Pra-chadis, or thin tall spires, from twenty to sixty feet in height, are in great numbers; and there is one at the krong or capital, which towers to the height, probably, of a hundred and fifty feet. The houses of the Talapoys are contiguous to the temples, and are generally shaded by fruit and forest trees. Small temples, having a high roof, and four wide avenues leading to the centre, for the burning of the richer sort, and a raised platform in the open air, for those who can only pay small fees, are placed at the most convenient spot near the water. A long bath, or small pond, containing young alligators, seems to be a necessary appendage to all temples. The grounds about the front of many of the richer temples, are neatly and prettily laid out with avenues, clumps of trees, shrubbery, &c. The priests derive a considerable revenue by making small images, either of the unconsumed bones of certain deceased persons, or else of common clay, gilt; and also by writing on palm-trees, certain moral or religious sentences, in the sacred language. The Indian lotus, with its broad leaf, is nowhere neglected, but is found about every temple, growing from large porcelain or stone vases, neatly, and sometimes elaborately wrought. Every Siamese temple is not only a place for worship, but it is likewise a monastery: females are in them, old and worn out, and their characters are far from being respected. They only do menial offices, dress in white, and have nothing to do with the worship in the temples. As rice, their chief support, is abundant, it is but just that the Talapoys should support them in their old age.
The spot on which the present capital stands, and the country in its vicinity, on both banks of the river for a considerable distance, were formerly, before the removal of the court to its present situation, called Bang-kok; but since that time, and for nearly sixty years past, it has been named Sia yuthia, (pronounced See-ah you-tè-ah, and by the natives, Krung, that is, the capital;) it is called by both names here, but never Bang-kok; and they always correct foreigners when the latter make this mistake. The villages which occupy the right hand of the river, opposite to the capital, pass under the general name of Bang-kok.
COCHIN-CHINESE AMBASSADOR.
A Cochin-Chinese ambassador, with several junks, arrived here from Longuar (alias Saigon) a few days before our arrival, being the same mentioned previously. Ambassadors’ junks of both nations, whenever they visit each other’s country, or pay their annual tribute to China, are always well laden with goods, out and home, on account of the king or his ministers; it is in part a trading expedition, and the secret is, they are allowed to go duty free, as I have before stated.
COCHIN-CHINA AND SIAM.
The object of the emperor of Cochin-China, in this case, is blended with a more serious piece of business; it is no less than to demand the delivery, to them, of the person of the first minister of state, and superintendant of Pegu, and the principalities of Laus and Camboja, whose title is “Chan-phaya-bodin-desha;” he is a “meh-tap,” or commander of the Siamese forces now in Camboja. It seems, in 1827, the Siamese government oppressed the subjects of one of the Laos tributary princes, Chow-vin-chan, to such a degree, that he was obliged to take up arms in defence of his rights, against the neighbouring Siamese government; this was the point to which the Siamese government wished to force him, for the purpose of taking into possession his territory. Hordes of soldiers were sent among them under the command of the said Chan-phaya-bodin-desha, and they committed all sorts of enormities; the country was stripped of its riches, and the inhabitants, fleeing from the enemy, were shot down indiscriminately like wild beasts; this process being found too tedious, thousands were packed into houses and blown up with gunpowder; the younger women became the prey of a licentious soldiery, and the smoking ruins of a peaceable people marked the track of a band of savages, whose knives were steeped to the hilt in the blood of their fathers and mothers, husbands, wives, and children. Those who escaped were sent to the capital and sold as slaves; thousands and thousands died on the rafts which floated them down the Menam, with wounds, sickness, and starvation. In fact, the country was made desolate, was in ruins: “He made a solitude and called it peace.” The survivors were never more to see their country; their soil was given to their savage invaders. In the midst of these horrible excesses, an ambassador from the emperor of Cochin-China was sent to the general in command, with the ostensible object of interposing in behalf of Chow-vin-chan and his family, who had fled into their territory—not from motives of compassion, I conceive, for the present emperor of Cochin-China is an ignorant, blood-thirsty savage, and pursues his enemy, where he dares, with an unrelenting hand. The object was, in truth, to prevent the conquest of the kingdom of Laos by Siam, which would give the Siamese a better chance of obtaining a larger slice at a future day, which they had long contemplated with eager and with gloating eyes. The Siamese commander, smarting with all his wounds, and red-hot from the bloody battle-field, or to speak less hyperbolically, not having filled a heavy purse from the spoils of the conquered, anticipating a golden harvest from the onward march, and feeling deeply indignant at the insidious policy of his wily neighbours, ordered an instantaneous massacre of the envoy and his suite of a hundred men, with the exception of one, who was sent back to say, “I alone am left out of all my brethren.” Highly enraged as was the emperor at the fell swoop of the embassy, and the gross violation of the law of nations, he dissembled, not daring to wage a war or revenge cruelty by cruelly; for his crazy, disjointed, and puny government would probably crumble into atoms, the moment a large force should quit the kingdom.
The Cochin-Chinese government are aware that the Tung-kinese, on the north, are watching keenly for the first possible chance which offers of freeing themselves from their despotic oppressors; the Cambojans on the south are desirous also of measuring the length of their swords with their hard task-masters, and the lower class of Cochin-Chinese, which comprise nine hundred and ninety-nine of the thousand, are ripe for a revolt; being ground to the earth by the higher orders. They are ragged, filthy, and starving, from the gulf of Tung-king to the gulf of Siam, and from the coast washed by the China sea, to the boundaries of his “golden-footed majesty.” Year after year this demand has been made and evaded, and so far from his Siamese majesty ever intending to comply with it, he has lately sent this same “Meh-tap” into that part of Camboja which fell to his majesty’s share in the division of that kingdom with Cochin-China, to receive, and to protect from capture, the many thousands of Cambojans, who have recently fled into the Siamese territory. The ambassador paid his first visit a few days after his arrival, to the chow-pia-praklang, and was treated with bare civility; he was told, by order of his majesty, that a copy of the same letter which was sent to his majesty the last year, was all the answer which would be returned to the letter received from the emperor through his hands. His audience with the king, which took place a few days previously to ours, was marked by no distinguished honours; the pomp and parade exhibited to us were dispensed with upon that occasion. It is said by Mr. Silveira, and all others, that no embassy from a foreign country ever had so favourable and honourable a reception as ours, marked at the same time with the most extraordinary despatch ever known.
This same emperor of Cochin-China, this deep sympathizer in the wrongs of the people of Lao, has lately persecuted to death a handful of poor Roman Catholics, all who would not trample on the cross and renounce Christianity. To conclude, the Chow-vin-chan and family were betrayed into the hands of the Siamese. Sickness, distress of mind, and long exposure to the elements, fortunately put an end to the prince. He died in a cage, a few days before his cruel oppressors intended to put him and his family to the most excruciating tortures; the heir apparent escaped, but committed suicide by throwing himself from the roof of a temple to the ground, rather than fall into the hands of his blood-thirsty pursuers. The female part of the family receive a scanty subsistance from the government and remain in the capital. Thus ended the dynasty of Chow-vin-chan, adding another victim to the millions that have heretofore perished, from the effect of inordinate ambition.
The barbarous conduct of the Siamese last year, in the Malay peninsula, in sending hordes of soldiers, or rather common coolies, under the command of the chow-pia praklang, which destroyed Patani, Singora, &c., plundering them of their property, and sending nearly five thousand prisoners as slaves to this place, which had been given away, or “sold in lots to suit purchasers;” the thousands that died from wounds, bad treatment, and starvation—deserve the bitter execration of every friend of humanity.
Education is carried to a very limited extent; a mere smattering only is generally diffused among the Siamese, in reading, writing, and arithmetic. The suan-pawn is in general use as an assistant in making calculations. Those who wish to attain to a greater degree of knowledge, more particularly in the Pali or sacred language, resort to the monasteries of the Talapoys. In their composition, (if I may be allowed to judge from the various articles of the treaty, being again and again altered to make them clear and perspicuous,) they are fond of being ambiguous in all their forms of expression. There was always a disposition evinced to hint obscurely at things, like the Chinese, rather than express their full meaning.