Travels in South-Eastern Asia, embracing Hindustan, Malaya, Siam, and China. With notices of numerous missionary stations, and a full account of the Burman Empire with dissertation, tables, etc

Front matter

I I TRAVELS IN SOUTH-EASTERN ASIA, EMBRACING HINDUSTAN, MALAYA, SIAM, AND CHINA WITH NOTICES OF NUMEROUS MISSIONARY STATIONS, AND A FULL ACCOUNT OF THE BURMAN EMPIRE; WITH DISSERTATIONS, TABLES, etc BY HOWARD MALCOM. " Homo sum ; humani nihil a me alienum puto." Tehence. IN TWO VOLUMES. VOL. I. BOSTON: GOULD, KENDALL, AND LINCOLN. SOLD BT BOOKSELLERS GENERALLY THROUGHOUT THE UNITED STATES. 1839. Entered according to Act of Congress, in the year 1839, By Gould, Kendall, and Lincoln, In the Clerk's Office of the District Court of Massachusetts. STEREOTYPED AT THE BOSTON TYPE AND STEREOTYPE FOUNDRY.

Preface

. The only aim of the following pages is utility. Had a place been sought among admired travellers, I should have given more descriptions, incidents, and delineations of private character; and fewer facts, opinions, and reflections ; which would at once have saved labor, and rendered me less vulnerable. Honest intentions, diligent inquiries, and fortunate opportunities, will not secure a traveller from errors, even in Europe or America, where, in every place, we meet persons of veracity, and free to impart information. In the East, the case is much worse. The foreigner, dreaded for his power, and abhorred for his religion, excites both civil and religious jealousy. His manners often displease, by the omission of forms of which he may be ignorant, or to which he cannot succumb. He is met with taciturnity, or wilful mis representation; and if he escape these, he will generally encounter ignorance.

If he be so happy as to find both intelligence and communicativeness, the want of books, maps, charts, and statistics, renders the information of natives merely local, and often conflicting. Added to all, his interpreter may be unskilful. If he

PREFACE.

. depends upon resident foreigners, their arrival may have been recent, or their opportunities small, or their inquiries negligent, or the statements of one may be flatly contradicted by those of another. All these embarrassments have met me by turns, so that frequently, after laborious and continued inquiries, I have been compelled to lay aside the whole mass of notes, in the utter inability to decide whom to believe. I preferred silence, and apparent deficiency, to questionable statements. My advantages have, nevertheless, been great. I was sent out, as the deputy and representative of one of the great American Missionary Societies, to examine into, and with the missionaries adjust, many points not easily settled by correspondence ; to compare the various modes of operation in different missions ; to survey the field ; to compare the claims of proposed new stations ; to comfort, encourage, and strengthen the missionaries in their arduous work ; and to gather details on every point where the Board lacked information.

Such a mission gave me confidence, in the eyes of all classes, wherever I went ; and toleration in making investiga tions, which might otherwise have been deemed impertinent. The time spent at each place, was suffi cient for deliberate inquiries, from various sources. In most places, I found missionaries and civilians, who had lived long on the spot, and who gave me the fruits of mature and extended observations. My inter preters were in general not only thoroughly conversant with the language, but in the habit of familiar inter course with the people, and possessing their confidence.

PREFACE.

. 5 Before leaving a place, I generally submitted my notes to several persons for a careful revision. If, therefore, I should be convicted of errors, they are such as the best informed persons on the spot have fallen into, and as my reader would have imbibed, had he been in my place. Some errors may be charged to me, through mistake of the objector ; for often, when I read my notes in various places, gentlemen dissented from some statements with great confidence, the correctness of which they admitted on further examination ; which examination they would not have made, had I not quoted some influential name as my informer. It is, of course, out of the question to quote authori ties in a work not drawn from books. To have filled the margin with names would have been to violate propriety, while it could not add to the reader's con fidence to quote persons wholly unknown to him.

In every part of the work I have studiously sought brevity, lest, by diminishing its circulation, my great object should be defeated. Voluminous communica tions in relation to my official doings, inquiries, and conclusions, are in possession of the Board, which will not be withheld from the examination of proper applicants. Conversations with heathen, converted and uncon verted, often deeply interesting, are omitted, because they occur so abundantly in the printed commu nications of missionaries. Descriptions, adventures, and scenery, as well as geographical, commercial, and political memoranda, are inserted only so far as comported with the precise object in view. To have 1*

PREFACE.

. abstained wholly from such observations, would have been to withhold facts necessary to a proper knowledge of the countries to which our friends extend their benevolence; beside which, many of the friends of missions have access to but few books ; and some will be indebted to these pages, for most of their information on the subjects which are introduced. All works on the East differ from each other in the orthography of names, and few are even consistent with themselves. Some seem to take pride in a new oithography of old terms ; and no two have the same system as to new ones. This difficulty cannot be surmounted, till some mode of Romanizing foreign languages becomes universal. Words which have acquired an established spelling, I have so given. Others are written as directed by some one skilled in that particular language.

When no aid was at hand, they are given just as they sounded to my ears, from the lips of natives. Every one is embarrassed, in reading works on India, by meeting terms not found either in dictionaries or encyclopedias. An explanation given in the margin, when the term first occurs, cannot be always recollect ed, and the note is not easily found again. To avoid this disadvantage, I have thrown together the necessary explanations in a glossary. Some terms, not used by me, but often occurring in Oriental works, are added, to make it more useful. The map has been constructed with great care. On arriving in India, an outline was drawn on a very large scale ; and, as local surveys or narratives of recent jour-

PREFACE.

. neys came to hand, corrections were continually made. My own tours, and conversations with missionaries, and other gentlemen, furnished more. At the surveyor general's office in Calcutta, I was allowed an inspection of various recent unpublished maps and charts of Farther India. The omission of unimportant towns, and un certain rivers and mountains, makes some parts of it look meagre ; but confusion is thus avoided without diminishing the amount of general information. A slight comparison with other maps of these regions, will show that the corrections are so important and numer ous, as to entitle it to be called an original map. Deeming it indispensable that a book of travels, in a region so unknown, should contain numerous pictorial illustrations, I applied myself from the beginning to making sketches at every opportunity.

A large number of these are inserted, and constitute an entirely new contribution to our stock of Oriental pictures. These and the map considerably augment the cost of the book, but it is hoped not so much as its value. For the views of Maulmain, Tavoy, and Mergui, I am indebted to a distinguished artist. That of Sagaing was taken from the door of Mr. Kincaid's house, and shows a section of his family boat, partly hid under the bank. I preferred giving this to a sketch of Ava, as being most likely to be the seat of that mission. The small size of Burman houses, and the fashion of filling their cities with stately fruit-trees, make them all appear to be far less populous than they really are. It would be a grateful task to acknowledge the kind nesses which were multiplied upon me in every place.

PREFACE.

. But such matters belong to the sacred recollections of private history. To publish them all, would require constant repetitions, in which the reader could take no interest ; and to name a part, would be doing injustice to the rest. Suffice it to say, that I was every where most affectionately and respectfully received, for my work's sake. Never had a man kinder homes when far from his own, not only among missionaries, but with private, civil, and military gentlemen. May He who blessed the enterprise, and bore me safely through, bless the publication ! Boston, February, 1839. CONTENTS PARTI TRAVELS IN BURMAH.

Chapter I

Departure — Employments — Illness — Comet — Company — Preach on Deck — Squall — Magellan Clouds — Send Letters — Trade- Winds — Another Illness — Tristan d'Acunha — Portuguese Menos- War — Ship Tigris for Ceylon — Encounter between a Whale and a Thresher — " Doubling Cape of Good Hope " — Day of Fasting — Enormous Shark — Nicobar Islands — First Sight of Idolaters — Kedgeree — Heavy Dews — Andaman Islands — Preparis and Narcondam p. 13

Chapter II

Arrival at Amherst — First Sabbath at Maulmain — Coasting Voyage Mouncrmagoung — Curiosity of the People — Walk over the Mountain — Tavoy — Mata — Karens ; their Piety, Liberality, Temperance, Gratitude ; Letters from Young Converts ; Churches; Books — Mergui ; Population ; Chinese ; Mussulmans; Christians; Siamese Shyans ; Important as a Missionary Station — Tennasserim Islands — Se-longs — Storm — Disagreeable Insects — Variety of Costumes — Karen Juggler p. 35 CHAPTER HI. Return to Maulmain — Missionary Conference — Preaching — Balu Island Karen Churches near Maulmain — Water Festival — Chinese Ceremony — The Mohurrum — River Excursion — Remarkable Caves — Karen Christian Village — Church-Meeting and Baptism Population of Maulmain — Commerce — State of Boodhism — State of the Mission — English Influence p. CONTENTS.

Chapter IV

Population of Rangoon ; Commerce; Prices of Living — Shoodagon Pagoda — Slaves of the Pagoda — Sunrise Worship — Rainy Monsoon — History of the Mission — Maubee — Labor of Native Assistants — Interesting Case — Voyage to Pegu — Evidences of former Greatness — Shoomadoo Pagoda — Voyage up the Irrawaddy — Boats — Mode of Fishing — Prome — Leper Village — Gaudama's Foot — Burman Energy — Earth-Oil Wells — Shyan Caravan — Ruins of Pagban — Attempt to buy Beef — Buffalo Herdmen — Curiosity of Natives — Toddy — Arrival at Ava p. 73

Chapter V

Ava — Splendid Kyoungs — Pagodas — Priests — Palace — Population — Arts — Prices — The Mekara Prince — Meawade Woongyee — The Burman Pontiff — Surrawa Prince — Climate of Ava — History of the Mission in Ava — Present State of Mission — Safety of the Missionaries — Roman Catholics — Sagaing — Marble Quarries — Mengoon Pagoda — Umerapoora p. 97

Chapter III

Population — Form and Features — Buildings Food Dress Manners and Customs — Character — Condition of Women — Marriage — Polygamy — Divorce — Diseases — Medical Practice — Midwifery — Funerals — Amusements — Musical Instruments — Manufactures p. J73

Chapter IV

Government — Orders of Nobility — Grades of Community — Magistracy — Laws — Division of Property p. 211

Chapter V

Revenue — Commerce — Currency — Army — Navy — Slavery — Division of Time — Weights and Measures — Language — Literature — Degree of Civilization p. 222