MY friend Maha Mongkut used to maintain, with the doctors and sophists
of his sect, that the Buddhist priesthood have no superstitions; that
though they do not accept the Christian's "Providence," they do believe
in a Creator (_P'hra-Tham_), at whose will all crude matter sprang into
existence, but who exercises no further control over it; that man is but
one of the endless mutations of matter,--was not created, but has
existed from the beginning, and will continue to exist to all eternity;
that though he was not born in sin, he is held by the secondary law of
retribution accountable for offences committed in his person, and these
he must expiate through subsequent transmigrations, until, by
sublimation, he is absorbed again into the primal source of his being;
and that mutability is an essential and absolute law of the universe.
In like manner they protest that they are not idolaters, any more than
the Roman Catholics are pagans; that the image of Buddha, their Teacher
and High-Priest, is to them what the crucifix is to the Jesuit; neither
more nor less. They scout the idea that they worship the white elephant,
but acknowledge that they hold the beast sacred, as one of the
incarnations of their great reformer.
Nevertheless, no nation or tribe of all the human race has ever been
more profoundly inoculated with a superstition the most depraving and
malignant than the Siamese. They have peopled their spiritual world with
grotesques, conceived in hallucination and brought forth in nightmare,
the monstrous devices of mischief on the one hand and misery on the
other,--gods, demons, genii, goblins, wraiths; and to flatter or
propitiate these, especially to enlist their tutelary offices, they
commit or connive at crimes of fantastic enormity.
While residing within the walls of Bangkok, I learned of the existence
of a custom having all the stability and force of a Medo-Persic law.
Whenever a command has gone forth from the throne for the erection of a
new fort or a new gate, or the reconstruction of an old one, this
ancient custom demands, as the first step in the procedure, that three
innocent men shall be immolated on the site selected by the court
astrologers, and at their "auspicious" hour.
In 1865, his Majesty and the French Consul at Bangkok had a grave
misunderstanding about a proposed modification of a treaty relating to
Cambodia. The consul demanded the removal of the prime minister from the
commission appointed to arrange the terms of this treaty. The king
replied that it was beyond his power to remove the Kralahome. Afterward,
the consul, always irritable and insolent, having nursed his wrath to
keep it warm, waylaid the king as he was returning from a temple, and
threatened him with war, and what not, if he did not accede to his
demands. Whereupon, the poor king, effectually intimidated, took refuge
in his palace behind barred gates; and forthwith sent messengers to his
astrologers, magicians, and soothsayers, to inquire what the situation
prognosticated.
The magi and the augurs, and all the seventh sons of seventh sons,
having shrewedly pumped the officers, and made a solemn show of
consulting their oracles, replied: "The times are full of omen. Danger
approaches from afar. Let his Majesty erect a third gate, on the east
and on the west."
Next morning, betimes, pick and spade were busy, digging deep trenches
outside the pair of gates that, on the east and west alike, already
protected the palace.
Meanwhile, the consul either quite forgot his threats, or cooled in the
cuddling of them; yet day and night the king's people plied pick and
spade and basket in the new foundations. When all was ready, the _San
Luang_, or secret council of Royal Judges, met at midnight in the
palace, and despatched twelve officers to lurk around the new gates
until dawn. Two, stationed just within the entrance, assume the
character of neighbors and friends, calling loudly to this or that
passenger, and continually repeating familiar names. The peasants and
market folk, who are always passing at that hour, hearing these calls,
stop, and turn to see who is wanted. Instantly the myrmidons of the san
luang rush from their hiding-places, and arrest, hap-hazard, six of
them--three for each gate. From that moment the doom of these
astonished, trembling wretches is sealed. No petitions, payments,
prayers, can save them.
In the centre of the gateway a deep fosse or ditch is dug, and over it
is suspended by two cords an enormous beam. On the "auspicious" day for
the sacrifice, the innocent, unresisting victims--"hinds and churls"
perhaps, of the lowest degree in Bangkok--are mocked with a dainty and
elaborate banquet, and then conducted in state to their fatal post of
honor. The king and all the court make profound obeisance before them,
his Majesty adjuring them earnestly "to guard with devotion the gate,
now about to be intrusted to their keeping, from all dangers and
calamities; and to come in season to forewarn him, if either traitors
within or enemies without should conspire against the peace of his
people or the safety of his throne." Even as the last word of this
exhortation falls from the royal lips, the cords are cut, the ponderous
engine "squelches" the heads of the distinguished wretches, and three
Bangkok ragamuffins are metempsychosed into three guardian-angels
(_Thevedah_).
Siamese citizens of wealth and influence often bury treasure in the
earth, to save it from arbitrary confiscation. In such cases a slave is
generally immolated on the spot, to make a guardian genius. Among
certain classes, not always the lowest, we find a greedy passion that
expends itself in indefatigable digging for such precious _caches_, in
the environs of abandoned temples, or among the ruins of the ancient
capital, Ayudia. These treasure-seekers first pass a night near the
supposed place of concealment, having offered at sunset to the genius of
the spot oblations of candles, perfumed tapers, and roasted rice. They
then betake themselves to slumber; and in their dreams the genie is
expected to appear, and indicate precisely the hiding-place of his
golden charge, at the same time offering to wink at its sacking in
consideration of the regular perquisite,--"one pig's head and two
bottles of arrack." On the other hand, the genie may appear in an angry
aspect, flourishing the conventional club in a style that means
business, and demanding by what right the intruders would tamper with
his charge; whereat sudden waking and dishevelled flight.
Another and more barbarous superstition relates to premature delivery.
In such a case the embarrassed mother calls in a female magician, who
declares that an evil spirit has practised a spiteful joke upon the
married pair, with a design upon the life of the mother. So saying, she
pops the still-born into an earthen pot, and with that in her left hand
and a sword in her right, makes for the margin of a deep stream, where,
with an approved imprecation upon the fiend and a savage slash at the
manikin, she tosses the pot and its untimely contents into the flood.
By such witches as this, sorceries of all kinds are practised for fee.
They are likewise supposed to be skilled in the art of healing, and are
notable compounders of love-philters and potions.
The king supports a certain number of astrologers, whose duties consist
in the prediction of events, whether great or small, from war or peace
to rain or drought, and in indicating or determining future
possibilities by the aspect and position of the stars. The people
universally wear charms and talismans, to which they ascribe
supernatural virtues. A patient in fever with delirium is said to be
possessed of a devil; and should he grow frantic and unmanageable in the
paroxysms, the one becomes a legion. At the close of each year, a thread
of unspun cotton, of seven fibres, consecrated by priests, is reeled
round all the walls of the palace; and from sunset until dawn a
continuous cannonading is kept up from all the forts within hearing, to
rout the evil spirits that have infested the departing year.