As an indication of the spirit that is quickening New Siam we should not forget to mention the exhibition held in Bangkok in 1882, to celebrate the centennial of the present dynasty and of its establishment as the capital. An object-lesson on such a grand scale was of course a thing before unheard-of in Eastern Asia, but its benefits to the people of this region were both wide-spread and real, and are still to some extent active in the form of a museum where many of the exhibits are permanently preserved for examination and display. "The exhibition will be given"—run the words of the royal announcement—"so that the people may observe the difference between the methods used to earn a living one hundred years ago and those now used, and see what progress has been made, and note the plants and fruits useful for trade and the improved means of living. We believe that this exhibition will be beneficial to the country."
Miss Mary Hartwell, one of the American missionaries in Bangkok, in describing the exposition says: "Nothing there was more significant than its school exhibit. The Royal College was solicited to make an exhibit representing the work done in the school. This consisted chiefly of specimens of writing in Siamese and English, translations and solutions of problems in arithmetic, the school furniture, the text-books in use, and the various helps employed in teaching, such as the microscope, magnets, electric batteries, etc. The Siamese mind is peculiarly adapted to picking up information by looking at things and asking questions, and it is believed that this exhibit will not only enhance the reputation of the college, but give the Siamese some new ideas on the subject of education.
THE PALACE OF THE KING OF SIAM, BANGKOK.
"Miss Olmstead and I, together with our assistant, Ma Tuen, have been training little fingers in fancy-work, or rather overseeing the finishing up of things, to go to the exhibition. April 25th we placed our mats, tidies, afghans, rugs, cushions, needle-books, edgings, work-bags, and lambrequins in the cases allotted to our school in the Queen's Room, and on the 26th we were again at our posts to receive his Majesty the King, and give him our salutations upon his first entrance at the grand opening. He was dressed in a perfectly-fitting suit of navy-blue broadcloth, without any gaudy trappings, and never did he wear a more becoming suit. His face was radiant with joy, and his quick, elastic step soon brought him to us. He uttered an exclamation of pleasure at seeing us there, shook our hands most cordially, took a hasty survey of our exhibits, and then cried out with boyish enthusiasm, 'These things are beautiful, mem; did you make them?' 'Oh, no,' I responded, 'we taught the children, and they made them.' 'Have you many scholars?' was the next question. 'About thirty-one,' I answered. Turning again to the cases he exclaimed, emphatically, 'They are beautiful things, and I am coming back to look at them carefully—am in haste now.' And off he went to the other departments. Since then we see by the paper published in Bangkok, that his Majesty has paid the girls' school of Bangkok the high compliment of declaring himself the purchaser of the collection, and has attached his name to the cases."
"The king of this country," says a discriminating writer in the Saturday Review, "is no doubt one of the monarchs whom it is the fashion to call 'enlightened.' But he understands the word in a very different sense from that which is often applied to it in London. He does not interpret it to mean a sovereign who throws about valuable lands and privileges to be scrambled for by all the needy adventurers and greedy speculators who are on the watch for such pickings. No; King Chulalonkorn and his ministers, many of whom are highly accomplished men, are sincerely anxious for the speedy development of the great resources over which they have command. They have shown, by the most practical proofs, that they have this desire and are able to carry it out. An extensive network of telegraphs has rapidly been established throughout their wide territory. Schools, hospitals, and other public buildings have been erected and are increasing every day. In 1888 a tramway company, mainly supported by Siamese capital, began running cars in the metropolis. A river flotilla company, wholly Siamese, carries the passenger traffic of the fine stream on which Bangkok is built; and in 1889 important gold-mining operations were begun by a company formed in London, in which the great majority of subscribers are Siamese nobles and other inhabitants of that country. Lastly, a well-known Englishman, formerly Governor of the Straits Settlements, obtained some years ago a contract for surveying a trunk line of railway in Siam, for which he was paid some £50,000 by the Siamese government.
"With these evidences staring us in the face, it would be very absurd to speak of the country or its ruler as hanging back in the path of progress. One must, moreover, remember that, besides these signs of advancement, a free field has been and is opened to the wide employment of foreign capital in ordinary matters of trade. Rice-mills, saw-mills, and docks are doing a very large business, with very large profits to their owners, who consist of English, French, German, and Chinese capitalists.... A policy of reaction or inaction is the very reverse of that which Siam now professes; and the ruling powers in that country are as anxious as any foreigner to improve it in a wise, liberal, and even generous spirit. We have thus, on the one hand, a king and ministers sincerely desirous of promoting European enterprise, and, on the other hand, a European public hardly less ready to embark capital therein."
Unfortunately for Siam, there lies in the way of her advancement the same stumbling-block of extra-territoriality which has impeded the honest aspirations of other Asiatic states. The term implies those civil and judicial rights enjoyed by foreigners living in the East, who, under treaties for the most part extorted when the conditions were entirely different, exercise the privilege of governing and judging themselves independently of native officers and tribunals. In such eager and enlightened countries as Japan and Siam, this limitation to the autonomy of the sovereign is peculiarly humiliating as well as intensely unsuitable to existing conditions. The simplest measures of police ordinance and local government, even if it be a new liquor traffic law, or an opium farm regulation, cannot be carried into effect without the separate consent of every European power, whether great or small, which has a consul in the place. Add to this the too common contingency of unjust or inefficient consuls, wholly unqualified for their offices, and their frequent inability to properly control the adventurers or aliens nominally residing under their flag, and the drawbacks to further improvement in Siam, as in other parts of Asia, may be dimly understood. With the revision of the antiquated treaties now in force commercial relations between Siam and the countries of Christendom would soon be established on a fair footing, to the mutual advantage of all parties interested.