A Civil Servant in Burma

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White Herbert Thirkell. A Civil Servant in Burma

PREFACE

NOTE

CHAPTER I. INTRODUCTORY: A RETROSPECT AND SOME COMPARISONS

CHAPTER II. EARLY YEARS AND FIRST IMPRESSIONS

CHAPTER III. THE FIRST SUBDIVISION: THE SECRETARIAT

CHAPTER IV. SOME ASPECTS OF BURMESE LIFE AND CHARACTER

CHAPTER V. ON THE FRONTIER

CHAPTER VI. THE SECRETARIAT: THE LAST SUBDIVISION

CHAPTER VII. THE TAKING OF MANDALAY

CHAPTER VIII. EARLY DAYS AT MANDALAY

CHAPTER IX. LORD DUFFERIN’S VISIT: MANDALAY ONCE MORE

CHAPTER X. THE FIRST YEAR AFTER THE ANNEXATION

CHAPTER XI. A FEW WORDS ON BUDDHISM

CHAPTER XII. UNDER SIR CHARLES CROSTHWAITE, 1887-1890

CHAPTER XIII. A VISIT TO THE SHAN STATES

CHAPTER XIV. RANGOON—MANDALAY

CHAPTER XV. LOWER BURMA ONCE MORE

CHAPTER XVI. MANDALAY—THE BOUNDARY COMMISSION

CHAPTER XVII. THE CHIEF COURT—LAST YEARS IN BURMA

GLOSSARY

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This is not a guide-book, or a history, or a study of manners and customs. It is a plain story of official life for more than thirty years. It does not compete with any of the books already written about Burma, except, perhaps, the monumental work of General Fytche. While pursuing as a rule a track of chronological order, I have not hesitated to wander into by-paths of dissertation and description. I could not write without attempting to give fragmentary impressions of the people and their character. As far as possible I have limited my narrative to events within my own knowledge; my judgments are based on my own observation.

I have to express my acknowledgments to the friends who have given me photographs to illustrate the book. My special thanks are due to Mr. A. Leeds, I.C.S. (retired), for a large number of characteristic and charming pictures.

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Among the military civilians were men of conspicuous ability, trained in the school of Sir Arthur Phayre, whose name is still reverenced throughout Burma, and who stands in the first class of Indian statesmen and administrators. Many of them had taken an active part in the pacification of Pegu after the Second War, and were thoroughly familiar with the Province and its people, their language and customs. I yield to none in high appreciation of the men of my own Service. They have done as good work in Burma, and have got as near to the people, as any men in India. But military civilians also have maintained to this day an honourable record, and have furnished to the Commission many valuable officers. I was just too late to know Colonel David Brown (Brown-gyi13), whose memory still lives in the Province. Colonel Horace Browne,14 Colonel A. G. Duff, Captain C. H. E. Adamson,15 Colonel W. C. Plant, are among the notable soldier-civilians of my early service. Other officers, afterwards well-known, were Mr. de Courcy Ireland, the first officer of his Service in India to become a commissioner; Mr. A. H. Hildebrand,16 the first Superintendent of the Shan States; and Johnny Davis, of Papun, whose knowledge of Burma and the Burmese was unique. When I joined, all the divisions were in charge of military officers, and with one or two exceptions, military and uncovenanted officers ruled every district.

In 1878 there was one line of railway, 160 miles in length, from Rangoon to Prome on the Irrawaddy. To and from Toungoo, a station on the Burmese frontier, the journey had to be made by way of the Sittang River, and occupied about a fortnight. Once upon a time, a man started from Toungoo with a friend. They travelled in separate boats, in one of which was stored all the provisions for the voyage. The commissariat boat started first, and my man never saw his friend again till he reached Rangoon. For a fortnight he had to subsist on such scanty fare as he could pick up on the river-bank. When I saw him soon afterwards, he was perceptibly thinner and still full of wrath. Toungoo is now on the Mandalay line, and is reached in a few hours. There are 1,529 miles of railways in Burma; lines to Mandalay, to Myit-kyi-na in the extreme north, to Alôn on the Chindwin, to Moulmein, one of our ports, to Lashio in the Northern Shan States, in mid-air on the way to China, to Bassein and Henzada in the Delta. The sea-borne trade has made immense progress. In 1878 it was valued at £15,684,920; in 1911 at nearly £43,000,000.

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