I call,—but she does not stoop to my cry;
I wait,—but she lingers, and ah! so long!
It was not so in the years gone by,
When she touched my lips with chrism of song.
I swear I will get me a garret again,
And let the wee wife see the sunset's fires,
And lure the Goddess, by vigil and pain,
Up with the sparrows among the spires!
For a man should live in a garret aloof,
And have few friends, and be poorly clad,
With an old hat stopping the chink in the roof,
To keep the Goddess constant and glad!
THE THRONE OF THE GOLDEN FOOT.
Early on the morning of the 13th of September, 1855, a most fantastic and picturesque procession—in which the formal and arrogant simplicities of a nice Western civilization, and the grotesque and insolent ostentations of a crude Oriental barbarism, with all the splendid riddles of its far-fetched type-and-symbolry, were blended in a rich bizarreness—formed in the main street of the western suburb of "the Immortal City" of Amarapoora, and moved toward the palace of "him who reigns over the kingdoms of Thunaparanta, Tampadépa, and all the great umbrella-bearing chiefs of the Eastern countries,"—the Lord of Earth and Water, King of the Rising Sun, Lord of the Sacred White Elephant and of all white elephants, Master of the Celestial Weapon, and Great Chief of Life and Righteousness,—called, "for short," Mendoon-men, King of Ava. An imposing deputation of Woons and other grandees, with their respective "tails," were escorting the newly arrived Envoy of the Governor-General of India, and his suite, from their Residency on the south shore of the lake Toung-ah-mah-Eing below the city, to the Hall of the Throne of the Golden Foot, there to have audience of that great, glorious, and most excellent Majesty, whose dominions are bounded only by the imagination—and here and there a British customhouse; and whose excursions of dreadful power are stayed only by the forbearing fiat of Boodh—and now and then some British bayonets.
The escort was illustrious: there were the old Nan-ma-dau-Phra Woon, or Lord-Governor of the Queen's Palace; the Woondouk Mhoung Mhon, a minister of the second order in the High Court and Council; and the Tara-Thoogyi, or Chief Judge of Amarapoora; besides other magnificos of less note, but all very fine in their heavy, wide-sleeved court robes of crimson velvet, laced with a broad edging of Benares brocade. On their heads they wore high mitres, also of crimson velvet, curving backward in a volute, and encircled at the base with a coronet of tinsel spear-heads. It is the ton at court to wear these mitres excessively tight, and to carry a little ivory blade, modelled like a shoe-horn, with which the cap of honor is drawn on, and all "vagrom" locks of hair "comprehended." The tsalwé (a Burman badge of nobility, derived from the Brahminical triple cord, and having three, six, nine, or even twelve threads, according to the distinction conferred on the wearer), and a trumpet-shaped ear-tube of gold, complete the official costume.
The royal presents from England, guarded by the British-Indian cavalry escort, had been sent forward over a long bridge which spanned the southern end of the Toung-ah-mah, to await on the other side the arrival of the Envoy. There was a superb carriage for the King, which, being too wide to pass the bridge, was towed across the lake on a raft.
That was a brilliant scene, the passage of the lake; and the picturesque elements almost surpassed the fantastic;—the jolly-boats of the steamers, leading the way with the men of her Majesty's 84th, followed by the Zenobia's gig, bearing the Governor-General's letter, with the Honorable East India Company's jack saucily flaunting at the bow; then other gigs and cutters, with the Envoy's suite; and, lastly, a gorgeously gilded war-boat, carrying the Envoy and the Woons, with fifty Burman oarsmen rowing to a wild chant. The white spire and pinnacles of the Ananda temple, with its grove of noble cotton-trees and tall palms, sharply defined against the boldly diversified ranges of the Shan Mountains, formed the background of the picture, which derived rich color and grotesque action from the Burmese soldiers of the Envoy's guard lining the banks, and the hurly-burly of half-naked, splashing villagers, waist-deep in the lake,—salvages coupés.
First in the procession went the cases of royal presents, borne by Burmese porters on bamboo litters, and followed by four Arab horses and an English carriage for the King; next came the cavalry and infantry of the Envoy's Anglo-Indian escort, preceded by a band; behind these, the Secretary of the mission on an elephant, with the Governor-General's letter under the Company's jack; the Envoy (Major Phayre) in a tonjon, attended by the Nan-ma-dau Woon and the Woondouk on elephants; the British superintending surgeon in Pegu, and the Tara-Thoogyi; a British special deputy commissioner for the frontier, and one of the Tsa-re-dau-gyis, or Royal Scribes; and all the rest of the British officials, each paired with a Burmese thoo-gyi or "great man," in a Burmese howdah.[3]