The English Governess at the Siamese Court | Page 7

Highness Prince
Krom Lhuang Wongse; and I hope to have an opportunity to introduce
you to the Prince, who I believe is to be present with his family."
The intelligence was not gratifying, a Siamese prince had too lately
disturbed my moral equilibrium; but I held my peace and awaited the
result with resignation. A few strokes of the oars, seconded by the swift
though silent current, brought us to a wooden pier surmounted by two
glaring lanterns. Captain B---- handed us out. My child, startled from a
deep sleep, was refractory, and would not trust himself out of my fond
keeping. When finally I had struggled with him in my arms to the
landing, I saw in the shadow a form coiled on a piece of striped matting.
Was it a bear? No, a prince! For the clumsy mass of reddish- brown
flesh unrolled and uplifted itself, and held out a human arm, with a fat
hand at the end of it, when Captain B---- presented me to "his Royal
Highness." Near by was his Excellency the Prime Minister, in the
identical costume that had disgraced our unpleasant interview on the
Chow Phya; he was smoking a European pipe, and plainly enjoying our
terrors. My stalwart friend contrived to squeeze us, and even himself,
first through a bamboo door, and then through a crowd of hot people, to
seats fronting a sort of altar, consecrated to the arts of jugglery. A
number of Chinamen of respectable appearance occupied the more
distant places, while those immediately behind us were filled by the
ladies and gentlemen of the foreign community. On a raised dais hung
with kincob [Footnote: Silk, embroidered with, gold flowers.] curtains,
the ladies of the Prince's harem reclined; while their children, shining in
silk and ornaments of gold, laughed, prattled, and gesticulated, until the
juggler appeared, when they were stunned with sudden wonder. Under
the eaves on all sides human heads were packed, on every head its
cherished tuft of hair, like a stiff black brush inverted, in every mouth
its delicious cud of areca-nut and betel, which the human cattle
ruminated with industrious content. The juggler, a keen little
Frenchman, plied his arts nimbly, and what with his ventriloquial doll,
his empty bag full of eggs, his stones that were candies, and his candies
that were stones, and his stuffed birds that sang, astonished and

delighted his unsophisticated patrons, whose applauding murmurs were
diversified by familiarly silly shrieks--the true Siamese
Did-you-ever!--from behind the kincob curtains.
But I was weary and disheartened, and welcomed with a sigh of relief
the closing of the show. As we passed out with our guide, the glare of
many torches falling on the dark silent river made the swarthy forms of
the boatmen weird and Charon-like. Mrs. B---- welcomed us with a
pleasant smile to her little heaven of home across the river, and by the
simplicity and gentleness of her manners dispelled in a measure my
feeling of forlornness. When at last I found myself alone, I would have
sought the sleep I so much needed, but the strange scenes of the day
chased each other in agitating confusion through my brain. Then I
quitted the side of my sleeping boy, triumphant in his dreamless
innocence, and sat defeated by the window, to crave counsel and help
from the ever-present Friend; and as I waited I sank into a tumultuous
slumber, from which at last I started to find the long-tarrying dawn
climbing over a low wall and creeping through a half-open shutter.

II. A SIAMESE PREMIER AT HOME.
I started up, arranged my dress, and smoothed my hair; though no water
nor any after-touches could remove the shadow that night of gloom and
loneliness had left upon my face. But my boy awoke with eager,
questioning eyes, his smile bright and his hair lustrous. As we knelt
together by the window at the feet of "Our Father," I could not but ask
in the darkness of my trouble, did it need so bitter a baptism as ours to
purify so young a soul?
In an outer room we met Mrs. B---- _en déshabillé_, and scarcely so
pretty as at our first meeting, but for her smile, remarkable for its
subtile, evanescent sweetness. At breakfast our host joined us, and,
after laughing at our late predicament and fright, assured me of that
which I have since experienced,--the genuine goodness of the Prince
Krom Lhuang Wongse. Every foreign resident of Bangkok, who at any
time has had friendly acquaintance or business with him, would, I
doubt not, join me in expressions of admiration and regard for one who
has maintained through circumstances so trying and under a system so
oppressive an exemplary reputation for liberality, integrity, justice, and
humanity.

Soon after breakfast the