furnishes valuable water-power, but most of the manufactories are operated by steam. Quantities of marble were formerly taken from quarries in the vicinity. The city is a wholesale distributing centre for all northern Vermont and New Hampshire, and is one of the principal lumber markets in the east, most of the lumber being imported from Canada. It is the port of entry for the Vermont customs district, whose exports and imports were valued respectively in 1907 at $8,333,024 and $5,721,034. A charter for a town to be founded here was granted by the province of New Hampshire in 1763, but no settlement was made until 1774. Burlington was chartered as a city in 1865.
BURMA, a province of British India, including the former kingdom of independent Burma, as well as British Burma, acquired by the British Indian government in the two wars of 1826 and 1852. It is divided into Upper and Lower Burma, the former being the territory annexed on 1st January 1886. The province lies to the east of the Bay of Bengal, and covers a range of country extending from the Pakchan river in 9° 55′ north latitude to the Naga and Chingpaw, or Kachin hills, lying roughly between the 27th and 28th degrees of north latitude; and from the Bay of Bengal on the west to the Mekong river, the boundary of the dependent Shan States on the east, that is to say, roughly, between the 92nd and 100th degrees of east longitude. The extreme length from north to south is almost 1200 m., and the broadest part, which is in about latitude 21° north, is 575 m. from east to west. On the N. it is bounded by the dependent state of Manipur, by the Mishmi hills, and by portions of Chinese territory; on the E. by the Chinese Shan States, portions of the province of Yunnan, the French province of Indo-China, and the Siamese Shan, or Lao States and Siam; on the S. by the Siamese Malay States and the Bay of Bengal; and on the W. by the Bay of Bengal and Chittagong. The coast-line from Taknaf, the mouth of the Naaf, in the Akyab district on the north, to the estuary of the Pakchan at Maliwun on the south, is about 1200 m. The total area of the province is estimated at 238,738 sq.m., of which Burma proper occupies 168,573 sq.m., the Chin hills 10,250 sq.m., and the Shan States, which comprise the whole of the eastern portion of the province, some 59,915 sq.m.
Natural Divisions.—The province falls into three natural divisions: Arakan with the Chin hills, the Irrawaddy basin, and the old province of Tenasserim, together with the portion of the Shan and Karen-ni states in the basin of the Salween, and part of Kengtung in the western basin of the Mekong. Of these Arakan is a strip of country lying on the seaward slopes of the range of hills known as the Arakan Yomas. It stretches from Cape Negrais on the south to the Naaf estuary, which divides it from the Chittagong division of Eastern Bengal and Assam on the north, and includes the districts of Sandoway, Kyaukpyu, Akyab and northern Arakan, an area of some 18,540 sq.m. The northern part of this tract is barren hilly country, but in the west and south are rich alluvial plains containing some of the most fertile lands of the province. Northwards lie the Chin and some part of the Kachin hills. To the east of the Arakan division, and separated from it by the Arakan Yornas, lies the main body of Burma in the basin of the Irrawaddy. This tract falls into four subdivisions. First, there is the highland tract including the hilly country at the sources of the Chindwin and the upper waters of the Irrawaddy, the Upper Chindwin, Katha, Bhamo, Myitkyina and Ruby Mines districts, with the Kachin hills and a great part of the Northern Shan states. In the Shan States there are a few open plateaus, fertile and well populated, and Maymyo in the Mandalay district, the hill-station to which in the hot weather the government of Burma migrates, stands in the Pyin-u-lwin plateau, some 3500 ft. above the sea. But the greater part of this country is a mass of rugged hills cut deep with narrow gorges, within which even the biggest rivers are confined. The second tract is that known as the dry zone of Burma, and includes the whole of the lowlands lying between the Arakan Yomas and the western fringe of the Southern Shan States. It stretches along both sides of the Irrawaddy from the north of Mandalay to Thayetmyo, and embraces the Lower Chindwin, Shwebo, Sagaing, Mandalay, Kyauksè, Meiktila, Yamèthin, Myingyan, Magwe, Pakôkku and Minbu districts. This tract consists mostly of undulating lowlands, but it is broken towards the south by the Pegu Yomas, a considerable range of hills which divides the two remaining tracts of the Irrawaddy basin. On the west, between the Pegu and the Arakan Yomas, stretches the Irrawaddy delta, a vast expanse of level plain 12,000 sq.m. in area falling in a gradual unbroken slope from its apex not far south of Prome down to the sea. This delta, which includes the districts of Bassein, Myaungmya, Thôngwa, Henzada, Hanthawaddy, Tharrawaddy, Pegu and Rangoon town, consists almost entirely of a rich alluvial deposit, and the whole area, which between Cape Negrais and Elephant Point is 137 m. wide, is fertile in the highest degree. To the east lies a tract of country which, though geographically a part of the Irrawaddy basin, is cut off from it by the Yomas, and forms a separate system draining into the Sittang river. The northern portion of this tract, which on the east touches the basin of the Salween river, is hilly; the remainder towards the confluence of the Salween, Gyaing and Attaran rivers consists of broad fertile plains. The whole is comprised in the districts of Toungoo and Thaton, part of the Karen-ni hills, with the Salween hill tract and the northern parts of Amherst, which form the northern portion of the Tenasserim administrative division. The third natural division of Burma is the old province of Tenasserim, which, constituted in 1826 with Moulmein as its capital, formed the nucleus from which the British supremacy throughout Burma has grown. It is a narrow strip of country lying between the Bay of Bengal and the high range of hills which form the eastern boundary of the province towards Siam. It comprises the districts of Mergui and Tavoy and a part of Amherst, and includes also the Mergui Archipelago. The surface of this part of the country is mountainous and much intersected with streams. Northward from this lies the major portion of the Southern Shan States and Karen-ni and a narrowing strip along the Salween of the Northern Shan States.
Mountains.—Burma proper is encircled on three sides by a wall of mountain ranges. The Arakan Yomas starting from Cape Negrais extend northwards more or less parallel with the coast till they join the Chin and Naga hills. They then form part of a system of ranges which curve north of the sources of the Chindwin river, and with the Kumon range and the hills of the Jade and Amber mines, make up a highland tract separated from the great Northern Shan plateau by the gorges of the Irrawaddy river. On the east the Kachin, Shan and Karen hills, extending from the valley of the Irrawaddy into China far beyond the Salween gorge, form a continuous barrier and boundary, and tail off into a narrow range which forms the eastern watershed of the Salween and separates Tenasserim from Siam. The highest peak of the Arakan Yomas, Liklang, rises nearly 10,000 ft. above the sea, and in the eastern Kachin hills, which run northwards from the state of Möng Mit to join the high range dividing the basins of the Irrawaddy and the Salween, are two peaks, Sabu and Worang, which rise to a height of 11,200 ft. above the sea. The Kumon range running down from the Hkamti country east of Assam to near Mogaung ends in a peak known as Shwedaunggyi, which reaches some 5750 ft. There are several peaks in the Ruby Mines district which rise beyond 7000 ft. and Loi Ling in the Northern Shan States reaches 9000 ft. Compared with these ranges the Pegu Yomas assume the proportions of mere hills. Popa, a detached peak in the Myingyan district, belongs to this system and rises to a height of nearly 5000 ft., but it is interesting mainly as an extinct volcano, a landmark and an object of superstitious folklore, throughout the whole of Central Burma. Mud volcanoes occur at Minbu, but they are not in any sense mountains, resembling rather the hot springs which are found in many parts of Burma. They are merely craters raised above the level of the surrounding country by the gradual accretion of the soft oily mud, which overflows at frequent intervals whenever a discharge of gas occurs. Spurs of the Chin hills run down the whole length of the Lower Chindwin district, almost to Sagaing, and one hill, Powindaung, is particularly noted on account of its innumerable cave temples, which are said to hold no fewer than 446,444 images of Buddha. Huge caves, of which the most noted are the Farm Caves, occur in the hills near Moulmein, and they too are full of relics of their ancient use as temples, though now they are chiefly visited in connexion with the bats, whose flight viewed from a distance, as they issue from the caves, resembles a cloud of smoke.
Rivers.—Of the rivers of Burma the Irrawaddy is the most important. It rises possibly beyond the confines of Burma in the unexplored regions, where India, Tibet and China meet, and seems to be formed by the junction of a number of considerable streams of no great length. Two rivers, the Mali and the N'mai, meeting about latitude 25° 45′ some 150 m. north of Bhamo, contribute chiefly to its volume, and during the dry weather it is navigable for steamers up to their confluence. Up to Bhamo, a distance of 900 m. from the sea, it is navigable throughout the year, and its chief tributary in Burma, the Chindwin, is also navigable for steamers for 300 m. from its junction with the Irrawaddy at Pakôkku. The Chindwin, called in its upper reaches the Tanai, rises in the hills south-west of Thama, and flows due north till it enters the south-east corner of the Hukawng valley, where it turns north-west and continues in that direction cutting the valley into two almost equal parts until it reaches its north-west range, when it turns almost due south and takes the name of the Chindwin. It is a swift clear river, fed in its upper reaches by numerous mountain streams. The Mogaung river, rising in the watershed which divides the Irrawaddy and the Chindwin drainages, flows south and south-east for 180 m. before it joins the Irrawaddy, and is navigable for steamers as far as Kamaing for about four months in the year. South of Thayetmyo, where arms of the Arakan Yomas approach the river and almost meet that spur of the Pegu Yomas which formed till 1886 the
