After dinner, in the course of conversation, Dr Cushing, thinking, perhaps, that I was a Mark Tapley, and that a lugubrious tale might cheer me up, told me that he was a most unlucky companion to travel with. All his former comrades had died on the journey, or soon afterwards. He then backed up his statement with three instances. Kelly, a missionary, was drowned one day’s journey from Moné; Lyon, another missionary, had died of consumption at Bhamo; and Cooper had been killed by one of his guard at Bhamo. I instanced his wife, who was then in America, as an exception. It was of no use—she was his better half—I was a doomed man. Next morning the thermometer stood at 48°, the same as it had been at Maing Loongyee. The trees, however, were shedding their leaves far less in the upper valley than in the lower country. Starting about eight o’clock, accompanied by the mournful wailing of gibbons, who were practising the trapeze from tree to tree far above our heads, and making astounding leaps, we continued up the glen, passing large droves of Karen pigs, and caravans of laden cattle, until the stream forked, and we ascended the intermediate spur to the crest of Loi Kom Ngam—the Beautiful Golden Mountain—the hill-range dividing the drainage of the Meh Sa Lin from that of the Meh Laik. [Illustration: _View looking west down Pass at 10.53 A.M. 14th February._ ] Gigantic tree-ferns, and the first chestnuts we had seen, were passed as we clambered the spur; and we noticed trees in bloom bearing a red flower, and a large periwinkle-blue creeper which, spreading over the largest trees, spangled them with blossoms. Before reaching the summit we had a magnificent view down the nine miles of valley we had been ascending, extending across the Meh Mum valley to the hills beyond the Salween river. The pass, which is 109 miles from Hlineboay, is 3609 feet above sea-level. A short descent of 70 feet brought us to a little valley, which we crossed; then following a spur, we descended to the Meh Hau, a small stream draining into the Meh Laik here at a level of 2638 feet above the sea. We had fallen nearly 1000 feet in less than three miles. Crossing the spur which separates the Meh Hau from the Meh Lye, we halted for the night near some springs at the 115th mile. Left the next morning at seven o’clock and descended for a mile to the Meh Lye, passing on our way 109 laden cattle. The Meh Lai—River of Variegated Water—is 20 feet wide and five feet deep; sandstone and quartz outcrop in its bed. Looking down-stream to the south, we had a pretty view, bounded by pine-clad spurs, into the Meh Laik valley.