Siamese people

“ However this may be, the Christian religion did not make any great headway among the Siamese people. And while they conceded to the foreigners religious liberty, they showed no eagerness to receive from them the gift of a new religion.
In the year 1604 the Siamese king sent an ambas [Pg 4] sador to the Dutch colony at Bantam, in the island of Java. And in 1608 the same ambassador extended his journey to Holland, expressing "much surprise at finding that the Dutch actually possessed a country of their own, and were not a nation of pirates, as the Portuguese had always insinuated." ”

“ The Siamese are probably the most debased in morals of any people on earth. They belong to the remotest outskirts of the Indo-Chinese civilization; yet among them every one knows how to read and write. ”

“ They are born on a boat, reared on a boat, get their education neglected on a boat, go a courting on a boat, get married on a boat, and never forsake the water till life is over and they set out on that long mysterious journey, from which no boat or carriage will ever bring them back. There is not much room in a boat, but the inhabitants thereof seem perfectly contented with their lot; in fact, the Siamese seem to be always and everywhere perfectly happy and contented: they are one of the merriest and most cheerful people upon the face of the earth. ”

“ And if they have children, these frequently cut their tails, and become for a certain time Siamese priests. Within two or three generations, all the distinguishing marks of the Chinese character dwindle entirely away; and a nation which adheres so obstinately to its national customs becomes wholly changed to Siamese. These people usually neglect their own literature, and apply themselves to the Siamese. ”

“ At first sight the children, with their straight black hair and their brown faces, strike the white man as being rather funny-looking little creatures. But after a while, when one has seen more of them, it is recognised that they possess a distinct charm and beauty of their own. Their features are quite different from those of the European, because they belong to a different race of people. The Siamese are Mongols, as are also the people of Japan, China, Burma, and Tibet. ”

“ Even in their gravest festivals there is an element of cheerfulness and kindness, which tends to promote genial fellowship and foster friendships, and by bringing together all sorts of people, otherwise separated by diversity of custom, prejudice, and interest, unquestionably avails to weld the several small states and dependencies of Siam into one compact and stable nation.
XXI. SIAMESE LITERATURE AND ART. At the head of the Siamese writers of profane history stands, I think, P'hra Alack, or rather Cheing Meing,—P'hra Alack being the generic term for all writers. ”

“ It has this name because the white elephant is the national emblem, and is represented on the Siamese flag, as the eagle is on the American flag.
Siam is a very pleasant country to live in, and a good many Europeans have from time to time had their homes there, so that the Siamese, who seem to be a teachable people, have learned a great deal from them, and have copied some of their ways. The missionaries, too, have done very much to improve the manners and customs of the Siamese. ”

“ It is evident, from the careless gaiety of these people, that they do not suffer the frightful poverty but too often met with in our large cities. When his appetite is satisfied—and, for that, all that is necessary is a bowl of rice, and some fish seasoned with capsicum—the Siamese is lively and happy, and sleeps without care for the morrow ”

“ The number of vessels in the merchant marine cannot be great. Dwelling so long in peace and security at home, the tastes and the energies of the Siamese people have been confirmed, by their political circumstances, in that inclination toward agricultural rather than commercial pursuits which their geographical conditions naturally engender. The extreme fertility of the soil, watered by innumerable streams, and intersected in every direction by a network of capacious canals (of which the Klong Yai, Klong Bangkok-noi, and Klong P'hra- cha-dee, are the most remarkable) ”

“ 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. ”

“ There is also a tea-set, and all the appliances for betel chewing and tobacco smoking, some stock of provisions and condiments for food.
Probably the most reliable witnesses to the true character of the Siamese are those Protestant missionaries whose lives are passed in intimate association with the people and devoted to doing them good. From a recent book written by one of these, Miss M. [Pg 238] L. Cort, [A] we shall obtain a fair idea of life in Siam and of certain customs dear to the common people.
"Women enjoy greater liberty than in almost any other Oriental land. ”

“ But there is absolutely no place in all Bangkok where they can attend church unless they divide up by sexes and travel several miles in a boat to Sumray and Wang Lang. This some of them do, but their parents and friends do not. Every year our schools are sending out more of these young people, but we are not following them up, and they are left to drift.... For this great work a man and a church are needed at once. No other need in Siam is more urgent. The man should be able to speak the Siamese like a native. He should be conversant with the intricacies of Siamese customs and etiquette ”

“ In disposition the Siamese are mild-mannered, patient, submissive to authority, kindly and hospitable to strangers. They are a light-hearted, apathetic people, little given to quarrelling or to the commission of violent crime. ”

“ The cause of this difference, in a matter so closely interwoven with their religion, is probably to be looked for in the different genius of the nations, to which cause also we must attribute the difference observable in their respective images of Buddha himself, for to the individuals of neither people are we to look for the original exemplar of that form. The Siamese, like other tribes of the Moghul race, seem to have formed to them [157] selves a standard of beauty, differing both from that of Europeans and of Indians. ”

“ Slaves taken as wives must tend to influence the breed of the people, otherwise it is difficult to account for the difference in type between the Burmese Shans and the Siamese.
In Siam the right of changing their lord has been taken away from the people, the majority of whom are classed as prai-luangs, or Crown commoners, and all of whom, outside the Chinese and subjects of foreign Powers, are serfs of the Government, and are placed in classified gangs under grinding Government masters. ”

“ Even still, although hemmed in on one side by the British possessions, on the other by the French protectorate of Camboja, Siam comprises beyond the Menam Valley a considerable part of the Malay Peninsula, and draws tribute from numerous people in the Mekong and Salwen basins. But this State, with an area about half as large again as that of France, has a population probably less than 6,000,000. ... The inhabitants of Siam, whether Shans, Laos, or Siamese proper, belong all alike to the same Thai stock, which is also represented by numerous tribes in Assam, Manipur, and China. ”

“ The existence of the Siamese schools greatly emphasizes the importance of our own work, and the necessity of maintaining a high standard and a strong teaching force in Siamese, English, mathematics, and the sciences. Their schools then will be tributary to ours.
The ultimate prevalence of the Siamese language in all the provinces under Siamese rule, has been inevitable from the start. All governments realize the importance of a uniform language in unifying a people, and have no interest whatever in perpetuating a provincial dialect. ”

“ The women were fairer than the Siamese or Birmese; and it was a pleasant sight to see them always cheerful and industrious—pounding paddy, weaving their garments, or otherwise occupied in their simple household duties, and lightening their toil by singing plaintive native songs." Owing to a tradition that they would one day receive a religion from the West, these people are said to be peculiarly amenable to the influence and instruction of Christian missionaries.
Of the Lao or Shan tribes owning allegiance to the King of Siam, we have spoken very briefly in the second chapter of this volume. ”

“ But the national childish vanity of the Siamese in thinking themselves superior to all nations, except the Chinese and Burmans, has vanished; and the more the English arc feared, the better is the treatment which is experienced during their residence in this country. The more the ascendancy of their genius is acknowledged, the more their friendship as individuals is courted, their customs imitated, and their language studied. ”

“ The English must not go and molest, attack, disturb, seize, or take any place, territory, or boundary belonging to the Siamese in any Country subject to the Siamese. The Siamese shall settle every matter within the Siamese boundaries, according to their own will and customs. ”

“ It is the Avans who call them Sian or Shan; from whence the European term has been derived through the Portuguese.
The Siamese population is of course greatest on the Siamese frontier; so that, increasing as we go south, it attains its maximum in Tenasserim just as the Môn did in Maulmein. It seems, also, to have been introduced at different times; a fact which gives us a distinction between the native Siamese and the recent settlers. [97]
Like the Môn, the Tha'y, at least in its more classical dialect, is a lettered language; the alphabet, like the Buddhist religion, being Indian. ”

“ The converts are chiefly from among the Chinese, who, for centuries past, and in great numbers, have made their homes in this fertile country, monopolizing much of its industry, and sometimes, with characteristic thriftiness, accumulating much wealth. They have intermarried with the Siamese, and have become a permanent element in the population, numbering, in the coast region, almost as many as the native Siamese, or Thai. ”

“ When ice itself was first introduced to the Siamese by the European residents, they promptly coined for it the short and expressive name of "hard-water." It is amusing to hear the little ones exclaim as they swallow the frozen fluid, "Golly! How it burns!"
As far as the casual observer can judge, in this capital of Siam there are no Siamese engaged in any hard manual labour at all. There are of course, many Siamese employed in various kinds of domestic or official work, but in the streets nearly every workman is Chinese. There are nearly as many Chinese in the country as there are Siamese. ”

“ A beginning has at last been made by the present king, and the last and best, though poetically maligned, age of iron is about to spread its blessings over the Siamese Empire.
The population of Siam cannot be ascertained with correctness, owing to the custom of enumerating only the men. When I was in Bangkok, the native registers gave the number of them as four million Siamese, one million Laotians, one million Malays and Indians, one million five hundred thousand Chinese, three hundred and fifty thousand Cambodians, fifty thousand Peguans, and the same number of mountain tribes ”

“ What degree and kind of genius they may possess in music and in the arts remains to be seen. In the actual state of our knowledge, I cannot but consider the Siamese as prodigiously inferior to the rude inhabitants of the interior of Ceylon, with whom, as professing the same religion, they will admit of a comparison. ”

“ Their location and their weakness made it a necessity that they should look to one of these rival kingdoms for protection against the other. At the same time, they added both dignity and strength to the one on which they leaned—they served it as a buffer against the other. Nature had connected the Lāo country more intimately with Siam. All its communication with the sea was through the Mênam Chao Prayā and its tributaries, while a range of lofty mountains separated it from Burma. In race and language too, they were Siamese, and not Burmese. ”

“ Peoples’ furlough in 1889 that we succeeded in getting our present type. Meanwhile we had used the Siamese Scriptures, with some present disadvantages, indeed, but with some advantages as well. Some of our first Christians were attracted to our religion by their desire to learn Siamese; and the Siamese Bible and catechism were our textbooks. And now, under Siamese rule, knowledge of the Siamese opens the way to promotion in the government service. Siamese alone is taught in the 225government schools. Young monks are more eager to study Siamese than their own tongue. ”

“ Education begins with the shaving the tuft, and the boys are then sent to the pagodas to be instructed by the bonzes in reading and writing, and in the dogmas of religion. They give personal service in return for the education they receive. That education is worthless enough, but every Siamese is condemned to pass a portion of his life in the temple, which many of them never afterward quit. Hence, the enormous supply of an unproductive, idle, useless race. ”

“ But though so barbarous to their enemies, the Siamese in some respects are better than most other heathen nations, for they treat their relations more kindly. They do not kill their infants, nor shut up their wives, nor cast out their parents. Yet they show their cruelty in this:—they often sell one another for slaves. They also purchase slaves in great numbers; and there are wild men in the mountains who watch Burmans and Karens to sell them to the great chiefs of Siam. It is the pride of their chiefs to have thousands of slaves crawling around them. ”