to themselves again. The other two were still asleep under their blankets when Pho Lone awoke in the morning and sat up on his mat to look out. It was very cold. A white shroud of mist lay on the flats, hiding all but the crowns of the distant trees ; the paddy drooped under the weight of dew, and water dripped heavily from the roof. The red sun, just peeping over the jungle, gave no warmth, and Pho Lone, shivering, was half inclined to roU himself up again and wait tUl one of his friends should wake and light the fire.

But they seemed so sound asleep and he was so cold that he folded his blanket over his head and shoulders and crept out over the wet bamboos, down the ladder, to the blot of ashes whereon lay the charred ends of three logs which were being burned whole to save the work of cutting up. The logs were still smoulder ing under the feathery ash, so Pho Lone tucked his pasoh about his hips and went to work. They were thick as his thigh, and in length twice the stretch of his arms ; but standing astride he knit his fingers underneath and swung the glowing ends together ; then, having laid a few sticks against the embers, crouched to blow up a blaze. He had to stop for breath many times before he got anything but a lazy curl of smoke, for the sticks were green, and damp with dew besides : but in about the time needed to boil a pot of rice WITH THE JUNGLE FOLK 6 flame burst up, pale in the brightening sunshine, and Pho Lone sat back on his heels to warm himself.

The fire had begun to burn briskly when the creaking of bamboos made him turn to see Shway Toon coming down the ladder. " You always wake when there is fire," said Pho Lone a little crossly. " Yes," answered Shway Toon with a chuckle. " Ho, neighbour ! there is fire." Moung Yeik came out at once, wrapping his blanket about him. He squatted beside Pho Lone and, looking in his face said gravely it was much trouble to light the fire on such a morning. Pho Lone did not answer. Moung Yeik was chewing betel, so it was plain he had been awake for some time. The sun rose higher and roUed away the mist to see a shining golden sea where the moon saw a cold grey one : the dew-fall from the roof grew slow and stopped, and the diamonds vanished from the grass. A family of crows came and perched on the hut to see if there was anything to steal, and finding the rice-pot not even on the fire, flew away scolding, towards the viUage.

Then a chattering flight of parrokeets swept like a bow down from the jungle and dropped into the gram. " Birds," said Shway Toon. Moung Yeik, who was nearest, shook off his blanket, and reaching OUT ON THE KWINS for the ropes overhead, pulled till the clappers rattled and rag streamers danced. A flutter, a swelling roar of wings and the parrokeets poised to fly off shrieking. There was no breakfast for them on the kwins nowadays ; cobwebs of scares stretched from a dozen little huts peeping above the paddy like rocks in the sea. It is only for a little whUe after sunrise in the cold season that the fire is pleasant, and the young men, who had already begun to edge away from it, now threw off their blankets and twisted up their hair. It was time to think about morning rice, so Pho Lone filled the chatty and set it on the fire ; they were not going to work until the people came out from Myothit.

Rice had been eaten and cheroots smoked before the screeching of cart-wheels told that the vUlagers had set out. Pho Lone, looking round from time to time, followed the carts by the dust-cloud. " There are many people coming I think ; hear the wheels." "Yes," replied Moung Yeik, smUing at him, " every one in Myothit comes to-day, except the carpenter." Pho Lone laughed. Moung Maw was very busy just now repairing his neighbours' paddy boats which had been drawn up on the creek bank ever since the end of last hot weather. There was always something to be done to each before it was ready to launch again ; new oar posts to put in, split planks to replace, or perhaps a crack to caulk and clamp in the great hoUowed log which forms the lower hull. Several of the village boats were already in the water waiting for the cargoes of grain they would carry to Bassein for sale at the English miUs, but Pho Lone knew that Moung Maw had still many days work to do on Moung Byoo's big boat, which carried fourteen hundred baskets of paddy.

Pho Lone took particular interest in that boat for Moung Byoo was Mah Pan's father. The screaming and groaning of the wheels on their ungreased wooden axles began to grow louder again after being nearly lost by distance, and the carts could be seen coming round in the jungle shade. The heavy water-buffaloes moved slowly, but presently you could hear the tong tong of the bells at their necks and then the voices of the young men and women. At last they clattered down the bank into the stubble while the girls, packed tightly in the carts, clung to each other, screaming and laughing by turns. The drivers unyoked the cattle and sent them away in charge of the little boys to graze, while the girls shook out their tameins and waded through the long straw to the hut where Pho Lone and his friends squatted awaiting them.

" I think everybody in the village has come to day," Pho Lone called to Mah Pan who, with one or two other girls, was sitting down in the scanty shade to light her cheroot. He had not moved when she approached and she did not seem to see him, though she knew quite well he was there. She glanced up now and smiled, so he took courage and went to sit near her. She looked very pretty this morning : her working dress, an old cotton tamein of faded pink check, left her plump arms and shoulders bare to the breast, while its single fold hinted the soft curves of her figure. Three white blossoms set off the blackness of her smoothly coiled hair, and in her ears she wore yellow glass nadoungs thick as Pho Lone's finger. Yery few girls of her age could wear such thick ones, for stretching the holes the borer makes with his needle is painful.

Mah Mee, who sat beside her, wore nadoungs no thicker than a paddy straw ; but then Mah Mee did not think so much about her appearance ; her skin was much darker than Mah Pan's, and her mother used to say she had a nose as big and as thin as an Englishwoman's ; so it would have been odd if she had thought herself pretty. Nevertheless, everybody in Myothit liked Mah Mee. " Why do you stay out here on the kwins?" Mah Pan asked Pho Lone who sat staring at her. Pho Lone replied that she knew he came on account of his old father ; if he did not do the scaring his father must and he always got pains in his bones if he slept out in the fields. "I do not like to stay," he added looking at her. Mah Pan did not believe that ; she thought he liked the easy hfe. Anyhow it showed that he did not care to come and see her.

Pho Lone protested, but she would not listen, turning her back on him to talk to Mah Mee. Of course he was not going to court a snub before everbody, so he went to sit with some of the neighbours who sat smoking and talking tiU the kuUah coolies should come before they began work. The Myothit cultivators could not get in their great crop of paddy without help ; so at each harvest they sent to Bassein to hire the big, black Strangers from the West, who were always eager to earn money. There is no work for coolies in the rice miUs until the grain is brought to market, and they were glad to come to the jungle and help reaping. They could not speak Burmese, but that did not matter as they knew what they had to do and nobody wanted to talk to them. They were not at all like Burmese people. You could see that now as they filed along the bunds on their way out.

They walked one behind another, a long line of men, solemn as buffaloes and as silent. All were dressed alike : a dirty, blue rag about the loins, and another round the head, and a string with a key tied round the waist, was the dress of each. " What does a kuUah keep in his box ? " asked Moung Yeik, as the coolies streamed off the bund and squatted in a group a little apart. " Clothes and pice," suggested a neighbour. " I think he wears all his clothes," said Moung Yeik, coming nearer the truth than he supposed. " I know what he keeps there," struck in another man. " I can tell." " TeU ! " said everybody turning to him. " He keeps things belonging to Men." " Moung Pay thinks of the big bundle of cheroots a kuUah stole from his boat at the mill last season," laughed Moung Yeik. " He could not teU which one took them."

" How can one tell ? " asked Moung Pay. " The animals are all alike." " They are," agreed several men. " Their black faces are all quite the same." " Now then," said Moung Byoo, going to the coolies and pointing to the paddy, " work ! work ! " The strangers blinked at him stupidly for a minute ; then one grunted and took up his sickle, like a great bird's claw stuck through the end of a handle. The vUlagers watched them working for some time before any one thought of moving ; when you can hire kullahs who seem reaUy to like work it is stupid to exert yourself more than you must. But presently Ko Moung Galay, the headman of Myothit, jerked himself upon his feet, saying, " Go ! " And the rest got up slowly, tucked up their pasohs, and drifted out to reap. Pho Lone was the last to go ; he lingered on, hoping Mah Pan would speak to him.

But she would not look his way, and at last he rose in a huff and went to take his place in line with the rest, who were cutting paddy in intervals of talk and laughter. Reaping is very hard work, because after the paddy has been laid by dragging a bamboo over it you must stoop to cut off the ears, and stooping with the sun on one's bare back is tiring ; so naturaUy you stop pretty often to stretch your self and see how your neighbours are getting on, or to take a few pulls at a cheroot. The coolies did much more than the village men. When Moung Byoo threw down his sickle and stroUed back to the hut to rest, their line was far in front. But then they had been promised an extra rupee each if the work were finished quickly, and, as Moung Yeik said, a kuUah wiU do anything to have a few more pice to count before he goes to sleep at night.

Pho Lone sat down near Mah Pan, but he did not speak to her and tried not to look that way. Two or three times she spoke of Moung Maw so that he might hear, but he took no notice even when she told Mah Mee that Moung Maw was going to row in her father's boat when they took the paddy to Bassein. "Moung Maw!" exclaimed Mah Mee, "why does he row in your father's boat ? " Mah Pan laughed. " I think he likes to do so this year," she said. " I think you wiU go in the boat," said Mah Mee. Mah Pan was not sure, but thought perhaps she should go one trip. Moung Byoo would certainly go three or four times, and her mother intended to accompany him to see that he did not gamble away all the money. Pho Lone could hardly keep stUl while he listened to this. Mah Pan meant him to hear what she was saying ; he could tell that by her voice.

" Your mother grows very careful," said Mah Mee after a pause. " Why is she so careful ? " " She wishes to earn Merit," answered Mah Pan. " She says she must gain koothoo, and wishes to build a little kyoung." Mah Mee took her cheroot from her lips and stared. Mah Hehn had often said that she should like to perform this Work of Merit ; but so had many other women and men in Myothit. It was news that she reaUy meant to do it, though one does not save money without a purpose. The village hpoongyee was always telling his supporters that the person who built him a new monastery would thereby gain very great Merit and much honour. But the work would cost three or four hundred rupees, and nobody had thought seriously of it. Certainly the kyoung in which the holy man now lived was very old and ruinous.

It leaned over to one side, there were great gaps in the plank walls, and the boards in several places were so hollowed by white ants that you could push }Tour finger right through. Ko Moung Galay, Moung Byoo and other men had gained a good deal of merit by making repairs when they had wood and leisure to devote to the task ; but they were content to stop at that, though each one agreed with the hpoongyee that a new monastery would gain far more for the builder than for the priest who consented to dweU in it. It would have been strange had they denied it, when everybody knew that to build the kyoung would be an action so meritorious that the builder might make his mind tolerably easy about future existences ; while the hpoongyee could gain nothing by moving from his old ruined dwelling into a new one.

The only wonder was that some one had not seized such an opportunity long ago. At any other time Pho Lone would have been quite as much interested as Mah Mee in Mah Hehn's project ; but just now he could think of nothing save what he had heard about Mouno- Maw ; and when the shadows, creeping under the hut, told that it was time to resume work, he went out into the field without having spoken a word to Mah Pan. He was not going to talk to a girl who slighted him as she did, and he would not go and see her any more after this. He grasped his sickle and sawed off great handfuls of ears as though cutting himself free, but he heard her gay voice above the hum of talk about him and felt like a fish in a net. By-and-by the women came to gather up the cut paddy and pUe it with the grain inwards to await the sleds and carts which would carry it to the threshing-floor.

Pho Lone's heart gave a leap, for he heard Mah Pan's voice behind him. There were fifty swathes to choose from and she had chosen his or one very near it. He did not look round ; every sheaf she coUected brought her nearer, but he went on cutting without turning his head ; she should not think he knew she was there. " You work very hard." Pho Lone nearly dropped his sickle half way through a bunch of straw, for Mah Pan was sitting close behind him. She smiled as he stood up straight and turned. " Everybody had breakfast in your father's house this morning," she remarked. As Moung Let was chief partner in the twenty acres of land he farmed with Shway Toon and Moung Yeik, and it was their paddy which had been reaped to-day, it was hardly necessary for Mah Pan to come for the express purpose of tell ing him that.

If Moung Let had not invited his neighbours to eat the morning rice at his house when he asked their help, it would have been very strange — quite unheard of in Myothit or any- Avhere else. Moung Let would never neglect the civility expected by ancient custom. Pho Lone said yes, he supposed so, and stood turning his sickle in his hands. " In whose boat do you row this season ?" Mah Pan asked suddenly, after a silence. Pho Lone did not know ; he had not thought about it yet ; there was plenty of time. " My father is already engaging rowers," said Mah Pan drawing a straw through her fingers. Pho Lone thought it was wise of her father ; he wanted many rowers for that big boat. Mah Pan thought so too. He had engaged nearly aU his crew now she believed : Moung Gyaw, Poh Sein, Loo Oung, Zah Nee, and — and several others.

Her father always liked to engage his rowers early and so get the best oarsmen of the strong young fellows in Myothit. Pho Lone observed that he had a very good crew last season ; and, as Mah Pan did not seem to have any more to say, balanced his sickle as if to begin work again. " If my father asks you to row, wUl you come?" she asked smiling. Pho Lone tried to hesitate but could not. He smiled back and said he would take an oar if Moung Byoo wanted him. " It is very good," said Mah Pan, " he wiU ask you ; I will tell him. I am going in the boat." She smiled again and got up to rejoin the other women ; for the sun was low now and the little boys were already dragging the buffaloes by their nose lines to the carts. n

Chapter II

" Stop then ! " cried Pho Lone pulling at the driving lines. " Stop ! " The screeching of the wheels died in a groan as the buffaloes answered the tugs at their noses and stood stUl, sawing their necks against the yoke. Pho Lone uncurled himself to push one beast's quarters out with his foot that he might get down, for Shway Toon, who sprawled on top of tbe load, was calling that paddy had fallen off. He went back, raked up the scattered ears with his fingers and packed them into the cart, grumbling. " Can't you hold it on better 1 " he asked his friend who peered down at him. " Four times now paddy has fallen and we have come a very little way." Shway Toon squirted a mouthful of red betel juice and replied that he could keep the load firm if the cart were properly driven ; he thought his young friend could not drive buffaloes very well.

Pho Lone grunted contemptuously and told him he had better come down and drive himself. But Shway Toon only rolled his chew and smiled ; it was pleasanter to he up there on the paddy than squat on the cart-pole jamming one's back against the load to avoid being shaken off. Pho Lone climbed back to his perch on the pole between the buffaloes' buttocks and poked up the cattle, bawling his opinion of Shway Toon above the squeal of the axles. It was impossible for any one to drive smoothly over the kwins. The long stubble hid places where the ground was so soft that the wheel sank half-way to the hub, shooting off great swathes of paddy in spite of Shway Toon's outspread arms and legs. A rope would have saved much trouble but they had forgotten to bring one. Besides the soft spots, there was a bund to get over at every stone's throw ; straw and earth had been heaped against each to make a path, but nevertheless the clumsy cart bumped and jolted tUl it seemed that the axle must surely snap.

" I wish we had a sled," sighed Pho Lone as he pulled up again to coUect more fallen paddy, " a sled is much better." " Yes," agreed Shway Toon, with the air of one regretting good advice thrown away, "it is a pity you did not make one." Pho Lone took no notice of this speech. While he had been helping Moung Byoo to buUd his sled, Shway Toon had lain in his house just opposite, looking on. When urged to get to work, he always answered that it was foolish to bother about the harvest while the paddy was green ; so, as Pho Lone was never able to begin a job by himself, the time came to go and live out in the watch-hut before a single bamboo had been cut. A sled is far more suitable than a cart for carrying in the grain ; it is easier to load, carries more, and above all, it slides safely over the mud-holes and bunds.

A dozen of them, like rude ship gang ways, might be seen on the kwins to-day, for aU the crop was cut and everybody was bringing his grain to stack by the threshing-floor behind the vUlage. The buffaloes waded slowly through the stubble, heeding their driver's stick as little as the glisten ing flies which swarmed about their eyes and nostrils. The air was hot and stiU but the fields were full of life. Fat bronze lizards basked on the bunds, too lazy to move even when the shadow of the passing cart feU on them ; now and again a snake peeped above the grass and sank again with a whispered hiss ; in the wet corners of the fields, little red land-crabs trundled out of the way to draw into their holes. Overhead a kite floated, whistling sadly, as if calling his mate to join him and go to the coast where kites spend the dry season.