industrious--pounding paddy, weaving their garments, or otherwise occupied in their simple household duties, and lightening their toil by singing plaintive native songs." Owing to a tradition that they would one day receive a religion from the West, these people are said to be peculiarly amenable to the influence and instruction of Christian missionaries. Of the Lao or Shan tribes owning allegiance to the King of Siam, we have spoken very briefly in the second chapter of this volume. They probably represent the mixed and deteriorated remnant of the aborigines who were originally driven from Central China to occupy, under the national name of _Tai_, the forests and coasts of Indo-China. Such accounts as we possess of these peoples are fragmentary, and often strangely contradictory, their tribal names and divisions being applied by different travellers to a great variety of localities. In general, although the names are often used interchangeably, the word _Lao_ seems to be given to that part of the great Shan (or Tai) race who live in the north and east of Siam, some of their tribes coming down as far south as the Cambodian frontier. Mr. Carl Bock, in his notes taken on the spot, explains that "there are six Lao states directly tributary to Siam, all entirely independent of each other, but with several minor states dependent upon these larger ones. The rulers in all these states, even the smaller ones, are autocratic in their authority. Their chiefs hold office for life, but their places are not hereditary, being filled nominally by the King of Siam, but really on the election and recommendation of the people, who send notice to Bangkok on the decease of a chief, with a private intimation of their views as to a successor. Tribute is paid triennially, and takes the form of gold and silver betel-boxes, vases, and necklaces, each enriched with four rubies of the size of a lotus-seed, and a hundred of the size of a grain of Indian corn. Besides these are curious representations of trees in gold and silver, about eight feet high, each with four branches, from which again depend four twigs, with a single leaf at the end of each. The gold trees are valued at 1,080 ticals (£135) each, and the silver ones at 120 ticals (£15) each.