The National tribune., 1889-04-25

contains twice as much land as GfeaV britain
and ireland. 1t is bigger than either France
or Germany, and it is five times the size of
our State Of New York. Its soil is rich and
we'll watered. 1t produces crop after crop with
out the aid of manure, and though not one
twentieth of the rich lands are cultivated 1t
brings III the King a revenue OF SlO,OUO,0O0
year. Its forests are full of teak wood, which
is now shipped TO all parts of the world for
furniture, aud which is worth as much as ma
hogany 1t ships millions of dollars worth of
rice and pepper and cattle yearly, and its pop
ulation is not more than one-tenth the num-
Der it could support. 1t lies in most danger
GUS position, as respects the swallowing up OF
its territory. On the west is British Burmah,
where war isnow going on between the Engilsn
and the natives. and OH the east are the French
provinces of Cochin China. Both countries
are land hungry, and both look with greedy
eyes on Siam Mr.. Child our Minister at the
Siamese court, said to me that he considered it
only a question of time. There is little doubt
but that such change would be to the adj
vantage of the people. AT present they are
no less than the slaves of the King and the
mobiles. and under France or England they
would be practically free at present the King
has an army and navy. His army consists OF
four regiments of soldiers, clad in brown jean
pantaloons, with shirts of similar material.
They are barefooted, and their force would be
swallowed up by half the number of French
or English. The navy is made up OF number
of small steamboats,, the most OF which were
bought secondhand, and one of which sunk here
in the river the other day They do very we'll
against the savages OF the interior, but they
will be of little use in fight with great
nation.
This Menam River, which flows by Bangkok,
is 40 feet deep from here to the great Gulf Of
Siam. 1t could admit the largest ocean vessels
to the wharves of the Capital were 1T not for
a bar of sand, which with slight dredging
might be so cut away that all kinds of ships
could go through. The King upon being APP
preached upon the subject lately said that
he did not want the big ships coming here,
for if they could come the men-of-war could
come, and these would. perhaps, steal his King
dom from him. The result is, that ships draw
ing more than ID feet of water have TO remain
outside the bar and have their cargoes carried
to them in steam lighters. The Mongkut, of
the Scottish Oriental line, upon which came
from Hong Kong, had bottom like that OF q
fat-boat, aud was built without keel especl-
ally for this Bangkok trade.
The Menam is 500 miles Song, and it is, | am
told, navigable for 500 iAes from Its mouth.
1t divides the country into two parts, the larger
of which is on the side of the French, but in
the future struggle for the spoils of the heather
it might be that the west portion would go to
England and the east to France, Some OF the
richest gold mines in the world are found IN
| Siam, and an English company is now about to
open these, and is already at work putting
| up the machinery to do SO. There are num-
| Der of English here in Bangkok, and English
| capital is gaining foothold here such as it has
| in every one of these Asiatic ports, and which
| once gained it never lets go.
Siam has, however, no national debt, and the
foreign powers can never get hold OF her as
| they have got hold of Egypt. The King is the
/ Government and he is worth all the way from
thirty to fifty millions of dollars. He collects
! high taxes on everything, from land to opium
and gambling, and the gambling taxes bring
/ in half million dollars a year. The taxes
| are all larmed out, as are also the people, who,
| as the slaves of the King, are forced to work
| for him part of every year. 1t Is only the
/ Chinese who are not subject to such service,
and they pay pOl-taX every three years.
| One-sixth Of the population is already Chinese,
and they are immigrating by thousands every
| wear Our ship brought about 400 coolies from
Swatow to Bangkok and the Captain told me
he often carried as many as 700 trip. Lhese
Chinese Immigrants are all men. They marry
| Samese wives, and it is estimated that out o
| the 100000 of people who live IN Siam only
! one-third are Siamese The others are MalayS
and Jaytians. The race thus seems bound tt
die out, and Chinese cheap labor and Chinese
industry and economy are fast getting theil
blood and money sucking hold on the country
There are many Malays in Bangkok, an(
next to the Chinese they are the busiest mel
in the city. They are clean limbed, slender
dark faced men with good features of an almos
Caucasian cast, and they often have gold ring
in their ears. They come here from Malacc
and Singapore, and some of them have place
under the Government. The Hindoos are to b
fonnd bere too and the crowds on the street
are what might be called Asia-politan. In