along this portion of the river’s course, which slope
easily on their eastern faces, and end in sudden precipices
on the west. The blue mountains, the precipitous
cliff, the great curve, make here, between them, an
episode of beauty and power. Thirty-one miles of travel
from the junction of the Yu bring us to the hamlet of
Sittaung, a place of ten houses, which exists because
it is on the road to Manipur. It is very unhealthy,
but serene of a morning, with its monastery at one end,
surrounded by betel-palms, its Government rest-house
at the other, and its one narrow street of thatched houses
overlooked by papayas in full fruit, by plantains and
betel-vines. Although remote and isolated, it has
nearly all the most beautiful things in nature to look
at if it wilH i
Leaving it, and past a big island and splendid avenues
of forest, we come to Paungbyin, a place of some note
on the river. A long line of new houses stretches
along the high flat shore ; a court-house, reached by a
bridge and a pathway through the jungle, stands on an
adjoining hill ; a monastery lies in the seclusion of a
grove of palms and other trees. Paddy-flats and snipe
grounds spread away beyond. Paungbyin doe's a considerable
trade in buying and rafting down the rice
grown in the interior, and in supplying the inland villages
with European goods. Every house in the village is
a shop, and every inhabitant, by virtue of locality, a
trader. Some little time ago the village was burnt down,
and now it has arisen again with new splendour.
Flower-pots grace the front doors of most of the cottages,
429