The Shans,[223] remnants of the race which once dominated a vast empire in Eastern Asia, including the whole of Northern Burma to the confines of Tibet, are now somewhat backward in civilization. A clannish folk, with the cohesion lacking among Burmans. If you get hold of the chief you secure his people also. This no doubt facilitated the task of settlement. Of fierce appearance, to us they seem unwarlike. Once at least a conflict was stopped by a British officer adopting the simple expedient of pitching his camp midway between two hostile armies. But before our coming internecine feuds raged savage and devastating. Like medieval barons, Chief warred against Chief, laying waste the country. Populous cities reduced to ruinous heaps gave place to miserable hamlets. Wide stretches of fertile land, thrown out of cultivation, became deserts of jungle and tall grass where the tiger made his lair and the elephant ranged at will. Under the firm and just rule which we have substituted for the intermittent ferocity of Burmese dominion, the Shan plateau is reviving, and once more promises to be an orchard and a harvest-field. Scantiness of population and distance from markets alone retard the cultivation of wheat, vegetables, and fruit. Now a railway to the Southern States is being made. If it is not stopped in mid-air, and if no parsimonious schemes hinder through communication, an era of prosperity for the Shan country is at hand. Early in 1890, I accompanied Sir Charles Crosthwaite on the first visit paid by a Chief Commissioner to the Southern Shan States. We rode from the railway at Meiktila road (Thazi), past Hlaingdet, up and along the customary mule-track to Kalaw, on the border of the Myelat[224] plain. The cart-road was yet unmade. There was not a cart of any kind in the Shan country. Kalaw lies in the midst of pine-forests, a perfectly lovely spot, believed by many to be the future hill-capital of Burma. It will be an important station on the new railway. Personally, I doubt whether it will displace Maymy̆o, though it may well be to Maymy̆o what Mussoorie is to Simla. From Kalaw we rode through the Myelat, fine open country, but intersected by many ravines, to Nyaungywe, on the edge of the Inle Lake. The chiefs of the Myelat States flocked to meet the head of the Province, and with bands of wild retainers, with much clashing of cymbals and beating of gongs, escorted him on his march. Crossing the lake we came to Fort Stedman, then the civil and military headquarters. Here the Chief Commissioner halted for some days, interviewing local officers and many Shan notables, and holding a Durbar, at which he addressed the assembled Chiefs. These State visits to Fort Stedman and Taung-gyi, which afterwards became the Superintendent’s headquarters, were full of interest, certainly to the visitors, probably also to the local inhabitants. I have assisted at three such visits. From distant hills, from far across the