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Split bamboos support narrow shelves, whereon are placed the various food-offerings with which is sought the goodwill of the evil spirits. The Kachin men we met were all armed with the formidable dah or native sword, whose widened blade they protect in a univalvular sheath of wood. They wore Shan jackets and dark knickerbockers; their hair was gathered under a turban.
Jack stood still and looked round for their enemies. There was no sign of a Kachin to be seen. One had dropped into the river, and the current had certainly carried him away; the others had escaped into the jungle which grew thickly within a short distance of the bridge head. "By Jingo!" cried Jim Dent blankly, as he ran up. "The bridge has gone. We're in a pretty fix." "Gone," echoed Buck.
He dropped back and vanished into the gulf without a sound. Jack recovered his bar, and waited with a stern, grim face for the next attack. It was a life and death struggle now, and it was his duty to guard the gap. Mr. Haydon caught up the dah which had flown from the hand of the Kachin, and swung it with a deep guttural sound of satisfaction. Me Dain had his great knife in his hand.
They were now actually hanging with heads over the brink of the gulf, and the uproar of the rushing waters below sounded loud in Jack's ears. Suddenly he felt that they were both going over, slowly but steadily. The Kachin was no longer trying to master his foe. So that his enemy went, he was willing to fall with him.
This devoted evangelist told me that a poor woman, a Kachin Christian, in whose welfare he felt deep personal interest, was, he greatly feared, dying from blood-poisoning at a small Christian village one hour's ride up the river from Bhamo; and he had little doubt that some surgical interference in her case would save her life. I at once offered to go and see her.
Her jaunty husband comes behind, with his red bonnet or turban cocked on one side, the sword and red tasselled bag hung from his left shoulder. The square Kachin bag or satchel is a pure joy of bright threads and patches and wonderful needlework, and is a little suggestive of a magnificent sporran. His expression is said to be sly, but I don't think so.
Enter left, dancers and musicians slowly, with shuffling steps. The quiet is broken by a note on a gong, struck softly, and there is an almost inaudible flute melody on reeds, and liquid notes struck on empty bamboos. These dusky figures are Kachin men, with red turbans, and short, white, very loose kilts and bolero jackets.
This shook the Kachin so much that the vicious knife-thrust he launched went wide of its mark, and at the next moment Jack closed with him and tried to wrench the knife from his grasp. But though the Kachin was no boxer, he was a wrestler of uncommon power and skill, and Jack felt the little man seize upon him with an iron clutch.
He looked round, but could catch no glimpse of his father. He saw the native woman, their companion in misfortune, seated in a corner, a Kachin beside her as if on guard. The woman's head was bent upon her breast, and her child was closely clasped in her arms. She did not look up when Jack was brought in, and her attitude was one of utter dejection. She had already learned her fate.
In the first week of February, 1894, I returned to Shanghai from Japan. It was my intention to go up the Yangtse River as far as Chungking, and then, dressed as a Chinese, to cross quietly over Western China, the Chinese Shan States, and Kachin Hills to the frontier of Burma.
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