Anna and the King of Siam

by Margaret Landon

  Immediately behind him came four young girls of the highest birth, bearing his betel-box, spittoon, fan, and sword, the emblems of his rank. After them were seventy others carrying reverently in both hands the vessels of gold and all the other accoutrements proper to a prince of the blood royal. And behind them were yet more girls holding over their right shoulders golden fans.

  A great troop of children came skipping along, the sons and daughters of the nobility, dressed in the most costly garments their families could afford and hung with heavy gold jewelry. Then the maids of honor, personal attendants, and concubines of the King, less conspicuously dressed than the children, but crowned with gold coronets and also wearing gold chains and rings of great value and beauty. After them came a crowd of Siamese women, painted and rouged, in European costume, troops of children, ladies in Chinese costume, Japanese ladies in rich robes, women of Hindustan, Karens. And last of all were the slaves and dependents of the prince.

  On the fourth of January excitement reached fever pitch, for this was the great day of the actual tonsure. The route to the Maha Prasat was somewhat shortened and the procession started earlier. Near the temple the prince was met by a group of girls who held before him tufts of palm and branches of gold and silver. They escorted him to the inner chamber of the temple, where he was seated on a carpet heavily fringed with gold, placed before an altar on which were lighted tapers and offerings of many kinds. A strip of palmyra leaf was put into his hand, inscribed with the mystic words:

  Even I was, even from the first, and not any other thing: that which existed unperceived, supreme. Afterwards, I am that which is, and He that was, and He who must remain am I. Know that except Me, who am the First Cause, nothing that appears or does not appear in the mind can be trusted; it is the mind’s Maya or delusion,—as Light is to Darkness.

  On the reverse side was inscribed this sentence:

  Keep me still meditating on Thy infinite greatness and my own nothingness, so that all the questions of my life may be answered and my mind abundantly instructed in the path of Nipphan!

  All the princes, nobles, and high officers of government, with the Brahman priests who were to officiate, and a company of Buddhist priests, musicians, trumpeters, and conch-blowers were assembled. As the priests took up their chant a Brahman placed a ball of unspun thread in the hands of the prince. The ends of it were carried around the sacred mountain and then around the temple itself and finally into the inner chamber where it was bound around the head of the young prince. From there nine strands were passed around the altar and into the hands of the officiating priest. These latter threads, forming circles within circles, symbolized the mystic word Om, which may not escape the lips even of the purest, but must be meditated upon in silence.

  The King poured a few drops of lustral water from a conch shell on the prince’s head, the favorable moment was proclaimed by trumpeters, conch-blowers, and other musicians, and the supreme climax of the ceremony had arrived. The royal sire handed to the Brahman priests first the golden shears and then a gilded razor. The long lock that had been growing on the prince’s head since babyhood was clipped, and then his head was shaved.

  The King emerged first from the temple and was carried away in his gold palanquin, borne on the shoulders of eight men. A golden umbrella, eighteen feet in circumference, was carried over him on his way to Mount Kailasa where he would wait for the young prince. There the curious drama so carefully prepared was to take place. The principal parts were assumed by His Majesty, the Kralahome, and the Phra Klang, or Minister of Foreign Affairs. The King was dressed as Phra Isuan, or Siva. The Kralahome impersonated the architect and artificer of the gods, whom the Siamese called Wisawakam, and the Phra Klang was Indra’s charioteer, Matali. The imperial elephant followed in the part of Airavata. It was caparisoned in velvet and gold, and bore the supernatural weapons, the vajra or thunderbolts, and was led by allegorical characters representing winds and showers, lightning and thunder.

  Once the royal party had passed into the enclosure around the mountain a number of hideous monsters riding on gigantic eagles appeared on the east. Their heads reached almost to their knees, and their hands grasped indescribable weapons. They were Yaks, the mythological giants of the Ramayana, and were appointed to guard the Sacred Mountain from all vulgar approach. A little distance from them, around a pair of stuffed peacocks, were a number of young men in the attire of warriors representing the viceroys, governors, and chiefs of the several dependencies of Siam. They cautiously approached the Yaks, performing a ceremonial dance while chanting in chorus, “Come, let us go to the Sacred Mountain!”

  The Yaks, pointing their weapons at the intruders, and dancing and chanting in the same rhythm, replied, “Come, let us slay them all!”

  The drama continued with the Yaks dancing, striking and thrusting until the princes, rajahs, and governors dropped one by one as if wounded or dead. This play stopped when the young prince arrived in his palanquin. Near the foot of the mountain was a cave and in it a pool representing Anotatta Lake on the real Mount Kailasa. To this the young prince was led where he was seated on a rock beside the King. The white elephant, the bull, the horse, and the lion were brought together and from their mouths baptized him with the sacred waters. The King then poured over him the contents of a great conch shell, as did his royal uncles, the prime ministers of the North and South, and finally the chief of the Brahmans.

  The prince was then led to a pavilion where women of rank changed his white bathing garments for others, still white but of the richest silk, and a jeweled crown.

  In the meantime the King retired to the pavilion on the top of the mountain, which represented Siva’s palace. When the little prince was ready the King commanded his two celestial attendants to descend and conduct him to the top of the mountain. They led him up by the western approach to where the King waited to bestow his blessing on his heir. The King presented the prince to the people and they all did him homage by prostrating themselves three times. Then the two of them entered the pagoda and the King solemnly uttered in Pali his royal benediction:

  “Thou who art come out of the pure waters, be thy offenses washed away! Be thou relieved from other births! Bear thou in thy bosom the brightness of that light which shall lead thee, even as it led the sublime Buddha, to Nipphan, at once and forever!”

  The King presented the prince with a jeweled coronet larger than the one he had formerly worn, and other insignia of high station. His Majesty then withdrew, and the prince was led down to his palanquin. Two lines of young men fancifully dressed as guardian spirits, holding purple cords and standing ten feet apart, surrounded the mountain. The prince’s palanquin and a part of the procession that had originally accompanied him moved in stately order between these lines, circumambulating the mountain three times within the enclosure, and without it twice more. Then the whole procession withdrew. With the end of the rites the priests were served with a princely banquet, and the nobility and the common people were also feasted.

  About noon two standards, called baisri, were set up within a circle formed of princes and nobles. These were about eight feet high. The central staff was fixed in a wooden pedestal and supported five circular, deep-rimmed trays, each smaller than the one below. The different stories of the trays were made of plantain leaves decorated with gilt and silvered paper. In them had been placed a little cooked rice, a few cakes, some sweet-scented oil, a handful of fragrant flour, and some young coconuts and plantains. Other edibles of many kinds were brought and arranged about the baisri. A bouquet adorned the top of each standard.

  A golden throne surmounted by a three-tiered umbrella had been erected between the baisri for the prince, and his insignia was arranged on side tables near him. When he was seated a curious ancient rite was performed, a kind of ceremony of blessing, called Wien-thien, or “the rotation of the candles.” Selected nobles and princes moved around the throne, keeping their right shoulders always toward the prince, and as they moved they
passed seven golden candlesticks with the candles lighted from one to the other. As often as they came in front of the prince they performed three circles on a vertical plane with the candles and wafted the smoke toward him with the free hand. Nine times they moved solemnly around the young prince, revolving the candles.

  Then the chief of the Brahman priests stepped forward to offer food to the spirit of the prince, which after a period of wandering during early childhood, was supposed to rest finally in the body of the boy on whom the tonsure had been performed. The priest took a portion of the rice from the baisri and mixed it with coconut water before presenting it to the prince to eat as food for the spirit or khwan. Then he tied around his ankles protective threads. Last of all, dipping his finger first in the scented oil and then in the fragrant flour, he anointed the right foot of the prince by making upon it a unnalom scroll, the sign of Siva, it being forbidden to touch the head of a prince. The prince himself completed his own unction by passing his right forefinger over the sign and then marking his forehead between his eyebrows with the unnalom. The last step in the anointing was the pouring of a few drops of water from the great conch shell on the prince’s head by the King.

  The main ceremonies for which the whole Palace had been preparing for many months were over. Now presents of silver and gold were laid at the feet of the boy. Every prince not of the immediate family, and every noble and high officer in the kingdom, were expected to appear with gifts. It was said that the gifts on this occasion amounted to a million ticals. The King had commanded, however, that careful note be kept of all sums of money presented by officers of the government in order that the full amount might be refunded with the next semi-annual payment of salary.

  On the two succeeding days the ceremonies connected with the baisri and the presentation of gifts were continued. And on the last day of the rites the hair that had been cut from the prince’s head was carried in state procession to the river and ceremoniously cast into the water.

  34

  THE DEATH OF THE SECOND KING

  The following Sunday morning—January 7, 1866—Anna slept late. She was tired after the six days of festivities, although her own responsibilities had been small. About ten o’clock Louis came running in to tell her that the Second King was dead. The news was not unexpected, for the Second King had been ill for months. Early in December he had been rushed to Bangkok from his retreat at Saraburi, and since then the end had been expected at any time. It had been a source of much anxiety—if he died before or during the tonsure ceremony the nation would be plunged into mourning and the festivities would cease. With the consideration that had marked his whole life he had waited to die until the rite was complete.

  Anna lay back on her pillow and thought with compassion, “Well, he has escaped at last!” The prince, whom every European had regarded for thirty years as the most enlightened member of the royal family, had been in effect a prisoner of state for two reigns. In many ways his life had been easier during the first reign, from 1824 to 1851, when his half-brother, the Usurper, Phra Nang Klao, was king. Prince Mongkut had taken refuge in the priesthood, but Prince Chuthamani had decided to go on as before. Watched constantly by spies, but outwardly serene, he had led a busy life. He had learned English from Mr. Robert Hunter, and had used it with a grace and correctness that Mongkut was never to attain. The King had appointed him Superintendent of Artillery and Malayan Infantry, as well as Secretary for English Correspondence, and raised him in rank and title to Krom Khun Isaret Rangsan.

  Early in the reign he had been sent to superintend the construction of important works of defense near the mouth of the Mekong River. In 1842 he had commanded a successful expedition against Cochin-China. Then he was commissioned by the King to reconstruct the ancient fortifications at Paknam after Western models. He had engaged a corps of European engineers and artisans and eagerly seized the opportunity to improve his knowledge of Western science, navigation, naval construction, armament, coast and inland defense, engineering, transportation, telegraphy, the working and casting of iron, and whatever else his quick mind could extract from the men in his employ.

  The Europeans whom he met admired his liberal spirit and his wise comprehension of world events. He was the embodiment of the hopeful qualities of his nation and of its most progressive tendencies. His talents as a statesman commanded the respect of the embassies that came to negotiate treaties during Mongkut’s reign. George Bacon, one of the Americans present at the exchange of ratifications of the treaty with the United States in 1857, wrote that he found him “one of the most remarkable men in the world.”

  He was handsome, proficient in all sports, and so popular with his own people that at the death of the Usurper in 1851 it was widely hoped that he would be chosen king. If Mongkut had decided to stay in the priesthood, Prince Chuthamani’s succession would have been sure. But Mongkut chose the throne, and so relegated his more able brother to the powerless position of Second King.

  Since Mongkut had been in the priesthood for almost thirty years, his decision to leave it must have been a shock to the younger prince, who had prepared himself in every way to assume the throne, but he bore his disappointment in silence. His great talents were turned to modest works of construction within his palace grounds. Rather grudgingly the older brother wrote of the younger after his death:

  He made everything new and beautiful, and of curious appearance, and of a good style of architecture, and much stronger than they had formerly been constructed by his three predecessors, the second kings of the last three reigns, for the space of time that he was second king. He had introduced and collected many and many things, being articles of great curiosity, and things useful for various purposes of military acts and affairs, from Europe and America, China, and other states, and placed them in various departments and rooms or buildings suitable for those articles, and placed officers for maintaining and preserving the various things neatly and carefully. He has constructed several buildings in European fashion and Chinese fashion, and ornamented them with various useful ornaments for his pleasure, and has constructed two steamers, in manner of men-of-war, and two steam-yachts, and several rowing state-boats in Siamese and Cochin-Chinese fashion, for his pleasure at sea and rivers of Siam; and caused several articles of gold and silver being vessels and various wares and weapons to be made up by the Siamese and Malayan goldsmiths, for employ and dress of himself and his family, by his direction and skilful contrivance and ability. He became celebrated and spread out more and more to various regions of the Siamese kingdom, adjacent States around, and far-famed to foreign countries, even at far distance, as he became acquainted with many and many foreigners, who came from various quarters of the world where his name became known to most as a very clever and bravest Prince of Siam.…

  As he pleased mostly with firing of cannon and acts of Marine power and seamen, which he has imitated to his steamers which were made in manner of the man-of-war, after he has seen various things curious and useful, and learned Marine customs on board the foreign vessels of war, his steamers conveyed him to sea, where he has enjoyed playing of firing in cannon very often.…

  He pleased very much in and was playful of almost everything, some important and some unimportant, as riding on Elephants and Horses and Ponies, racing of them and racing of rowing boats, firing on birds and beasts of prey, dancing and singing in various ways pleasantly, and various curiosity of almost everything, and music of every description, and in taming of dogs, monkeys, &c., &c., that is to say briefly that he has tested almost everything eatable except entirely testing of Opium and play.

  Also he has visited regions of Northeastern Province of Sarapury and Gorath very often for enjoyment of pleasant riding on Elephants and Horses, at forests in chasing animals of prey, fowling, and playing music and singing with Laos people of that region.

  When Mongkut was raised to the throne, he had insisted that his brother be given a title higher than that of any previous second king, Phrabat Somdet
Phra Pin Klao Chao Yu Hua, and other honors to enhance the empty position. Before long, however, jealousy between the brothers began to be apparent. No one knew how it started. Some whispered that the Second King chafed under the knowledge that the woman he loved best was forbidden to marry him because she was a princess of the first rank and might be offered only to the Supreme King. Others said that each king was traduced by the corrupt tongues of his own courtiers—those of the First King whispering that the Second King’s popularity was a constant threat to the throne, and those of the Second King pointing out how unworthily the older brother suspected the younger brother of rebellious intentions.

  Perhaps the seeds of this feeling had been sown in childhood. An old priest named Phra Net, who had been one of Prince Chuthamani’s tutors, told Anna many stories about the prince’s youth. He told her sadly that the astrologer who cast the prince’s horoscope at his birth had foretold for him an unnatural death. Because of this prophecy his mother had watched over him with such devotion and imprudent partiality that her older son must have found himself almost excluded from the warm circle of affection. If that were so, the feeling between the brothers was probably not new, but arose from their mother’s favoritism. During the years of exile it was latent, united as they were by their common exclusion from their heritage.

  After the birth of Prince Chulalongkorn, the First King was known to be eager to settle the succession on his own line, and very much afraid that premature death would deprive his son of the throne. Instead of employing his brother’s abilities, he excluded him more and more from active participation in the government, until at last the Second King became nothing but a captive in his narrow domain. More than once it was in the power of the Second King to overthrow his brother and seize the throne, but he never made a move to do so. It was said that many disaffected groups would have united to accomplish this even without his consent if the Kralahome had not intervened, and if the Second King had not sided with the Kralahome immediately. Yet Mongkut, incapable of trusting anyone, continued to be suspicious of his brother’s motives.