IIIF Color HighRes
National Institute of Informatics - Digital Silk Road Project
| |||||||||
|
| IIIF Color HighRes |
| The Book of Ser Marco Polo : vol.1 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
|
|
 |
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Citation Information
MEMOIR OF SIR HENRY YULE
1851.
weeks old, behind him. Some verses dated " Christmas Day
near the Equator," show how much he felt the separation.
Shortly after his return to Bengal, Yule received orders to
proceed to Aracan, and to examine and report upon the passes
between Aracan and Burma, as also to improve communications
and select suitable sites for fortified posts to hold the same.
These orders came to Yule quite unexpectedly late one Saturday
evening, but he completed all preparations and started at day-
break on the following Monday, 24th Jan. 1853.
From Calcutta to Khyook Phyoo, Yule proceeded by steamer,
and thence up the river in the Tickler gunboat to Krenggyuen.
" Our course lay through a wilderness of wooded islands (5o to
200 feet high) and bays, sailing when we could, anchoring when
neither wind nor tide served . . . slow progress up the river.
More and more like the creeks and lagoons of the Niger or a
Guiana river rather than anything I looked for in India. The
densest tree jungle covers the shore down into the water. For
miles no sign of human habitation, but now and then at rare
intervals one sees a patch of hillside rudely cleared, with the
bare stems of the burnt trees still standing. . . . Sometimes, too,
a dark tunnel-like creek runs back beneath the thick vault of
jungle, and from it silently steals out a slim canoe, manned by
two or three wild-looking Mugs or Kyens (people of the Hills),
driving it rapidly along with their short paddles held vertically,
exactly like those of the Red men on the American rivers."
At the military post of Bokhyong, near Krenggyuen, he
notes (5th Feb.) that " Captain Munro, the adjutant, can
scarcely believe that I was present at the Duke of Wellington's
funeral, of which he read but a few days ago in the newspapers, and
here am I, one of the spectators, a guest in this wild spot among
the mountains 22 months since I left England."
Yule's journal of his arduous wanderings in these border
wilds is full of interest, but want of space forbids further
quotation. From a note on the fly-leaf it appears that from the
time of quitting the gun-boat at Krenggyuen to his arrival at
Toungoop he covered about 240 miles on foot, and that under
immense difficulties, even as to food. He commemorated his
tribulations in some cheery humorous verse, but ultimately fell
seriously ill of the local fever, aided doubtless by previous
exposure and privation. His servants successively fell ill,
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Copyright (C) 2003-2019 National Institute of Informatics and The Toyo Bunko. All Rights Reserved.