CHAPTER XIX ON FOOT ACROSS THE MALAY PENINSULA

“Now lads,” said our host, as we were finishing a late breakfast the next morning, “I’ll ’ave to ask you to move on. If I was fixed right you’d be welcome to ’ang out ’ere as long as you’re in town, but I don’t draw no viceroy’s salary an’ I’ve got a fair size family to support. Up on the ’ill there, lives an American Christer. Go up an’ give ’im your yarn an’ touch ’im fer a few dibs.”

We did not, of course, take the advice of the Englishman. James and I were agreed that it would not be consistent with our dignity to turn to so base a use as the purchase of currie and rice the funds needed for the distribution of Bibles and tracts among the aborigines. We did call on the good padre, but for no other purpose than to crave permission to inspect his cast-off foot wear. The tramp from Pegu had wrought disaster to our own. My companion wore on his right foot the upper portion of a shoe, the sole of which he had left somewhere in the Burmese jungle; on the left, the sole of its mate, to which there still adhered enough of the upper to keep it in place. He was better shod than I.

But missionaries domiciled in the far corners of the brown man’s land are not wont to be satisfied with a casual morning call from those of their own race. The “Christer” espied us as we started up the sloping pathway through his private park, and gave us American welcome at the foot of the steps. Our coming, he averred, was the red-letter event of that season. Before we had time even to broach the object of our visit, we found ourselves stammering denials to the assertion he was shouting to his wife within, that we were to stay at least a fortnight.

Our new host was a native of Indiana, a missionary among the Talaings, as the inhabitants of this region are known. His dwelling, the Talaing Mission, was a palatial bungalow set in a wooded estate on the outer rim of the city. Its windows commanded a far-reaching view over a gorgeous tropical landscape. Within, it was not merely 411spacious, airy, and lighted with soft tints of filtered sunshine—blessings easily attained in British-Burma, it was hung with rich tapestries, carpeted with downy rugs, decorated with Oriental works of art. The room to which we were assigned was all but sumptuously furnished; and it was by no means the “bridal chamber.” At table we were served formal dinners of many courses; a white-liveried chowkee dar slipped in and out of the room, salaaming reverentially each time he offered a new dish; a punkah-wallah on the back veranda toiled ceaselessly; a gardener clipped away at the shrubbery in the mission grounds; a native aya followed the two tiny memsahibs who drove about the house a team of lizards, harnessed in tandem with the reins tied to their hind legs. In short, the reverend gentleman lived in a style rarely dreamed of by men of the cloth at home, or by the sympathetic spinsters to whose charity the adjacent heathen owed their threatened evangelization.

For all his profession, however, the man from Indiana was one whose acquaintanceship was well worth the making. To us especially, for when he was once convinced that our plea for employment was genuine, he quickly found something to put us at. One would have fancied that a “handy man” had never before entered the mission grounds. There was barely a trade of which we knew the rudiments that we did not take a turn at during our stay. Having served apprenticeship in earlier days as carpenter, blacksmith, shoemaker, and “carriage trimmer,” I repaired the floor and several doors and windows, constructed two kitchen benches, forged wardrobe hooks, half-soled the family shoes, and upholstered two chairs used on “state occasions.” James, meanwhile, recovered the padre’s pack-saddle, overhauled and oiled his fire-arms, put new roosts in his henhouse, and set his lumber room in order. It was not that native workmen were scarce; a small army of servants flitted about the bungalow, leering at our loss of caste. But saddening experience had taught the missionary that Hindu or Burmese workmen not only made a botch of any task outside their narrow fields, but ruined with surprising rapidity the tools of which he had brought a well-stocked chest from his native land.

Our first day’s labor was enlivened with tales of the horrors that would befall us if we persisted in continuing our journey; the second, with pleas for a longer sojourn; the third, with preparations for our departure. As to the route, we could learn no more than the names of three villages through which the “wild men” of the interior 412passed on their way to Siam. To what section of Siam their trail might bring us no man knew.

A few hours over washtub and needle made our rags presentable, and we still had two extra cotton suits. That these and our other possessions might be protected from the tropical deluges, we bought two squares of oilcloth in which to roll our “swag.” My bundle contained one of the two pairs of half-worn shoes that I had come across in the lumber-room. Unfortunately, there was a marked pedal disparity between the Australian and the missionary, and my companion might have departed as poorly shod as he had arrived, had not the good sky pilot insisted on fitting him out in the bazaars. There, the stoutest shoes in stock proved to be a pair of football buskins, imported for some Moulmein exponent of Rugby. These the purchaser chose, in the face of the protest of the prospective wearer, arguing that the cleats made them just the thing for climbing steep mountain paths. In my pack, too, were our earnings at the mission, some four dollars in silver and copper; James having pleaded that he was too careless to be intrusted with such a fortune. Nor should the parting gifts of our hosts be forgotten,—a little pocket compass from the padre, and a bottle of “Superior Curry Dressing” from his solicitous spouse.

We left the Talaing Mission, then, on the morning of May twenty-third, and, boarding a tiny steamer plying on the Gyang river, disembarked as the sun was touching the western tree-tops, in the village of Choung Doa. It comprised two rows of spindle-shanked hutches facing a narrow clearing ankle-deep in mud. In one of the booths, boiled rice, tea, and a few stale biscuits from far-off England were for sale. The population, irrespective of age, sex, or dishabille, formed a gaping circle around us and flocked behind us as we set out, like country boys in the wake of the annual circus parade.

A jungle trail that was almost a highway led eastward through densest virgin forest. We set a sharp pace, for the hour was late and the next hamlet full fifteen miles distant. Not a hut nor a human being did we pass on the journey; only the trail, winding over thick-clothed foothills, gave evidence that man had been here before us.

Black night had fallen when we reached Kawkeriek. As the capital of the most eastern district of the Indian Empire, it posed as a city of importance; yet it was only a larger collection of those same one-story, bamboo huts, ranged in unsteady rows like the soldiers of an inebriated army, in the square clearing which its inhabitants had 413won by force of arms from the militant jungle. A sub-commissioner dwelt there. That much information had reached Moulmein. Perhaps he spoke a smattering of English. We fell to shouting an inquiry for his bungalow as we wandered in and out among the huts. Here and there, where a light cast a flickering gleam into the night, we startled the peace of a quiet family by intruding upon them—and seldom found them in a garb to receive callers. The few belated stragglers whom we came upon in the darkness listened with trembling limbs to our query, grunted unintelligibly, and sped noiselessly away.

It was surely nine and time all well-behaved residents of the capital should have been abed, when we captured a night-hawk on his way home after a little supper with the boys, or a round of the dance-halls. He was of bolder stuff, naturally, and better informed on who’s who in Kawkeriek than his hen-pecked neighbors, and consented like a man ready for any adventure to give us guidance.

Beyond the last row of dwellings, he plunged into a sub-sylvan pathway, and, mounting a gentle slope, paused before a forest-girdled bungalow. We turned to thank him, but he had slipped silently away, anxious, no doubt, to reach his apartment before the elevator stopped running.

The commissioner was reading in his study. He was a Burman from “over Mandalay way,” as much a foreigner in Kawkeriek as we, and so much a sahib in his habits that he had not yet dined. For that we were grateful. To have missed the formal repast to which he invited us would have been a misfortune indeed.

So rarely does England appoint any but a white man to rule over a district, that this native, who had risen so high in her esteem, awakened our keenest curiosity. In appearance he was like any other Burman of the prosperous class. His garb was the usual flowing robe, though his legs were dressed and his feet shod. His long, black hair, a bit wavy and of a thickness the other sex might have envied, was caught up at the back of his head in a “Psyche knot.” Like the police captain of Bankipore, however, he was in all but nationality and dress a European. Without the trace of a foreign accent, he couched even his casual remarks in an English that sounded like a reading from a master of style. His energy, his accomplishments, his very point of view were those of the Occident. Had we entered the bungalow blindfolded, we should never have suspected that his skin was brown. So little of the native was there left in his make-up that, though middle-aged, he was still a bachelor.

414“I have been too busy in my short life,” he confided, “to give attention to such matters.”

There was a dak bungalow in Kawkeriek. The commissioner’s servant escorted us thither, prepared our bath, and arranged the sleeping-quarters for the reception of such distinguished guests. In the morning we took breakfast with the governor. No more important problem, apparently, than the planning of our itinerary had occupied his attention in many a day. He had summoned his entire council, six men of standing in the community, who approached the business in hand with the solemnity of delegates to a Hague conference.

The morning was half spent before the result of their deliberations was laid before us. It was tabulated under three heads. First: the country east of the capital was a trackless jungle overrun with savage dacoits, poisonous reptiles, and man-eating tigers, into which even the people of Kawkeriek dared not venture. Secondly: if we persisted in our suicidal project, would we not spend a few days of our closing existence with the commissioner, who was pining away for lack of congenial companions. Thirdly: if we denied him even this favor, there was outside his door a “wild man,” chief of a jungle village, whose route coincided with our own for one day’s journey.

We suggested an immediate departure. A servant stepped out on the veranda and summoned the boh into the council chamber. He was a “wild man” indeed. In physique, he was thin and angular, a tall man for his race, though small when judged by our standard. His skin was a leathery brown, his hair short and bristling, his eyes small and shifty, with a suggestion of the leopard in them. The chewing of betel-nut had left his teeth jet-black, and the prominence of his cheek bones under a sloping forehead made his face ugly to look upon. All in all, he was a creature who would have seemed in his proper element chattering in the tree-tops of the jungle.

His dress, nevertheless, was brilliant. Around his brow was wound a strip of pink silk; an embroidered jacket, innocent of buttons, left his chest bare to the waist-line; his loins and thighs were clothed in many yards of bright red stuff arranged in the fashion of bloomers. Below the knees he wore nothing. At his waist was fastened a betel-nut pouch. He carried a leather sack of the shape of a saddlebag, and—having fallen under the civilizing influence of Kawkeriek—an umbrella.

His dialect being a foreign language to the commissioner, the importance of his mission was impressed upon the boh through an interpreter. 415He replied only in monosyllables, salaaming, each time he grunted, so low that his head all but touched his knees. From time to time he sat down on his heels as a signal mark of respect. When he retired, he backed towards the door, kowtowing with every step, and forgetting, in his awe, his leather sack, until he was called back by the commissioner’s major domo.

The brilliant garb which the village chieftan had donned for his audience with the governor was not, of course, his traveling costume. On the outskirts of the capital he signed to us to halt and stepped inside a hut. But for his ape’s countenance we should not have recognized him when he reappeared. His regal garments had been packed away in his haversack, the broad strap of which was his only covering, save a strip of dirty, white cotton about his loins.

He plunged at once into the jungle, moving with little, mincing steps beside which our strides seemed awkward. The path was so narrow that the outstretching branches whipped us in the faces. It showed few signs of travel and was overgrown with virile creepers that entangled our feet. None but a jungle-bred human could have followed the erratic, oft-obliterated route through that labyrinth of vegetation. Flocks of birds of brilliant plumage flew away before us, uttering strident screams; now and then a crashing of underbrush marked the flight of some unknown animal. The overbearing sunshine, falling sheer upon us, seemed to double the weight of the “swag” on our shoulders; and the bundles themselves were not light.

Our guide was the most taciturn of Orientals. Not once during the day, to our knowledge, did a sound escape his lips. Where the path widened a bit, he raised his umbrella and cantered steadily forward. Even swollen streams were no obstacle to him. Had he been alone it is doubtful whether he would have noticed them at all. With never a pause he splashed through the first and loped unconcernedly on along the branch-choked path. We hallooed to him as we sat down to pull off our shoes; and he halted a moment, but set off again before we had waded ashore. When we shouted once more he turned to stare open-mouthed until we were re-shod. Why these strange creatures should wear garments on their feet under any circumstances was an enigma to him; that we should stop to put on our shoes again when we must know there were other streams to wade seemed the height of asininity. When we had overtaken him he hinted in awkward pantomime that we should do better to toss aside the foolish leather contrivances that hindered our progress. He could not realize that a 416mile over sharp stones and jagged roots would have left us crippled.

As we neared the mountains the streams increased in number and swiftness. In the beginning we took it upon ourselves, as a duty to beachcombers who might some day appeal to us for statistical information, to count them. When we had forded thirty-six before the sun began its decline, we gave up the attempt in despair. By that time, too, we had grown weary of halting every hundred yards to pull off our shoes and bellow after the boh, who must be reminded at every rivulet of our peculiar custom. James essayed to cross one on a few stepping-stones, lost his balance, and sprawled headlong into it. I was more fortunate, but reached the further bank by no means dry shod. Thereafter we waded through the streams, which for the most part were something over knee-deep, and marched on with the water gushing from our shoe-tops. It mattered little in the end, for a pent-up deluge burst upon us.

He who has never bowed his back to a tropical shower at the height of the rainy season cannot know their violence; and nowhere do they rage with more fury than in the mountains of the Malay Peninsula. With a roar like the explosion of a powder-mill an infuriated clap of thunder broke above us. Then another and another, in quick, spasmodic blasts. It was no such tamed and domesticated thunder as that of the north. Flaming flashes of lightning followed each other in quick succession, half blinding us with their sudden glare. We looked instinctively to see the riotous vegetation burst into flame. In the falling masses of water—to call it rain seems absurd—we plunged on; the densest thicket could not have offered the least shelter. The boh had raised his umbrella. It broke the force of the downpour, but could not save him a drenching. What cared he, dressed only in a loin-cloth? The water ran in rivulets down his naked shoulders and along his prominent ribs, yet on his macilent face hovered the beginning of a haggard smile. Between the crashes of thunder the devil’s-tattoo of the storm drowned out all other sounds. Only by speaking into my companion’s ear as into a telephone receiver, and bellowing at the top of my lungs, could I make myself heard.

Then the storm abated—gradually at first, then suddenly, and with its ceasing our tones were still shrill and strident. Quickly the sun burst forth again, to blaze fiercely upon us; though not for long. All that day the deluges broke in succession so rapid that we had no notion of their number. More often than not they caught us climbing a sheer mountainside by a narrow, clay-bottomed path down which an 417ever-increasing brook poured, washing us off our feet while we clutched at the overhanging bushes.

The boh led us, by zigzag routes, over two mountain ranges before the day was done. At sunset, we were descending into a third valley when we came suddenly upon a tiny clearing and a tinier village. “Thenganyenam” the natives called it. There were four bamboo huts and a dak bungalow, housing a population of thirty-one “wild men” and one tame one. To take the census was no difficult matter, for the inhabitants poured forth from their hovels before we had crossed five yards of the clearing.

At their head trotted the domesticated human. In all the shrieking, gaping band of men, women, and children there was no other that wore more than a loin-cloth or an abbreviated shirt. He was a babu, the “manager” of the public rest-house. With a majestic bow of deepest reverence he offered us welcome, turned to wave back the awe-stricken populace with the gesture of a man born to command, and led the way with martial stride to the government bungalow.

“Look here, babu,” I began, as we sank down into wicker chairs on the veranda, “this is a splendid little surprise to find a dak bungalow and a man who speaks English, here in the jungle. But we’re no millionaires; and the government fee is two rupees, eh? Too strong for us. Can’t you get us a cheaper lodging in one of the huts?”

“The government,” returned the babu, with careful enunciation, “the government have make the dak bungalow for Europeans. Why; you may not ask me. In two years and nine days that I am living in Thenganyenam there are come two white men, and one have only rested and not sleep. But because the dak bungalow is make, all sahibs coming in Thenganyenam must stop in it. When I have see you coming by the foot and not by the horses I must know that you have not plenty money. Every day we are not everybody rich. How strong you have the legs to come from Kawkeriek by the foot! The two rupees you must not pay. If you can give some little to the cook, that he make you a supper—”

“That’s the word,” burst out James. “Sure, we pay for our chow. Where’s the chowkee? Tell him to get busy.”

“But,” apologized the babu, “this is a very jungly place and we have not proper food for Europeans.”

“Holy dingoes!” shrieked the Australian. “Do I hear that old, stale joke again? Bring a pan of rice, or a raw turnip, or a fried snake, anything, only julty karow. That wobbly-legged boh scoffed 418all his sandwiches without saying ‘How d’ye do,’ and that breakfast in Kawky didn’t last an hour. Ring up the chowkee.”

“The other day,” observed the babu, reminiscently, “there was a chicken in Thenganyenam. I shall send the cook to hunt him.”

Through the united efforts of the Thenganyenamians, the solitary fowl was run to earth, with more hubbub than dispatch, and sacrificed in sight of the assembled multitude. A delay that was both painful and unaccountable ensued before it appeared before us as tongue-scorching currie, in an ample setting of hard-boiled rice.

Meanwhile we had pulled off our water-soaked rags, rubbed down with a strip of canvas, and donned our extra garments. The change was most gratifying. It was not until then that we realized the full value of the squares of oilcloth that had kept our “swag” dry. Supper over, we drove the babu forth into the night and turned in on the canvas charpoys.

The swamps and streams through which we had plunged during the day had swarmed with leeches. One of these, having imbedded itself in a vein of my right ankle, refused to be dislodged. At supper a tiny stream of blood had trickled along my toes; but, fancying the flow would cease of itself, I made no efforts to staunch it. I awoke in the morning with the sensation of being held captive. The blood, oozing out during the night, had congealed, gluing my right leg to the canvas of the charpoy.

Before I had dressed, the Hindu cook and care-taker wandered into the room; and, catching sight of the long, red stain, gave one lusty shriek, and tumbled out on the veranda. James, who had slept in an adjoining chamber, was awakened by the bellow, and, hearing the Hindustanee word for “blood,” sprang to his feet with the conviction that I had been assassinated as he slept. I was explaining the matter to him when the cook returned, wild of eye, and bearing the register in which we had inscribed our names the evening before. Waving his free arm now at the book, now at the charpoy, he danced about us screaming excitedly. Comprehending little of his voluble chatter, we waved him off and stepped out upon the veranda. The “manager” was just mounting the steps.

“Here, babu,” demanded James, “what’s biting our friend from the kitchen?”

The Hindu turned to his superior, all but choking himself over his convulsive utterance. Tears were streaming down his tawny cheeks.

419“He says,” cried the babu, when the cook fell silent at last, “in the charpoy is much blood. Have you become wounded?”

“It was only a blood-sucker,” I explained, “but where does the register come in?”

“The cook asks that you will write all the story of the blood in it, very careful.”

“What nonsense,” I answered, when James’ mirth had subsided. “I’ll pay for the damage to the charpoy.”

“Oh! It is no dam-máge,” protested the babu, “no dam-máge at all. He is not ask for pay. But when the inspector is coming and seeing the much blood in the charpoy, he is thinking the cook have kill a man who have sleep here, and he is taking him to Kawkeriek and making him shot. Very bad. So cook cry. Please, sir, write you the story in the register book.”

I sat down at the veranda table and inscribed a dramatic tale for the visiting inspector. Only when I had filled the page below our names and half the next one, did the Hindu acknowledge himself contented, and carry away the book for safe keeping.

We stowed away our dry garments and donned the rags and tatters we had stretched along the ceiling the evening before. They were still clammy wet. As for our footwear, we despaired for a time of getting into it, or of being able to walk if once we did. Our feet were blistered and swollen to the ankles, the shoes shrunken and wrinkled until the leather was as inflexible as sheet-iron. We got them on at last, however, and hobbled down the veranda steps and away. For the first hour we advanced by spasmodic bursts, picking our way as across a field of burning coals. James was in even more uncomfortable straits than I. The football buskins, theoretically just the thing for jungle tramping, had, in actual use, proved quite the opposite. The day before, the Australian had slipped and stumbled over the rubble like a man learning to skate. In drying, the shoes had wrinkled and twisted into a shape that gave anything but a firm foothold, and the heavy leather chafed like emery paper. Wherever he came upon a sharp stone, the sufferer halted to chop viciously at one of the cleats, cursing the missionary’s judgment and snarling like one wreaking his pent-up vengeance on a mortal enemy. Before noonday came, he had pounded off the last cleat, not without inflicting serious injury to the soles; and at the first opportunity he borrowed a knife and transformed the shoes into a decidedly low pair of oxfords. 420But even after these radical alterations he was uncomfortably shod. I much doubt whether the white man has yet devised the proper footwear for jungle tramping. To be foot-sore seems to be one of the inevitable hardships of those who walk in the tropics. We, at least, suffered more or less pain at every step from Kawkeriek to the end of our journey.

Thenganyenam was no great distance from the frontier village. Our guide of the day before had turned westward, but the pathway between the adjacent hamlets was distinctly enough marked to be followed. It was not yet noon when we reached Myáwadi. A few showers had visited their fury upon us; but the brilliant sunshine was again flooding the world about us. Myáwadi was a more populous thorp than that we had left in the morning, pitched along the bank of the stream that marks the limit of old England’s sway. An air of lazy, soul-filling contentment hovered over the tiny jungle oasis. With every puff of the soft summer breeze the tinkling of the little silver bells at the top of the pagoda came musically clear to our ears. Here and there a villager was stretched out on his back in the grass. It seemed ill-mannered to break the peaceful repose of the inhabitants.

Besides the stone and mud sanctuary soaring above the brilliant vegetation, the most imposing edifice was a bamboo barracks, housing a little garrison of native soldiers. Here we stopped, as was our duty before crossing the frontier. The sepoys were childish, good-hearted fellows who made known their astonishment and offered their condolences in expressive pantomime, and did their best to make as appetizing as possible the dinner of rice and jungle vegetables they offered. It was fortunate that they were so open-handed, for we could not have purchased food in the village. This jungle land has not yet reached the commercial stage.

The native lieutenant evinced a strong curiosity to know what errand had brought us thus far from the beaten track of sahibs, and our pantomimic explanation seemed only to increase his suspicions. When he grew querulous we mentioned the name of Damalaku. He sprang to his feet shrieking with delight, and, having danced about us for some time, detailed a sepoy to accompany us to the first Siamese village, with a note of explanation to the head man.

When the sun had begun its decline and the latest storm had abated, we left the barracks and Burma behind. The international stream was little wider than many we had already encountered, and barely waist deep. We forded it easily, and the tinkling of the pagoda bells 421still came faintly to our ears when we climbed the sandy eastern bank,—in Siam at last.

The first village, we had gathered, was no great distance off, so we strolled leisurely on through the jungle, pausing to rest in shady thickets so often that the sepoy left us in disgust and went on alone. Two hours later he paused on his homeward journey to tell us in gestures that he had delivered his international note and that the village was waiting to receive us.

The day was not yet done when we reached the outpost of Siam, to be picked up at the edge of the jungle by a Siamese of ape-like mien, who conducted us to the hut of the village head man.

Picture to yourself a trust magnate of the most pompous and self-worshiping type, with the face of an Alaskan totem pole, the general appearance of a side-show “wild man,” a skin the color of a door mat that has done service for many years, dressed in a cast-off dish cloth, and you have an exact visualization of the man who ruled over M?sawt. He received us in the “city hall,” sitting with folded legs on a grass mat in the middle of the floor. Around the walls of the misshapen bamboo shack squatted several briefly-attired courtiers. Through the network partition that separated the hall of ceremonies from the family sanctum, peered a parchment-skinned female, and a troop of dusky children not yet arrived at the dignity of clothing. If we had waited for an invitation to be seated we might have remained standing all night. The attitude of the Siamese towards the European is quite different from that of the Burman. Their very poise seems to say:—“We are a free people, not the slaves of white men like our neighbors over the border.”

We made ourselves comfortable on the pliant floor, with our backs to the wall, and lighted the saybullies that had done service for three days past. For more than an hour the head man and his satellites sat motionless, staring fixedly at us, and mumbling in an undertone without once turning their heads towards those they were addressing. The sun sank into the jungle and swift darkness fell. The parchment-skinned female drifted into the room and set on the floor an oil torch that gave a poor imitation of a light. At the dictation of the babu of Thenganyenam, I had jotted down a few vital words of Siamese. When conversation lagged, I put this newly-acquired vocabulary to the test by calling for food. The head man growled, the female floated in once more and placed at our feet a small washtub of boiled rice.

422Now this Oriental staff of life is not without its virtues; but to eat one’s fill of the tasteless stuff without any “trimmings” whatever is rather a pleasureless task. I dragged out my notebook and again ran my eyes down the list of Siamese words. Neither currie nor chicken was represented. The only word that appeared to be of any value under the circumstances was that for “sugar.” I bellowed it at the head man. He stared open-mouthed until I had repeated it several times.

“Sugar?” he echoed, with an inflection of interrogation and astonishment.

“Yes, sugar,” I cried, sprinkling an imaginary handful over the rice.

The councillors gazed at each other with wondering eyes, and the word passed from mouth to mouth—“sugar?”

“Sure, sugar!” cried James, taking up the refrain.

A man rose slowly to his feet, marched across to us, and, squatting before the dish, began to run his bony fingers through the rice.

“Sugar?” he queried, peering into our faces. “No! no!” He took a pinch of the food between his fingers, put it into his mouth, and munched it slowly and quizzically. Then he shook his head vigorously and spat the mouthful out on the floor.

“No, no; sugar, no!” he cried.

“Of course there’s no sugar!” shouted James. “That’s why we’re making a bloody holler. Sugar, you thick-headed mummy!”

The official taster retired to his place; a silence fell over the company. We continued to shout. Suddenly a ray of intelligence lighted up the face of the head man. Could it be because we wanted sugar that we were raising such a hubbub, rather than because we fancied that foreign substance had been inadvertently spilled on our supper? He called to the female. When she appeared with a joint of bamboo filled with muddy brown sugar, the councillors rose gravely and grouped themselves about us. I sprinkled half the contents of the bamboo on the rice, stirred up the mess, and began to eat.

At the first mouthful such a roar of laughter went up from the assembly that I choked in my astonishment. Whoever would have guessed that these gloomy-faced dignitaries could laugh? The chieftan fell to shaking as with a fit, his advisers doubled up with mirth, and aroused the entire community with their shrieks. Wild-eyed Siamese tumbled out of the neighboring huts. Within two minutes half the village had flocked into the room, and the other half was 423howling for admittance and a glimpse of those strange beings who ate their rice with sugar!

The surging mob must surely have burst the walls of the frail hut asunder, had not the head man risen to the dignity of his position, and driven all but the high and mighty among his subjects forth into the night. Among those who remained after the general exodus was a babu. He was a Siamese youth who had spent some years in Rangoon, and his extraordinary erudition, like the garments he wore in excess of the diaphanous native costume, weighed heavily upon him. At the instigation of the head man, he subjected us to a searching cross-examination, and later communicated to us the result of a debate of some two hours’ duration. The jungle to the eastward was next to impassable to natives; obviously such notoriously weak and helpless beings as white men could not endure its hardships. There was in M?sawt a squad of soldiers with whom we could travel to Rehang when their relief arrived—in a week or ten days. Meanwhile we must remain in the village as government guests.

James and I raised a vigorous protest against this proposition. The only reply to our outburst was the assertion of the head man that we should stay whether we liked it or not. As the night was well advanced, we feigned capitulation and made ready to retire. The village chief lighted us into one of the small rooms of his dwelling and left us to turn in on the bamboo floor.

Had we anticipated any great difficulty in escaping in the morning it would have been a simple matter to have taken French leave during the night. Bolts and bars were unknown in M?sawt, and even had our door been fastened, it would have needed only a few kicks at the flimsy walls of our chamber to make an exit where we chose. We had no desire to lose a night’s rest, however, and fell asleep with the conviction that the head man would not be as energetic in executing his order as in giving it.

Nor was he. While the mists still hovered over M?sawt, we packed our “swag” and entered the council chamber in marching array. The chief was already astir, but the only effort he made to thwart us was to shout somewhat meekly when we stepped out into the dripping dawn.

At the eastern end of the town began a faint suggestion of a path, but it soon faded away and we pushed and tore our way through the jungle, guided only by the pocket compass. The militant vegetation wrought havoc to our rags and cut and gashed us from brow to 424ankles; the perspiration ran in stinging streams along our lacerated skins and dripped from our faces. Though we fought the undergrowth tooth and nail it is doubtful if we advanced two miles an hour.

The sun was high when we came upon the first evidence that man had passed that way before—a clearing not over six feet square, in the center of which was a slimy pool and a few recently-cut joints of bamboo. With these we drank our fill of the tepid water and had thrown ourselves down in the shade when we were startled to our feet by the sound of human voices. The anticipation of an attack by murderous dacoits turned quickly to that of a forcible return to M?sawt, as there burst into the clearing a squad of soldiers.

There were seven in the party, a sergeant and four privates, armed with muskets, and two coolie carriers, each bowed under the weight of two baskets slung on a bamboo pole. After the first gasp of astonishment the soldiers sprang for the bamboo cups beside the waterhole, while the servants knelt down to set their burdens on the grass. The fear that the troopers had been sent to apprehend us was quickly dispelled by their acquiescence in permitting us to handle their weapons. They were bound for Rehang, but why they had been released from garrison duty at the frontier village so long before the time set, we could not learn.

A formidable force was this indeed. There was far less suggestion of the soldier about the fellows than of half-grown youths playing at a military game. The sergeant, larger than the others, came barely to James’ chin; and the Australian was not tall. The privates were undeveloped little runts, any one of whom the average American school boy could have tied in a knot and tossed aside into the jungle. There was little of the martial air either in their demeanor or in their childlike countenances. They were dressed in regulation khaki, except that their trousers came only to their knees, leaving their scrawny legs bare. On their heads were flat forage caps of the German type; from their belts hung bayonets; and around the waist of each was tied a stocking-like sack of rice.

We conversed with them at some length, so adept had we become in the language of signs. Long after I had forgotten the exact means employed in communicating our thoughts, the ideas that we exchanged remained. Among other things I attempted to impress upon the sergeant the fact that my own country held possessions not far from his own. He caught the idea well enough, except that, where I had said Philippines, he understood Siam. His sneers were most scathing. 425The bare suggestion that the white man held any sway over Muang Thai—the free country—was ludicrous. Even the carriers grinned sarcastically. A strange thing is patriotism. Here were these citizens of a poor little state, stranded between the possessions of two great powers, boasting of their unalienable independence, utterly oblivious of the fact that their national existence could not last a week if one of those powers ceased to glare jealously at her rival. When they had eaten a jungle lunch, the soldiers stretched out for their siesta, and we went on alone.

It was long hours afterward that we made out through a break in the undergrowth two miserable huts. Not having tasted food since the night before, we dashed eagerly forward. Two emaciated hags, dressed in short skirts and ugly, broad-brimmed hats of attap leaves, were clawing the mud of a tiny garden patch before the first hovel. I called for food and shook a handful of coppers in their faces, but, though they certainly understood, they made no reply. We danced excitedly about them, shrieking our Siamese vocabulary in their ears. Still they stared, with half-open mouths, displaying uneven rows of repellant black teeth. We had anticipated such a reception. Even the missionary of Moulmein had warned us that the jungle folk of Siam would not sell food to travelers. The age of barter has not yet penetrated these mountain fastnesses. What value, after all, were copper coins in any quantity to the inhabitants of this howling wilderness?

We waded through the mire to the next hutch. Under it were squatted two men and a woman, and a half-dozen mud-bespattered brats sprawled about a crude veranda overhead. This family, too, received us coldly, answering neither yes nor no to our request for food. We climbed the rickety bamboo ladder into the hut and began to forage for ourselves. The men scrambled up after us. When I picked up a basket of rice, the bolder of the pair grasped it with both hands. I pushed him aside and he retreated meekly to a far corner. In other baskets we found dried fish, a few bananas, and a goodly supply of eggs. Beside the flat mud fire-place were two large kettles and a bundle of fagots. While James broke up branches and started a blaze, I brought rain water from a bamboo bucket, in cocoanut shells, and filled the kettles.

Chimney was there none, nor hole in the roof; and the smoke all but choked and blinded us before the task was done. The rice and fish we boiled in one conglomerate mess, pouring it out on a flat leaf 426basket when it approached an edible condition, and dashing out on the veranda for a breath of fresh air. The householder remained motionless in his corner. Having found, after long search, a bamboo joint filled with coarse salt, we seasoned the steaming repast and fell upon it. James had the bad fortune to choke on a fish bone, but recovered in time to swear volubly when he discovered in the concoction what looked suspiciously like a strip of loin-cloth. By the time we had despatched the rice, a dozen eggs, and as many bananas, we were ready to push on. I handed the downcast native a tecal—the rupee of Siam—which he clutched with a satisfied grunt, as well he might, for a shopkeeper would not have demanded a fourth as much for what we had confiscated.

Just at sunset we burst into the straggling village of Banpáwa. Some forty howling storms had added to our entertainment during the day and we had forded an even greater number of streams. My jacket was torn to ribbons; my back and shoulders were sadly sunburned; in a struggle with a tenacious thicket I had been bereft of a leg of my trousers; and the Australian was as pitiable an object to look upon.

Near the center of the village was an unpretentious Buddhist monastery beside which the priests had erected a shelter for travelers, a large thatch roof supported by slender bamboo pillars. Under it were huddled nearly a score of Laos carriers, surrounded by bales and bundles; Banpáwa being an important station of the route followed by these human freight trains of the Siamese jungle. They were surly, taciturn fellows, who, though they stared open-mouthed when we appeared, treated us like men under a ban of excommunication.

Physically they were sights to feast one’s eyes upon; splendidly developed, though short of stature, with great knots of muscles standing out on their glistening brown bodies. A small loin-cloth was their only attire. Above it their skins were thickly tattooed to their necks with fantastic figures, all in red, representations of strange and repulsive beasts, among which that of a swollen fat pig was most often duplicated. Below the indispensable garment the figures were blue, even more closely crowded together, but stopping short at the knees.

It is said that this custom of making pictorial supplements of themselves was first forced upon the Laos by a wrathful king. A youthful servant, received as an attendant in the royal harem, was rapidly becoming a great favorite among the secluded ladies, when one sad day 427the appalling information leaked out that the supposed country maid was really a man. When the culprit had been duly drawn and quartered, an imperative edict went forth from the palace of his raging majesty, commanding every male in the kingdom to submit forthwith to the tattooers’ needles. Even to-day, this custom, mentioned by Marco Polo, is still universal among the males.

We sought to buy food from our sullen companions. They growled for answer. Like the soldiers, each wore round his waist a bag of rice; a few were preparing their evening meals over fagot fires at the edge of the shelter; but not a grain would they sell. A raging storm broke while we were wandering from one to another, shaking money in their faces. When it had abated somewhat, we hobbled out into the night to appeal to the villagers. There were some twenty huts in the clearing, into each of which we climbed, in spite of our aching legs. Every householder returned us the same pantomimic answer—he never sold food, but he was sure his next door neighbor did, and the neighbor was as sure that it was in the next hovel that our money would make us welcome.

We played this game of puss-wants-a-corner for an hour, and we were still “it” when we reached the last dwelling. The village was really too populous a community in which to repeat the tactics that had won us dinner; but hunger made us somewhat indifferent to consequences. We climbed boldly into the hut and caught up a kettle. The householder shrieked like a man on the rack; and, before we had kindled a fire, a mob of his fellow townsmen swarmed into the shack and fell upon us. They were not particularly fierce fighters. We shook and kicked them off like puppies, but when the last one had tumbled down the ladder we awoke to the sad intelligence that they had carried off in their retreat every pot, pan, and comestible on the premises. Besides the bare walls there remained only a naked brown baby that rolled about the middle of the floor, howling lustily.

The village population was screaming around the shanty in a way that made us glad we had a hostage. James sat down, gazed sadly at the wailing brat and shook his head.

“No good,” he announced. “Not fat enough. Anyway there’s no kettle to cook it in. Let’s vamoose.”

We turned towards the door. A man was peering over the edge of the veranda. By the silken band around his brow we knew him for a Burman; and he spoke Hindustanee. We gathered from his excited chatter in that language that he had come to lead us to a place where 428food was sold. As we reached the ground the throng parted to let us pass, but the frenzied natives danced screaming about us, shaking sticks and cudgels in our faces. A few steps from the hovel some bold spirit struck me a resounding whack on the back of the head. It was no light blow, but the weapon was a hollow bamboo and no damage resulted. When I turned to fall upon my assailant the whole crew took to their heels and fled into the night.

“All I’ve got to say,” panted James, as we hurried on after our guide, “is, I’m bloody glad that’s not a bunch of Irishmen. Where would the pioneer beachcombers of the Malay Peninsula be now if that collection of dish-rags knew how to scrap?”

The Burman led us through a half-mile of mire and brush, and a stream that was almost waist-deep, to a suburb of Banpáwa. Four huts housed the commuters. After long parley our guide gained us admittance to one of the dwellings and sat down to keep us company until our rice and fish had been boiled. He was something of a cosmopolite, fairly clever in piecing together a language of gestures and the few words we had in common. The conversation turned naturally—in view of the fact that we were two as ragged sahibs as one would run across in a lifetime of wandering—to the question of personal attire. Our sponsor was well dressed for the time and place, and the whim suddenly came upon him to substitute a tropical helmet for the silk band about his brow. He offered James a rupee for his topee, and pondered long over the refusal of the offer. Then he rose to depart, but halted on the edge of the night to hold up two fingers.

“Dō rúpika! Achá, sahib?” he pleaded.

“You’re crazy!” retorted the Australian, “Think I want to get a sunstroke?”

The Burman shrugged his shoulders with a disgruntled air and splashed sadly away.

Our host was a sulky “wild man” in the prime of life, his mate a buxom matron who had not yet lost the comeliness inherent in any healthy, well-developed female of the human species. The pair, evidently, had been long married, for they had but seven children.

A section of the bamboo floor of the tiny hut was raised a few feet above the level of the rest, forming a sort of divan. On this we squatted with the family, chatting over our after-supper saybullies. The wife, for all her race, was a true sister of Pandora. What especially awakened her curiosity was the color of our skins; though they were not, at that moment, particularly white. She was seated 429next to James, suckling two lusty infants, and gazing with monkeylike fascination at the hand of the Australian that rested on the divan beside her. Hugging the babes to her breast with one arm, she edged nearer and ran her fingers across the back of the Australian’s sunburned paw. To her astonishment the color would not rub off. She pushed up a sleeve of his jacket and began to examine the forearm; when my companion, till then absorbed in conversation, snatched his hand away with an exclamation of annoyance. No sooner had he let it fall again, than she resumed the examination.

“Quit it!” cried James, turning upon her, “Or I’ll pay you back in your own coin.” The husband snarled fiercely, sprang to his feet, and, crowding in between his wife and the Australian, glared savagely at him as long as the evening lasted.

We turned in soon afterward, eleven of us, on the divan. Though the front wall of the shack was lacking, we needed no covering; even when the rain poured we sweated as in the glare of sunlight. The sucklings took turns in maintaining a continual wailing through the night; the other brats amused themselves in walking and tumbling over our prostrate forms; a lizard chorus sang their monotonous selections with unusual vim and vigor. If we slept at all it was in brief, semi-conscious snatches.

With daylight, came the Burman to repeat his attempt to purchase my companion’s helmet. James spurned the offer as before.

“Then yours, sahib,” pleaded the fellow, in Hindustanee. “One rupee!”

“One?” I cried. “My dear fellow, do you know that the Swedish consul of Ceylon once wore that topee?”

“One rupee,” repeated the Burman, not having understood.

“Tell him to chase himself,” said James.

“Still,” I mused, “if he’d give two dibs it’d almost double our stake.”

“Are you crazy?” shouted the Australian. “The sun would knock you out in an hour.”

“But two more chips might just carry us through,” I retorted, “and starving’s worse than the sun. I’ll risk it.”

“Will you sell?” demanded the Burman.

“Two rupees.”

“One!” shrieked the Oriental, “Two for the sahib’s which is new, One for yours.”

There ensued a half-hour of bargaining, but the Burman gave in 430at last, and, dropping two tecals in my hand, marched proudly away with that illustrious old topee, that I had won in fair barter with the Norseman, set down on his ears.

I handed one of the tecals to our scowling host and we hit the trail again. Out of sight of the hamlet we halted to don the extra suits in our bundles. The Australian gazed sorrowfully at his buskins while I slipped on my second pair of shoes. From the rags and tatters I was discarding I made a band to wind around my brow, after the fashion of Burma. Even with the top of my head exposed to sun and rain, as it was for days, I suffered no evil effects.

The territory beyond Banpáwa was more savage than any we had yet encountered; everywhere a rank vegetation so thick that our feet rarely reached the ground. Now and again we plunged into a thicket only to be caught as in a net, and, powerless to advance, retreated with rent garments and bleeding hands and faces to fight our way around the impenetrable spot. We were now in the very heart of the mountains. Range after range of unbroken jungle succeeded each other. From every summit there spread out a boundless forest of teak and bamboo, turgid with riotous undergrowth. Mountains that were just blue wreaths in the morning climbed higher and higher into the sky—rolling ranges without a yard of clearing to break the monotony of waving tree tops—and beyond them more mountains, identical in formation. Level spaces were there none. Descents so steep that the force of gravity sent us plunging headlong through thorn-bristling thickets, ended in the uncanny depths of V-shaped valleys at the very base of steeper ascents which we mounted hand over hand as a sailor climbs a rope. In our ears sounded the incessant humming of insects; now and then a snake squirmed off through the bushes; more than once there came faintly to us the roar of some distant brute. Of animate nature, most numerous were the apes that swarmed in the dense network of branches overhead, and scampered screaming away, at our intrusion, into the oppressive depths of the forest.

Though the rains continued unabated, there were fewer streams in these higher altitudes, and those were mere rivulets of silt fighting their way down the slopes. At every mudhole we halted to drink; for within us burned a thirst such as no man knows who has not suffered it in the jungle-girdled waist line of Mother Earth. Chocolate-colored water we drank, water alive with squirming animal life, in pools 431out of which wriggled brilliant green snakes. Often I rose to my feet to find a leech clinging to my nether lip.

As the day grew, a raging hunger fell upon us. In a sharp valley we came upon a tree on the trunk of which hung a dozen or more jack-fruits within easy reach. We grasped one and attempted to pull it down. The short, fibrous stem was as stout as a manila rope, and knife had we none. We wrapped our arms around the fruit and tugged with the strength of despair; as well have tried to pull up a ship’s anchor by hand. We chopped at the stem with sharp stones; we hunted up great rocks and attempted to split the fruit open on the tree, screaming with rage and bruising our fingers. Streams of perspiration coursed down our sun-scorched skins, hunger and thirst redoubled, and still our efforts availed us nothing. When we gave up and plunged on, our assault on the fruit had barely scratched the adamantine rind.

Weary and famished, matted with mud from crown to toe, and bleeding from innumerable superficial lacerations, we were still grappling with the throttling vegetation well on in the afternoon when James, a bit in advance, uttered a triumphant shriek.

“A path! A path!” he cried, “and a telegraph wire!”

Certain that hunger and the sun had turned his brain, I tore my way through the thicket that separated us. His cry had been awakened by no mirage of delirium. A path there was, narrow and steep, but showing evidences of recent travel, and, overhead, a sagging telegraph wire running from tree to tree. The compass had brought us again to that elusive route followed by the native porters.

A half-hour along it and we came to a little plain, intersected by a swift stream, in the backwater of which swam a covey of snow-white ducks. On the western bank stood a weather-beaten bungalow, over the door of which was a faded shield bearing the white elephant of Siam. Above it disappeared the telegraph wire. Our thirst quenched, we mounted the narrow steps and shouted to attract attention. There was no response. We pushed open the door and entered. The room was some eight feet square and entirely unfurnished, but in one corner hung an unpainted telephone instrument of crude and ancient construction. A spider had spun his web across the mouth of the receiver and there were no signs that the hut had been occupied within modern times.

“Nothing doing here,” said James. “Let’s swim the creek.”

432On the opposite bank was a bamboo rest-house, smaller than that of Banpáwa, but with a floor raised some feet above the fever-breeding ground. Back of it, among the trees, stood a cluster of seven huts. We made the round of them, seeking food; but returned to the rest-house with nothing but the information that the village was called Kathái Ywá. Nine Laos carriers had arrived, among whom were several we had seen the evening before. They had, perhaps, some secret grudge against white men, for they not only refused to sell us rice, but scowled and snarled when we drew near them. The day was not yet done. We should have pushed on had not James fallen victim to a burning jungle fever.

With plenty of water at hand, hunger grew apace. For a time the forlorn hope that some more tractable human might wander into Kathái Ywá buoyed us up. But each new arrival was more stupid and surly than his forerunner. The sun touched the western tree-tops. James lay on his back, red-eyed with fever. Eat we must, if we were to have strength to continue in the morning. I made a second circuit of the village, hoping to win by bluster what we had not with cajolery. The community rose en masse and swarmed upon me. The males carried long, overgrown knives; the females, cudgels. I returned hastily to the rest-house.

The sight of the telephone wire awakened within me the senseless notion that I might summon assistance from some neighboring village. I left my shoes and trousers in charge of the Australian and dashed through the stream and into the government bungalow. At the first call I “got” someone. Who or where he was I could not guess. I bawled into the receiver English, French, German, and all the Hindustanee I could muster. When I paused for breath the unknown subscriber had “rung off.” I jangled the bell and shook and pounded the apparatus for five minutes. A glass-eyed lizard ran out along the wire and stared down upon me. His mate in the thatch above screeched mockingly. Then another voice sounded faintly in my ear.

“Hello!” I shouted, “Who’s this? We want to eat. D’ you speak English? Dō sahib hai, Kathái Ywá. Send us some—”

A flood of meaningless jabber interrupted me. Two words I caught,—that old, threadbare phrase “n?melay-voo.” I had rung up a Burman; but he was no babu.

“English!” I shrieked. “Anyone there that speaks English? We’re sahibs! Hello! Hello, I say! Hello—”

A Laos carrier crossing the stream that separates Burma from Siam

433No answer. Central had cut me off again. I rang the bell until my arm was lame and listened breathlessly. All was still. I dropped the receiver and tumbled out of the hut determined to throttle one of the Laos carriers. In the middle of the stream I slipped on a stone and fell on my knees, the water to my armpits. The startled ducks ran away before me. I snatched up a club and pursued them through the village and back to the creek again, the inhabitants screaming in my wake. I threw the weapon at the nearest fowl. It was only a joint of bamboo and fell short. The ducks took to the water. I plunged in after them and once more fell sprawling.

Before I could scramble to my feet a shout sounded near at hand, and I looked up to see the squad of soldiers breaking out of the jungle. They halted before the government bungalow and watched my approach with deep-set grins. The sergeant, understanding my gestures, offered us places around the common rice heap. I returned to the rest-house for my nether garments. The villagers were driving their panting ducks homeward. The Australian struggled to his feet and we waded the stream once more, joining the soldiers on the veranda of the government bungalow. Their porters brought huge wet leaves to protect the floor, and built a fire within. A half-hour later the troopers rose to their feet shouting, “Kin-kow! Kin-kow!” easily understood from its similarity to the familiar Chinese word “chow,” and we followed them into the smoke-choked building. In a civilized land I would not have tasted such a mess as was spread out on a banana leaf in the center of the floor, to win a wager. At that moment it seemed a repast fit for an epicure.

We slept with the soldiers in the telephone bungalow. James’ fever burned itself out and he awoke with the dawn ready to push on. For the first few miles we followed a path below the telephone wire. In stumbling over the uneven ground my shoe-laces broke at frequent intervals. Well on in the morning I halted to replace them with stout vines. The Australian drew on ahead. Before I had overtaken him the path forked and the wire disappeared in the forest between the diverging routes. I hallooed to my companion, but the rain was coming down in torrents, and the voice does not carry far in the jungle. I struck into one of the paths; but in a very few minutes it faded and was lost. I found myself alone in the trackless wilderness.

Here was a serious mishap indeed. The Australian had carried off the compass; our money was in my bundle. Separated we were 434equally helpless, and what chance was there of finding each other again in hundreds of miles of unblazed wilds?

I set a course by the sun and for three hours fought my way up the precipitous face of a mountain. To crash and roll down the opposite slope required less than a third of that time. In the valley, tucked away under soaring teak trees, was a lonely little hut. A black-toothed female in scanty skirt squatted in the square of shade under the cabin, pounding rice in a hollowed log. The jungle was humming its un-cadenced tune. I climbed to the veranda and lay down, certain that I had seen the last of James, the Australian.

Under the hut sounded the thump, thump, thump of the pestle. What exponents of the “simple life,” of which we hear so much where it does not exist, are these jungle dwellers of Siam! They are as independent of the outside world as their neighbors, the apes, in the tree-tops. The youthful “wild man” takes his mate and a dah and wanders off into the wilderness. He needs nothing else to win a livelihood and rear a family. The dah is a long, heavy knife, a cross between a butcher’s cleaver and a Cuban machete. It is the one and universal tool and weapon of the indigène of the Malay ranges. With it he builds his house, gathers his food, and defends himself against his enemies. His dwelling is a mere human nest, as truly a nest as the home of the swallow or the squirrel. The walls are of bamboo, tied together with vines and creepers; the floor, of split bamboo; the eight-foot pillars that support his hut, the ladder at the doorway, the rafters, are all of the same material. Attap leaves for the roof grow everywhere. Cocoanut shells do duty as plates and cups; a joint of the omnipresent bamboo makes a light and handy pitcher or pot. To lay up a stock of bananas for flood time is the work of a few hours; a few yards of clearing supplies the householder rice in abundance. If he has a taste for “fire-water,” an intoxicating drink can be made from the sap of the palm tree. Two loin-cloths a year may be fashioned from the skin of an animal or from a thick, woolly leaf that grows in swampy places. Take away the dah and there is nothing that is not of the jungle, save one import from the outside world—tobacco. The “wild man” and his mate are inveterate smokers.

But it was not by loafing in the shade that I should beat my way through to civilization. I rose to my feet and rearranged my “swag.” If only I could hire a guide. Hark! The sound of a human voice came faintly to my ear. No doubt the owner of the hut, and of the slightly-clad female, was returning from a morning expedition. I 435listened attentively. Then off to the right in the jungle rang out a familiar song:—
“Oh, I long to see my dear old home again,
And the cottage in the little winding lane.
You can hear the birds a-singing,
And pluck the roses blooming;
Oh, I long to see my old home again.”

It was the Australian’s favorite ballad. I shouted at the top of my lungs, and, springing to the ground with one leap, crashed into the jungle. A thicket caught me in its sinewy grasp. I tore savagely at the entangling branches. The voice of the Australian rang out once more:—
“Oh, why did I leave my little back room, out in Bloomsburee?
Where I could live on a quid a week, in such luxuree....”

He was further away now. I snatched myself loose and plunged on after him, leaving a sleeve of my jacket in the thicket.

“Hello, James! Hello!” I bellowed. He was singing with a volume that filled his ears. I opened my mouth to shout again, and fell through a bush into a clearly-marked path. Above it sagged the telephone wire and just in sight through the overhanging branches plodded the Australian.

“Gee, but you’re slow,” he laughed, when I had overtaken him.

“When d’you find the path?” I demanded.

“Haven’t lost it,” he answered. “Why? Did you?”

“Haven’t seen it for five hours,” I replied.

“Holy dingoes!” he gasped, “Thought you were close behind, or I’d have felt mighty little like singing.”

We had no difficulty in keeping to the route for the rest of the day, and passed several carriers westward bound. With never a hut to raid, we fasted. Yet had we but known it there was food all about us. What a helpless being is civilized man without the accessories of civilization! It fell to uncouth jungle dwellers to bring home to us our own ignorance.

Weak from hunger, we had halted at the edge of a mountain stream well on in the afternoon, when we were overtaken by the soldiers. They had packed away their uniforms and wore only loin-cloths and caps.

“Kin-kow? Kin-kow?” cried the sergeant, with an interrogatory gesture.

436We nodded sadly. He chuckled to himself and waved his arms about him, as if to say that there was food everywhere. We shrugged our shoulders skeptically. He laughed like a man prepared to prove his point and addressed himself to the squad. Two of the soldiers picked up cudgels, and, returning along the path to a half-rotten log, began to move back and forth on opposite sides of it, striking it sharp blows here and there. They came back with a half-dozen lizards, those great, green reptiles that sing their “she-kak!” all night long in the thatch of Indian bungalows. Meanwhile two others of the squad were kneeling at the edge of a mudhole. From time to time they plunged their bare arms into it, drawing out frogs and dropping them, still alive, into a joint of bamboo. The sergeant took a dah and cut down a small tree at the edge of the jungle. A servant dug some reddish-brown roots on the opposite bank of the stream, while his mate started a fire by rubbing two sticks together.

In a few minutes all were reassembled beside us. The lizards were skinned, cut up with lumps of red currie in an iron pot, and set to boiling. A servant drew out the frogs one by one, struck them on the head with a stick, and tossed them to his companion. The latter rolled them up inside mud balls and threw them into the fire. The sergeant split open his tree, extracted a pith some four inches in diameter, cut it into slices, toasted them on the point of his dah, and tossed them onto a large leaf spread out at our feet. The reddish roots were beaten to a pulp on the face of the rock and sprinkled over the toasted slices. Rice was boiled, the soldiers, grinning knowingly, took up their refrain of “kin-kow! kin-kow!” and the meal began. Before it was finished, both the jungle and its inhabitants had risen several degrees in our estimation. Extracted from their shell of mud, the frogs were found to be baked into brown balls, and tasted not unlike fried fish. The toasted pith resembled pickled beets. But best of all was the lizard currie. James and I ate more than our share, and offered mutual condolence that the pair sent to pound the old tree trunk had not remained longer at their task.

We went on with the soldiers, halting soon after dark at the bank of the largest stream we had yet encountered. There was no village in the vicinity, but the government had erected a military rest-house on the bank. In this we spent the night with the troopers, after partaking of a frog and lizard supper.

Beyond, the territory was less mountainous and the path well-marked; 437but whatever advantage we gained thereby was offset by another difficulty. The river beside which we had left the soldiers was deep and swift, and wound back and forth across our course with a regularity that was disheartening. In the first few morning hours we swam it no less than fourteen times. It was the ninth crossing that we had cause longest to remember. Reaching the narrow, sandy bank a bit before my companion, I stripped, and, rolling my clothing up in the oilcloth, tied the bundle to my head, and plunged in. James began to disrobe as I reached the opposite shore. Without removing his ragged shirt, or his helmet, he fastened on his “swag” as I had done, and struck out. Being an excellent swimmer he advanced with long, clean strokes. Unfortunately he did not take care to keep his head pointed up-stream. The powerful current caught him suddenly broadside, dragged him under, and dashed him against a submerged snag. He righted himself quickly, but in that brief struggle lost both his bundle and his helmet, and in an effort to save both caught only the topee. The “swag” raced down stream. I sprang to my feet and dashed along the sandy shore in hot pursuit. The stream was far swifter than I. The tangled undergrowth brought me to a sudden halt, and the Australian’s worldly possessions were swallowed up in the jungle.

I returned to find him sitting disconsolately on the bank. Luckily there was but one tecal in his bundle, but with it had gone his shoes, trousers, jacket, the odds and ends he had picked up on his travels, his military and citizenship papers, the pocket compass, and even that bottle of “Superior Currie Dressing”; in short, everything he possessed except a helmet and a tattered shirt.

But James was not a man to be long cast down by minor misfortunes. He tied the shirt about his loins and we proceeded. Relieved of his burden, he marched more easily and crossed the streams with far less difficulty than I. But in less than an hour his shoulders, back, and legs were painted a fiery red by the implacable sun; and the stones and jagged brambles tore and bruised his feet until he left a blood stain at every step.

We were again overtaken by the soldiers about noonday and halted for another jungle meal. Off once more, we forged ahead for a time, but found it prudent to wait for the troopers to lead the way; for the route was beset with unexpected pitfalls. As once, in fighting our way along the bank of the river, we crashed headlong through the 438bushes into the dry, stony bed of a tributary—fifteen feet below. This mishap left little of my clothing, and gave the Australian the appearance of a modern Saint Sebastian.

A wider path began where we rejoined the soldiers. The higher mountain ranges fell away; but if the foothills were less lofty they were as steep, and the slopes were often clear of vegetation and reeking in mud. At the top of such a ridge we overtook an equine caravan returning from some village off to the southwest. Burdened with huge pack saddles, the horses began the perilous descent reluctantly. Suddenly three of them lost their footing, sat down on their haunches, and rolled over and over, their packs flying in every direction. James laughed loudly and slapped me on the back. The blow disturbed my equilibrium. My feet shot from under me, and, slipping, sliding, rolling, clutching in vain for support, I pitched down the five-hundred yard slope and splashed headfirst into a muddy stream at the bottom several seconds in advance of the horses.

Another mile left me barefooted and nearly as naked as my companion. Now and again we overtook a band of Laos carriers, once a young Buddhist priest in tattered yellow, attended by two servants. We had seen him somewhere a day or two before and remembered him not only by his garb but on account of the licentious cast of his coarse features. He joined our party uninvited and tramped along with us, puffing at a long saybully and chattering volubly. The soldiers greeted his sallies with roars of laughter and winked at us in a way to suggest that the tales he told would have made the efforts of Boccaccio seem Sunday-school stories. We deplored more than ever our ignorance of the Siamese tongue.

James was protesting that he could not continue another yard when we came most unexpectedly to the edge of the jungle. Before us stretched a vast paddy field, deeply inundated. The soldiers led the way along the tops of the ridges toward a dense grove two miles distant. The howling of a hundred curs heralded our approach, and as many chattering humans swarmed about us when we paused in a large, deep-shaded village at the edge of a river fully a mile wide. It could be no other than the Menam Chow Pya—the “great river” of Siam. Along the low eastern bank stretched a veritable city with white, two-story buildings, before which were anchored large native junks. It was Rehang. The soldiers told us so with shouts of joy and ran away to don their uniforms.

We threw off what was left of our garments and plunged into the 439stream to wash off the blood and grime of the jungle. When we had prepared ourselves for entrance into civilization the soldiers were gone. We appealed to the villagers to set us across the river. They refused. We took possession of one of a dozen dug-out logs drawn up along the shore, and the village swarmed down upon us in a great avalanche of men, women, children, and yellow curs. We caught up two paddles and laid about us. In two minutes we were alone.

We pushed the dug-out into the stream and were climbing in when two ugly, wrinkled females ran down the bank and offered to ferry us across. They pointed the craft up-stream and fell to paddling, their flabby breasts beating against their paunches with every stroke, their bony knees rising and falling regularly. They were expert water dogs, however, and crossed the swift stream without mishap, landing us at a crazy wooden wharf in the center of the town.

In every published map of Siam you will find Rehang noted—somewhere within a hundred miles of its actual situation. Not that the city deserves such distinction. The geographer must have some name to fill in this vast space on his chart or he lays himself open to a charge of ignorance. On nearer sight the white, two-story buildings were rather pathetic, dilapidated structures. The avenue between them was not much better paved than the jungle paths, and deeper in mud. The sanitary squad, evidently, had not yet returned from an extended vacation. Here and there a dead cat or dog had been tossed out to be trampled under foot. There was no dearth of inhabitants; one could not but wonder how the town could house such a population. But the passing throng was merely a larger gathering of those same uncouth “wild men” of the jungle villages. The fear of being arrested for unseemly exposure soon left us. James, in national costume, attracted much less attention than I, in the remnants of jacket and trousers.

Just one advance agent of modern civilization had reached Rehang. Bill posters had decorated several blank walls with huge lithographs announcing, in Siamese letters a foot high, the merits of a well-known sewing machine. That we had expected, of course. In the back waters of modern progress are a few hamlets where Milwaukee beer is unknown, but the traveler who extends his explorations so far into the wilds as to discover a community ignorant of the existence of the American sewing machine merits decoration by the Royal Geographical Society.

It was easy, however, to overlook the backwardness of this tumble-down 440thorp on the banks of the Menam; at least it was a market town. James dashed into the first booth with a whoop of delight and startled the keeper out of his wits by demanding a whole three cents’ worth of cigarettes. Saybullies might do well enough as a last resort, but the Australian did not propose to be reduced to such extremities again. He splashed on through the reeking streets blowing great clouds of smoke from his nostrils and forgetting for the time even the smarting of his torn and sun-scorched skin.

Half the merchants of the town were Chinamen. We stopped at a shop kept by three wearers of the pig-tail and, dragging a bench into the center of the room, called for food. One of the keepers, moving as if he deeply resented our intrusion, set canned meat before us, and brought us as a can-opener, after long delay, a hatchet with a blade considerably wider than the largest tin.

When we rose to depart, the Celestials quickly lost their apathy. They demanded ten tecals. I gave them two. The market price of the stuff was certainly not over a half of that sum. A triple scream rent the air and a half-dozen Monguls bounded into the shop and danced like ogres about us. One caught up the hatchet and swung it high above his head. James snatched it from him, kicked him across the room, and threw the weapon among the heaped-up wares. We fought our way to the street. The keeper nearest us gave one stentorian bellow that was answered from every side. Chinamen tumbled out through every open doorway, out of every hole in the surrounding shop walls; they sprang up from under the buildings, dropped from the low roofs, swarmed out of the alleyways, for all the world like rats; screaming, yelping, snarling, clawing the air as they ran, their cues streaming behind them. In the twinkling of an eye the mob at our heels had increased to a hundred. We refused to sacrifice our dignity by running. The frenzied Celestials scratched us savagely with their overgrown finger nails, caught at our legs, spattered us with mud. Not one of them used his fists. When we turned upon them they recoiled as from a squad of cavalry and we could retaliate only by catching a flying pig-tail in either hand to send a pair of yellow-skinned rascals sprawling in the mud. They came back at us after every stand before we had taken a dozen steps. Our backs were a network of finger-nail scratches. We cast our eyes about us for some weapon and found two bemired sticks. Before we could use them our assailants turned and fled, still screaming at the top of their lungs.

The sort of jungle through which we cut our way for three weeks. Gerald James, my Australian companion, in the foreground

Not far beyond, we turned in at the largest edifice in the town—the 441Rehang barracks. Among the half-hundred little brown soldiers lounging about the entrance were our intermittent comrades of the few days past. It was plain that they had told our story. The recruits gathered about us, laughing and plying pantomimic questions. How had we liked lizard currie? What had turned our dainty skins so blood red? What ignorant and helpless beings were white men, were they not?

Suddenly, amid the general chatter, I caught a hint that there was a European on the floor above. We sprang towards the stairway at the end of the veranda. The soldiers shrieked in dismay and snatched at our rags. We must not go up; it was contrary to stringent barrack rules. A guardsman on duty at the foot of the stairs held his musket out horizontally and shouted a tremulous command. James caught him by the shoulder and sent him spinning along the veranda. We dashed up the steps. Two doors stood ajar. James sprang to one while I pushed open the other.

“Hello!” I shouted, “Where’s the white—”

A triumphant roar from my companion sent me hurrying after him. He was dancing gleefully just inside the second door, and shaking a white man ferociously by the hand, an astonished white man in khaki uniform with officer’s stripes. I reminded the Australian of his costume and he subsided. The European invited us inside and sent a servant for tea, biscuits and cigars. Our host was commander of the Rehang garrison—a Dane, but with a fluent command of English. That we had been wandering through the jungle was all too evident; but that we had come overland from Burma was a tale he would not credit until the sergeant had been called in to confirm our assertions. Forgetting his military duties, the commander plied us with wondering questions until dusk fell, and then ordered three of the newly-arrived squad to arrange for our accommodation.

The sergeant, plainly overawed at finding us on such intimate terms with his dreaded chief, led the way through the barracks. The garrison grounds were extensive. Within the inclosure was a Buddhist monastery, resembling, if less pretentious than, the Tavoy of Rangoon. Here were the same irregular patches of untilled ground, where priests wandered and chattered in the twilight; the same disorderly array of gaudy temples, gay little pagodas with tinkling silver bells, and frail priestly dwellings.

On the veranda of one of the latter the soldiers spread a pair of army blankets. We were for turning in at once. Our seneschals would not hear of it. For a half-hour they trotted back and forth 442between our bungalow and that of the commander, bearing steaming dishes. The little table they had set up was groaning under its burden before the sergeant signed to us to begin. There was broiled fish, a mutton roast, a great steak, a spitted fowl, fruits and vegetables of astounding variety and quantity. The sergeant laughed aloud at our astonishment when he drew out a pair of knives and forks from his pocket. Then he tapped his head meditatively with a skinny finger and ran off again into the night. He came back with a box of cigars and a quart bottle of whiskey!

Neither of us being particularly addicted to the use of fire-water, we wet our whistles and fell upon the fish. When I looked up again, the sergeant was watching me with the fixed stare of a half-starved cat.

“Kin-kow?” I asked, pointing at the steak.

The trooper shook his head almost fiercely.

“Try him on the gasoline,” suggested James.

I poured out a glass of whiskey and held it out to him. In accordance with Oriental etiquette, he refused it seven times with a pained expression. At the eighth offer he smiled nervously. At the ninth he raised his hand hesitatingly and dropped it again. At the tenth he took the glass gingerly between his slim fingers, eyed it askance, tasted the liquor half fearfully, smacked his lips, gulped down a liberal half of the potion, and handed the glass to the privates behind him.

The mutton roast engrossed our attention. When it was finished, I found the officer grinning down upon me. I filled the glass again. He cocked his head on one side in the beginning of a shake and kept it there. His refusals had lost force. With the third glass there was no refusal. The fourth he poured out for himself. By the time we were picking the chicken bones, the three warriors were dancing gleefully about us. We sat down on the blanket for a smoke. The sergeant, shrieking his undying affection, threw himself down between us and began to embrace us in turn. When we kicked him off the veranda he locked arms with the privates and waltzed away across the parade-ground, screaming a high-pitched native song at the top of his lungs. The quart bottle stood on the table—empty.

We spent the night on the veranda. We did not sleep there. Our sun-scorched skins would not permit it; even had they burned less fiercely, we could not have slept. One would have fancied the monastery a gigantic hen yard, with the priests transformed into chanticleers 443during the hours of darkness. After every shower the unveiled moon was greeted with a din of crowing that was nothing short of infernal. In the brief respite each gathering storm brought us, we tossed about wide-awake on our asperous couch, listening to the symphonic tinkling of the pagoda bells.

With dawn came a summons from the Dane. We hurried to his bungalow and joined him at breakfast. He had gathered together two pairs of shoes and four khaki uniforms. They were from his own tailor in Bangkok, still very serviceable, though fitting us a bit too snugly, and chafing our blistered skins. Rolling up the extra garments and swinging them over our shoulders, we bade our host farewell. As we left the garrison inclosure we came upon the sergeant, sitting on the ground, his knees drawn up to his chin, his face buried in his hands—a very personification of the baneful morning after.