The country was not rich. There were no forests that it would pay to work, and no minerals had been discovered. The cultivation was of the primitive kind--"Taungya," or "Jhoom"--that is to say, felling the trees, burning them when dry, and sowing hill-rice and other crops in the ash. In the forests they had plenty of game, and much fish--Mahseer and other kinds--in the rivers; and the jungles were rich in fruits and roots that would support life if the grain failed. Metal of all kinds was very scarce. The hills produced none, and the Burmese Government had forbidden the export of metals from the plains. The trouble the Chins gave by cutting the telegraph wire was caused by their desire to procure metal, rather than to cause annoyance. Mr. Carey compared the attraction felt by the Chin for the unprotected wire to that felt by an English boy for an unfenced apple-orchard. The insulator spikes were beaten into hoes and the wire melted to make bullets, or bangles for the damsels. Their wants were blankets, cottons and other cloths, iron and steel for tools, lead for bullets, needles and thread and salt. In exchange they were able to offer honey, beeswax, chillies, mats, and a little lac. The reports of 1889 were more concerned with the measures carried out for their subjugation than with descriptions of the people and their manners. In the main, what is written in the _Burma Gazetteer_ published in 1908 is true of the Chins of twenty years ago:-- "They are a sturdy, warlike, hospitable people, slow of speech, grave of habit, paying great regard to rank and to the ties of clan, but spoilt by their intemperance, their vindictiveness, their treachery, their greed, their lack of persistence,[64] and their personal uncleanliness." There is a quaint humour about this description which is refreshing in a Gazetteer. A race would have to be good indeed if, with such an array of vices, there was anything left to spoil. Their villages are described as built on the hill-slopes, some of them fortified; and their houses are often solid, elaborate structures. Their dress is the reverse--a loin-cloth, none too ample, and a blanket for the men; a short skirt and jacket for the women. Home-woven check plaids are seen in a good many costumes, and some tribes have distinctive plaids, as in Scotland. The people are mainly vegetarians, but they will eat anything, from a dog to an elephant. They smoke tobacco in pipes, and they make a liquor from fermented grain, presumably rice, which is called _zu_. They suck up this, in the most approved fashion, through a hollow reed, out of the original still-pot. Enormous quantities of _zu_ are consumed at Chin entertainments, which usually end in disgusting orgies. THE CHINBÔKS AND CHINBONS.