CH A P T E R VII
T H E S H IV A Y D A G O N
“ Take it all in all, it is the fabric in India of all that I have visited most
worth seeing, the Taj alone excepted.”— M a r q u e s s o f D a l h o u s i e . ,
OF the origin of the Shway Dagon, I have already
spoken in connection with the origin of Rangoon.
The life that animates it to-day is of more interest,
and it is true that if all else in Burma were destroyed
and only the Shway Dagon with its life were preserved,
there would 'remain enough to tell the world of all
that is best in the idiosyncrasy of the Burmese race.
There is no other centre in Burma that can compare
with it for the display of colour, for the physical
pageantry and the spiritual expression of life, for the
grand movement o f many peoples on a stage as splendid
as any in the world.
Rising to a height of three hundred and sixty-eight
feet, it is loftier than St. Paul’s, and its size is greatly
enhanced by the fact that it stands on an eminence
that is itself one hundred and sixty-six feet, above
the level of the city. This circumstance gives it an air
■of great dignity, and makes it conspicuous over a wide
horizon. Its spire of gold, touched by the flaming sun,
is the first object
upon which the
eyes of the world-
traveller rest as
he approaches Rangoon,
and it is the
last of the city he
looks upon when
his steamer is bearing
him away and
the memory of it
never fades from
the eyes of one .
w h o h a s o n c e
looked upon it.
It is covered
with pure gold
from base to summit
; and once in
e v e r y generation
this gold is completely
TH E SHWA Y DAGON
renewed by public subscription. Yet throughout
the interval the process of regilding goes on perpetually.
Pious people who seek in this way to express their
veneration and to add to their store of spiritual merit,
climb up daily with little fluttering packets of gold leaf,
which they fasten on some fraction of its great surface ;
and there is no more picturesque sight offered by it
than that of a group of these silken worshippers outlined
high against its gold, in the act of contributing