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The explorers were now well into the Laos country, and they were much struck by the intelligence and gentleness of the natives. Garnier fancied that he dis- cerned in them some traces of that vitality and mental energy which are the germs of progress, and for a period he cheated himself into the belief that they might have a future before them such as is surely denied to the spent peoples of Kambodia. The people of Laos he says, "peuvent renaître à l'activité et à la richesse, au milicu des contrées admirables qu'ils habitent, sous l'influence civilisatrice de la France," an opinion which may or may not be true, but which has certainly not yet been justified in the smallest degree. It is to be feared that Garnier, deluded by his love of Indo-China and by his very natural enthusiasm for the future of countries with which he had become so closely identified, allowed himself to be blinded to some obvious facts. Compared to the Kam- bodians the Laotines were doubtless less utterly past hope, but the people of southcastern Asia who are most vital, most alive to-day are, without question, the Siamese, whose energy has been sufficient to achieve the reduction of so many of their neighbours; yet no one who has studied modern Siam with any care, and has not had his vision confused by personal predilections and prejudices, can cherish many illusions concerning the future that awaits its people. As for the Laotines, such achievement as was possible to their limitations belongs to the days of Vien Chan's prosperity; compared with that of Siam or Burma, leaving entirely on one side the great empire of the Khmers, it is a paltry thing, and as regards their future,