I believe I was the first man to ride a bicycle in Rangoon. I know I was the cause of much wonder to the natives, who would stare in open-eyed astonishment to see a white man scorching by on a little iron carriage with two wheels. When I chanced to dismount, they would gather around and take a look at the machine, finger the tires, ask how much it cost, and finally grunt out some such remark as "_Teh goundy, naw?_"--Pretty good, isn't it? It was pleasant to be the centre of all this admiration, but not so pleasant when I turned the admiration into amusement by coasting boldly down a steep hill, making a sharp turn just in time to avoid a deep ditch, and driving full speed into a most unyielding fence. It is peculiarly mortifying to be laughed at by those whom you regard as your social inferiors. When I arrived in Rangoon, it was just after the "dacoit times." Dacoits are the highway-robbers of India. They work in gangs, and travel over the country plundering, murdering, and sacking and burning the villages in the jungle. They carry guns when they can get them; but as the English are very careful to confiscate guns found in the possession of natives, the dacoits are generally armed with _dahs_, as the Burmese swords are called. Shortly before I arrived in Burmah, the country had been infested with dacoits, so that even in the outskirts of Rangoon houses were barricaded at night, and the employment of private watchmen, always common in Burmah, became almost universal. By the time I arrived there, however, the gentle custom of dacoity had been pretty thoroughly broken up. Now and then a lonely village in the jungle might be looted and burned, or an English official living in some remote town might be murdered, but we who lived in Rangoon were safe. No dacoit dared to show himself there. At least, so I was assured. Now I had a sweetheart in those days; and have her still--no less sweet now that she shares my home. But then she lived in Kemendine, a considerable village about two miles from my own home in Rangoon. I believe that technically Kemendine lies within the municipal limits of Rangoon, but practically it is a separate community, being cut off from Rangoon proper by a considerable stretch of unimproved land. Kemendine is distinctively a native community, having a large population of Burmans, but not half a dozen white inhabitants. I was in the habit of using my bicycle when I went out to spend an evening with my _fiancée_. The road was lonely, but I considered it perfectly safe.