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The earth quaked, many thunderbolts fe ll, the Irrawaddy
rolled up its waves and broke down its banks. Kuttha
was seized with terror, and, as he fled forth from the
city gate, the earth opened and swallowed him up.
11 is not the least interesting feature of many legends
in Burma that they enshrine the traditional knowledge
of some ancient historical or natural fact, and. I believe
that in this pretty tale we have the record of some
great convulsion, an
episode of mo r e
than usual moment
in the ceaseless conflict
between the
great river and its
encompassing hills.
This, the place
of the Great Cliff is
the finest portion of
the Second Defile.
Soon after leaving
A T SHWEGU FAIR
it, the river sweeps round in more than a semicircle, to
emerge once more in untrammelled splendour at the foot
of a rounded hill tinted with reddening grass and not
unlike an English down.
Below the defile lie the island and village of Shwegu,
through the tree-tops of which gleam the golden spires
of many pagodas, the centre of a great annual festival
attended by many thousands of pilgrims. An island
of greeii and gold, set in the folds of a sunlit river
fading away to steel-blue mist at the threshold of the If