many
things from these Tippera merchants in reference to the nature and
extent of their country if they had known how to give me as good as
account of it as they did of my good wine when I proposed a health. For
my interpreter had scarce finished paying them a compliment, on my
behalf, before the wine was drunk, when they gazed at one another,
smacked their lips, and strook their hands two or three times on their
stomachs with a sigh.1 These three merchants had come by way of the Kingdom of Arakan, which lies to the south and west 2
of that of Tippera, partly bounded by Pegu in the direction of the
winter sunset, and they told me that they spent about fifteen days in
traversing their country, from which one cannot very well estimate its
extent, because the stages are unequal, being sometimes longer and
sometimes shorter, according as water is to be found.
For
the conveyance of goods they use, as in India, oxen and horses, which
are similar to those I have described above, small in size, but
otherwise excellent. As for the King and the great nobles, they travel
in pallankeens,3 and have elephants trained for war. The
inhabitants of Tippera are not less troubled by goitre than those of
Bhutan. I was told that it attacked some of the women on the breasts.
Of the three men from Tippera whom I saw in Bengal, the one who was at
Dacca had two goitres, each of the size of the fist; they are caused by
the bad water, as in many other countries of Asia and Europe.4
Nothing
is produced in Tippera which is of use to foreigners. There is,
however, a gold mine, which yields gold of very low standard ; and
silk, which is very coarse.5 It is from
1
' Drunkenness among them [the Tipperas] does not take an amorous or a
pugnacious direction; it generally expends itself in vehement dancing,
until such time as the head becomes giddy, and the dancer lies down to
sleep oft what he has drunk' (T. H. Lewin, Wild Races of South-Eastern India, 201). 2 East.
5 The King, without reason, claims descent from the Rajput Lunar Race {Imperial Gazetteer, xiii. 118).
*
For early explanations of the origin of goitre see Mundy, i. 117. It
seems to be due to telluric or malarial causes, combined with drinking
water impregnated with salts of lime and magnesia (Ency. Brit., xii. 192). It is prevalent in the Sub-Himalayas and the adjoining districts.
' Tippera, as now understood, does not produce gold—the gold brought from thence may have been originally obtained elsewhere
