that of princes and ministers at the capital, of which there are several, and third, that
of the king. No causes of importance are tried by the first, and it is only thé last
that exercises unlimited jurisdiction. Every court has its assessors, and all proceedings
are taken in writing. In criminal cases the punishments are occasionally of
extreme severity. Thus, a thief who melts down a gold or silver idol stolen from a
temple is condemned to be burnt alive. Adulterers are branded on the cheek, and
Talapoins, or priests, convicted of a breach of chastity are stripped of their sacerdotal
dress, scourged, and condemned for life to cut grass for the royal elephants, a punishment
considered infamous, and for which there is no pardon. According to law,
capital punishment ought to be inflicted for murder, and several other crimes, but at
present it is confined to high treason and rebellion. Sentence of death is passed by
the tribunal, but usually commuted by the crown for a smaller punishment. When
the extreme sentence of the law is carried into effect, it is by decapitation, or by
binding the malefactor to a post, and transfixing him with spears, the body in either
case being left to be devoured by birds of prey. In the case of criminals of the royal
family, their blood must not be shed, and with them the mode of execution is
to sew them in leathern bags and sink them alive in the Menam. In cases of
murder and of suicide, neighbourhoods within a radius of fifty fathoms are made
responsible under the penalty of a heavy fine. When quarrels take place, therefore,
the neighbours take much pains to prevent their ending in death; and acts of suicide,
lest they should be construed into murders, are carefully concealed.
The Siamese prisons appear to be most execrable dungeons. The prisoners are all
chained together at night, and in the day subjected to hard labour, while throughout
their incarceration, they have no other food than a little rice and salt, while they are
subject to the ill-usage and extortion of the jailers. Prisoners for debt, however, are
usually set free in no long time by the interference of their relatives. A Siamese
who had been confined in these dungeons observed to the Bishop of Siam, that he
could not imagine hell itself to be worse.
The art of war, as may well be imagined, is in a very low state among the Siamese.
By the accidents of position they are an agricultural and by no means a warlike
people. The masses go unarmed, a mark of civilisation which distinguishes this
people from the Malays and other rude nations of the same class. The strength,
however, which a civilisation derived chiefly from the advantages of locality has conferred
upon the Siamese, has immemorially enabled them to subdue and hold in subjugation
most of the smaller nations of their neighbourhood not so favourably situated,
as well as to hold their own with their equals in power and civilisation, the Burmese,
Peguans, and Kambojans. The Siamese have never, indeed, been permanently conquered,
although their country has frequently been invaded and over-run.
When the Kong of Siam declares war he issues a proclamation to the princes, chiefs,
governors, and tributary states, to furnish the quotas of their respective followers,
prescribed by custom. Each soldier is clothed, and supplied with one month’s
rations, the state furnishing arms. Such is the constitutional army of Siam ; but
within the last twenty years a sort of standing army, disciplined and formed on the
European model, has been organised, under the instruction of some Englishmen.
This consists of infantry and artillery, and is said to number 10,000. The route of a
Siamese army is usually by water, and when it lands, in the absence of all roads, its
artillery is conveyed on elephants, and its small baggage on the backs of the soldiers
and camp-followers. In former times, and in wars with the Burmese, Peguans, and
Kambojans, a Siamese army is said to have sometimes amounted to 100,000 men, and
1000 elephants. Such a rabble host could only have subsisted, and subsisted miserably,
too, on the plunder and devastation of the country it invaded.
The Siamese marine is a good deal more respectable than the land force. I t consists
of 120 war boats, furnished both with oars and sails, some carrying two and some
four guns, these being in the bow and stem only, so that in action each must be alternately
swept round by oar, to bear on the enemy. In addition to these boats, the
present king has built no fewer than six frigates and sixteen corvettes, on European
models, and these are commanded by Europeans.
The Arsenal, for security against insurrection or rebellion, is within the inclosure
of the royal palace, and amply stocked with small arms and cannon, kept in good
repair. These are of foreign, chiefly English manufacture, but the gunpowder is of
Siamese make, coarse and weak. Towards the mouth of the Menam, there have been
erected, since my visit in 1822, several fortresses, well constructed of earth, and on
European principles, some of which mount as many as 100 guns. These seem to be,
with the exception of the weak wall round the king’s paiace, the only fortifications in
the kingdom, for in this respect Siam, as well all the other Indo-Chinese countries,
differ widely from Hindustan, which abounds in fortified places.
The Siamese are said to treat prisoners of war with humanity. This is probably a
matter of policy. The paucity of population seems to be felt, and the prisoners are
hence adopted as citizens, and planted as colonists, under a leader of their own nation.
In this manner we find settlements of Peguans, Kambojans, Cochin Chinese, and
Malays. The exception to this rule of good treatment are captured rebellious chiefs
who are exposed, in iron cages, to the insults of the populace, and then immured in
dungeons. An example of this took place as late as 1829, under the late king, when
the Lao prince of Vieng-chan was brought prisoner to Bangkok, exposed in an iron
cage, and soon after died from the ill treatment to which he was subjected.
The history of Siam is divided by the Siamese themselves into two parts, an early
and mostly fabulous, and a modern and comparatively authentic one. In the first,
the founders of the kingdom are described as having been two Bramins, who were
cotemporaries of Buddha, or who lived 513 years before Christ. The first date, however,
which is, quoted for any event, is 950 of the sacred era, corresponding with
407 of Christ. Siam, at this time called Sayam, for it had not yet taken the name of
Thai, was tributary to Kamboja, but threw off the yoke under a prince called Arun-
nârat, said to have been born in the year in question. To his time is ascribed the
invention of the Siamese alphabet, and the restriction of the Kambojan to religious
purposes, as at present. In the year of Christ, 638, was established the civil era, and
this is ascribed to a king called Phaya Krek. I t is probable, however, that thi3
era is contemporary with the first introduction of the Buddhist religion into Siam.
At whatever time this last event happened, we must conclude that the Siamese must
have been already a tolerably civilised people when they were capable of adopting a
system of worship so refined as that of Buddha, with its transmigration, its priesthood
supported by voluntary alms, its temples and its monasteries.
The modern or authentic history of Siam dates from the establishment of the seat
of government in Yuthia, evidently a corruption of the Sanscrit Ayudhya or Oude. This
happened in the civil year, 712, corresponding to 1350 of our time, under a prince
named Phaya Uthong. This event, then, took place only 161 years before the arrival
of Alboquerque at Malacca, when the name of Siam became first known to Europeans.
From that time to the accession of the reigning king, 475 years have transpired,
during which there have reigned twenty-nine kings, which gives an average of between
sixteen and seventeen years for each reign. Some of the princes reigned only a few
months, and others even only a few days. Some were assassinated by brothers
uncles, and ministers, and four different dynasties have occupied the throne. Thé
country within the period named was repeatedly invaded by Peguans, Burmese, and
Kambojans, even the capital having been taken, sacked, and its inhabitants carried
into captivity. In the year 1583, one of the best of the Siamese kings, Phra Naret,
in retaliation of an invasion of his own country, invaded Kamboja, captured its
capital, and took its king prisoner. He had made a vow that he would bathe his
feet in the blood of the Kambojan monarch, and he kept his word, for he caused his
prisoner to be assassinated in his own presence, and went through the ceremony to the
sound of cymbals and other musical instruments.
In 1656, a prince called Phra Narai, who on his accession took the title of Phra
Châo Champhuok, ascended the throne. He was the second of his dynasty, for his father
had been a noble who had usurped the government by the assassination of his predecessor.
Phra Narai was the ally of Lewis XIV., and the same who sent missions
to France and received ambassadors from that country. The intercourse was brought
about by an adventurer of the name of Constantine Falcon, a Greek of the island of
Cephalonia. This person had been the steward of an English East Indiaman but
had the talents and dexterity to raise himself to the post of first minister of
Siam, and is justly quoted by Voltaire as a signal example of the superiority of the
European over the Asiatic races. His master and protector, however, dying in 1688
Falcon was deposed and put to death, and with him ended the prospect, at one
time promising, of establishing French influence in Siam.
In the 80 years between the death of the ally of Lewis XIV., and the year 1767,
v reo 'iif th“ .flve different sovereigns reigned in Siam, most of them usurpers. In
1758, the celebrated Birmese king, the conqueror of Pegu, and known to Europeans
as Alomprah, invaded Siam, laid siege to Yuthia, but dying during the siege, his
army retreated. The Siamese capital, however, was captured and sacked by his
son and successor in 1766. Next year the son of a Chinese by a Siamese mother,
seized the throne on the death of the reigning prince and expelled the Burmese,