"Their argument was, 'There are fewer dacoits now than there used to be even in the King's time. We prefer dacoits to inconvenience and hardship.'" That was their attitude everywhere, and if peace was to be established we could not accept it. I removed the incompetent officers and sent the best officer I had at my disposal (the late Mr. Todd Naylor) to take charge of the district. At the same time a competent Commandant was posted to the military police battalion. General Symons undertook to remain in the district for another month. Minbu had been cleared of the gangs which had harassed it so long, and I was able to transfer Mr. G. G. Collins to Magwè to help Mr. Todd Naylor. Having put matters in train, my duties took me to Mandalay and then up the Chindwin to arrange matters connected with the coming expedition against the Chins. General Symons was appointed to command the Chin-Lushai expedition, and Magwè had to be left to the local officers. Progress was slow. The dacoits lay up in the forests of the Yomas, and until they were driven out and destroyed there would be no peace. For the last three months of the year my health compelled me to take leave to the Nilgiri Hills. There was no hill station in Burma at that time. The climate varying between a stokehole and a fern-house was not invigorating, and labour, physical and mental, such as we were all sustaining was somewhat exhausting. During my absence Mr. A. P. MacDonnell,[31] Home Secretary to the Government of India, was appointed to act for me. He took up the Magwè business vigorously, and under his direction several columns were organized to operate simultaneously in the unsettled tract from Yamèthin, Pyinmana, Magwè, and Thayetmyo. They commenced work in December, 1889. The party from Magwè encountered one of the gangs in the Yomas, but inflicted no punishment on them. One leader was driven out and captured or killed in the Yamèthin district. But there was no marked success. The dacoits were able to get food anywhere in the forests from the cutch boilers, and it was suspected ammunition from the Burman foresters in the Bombay Burma Company's service. On my return, from leave in December 1889, I had the great honour of receiving His Royal Highness Prince Albert Victor of Wales, accompanying him to Mandalay by rail and returning by river. This duty necessarily delayed the ordinary work of administration.