The next day was brighter. There was a light wind and the whole sunlit crowd was a babel of excited talk. A little naked Hindoo baby, just able to walk, was playing mischievously with me. I had been nursing her for a while and now she was laughing, and with palms up-turned was moving her hands like a Nautch dancer as her eyes twinkled with merriment. She was called Mutama, and the poor mite's ears had had a big cut made in them and the lobes were already pulled out more than two inches by the bunches of metal rings fastened in for this purpose.
A purple shawl, tied up to dry, bellied out in the wind over the side of the ship in a patch of vivid colour. It had a border of gold thread and was of native make. Not that the gold thread itself is made in Madras. It is curious that English manufacturers have tried in vain to make these shawls so that their gold thread shall not tarnish, whereas the gold thread obtained from France does not do so.
On a box in the midst of hubbub, a Mohammedan was praying, bending his body up and down and looking toward the sun.
MUTAMA, A HINDOO BABY.
The following morning we reached very turbid water, thick and yellow, with blue reflections of the sky in the ripples. We could just see the coast of Burmah and about noon caught sight of the pilot brig, and entering the wide Rangoon river, passed a Chinese junk with all sails spread. Now the mats began to go overboard and gulls swooped round the ship. We had passed the obelisk at the mouth of the river when, above a green strip of coast on a little blue hill, the sun shone upon something golden.
"The Pagoda!" I cried, and a pagoda it was, but only one at Siriam where there is a garrison detachment. The Golden Pagoda—the Shwe Dagon—appeared at first grey and more to the north. The water was now as thick and muddy as the Thames at the Tower Bridge. It was full of undercurrents too, and there was a poor chance for anyone who fell in.
Over went the mats, scores and scores and scores of them!