“As soon as the order for marching arrives,” says Sangermano,[70] “the soldiers, leaving their sowing and reaping, and whatever occupation they may be engaged in, assemble instantly in different corps, and prepare themselves; and throwing their weapon over their shoulders like a lever, they hang from one end of it a mat or blanket to cover them at night, a provision of powder, and a little vessel for cooking; and from the other end, a provision of rice, of salt, and of Napè, a species of half-putrid, half-dried fish, pickled with salt. In this guise they travel to their place of destination, without transport-waggons, without tents, in their ordinary dress, merely carrying on their heads a piece of red cloth, the only distinctive badge of a Burmese soldier.[71] About nine o’clock in the morning they begin to march, after having taken a short sleep, and cooked and eaten their rice, and Carè, a sort of stew eaten with the rice, of which that kind which is used by soldiers and travellers is generally made of herbs or leaves of trees, cooked in plain water, with a little Napè. He might then bivouac on the bare ground, without any protection from the night air, the dew, or even the rain; merely constructing a palisade of branches of trees or thorns. Sometimes it happens that the expedition is deferred till the following year, and then the soldiers being arrived on the enemy’s confines are made to work in the rice-grounds, thus to furnish a store of that commodity for their provision.” This is the picturesque description left us by the missionary, and it is of the more value as we know it to come from an eye-witness. But in the Burmese army, as in the ancient Persian, there is a corps of several thousand men, known by the name of the Invulnerables. Major Snodgrass has given us an interesting sketch of this body of military; and it being short, finds a fitting place here.[72] “They are distinguished by the short cut of their hair, and the peculiar manner in which they are tattooed, having the figures of elephants, tigers, and a great variety of ferocious animals, indelibly and even beautifully marked upon their arms and legs; but to the soldiers they were best known by having bits of gold, silver, and sometimes precious stones in their arms, probably introduced under the skin at an early age.