THE FAVORITE OF THE HAREM.
The morning on which his Majesty set out on his annual visit to Pitchaburee was one of those which occur in the climate of Siam at almost any season of the year, but are seen in their perfection only in October. The earth, air, and sky seemed to bask in a glory of sunlight and beauty, and everything that had life gave signs of perfect and tranquil enjoyment. Not a sound broke the stillness, and there seemed nothing to do but to sit and watch the long shadows sleeping on the distant hills, and on the warm golden fields of waving corn.
Reluctantly quitting my window, I turned my steps toward the palace, leaving all this beauty behind me in a kind of despair; not that my temple school-room was not in itself a delicious retreat, but that it always impressed me with a feeling I could never analyze; when there, it seemed as if I were removed to some awful distance from the world I had known, and were yet more remotely excluded from any participation in its real life.
Taking out my book, I sat down to await the coming of such of my pupils as might not have accompanied the king on his visit.
In the course of an hour, only one presented herself; she was a young woman called Choy, a fair and very handsome girl of about twenty summers, or perhaps not so many, with regular features,—a very rare thing in a Siamese woman; but the great beauty of her face was in her large lustrous eyes, which were very eloquent, even in their seeming indifference. Her hair, which was so long that when unbound it covered her whole person, even to her feet, was tied in a large knot behind, and ornamented with the jessamine and Indian myrtle. She had a careless, and I might almost say even a wicked, expression in her face, which was slightly marked with the smallpox.
Choy was the youngest sister of the head wife (or concubine) Thieng, and had been my pupil for about six months. This morning she brought me a flower; it was a common wild-flower, that grew up everywhere in great profusion, making a lovely carpet, blossoming as it did in every nook and crevice of the stone pavements within the palace. It was just like her to snatch up the first thing that attracted her, and then to give it away the very next moment. But I received it with pleasure, and made a place for her at my side. She seemed to be out of humor, and, jerking herself impatiently into the seat, said abruptly: "Why don't you despise me, as all the rest of them do?" Then, without waiting for an answer, she went on to say: "I can't be what you wish me to be; I'm not coming to school any more! Here's my book! I don't want it, I hate English!"
"Why, Choy, what is the matter?" I inquired.
"I am tired of trying to do so much; I am not going to learn English any more," she replied.
"Don't say so, Choy," I said, kindly; "you can't do everything at once; you must learn by degrees, and little by little, you know. No one grows good or clever at once."
"But I won't learn any more, even to grow good and clever. There's no use, no one will ever care for me or love me again. I wish they had let me die that time," she continued. "Bah! I could kill that stupid old consul who saved my life. It were better to be quartered, and cast to the crows and vultures, than to live here. Every one orders me about as if I were a slave, and treats me like a dog. I wish I could drown myself and die."