The Vernay-Hopwood Chindwin expedition

Arthur Stannard Vernay, field associate in the museum's Department of Mammalogy, led the expedition to upper Burma to collect animal specimens and ethnographic artifacts. In the opening scenes, Vernay and hunter G. S. Rowley arrive by plane in Rangoon, where they join the rest of the expedition staff for the train trip to Mogaung and Nanyaseik. There the huge expedition company of 6 staff members, 52 assistants, and 110 mules prepare for the journey. At the jade mine at Lonkhin, a Burmese man notches chunks of jade using a pedal-propelled stone wheel and bamboo water pumps drain water from a stream bed. There are also scenes of children singing and tending younger children, people playing a roulette-like game, an elephant being ridden, and dancers carrying leafy branches in a circle dance, as well as closeups of individuals and views of bamboo houses with thatched roofs, the Chindwin River, and surrounding jungle. Kachin Hill people pound grain in a wooden trough, winnow grain, use a mortar and pestle, spin, and weave on two different kinds of looms. Men strain and pound a white substance. The expedition staff sets up camp. Close-ups of these people illustrate their clothing and personal adornment. Natives bring in animals, some to serve as specimens and some as food, to the expedition camp. Specific animals include tree shrews, bamboo rats, owls, parrots, and a swarm of bees. In a long sequence a young gibbon (evidently the expedition mascot) plays with staff members, eats, runs, and climbs trees. The expedition moves steadily northward up the Chindwin River and enters the Naga Hills, where an official edict prohibiting human sacrifice and slave owning is posted. The expedition boat, two dugouts lashed together with a superstructure, is dismantled and portaged around the Kyaukse Rapids. Women wash in the river. In the hillside Naga village of Hathi, pigs are roasted and a head-hunting dance in war regalia are demonstrated. Both men and women wear elaborate tattoos extending from their jaws down their necks and over their upper chests, the design fanning outward. Their pole and thatch dwellings and woven blankets with geometric designs are seen as the expedition staff presents gifts. A barber cuts hair by holding a large knife under the hair and striking the knife edge with a piece of bamboo. Henry Cushier Raven, associate curator in the museum's Department of Comparative and Human Anatomy, takes facial plaster casts of native people. The finished masks are filmed, including one of Vernay, who had served as "guinea pig" to demonstrate that the process was painless. Domesticated elephants bathe in the river; a wild buffalo is seen in the jungle. The expedition visits and films a military training center. Several barges with small dwellings built on top of them are seen on the river. The film ends with the gibbon mascot running after Randolph C. Morris, one of the expedition hunters.