This reprint offers a colorful account of the Shan States, where the author, Mrs. Leslie Milne, lived from 1906-1907, six months in Hsipaw and then fifteen months in the Namkhain valley of the Shweli River. For most of the time she was the only foreign resident; being a member of the Royal Asiatic Society and Bombay Natural History Society no doubt prepared her to live the life of an explorer to the full. She studied most aspects of Shan life, particularly family life, illustrating her observations with a host of remarkable photographs. Language, folklore, villagers at work, crafts, medicine and charms, Shan cosmology, are all discussed in lively anecdotes, peppered with astute observations. Blessed with such a keen interest in all that crosses her path, she happily sprinkles her account with critical remarks about this simple life, and of the British for their failure to cash in on their empire building. Her passion for textiles and her other preferred pastime-natural history-led her to record natural dyes and products, and nature in general, noting that both were already losing out, albeit to German rather than British traders. The book is enhanced by two chapters on the history and literature of the Shan States by the Reverend Wilbur Willis Cochrane.