There is also a Second King, which is merely a nominal title without any of the responsibility of the government. He is surrounded by his court, and has nearly all the honors of the First King shown him, but has nothing to do with government except amongst his own personal adherents. Even at the death of the First King he does not assume, even temporally, any authority. He may be chosen First King. A few instances are on record in which this has been the case. The son of the late Second King now occupies the second throne, under the title of Krom Pra Raja Bowawn Sahthan Mongkoon. This prince is better known to Europeans by the name of George Washington, a name given him when a boy, either by his father, or by some of the American missionaries who taught him English. His father is said to have manifested a great love for the memory of Washington. The Second King is now about thirty-five years old, has a pretty good knowledge of English, some knowledge of the sciences, western civilization and governments, is polite and gentlemanly in his manners, and apparently very friendly to Europeans. He is also well liked by all Europeans. The commander of one of our United States war vessels, after an audience with the Second King, remarked to me on retiring from the palace, "That is the man who should have been First King." The title of Second King appears to have been originally established to satisfy the disappointed one of two rival princes.
The Siamese have an excellent code of civil and criminal laws, if they were properly enforced, but, unfortunately, the Judiciary are so corrupt that justice is seldom meted out, the one paying the largest bribe generally gets the case. The Lord Mayor's and Sub-Mayor's Courts are the chief criminal courts in the city. There are also within the palace walls several other courts, chiefly for civil cases, and presided over by the chief Ministers of State. There is also an International Court, established by the late King, for the investigation of those cases in which both Siamese and the subjects of treaty powers are involved. Besides these, every prince of rank is vested with judicial powers, and can hold court at his own palace. The courts in the provinces are presided over by the provincial governors, but those governors have not the power of life and death unless delegated to them, in a special emergency, by the King. The judge of any court is vested with full powers to investigate and decide any case, subject, however, to an appeal to the King. There is, however, seldom such an appeal, as, in other instances of oppression, the unchained lions in the way are numerous. There are associate or assistant judges, but they are simply for the investigation of minor cases. The judge places his mat down on the floor in one end of the court-room, upon which he places a three-cornered pillow, and then places himself in a reclining position. The litigants are crouching around him, presenting their cases, and the whole thing frequently turns into a general conversation and brow-beating. There is nothing like a jury. The witnesses are taken out to a Budhist temple, where the following ironclad oath is administered to them. "I, who have been brought here as a witness in this matter, do now, in the presence of the sacred image of Budha, declare that I am wholly unprejudiced against either party, and uninfluenced in any way by the opinions or advice of others; that no prospects of pecuniary advantage or advancement to office have been held out to me. I also declare that I have not received any bribe on this occasion. If what I have now to say be false, or if in my further averments I shall color or pervert the truth so as to lead the judgment of others astray, may the Three Holy Existences before whom I now stand, together with the glorious Tewadas of the twenty-two firmaments, punish me. If I have not seen, and yet shall say I have seen; if I shall say I know that which I do not know, then may I be thus punished. Should innumerable descents of Deity happen for the regeneration and salvation of mankind, may my erring and migratory soul be found beyond the pale of their mercy. Wherever I go may I be compassed with dangers, and not escape from them, whether murderers, robbers, spirits of the earth, woods, or water, or air, or all the divinities who adore Budha; or from the gods of the four elements, and all other spirits. May blood flow out of every pore of my skin, that my crime may be made manifest to the world. May all or any of these evils overtake me within three days, or may I never stir from the spot on which I now stand; or may the lightning cut me in two, so that I may be exposed to the derision of the people; or if I should be walking abroad, may I be torn in pieces by either of the supernaturally endowed lions, or destroyed by poisonous serpents. If on the water of the river or ocean, may supernatural crocodiles or great fish devour me; or may the winds and waves overwhelm me, or may the dread of such evils keep me a prisoner during life at home, estranged from every pleasure. May I be afflicted with intolerable oppression of my superiors, or may a plague cause my death; after which may I be precipitated into hell, there to go through innumerable stages of torture, amongst which may I be condemned to carry water over the flaming regions in wicker baskets, to assuage the heat of Than Tretonwan, when he enters the infernal hell of justice, and thereafter may I fall into the lowest pit of hell; or if these miseries should not ensue, may I after death migrate into the body of a slave, and suffer all the pain and hardship attending the worst state of such a being, during the period measured by the sand of the sea; or may I animate the body of an animal or beast during five hundred generations, or be born a hermaphrodite five hundred times, or endure in the body of a deaf, dumb, blind, and houseless beggar every species of disease, during the same number of generations; and then may I be buried to narok, and there be crucified by Phya Yam."
They have also a way of extorting confessions from criminals, which is terribly severe. The first way is by the use of the lash or ratan. He first receives ninety stripes, and then, if he don't confess, he is allowed a respite of a few days and receives ninety more; and if he stills holds out, he is allowed another respite, and receives ninety the third time. Any one who can endure three times ninety without confessing is presumed to be innocent. They have also other modes, by putting split bamboos on their fingers, something like the thumb screw of old. Persons often confess when they are innocent, from fear of the torture.
They punish with death murder, highway-robbery, and treason. Their mode of execution is decapitation. The criminals are brought out in chains, and a clamp consisting of two bamboo poles is placed on the neck. He is then made to sit down on the ground, the one end of the clamp resting on the ground. They then most generally drug the criminal, so as to produce stupor, amounting oftentimes to unconsciousness, and also stop up their ears with soft mud. At a signal the executioner runs out with a sword and cuts off the head. He generally does it very neatly with one stroke, but I have known one or two instances in which the executioner, to give him nerve, took quite too much liquor, and made wonderful hacking of it.
Corporal punishment with the ratan is very common—so common that there is little or no stigma attached to it. I have known high officers to be severely thrashed. On public occasions I have seen those in charge of certain things, who displeased the King, taken out and thrashed. They were made to lie down on their face on the pavement, and a man stood over with a ratan and put it down in no light manner, the victim crying, "Ooey! ooey!" at every stroke. So you perceive that it may in some respects be called a ratan government.
The revenue of the country is derived from various sources. Certain things are sold out by the government to the highest bidder, who, when he receives it, has full control of the whole matter. He sub-lets again to other minor parties and retailers, and has full powers to punish all those who violate the right which he has so dearly purchased. These are called farms. The most lucrative is the opium farm. There is also the spirit farm, that is liquor distilled from rice; the gambling farm; the rice farm; the cocoanut-oil farm, and some others. There is also a tax on fisheries, on trading-boats, on fruit orchards, on shops and stores; an export duty on rice, and an import duty of three per cent, on all goods imported. There is also a triennial poll tax of about two dollars on every Chinaman in the kingdom, which amounts to a large sum every three years.
CHAPTER III.
RELIGION.
The religion of Siam is Budhism. It would however be impossible on an occasion of this kind to give any extended outline of Budhism, and besides this the principal works on that subject in the English language are dry and uninteresting to the general reader or listener. Any translations from the Budhist classics must also be necessarily stiff, and many of the names unintelligible, unless accompanied with explanations; I shall only, therefore, give as brief an outline as I can of the Budhist faith, and describe, as nearly as possible, the manner in which it is practised in Siam.
Budhism arose from a man of royal blood called Gautama, but by the Siamese, Somanakodome. His father ruled a small kingdom in the province of Oude, near the Himelaya mountains. Gautama died probably about 534 B.C., and is supposed to have been nearly cotemporary with the prophet Daniel. Becoming disgusted with the luxuries and pleasures of courtly life he adopted that of a hermit, and like all hermits became an enthusiast, and fancied that he had found the only true road to all good, and thus leaped from the circle of eternal transmigration into a "sublimation of existence that has no attribute and knows no change."