Part 15 (2/2)

More than eighteen months after the First King of Siam had entertained me with this essentially Buddhistic argument, and its simple and impressive ill.u.s.tration, a party of pages hurried me away with them, just as the setting sun was trailing his last long, lingering shadows through the porches of the palace. His Majesty required my presence; and his Majesty's commands were absolute and instant. ”Find and fetch!” No delay was to be thought of, no question answered, no explanation afforded, no excuse entertained. So with resignation I followed my guides, who led the way to the monastery of Watt Rajah-Bah-dit-Sang. But having some experience of the moods and humors of his Majesty, my mind was not wholly free from uneasiness. Generally, such impetuous summoning foreboded an interview the reverse of agreeable.

The sun had set in glory below the red horizon when I entered the extensive range of monastic buildings that adjoin the temple. Wide tracts of waving corn and avenues of oleanders screened from view the distant city, with its paG.o.das and palaces. The air was fresh and balmy, and seemed to sigh plaintively among the betel and cocoa palms that skirt the monastery.

The pages left me seated on a stone step, and ran to announce my presence to the king. Long after the moon had come out clear and cool, and I had begun to wonder where all this would end, a young man, robed in pure white, and bearing in one hand a small lighted taper and a lily in the other, beckoned me to enter, and follow him; and as we traversed the long, low pa.s.sages that separate the cells of the priests, the weird sound of voices, chanting the hymns of the Buddhist liturgy, fell upon my ear. The darkness, the loneliness, the measured monotone, distant and dreamy, all was most romantic and exciting, even to a matter-of-fact English woman like myself.

As the page approached the threshold of one of the cells, he whispered to me, in a voice full of entreaty, to put off my shoes; at the same time prostrating himself with a movement and expression of the most abject humility before the door, where he remained, without changing his posture. I stooped involuntarily, and scanned curiously, anxiously, the scene within the cell. There sat the king; and at a sign from him I presently entered, and sat down beside him.

On a rude pallet, about six and a half feet long, and not more than three feet wide, and with a bare block of wood for a pillow, lay a dying priest. A simple garment of faded yellow covered his person; his hands were folded on his breast; his head was bald, and the few blanched hairs that might have remained to fringe his sunken temples had been carefully shorn,--his eyebrows, too, were closely shaven; his feet were bare and exposed; his eyes were fixed, not in the vacant stare of death, but with solemn contemplation or scrutiny, upward. No sign of disquiet was there, no external suggestion of pain or trouble; I was at once startled and puzzled. Was he dying, or acting?

In the att.i.tude of his person, in the expression of his countenance, I beheld sublime reverence, repose, absorption. He seemed to be communing with some spiritual presence.

My entrance and approach made no change in him. At his right side was a dim taper in a gold candlestick; on the left a dainty golden vase, filled with white lilies, freshly gathered: these were offerings from the king. One of the lilies had been laid on his breast, and contrasted touchingly with the dingy, faded yellow of his robe. Just over the region of the heart lay a coil of unspun cotton thread, which, being divided into seventy-seven filaments, was distributed to the hands of the priests, who, closely seated, quite filled the ell, so that none could have moved without difficulty. Before each priest were a lighted taper and a lily, symbols of faith and purity. From time to time one or other of that solemn company raised his voice, and chanted strangely; and all the choir responded in unison. These were the words, as they were afterward translated for me by the king.

_First Voice._ Sang-Khang sara nang gach' cha mi! (Thou Excellence, or Perfection! I take refuge in thee.)

_All._ Nama Pootho sang-Khang sara nang gach' cha mi! (Thou who art named Poot-tho!--either G.o.d, Buddha, or Mercy,--I take refuge in thee.)

_First Voice._ Tuti ampi sang-Khang sara nang gach' cha mi! (Thou Holy One! I take refuge in thee.)

_All._ Te satiya sang-Khang sara nang gach' cha mi! (Thou Truth, I take refuge in thee.)

As the sound of the prayer fell on his ear, a nickering smile lit up the pale, sallow countenance of the dying man with a visible mild radiance, as though the charity and humility of his nature, in departing, left the light of their loveliness there. The absorbing rapture of that look, which seemed to overtake the invisible, was almost too holy to gaze upon. Riches, station, honors, kindred, he had resigned them all, more than half a century since, in his love for the poor and his longing after truth. Here was none of the wavering or vagueness or incoherence of a wandering, delirious death. He was going to his clear, eternal calm. With a smile of perfect peace he said: ”To your Majesty I commend the poor; and this that remains of me I give to be burned.” And that, his last gift, was indeed his all.

I can imagine no spectacle more worthy to excite a compa.s.sionate emotion, to impart an abiding impression of reverence, than the tranquil dying of that good old ”pagan.” Gradually his breathing became more laborious; and presently, turning with a great effort toward the king, he said, _Chan cha pi dauni!_--”I will go now!” Instantly the priests joined in a loud psalm and chant, ”P'hra Arahang sang-Khang sara nang gach' cha mi!” (Thou Sacred One, I take refuge in thee.) A few minutes more, and the spirit of the High-Priest of Siam had calmly breathed itself away. The eyes were open and fixed; the hands still clasped; the expression sweetly content. My heart and eyes were full of tears, yet I was comforted. By what hope? I know not, for I dared not question it.

On the afternoon of the next day I was again summoned by his Majesty to witness the burning of that body.

It was carried to the cemetery Watt Sah Kate; and there men, hired to do such dreadful offices upon the dead, cut off all the flesh and flung it to the hungry dogs that haunt that monstrous garbage-field of Buddhism.

The bones, and all that remained upon them, were thoroughly burned; and the ashes, carefully gathered in an earthen pot, were scattered in the little gardens of wretches too poor to buy manure. All that was left now of the venerable devotee was the remembrance of a look.

”This,” said the King, as I turned away sickened and sorrowful, ”is to give one's body to be burned. This is what your St. Paul had in his mind,--this custom of our Buddhist ancestors, this complete self-abnegation in life and in death,--when he said, 'Even if I give my body to be burned, and have not charity [maitri], it profiteth me nothing.'”

[Ill.u.s.tration: Priests at Breakfast.]

COMMON MAXIMS OF THE PRIESTS OF SIAM.

Glory not in thyself, but rather in thy neighbor.

Dig not the earth, which is the source of life and the mother of all.

Cause no tree to die.

Kill no beast, nor insect, not even the smallest ant or fly.

Eat nothing between meals.

Regard not singers, dancers, nor players on instruments.

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