Buch lesen: «A Civil Servant in Burma», Seite 16

A charming tour took us the round of the maritime districts, Tavoy, Mergui, Akyab, Kyaukpyu, and Sandoway, in the R.I.M.S. Dalhousie. We cruised in the lovely Mergui Archipelago, a summer sea set with countless islands, rivalling in beauty the Inland Sea of Japan. Perhaps the most noticeable sight was Elephant Island. It stands alone, its green slopes narrowing to the sky. At low water we approached the shore, our boat with difficulty and strenuous effort pushed over sands hardly covered by the shallow sea. So we came to where the water deepened, at the mouth of a gloomy cavern. Entering, we found a low, winding, rock-roofed tunnel, just wide and high enough for our boat, with a glimmer of daylight at the far end. Emerging, we reached the middle of the island, a still lagoon, encircled by smooth marble walls. A magic scene from fairyland: a snow-white ring, with an opening like the crater of a volcano; in the midst the purple lake. One pictured it as the secret refuge of buccaneers, who here might hide in safety. Our time for admiring this lovely landscape was limited; too long a stay would have imprisoned us for hours, till the tide fell and left the tunnel navigable. Working by charts nearly a hundred years old, we approached Victoria Point, the farthest outpost on the south, bordering on the Siamese State of Renoung. The revival of tin-mining had begun to make the place of some importance. Later a wireless telegraph station was established. More recently rubber-planting has been tried.

After a winding course over rocks and shoals, through unexplored Shan States and savage hills where head-hunting is still fitfully pursued, the Chindwin joins the Irrawaddy above Pakôkku. Passing between banks clad with dense forest, we desecrated with steam and smoke silent reaches glamorous with romance. The march of progress is gradually dissipating the mist which yet still clings to this river of ancient story. Here and there a court-house or a military police post marks the advance of civilization. Inland the woodman’s axe resounds in the primeval forest. A coal-mine, one of the many promising but faithless ventures of the prospector, makes a deep cavern in a hillside. We explored it for a considerable way by the light of naked, guttering candles; no Davy lamps in that mine. On the Chindwin are still current stories with an old-world ring. There you will see a little monastery at the water’s edge. Above that point, though snakes abound, they have no power to harm. On one side of the line thus marked, if a snake bites you, prepare to die; cross the line, the same snake may bite you with no worse effect than a fleeting sting. Walking through a village, to test the story we asked a man if there were many snakes. “Oh yes,” he replied; “but, of course, they do no harm. I was bitten yesterday.” And he showed on his leg the mark of recent fangs. The reason of this interesting difference is comparatively simple. Once upon a time the countryside was ravaged by a gigantic serpent. The King himself, in the fearless old fashion, gave battle to the snake, and, after a desperate struggle, slew it and cut it in half. The two pieces he flung into the river. Now, the head-piece, where are the poisonous fangs, floated down-stream; the tail-piece, where there are none, floated upwards. You see the result. If you go farther north, you will come to a village where the people have the fascinating power of turning themselves into tigers. We went no higher than Homalin, and missed the chance of verifying this attractive legend. It was poor compensation to land at Thangthut, the capital of a very small Shan Chief, to find a stack of polo-sticks in his haw,²⁷³ and to learn that Manipuris, the originators of the game, sent teams to play polo with the Sawbwa and his staff.

Talking of tigers reminds me of one or two stories which may find a place here. Real tigers are common to many parts of the Province. One day a tiger came upon two little girls in the jungle, seized the younger, and was trotting off with her. The elder sister, a girl of about twelve, took off her tamein²⁷⁴ and flapped the tiger about the face till the astonished beast dropped the child and fled. The truth of this story is proved by the fact that Government gave the girl a silk tamein in recognition of her courage and presence of mind. Another time, quite recently, a woodman was seized by a tiger. He cut at him with his da²⁷⁵ till the tiger dropped him and retreated. The man, enraged at being attacked, followed and slashed him again, his only weapon being a long wood-cutting knife. Another authentic story, of an earlier date, tells how a tiger was killed by a man armed only with da. We may hesitate to believe people who tell us that Burmans are not brave.

The American who declined to go to the Taj Mahal because he had not come to India to see tombs, when he came to Burma would not look at Pagan because he had not come to see pagodas. Described once for all by Sir Henry Yule in “The Court of Ava,” in its way Pagan is one of the most remarkable places in the world. The seat of an ancient dynasty, it lies along the bank of the Irrawaddy below Myingyan. Pagodas, literally for miles and in hundreds, fill the landscape as far as eye can see. All varied styles of Buddhist architecture, with many traces of Hindu influence, are represented. Here is the renowned Ananda Pagoda, among the most famous of Buddhist shrines. Here, too, are solemn, stately figures of the four Buddhas²⁷⁶ who have yet visited the earth. As the ages roll by, other Buddhas will descend for the regeneration of the world.

Not very far below Pagan, illustrative of a strange mingling of ancient and modern, is the most productive of the oil-fields of Burma, that of Yenangyaung. In 1886, reviewing the prospects of mineral discovery in Upper Burma, we prophesied before we knew. We went nap, as might be said, on coal, and took but little interest in petroleum. The development of the oil-fields is the most striking feature of the economic history of the Province for the past twenty-five years. The search for coal has been uniformly disappointing. The Yenangyaung field was worked in former times by crude native methods. Into shallow wells dug by hand men went down, clad in a sort of diver’s costume, and laboriously baled out oil with a bucket. The out-turn was comparatively small. The wells were owned by a close corporation of local Burmans known as twinzas,²⁷⁷ who had exclusive hereditary rights. All the oil extracted had to be sold to the King at a fixed price. Of late years the oil-fields have been exploited with all the resources of modern science by companies who, by grant or purchase, have acquired rights over wells and oil-bearing land. The Burma Oil Company were pioneers of the industry. It was under the auspices of my friend Sir Campbell Kirkman Finlay, Managing Director of the company, that I twice visited Yenangyaung. One of my visits was marked by the spouting of the most productive well yet struck in Burma. The oil-field is a busy bustling place, covered with tall derricks and giving employment to many drillers and mechanics. Side by side with modern scientific extraction may be seen the primitive native methods still practised. Over all is a Warden to enforce the elaborate rules necessary to safeguard the field against danger from fire and to prevent its premature exhaustion. From the wells runs a pipe-line conveying oil for about two hundred and seventy-five miles to the refinery at Syriam, where a populous town has sprung up. The latest report gives the total quantity of petroleum produced in Burma as 222,000,000 gallons, a very small fraction of the world’s production.

Our tours on the Irrawaddy and Chindwin were made in steamers of the Royal Indian Marine and in the house-boat already mentioned. Among Indian Marine officers I had many friends. One I may mention by name, Lieutenant H. R. Bowers, was with us on several tours. The son of Captain A. Bowers, R.N.R., long resident in Burma, who had accompanied Colonel Sladen’s mission to Yunnan in 1868, he had close hereditary associations with the Province. From the first he impressed us as an officer of great promise, capable and self-reliant. I bade him farewell on the eve of his departure, full of hope and pride, for the journey whereon he died a hero’s death among Antarctic snows. His memory lives in the hearts of his countrymen.

My final tour brought me at last to the lovely lake of Indawgyi, which I had in vain tried to reach in 1894.²⁷⁸ From Hopin on the Mu Valley Railway the distance is only some thirty miles, which we rode leisurely in three or four easy stages. With us were Mr. Hertz,²⁷⁹ the very able and distinguished Deputy Commissioner of Myitkyina, and Mr. W. Scott, one of his Assistant Superintendents, whose knowledge of Kachin language, folklore, and customs is extensive and peculiar. Very impressive is the panorama of the lake, lying in a semi-circle of hills, with few traces of civilized intrusion. A pagoda here and there on its green banks adds a picturesque touch to the scene. We sought but did not find the floating islands of which we had heard long ago. Indawgyi lies on the border of a fertile country once populous, but devastated after a Kachin rising not long before the Annexation. It is slowly recovering, and as population increases will once more be a rich harvest-field. Thence we paid a last visit to Myitkyina and the confluence.²⁸⁰ More precious than the Commissioner, the Lieutenant-Governor was not allowed to shoot the rapids. He was induced to skirt them on a pony. Of the rise and progress of Myitkyina I have already written. Then for the last time, with many regrets, we passed through the glorious First Defile and bade farewell to it for ever.

It were ungracious to close this discursive record without expressing my grateful obligations to those who worked with me in the last responsible years of my service. No Lieutenant-Governor ever had a better personal staff or more capable Secretaries. If I take leave to mention Mr. F. C. Gates,²⁸¹ Mr. W. F. Rice, C.S.I., Mr. Lionel Jacob,²⁸² Mr. R. E. V. Arbuthnot, Mr. G. F. Arnold, C.I.E., Mr. F. Lewisohn among Secretaries; Major F. J. Fraser, the late Mr. D. Shearme, Captain A. F. S. Hill, R.E., Mr. C. S. Pennell, Captain E. L. Caldecott, R.A., among officers of the personal Staff, it is not that I value less highly the loyalty and good service of their colleagues. If I were to mention Commissioners, district, and departmental officers to whom I am indebted, I must name practically the whole Commission and plagiarize many pages of the Civil List.

So after a chequered career we bade farewell to Burma, fairest and brightest of Eastern lands, the memory of whose happy people will always be enshrined in our hearts.

GLOSSARY

[Containing only Burmese words used more than once, or not explained in text or notes.]

amat = Minister.

atu-ma-shi = incomparable. “There is none like her—none.”

bein-sa = opium-eater.

bo = chief, leader.

da = a knife of any sort.

Ein-she-min = heir-apparent.

gyi = great.

hlutdaw = Council of State.

kala = barbarian, a foreigner from the West.

kappiya-taga = a lay attendant of a monastery.

kin-bya = a somewhat familiar form of address.

ko-mi = a game of cards.

ku-tho-daw = royal merit.

kyaung = monastery.

kyaung-taga = founder of a monastery.

maung = much the same as “Mr.”

min = King, lord.

mingyi = great lord, high official; in this book, one of the four chief Ministers of State.

min-laung = an embryo min.

min-tha = Prince, son of a min.

Mi-paya = Queen.

my̆o = city, town, township, circle.

my̆o-ôk = officer in charge of a township, a member of the Subordinate Civil Service.

my̆o-ôk-gavaw = My̆o-ôk’s wife.

my̆o-sa = a title of a Shan chief (in his book).

my̆o-thu-gyi = head of a my̆o or circle.

my̆o-wun = town magistrate.

nat = a spiritual being.

neik-ban—Nirvána = the state of rest.

pa-dauk = a tree yielding excellent timber and bearing lovely flowers.

pa-ya = a pagoda, a sacred image, a title of honour = lord.

pè-nin = helmsman.

pôn-gyi = a monk; literally, “great glory.”

pôn-na = Hindus of Mandalay, descendants of captives from Assam or Manipur.

pwè = an assembly, most commonly an entertainment of a dramatic nature.

pya-that = a terraced spire.

sa-daw = a monk of high position.

Saw-bwa = a title of a Shan chief.

sa-ye-daw-gyi = clerks or secretaries of the hlutdaw.

shwe = gold, golden.

Su-paya = a Princess of royal birth on both sides.

taik = a territorial division, called in English a “circle.”

taik-thu-gyi = headman of a circle.

tamein = a woman’s skirt.

taung-ya = hill-cultivation.

tha-tha-na-baing = head of the monastic Order.

thu-gyi = headman; literally, “great man.”

twet = a term applied to a monk who renounces his Order.

win = a house and grounds.

wun = an official title of varying denotation.

yo-ma = a range of hills; literally, “backbone.”

za-yat = a rest-house.

ze-gyo = the great bazaar or market at Mandalay.