Jacob T. Child

“ They make one or two diseases a specialty, none of them attempt to become a general practitioner of medicine. They know but little in regard to surgery and will send for miles to secure the services of a foreign physician. Doctors stand high in the estimation of the people; they look to them as their natural protectors, not only against the effects of disease, but the spells that the spirits may cast over them, and when a doctor fails of a cure he always attributes it to the spell of a witch or a spirit beyond the power of human skill to avoid, and thus retains the confidence of his dupes. ”

“ At some great Siamese ceremonies one may see an enormous serpent or dragon, made of lamps, ingeniously joined together, and borne about by a number of men, intended to represent Rabu chasing the moon. Conversing with some of the leading Princes in regard to this legend, they smilingly remarked that the ceremonies now attending the eclipse was but the more keeping up of an ancient custom, like the western nations hanging up stockings for St. Nicholas to fill with sweets; that the belief in the dragon Rahu of Siam was but a myth, as was that of St. George and the dragon of Britain. ”

“ A native plough is not worthy of the name. They are of two kinds, one designed to be drawn by a single buffalo, and the other by a yoke of oxen. The difference between them is mainly in the length of the beam. The plough for a single buffalo has a beam only about four feet long; but the beam for a yoke of oxen is from 10 to 12 feet in length, proceeding forward from the handle with an upward curve, then downward, and then again upward to a slender and graceful point which is seen above the heads of the oxen, and 18 or 20 inches ahead of them. ”

“ The three first dynasties reigned in Ayuthia, which was captured and destroyed in the year of 1767, after a three-year siege, they having been the monarchs of Siam for a period of four hundred and seventeen years. After the Burmese had sacked the capital and taken off thousands of the people prisoners a Siamese General, P'ra yah Lohk-Sin, of great celebrity, rallied the Siamese under him at T'onaburee and after a number of hard-fought battles, drove the invaders back and laid the foundation of Bangkok, since then the capital. ”

“ Under his control the doomed one has a foretaste of hades ere he shuffles off his mortal coil. The life prisoner has a chain fastened to a steel ring riveted around his neck, and this is never taken off till death claims him; the chain from his neck is also riveted around his ankles, and the clanking of these fetters can be heard in every part of Bangkok, as long lines of prisoners are daily driven through the streets to their work. The other prisoners are chained around the ankles with a chain about eighteen inches in length. ”

“ The catty can be no more nor less than what the law of China ordains. As the export trade is greatly in excess of the imports, large quantities of Mexican dollars are brought into the country and recoined into ticals and smaller currency The late King Somdetch P'ra Chaum Klow established the present law, making five ticals the equivalent of three Mexican dollars, Mexican silver being the standard of the Asiatic coast. The importer takes his dollars to the mint and the officers there heat them red-hot to detect counterfeits, and if genuine, ticals are given in exchange. ”

“ The body is encased in a handsome coffin covered with gilding and elaborately carved, more like an ornamented chest than a coffin, and on it is fastened a beautiful white bantam rooster; over the casket is suspended a pavilion and above it two blue banners and two large blue lanterns with other decorations. As soon as the steamer is reached the casket is placed in the hold with the rooster still on it, and by the time the vessel reaches its destination the doomed bird has also gone out into the unknown with the spirit of the son of the celestial. ”

“ On the point of leaving our capital we request you to assure the President of the United States of our anxiety to increase our friendly relations with the United States of America, which are of the highest moment to us, and we beg likewise that you will assure him of our personal esteem and friendship. ”

“ Occasionally one of the gold pieces can be purchased, but they are rare and bring large prices by coin collectors, being regarded as curiosities. There are a large number of counterfeits in circulation among the bullet-shaped coin, owing to the fact that a number of years ago the master of the mint, unknown to the King, manufactured an immense number of copper ticals, and being an adept in metallurgy plated them with silver, and put them in circulation. ”

“ You will see the buffalo going along with great apparent carelessness, always holding his head near the ground, snapping up here and there a mouthful of grass, and yet never losing the furrow by which he is to walk. ”

“ The power of the jailer is absolute and there is no one to stand between him and the code that he lays down for the management of those who are so unfortunate as to fall into his power. In Bangkok the subject of prison reform has been agitated to some purpose by the missionaries and others, and prisoners are now better cared for, and treated with more leniency than in the past ”

“ Hundreds of these miserable diseased wretches can be seen begging by the wayside for alms in all stages of the dread disease. Some with fingers and toes gone, others with noses and lips off, their blackened gums protruding in the most hideous manner, while many are a mass of hideous ulcers, barely able to crawl into the shade of a tree and point to the cocoanut shell that holds the few coppers tossed to them by the charitable. ”

“ Silver is the standard of values in Siam, no gold being coined except a few pieces that the King distributes on coronation or cremation ceremonies. The gold pieces are similar in design to those of the silver coinage and possess twenty times their value. ”

“ After sentence of death is pronounced on a prisoner he is confined in jail till the morning of execution and then a bamboo yoke, about a yard in length, is placed around his neck and fastened to a round piece of wood that encloses his wrists, thus keeping the arms stretched out in front of him and with chains on his neck and ankles he is led to a wat in the neighborhood of the execution ground where he is bambooed by the executioner and after prayers by the priests is taken to the spot selected for the purpose where a small bamboo cross is stuck in the ground ”

“ Being a natural branch of the runner it needs nothing to strengthen it. The hinder end of the beam curves down and is framed into the back end of the runner. The handle of the plough (for there are never two) is a natural crook forming a large segment of a circle four feet long, passes through the beam just behind the mould board, and is framed in the runner near the acute angle made by the two. ”

“ Practice of Medicine – Native Doctors.
The Siamese formerly believed that the human system is composed of four elements: water, wind, fire and earth; that disease is simply a disarrangement of these elements; hence if fire from without, the heat of the sun, for instance, enters the body in undue proportion fevers, small-pox, etc., necessarily follows. Each element is claimed by the physicians to have its regular seasons, similar to climatic changes. In the native books that they read they are told that during such a month that wind is prone to prevail and beget disease, another month fire. ”