Iron Work.--The blacksmith is one of the village officials described in Chapter III, para. 2. The forge is placed in the middle of the widest street to lessen the risk of fire; it is only a rough shed with a log platform in front, which is as favourite a resort for loafers as is the forge door in England. The bellows consist of two hollow wooden cylinders in which pistons fringed with feathers are worked up and down. The lower ends of the cylinders are buried in the ground, side by side, and from them two bamboo tubes converge, meeting just behind a stone through which there is a hole; the charcoal fire is placed in front of this stone, and when the pistons are worked smartly a very strong draught is obtained. The blacksmith does little more than make and repair the simple agricultural implements of the village, but I have heard rumours of some who are capable of making gun locks. I think the form of bellows and the art of working iron have been introduced by captives, as the same type of bellows is found in the adjoining plains. Cloth Manufacture.--Cotton is grown in the jhums. It is cleaned in a home-made gin, consisting of a frame holding two wooden rollers, one end of each being carved for a few inches of its length into a screw, grooved in the opposite way to the other, so that on the handle being turned the rollers revolve in opposite directions, and the cotton is drawn between them, the seeds being left behind. The cotton is then worked by hand into rolls a few inches long, whence it is spun into the spindle of a rough spinning wheel, or occasionally a bobbin is used, which, being given a sharp twist, draws the cotton into a thread by its own weight. This method admits of diligent ones spinning as they go to and from their jhums. The thread having been spun, it is thoroughly wetted and then hung in loops some three or four feet long over a horizontal bar, and stretched by several heavy bars being suspended in these loops. Weaving.--The warp is prepared by passing the thread round two smooth pieces of wood, one of which is fastened to two uprights, while the ends of the other are attached to the ends of a broad leather band, which passes behind the back of the weaver as she sits on the ground and, by leaning back, stretches the threads to the requisite degree of tightness. The woof is formed by passing to and fro bamboos round which are wound different coloured threads, which are beaten home with a well polished batten made of the sago palm. A very serviceable form of quilt called "puanpui" is made by passing round every fourth or fifth thread of the warp a small roll of raw cotton and drawing both ends up. A row of these cotton rolls is put in after every fourth or fifth thread of the woof, so that on one side the quilt is composed of closely placed tufts of cotton.