Democratic Sentinel, Volume 17, Number 33, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 1 September 1893 — SIAM AND ITS PEOPLE. [ARTICLE]

SIAM AND ITS PEOPLE.

Public interest in Siam ami curiosity as to the resources, degree of civilization, habits and customs of the Siamese have been quickened by the Franoo-Chiuese imbroglio, and accoidingty the following article will be found interesting aud instructive: The Siamese trace their dement from the first disciples of Buddha. Their descendants having established themselves in a province of what is now North Laos, were so annoyed by their enemies that they deserted their country and founded a city in Western Siam. The conquered Southern Siam, then held by the Cambodians, and changed thiir seat of government to Aguthia, a short distance north of the present capital. The Laotians, the Cambodians, the Peguans from the West, Chinese oaptivesaud Hindus were all brought together in the capital city; and this period (1350; marks the commencement of Siam’s authentic history. Along In the seventeenth century foreign ideas commenced to be kindly received in Siam, and a European merchant who had become a great favorite with the people and the king on account of his practical ability and the interest he took in their welfare, was appointed governor of all the northern provinces. He suggested to the king the propriety of erecting a fort, on European principles, to protect hi- capital. The king accordingly selected a plat of garden ground on the west bank, near the mouth of a canal, and constructed a fort. This garden ground became a portion of the site of the unique city of Bangkok, aud the fort still stands near the royal residence. Aguthia was destroyed by the Burmese when they conquered Siam in the latter part of the eighteenth century. The fort had been erected for a century, and the city of Bangkok had so far advanced in magnificence that a few years after the destruction of the old capital it was occupied by the royal family. The first ki g to hold his court in Bangkok was of Chinese origin, he having deliv ered his country from the Burmese. There is probably no country in Ihe world where Buddhism has so absolute a sway as in Siam. Even more profusely thau in Burraah is the wealth of the kingdom lavished upon temples and priests. It is stated that in the capital alone there are 20,000 priests supported by voluntary contributions. THE SIAMESE CAPITAL.

Bangkok, the capital, is in many respects a singular city. Its population is estimated all the wav from 500,000 to 1,000,000. and is curiously mixed and cosmopolitan. Siamese and Chinese predominate in its streets, though the Malays are also very numerous, and frequent Europeans demonstrate the presence of Western civilization and interests. They are, in fact, the leaven of Siam, and to their influence and the spread of Western ideas are due the various improvements noticeable in the great city from which political power proceeds to the utmost boundaries of Siam. The army is officered by Europeans, chiefly English and Danes; the navy is commanded by Europeans, and of the many business enterprises in Siam, most of those which connect it with the outside world are superintended by Europeans. There is little love lost, however, be tween the native and foreign elements of society, and the intense hatred felt for all foreigners by the large Chinese population may at any moment prove disas trous to all foreign interests. English, French, German, Russian are all alike to the low class Chinamen, who cannot distinguish between their languages, and all are hated alike. There is every reason to believe, therefore, that the presence of a hostile fleet in the river may at any time excite the passions of the populace to an uncontrollable degree, and mob violence in the East has a meaning which is unknown in Western lands. Bangkok is the Eastern Venice. Formerly all its houses were built on the land, but the prevalence of cholera many years ago so alarmed the government that it ordered the houses on the banks to be abandoned and directed the people to live on the river itself. Thousands upon thousands of bouses were consequently built on rafts and moored to the banks of the river, and although the policy of river houses has been to some extent modified by the government, no inconsiderable part of the capital is still on the waters of the Menam; The houses are- of slight materials, constructed on bamboo rafts, each attended by a canoe, for to the rivjr resident of Bangkok a skiff ia as indispensable as a street car to the suburban resident in an American city. Formerly the right to build on the banks was reserved to the king, nobility, clergy and privileged characters. This right has been greatly extended, and now Bangkok has spread its limits on both sides of the Menam. The most striking features of the city are the palaces and the temples. The former are located in a citadel securely fortified against sudden attack or prolonged siege and comprise the palaces of the two kings aDd a variety of temples and other structures pertaining to the court. As the first king has about 5,003 women attached to the court in one capacity or another, the palaces are, as may beAonjectured, very roomy. GUARDS OF TIIE HAREM. Prominent emong the attendants are the Amazon guards of the harems They are women trained to the use of arms and employed to guard the king's wives, and whenever a lady of the harem appears in public, she is attended bv a retinue of these female soldiers, who answer with their lives for her seclusion. Several very magnificent temples are within the limits of the palace walls, the most remarkable beiag that of the “Sleep io" Idol ” and that of the ‘ * Emer aid Idol.” The Sleeping Idol is a statue 153 feet long, overlaid from head to fool with plate gold, in many places covered with inscriptions and representations of the transmigrations of Buddha. Not fur awsy is tbs palsce of the White Elc

his court* his attendants, his throngs of servants, and is treated like a prince. The White Elephant is an albino, not completely* white, but here and there having spots of cream color over his otherwise dusky hide. The Emerald Idol’s temple is a wonderful structure of the utmost magnificence, the doors and much of the wall being plated with gold. The idol itself is said to be a solid emerald twelve inches high by eight wide, the liair and dress of the rude figure being made of gold studded with precious gems. Siam is one of the least known df the great countries of Asia. It lies at the lower part of the peninsula of iarther India, and it is out up by the gulf of Siam. The mighty river Menam runs through it from north to south aud the whole country is a network of canals. In the winter a large part of it is covered with water and the people go from house to house aud from place to place in boats.

Siam is about four times as big as the State of New York; it contains about 10,030,000 people, and the country and the people, body and soul, belong to the king. The king has the right to every man’s labor, and any woman whom he calls upon must enter his harem. He has the most arbitrary power of any king of the East, and he is one of the rich inonarchs of the world. TIIE ROYAL PALACE. His palace in Bangkok is a magnificent structure, with golden elephants guarding its entrances. It has twentyfive acres of ground about it, and it is said that 5,000 people live within the palace walls. The king is said to have 300 wives, but the queen, who is the chief of these, is his majesty’s half sister. She is a very bright woman and has made herself noted for her charity. Sho rrilcs the harem and smokes cigarettes. Siam is the home of Buddhism. There are 25,003 Buddhist priests in the Siamese capital, aud these are of all ages, from 10 to 80. They go about with shaved heads aud yellow stripes of cloth wound about their half-naked bodies, and they chew the betel and smoke cigarettes as they go begging from house to house.

Chululong Korn, the king, is one of the brightest of Asiatic rulers and lias done much to advance civilization in Siam. He hns put telegraph lines throughout a great part of his kingdom. There is now a street car line in Bunkkok and the city has electric lights. It used to be that the money used in Siam was cowrie shells, or silver and gold buttons. The king hasadopttd a coinage, making money much the same as that of ours, lie has a mint of his own, and he imports Mexican dollars and recasts these into coins for the use of his people. The unit of value in Siam is the tecal, and the chief silvei coin is about the size of a half dollar. He has a post office department, and Siam belongs to the international postal union. The king talks English, and he is thinking of building a railroad which will open up the interior of his rich kingdom. Siam is full of valuable resources. It has mighty forests of teakwood aud its mines contain the finest of gold and silver. The king has an income of about $10,000,000 a year, aud lie is said to have about $50,000,000 stored away in his coffers. He has his own secretary of the treasury, hut he signs all the checks himself, and is said to he a very fine business man. He has his cabinet, just as our president has, and he lias his war department, state department, interior department and agricultural department. His country is divided up into fortyone provinces, presided over by governors, and he runs things to suit himself, making such appointments as he chooses. TIIE BURDEN OF TAXES. The people of Siam are taxed for all they are worth. Everything ifuder the sun has to pay a percentage to the government. A great part of the revenue of the king comes from the gambling establishments. The people are a nation of gamblers and the gambling taxes bring in $500,000 a year. The taxes are all farmed out, as are also the people, who as slaves of the king are ordered to work for him a part of every year. It is only the Chinese who are not subject to such service, and they are released from it by the payment of a poll tax. There are many Chinese in Siam, aud it is said that they are fast swallowing up the country. The king of Siam is very anxious to strengthen the relations with foreign powers. He realizes the danger which constantly menaces his country from its geographical position. It is the meat of the sandwich of farther India. One slice of this sandwich belongs to France, and includes Cochin China. The other slice belongs to Great Britain, and it takes up the provinces of Bnrmah. Siam lies in the centre, and it is richer than either.

Both France and England are land hungry, and they look with greedy eyes upon Siam. It is one of the richest plums which still hang on the tree of barbarism in the far East. The army is nothing to speak of. Every man has to serve the state for three months in the year, but there is no armed militia. In case of a war with England or France Siam could not do much, and its chief safety lies in the fact that neither of these great countries wants the other to have it. Probably eventually it wifi he divided between them. The king of Siam is still a young man. He will be 40 years old September2l. He is not over five feet high, hut is very straight and well formed. In his court dress he wears a vast fortune of jewels. His head is crowned with a golden pyramid of jewels. He puts on upon state occasions a coat., vest and brocaded surong, which are loaded down with jewels, and he often wears upon state occasions precious stones which are worth *1.000,000. The Siamese dt> not wear trousers. The surong, which they tic about the waist and tuck in at the hack, takes their place. The king wears silk stockings, shoes which are pointed like those of the Turk, and his costume is a beautiful one. He is not a bad looking man; his face is olive brown, his eyes are black, his forehead is high and his eyes are slightly almond in shape. He has a little mustache and thickest of stiff, black hair. He is very fond of his wife —that Is, half-sister wife—and he makes a great deal of the crown prince. NATURE OF TUB GOVERNMENT. The government of Siam is in some respects much like thut of other countries having a limited monarchy, while in one particular it is curiously different. There are two kings, afirst and a second, each of whom has a state establishment, but only one is honored as a sovereign, the other acting as a sort of prime minister. The whole country is divided into distriots, the government of each being administered by a local official who is Siamese or Luosian, or Malay, according to tbs prominence of the people in these nationalities in the popu iation. The reigning king is Chulalong Kom L, known nlso » Somdetch Pbra Pnrnainde Mahn, whe ascended u»

throes in 1863, and who governs by means of a council of six princes and from ten to twenty members, appointed by himself. Nominally a limited monarchy, there are so many ways of setting aside the established laws of the kingdom that although the Siamese call themselves the Thai, “the free,’’ and their kingdom the Muung Thai, “the free kingdom,” they are practically under the same kind of government as most other Asiatics. The king of Siam is, comparatively speaking, a rich monarch, having an annual revenue somewhat exceeding £2,000,000, of which sum £287,000 comes from the land taxes, £65,000 from the taxes on fruit trees, £IOO,000 from the spirit tax, £120,000 from the opium tax, £IOO,OOO from the gambling tax, £143,000 from the customs duties, £90,000 from the tin tax, £27,000 from the tax on edible birds’ nests, and about the same amount from the fisheries tax. As all the taxes are, however, farmed out, and Siamese tax farmers are no more honest than the people of the same business in other parts of’ the world, his majesty of Siam loses no small sum annually from the peculations and embezzlements of his agents, and it is even asserted that scarcely more than half the amount due reaches the royal coffers. He probably makes up the difference in the personal service exacted from all Siamese natives, every Siamese inhabitant of the kingdom being required, if called upon, to give at least tlitee mouths’ labor in the year to his sovereign. The result may he beneficial, so far as the king is concerned, but ns he frequently calls for this service at a time when the crops should he planted, cultivated or gathered, the result is far from beneficial to either the agriculture or the general prosperity of the kingdom. All the inhabitants are required to render military service, exceptions, however being mude in favor of the priests, of the Chinese, who are taxed instead; of slaves, of government officials and of those who are willing and nble to purchase exemption by hiring a substitute. The whole kingdom is practically, therefore, at the king’s command both in time of peace and of war, and although it is, in some respects, one of the richest countries on the globe, its natural advantages lie unimproved, and a territory almost the size of Texas has thus an annual export of only about $12,050,000 a year, consisting mostly of rice, teak, pepper and other tropical products.

AREA OF THE EMPIRE. The limits of Siam on the north and east have always been rather indefinite, for to the north, adjoining British Burmah, there lay a number of semi-iude-pendeut States, which sometimes owned allegiance to Siam aud sometimes to Burmah, as the influence of one or the other preponderated. The same difficulty existed in the East, where the An unites sometimes paid tribute to China and sometimes to Siam. Siam itself has in times past been a dependency of the Chinese empire, and even now a sort of allegiance is acknowledged and a tribute paid. So far as the Siamese territory can be estimated, its utmost limits at the time of its greatest extent were about 1,200 miles from north to south and 700 miles in width, or very nearly one-third the size of the United States. That, however, was before ttio English conquests in Bnrmah, which considerably reduced the nominal size of the empire. Its present area is estimated at 250,00) square miles, while it has a population of 2,000,000 Siamese, 2,000,000 Luosians, and 1,000,000 eaoh of Chinese or Malays. The Siamese have been given a bad reputation by travelers as beiug turbulent, quarrelsome and destitute of good qualities, but apparently do not deserve it, for the best authorities describe them as a peaceable, polite and kindly people. They are not particularly goodlooking, having a Mongolian aspect, with large heads, broad faces, wide mouths, short noses, low foreheads, and the teeth, ill accordance with the prevailing fashion, stained a repulsive black. Like most nations having little beard, they regard this feature as a blemish, and early in life carefully extract all the hairs from their faces. Except a small tuft on the top of the head, the cranium is shorn, while the clothiug, as is common in Eastern and torrid countries, is of au exceedingly airy aud primitive character.

The fertility of the cultivated laud iu the Menang valley is described by travelers as something wonderful. Most of the river valley is what is called in this country bottom land, which is annually overflowed and fertilized by the river, and is described as yielding as bountifully as the valley of the Nile. The wealth of the forests is wonderful, but on account of the climate large tracts have never yet been explored, and what may lie beyond is unknown. In the tropical jungles of Northern and Central Siam, however, grow the gutta-percha and lac, dozens of odoriferous woods and hundreds of medicinal herbs. The bamboo is found everywhere, and it and the rattan form a large portion of the houses of the population; teak, rosewood, ebony and other valuable timber trees are found iu profusion, and must in time become sources of great wealth to the power falling heir to the kingdom. That power will also fall heir to a good deal of trouble with the population, which is of so mixed and heterogeneous a character that the elements of serious difficulty are always present.