Democratic Sentinel, Volume 18, Number 40, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 19 October 1894 — WHEN WILL HE DIE? [ARTICLE+ILLUSTRATION]

WHEN WILL HE DIE?

Great Anxiety for the Health of the • of Sia m. Tho absorbing subject of conversation in Bangkok is the condition of the Siamese monarch. When will he die?

What will happen afterward? (questions like these are heard on all sides. Bis death has been repot tid at least ha f a dozen times. Indeed, not a fetv believe he is dead ■and the intimation withheld for state rea-ons from the ge eral public. The foreign representatives even share

the general ignorance on the subject, and J. G. Scott, British charge d'affaires, deemed it alvisable to bring down another gunbeat from Hong Kong in view of the alarming rumors in high circles. The state of the city is thus one of intense e citement. It has been asserted that the King is but suffering from an attack of fever, brought on by residence at Col-ei-Chang an island in the Gulf of Siam. The real cause of ai ment, however, is

indulgence in anasthetics. For years chloral has been the favorite drug of the Siamese mo n a r c h , and now its poi ouous effects "are felt with a severity that' leaves small hope of 1 ecovery. Maha Vajirunhis is the Crown r r in co, eldest FO.l of Chulalongkorn, who will probably succeed hisj

father. In Siam, however, the right of primogeniture is not fully recognized as a fundamental law of the realm, and the Sei abodee. or Council of State, upon tne death of the reigning sovereign, may elect a king. The Crown Prince, whose full name is Somdetch Chowfa Maha Va irunhis, is but 16 years old.

KING OF SIAM.

MAHA VAJIRUNHIS.