The romantic East: Burma, Assam, & Kashmir - Khamkoo

110 THE ROMANTIC EAST
timber after Mahur. There are other streams to
cross and further tunnels until, after threading
No. 32, the line runs through a level jungle of
bamboos and pampas-grass to Langting (343 miles).
Three miles farther on there is a grave covered
with a white marble cross by
the side of the line.
After Lumding, where we changed
into the
dining-car, the railway goes across country to
Dhansiri station, and then down the Dhansiri
valley.
After Manipur Road, from where there is
a cart-road to Manipur going south-west to Kohima
and then south, the railway runs in the Sibsagar
district with the Naga hills lying to the east.
It was
about three o'clock in the morning when we pulled
up at Kamarbandha Ali station, where we found
kind friends whose tea-gardens are in this district.
Life in
a bungalow on an Assam tea-garden is
very much the same as it is in other remote districts
in India. There are the same heavy risks to life
and health taken lightly,
and the same social
trivialities taken seriously. There is the close
clinging to the customs and habits of "home,"
together with a quickened ingenuity in adapting
the local conditions to one's wants, or in adapting