After a winding course over rocks and shoals, through unexplored Shan States and savage hills where head-hunting is still fitfully pursued, the Chindwin joins the Irrawaddy above Pakôkku. Passing between banks clad with dense forest, we desecrated with steam and smoke silent reaches glamorous with romance. The march of progress is gradually dissipating the mist which yet still clings to this river of ancient story. Here and there a court-house or a military police post marks the advance of civilization. Inland the woodman’s axe resounds in the primeval forest. A coal-mine, one of the many promising but faithless ventures of the prospector, makes a deep cavern in a hillside. We explored it for a considerable way by the light of naked, guttering candles; no Davy lamps in that mine. On the Chindwin are still current stories with an old-world ring. There you will see a little monastery at the water’s edge. Above that point, though snakes abound, they have no power to harm. On one side of the line thus marked, if a snake bites you, prepare to die; cross the line, the same snake may bite you with no worse effect than a fleeting sting. Walking through a village, to test the story we asked a man if there were many snakes. “Oh yes,” he replied; “but, of course, they do no harm. I was bitten yesterday.” And he showed on his leg the mark of recent fangs. The reason of this interesting difference is comparatively simple. Once upon a time the countryside was ravaged by a gigantic serpent. The King himself, in the fearless old fashion, gave battle to the snake, and, after a desperate struggle, slew it and cut it in half. The two pieces he flung into the river. Now, the head-piece, where are the poisonous fangs, floated down-stream; the tail-piece, where there are none, floated upwards. You see the result. If you go farther north, you will come to a village where the people have the fascinating power of turning themselves into tigers. We went no higher than Homalin, and missed the chance of verifying this attractive legend. It was poor compensation to land at Thangthut, the capital of a very small Shan Chief, to find a stack of polo-sticks in his haw,[272] and to learn that Manipuris, the originators of the game, sent teams to play polo with the Sawbwa and his staff.