VOL III. Burma
A Handbook of Practical Information
Book review by Michael Smithies
(The Nation, Bangkok, October 22, 2000)
Sir George Scott was an authority on colonial Burma. In 1882, under the pen-name "Shway Yoe",
he published The Bunnan, His Life and Notions, a work now recognised as a classic.
He went on to produce Bunna, As It was, As It Is, and
As It Will Be in 1886, five volumes of the Gazetteer of Upper Burma and
the Shan States (with JP Hardiman) in 1900, and Burna from Earliest Times
to the Present Day in 1924.
The present reprint was first published in 1906; this
is the revised third edition of1921. It is rather similar to the 1904 publication
The Kingdom of Siam which the Siam Society reprinted in 1988, seeking to
give a comprehensive guide to the Kingdom at the beginning of what was
then a new century.
Burma: A Handbook of Practical Information covers the
physical aspect of that country and its races; extractive industries, agriculture,
and transport; archaeology and the arts; religion; language and literature;
and a necessarily dated section on government.
There are extensive appendices on the different divisions
of the country and on the flora and fauna found there.
A lot of this has not changed at all, of course; hence
the value of the reprint. There is one fascinating section, "Hints
to Visitors or New Residents", where things have indeed changed. Tourists
in those days were expected to have time and money.
They are advised to hire a "boy" and a cook,
lay in wines and spirits (to be "replenished at any railway station
of headquarters town"), acquire a saddle and a side saddle, to have
supplies of quinine and chlorodyne "to give to the servants if necessary",
while the traveller immunises himself with "a bottle of brandy and
some pints of champagne".
Take as little ice as possible, do not eat fruit at
night, get your clothes made locally. Do not expect invitations to stay
from resident Europeans, and do not rush Pagan: to do so "is very
much like trotting through the Louvre after lunch". "Sport"
means exclusively shooting the wildlife, or fishing.
This volume is reprinted in tasteful sepia tones throughout,
with marbled end-papers and a fawn jacket.
[More Orchid Press Reviews]
|
![[Download a map to our Bangkok office location]](../downloads/orchid_map.jpg){kind=link}