It was with feelings of no common interest that we disembarked from the steamer at Mandalay, and took our first glimpse of the place. The bustle of so many passengers disembarking created a very busy scene, and dense clouds of dust arose, so that we were glad to get away as soon as possible. We proceeded to charter one of the conveyances we found there waiting for hire, a peculiar kind of vehicle, resembling in size and appearance a dog kennel set on a pair of high wheels, and it proved a marvel of inconvenience. You climb up with difficulty, thrust yourself through the small aperture as best you can, for it is no easy matter, and then you stow yourself away, sitting down on the floor of the conveyance with your knees about your ears. It is quite impossible to preserve a dignified demeanour in one of these bullock gharries, and yet, sad to relate, it was found that this was the only kind of conveyance available for His Majesty the King, when he was removed from the palace to the river on his way to India. The matter created quite a difficulty. To have mounted the king on such an occasion on a horse or an elephant would have been cruel mockery. At that time there were no horse gharries in Mandalay. They brought a dhooly first, but the king declined point blank to enter it. The bullock gharry was the best arrangement they could devise. One of the first things that attracted our attention was the inordinately gorgeous appearance of some things, and the very primitive and mean condition of others. This mixture of grandeur and shabbiness is quite an Oriental trait. The royal city and palace, the pagodas and the monasteries, were most sumptuous in style of building and decoration, but everything else looked very poor in comparison. The bamboo houses of the people looked small and frail and cheap. The roads, which we consider amongst the first essentials of civilised life, were as bad as they could be. They were of mere mud, which became dust several inches deep in dry weather, and a quagmire when it rained. The dense clouds of dust that rose wherever there was much traffic formed an experience truly distressing.