Road-making for the passage of the elephants became more difficult, and transport was so deficient that the troops could only be brought up very gradually.

Thus, it was the 22nd of the month before we reached the Tuibum river, only twenty miles from Tipai Mukh.

On our way we were met by some scouts from the villages ahead of us, who implored of us to advance no further, saying, if we would only halt, their headmen would come in and submit to whatever terms we chose to make.

The villagers were informed in reply that our quarrel was not with them, and so long as we remained unmolested, not the slightest injury should be done to them, their villages, or their crops; but that we were determined to reach the country of Lalbura, the Chief who had been the ringleader in the raids upon the tea-gardens.
We pushed on as fast as the dense undergrowth would permit until within about a mile of the river, where we found the road blocked by a curious erection in the form of a gallows, from which hung two grotesque figures, made of bamboo.

A little further on it was a felled tree which stopped us; this tree was studded all over with knife-like pieces of bamboo, and from the incisions into which these were stuck exuded a red juice, exactly the colour of blood.