THE LAKHERS 



BY 

N. E. PARRY 

INDIAN CIVIL SERVICE 



WITH AN INTRODUCTION AND SUPPLEMENTARY 
NOTES BY 

DR. J. H. HUTTON, C.I.E. 



INDIAN CIVIL SERVICE 



Published by direction of the Government of Assam 



MACMILLAN AND CO., LIMITED 

ST. MARTIN'S STREET, LONDON 

1932 



COPYRIGHT 



PRINTED IN GREAT BRITAIN 



MIZO RAMA KUM LI HLIMTAK 
HRIATRENGNAN 



LUNGPUI PAWH LUNGTE-IN A KAMKILO 
CHUAN A AWM THEILO 



PREFACE 

THIS account of the Lakhers was originally intended to be 
a brief record of those customs concerning which litigation 
most often arises, in order to facilitate an equitable decision 
of such disputes as the chiefs may be unable to settle. So 
interwoven with the whole life of the people, however, are all 
Lakher customs, that I soon realised that the record would 
be incomplete if confined to those points on which cases 
might arise, as without some knowledge of the daily life of 
the people, it is impossible to appreciate either their point of 
view or the practical effect of their customs. This book 
therefore has expanded beyond its original scope. I have, 
however, kept in view throughout the object with which I 
started, and have endeavoured to give a clear and detailed 
account of all customs which are likely to come before the 
courts. All those, I think, who have had the good fortune 
to serve in the Assam hills will agree as to the importance to 
an official of a thorough knowledge of the customs and 
languages of the tribes under his charge, and it is in the hope 
that it may be of some use both to the friendly and pictur- 
esque people with whom it deals and to those who have to 
control their destinies that this book has been written. I 
held charge of the Lushai Hills district in which the Lakher 
country is situated from February 1924 to April 1928. It 
was in 1924 that the hitherto independent Zeuhnang andSabeu 
villages lying between Assam and Burma were first brought 
under control, so I was fortunate enough to be able to observe 
the customs of those groups of the tribe while they were still 
practically untouched by foreign influences. 

I am deeply indebted to many Lakhers and Lusheis for 
much invaluable help while making my inquiries. Without 
the ungrudging assistance rendered me throughout by 
Chhali and Chhinga, the former a Lakher and the latter a 
Lushei interpreter, both of intelligence above the average 
and both keenly interested in their tribal customs, I could 

vii 



viii PREFACE 

not possibly have completed this work. Others who 
willingly told me all they could, though they must at times 
have been sadly bored at what they doubtless felt were 
tedious inquiries one of the Savang chieflings going so far 
as to compose a couplet expressing their feelings on the 
subject, which they afterwards sang to me are Taiveu, chief 
of Savang; Eachi, chief of Chapi; Zahia, chief of Paitha; 
Deutha, chief of Vahia ; Tlaiko, chief of Tiahra ; Khangcheh, 
macha of Savang ; Sarong, macha of Saiko ; Khama, Lushei 
interpreter, and many other chiefs and elders from all the 
Lakher villages. I must not omit to mention the clerical 
work done for me by Saighninga, Saitowna, and Zialunga of 
the Aijal office and the typing done by Chhinga, the Aijal 
typist, and by Debendra Chisim, the Garo typist of the Tura 
office. To Dr. J. H. Hutton, C.I.E., I owe very many thanks 
indeed for much advice and assistance, and also for his intro- 
duction and notes. I am indebted to Sir George Grierson, 
K.C.I.E., for very kindly allowing me to reproduce his list 
of Lai words from Vol. 3, Part III, of The Linguistic Survey 
of India. To the Eev. F. W. Savidge, till a few years ago of 
Serkawn, near Lungleh, my thanks are due for allowing me 
to make free use of his Grammar and Dictionary of the 
Lakher language. Miss Hughes of the Welsh mission at 
Aijal kindly reduced the Lakher tunes to tonic solfa for me, 
for which I am most grateful, and to Rev. R. A. Lorrain of 
Saiko I am indebted for information on certain points. The 
plants given in the list in Appendix VII were all collected by 
my wife. For identifying most of these plant and for much 
help in drawing up the list I have to thank Mr. C. E. C. 
Fischer of the Royal Botanic Gardens at Kew, and for 
identifying a number of other specimens I am indebted to the 
Curator of the Herbarium at Sibpur Botanical Gardens. Of 
the illustrations, for the photographs I am indebted to my 
wife and to Miss Lorrain of Saiko, for the originals of the 
coloured plates to Miss Daria Haden and for the drawings to 
Miss Ruth Wood and Mr. W. B. Morrall of the School of 
Art at Exeter. 

N. E. PARRY. 

August 1931. 



INTRODUCTION 

MB. PARRY'S monograph on the Lakhers is primarily im- 
portant as being a record of an Assam hill tribe taken before 
annexation and administration have had time to modify its 
primitive customs and mode of life, for the Lakhers have 
been independent and unadministered until the last few 
years, and generally detailed accounts of this kind are not 
obtained until a tribe have been administered for some time, 
and their customs and outlook have been modified in conse- 
quence, at any rate to the extent of causing them to conceal 
customs which they have discovered to engender disapproval 
on the part of strangers. But this account of the Lakhers is 
also extremely important as likely to throw light on the 
stratification of cultures in the Assam-Burma hills, since 
the features described are some of them typically Naga, and 
some typically Kuki, while others appear to belong to neither 
of these cultures. 

Externally and superficially the Lakhers appear to be a 
definitely Kuki tribe. Their language and material culture 
associate them with Lusheis and Chins. Their terms of 
relationship are rather Kuki than Naga, their weapons, 
including their ceremonial daos, are similarly Kuki. The 
dislike, which Mr. Parry records, on the part of a Lakher of 
using anyone's comb but his own is typically Kuki, not 
based, of course, on any scruple of squeamish cleanliness, 
but on considerations of magic and the location of the soul 
in the head or in the hair. The story of the theft of fire by 
a fly has several local parallels, but differs from most in the 
case of the Lakher in that the secret stolen was that of flint 
and steel, used by all Kuki tribes, instead of that of the fire- 
stick as in the Naga versions. As by the Kuki, in contra- 



x INTRODUCTION 

distinction to the Naga, no bees are kept, and the absence 
of the morung as a separate building is essentially Kuki 
rather than Naga. It is true that Lushei tribes do build a 
zawlbuk for their unmarried men, and conversely the Sema 
Naga builds no bachelor's house as a rule, but the institution 
does not take among the Lushei the place it takes in Naga 
tribes, and its absence from among the Sema appears due to 
the same Kuki influence that has introduced a whole series 
of Kuki customs in connection with inheritance and the 
rights of chiefs. No doubt the zawlbuk among the Lushei 
represents the fortuitous survival or adoption of some non- 
Kuki customs, just as its occasional erection by Semas " in 
order to conform to ancient custom " indicates the dis- 
appearance under alien influence of a custom previously 
prevalent. The Lakher follows much the same practice as 
the Thado Kuki, young men choosing as a sleeping-place 
the house of any girl they admire. Like most Kukis and 
a few Nagas (e.g. the Tangkhul), the Lakher possesses the 
ordeal by water, or rather by diving, which is found from 
the Ganges to Siam, and is perhaps Mon in origin (see Notes 
on the Thadou Kukis, p. 68, ^. 4 ), but the fact that it is 
definitely unpopular may perhaps be taken to indicate that 
it belongs to an intrusive culture. However, there is so 
much, in any case, to associate the Lakher with his neigh- 
bours the Lushei and the Chins that it is unnecessary to 
labour the points of resemblance. 

There is much, however, to suggest that underneath his 
externally Kuki culture the Lakher is something of a Naga 
at heart. His attachment to his village site and to the 
graves of his ancestors is essentially Naga, as distinct from 
the migratory habits of Kuki tribes. His want of discipline, 
as contrasted with the Lushei, is again Naga, as contrasted 
with Kuki. It is true that the Sema Naga, taken by these 
two tests alone, would conform to the Kuki instead of to 
the Naga type, but, as already pointed out, the Sema has 
many very markedly Kuki features in his culture. Place- 
names, as by the Naga generally (the Sema largely excepted), 
are taken by the Lakher from natural features, instead of 
from the traditional sites of former villages. The Bongchhi, 



INTRODUCTION xi 

the sacred ficus, is obviously closely associated with the 
external souls of the village, and affords a close parallel to 
the Lhota mingethung. Doors made by cutting round 
openings in wood are characteristic of some branches of the 
Konyak tribe, though also perhaps of other Chin tribes 
besides the Lakhers. The warp-spacer of the Lakher loom 
is Kuki or Kachari, not Naga, but the use of the simple 
spool as a shuttle instead of a bamboo-covering sheath, 
with a hole for the exit of the weft, seems to be Naga rather 
than Kuki, and the grass rain-cloak is definitely Naga rather 
than Kuki, though found sporadically from Assam to the 
Nicobars and from Formosa to the Philippines. The absence 
of any institution corresponding to the Lushei tuai men 
who wear women's clothes and follow women's pursuits 
also suggests that the Malay element present in the Lushei 
may be weaker in the Lakher, while the use of conch-shell 
ornaments with patterns of circles and dots coloured in 
black is clearly a link with the Angami and with other 
Nagas, Konyak in particular, and one may note in passing 
that just such conch-shell ornaments identical with Naga 
types have been found in early Iron Age graves in Arcot in 
S. India, and have also been excavated at Mohenjo Daro, 
where pottery imitations of conch-shell ornaments have also 
been found, suggesting the baked-clay ornaments imitating 
conch-shell which the Nagas of Laruri make, or used to 
make, for their dead. Although the Lakher do not make 
the huge hollow wooden gongs, aptly described as " canoe 
drums," which are typical of so many Naga tribes, their 
tekaleu, a hollow wooden gong for scaring birds, is perhaps 
a survival of these, as also no doubt is the similar bird- 
scaring gong of the Kachha Nagas, while its real origin in a 
canoe may perhaps be traced to the " boat " made and used 
by a Kabui Naga village for its harvest festival, though the 
village is on the top of a hill and has never within traditional 
memory used or needed a real boat. 1 Mention of the Kachha 
Nagas reminds one that the Lakher rapaw, the due payable 
to a chief for cultivating his land, is the identical word used 

1 See The Ao Nagas, pp. 76 n. 1 , 79 n. 3 , 80 n. 8 , 208 n.. 



xii INTRODUCTION 

by the Kachha Nagas for the right to a payment, on each 
occasion that a person cultivates land which was originally 
cleared of virgin forest by the claimant of rapd or by the 
person from whom he inherited or purchased the claim, for 
the title to rapd is permanent and alienable among Kachha 
Nagas, even though a right to actual cultivation no longer 
exists and the land in question be now in the domain of 
another village. 

Very suggestive also of the Naga tribes are the clans 
Mihlong, Hnaihleu and Bonghia, descended respectively 
from the hornbills, the tiger's man friend and the python, 
which animals respectively they may not kill. The exact 
parallel seems only to be found as regards the hornbill 
among Nagas, but the feeling about tigers and pythons is 
very similar, e.g.^ in the Chang tribes, where the Chongpo 
Hawang clan claims close kinship to the tiger, and may not 
injure one without giving him warning and a chance to 
escape, while the python is an object of awe and more or 
less tabu to the whole tribe, except that in time of great 
scarcity a man with nothing to lose is sent out to kill one 
in the hope of restoring prosperity, an enterprise regarded 
as most hazardous and followed by a prolonged period of 
tabu on the killer. So, too, in the Angami tribe, if a tiger 
be killed the village observes a tabu " for the death of an 
elder brother," the tiger being regarded as a close collateral 
relative of mankind. 

These are, however, certain features of Lahker culture 
which seem to be definitely neither Kuki nor Naga, but in 
contrast to both. Thus the practice of reaping by pulling 
up the rice by the roots has probably no parallel in Assam. 
Most hill tribes use a reaping-knife, while others strip the 
ear by hand into the basket. Similarly the Lakher careless- 
ness about the after-birth at parturition is in contrast to 
prevailing practice, whether Naga or Kuki, while their ex- 
clusion of women from sacrifices on account of the possibility 
of their menstrual uncleanness is totally at variance with 
both Kuki and Naga sentiment, in which a very prominent 
and important place is always given to the wife of a man 
performing sacrificial ceremonies. Indeed a Naga widower 



INTRODUCTION xiii 

would be unqualified to perform a feast of social status. 
Here again the Lakher differs from all the Naga and Kuki 
tribes in Assam in the almost total absence from his culture 
of these graded " Feasts of Merit," by which the individual 
celebrates and reinforces his prosperity and attempts to 
infect with it the whole of the community. Apparently only 
by the chiefly clan of one village are such series of feasts 
observed, their place being taken elsewhere by sacrifices to 
particular deities, which are obviously far more frequent 
and important than in Naga or Kuki tribes in general. 
Another point of divergence from the latter is also to be 
found in the weakness or absence of exogamy and in the 
strength of the traces which survive of a matrilineal system. 
These two are perhaps supplementary features indicating a 
comparatively recent amalgamation of a patrilineal with a 
matrilineal people, the result of which may have been to 
break down exogamy on both sides, and it is perhaps possible 
to see a trace of this process in the unusual practice of sending 
the bride-price by instalments, each of which is always 
refused until the next instalment appears, a formality which 
rather suggests the incorporation of strangers who can only 
get brides by an unfamiliar series of customary payments. 
This factor of recent amalgamation seems also indicated by 
the prohibition of marriage between half-brother and sister 
by the same father, whereas uterine relationship is no bar, 
a rule apparently quite at variance with anything like a 
matrilineal system. However that may be, the traces of a 
very recent matrilineal system are exceedingly strong. The 
maternal uncle receives a very substantial share of the bride- 
price, while a woman living with her husband nominates a 
sister to take her share of the bride-price of her daughter, 
thus effectively removing it from the control of her husband. 
The same survival probably accounts for the right of a 
divorced wife to retain her angkia, and perhaps for the 
absence of any prohibition on the marriage by a younger 
brother of his elder brother's widow, which most patrilineal 
Assam hill tribes prohibit, though the fact that the Lakher 
wife may address her husband's younger brother by his 
personal name, but not so his elder brother, suggests that 



xiv INTRODUCTION 

the custom of levirate was once restricted to the younger 
brother by Lakhers also, unless it be that this familiarity 
had special reference to the rights of the younger brother 
during the husband's lifetime. The matrilineal system seems 
again operative in the convention by which a daughter's 
bride-price exceeds the normal rate of her father's clan if 
her mother be of a superior clan. But the most convincing 
survival of all is in the custom which reserves as the right 
of his sister or her son the duty or privilege of opening the 
vault of the buried chief for a new interment and taking as 
the fee therefor the articles of value interred with the late 
chief, so that these heirlooms are lost to the male and secured 
in the possession of the female line. 

These matrilineal survivals suggest at first sight Mon- 
Khmer associations, but, except perhaps for the locality in 
which the Lakhers are found, might equally well be Bodo 
and Bodo likewise is suggested quite as much as Naga by 
the existence of a tiger clan, such as those of the Kachari 
and the Garo, while the latter tribe, Mr. Parry points out, 
resembles the Lakhers in practising divination by the bullet- 
bow. The absence of the buffalo, moreover, also appears 
suggestive of Bodo rather than Mon-Khmer culture, but the 
line between these two is not at all clear, as there seems to be 
a good deal to connect the Manipuri, Kachari, Synteng and 
Ao Naga not only in physical characteristics, but also to 
some extent culturally, although the languages spoken by 
these four tribes belong to the Kuki, Bodo, Mon-Khmer and 
Naga families respectively. 1 The Lakher would seem to go 
further than any of these tribes in Assam in the importance 
they attach to the influence of sympathetic magic on the 
crop, as an instance of which may be quoted the aoh (tabu) 
which is observed in the case of any woman being delivered 
of a still-born child, for fear that such a birth may affect 
the paddy, causing the grain to fail to form in the husk. 
This point of view suggests a very intimate association in 
Lakher belief between human beings and the crop, but in 
head-hunting, so important to Nagas from a fertility point 

1 For the physical resemblances, see Dixon, The Khasi and the Racial 
History of Assam, *' Man in India,'* Vol. II, pp. 1-13. 



INTRODUCTION xv 

of view, as to the Wa, and probably aforetime to the Khasi, 
the Lakher seems, like the Kuki, to attach comparatively 
little importance to the fertility aspect and to be dominated 
by fear of the ghost. The two points of view are not neces- 
sarily contradictory, as the ghost must be distinguished 
from the soul or life-principle, and is so distinguished by 
most if not all Assam tribes. At the same time, the Lakher 
fear of the ghost and comparative indifference to the head 
as a giver of life agree with the Kuki point of view, in which 
head-hunting is probably a development, produced by con- 
tact or association with head-hunters, of the sacrifice of 
slaves to serve the dead in another world, and recalls the 
practice of the tribes north of the Brahmaputra from which 
direction, after all, the Bodo, Kuki and Kachin peoples have 
migrated southwards who do not take the head, but cut 
off the hands, probably to cripple the ghost. The Naga and 
Kuki, it may be noted, both cut off limbs as well, but it is 
the head which is the important member. 

It remains to indicate one or two points of contact further 
afield. Mr. Parry has himself noted a number of Fijian 
parallels to Lakher beliefs or customs, and other Indonesian 
and even Pacific resemblances occur to one in reading his 
manuscript. For instance, the red worn in the headgear by 
warriors suggests at once the Mandaya of Mindanao, who 
wear red trousers for a martial exploit, and are later awarded 
what one might term a full- as distinct from a half-red in 
the form of a red cap and coat for further prowess. The 
Lakher methods of fishing, both with traps and intoxicants, 
are to be found throughout Indonesia and, whether or not 
there is any cultural connection, northern South America. 
The word pana, too, for tabu, has an interesting extension. 
Obviously it is to be associated with the Naga words penna 
(Angami) and pini (Sema), and probably with the Caroline 
Islands penant and the Tabui panale, 1 since Evans has 
shown 2 that puni in Malay links up across the Pacific to 
New Zealand, actually appearing in the word tapbuni, 
always with the sense of segregation or tabu. But the 

1 Delinar, Religion des Marquisiens, p. 62. 

2 Kempunan, " Man,'* May 1920. 



xvi INTRODUCTION 

resemblance of the Lakher word for rice wine, sahma, with 
the soma of the Vedas, we fear must be put down to the 
merest coincidence. 

The Lakhers then, to conclude, must be classed, at any 
rate in so far as their language and material culture are 
concerned, with the Kuki tribes who have migrated almost 
in historic times down the valley of the Chindwin from its 
sources to the Bay of Bengal, continuously throwing off 
branches of their race westward into the hills, while the 
vanguard, having turned north again up the same range, 
are still involved in a slow drift back again, like their own 
fabled river, which runs down to a rock in the ocean and 
thence flows upwards to its source. At the same time, the 
Lakhers include in their composition more perhaps than 
their immediate neighbours of the races that preceded them, 
of which the Indonesian race, everywhere submerged by the 
Mongolian flood, appears to have been one, while Bodo, 
Mon-Khmer and Melanesian elements seem to be definitely 
traceable. The pity is that Mr. Parry, who, in spite of 
having had to write under circumstances of considerable 
difficulty, has described them here in greater detail in many 
respects than that yet recorded of any other Assam tribe, 
is unable to return to give us yet more information of 
themselves and their neighbours. Howbeit, he has left no 
unworthy memorial of his sojourn among them. 

J. H. HUTTON. 



CONTENTS 

PAGE 

PREFACE vii 

INTRODUCTION ix 

PART I 

INTRODTJCTOKY ....... 1 

Habitat History Effects of British Rule The Mission 
Physical Characteristics Character Dress and Ornaments 
Weapons and Tools Stones Tattooing. 

PART II 
DOMESTIC LIFE ........ 60 

The Village Its Site and Fortifications Houses Household 
Implements Daily Lifo Agriculture Food Drink To- 
bacco Trade Spinning and Weaving Dyeing Metal-work 
Fire Basket-work Bridges Pottery String Knots 
Woodwork Hide Gunpowder Hunting Traps Fishing 
Livestock Medicine Poisons Amusements Songs Musi- 
cal Instruments Dancing Games Measurements of Time, 
Length, Height, Width, Area, Capacity Counting Points of 
the Compass Currency War The la Ceremony Peace- 
making Cannibalism Captives Slavery. 

PART III 
LAWS AND CUSTOMS ....... 229 

Tribal and Clan Organisation Pedigrees Relationship The 
Village Organisation and Functionaries The Chief, his Lands 
and Rights Dues and Subscriptions Hospitality Migration 
Trial of Cases Oaths Fines Murder Suicide-~Theft 
Assaults Eavesdropping Trespass IJelaliiation Mode's of 
Acquiring Livestock Debt Damage done by Animals 
Friends Position of Women The Bastard's Price Fornica- 
tion Sexual Offences Lunacy Inheritance Adoption 
Heirlooms Marriage Customs The Marriage Price Dowry 
Jilting Elopement Concubines Sata wreu Longtang 
Divorce Adultery. 

PART IV 
RELIGION ......... 349 

God Spirits The Soul Ana Pana Aoh The Anahmang 
The Pharaw Sacrifices Feasts Birth Ceremonies Names 
Death Ceremonies Graves and Memorials The Death Due 
Crop Sacrifices Rain Ceremonies Ceremonies Connected 
with Sickness Miscellaneous Beliefs Beliefs about Animals 
Dreams Divination Natural Phenomena. 



xviii CONTENTS 

PAGE 

PART V 
THE LAKHEB LANGUAGE 501 

PART VI 
FOLKLORE 542 

APPENDIX I 

* 

GLOSSARY 570 

APPENDIX II 
BIBLIOGRAPHY 576 

APPENDIX III 
LIST OF CLANS. ........ 579 

APPENDIX IV 
LIST OF VILLAGES AND CHIEFS . 580 

APPENDIX V 

LIST OF CEREALS AND VEGETABLES . 582 

APPENDIX VI 
NOTES ON CHHALI'S PEDIGREE 584 

APPENDIX VII 
LIST OF TREES AND PLANTS 586 

INDEX ......... 614 



LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS 

PLATES 

Facing Page 

A SABEU GIRL (Colour) .... frontispiece 

TYPES OF LAKHER MEN ...... 25 

LAKHER GIRLS ........ 28 

LAKHER CHILDREN ....... 28 

LAKHER MEN WITH WOMAN IN CENTRE OF BOTTOM ROW . 32 

THE ANAHMANG 38 

MAKING A PIPE BOWL ....... 38 

LAKHER CLOTHS ........ 38 

LAKHERS ARMED WITH FLINTLOCKS .... 45 

Two WARRIORS OF CHAPI ...... 45 

SAVANG VILLAGE ........ 60 

GROUP OF LAKHER GIRLS ON VERANDAH OF A HOUSE 

IN SAVANG ........ 60 

WINNOWING PADDY AT SAVANG ..... 80 

GIRLS IN FRONT OF GRANARY, SAVANG .... 80 

BACK VIEW OF LAKHER WEARING POWDER FLASK AND BAG 109 
LAKHER WEARING RAINCOAT AND HAT .... 109 

THE KOLODYNE RIVER . . . . ... . 128 

BAMBOO SUSPENSION BRIDGE OVER THE TISI RIVER . .128 
DOCHHA OF CHAPI IN WAR DRESS (Colour) . . . 205 
THE SAWLAKIA DANCE AT SAVANG . . . . .214 

THE CHOCHHIPA BEING DANCED IN FRONT OF THE CHIEF'S 

HOUSE AT CHAPI ....... 214 

THE DAWLAKIA BEING DANCED IN THE COURTYARD OF THE 

CHIEF'S HOUSE AT CHAPI . . . . .214 
LAKHER CHIEFS . . . . . . . .231 

THE CHAPI BAND 231 

TAIVEU CHIEF OF SAVANG (Colour) ..... 249 

TYPES OF LAKHER WOMEN 276 

PUMTEK NECKLACE BELONGING TO RACHI, CHIEF OF CHAPI 290 
PALA TIPA, THE HAUNTED LAKE ..... 561 
MEMORIALS TO THE DEAD OUTSIDE CHAPI . . . 561 



xx LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS 

IN THE TEXT 

PAGE 

BAGS, PILLOW, SMALL BASKET ..... 36 

MEN'S AND WOMEN'S OBNAMENTS . . . . .40 

OBNAMENTS, ETC. ........ 43 

WEAPONS ......... 47 

WEAPONS AND IMPLEMENTS ...... 52 

PIPES, FLINT AND STEEL AND MISCELLANEOUS ABTICLES . 91 

SPINNING WHEEL 96 

THREAD WINDEBS AND RAIN HAT ..... 100 

BASKETS . . . . . . . . .115 

BASKETS . . . . . . . . .119 

KNOTS 132 

MONKEY TRAP. AZEUBATLA ...... 146 

MONKEY TBAP. AZEUBATLA ...... 147 

TIGEB, BEAB AND MONKEY TBAP. VEUTLA , . .147 

TIGEB TBAP. MEITEI KAPU 148 

TIGEB, DEEB AND PIG TBAP. KAPU .... 149 

POBCUPINE TBAP. KAPU 149 

DEEB TBAP. SABI . . . . . . .150 

TBAP FOB POBCUPINES, ETC. MAKHEU .... 151 

BAT TBAP. CHALONG . . . . . . .151 

RAT AND SQUIBBEL TBAP. LEIKA . . . . .152 

RAT TBAP. VIAKHANG . . . . . . .153 

PHEASANT TBAP. PIVA ...... 154 

TBAP FOB PHEASANTS AND OTHEB LABQE BIBDS. KHANGKHA 155 
BIBD TBAP. APHEU ....... 155 

FISHWEIB. CHHA 160 

MUSICAL INSTBUMENTS 184 

MEMOBIAL POST . . . . . . . .416 

PHUBA PACHANG. STONE MEMOBIAL PYBAMID . . 417 
LONGDONG. STONE MEMOBIAL ..... 417 

FACING PAGE 

MAP 1 



THE LAKHERS 
PART I 

INTRODUCTORY 

THE Lakhers, or, to be more correct, the Maras, Lakher being 
merely the name by which they are known to the Lusheis, 
inhabit the south-eastern corner of the Lushai Hills district, 
south of the Haka sub-division of the Chin Hills, and the 
extreme north of the Arakan Hill Tracts. Most of the 
villages are enclosed in the large bend made by the Kolodyne 
river, which, after rising in the hills near Haka and flowing 
in a southerly direction, takes a sharp turn, and flows 
northwards till somewhat north of Muallianpui village, when 
it again turns south and flows down to the Bay of Bengal at 
Akyab. There are a few Mara villages situated west of the 
Kolodyne, between that river and Lungleh, and some 
powerful villages of the Sabeu tribe of Maras on the east 
of the upper Kolodyne or Beinong in the Haka sub-division 
of the Chin Hills. This work deals more particularly with 
the Lakhers in the Lushai Hills district, though actually the 
Haka Lakher villages of Ngiaphia, Khihlong, Heima and 
Lialai and their subordinate villages are ruled over by 
Changza chiefs, and their customs are the same as those 
followed in Cahpi. The following are the principal Mara 
tribal groups : Tlongsai, Hawthai, Zeuhnang, Sabeu, Lialai, 
Heima. 

On the west the Maras are bordered by Fanais and Lusheis, 
on the east and north by Chins, and on the south by the 
tribes of the Arakan Hill Tracts, Khumis, Matus and 
Khyengs. The Maras are a branch of the Lai tribe of Chins, 
and speak a language closely akin to Lai. They are the 
B 



2 THE LAKHERS PART 

same people as the Shendus to whom Colonel Lewin makes 
constant references in his various works, and are still called 
Shendus by the Arakanese. Tradition says that the Maras 
came from the north, and it is certain that they all came to 
their present homes from different places in the Haka sub- 
division of the Chin Hills, presumably being pushed forward 
by pressure from the east, in the same way as the Lusheis 
under their Thangur chiefs were pushed forward into the 
country they now occupy. The progress of the migration 
to their present territory can be traced fairly accurately. 
The Saiko and Siaha people are both Tlongsai, and say that 
they originated at a place called Leisai between Leitak and 
Zaphai. From Leisai they moved to Saro, and thence to 
Chakang, both of which places are in Haka. From Chakang 
they crossed the Kolodyne and came into the Lushai Hills, 
and settled first at Phusa, on a high hill between Ainak and 
Siata ; thence they moved to Khupi on the Tisi river, thence 
to Theiri, and thence to Beukhi. At Beukhi the Siaha and 
Saiko Tlongsais separated, the former occupying various 
sites in the neighbourhood of Beukhi, ending up at their 
present site of Siaha, while the latter moved successively to 
Saikowkhitlang, Khangchetla, Zongbukhi, Chholong and 
Khihlong, eventually settling at Saiko about fifty or sixty 
years ago. From Saiko they have formed the other villages 
of the Tlongsai group ruled over by Hleuchang chiefs. 
From the number of village sites they have occupied since 
coming to the Lushai Hills, it is certain that they must have 
been settled in the Lushai Hills district between 200 and 
300 years. 

The Hawthai clan, whose main village is Tisi, originated, 
they say, at a place called Chira in Haka, whence they came 
via Saro, Siata, Paimi and Nangotla to Tisi, where they have 
now been for thirty years. They are therefore more recent 
immigrants than the Tlongsai. Nangotla, Chholong, and 
Longbong, or, as the Lusheis call them Ngiawtlang, Chuar- 
lung, and Lungbun, are Hawthai villages, as are also the 
two villages of old and new Longchei in Haka. The Zeuh- 
nang, who are the people of Savang, originated at Hnarang 
in Haka, whence they crossed the Kolodyne and settled on 



i INTRODUCTORY 3 

a high range called Kahri Tla. They moved in succession 
to Hlongma near Sehmung and Cheuong on the banks of 
the Tisi river, and then settled on their present site of 
Savang, where they have now been established for about 
130 years. 

The Sab, who are the people of Chapi, originated at 
Thlatla in Haka. One of their chiefs, Mahli, married a 
Lakher woman, and from that time the royal house has 
regarded itself as Lakher. This Mahli moved from Thlatla 
to Ngiaphia, whence his branch of the Sabeus moved in 
succession to Pazo, Khothlaw, Chorihlo, Chawkhu, Fachaw 
(near the junction of the Satlong river with the Kolodyne), 
Khiraw, Ravaw, Tichei, Pasei, Pemai, Sacho, Loma and 
thence to their present site called Tichhang, where they 
have now been settled for twenty years. The reason given 
for the frequent moves of site is that they were afraid of 
being raided. 

The Sabeu, whose villages are in Haka, are of the same 
group as the Sabeu of Chapi. Their head chief, Vasai, is a 
Changza, and a cousin of Rachi, Chief of Chapi, and his 
village, Khihlong, is only about thirteen miles from Chapi 
along the top of the Kahri range. 

The inhabitants of Heima and Lialai in the Arakan Hill 
Tracts belong to the Heima and Lialai groups, which are 
very closely allied to the Sabeu. The chiefs of both villages 
are Changzas, and they have been always more or less vassals 
of the Changza chiefs of Khihlong. 

In addition to the purely Lakher villages, there are 
certain villages in Haka and also in the Lushai Hills the 
inhabitants of which are half-way between the Pois and the 
Lakhers, and it is difficult to say exactly what they are. 
Such villages are Hnarang or Ngaring in Haka and lana, 
and Siata in the Lushai Hills ; with lana must also be 
classed the Haka villages Mangtu, Khabong and Zeuphia, 
known in Lushai as Vuangtu, Khawbung and Zaphai. The 
customs followed in these villages are partly Lakher and 
partly Poi. The lana group are on the whole more Lakher 
than Poi, both in language and customs, and regard them- 
selves as Lakhers. Hnarang is more Poi than Lakher, and 



4 THE LAKHERS PART 

calls itself Poi, but Pois regard the Hnarang people as Lak- 
hers, though their language is Poi. These villages on the 
border line between Pois and Lakhers show how the Lakhers 
gradually formed themselves into a separate tribe after they 
broke off from Thlatla and their other original homes in the 
Chin Hills. 

The story of the origin of the Mara tribe as handed down 
by tradition is as follows : Long ago, before the great dark- 
ness called Khazanghra fell upon the world, men all came out 
of a hole below the earth. As the founder of each Mara 
group came out of the earth he called out his name. Tlongsai 
called out, " I am Tlongsai " ; Zeuhnang called out, " I am 
Zeuhnang " ; Hawthai called out, " I am Hawthai " ; Sabeu 
called out, " I am Sabeu " ; Heima called out, " I am 
Heima." Accordingly God thought that a very large 
number of Maras had come out and stopped the way. When 
the Lusheis came out of the hole, however, only the first 
one to come out called out, " I am Lushei," and all the rest 
came out silently. God, only hearing one man announce 
his arrival, thought that only one Lushei had come out, and 
gave them a much longer time, during which Lusheis were 
pouring out of the hole silently in great numbers. It is for 
this reason that Lusheis to this day are more numerous 
than Maras. After all men had come out of the hole in the 
earth God made their languages different,^ and they remain 
so to this day. 

A similar story is current among the Khyeng. 1 

The number of Lakhers in Assam at the last census was 
returned at 3683, 2 as against 3647 in 1911. As there must 
be very nearly as many again in the Chin Hills, and as at 
the time of the last census the areas recently taken over by 
Assam and Burma were not included, as they were still uii- 
administered, I estimate that the total number of the tribe 
is now somewhere about 10,000 souls. 

The country, though high, is fertile, and though the 
neighbouring Chins live on maize and millet, the Lakhers' 
staple food is rice. On the lower slopes bamboo jungle 

1 Cf. Lewin, Wild Races of South-eastern India, p. 238. N. E. P. 
Lloyil, Census of India 1921. Assam, Part II. N. E. P. 



i INTRODUCTORY 5 

prevails ; the higher hills are clothed with oaks, rhododen- 
drons and dwarf bamboos (Arundinaria falcata), known as 
lik to the Lushei and seuli to the Lakhers, which make 
excellent fishing-rods. There is also a thorned bamboo 
(Arundinaria callosa), called by the Lakhers aphaw, which 
is found at slightly lower elevations. On the lower slopes 
all the ordinary bamboos found in the Lushai Hills flourish. 
The main range running between Savang and Chapi is the 
Ka Hri Tla, whose highest points are Ka Hri or Khashia 
Klang, 6292 ft., and Tliatlu or Mizen Tlang, 6368 ft., while 
further north, on the edge of the Lakher country, lies Pheupi 
or the Blue Mountain, 7101 ft., the highest peak in the 
Lushai Hills district. The climate in the cold weather is 
perfect, in the rains it has the drawbacks common to all 
places in South-east India with a heavy rainfall, the worst 
being leeches, insects and damp. 

Early Relations with British. 

For many years the Lakhers seem to have been a thorn 
in the side of the authorities in Chittagong and Arakan, and 
were regarded as a powerful and warlike nation. When 
first they came into contact with the British they were 
known as Shcndus, a term which seems to have covered all 
the Haka Chin tribes and not only the Lakhers. It cer- 
tainly covered the Klangklangs, who are known to the 
Lakhers as Thlatlas, and also other Chin tribes such as 
Hakas, 1 though as a matter of fact the Lakhers are now 
quite separate from both, and speak a different tongue, 
though some of them originally broke off from Thlatla. 

Writing in 1841, Lieutenant Phayre 2 refers to the Tsein- 
dus, and gives a list of thirteen Tseindu clans, some of which 
can be identified with Mara clans, though others appear to 
be Poi. The Lungkhes referred to by him are, I think, 
probably a branch of Lakhers who had a village at Liazeu, 
on the western slopes of the Mephrutong Hill, which has 



1 Vide Carey and Tuck, The Chin Hills, p. 4 and p. 16 n. 2 

2 " Account of Arakan," by Lieutenant Phayre, Senior , 



-N. E. P. 
Assistant Com- 
missioner, Arakan, Journal of the Asiatic Society of Bengal, No. 117, 1841. 

N. E. P. 



6 THE LAKHERS PART 

now disappeared. Their chief, Leng-kung, was a Poi, who 
is known to the Lakhers as Laikong. Chiefs of this family 
still rule at Longtlai, Bungtlang and Sangao. The greater 
part of Laikong's villagers are said to have been Lakhers, 
the rest being Pois. This shows that the term Shendu 
covered Poi as well as purely Lakher tribes. Lewin l 
identifies some people called Lankhe by the Burmese with 
the Lushais. It seems more probable, however, that they 
are the same people as Phayre's Lungkhe, and closely 
related to the Lakhers. In " A Note on some Hill Tribes 
on the Kuladyne River," written in 1846, 2 Lieutenant 
Latter says, " The most powerful among them are the 
Shentoos, who, being beyond our frontier, are known to us 
only by their devastations on those tribes which pay us 
tribute ; the suddenness, secrecy and never-failing nature of 
these attacks cause them to be held by the rest in a dread 
of which it would be impossible to give an idea. The Khons, 
who are likewise beyond our frontier, are employed by the 
Shentoos as guides and spies, and are on that account 
obnoxious to the vengeance of those clans who may owe a 
blood feud to the Shentoos." 

The first account of the Lakhers as a separate tribe seems 
to have been written in 1852 : the writer, Captain Tickcll, 3 
says, " And amongst these, the Shendoos, though well known 
by name and repute in Arracan, have never yet been visited 
by the people of the plains, nor has a single specimen of this 
race been seen, I believe, by either Mugh or European in 
Arracan until 1850, when two emissaries or spies from them 
met me at a hill village some distance up the Kolodyne 
river." Captain Tickell refers to the tribe as Heuma or 
Shendoos. Heima is the name of a Lakher village in North 
Arakan known to the Lusheis as Vaki. 

Writing in 1875, Fryer says, 4 " The Khyengs call them- 

1 T. H. Lewin, The Hill Tracts of Chittagong and the Dwellers Therein, 
p. 98. N. E. P. 

8 Lieutenant T. Latter, " A Note on some Hill Tribes on the Kuladyno 
River, Arracan," J.A.S.B., 1846, No. 169. N. E. P. 

8 Captain S. R. Tickell, " Notes on the Heuma or Shendoos," J.A.S.B. 
No. Ill, 1852. N. E. P. 

* G. E. Fryer, " On the Khyeng People of Sandoway Arakan," J.A.S.B., 
1875, Part I. N. E. P. 



i INTRODUCTORY 7 

selves Hiou or Shou, and state that the Shindoos, Khumis 
and Lungkhes are members of the same race as themselves. 
They have a tradition that they came down many years ago 
from the sources of the Kyendweng river." The Lakhers 
have no traditions about the Kyendweng river, but they 
undoubtedly are related to the Khumis and other Arakan 
hill tribes, and also to the Haka Chins. 

Mackenzie, writing in 1884, says, 1 " The Shindus are a 
formidable nation living to the north-east and east of the 
Blue Mountain. All the country south of the Karnafuli 
has for many years been exposed to their ravages. Of their 
position and internal relations we know much less than we 
do of the Lushais. The whole aim of our frontier policy has 
of late years been the protection of the other tribes already 
named from the raids of the Chittagong Lushais and Shindus. 
The whole history of this frontier is, indeed, the story of 
their outrages and of the efforts to prevent, repel or avenge 
these." The Shindus or Lakhers, as we now call them, 
seem in fact to have been most assiduous raiders, and though 
the misdeeds of other tribes were doubtless not infrequently 
fathered upon them as the most redoubtable of the hill 
tribes, they seem to have well earned their reputation as 
harriers of the countryside. That it was, however, often a 
case of giving a dog a bad name and hanging him, is shown 
by para. 8 of Captain Hopkinson's letter No. 40 to the 
secretary to the Government of Bengal, dated 7th May, 
1856. 2 The first Lakher raid that we know of is on a Khumi 
village called Hlengkreing, when thirty to forty people were 
killed and thirty-eight women and children carried into 
slavery. 3 This was in 1838. A Shendu foray on Chittagong 
was reported in 1847, when they raided the subjects of 
Kalindi Rani and of the Phru, who is now known as the 
Bohmong. 4 Lewin 5 states that the reason why the Shendus 
were at enmity with the Poang, who is the same person as 

1 Mackenzie, The North-East Frontier of Bengal, p. 331. N. E. P. 

2 Mackenzie, op. cit., p. 532. N. E. P. 

3 Phayre, "Account of Arakan," J.A.S.B., 1841, No. 117, p. 708. 
N. E. P. 

4 Mackenzie, North-east Frontier of Bengal, p. 335. N. E. P. 

6 Lewin, Wild Races of South-eastern India, p. 300. N. E. P. 



8 THE LAKHERS PART 

the Phru or Bohmong, was that a Shendu chief sent an 
embassy to the Poang consisting of six men, bearing ivory 
and home-spun cloths. Of these men, five were murdered 
by the Poang's orders, and the man who escaped was 
murdered by Yuong on his way home. Colonel Shakespear 
gives a similar story, from which it appears that the Shendus 
in question were Tlongsais. 1 If Lakhers on a friendly 
embassy were murdered in this way, it is not to be wondered 
at if they avenged themselves by raiding their assailants. 
From 1847 onwards Lakher raids on the Chittagong Hill 
Tracts seem to have been of constant occurrence. In 1854, 
in a report by the Superintendent of Police, it is stated that 
during the preceding seventeen years there had been 
nineteen raids, in which 107 persons had been slain, fifteen 
wounded and 186 carried captive. All these forays were 
believed to be the work of Shendus or tribes from the south. 2 
In 1865 it was reported that Shendus and other tribes 
regularly spent November to May every year in raiding the 
Ghittagong Hill Tracts, and in 1866 the Shendus attacked 
a Mrung village only half a day's journey from Chima, the 
furthest outpost. 3 It is about this time that Lewin, 4 who 
really laid the foundations of British rule in the Lushai 
Hills, and who was the first Englishman to establish intimate 
relations with the hill tribes in this part of the world, appears 
on the scene. Lewin's adventures in the "Chittagong Hill 
Tracts and the Lushai Hills are described in his books, Wild 
Races of South-eastern India, The Hill Tracts of Chittagong 
and the Dwellers Therein, and The Fly on the Wheel, and it 
is impossible to go into them here ; he was, however, un- 
doubtedly the first Englishman to get into touch with the 
Zeuhnang, the Khenung, 5 who sent his son Aylong to visit 
Lewin and take him to their village, being the then Chief 
of Savang, as is clear from the Savang chief's pedigree. 
Meanwhile the Shendus continued to give the Chittagong 
and Arakan authorities much food for thought, and it is 

1 Shakespear, The Lushei Kuki Clans, p. 213. N. E. P. 

2 Mackenzie, North-east Frontier of Bengal, p. 338. N. E. P. 

3 Mackenzie, op cit., p. 349. N.E.P. 

4 Mackenzie, op cit., p. 349. N. E. P. 

6 Lewin, Wild Races of South-eastern India, p. 321. N. E. P. 



I INTRODUCTORY 9 

amusing to see how the Bengal and Burma Governments 
each tried to foist on to the other the responsibility of 
controlling them. 1 Bengal and Burma were equally ignorant 
about the Shendus, and owing to the difficulties of dealing 
with them, both provinces would have been glad to be rid 
of them. Colonel Phayre in a letter to the Government of 
India wrote : 2 

" I have known all the tribes personally except the Shendus 
for many years. The Shendu tribe has always been spoken 
of as powerful, and as being much feared. . . . The Shendu 
tribe appears to be more numerous as a people than any 
other Indo-Chinese hill race which I know. It extends over 
a large tract of country. The clans are independent of each 
other as long as they have power to maintain independence. 
Their predatory expeditions appear to be organised, as 
indeed they frequently are among the Kumeis and Khyengs, 
by persons of influence, whether chiefs or not, who collect 
individuals among several clans into a war party." 

The respect with which the Shendus were regarded must 
have been due mainly to lack of knowledge. Though un- 
doubtedly a very warlike tribe, they were nothing like as 
numerous as the Lusheis. The chief difficulty with the 
Shendus seems to have been the impossibility of getting 
into touch with them. In 1871-72 the Shendus attacked 
the Pyndoo outpost, but were driven off, 3 and in 1874-75 
they made an attempt at a raid, which was frustrated. 4 In 
1869 the first Lushai Expedition took place, 5 and in 1871 
two columns entered the hills, one from Cachar and the other 
from Chittagong. These expeditions dealt with the Lusheis, 
but left the Lakhers untouched. 6 For ten years after this 
both Shendus and Lusheis remained comparatively quiet. 
In 1888, however, a raiding party of Shendus under Hausata 

1 Mackenzie, North-east Frontier of Bengal, pp. 349, 350, 486, 489, para. 7, 
532, para. 7. N. E. P. 

2 Mackenzie, op cit., p. 351. N. E. P. 

3 Mackenzie, op cit., p. 362. N. E. P. 

4 Mackenzie, op cit., p. 365. N. E. P. 

5 Mackenzie, op cit., p. 302. N. E. P. 

6 See Mackenzie, op cit., p. 312 et scq. ; also for a description of the 
work done by the Chittagong column, T. H. Lewin, The Fly on the Wheel, 
p. 255 et seq.N. E. P. 



io THE LAKHERS PART 

murdered Lieutenant John Stewart of the Leinster Regiment, 
who was engaged in survey work with a small escort of 
Gurkhas. 1 As a matter of fact, these raiders, though re- 
ferred to as Shendus, were not Lakhers. Hausata was a 
Thlatla Chin, and a brother of the equally evil Vantura, 
whose death after a raid on the Lakher village of Saiko will 
be related further on. This outrage was the immediate 
cause of the Chin-Lushai Expedition of 1888-89, which 
resulted in the occupation of the Chin and the Lushai hills. 2 
All three brothers concerned in the murder of Lieutenant 
Stewart came to bad ends. Hausata died within a year, 
and his body was eaten by the village pigs, after Stewart's 
gun, which had been buried with him, had been recovered ; 
Vantura died of wounds received on a raid on the Lakher 
village of Saiko ; Dokula died in the Andamans, whither he 
had been sent for the murder of a fakir. Dokula had 
previously escaped the hanging to which he had been 
sentenced for murdering two Lakhers of Boite village, and 
though sentenced to death a second time for the murder of 
the Fakir, was again lucky enough to have his sentence 
commuted. 3 Dokula's descendants still rule in their villages, 
and are men of like character to their father and their 
uncles. The Lakhers still fear and hate them, and were 
we ever to withdraw from the hills, war would surely break 
out again between the Lakhers and the Poi villages ruled 
over by Dokula's descendants. It was as a result of the 
expedition of 1888-89 that some of the Lakher villages were 
first brought under British rule. In 1891 Captain Shake- 
spear visited Saiko and interviewed the Chief Theulai, whose 
brother laka had been responsible for a raid on Prenkyne's 
village. Compensation was assessed on the villages of Siaha 
and Saiko, and certain captives taken by the Ramri people 

1 Vide Carey and Tuck, The Chin Hills, p. 13, R. H. Sneyd Hutchinson, 
An Account of the Chittagong Hill Tracts, p. 25, and A. S. Reid, Chin Lushai 
Land, pp. 38-43.N. E. P. 

8 For a description of these operations so far as they related to the 
Lushai Hills, see Lt.-Col. J. Shakespear, " Lushai Reminiscences," in the 
Assam Review, Vols. I and II. For the Chin Hills, see Carey and Tuck, 
The Chin Hills, Vol. I, p. 12 et seq. Also Reid, Chin Lushai Land, passim, 
for both expeditions. N. E. P. 

* See Lt.-Col. J. Shakespear, " Lushai Reminiscences," the Assam Review, 
Vol. II, No. 2, April 1929. N. E. P. 



i INTRODUCTORY n 

from North Arakan were released. On another occasion 
when Captain Shakespear came to Siaha and was said to 
be coming on to Saiko, Theulai himself must have had an 
uneasy conscience, as he had recently led a raid against the 
Lakher village of Lialai and taken the head of its chief, 
Thaka. I was told at Saiko that while Captain Shakespear 
was at Siaha, the Saiko people were busy holding the la 
ceremony over the heads that had been taken at Lialai, and 
the news of his approach made them break off the festivities 
and hide all traces of their very questionable doings. After 
all, however, he did not come, and the Tlongsai might as 
well have finished the la festivities, which as it turned out 
were the last to be held in Saiko. 

From this time on Saiko, Siaha and the other Tlongsai 
villages formed part of the South Lushai Hills, and Theulai, 
the chief of Saiko, who had previously been concerned in 
many raids, became an excellent chief. There still remained 
unadministered, however, a tract of country between the 
Lushai Hills, the Chin Hills and Arakan, containing the 
Zeuhnang, Sabeu and Lialai groups with certain villages 
dependent on them, which was to give trouble for some time 
to come. These villages, especially Savang, used to jhum 
beyond their boundaries in administered territory belonging 
to other chiefs, which was always giving rise to disputes. 
In consequence of these encroachments, Mr. Whaley, the 
Sub-Divisional Officer, of Lungleh, marched through the un- 
administered tract and came to an unofficial agreement with 
Beihra, Chief of Khihlong, but for practical purposes the 
area was left as it was. In 1906 the Zeuhnang raided a 
British village called Paitha and carried off some runaway 
slaves, one of whom they killed. An expedition was pre- 
pared, but before it was ready to start the captives were 
released and operations postponed till 1907. In 1907 
Colonel Cole and Colonel Loch took a column to Savang 
and fined the Zeuhnang twenty guns for their raid on 
Paitha in 1906. Thence they went on to Laki, and met the 
Deputy Commissioner, North Arakan. After this no officials 
visited the area till 1918. In 1917 and 1918, as a result of 
the Haka rebellion, which itself was a repercussion of the 



12 THE LAKHERS PART 

Great War, the whole area was in a ferment. In 1917 the 
Zeuhnang had raided the Arakan Lakher village of Teubu, 
had taken heads and made captives. In retaliation for this, 
the Lialais, who were friends of Teubu, raided the small 
Zeuhnang hamlet of Mangtu, below Laki and above the 
Tinglo river, killed the chief, Huatmanga, and four others 
and seized nine captives for slaves. The Zeuhnang village 
of Laikei had seized a girl from the British village of Kiasi, 
while Chapi had raided the British village of Longchei and 
carried off some women as slaves. As a result of these 
forays a column was taken through the independent villages 
by the Superintendent of the Lushai Hills, and Chapi and 
Laikei were punished. 1 The Zeuhnang and the Lialai were 
dealt with by Arakan. In 1920, 1922 and 1924 the Super- 
intendent of the Lushai Hills again toured the villages, and 
in 1922 a meeting was held at Baw between the Super- 
intendent of the Lushai Hills and the Deputy Commissioners 
of the Chin Hills and the North Arakan Hill Tracts, at which 
the boundaries between the three districts were laid down 
and the villages in the independent area were divided among 
them. From 1924 the villages which fell to the Lushai 
Hills have been loosely administered as part of the district, 
the system of administration being the same in all essentials 
as that followed in the rest of the district. The villages 
which fell to the Chin Hills and North Abakan are being 
absorbed in the same way into those districts.* 

Effects of British Rule. 

It is only since 1924, therefore, that all the Lakhers have 
been under British rule. The Zeuhnang and Sabeu have 
taken to British rule on the whole quite kindly. Though 
they naturally regret their former freedom in many ways, 
as is shown in their songs, and as they tell one themselves, 
still they admit that British rule has brought certain ad- 
vantages in its train. Taiveu of Savang, one of the chiefs 
whom I was questioning on this matter, told me that the 
benefits his people had obtained from British rule were three 

1 Vide letter No. 1678 of 26th February, 1918, from Superintendent 
Lushai Hills to the Commissioner Surma Valley and Hill Division. N, E. P. 



i INTRODUCTORY 13 

namely, that they can sleep at night without sentries and 
without fear of a raid, that they can travel wherever they 
like without let or hindrance and without fear of an ambush, 
and that they can have beer-parties without posting sentries 
and without the fear at the back of their minds that they 
may be raided and cut up while intoxicated. British rule 
therefore has removed fear, implanted a sense of security 
and enabled the people to make the most of their simple 
pleasures. They can now make themselves gloriously drunk 
without fear of advantage being taken of their temporary 
incapacity. These are undoubted and solid gains, which the 
tribes could never have acquired for themselves. So far, in 
the new area at any rate, there is no sign of the deterioration 
which so often supervenes when savages are brought into 
contact with a superior culture, and the population shows 
no signs at all of decreasing. In dealing with the new area, 
all customs, save a very few that could not be countenanced, 
have been meticulously respected, and the greatest of care 
has been taken to avoid in any way lowering the position 
of the chief. One inevitable change has, however, taken 
place, which undoubtedly has diminished the chief's wealth 
and importance namely, the liberation of the chief's depen- 
dants. As soon as the area was taken over, numbers of 
these dependants came forward to pay the forty-rupee 
ransom which frees them from their obligations to the chief. 
I purposely refrain from calling these people slaves, and 
.though further on I shall deal with the institution of slavery 
among the Lakhers in detail, the term slavery is a complete 
misnomer to-day, whatever it may have been in the past. 
In any case, the exodus of numerous dependants from the 
chiefs' houses naturally reduced the wealth of the chiefs* 
Some of the freedmen remained in the village, but many 
migrated elsewhere, fearing that the chief would revenge 
himself on them for having ransomed themselves from him. 
This was an undesirable development, in that it removed 
people from their old surroundings ; on the other hand, it 
was both natural and inevitable that many of the freedmen 
should wish to migrate, and it was impossible to do anything 
to stop it. A certain number of them returned after a short 



14 THE LAKHERS PART 

time to their old villages and settled down again quite 
happily. 

Another noticeable sequel to the advent of British rule 
was the eagerness with which the people in the new area 
came forward to sell their surplus rice to the Tuipang guard 
in order to make a little money. Until these villages were 
taken over, they knew practically nothing about money ; 
when, however, they found that they had to pay house tax, 
they realised that they had to set about and obtain money 
somehow. British rule therefore has led inevitably to a 
diminution in the importance of the chiefs and a desire to 
acquire wealth. I cannot pretend that I consider either 
development desirable, but neither could have been avoided. 
As compared with the people in the villages which for years 
have been under British rule, the people of the new area, 
especially the Zeuhnang, are more hard-working and 
energetic. Why this should be, 1 cannot say, but they 
have much larger jhums, and get heavier crops of rice. So 
far, except in the two instances mentioned above, these 
people have been hardly touched by modern influences. 
Isolated from the rest of the district till 1924, they have 
retained their old customs intact. On the other villages, 
which have been under British rule for years, Government 
and mission influences have necessarily had more effect, by 
no means with entirely good results. Litigation is excessive, 
the chiefs are less powerful and the people less* well controlled 
than in the new area. In Saiko the combined influence of 
the mission and of Lushei interpreters has modified custom. 
The Lushei interpreters have given a Lushei tinge to certain 
customs, which have changed, not because officers intended 
to change them, but because they failed to realise that 
changes were being made. When a primitive people come 
under settled rule certain changes are inevitable, but the 
importance of altering as little as possible cannot be exag- 
gerated. If the customs of a primitive race are allowed to 
decay or are suddenly replaced by alien customs, the race 
degenerates. All these tribes have been taken over against 
their will and solely in the interest of their more advanced 
neighbours, and to stop them from raiding in the plains 



i INTRODUCTORY 15 

Like the other primitive tribes of the Assam Hills, Garos, 
Lusheis, Nagas and others, the Lakhers were not assenting 
parties to the change in their political status. They were 
not brought under British rule in their own interest ; in fact, 
whether they liked being taken over and whether it was in 
their interest to be taken over or not were never considered 
at all. The only motive actuating Government was the 
peace of the settled areas adjoining these primitive tribes. 
In view of this, therefore, a very special responsibility for 
their welfare falls upon Government. 

Two articles in The Times of the 23rd and 24th July, 1929, 
dealing with conditions in that part of New Guinea which 
was formerly owned by Germany but for which Australia 
now holds a mandate, are of great interest as showing the 
multifarious forces which impinge upon a primitive people 
when first they come into contact with a higher civilisation, 
and the extent to which primitive people lose all interest in 
existence when forced too rapidly to alter their ways of life. 
The following passages, which have been reproduced by kind 
permission of The Times Publishing Company, illustrate 
these facts well : 

" In administering the Mandated Territory of New Guinea, 
Australia is discharging in a special sense the responsibility 
which the covenant of the League of Nations describes as 
* a sacred trust of civilisation.' There is no more tragic 
example of the exploitation of primitive races by white men 
than the ravaging of the islands of the Pacific. The earliest 
white settlers were escaped convicts, deserting sailors, 
fugitives from justice, and others of the lowest character. 
The first ships brought sandalwood hunters ; the next 
slavers, the so-called ' black-birders/ who carried off 
thousands of ' boys ' to work in South America and Queens- 
land. In their train the white men brought disease, which 
swept through the insanitary native villages, and between 
1860 and 1890, it is estimated, destroyed 75 per cent, of the 
population of the Pacific. 

" Even then the tribulations of the New Guinea islanders 
had not ended. The pitiable relic of a once happy and 
numerous race had to suffer the shocks of collision with 



16 THE LAKHERS PART 

traders and planters, officials and missionaries, with widely 
differing standards of morality and widely differing creeds. 
Some planters and traders treated the native decently, but 
the majority exploited them mercilessly. Roman Catholic 
missionaries encouraged native dances, forbade divorce and 
accepted no native gifts to the Church ; Methodist mission- 
aries discouraged native dances, did not object to divorce and 
financed their work by an annual collection which the natives 
called the ' tula tula (Methodist) throwaway ' ; Lutheran 
missionaries proscribed all native dances and games ; and 
German officials, such as Bulwinski, colonised ruthlessly with 
the lash, and permitted traders and planters to flog and birch, 

" Their delicate and complex social system almost de- 
molished, the natives of New Guinea reacted to these 
bewildering influences with that ennui which defies psycho- 
analysis, but which is now appreciated as the most puissant 
factor in the depopulation of primitive races in contact with 
advanced civilisations. When, eight years ago, Australia 
took charge of former German New Guinea, charged by the 
mandate to fit the natives * to stand under the strenuous 
conditions of the modern world/ its administration had to 
deal with 500,000 natives who were slowly but surely dying 
through apathy. In view of the centuries which separate 
their stage of evolution from ours, the- administration 
cannot be expected to have done much for the natives in 
eight years, but it has done a great deal more than its de- 
tractors within the territory and without would have the 
League of Nations believe. 

" By no means all the natives of New Guinea are natural 
agriculturists. In their natural state food was easy to 
procure, and the ' boys ' were so busy fighting that they 
left their ' marys ' (women) to do what little cultivation was 
necessary. Appreciable success has followed the paternal 
encouragement of agriculture by district officers, who are 
handicapped by the fact that although it is legal to compel 
natives to grow enough food for their sustenance (a striking 
symptom of the dreadful apathy with which they are 
afflicted), they cannot be compelled to cultivate for trade, 
because that would be forced labour. 



i INTRODUCTORY 17 

" As in all native administration, much depends upon the 
personality of the District Administrator, whom the natives 
call ' Kiap.' " 

Though the conditions described are the results of German 
rule, such reports make sorry reading. How can a savage 
appreciate the benefits of civilisation when rival missions 
fight like cat and dog for his soul, when his customs are 
destroyed and he himself is ruthlessly exploited ? In the 
circumstances, it is hardly surprising if the race has become 
depressed to such a degree that the people have to be forced 
to cultivate their own food. What has happened in New 
Guinea shows how essential it is, in dealing with primitive 
people, that the administrator should be sympathetic and 
interested ; customs so far as is possible should be preserved, 
missions should be controlled, and rival missions should not 
be allowed, only one mission being permitted to work in 
one field. It is wrong to inflict upon the savage the futile 
religious rivalries of the West, and with primitive people 
religious differences speedily end in broken heads. So far 
among the Lakhers there is but one mission, and it is to be 
hoped that they will be spared a second. Had the Zeuhnang 
and the Sabeu known of the blessings conferred by civilisa- 
tion on the peoples of New Guinea, they would doubtless 
have welcomed its advent even less heartily than they did ; 
as it is, I have not the smallest doubt but that they would 
much rather have been left independent, even though their 
treatment has been the absolute reverse of that meted out 
to the natives of New Guinea, and even though, as they 
themselves will admit, they have benefited by being taken 
under British rule. The process of absorption in this part 
of India may be said to have begun in 1777, when the Chief 
of Chittagong reports to Warren Hastings the bad behaviour 
of a mountaineer called Ramoo Caw r n, who " committed 
great violence on the company's land-holders," and who 
called to his aid " large bodies of Kookie men, who live far 
in the interior parts of the hills, who have not the use of 
firearms and whose bodies go unclothed." l Coming gradu- 

1 Lewin, The Hill Tracts of Chittagong and tfo Dwellers Therein, p. 21 
N. E. P. 

n 



18 THE LAKHERS PART 

ally into closer contact with the hill tribes, Government was 
forced in 1860 to constitute the Chittagong Hill Tracts 
district. After this followed the various Lushai expedi- 
tions, leading to the annexation of the Hills, the process not 
finally ending till 1924, wheif the remaining unadministered 
territory was taken over by Assam and Burma. These 
tribes, having been brought under administration in interests 
other than their own, their activities have been circumscribed, 
head-hunting has been stopped, slaves have been freed, guns 
have been controlled, and the hillman has been made to 
conform to a settled though loose form of administration. 
It will naturally take a savage time to adapt himself to order 
and discipline, and meanwhile he may lose much of his 
interest in life. This is shown very clearly by the songs of 
the Zeuhnang : " Government has taken over all our 
country, we shall always have to work for Government ; 
it were better had we never been born," or " Government 
has now hemmed us in, on the north, on the south, on the 
east, on the west. Henceforth none of our young warriors 
will drink of the waters of the Salu river, where we always 
used to raid." Much of the joie de vive has gone. To 
replace the old enthusiasm for war, the capture of slaves, 
the feasts over heads, the free hunting of all kinds of game 
whenever they pleased, the Lakher has been given security ; 
this he appreciates, but it is doubtful whether security, at 
any rate at first, fills the place of what he has lost. It is 
necessary therefore to replace, so far as is possible, the 
pursuits that have been banned by other pursuits of a nature 
less objectionable to the civilised mind. Not only is it 
desirable that all customs save those which obviously cannot 
be tolerated should be sympathetically preserved, but it is 
equally essential that the hillman should be protected from 
an influx of plainsmen eager to exploit him and contemp- 
tuous of his customs and habits of life. Encouragement should 
be given to all pursuits such as agriculture which will fit the 
hillman to hold his own in modern life, while a stereotyped 
literary education which breeds denationalisation and 
fecklessness should be banned. What is needed above all 
is sympathetic and firm rule, personal knowledge of the 



i INTRODUCTORY 19 

people and interest in their ways of life, I cannot do better 
than quote here the words penned by Lewin in 1869. Though 
Lewin wrote sixty years ago, what he said is as true now 
as it was then. " This I say, let us not govern these hills 
for ourselves, but administer the country for the well-being 
and happiness of the people dwelling therein. What is 
wanted here is not measures, but a man. Place over them 
an officer gifted with the power of rule, not a mere cog in 
the great wheel of government, but one tolerant of the 
failings of his fellow-creatures and yet prompt to see and 
recognise in them the touch of nature that makes the whole 
world kin, apt to enter into new trains of thought and to 
modify and adopt ideas, but cautious in offending national 
prejudice. Under a guidance like this, let the people by 
slow degrees civilise themselves. With education open to 
them and yet moving under their own laws and customs, 
they will turn out not debased and miniature epitomes of 
Englishmen, but a new and noble type of God's creatures." l 
In order therefore to minimise the deterioration, mental or 
moral or physical, which may ensue when a primitive race 
comes in contact with modern civilisation, hill officers should 
be carefully selected and trained, as much harm can be done, 
with the best intentions, simply through lack of knowledge, 
which can be obviated by training yoiing officers for what 
is most certainly a specialist's job. 

The Mission. 

A more active instrument of change than Government is 
the Christian mission. The Lakhers have not been affected 
by the mission in the same way as the Lusheis, for although 
a mission has been established at Saiko for nearly twenty 
years, it has made comparatively little headway. As yet 
the Lakher mission has done little or no harm, and has in 
certain directions done much good. The Lakhers have not 
witnessed the frenzied orgies of revival dancing that some 
years ago disgraced the Lushei Christians. It is not yet 
necessary on visiting a Christian friend to weep on greeting 

1 Cf. Lewin, The Hill Tracts of Chittagong and the Dwellers Therein, 
p. 118, and Wild Races of South-eastern India, p. 351, N. E. P. 



20 THE LAKHERS PART 

your hostess, and to confess to her how wicked you are and 
how heavily your sins weigh upon you, while your hostess 
in her turn assures you that she is a much more miserable 
sinner than you, according to the custom of Biate village, 
as related to me by one of the more sensible of the Welsh 
Mission pastors, who strongly objected to such hysterical 
proceedings. The pharisaical attitude of " we alone are 
saved and all the rest are damned " has not yet been adopted 
by the Lakher Christian, though it is to be feared that this 
will come unless care is taken to suppress it. This absence 
of emotional hysteria is partly due to the fact that the hard- 
headed Lakher has little use either for education or for the 
teaching of the mission, and partly to the fact that so far the 
mission has always insisted on strict discipline among the boys 
in the school and on their all working in return for their 
education. No effort has been spared to ensure that educa- 
tion shall not lead to the creation of parasites ; the boys have 
been encouraged to retain their own customs, and babuism 
has been sternly repressed. The Lakher mission is conducted 
on sound and sensible lines, and the only criticism to be 
made is that the boys in the school wear shorts and cut off 
their top-knots. It is gratifying to see that most of them 
grow their top-knots again on leaving school. It is difficult 
to understand why Christianity should involve denationali- 
sation. There is no virtue in cotton drawers or in short 
hair. To quote Lewin again l : " Our present notions of 
sexual decorum are highly artificial. The question of more 
or less clothes is purely one of custom and climate. If it 
were the custom for the legs of horses and dogs to be clothed 
it would assuredly in a short time be stigmatised as gross 
indecency were they to appear in the streets without 
trousers." So with the Lakhers, if missionaries would try to 
improve their conditions without interfering with their dress 
and introducing the convict crop, they would receive more 
sympathy for their undoubtedly high ideals. The Lakher's 
dress is suited to his surroundings and his needs, his cloths are 
woven and decorated in the most artistic patterns ; surely 

1 Lewin, The Hill Tracts of Chittagong and the Dwellers Therein, p. 117. 
N. E. P. 



i INTRODUCTORY 21 

it is better to encourage the people to weave and wear their 
own beautiful cloths than to impose upon them the drab 
uniform of khaki drawers and cotton shirt, on which good 
money is unnecessarily wasted. Their wcll-cared-for top- 
knots of hair give scope for a display of lacquered and brass 
hair-pins and combs of great beauty. With the advent of 
the shaven pate these will all disappear. When a primitive 
people have beautiful things they should be encouraged to 
wear them ; far from inducing them to adopt a debased 
form of Western dress, we should endeavour to preserve all 
that is beautiful in their own costume. By so doing we 
shall increase their self-respect and encourage them to 
develop their own art on their own lines. 

Again, Lakher and Lushei Christians are not allowed to 
drink wine, beer or spirits, and no one can become a Christian 
who ever touches alcohol. In the author's opinion this is 
going much too far. The people have few pleasures, and 
after strenuous work, most likely in torrents of rain, a 
stimulant is rather a good thing. It would therefore be 
better to encourage temperance than to insist on prohibition. 
Among more civilised people prohibition has led to deceit ; 
its results are the same among these primitive hillmen. 
There are so few Christians among the Lakhers that the ill 
effects of prohibition are not yet so marked as among the 
Lusheis ; but if Christianity spreads and prohibition is 
insisted on, the same ill effects will occur. There is bound 
to arise a body of ex-Christians who have been turned out 
of the Church for drinking beer, but who, having lost their 
own beliefs, are subject to no moral sanctions whatever. 
There are many such among the Lusheis. It is to be hoped 
that a lesson will be learnt from the evils which prohibition 
purporting to be based on religion has caused among the 
Lusheis, and that a more enlightened policy may be followed. 
To a lay mind the teaching that no one who drinks beer can 
be a Christian savours of deceit, and one cannot be surprised 
if surreptitious drinking exists among Christian Lusheis and 
Lakhers. The Lusheis are much more advanced than the 
Lakhers ; they see many Christians who use alcohol, and 
naturally ask why their particular brand of Christianity 



22 THE LAKHERS PART 

prohibits all alcoholic drinks. As they become more 
enlightened they will inquire deeper, and trouble will ensue. 
With a primitive people absolute truth is essential ; once 
you deceive them, even with good motives, you forfeit their 
trust. For this reason, to make abstinence from drink an 
essential tenet of Christianity is entirely wrong, and is bound 
to lead to trouble. Encourage temperance in every way 
possible, but do not base your teaching on a false founda- 
tion. 

The Lakher mission therefore has an object lesson at its 
doors showing the need for discrimination. It is unfortunately 
so much easier to destroy customs wholesale than to pre- 
serve and improve them, and among the Lusheis destruction, 
admittedly with the best intentions, has worked havoc. 
When mission work was first started among the Lusheis it 
was carried on largely by the light of nature, without training 
and without knowledge of the customs of the people. This 
led to the condemnation as heathen and useless of some 
most excellent customs, which no one who had studied them 
could have failed to wish to preserve. No use was made of 
the zawlbuk or bachelor's house, nor of the custom of 
tlawmngaihna (an untranslatable term, meaning the obli- 
gation on every one to be unselfish and to help others). 
The zawlbuk was condemned quite wrongly as an evil place 
where people drank, while the practice of tlawmngaihna was 
neglected. Through lack of knowledge, therefore, excellent 
customs which would have greatly strengthened the Church, 
while at the same time keeping it Lushei and averting 
denationalisation, were left unused, and actually discouraged. 
Mission influence therefore has been largely destructive, 
good customs having been destroyed and not replaced ; at 
the same time, it is curious to see attempts on the part of 
Lushei church elders to arrogate to themselves temporal 
power at the expense of the chiefs. Such encroachments 
deserve short shrift. They are only made possible through 
ignorance and failure on the part of the heads of the Church 
to realise the importance of respecting Lushei custom. Is 
it too much to ask, therefore, that all missionaries should 
receive some training, at least in anthropology, before being 



i INTRODUCTORY 23 

sent out to try their prentice hands on a primitive people ? 
There are signs now that better training is being given by 
some missions, but no one in future should be allowed to 
become a missionary by the light of nature ; missionary 
work requires training, like any other work. These primitive 
tribes have so many admirable customs that no one, however 
high his motives, should venture to interfere and condemn 
until he has studied the customs and knows what he is doing ; 
while trying to improve, he should refrain from denationalis- 
ing ; instead of dressing his converts in the cast-off rags 
of Europe, he should preserve their native dress and allow 
them to maintain their own style of hair-dressing. Lakhers 
and Lusheis know perfectly well how to keep their hair 
clean, and it is only laziness if they do not do so. By 
encouraging schoolboys to cut their hair, the mission is 
encouraging idleness. No one can pretend that it is a good 
thing that tlawmngaihna, while still practised by heathen 
Lusheis, should often be conspicuous by its absence among 
Christian Lushei communities ; the reverse should be the 
case, and the fact that it is not so is due to failure in the 
past to study and make use of Lushei custom. It is to be 
hoped, therefore, that the Lakher mission will take warning 
and profit by the mistakes of its neighbours. I write as a 
friend, not as an opponent, as I am sure that, provided 
mission work proceeds on sound lines, much good can be 
done. Where, however, work is done purely by the light 
of nature, without training, without study, but simply under 
the influence of a call, which in many cases has only impelled 
the person called to preach, but not to make any study of 
the people he wishes to convert, I fear that as much harm 
is done as good. An incident that occurred some years ago 
when I was in the Garo Hills, where there is an American 
Mission, is a good example of the lengths to which de- 
nationalisation may go if the missionaries neglect the study 
and teaching of tribal customs. I was inspecting a mission 
school and asking the small boys various questions. Now 
there is a very well-known tradition among the Garos that 
formerly they came from Tibet, and they can tell you the 
route by which they came. I therefore asked one of the 



24 THE LAKHERS PART 

small boys, " Where did the Garos originally come from ? " 
The answer came out pat, " We came from America/' 

In writing of the Lakhers it is impossible to avoid mention 
of the mission. For good or for ill the mission is working in 
the Lakher country, and almost inevitably it must in due 
time produce considerable effect on Lakher culture and 
habits of thought. It is just as necessary therefore for the 
mission to be conducted efficiently as for Government. 
It is absolutely essential that a mission should be intelli- 
gently controlled, as missionaries are constantly dealing 
with the minds and thoughts of their converts, and cannot 
help exercising considerable influence over them. Mis- 
sionaries give their whole lives and sacrifice everything to 
their work ; surely it is worth their while to devote a short 
time to learning their job. Knowledge will give them real 
sympathy and understanding, and will keep them on the 
right road, unlike the false sympathy, based on sentiment 
and a vague belief in the rights of man, which can only lead 
astray. Once knowledge has been acquired, I venture to 
predict that missionaries will pause long before they venture 
to scrap even a detail of dress, and much more before con- 
demning good customs wholesale. The work of the mission 
and of Government should follow similar lines ; while 
avoiding denationalisation like the plague, they should aim 
at improving the general condition of the people ; by main- 
taining indigenous customs and allowing 'the free develop- 
ment of the tribe on its own lines, they should help the 
people to grow up uncontaminated by foreign influences, and 
enable them to work out their salvation according to their 
own genius. The mentality of these hill tribes is such that 
there is nothing to prevent their developing into very fine 
races if properly handled. 

I would commend to all interested in primitive races the 
remarks made by Dr. Schweitzer, a medical missionary 
of the Paris Evangelical Mission, in Chapter VII of 
his book On the Edge, of the Primeval Forest" l Though 

1 Dr. Albert Schweitzer, On the Edge of the Primeval Forest. Experiences 
and Observations of a Doctor in Equatorial Africa. (A. and C. Black.) 
N. E. P. 



i INTRODUCTORY 25 

Dr. Schweitzer is dealing with Africa, a very great deal of 
what he says applies equally to the Assam Hill Tribes, and 
is especially interesting as the opinion of a modern mis- 
sionary. In concluding his remarks Dr. Schweitzer says, 
" My opinion is and I have formed it after conversation 
with all the best and most experienced of the white men in 
this district that we should accept but try to improve and 
refine the rights and customs which we find in existence, 
and make no alterations which are not absolutely necessary." 

Physical CJiaracteristics. 

The Lakhers are not remarkable for their beauty, they are, 
however, of good physique, well built and strong. The 
average height of the men is about 5 feet 6 inches. They 
are taller than the Lusheis, and their physical fitness com- 
pares very favourably with that of their neighbours to the 
west in the villages situated on the lower hills between the 
Kolodyne and Lungleh, whose inhabitants are goitrous and 
unhealthy in the extreme. 

The men are good porters, and regularly carry up from 
the jhums loads of at least a maund. When required for 
carrying loads, only the exact number of coolies ordered 
turn up, while when Lushei coolies are engaged double the 
number required always appear, each man bringing a friend 
to help him. The Lakher prefers to carry a full load and 
get full pay. When carrying loads the Lakhers never use 
a yoke. A woman carries from her forehead. The brow- 
band is about l^r feet long and 4 inches wide ; it is made of 
a cane called ari (Calamus erectus, Roxb.), which is used 
because when made up it has a flat smooth surface which 
is comfortable to wear. To each end of this brow-band are 
attached ropes made from the bark of the pazo tree (Hibiscus 
macrophyllus, Roxb.) to tie round the load. 

Men use a combined brow- and shoulder-band. The ends 
of each band are spliced to each other and also to the ropes 
for tying the load, which are made of pazo. The brow- 
band is 2^ feet long, and is made of ari cane (Calamus erectus, 
Roxb.) and worn over the forehead like the woman's. The 



26 THE LAKHERS PART 

shoulder band is 2 feet long, and is also made of ari cane. 
It is worn over either the right or the left shoulder. This 
double carrying-band is very practical, as it enables a man 
to shift the weight of his load from the brow to the shoulder 
and from one shoulder to the other at pleasure. 

The constant carrying of heavy loads up and down hills 
leads to a great development of the muscles of the calves 
and thighs among both men and women. 

The women, too, are rather taller than Lushei or Kuki 
women and of very good physique. Both sexes are of light 
brown complexion, but darker than the Lusheis, and good 
looks are less common. Colonel Lewin l held that both sexes 
were of a fairer complexion than other hill men, and says 
that the faces of those he had seen bore no signs of the 
prevailing Mongolian type of physiognomy ; he also writes 
that the women reminded him of nothing more than a 
Portuguese half-caste, and describes how they tied their 
hair carefully in bands on each side of the face, fastening 
it in a knot at the back of the head. This mode of hair- 
dressing is no longer in vogue except among the Heima and 
Lialai in North Arakan. I cannot help thinking that 
Colonel Lewin must have seen particularly favourable 
specimens of the race, as his description does not apply to 
the average Lakher of to-day, who is darker than the 
average Lushei and of a distinctly mongoloid cast of 
countenance. As a rule they have broad noses, high cheek- 
bones and slightly oblique mongoloid eyes. Occasionally, 
however, you find men with really good features, but these 
are the exception. The men are far more manly in appear- 
ance than the Lusheis, and have none of that effeminate air 
which makes it so easy to mistake many Lushei men for girls. 
Looks vary somewhat in the different villages, the in- 
habitants of Chapi and Chakang having rather repellent 
and surly faces. The best-looking tribe are the Zeuhnang, 
and it was Zeuhnang that Lewin met on at least one occa- 
sion. The women when young are sometimes pleasing, but 
beauty is certainly not their strong point. They age 

1 T. H. Lewin, Wild Races of South-eastern India, pp. 282 and 311. 
N. E. P. 



i INTRODUCTORY 27 

rapidly, and after marriage become sloppy and take no care 
whatever of their appearance. Even the few who have any 
pretence to good looks are spoilt by their unwashed condi- 
tion. Lakhers do not bother themselves with overmuch 
washing, the usual allowance is once in three months, but 
some confine themselves to once in six months, and the real 
die-hards to once a year. When passing a river on the 
march or when out fishing they usually bathe, and if the 
village water supply is abundant and allows of their doing 
so one often sees them washing, but they do not go out of 
their way to be clean. Still, as their clothes are few, the 
dirt is washed off by the rain, and they are far less filthy 
than they would be if they wore clothes. 

Character. 

In character the Lakhers are reserved and rather dour on 
the surface, though when one knows them they open out 
and are friendly enough. As compared with the Lusheis, 
they are hard and unsympathetic, entirely lacking the 
spontaneous charm of manner and genuine kindliness of 
disposition so characteristic of many Lusheis, and especially 
of members of the Sailo clan. The Lushei is bound by his 
code of tlawmngaihna to be kindly, unselfish and hospitable ; * 
he must try to help others in distress, must never desert a 
companion out hunting or on a journey, and must vie with 
others in excelling in sport, work or hospitality, and in 
every branch of life must, at any rate in theory, consider 
others first. This code does, moreover, actively influence 
Lusheis in everyday life. The Lakher cares for none of 
these things, his language has no equivalent for tlawm- 
ngaihna, and though individual Lakhers are kindly and 
hospitable, they are not so as a race in the same way 
as the Lusheis. There is less hospitality and cheeriness 
among Lakhers and feasts are fewer, the chief occasions for 
merry-making being marriages and deaths. Lakhers are 
very undisciplined, and the lack of control in a Lakher 
village contrasts very strongly with the excellent discipline 

1 Cf. Parry, Lushai Customs and Ceremonies, pp. 19-21. N. E. P. 



28 THE LAKHERS PART 

maintained among Lusheis. A young Lakher when ordered 
to do something by an elder will argue, where a Lushei 
would obey at once, with the result that it takes much longer 
to enforce an order in a Lakher than in a Lushei village. I 
ascribe much of the indiscipline among the Lakhers to the 
fact that they have no bachelors' house or other equivalent 
to the Lushei zawlbuk. A young Lushei as soon as he is six 
or seven years old is no longer allowed to sleep in his father's 
house, but is sent off to the zawlbuk and becomes the fag of 
the older boys. Very strict discipline is maintained ; the 
younger boys are obliged to work for the older, are taught 
to wrestle, are punished when disobedient, and generally are 
imbued with a sort of public school spirit, with excellent 
effect on their character in after life. A Lakher child's 
training is of the most rudimentary description. A child 
starts speaking by calling his mother " Na, na, na" and 
next refers to his father as " Pa, pa, pa," No deliberate 
training is given ; if a child does wrong, its name is shouted 
loudly, and its father or mother says " Ta kha " (don't do 
that). Children are occasionally gently smacked, but are 
never really beaten till they are seven or eight years old, 
when they are licked with a cane if they do not obey. Once 
they are able to work by themselves, children are never 
beaten. Children are not taught the arts of hunting, 
fishing or trapping, but as soon as they are old enough 
they go with their father to the jungle, see what he does and 
on returning home make model traps. In this way they 
educate themselves. Boys and girls are taught how to weed 
and how to manage a hoe, and girls are taught to weave. 
The only religious exercise that is taught to children is the 
Khazangpina chant ; they learn about other sacrifices by 
watching them. With this very meagre training, and with- 
out the discipline of the bachelor's house, the young Lakher 
is allowed to go his own gait, with the result that his natural 
selfishness and independence are never checked, and he is 
apt to grow up a very headstrong individual. Considering 
his surroundings and upbringing, this is hardly surprising, 
and on the other hand he has some excellent points. He is 
honest, and stealing is practically unknown ; he is fond of 




LA K HER 







I INTRODUCTORY 29 

his family and children, to whom he is indulgent to a fault ; 
he is not greatly given to lying, though extremely litigious. 
In spite of the fact that on the surface some Lakher customs 
may seem to conflict with this view, from a Western stand- 
point the Lakher is a good deal more moral than the Lushei. 
Among the Lusheis bastards are common, and no one thinks 
any the worse of a girl for having given birth to a bastard. 
Among the Lakhers bastards are rare, and the mother of a 
bastard and her offspring are looked upon with the greatest 
contempt. A bastard suffers serious social disabilities, and can 
take no part in the religious ceremonies held by his relations. 
As a consequence of this, Lakher girls are much stricter and 
less free with their favours than Lushei girls, as they fear the 
social stigma incurred if an intrigue ends in its natural result. 
Suits for the bastard's price are rare in Lakher villages. 
Once married the women are very moral. Adultery is not 
common, and divorce, though it presents no difficulties, is 
less frequent than among the Lusheis. Unnatural offences, 
to which the Lusheis were at one time very prone, are quite 
unknown among the Lakhers, and the Lushei tuai, a man 
dressed in woman's clothes, who performed the work and 
other functions of a woman, has no counterpart among the 
Lakhers. The men I questioned on the subject expressed 
an amused horror at the possibility of the existence of such 
a creature. 

Dress. 

The most important article of a Lakher man's dress is the 
dua or loin-cloth. 

There are two kinds of loin-cloth : the dua kalapa for 
everyday wear, and the dua ah for more ceremonial occa- 
sions. The dua kalapa is a cloth about 3i yards long and 
Ij- feet wide. Its manner of tying is rather complicated. 
When putting on a dua kalapa a Lakher holds the cloth 
about \\ feet from one end and places it against the lower 
abdomen, covering the genitals, and leaving about l| feet 
of cloth hanging down in front. The other end of the cloth 
is passed through the legs, pulled up tight to the small of 
the back, and then wound round the waist to the left, 



30 THE LAKHERS PART 

passing over the portion of cloth covering the genitals and 
holding it in place. It is then wound round the waist once 
again, this time being wound over the body and not over the 
cloth. After this it is wound round a third time, and again 
taken between the flap hanging down in front and the cloth 
going between the legs. When it has been wound round the 
third time, the end of the cloth is passed through the cloth 
already wound round the body at the small of the back, and 
is tucked in on the wearer's left-hand side. Finally the flap 
of cloth hanging down in front is passed between the legs 
and tucked into the folds of cloth at the back. 

The dua ah is a much more ornamental cloth, worn at 
beer-parties, feasts, marriages and other ceremonies. Its 
length is 3 yards and its width 1| feet. The cloth is an 
ordinary white cloth, but at each end there is sewn on a 
2^-foot length of dark blue cloth, richly embroidered with 
patterns in different-coloured silks. In adjusting the dua ah 
it is held against the lower abdomen in the same way as the 
dua kalapa, about 7| feet being left in front, the other end 
of the cloth being passed between the legs, pulled up to the 
small of the back, brought round the waist from the left- 
hand side, passed over the portion of cloth held against the 
abdomen so as to hold it in place, and then carried round the 
waist to the back again. The portion lying loose in front is 
then gathered up and held, so that while the embroidered 
flap hangs down in front, a double fold of the plain white 
cloth is laid against the cloth already covering the abdomen ; 
the other end is then brought round the waist again, passed 
between the embroidered flap hanging down in front and 
the double fold of cloth covering the abdomen, and wound 
round again to the back, whence it is again wound round the 
body, and not over the cloth which has been already tied. 
When the end of the cloth again reaches the wearer's back, 
it is passed through the cloth covering the scrotum and taken 
up and passed through the part of the cloth which forms a 
waistband, whence the embroidered end hangs down over 
the buttocks a little to the left-hand side. The embroidered 
ends are thus displayed in front and behind. The double 
end of white cloth which has been left hanging in front 



I INTRODUCTORY 31 

under the embroidered flap is then passed between the legs 
and tucked into the waistband at the back. 

When at work a man simply wears a dua kalapa, though 
occasionally nowadays men wear a plain cotton coat called 
viapako. When they are standing about and doing 
nothing, they usually wear another cloth measuring about 
7 feet by 5 feet, which is drawn over the left shoulder, 
over the chest, and under the right arm, the end being again 
thrown over the left shoulder, the cloth hanging down so as 
to cover the whole body and to afford a modicum of warmth. 
On a cold day in winter, however, they look uncommonly 
chilly, and sit huddled up round any fire they can find, 
looking like nothing so much as a group of old vultures. 

There are a number of different cloths which are worn in 
this way. The finest cloth produced is the cheulopang, the 
ground of which is dark blue. Two white lines run down the 
middle, and the whole cloth is heavily embroidered with 
patterns in silk, said to represent the eyes of different birds 
and beasts. The cheulopang is only worn by men or women 
belonging to a chief's family. Another fine cloth is the 
cheunapang. Its ground is red, and it is embroidered with 
red and yellow silk. It is worn by chiefs and well-to-do 
people. The viapang is a plain dark blue cloth with a red 
stripe down the middle, and the zeupang is a thin cloth with 
white stripes on a black ground. The cloth most usually 
worn is the chiaraku, which is a plain white cloth with two 
broad black stripes running through it. The pangzapa is a 
plain white cloth with no ornamentation. The warmest 
cloth the Lakhers possess is the siahriapang , a heavy cloth 
of very coarse cotton which is used as a blanket. It is 
something like the Lushei puanpui, but not nearly so warm. 
Burmese check cloths are also popular. All the cloths 
described above can be worn by men and women alike, 
except the dua, which can only be worn by men. Men do 
not lay aside their clothing at night ; they wear the same 
cloths as in the daytime. 

The existence of a much more primitive form of dress 
among the Sabeus of Khihlong and Heima was reported in 
1901 by one Longtha of Kiasi, who was sent round the then 



32 THE LAKHERS PART 

independent Lakher villages to collect information by Mr. 
Drake-Brockman, the Sub-Divisional Officer of Lungleh. 
Longtha reported that both men and women in these villages 
were practically stark naked. " The former strap their penis 
to their stomach in a vertical position, holding it there by 
means of a little strip of cloth, from the ends of which 
strings go and fasten round the waist and at the centre of 
the cloth. At the lower end there is also a string which 
passes through the centre or scrotum between the legs and 
fastens on the waist-string behind, leaving the testicles 
quite bare. The women wear a small bit of covering of the 
bark of a tree, suspended by a waist string just in front to 
hide their private parts, and nothing behind. This con- 
stitutes all the clothing worn by both sexes." l 

I have never myself seen any Lakher man or woman 
wearing such a costume, whether in Khihlong or any other 
villages, but is is quite possible that in 1901. when they were 
still absolutely untouched by outside influences, these 
primitive clothes were in vogue among the poorer classes. 
There is no reason at all why Longtha should have invented 
the story, and it would never have occurred to a Lakher to 
describe such a mode of dress unless he had actually seen 
it. The men's dress appears to be a rudimentary form of 
the dua kalapa, which is probably a development from it. 
The bark skirt is certainly further removed from the volu- 
minous skirts worn by women to-day, but such skirts are 
worn by women of other tribes, and it seems probable that 
Longtha's description of the Sabeu women's skirt is correct. 

Men's Hair Dressing. 

The men always wear puggrees called khuthang, which are 
of two kinds, according as the wearer belongs to the older 
or the younger generation. The elder men on all ordinary 
occasions merely wear a bit of rag round their top-knots, 
and this has to do duty as a khuthang. When on the war- 
path or on a journey, when dancing the Sawlakia, or when 
performing the Khazangpina sacrifice, and nowadays when 

1 From a note recorded by Mr. C. B. Drake-Brockman, dated Lungleh, 
29th May, 1901. N. E. P. 





H 
U 




* INTRODUCTORY 33 

going to meet a high official, the elder men wear a special 
khuthang, which must be tied in a particular way. This 
formal khuthang consists of 4 yards of white cloth about a 
foot wide. About 1J feet from each end a black stripe an 
inch wide is woven into the cloth. The hair is worn in a 
knot on the top of the head just over the forehead. The 
khuthang is first wound round this top-knot. It is held in 
both hands ; the end held in the right hand is put round the 
top-knot and then twisted round the back of the head from 
right to left. After this it is twisted round the top-knot 
again once or twice, or as many times as are required, and 
the end is adjusted at the same spot on the top-knot as 
that from which the khuthang started, but the khuthang 
must be so tied that the black stripe 1| feet from the end 
of the cloth is in an exact line with the wearer's nose. 

The younger men also wear a khuthang, which consists of 
a strip of white cloth 2 yards long by 1 foot wide with no 
black stripes in it. After being woven the cloth is bleached 
by soaking it in water which has been strained through wood 
ashes. This khuthang is tied in the same way as that worn 
by the older men ; a brass hairpin (sakia) is run through the 
top of the hair knot to hold it in place, a lacquered comb 
(sathi) is worn at the back of the top-knot and a lacquered 
bamboo hairpin (sawkahrong) or sometimes a brass hairpin 
runs between the comb and the top-knot. Nowadays the 
ribs of old umbrellas cut to the right length are often 
used as hairpins. The end of the rib is sharpened, the 
little knob at the top serving as a head. These hairpins are 
very useful for extracting thorns from the feet when travel- 
ling in the jungle. Fine imported cloth is replacing the 
home-made product for khuthangs, and the modern blood 
adds a touch of colour by wearing a red or blue ribbon round 
the portion of the khuthang which encircles the top-knot. 
The hair is greased with pig's fat and kept carefully tended 
and clean. Lakhers are very proud of their hair. Boys' 
hair is cut up to the age of nine ; after that age the hair 
should never be cut. A man whose hair has been cut 
cannot take part in the Khazangpina sacrifice. In the old 
days only lunatics and idle, good-for-nothing slaves had their 
D 



34 THE LAKHERS PART 

hair cut ; nowadays mission-school boys must be included 
in this merry company. The Lakhers do not like other 
people to use their combs or brass hairpins. It is not ana 
to use another's comb, and it is not a matter which would 
call for a fine, but there is a strong feeling against it. They 
fear that if a man who is subject to headaches or who has 
a vampire soul (ahmaw) uses another's comb, the owner 
of the comb, when it is returned to him, may also suffer from 
headaches, or may even become a vampire himself. 1 The 
Lushei share this belief. Lakhers dislike getting their hair 
wet, and hardly ever wash it. They say that wet hair 
smells unpleasant and is the cause of sickness. The Bunjo- 
gees, a kindred tribe to the Lakhers, wear their hair in the 
same way, and Lewin gives the following story of the origin 
of the fashion. 2 " One day the squirrel and the horned owl 
had a quarrel, and the squirrel bit the owl on the top of his 
head, so that he became all bloody ; and when the squirrel 
saw the owl under this new aspect he became frightened and 
ran away, and the owl devoured all his young ones. A 
Bunjogee chief observed this. He was a Koavang, and the 
tiger came and told him that what he had seen was a message 
from Khozing. Thus it is that when the Bunjogees go to 
war they bind their hair over the forehead and put red 
cloth in their hair, so that, like the horned owl, they may take 
heads." 

Earrings are not worn by the elder men, but the younger 
men, from the age of nine up to the time of their marriage, 
wear a special kind of earring called hawmiraheu, which is 
worn by both men and women. This earring is illustrated 
in Fig. 6, p. 40. These are the only metal earrings made by 
the Lakhers themselves. Some potter's clay or some of the 
clay thrown up by termites is pounded on a stone with a 
little water. When the clay is plastic it is placed on a stone 
or plank. A bamboo stick is cut to the size of the earring 
it is proposed to make, and is pressed into the clay till the 
end of the stick is level with the rim of the hole made in the 

1 C/. Lieutenant R. Stewart, "Notes on Northern Cachar," J.A.S.B., 
1855, No. 7, for the comb among the Kookies. N. E. P. 

* Lewin, The Hill Tracts of Chittagong and the Dwellers Therein, p. 96. 
N. E. P. 



i INTRODUCTORY 35 

clay by the stick. The stick is then pulled out and the lump 
of clay is cut in half with a dao, leaving half the impression 
of the stick on each portion of the severed lump. A pattern 
is cut in the clay on each half with a knife, and the 
mould is placed in the sun to dry. When the mould is 
dry the two halves are tied together again with bark string. 
Some solder or white metal is mixed with pig's fat and melted 
in the forge, the fat being added as it is said to cause the 
metal to melt quickly. The molten metal is then poured into 
the mould and left to cool. When quite cool and hard, the 
clay is chipped off and the earrings are ready. I am told 
that the reason why only these small earrings are made by 
this process is that solder is scarce and difficult to get, what 
little there is having to be brought from Arakan. Men who 
possess them wear necklaces of pumteks, a black-and-white 
bead, sometimes round and sometimes oval or flat in shape. 
The round beads resemble peppermint bulls'-eyes. Old 
necklaces of these beads are very highly valued and treated 
as heirlooms. It is almost impossible to buy them, as no 
Lakher will part with them unless in the very last resort. 
Modern pumtek beads are imported from Mandalay, but I 
do not know where they are made. They are of very different 
quality from the old beads, and it is easy to distinguish a new 
bead from an old one. New beads fetch up to ten rupees 
each, according to their quality. Legend relates that old 
pumteks were the droppings of a goat. When the goat's 
owner fed him well, the goat produced pumteks of great 
excellence ; if the quality of the food fell off, the pumteks 
likewise deteriorated. 

No Lakher's costume is complete without a small em- 
broidered bag called sahria, which is worn hung over the 
left shoulder and contains the nicotine-water flask, pipe, 
tobacco and tinder box. When going to war a man only 
wore his loin-cloth, a plain white cloth tied crosswise over 
the shoulders, and a bag. The warrior also carried his dao, 
his gun or spear, his powder-flask and shield. 

The nicotine-water flasks are called karoaivng, and are 
made out of gourd or mithun's horn, the former being used 
by the common people and the latter by chiefs. Horn 



THE LAKHERS 



PART 




I INTRODUCTORY 37 

flasks are made by cutting off the base of a small mithun's 
horn, leaving a length of eight or nine inches to the tip. 
The opening at the base of this nine inches of horn is filled 
with a wooden plug, the point of the horn is cut off and 
closed with a wooden stopper. The horn and the wooden 
plug at the base are then ornamented to the owner's taste 
with patterns in red and black lacquer and solder ; some- 
times the flasks are simply lacquered plain red or plain black. 
The flask is filled with nicotine water, and the stopper, which 
is attached to the horn with a string, can be removed at will. 
Wooden flasks are also made like the horn flasks, and 
lacquered in the same way. 1 The gourd flasks are much 
commoner, and are made as follows. The top of the gourd 
is cut off, the pulp inside is crushed as far as possible with a 
small stick, sand mixed with water is poured in and left to 
stand for two or three days, after which the pulp is again 
crushed with a small stick and the seeds and pulp are 
poured out. The hollow gourd is next filled with water 
and left for three days, when the water is poured out. This 
process is continued until such time as the water in the 
gourd has ceased to be bitter to the taste, when it is ready 
to receive the nicotine water. The flask is completed by a 
small gourd cork which closes the opening (cf. Fig. 2, p. 91). 
Tinder boxes, called pachi chilong, are of two kinds. The 
commoner is illustrated at page 91, Fig. 6. The box itself 
is of plain wood and the cover of hide. The other kind is 
illustrated at page 52, Fig. 1. It is made of wood lacquered 
black. The two component parts of the box are kept 
together by string, which passes through two little wooden 
slots cut at each end. Each box contains flint, steel and 
tinder, the latter the dried sap of the sasai palm (Caryota 
urens). 

Women's Dress. 

The women wear far more clothes than the men, and when 
going to bed at night keep on the cloths they wear by day. 
Unaffected by the modern fashions of the West, they cover 
their nether limbs with a dark blue cotton petticoat called 

1 For details of the process of ornamentation, see p. 46. N. E. P. 



38 THE LAKHERS PART 

cheunahnang, the lower part of which is embroidered in silk. 
Over this is worn a skirt, which is shorter than the petticoat, 
so as to display the embroidered end of the latter. This 
skirt may be of plain dark blue cloth, when it is known as 
hnangra, or, if the lady prefers gayer clothes, she wears an 
embroidered skirt called viahnang instead. The women of 
lana village are famed for the beauty of their embroidered 
skirts, which command a ready sale. Ladies belonging to a 
royal house have a special cloth for ceremonial occasions 
called sisai a hnang, ornamented with cowries and different 
kinds of beads. The ornamentation varies in different 
villages. The cloth described below was seen by me in 
Savang. The cloth itself is dark blue, and the top quarter 
of the cloth, which is tied round the waist, is left plain. 
About three-quarters of the way up are placed three rows 
of cowries, one below the other, running the whole width 
of the cloth ; below these comes a row of small, round, green 
beads called chhihrang, followed successively by a row of 
wild coix seeds called sachipa, another row of chhihrang, a 
row of red beads called sisai, another row of chhihrang, a 
row of sachipa and a row of brass beads, of the size and shape 
of a match, called dawchalcopa. Below the brass beads follow 
successively a row each of sachipa, chhihrang, sisai, chhihrang, 
sachipa, finished off at the bottom with tassels of red silk. 
The cloth is sometimes finished off with a row of the wings 
of a brilliant green beetle (Chrysochroa bivittata) instead of 
with the red silk tassels. The upper row of beads is sewn 
firmly on to the cloth, the lower rows are strung on to cotton 
thread, and hang down in a fringe below the bottom of the 
cloth. These cloths are very beautiful. They are made by 
their royal owners themselves, and form part of their dowry. 
It is practically impossible to buy one, as the owners refuse 
to part with them. They are worn at weddings and at the 
Pakhupila dance. 

Ordinary skirts and petticoats are wide enough to go once 
round the body only. They are held up by metal belts worn 
round the waist and over the buttocks. These belts are 
called hrakhaw and chaiphiapha, the former being of brass 
and the latter of bell metal. Numerous belts are worn, and 




THE ANA H MAN U 



MAKING A PIPE BOWL 







I INTRODUCTORY 39 

the number of belts is an indication of the wealth of the 
wearer. The women take great pride in having well- 
polished belts. New belts are never bright, and polish is 
only slowly acquired by the belt rubbing against the body 
of the owner as she walks. The hrakhaw is a heavy, flexible 
belt made of links of brass joining into each other. These 
are sold to the Lakhers by Chin merchants, and are made by 
the Chins of Hnarang. There is a smaller and lighter brass 
belt made in the same way, and also called hrakfaw (cf. 
Fig. 3, p. 40. The chaiphiapha is shown in Fig. 8, p. 40, and 
is made in three patterns in Hnarang, and sold by the Chins. 

The chongchi (Fig. 1, p. 40) is made of lengths of spiral 
brass tubing, through the centre of which a string is run to 
attach the belt. These are also made in Hnarang and sold 
by the Chins. 

The saka (Fig. 10, p. 40) is a white-metal belt made of 
hundreds of small, circular, metal rings like tiny washers, 
and is obtained from Arakan. The old belts are very highly 
prized, and the saka are the belts preferred above all else by 
the Lakher women. 

The upper part of a Lakher woman's body is clothed in a 
small sleeveless jacket called kohrei, open or very loosely 
tied in front, which barely hides the breasts, while a con- 
siderable gap remains between the bottom of the jacket and 
the top of the skirt. One of the cloths already described, 
that can be worn by either men or women, is usually also 
worn in the same way as it is worn by the men, and cast off 
when doing any work. 

A woman's hair is worn at the back in a knot held in place 
by a heavy brass hairpin called hrokei (Fig. 2, p. 40), which 
keeps the hair well down on the neck ; but the hair, being 
loosely tied, falls about and gives an untidy appearance. 
These hrokei and the men's sakia (Fig. 7, p. 40) are both 
made in the Lakher villages by the cire perdue process. 
Women also wear the bamboo lacquered hairpins called 
sawkahrong (Fig. 11, p. 40). In rainy weather both men 
and women wear hats called lakhu, made of dried leaves 
and bamboo, and also leaf raincoats called chahnang. On 
ordinary occasions the women wear no head covering at 




PART 



O w ^ 

OjU 



8 ^ 5 
^^< s 

nil 
His 



. ." 6;. 

* 



Sf'a 

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a.9'9 



mils 



I INTRODUCTORY 41 

all, but young girls at a dance wear a head-dress called 
lalchang, which is not unlike the Lushei vakiria worn by girls 
when dancing the Chai, but higher and more solidly made. 
The girl depicted in the frontispiece is wearing a lakJwng. 
In making a lakhang they start with eight uprights of brass, 
about 1 foot 2 inches long and half an inch thick, to form a 
frame on which to build up the crown. These uprights are 
made by the cire perdue process. The upright is first made 
in wax ; this is pierced with holes at intervals, these holes 
are filled with clay, after which the whole upright is enclosed 
in clay and dried in the sun. The mould is then heated 
in the fire to melt the wax, and thus leave the inside of the 
mould hollow. Brass is then melted down in an earthenware 
pot on the furnace in the forge, and the molten brass is 
poured into the mould. As soon as the brass has cooled, 
the mould is chipped away and the clay inside the holes in 
the brass is pushed out with an iron hairpin and a bamboo 
stick. 1 The holes made in the uprights are at very close 
intervals, and are to hold strings of beads. Starting at the 
bottom, a long string of sisai beads is run through from one 
upright to the other, and so round and round up to the top 
of the uprights, which themselves are held in place by the 
strings of beads. The main body of the crown thus formed 
has no brim ; the lowest row of sisai beads rests directly on 
the wearer's head. When the lakhang is not being worn it 
can be folded up and put away. Having made the body of 
the crown, the next step is to get some parrot's tail feathers, 
cover the quills with lead foil made by paring off lead with 
a knife, and fix each of them with beeswax to a sharp bamboo 
spike, which is then pushed in between the top three rows of 
beads. The head-dress is now complete. 

Lakhang are only worn by the daughters and sisters of 

1 Lusheis also practise the cire perdue process. I know of three men at 
North Vanlaiphai, Hranghleia, Khuanga and Neilaia who make pipe-stems 
in this way. The process is described in detail by Dr. Hutton in Appendix 
E at p. 146 of William Shaw's Notes on the Thadou Kukia. The Vanlaiphai 
people work in the same way, but only use the red clay thrown up by 
termites. The ornamentation is put on as described, and bamboo syringes 
are likewise used to get the fine threads of wax ; the liquid wax being 
squirted into a trough of cold water, where it congeals. The Lakhers are 
not such skilled craftsmen as the Lusheis. N. E. P. 



42 THE LAKHERS PART 

chiefs on the occasion of marriages and when dancing the 
Pakhupila. When the owner of a lakhang marries, she wears 
it at her wedding, and takes it with her to her husband's 
house as part of her dowry ; if divorced she takes it back 
home with her, as a lakhang is a woman's property and 
a husband has no power over it. 

Women's Ornaments. 

For ornaments the women wear necklaces, preferably, if 
they possess them, of the cherished pumtek, and, in addition 
to these, various kinds of beads. The sisai (Fig. 7, p. 43) is 
a necklace of small, long, red, opaque beads. Thirty or forty 
strings of these are worn at a time. They are brought from 
Haka, and sold to the Lakhers by the Chins. Another kind 
of necklace is the dapachhi (Fig. 6, p. 43), made of white glass 
beads shaped like sisai beads. Five strings of these are worn 
at a time. They come from Arakan, whence come also the 
hard, round, white beads called lavaw. About forty of these 
beads go to make one string, and only one string of them is 
worn at a time. 

Naba (Fig. 4, p. 43) or theisa are cornelians, and come 
from Arakan. About eighty beads go to make up a neck- 
lace, and one string only is worn at a time. 

The most expensive of these necklaces are those composed 
of naba, which are valued at ten rupees a string. Lavaw are 
worth one rupee a string, sisai four rupees for thirty strings 
and dapachhi only an anna a string. 

Besides the earrings called hawmiraheu, which have 
already been described, there are two other kinds worn by 
Lakher women. The commoner kind is a wooden earring 
called thangraheu (Fig. 5, p. 43), made by the Lakhers them- 
selves with their knives. It is shaped like a stud, the head 
being ornamented with patterns in lacquer and solder, by the 
same process as is followed in ornamenting powder-flasks. 
The less common kind is called takaraheu (Fig. 2, p. 43), 
and in shape is exactly like the seed of the tall begonia 
(Begonia Roxburghii) from which it has obviously been copied. 
The core consists of lac ; the skin is of silver or white metal. 
These earrings are brought from Haka and sold by Chins. 



INTRODUCTORY 




44 THE LAKHERS PART 

The younger generation of men and girls have taken to 
wearing in their ears brass and bone collar-studs, which they 
prize highly. Both young men and girls sometimes wear 
orchids or other brightly coloured flowers in their ears. 
This practice, however, is confined to the unmarried. 

Bracelets, which are known generally as lakeu, though 
each kind has its special name, are worn by the women, but 
never by the men. The only kind of bracelet made by the 
Lakhers themselves is called rahongpachhi (Fig. 8, p. 43). 
This bracelet consists of brass beads strung upon a cotton 
string. The method by which these beads are made is as 
follows. A broken brass pot is cut into pieces, which are 
placed in an earthenware pot made for the purpose, which 
is then put on the fire in the forge. When the brass is melted 
it is poured off into another earthen pot, and as soon as it is 
cool enough to handle is hammered out on a stone till it is in 
thin sheets of the thickness of paper. The hammers used for 
this work are imported from the plains. The brass leaf is cut 
into strips an inch long by half an inch wide. The workman 
takes a strip, binds it round a piece of iron wire, the ribs 
of old umbrellas being preferred for this purpose, and works 
it into the shape of a bead by tapping it with the back of his 
dao. As soon as the bead is the right shape it is pulled off 
the wire and is ready for stringing. These bracelets are 
worn twisted once or twice round the wearer's wrist. Via- 
chhipang (Fig. 1, p. 43) are bracelets made out of very small 
black and white beads resembling pumteks, but much smaller. 
The beads are threaded on cotton strings and wound two or 
three times round the wearer's wrist. The Lakhers buy 
them from Haka Chins. Chhihrang are bracelets made out 
of small, round, opaque green beads. They are worn in the 
same way as the viachhipang, and are also brought from Haka. 

The bracelets described above are those which have 
always been worn by the Lakhers. Nowadays the girls 
wear all sorts of coloured glass bangles brought from Lungleh 
bazaar, and also a kind of metal bangle from the same source. 
These are all of very poor workmanship, and get broken 
quickly. Lakher women never wear anklets. There is one 
other ornament, called kihlong, which merits description, 




AttMKD WITH FJJNTLOCKS 




WABRIORS OF 



i INTRODUCTORY 45 

and is illustrated at page 40, Fig. 4. A kihlcmg is a conch- 
shell, and they are brought in their plain state from Arakan 
and ornamented by the Lakhers with a pattern of small 
circles with a dot in the middle of each. To make the 
pattern they take two sharp thin pieces of iron, tie them 
together with string, and use them like the two legs of a 
compass. The dot in the centre is made with the fixed leg ; 
the other leg moving round makes a small circle. The dots 
and circles are then coloured with lampblack. A hole is 
bored at the wide end of the conch-shell, through which 
passes a string whereby the shell is attached to a necklace 
of sisai beads. When the sisai beads are worn the kihlong 
is worn also at the back of the neck suspended from the 
strings of beads which hang down in front. These orna- 
mented conch-shells are rare, and are highly valued. 

Weapons and Tools. 

The Lakhers do nob possess many weapons. Till about 
a hundred years ago they had no guns. We know that the 
Kukies who came to help Ramoo Kawn in 1777 had no 
firearms, 1 and it was probably not till the disposal of surplus 
weapons at the end of the Napoleonic wars that guns began 
to trickle out to these wilds, being imported through Chitta- 
gong and Akyab. Most of the old flint-locks are Tower 
muskets marked with dates somewhere round 1815. Lakhers 
say that they had guns in the time of lakhai, father of Theulai, 
chief of Saiko, who died in 1927 aged between a hundred and 
a hundred and twenty years. When lakhai was chief, which 
was at least a hundred years ago, the Tlongsai were at war 
with the Thlatla Pois, and both sides used firearms and were 
able to make their own gunpowder. The Burmese are said 
to have had firearms in 1404, as when the King of Pegu 
advanced against Prome he dared not attack the place, 
because guns were mounted on the ramparts and some of 
the garrison were armed with firearms. 2 It is possible 
therefore that the Lakhers may have had a knowledge of 

1 Lewin, The Hill Tracts of Chittagong and the Dwellers Therein, p. 21. 
N. E. P. 

2 Sir A. Phayre, History of Burma, p. 70. N. E. P. 



46 THE LAKHERS PART 

firearms at a much earlier date without actually possessing 
them. 

It must have been later than this that the Lakhers learnt 
to make gunpowder, but from whom I have been unable to 
discover ; that the Lusheis learnt the art from the Lakhers 
has, however, been recorded by Lewin. 1 The guns now are 
handsomely decorated, the stocks being lacquered red and 
black. With the gun is carried a powder-flask made out of 
mithun's horn, ornamented with patterns in black and red 
lacquer and inlaid white metal. The powder-flasks are 
called zaiawng, and are made and ornamented by the Lakhers 
themselves. The base of the horn is closed with a wedge 
of hard wood, the centre of which is covered with a large 
brass stud. This wedge is covered with a pattern in red 
and black lacquer and inlaid with tin foil. The point of the 
horn is cut off and the hole closed with a wooden stopper, 
which is bound on to the horn with a brass band ; below 
this band the red, black, and silver ornamentation is con- 
tinued. The flask is worn on a sling attached to two brass 
slots. The slings are of cloth, and are often ornamented 
with cowries sewn on in three rows of three, with a star of 
four cowries between each group of rows of three. The 
wooden stopper is capped with a brass stud, and is attached 
to the body of the flask with string to prevent its falling off 
and being lost. The details of the construction and the 
patterns vary according to the taste of the maker. For 
measuring the charge a small bamboo measure is used, about 
3 inches deep and 2 inches in circumference. 

The ornamentation of these powder-flasks is very beauti- 
fully executed, and the work requires great skill and patience. 
The portion to be ornamented is first covered with black 
lacquer. While this is still wet, the patterns are made on 
the lacquer with thin pieces of solder which have been cut 
and kept ready. The solder is cut into the thinnest possible 
flakes, which stick on to the wet lacquer and are handled 
with a small pair of tweezers, as they are far too small to 
manage with the hands. The marvellous thing is that the 

1 T. H. Lewin, The Hill Tracts of Chittagong and the Dwellers Therein, 
p. 107. N. E. P. 



INTRODUCTORY 




48 THE LAKHERS PART 

patterns are symmetrical, as the only tools used are a small 
knife for cutting up the solder and the tweezers. Fre- 
quently tweezers are dispensed with, and the little pieces of 
solder are picked up on the sharp edge of a knife or with the 
point of a metal hairpin, and set in position on the lacquer. 
When the solder has been applied and fixed in the required 
patterns, red lacquer is added as desired. As the lacquer 
takes three days at least to dry, it gives time to apply the 
solder at leisure, for the work is so delicate that it cannot 
be done in a hurry. No other tribes in the Lushai Hills 
do delicate work of this nature. The black lacquer is called 
aihi, and is made from the sap which exudes from the bark 
of the Melanorrhoea. This sap when it leaves the tree is 
reddish in colour. Two coats are applied to the object to 
be decorated. The first coat is allowed to dry before the 
second coat is applied, and when the second coat has dried 
the colour is deep black. The red colouring is a powder 
called taku, and the red lacquer is made by mixing this red 
powder with some of the juice of the Melanorrhoea freshly 
collected from the tree, as at this time it quickly acquires a 
bright red hue when mixed with the red powder. It is only 
necessary to apply one coat of red lacquer. The Lakhers 
buy the red powder from the Haka Chins. 

The process described above is also used in colouring and 
ornamenting bamboo or wooden combs, hairpins, and 
nicotine-water flasks. 

Before Lakhers acquired guns their weapons of war were 
bows and arrows, daos and spears. 

Lakher bows are plain. The whole bow is called li, the 
stave is called libaw, and the string is called liri. The stave, 
which is single, is made either of rasang bamboo (Bambusa 
Tulda) or of rahniapa bamboo (Dendrocalamus Hookeri, 
Munro), as these two kinds are the strongest and most 
suitable for the purpose. The stave is generally about 5 feet 
long, the inside of the bamboo forming the convex side. 
The ends of the stave are notched to receive the string. 
The string is made out of the bark of a tree called pazo 
(Hibiscus macrophyllus, Roxb.). The bark having been 
stripped from the tree, the outer bark covering is removed 



INTRODUCTORY 49 

and thrown away. The inner skin is held against the sole 
of the foot, and the sticky outer covering is squeezed off 
with a dao. After this it is dried thoroughly in the sun, and 
is then ready for use. To make a bowstring, a strip of dry 
bark is rubbed between the hands or rolled against the thigh 
until it is thoroughly twisted. When two strips have been 
prepared in this way they are rolled together against the 
thigh to make a two-ply string, which is knotted at each end 
to prevent its component strips from flying apart. The 
string is attached directly to the stave by a knot called 
chakhi. In stringing the bow, the stave with the string tied 
at its lower end is placed on the ground and bent over by 
the knee until the string can be tied round the notch at the 
other end. When the bow is not in use, the string is loosened 
from one end and twisted round the stave, so as to allow the 
stave to return to an upright position, and is then kept on 
the shelf above the hearth, as warmth and smoke are said 
to harden it. 

In shooting, the stave is held perpendicularly in the left 
hand, and is gripped just below a knot in the bamboo, which 
is purposely left slightly projecting for the index-finger to 
rest against. The thumb is protected by a bracer called 
hneuthli (Fig. 7, p. 52), made of any fairly durable ordinary 
wood, which is worn on the wrist. The arrow is generally 
allowed to run between the first and second fingers, though 
some archers let it rest on the thumb, and in the case of right- 
handed persons it rests on the right-hand side of the bow, the 
position being reversed in the case of left-handed persons. 
The butt end of the arrow is held between the thumb and first 
finger. The arrows are carried in a bamboo quiver called 
lavaong (Fig. 6, p. 52), about 1 foot 10 inches l