The Mekon is a large and beautiful stream, full of rocks, which form frightful rapids in the rainy season. I shall descend it at the season when the waters are high, and when the navigation though dangerous is easy and rapid. I can then reach Cambodia in a month if I like, but I am undecided whether or not I shall go eastward towards the 15th degree of latitude.
It seems to me, my dear brother, that my happiness would be complete if I could have good news of you all; but, alas! more than a year must elapse before I shall hear. The last letters I received were in January; yet I am resigned, since I willingly embraced this career, which has been the dream of my whole life, for you remember how in our young days, when we still had the happiness of a tender mother to guide us, and impress on us, by her example, virtuous principles, religion, and the love of mankind, we delighted to roam the woods of our dear native place, to draw from nature, and how I stuffed the birds that we took in snares or nets.
That time is long passed, my friend, but I trust in God, who will I hope watch over you. I think of you every day in my solitude, and in the long nights when we bivouac beside the fires lighted to keep off the wild beasts, a scene of which I will send you a drawing before long.
What are your dear children doing—I picture to myself all the happiness they give you and your dear Jenny; she is well I hope. Ah! my friend, protect them all with a tender affection, and endeavour by your love, your care, and your example, to render them all happy and good.
There is one subject on which I can hardly write, that of our dear old father; it would make me too sad to think he was not happy; console him for my absence, write to him often, repeat to him how much I love him, that he is always associated in my thoughts with the memory of our good and worthy mother. But I have no need to recommend all this to you: have you not ever been good to him, a worthy son? therefore I am without anxiety on this point.
I do not speak to you of any of my physical sufferings, for I hold mental ones to be the only ones worth thinking of; but you may imagine that one cannot make a four months’ journey on elephants, who toss and shake one like a stormy sea, without fatigue, and that the heat, the long bad nights generally passed at the foot of some tree, and the wretched food, are all painful. But what matters all this? I am used to it, and my patience is inexhaustible. In truth, this life is happiness to me; how joyful I am when I find a new insect, or see a monkey fall from a tree! I do not therefore complain. The nights here are pleasant, and the mosquitoes not numerous.
The men of this nation are dull and apathetic and full of small vices. The women are generally better, and some of them are even pretty in spite of their yellow skins, but they have little idea of modesty. The men and women all bathe together without any clothing. But for the people, Louang Prabang would be one of the most charming places in the world: the lake of Geneva does not present scenes more beautiful than many here by the river.
After waiting for ten days I have at length been presented to the king with great pomp. The reception room was a shed such as they build in our villages on fête-days, but larger and hung with every possible colour. His Majesty was enthroned at one end of the hall, lazily reclining on a divan, having on his right hand four guards squatting down, and each holding a sabre: behind were the princes all prostrated, and farther off the senators, with their backs to the public and their faces in the dust; then in front of his Majesty was your poor brother, dressed all in white, and seated on a carpet, with teacups, basins, and spittoons in silver placed by his side, contemplating this grotesque scene, and having some trouble to preserve his gravity as he smoked his pipe. This visit cost me a gun for the king and various small presents for the princes, for one cannot travel here without being well furnished with presents for the kings, princes, and mandarins. Luckily it is not here as in Siam; the natives are willing to help me, and for a few inches of brass wire I get a beautiful longicorn or some other insect, and these are brought to me on all sides: thus I have succeeded in largely increasing my collection, but five pieces of red cloth have disappeared already.
The day after my first audience I had another from the second king, who wished also for a present. I sought among my stock, which anywhere else would cause me to be taken for a dealer in old stores, and found a magnifying glass and a pair of old-fashioned spectacles with round glasses, which make him look like a gorilla without hair, a little cake of soap (he had great need of it), a bottle of eau-de-cologne, and a bottle of brandy. This last was opened on the spot and duly appreciated. You see all this is expensive, but I am obliged to pay these good people, and the king has been kind to me, and is going to carry my letters for me. It is lucky that he does not understand French; for if at Bangkok the same system of postal curiosity was carried on as was established in Europe by the great king who betrayed La Vallière, I should be hung from the highest tree they could find, without even a warning. I afterwards distributed among the princes some engravings which I had bought at Bangkok—fine Cossack cavalry, lance in rest; some Napoleons (the First), for which I gave a penny; and some battles of Magenta, portraits of Victor Emmanuel and of Garibaldi, very white, blue, and red, and some Zouaves; also some brass-headed nails and some brandy; and it was quite pleasing to see how delighted they were, regretting only that I should go away before I had given them my whole stock.