| caption: |
Chapter Twelve. Towards Unknown Country |
| caption: |
news of head-hunting raids in Patkoi hills at Pangsha |
| text: |
It is not very far from Longkhai to Wakching, and yet the way back that day seemed long. Ordinarily it would have been a pleasant march in the sunny weather, but now I hardly noticed the country as I passed. I was turning over in my mind all those events which Mills had told me would probably lead to an expedition. Serious news had come from the tribal area, that the Kalyo Kengyus on the western slopes of the Patkoi Range were terrorizing their neighbours, and had developed the hunting of heads into systematic man-hunts. A few months ago they had treacherously raided and burnt two villages lying several days' journey from British territory. Only a few of the inhabitants escaped to tell the tale; the rest had been slaughtered or carried off as slaves. It was believed that the raiders were men of a Kalyo Kengyu village known as Pangsha, but Pangsha was not on the map, and the two destroyed villages, Saochu and Kejok, lay near the eastern limit of the land surveyed in 1923 and 1924. The area further to the east was still unmapped, and the country of these Kalyo Kengyus had never been entered by any European. |
