The white foreigners from over the water : the story of the American mission to the Burmese and the Karens. --

Preface

stories in this little book are true. It gives an account of the manner in which a downtrodden people received the gospel. They told the missionaries they had been waiting for " "White Foreigners from over the water" to bring them God's Book; their fathers had bidden them expect happiness to reach them in this way.

You like to read of great conquerors and brave soldiers. Here is the story of some of the conquests of Jesus, the Prince of Peace, and of some of the faithful soldiers who have fought under his banner. Nobler battles these than any to which mortal kings have led their followers ; far braver soldiers these, who have willingly and cheerfully suffered years of privation and persecution for the

O PREFACE.

love they bore to their Saviour and Lord. The kings of the earth kill to conquer; the King oi Heaven died to save.

The Son of God goes forth to war,

A kingly crown to gain ; His blood-red banner streams afar,

Who follows in his train ?

A noble army, men and boys,

The matron and the maid, Around the Saviour's throne rejoice,

In robes of light arrayed.

They climbed the steep ascent of heaven) Through peril, toil, and pain ;

O God, to us may grace be given, To follow in their train.

Contents

Oil A P.

I. Burmah; Its Animals And Plants

THE RELIGION AND CUSTOJIS OP THE BURMESE

Two BURMESE LEGENDS .

ii. in.

iv. DR. JUDSON VISITS FRANCE, ENGLAND, AND INDIA, AND SETTLES AT RANGOON ....

v. SOME VISITS PAID BY MRS. JUDSON. vi. MISSIONARY HOPES AND FEARS IN EANGOON . vii. VISITS TO THE KING AT AVA, AND THEIR RESULTS vin. DR. JUDSON AND DR. PRICE IN THE LET-MA-YOON-

TOUNG

ix. THE PRISON AT OUNG-BEN-LAI ....

X. DR. JUDSON ALONE AT AMHERST ....

xi. MAULMAIN AND NEW MISSIONARIES .... xu. THE KARENS AND THEIR TRADITIONS xni. A PRIEST'S FUNERAL — THE STORY OF GUAPUNG

XIV. MR. AND MRS. BOARDMAN GO TO TAVOY — TlIE

REBELLION 122

xv. MR. BOARDMAN'S WORK FINISHED — DR. MASON TAKES

HIS PLACE AT TAVGY , . . 134

PAG"

. 9 . 17

. 29

35 41 45 55

66 81 97 100 101 114

8 CONTENTS.

CHAP. PACfc

xvi. Da JUDSON AT RANGOON AGAIN— HE BRINGS MBS.

BOARDMAN TO MAULMAIN 142

xvn. MR. KINCAID AT RANGOON AND AVA— STORY OF PERSECUTIONS, AND OF CHRISTIAN GOVERNOR OF BASSEIN 147

xvni. MR. KINCAID AMONG ROBBERS 153

xix. LAST DAYS OF KOTHAHBYN 161

xx. MB. ABBOTT AND MR. KINCAID m ABBACAN —

STORY OF CHETZA 165

xxi. DB. JUDSON'S HOME 171

xxn. A GRAVE AT ST. HELENA ; AND A VISIT TO

AMERICA 180

xxni. THE RETURN TO MAULMAIN 185

xxiv. "BAT CASTLE'' — PERSECUTIONS IN RANGOON. . J87 xxv. NATIVE PREACHERS — STORY OF MYAT KYAN . 197 sxvi. MARTYRDOM OF THAGUA 204

xxvu. DB. JCDSON'S LAST VOYAGE 208

xxviii. THE DISPENSARY AT RANGOON .... 185

xxix. How THE PERSECUTIONS IN PEGU WERE ENDED . 221

xxx. THE GOSPEL SPREADING IN RANGOON AND THE

COUNTRY ABOUND 234

KXXI. DB. AND MRS. MASON REMOVE TO TOUNGHOO—

THE WHITE FOREIGNERS.

Chapter I. Burmah, With Its Animals And Plants

"OUKMAH is a country a little farther distant from England than India is. In the north it touches India, and is sometimes spoken of as Farther India. No doubt you can point to it on the map of the world, and know that the broad waters of the Bay of Bengal wash its shores.

Burmah is a warm, pleasant, and beautiful land, with high mountains, wide plains, deep fertile valleys, and broad flowing rivers. A great number of people dwell in it, either in cities built along the river banks, or in smaller towns and villages scattered over the country.

The largest river in Burmah is the Irrawadi, a river much larger than any we have in England. It runs right through the country, and divides into a number of channels or mouths where it enters the Bay of Bengal. A good many cities and towns are built upon its banks; Ava, Prome, Kangoon, Bassein, and many more. Another river, the Salween, flows very much in the same direction, and at its mouth are built Amherst and Maulmain. Between the Irrawadi and the Salween is another river, the Sittang, upon the banks of which the old city of Tounghoo is situated. Lower down on the sea coast are Tavoy and Mergui, and to the north lies the province of Arracan.

But the towns arid villages, and the cultivated land around them, by no means fill the country, 'ihere are vast jungles and forests, in which wild beasts roam at pleasure. Tigers, leopards, elephants, buffaloes, wild hogs and oxen, and many kind of deer are found in the land. They are not all creatures that you would wish to meet, are they ? Unless, indeed, you were well armed and prepared for them — then a hunt might be pleasant.

The elephants are sometimes hunted for the sake of their tusks ; and many are caught, and tamed, and forced to work for their owners. I am sure you have often heard stories of elephants, and know what sensible creatures they are. White elephants are very much prized, and the kings always like to possess one or more, and to have the title of " Lord of the white elephant."

BURMAH, WITH ITS ANIMALS AND PLANTS. 11

Men are sometimes eaten by the tigers. These animals do not, like the wild elephants, keep far away from the villages, but will venture quite close to them, and will even enter the compounds, that is, the house enclosures. If once a tiger has eaten human flesh, and finds out how nice it is, he will always try to get more, and then it is very dangerous to meet him.

Once a missionary reached a lonely cabin just at dusk, and was surprised to find it closely barricaded all around. He called to the men who were inside, and asked of what enemy they were afraid, that they should shut themselves in so closely? They told him that the day before a man had been eaten by a tiger close by. When this was known, five men had armed themselves, and had gone out to hunt and kill the animal. They found his track, and were following it, but instead of succeeding in killing the tiger, he had come out boldly on to the plain, and had actually leaped upon one of his pursuers, and devoured him also. The other four had returned to their hut, and, for fear the tiger should attack them, had barricaded themselves in. As it was already dusk, I should think the missionary must have been glad to take refuge with them for the night. A tiger once actually walked into a wayside shed and carried off a young man who was sleeping amongst a number of others.

Leopards also attack men, and will even climb trees. Two men were overtaken by night in the forests near Mauhnain. No house was near, so they climbed a large tree and went to sleep among the branches. One man was on a lower branch than his fellow, and by-and-by he was awakened by something creeping along the branch above him. From what he could distinguish of the dusky form in the darkness, he thought it was a tiger. He was not far wrong : it was a leopard. He called to his sleeping companion, the man answered, and the leopard was perfectly still for a few minutes — not a claw moved. But though the man had answered, he was not aroused, and was sound asleep again directly. His companion dared not go to him, and in a little time the leopard seized him, and jumping down with him, ate him there at the foot of the tree.

The rhinoceros is as much feared as the tiger, and this animal is very common. If it is once provoked, it will not leave its enemy; and it is so thickly covered with hard skin that it is not easy to kill. If a man, to escape the rage of a rhinoceros, climbs a tree, it is said that the huge creature will remain at its foot for three or four days without once quitting its post. Ehinoceroses like muddy places in which they can roll about, and they are met with mostly on the river banks, though they sometimes roam over the mountains. The Chinese buy rhinoceros horns for medicine : I cannot tell you for what diseases they use them. There is one kind of rhinoceros that the people say eats fire ; if that were true, it must be a very extraordinary and terrible creature, but I

BURMAH, WITH ITS ANIMALS AND PLANTS. 13

am sure you will agree with me in thinking they must have made a mistake.

There are plenty of monkeys of different kinds amongst the trees, gibbering and chattering. One species, the long-armed ape, is very plentiful, and these monkeys have a habit of screaming as soon as the day dawns. There is a monkey, too, which abounds on the seashore, called the fisher monkey. It feeds upon crabs and shell fish. The fisher monkeys come down in troops when the tide is low, to hunt ; and there you might see them, some busy turning over the stones, others breaking open shells, or thrusting their arms into the sand to dig out the crabs which have buried themselves to escape their foes. These monkeys like fruit as well as fish. Once a missionary, Dr. Mason, was passing near the shore in a boat, and a troop of fisher monkeys followed him for some distance to get the plantains which he threw into the water for them.

There are also large numbers of squirrels and bats. The largest kind of bat is called the flying fox, and sometimes it measures more than a yard across the wings from tip to tip. These bats are very fond of fruit, and steal it wherever they can. In some parts of the country they may be seen, many of them together, hanging by their heels, as is the custom of bats, from the tops of the Palmyra palms. The bats which get into houses are smaller. You will by-and-by read of a house in which there were a great number of these troublesome creatures.

Of birds there are many, such as vultures, eagles, kites, buzzards, falcons, owls, hawks, and crows. Crows are so plentiful everywhere that women, when carrying fruit, always have a stick to drive them away. They are very bold indeed. One pleasant morning a gentleman was sitting in his verandah, sipping coffee. His toast was on the table by his side, and he was enjoying the cool freshness of the morning air. For a minute he turned away to speak to some one, and on looking round again he discovered that a greedy crow had actually carried his toast away. Don't you think it must have been crows that Pharaoh's baker, of whom we read in the Bible, saw in his dream devouring the baked meats out of the basket on his head ?

Then there are birds of a different kind, such as wagtails, finches, larks, hornbills, tailor birds, cuckoos, and one, the paradise edolius, is a very beautiful singer. There are parrots, peacocks, pheasants, partridges, pigeons, quails, turtle-doves, and wild fowl. By the rivers and seaside you would find adjutants, bitterns, ibises, herons, rails, snipes, oystercatchers, teals, pelicans, cormorants, scissors-bills, and many more. Some of these you know as English birds ; but though they have the same name, and are of similar kinds, most of them are of different species to those we see here. The parrots often come down in great flocks upon the rice fields, and are very destructive. Pelicans, too, are seen in flocks of from fifty to a hundred. The birds' nests which

BURMAH, WITH ITS ANIMALS AND PLANTS. 15

are eaten by the Chinese are found on the coast near Tavoy ; they are built by a species of swallow in limestone caves, and are collected by the natives for sale.

Crocodiles, turtles, lizards, serpents, and frogs abound. Some of the lizards are useful for killing rats ; but they are at the same time very disagreeable, because they get so much into the houses : you could never be sure, if you were eating your dinner in Burmah, that a lizard would not drop down from the ceiling on to the table. Some of the lizards are eaten for food.

Insects are very plentiful. Here are the names of some : tiger beetles, long-snouted beetles, capricorn beetles, camelopard, ladybird, musk, and chameleon beetles. The wing-cases of the chameleon beetle are very beautiful, and are used for necklaces or, mixed with flowers, for head ornaments. The Capricorn beetle is more than two inches long, and sometimes flies into the houses at Maulmain. Glowworms, fireflies, blisterflies, locusts, soothsayers, the walking-stick and walking-leaf insects, ants, butterflies, spiders, and ant-lions, which make pits for other insects. One species of the walking-stick insect is nearly as much as twelve inches long. The soothsayers, or mantis, are considered very pious insects, because they hold their fore-feet together as though they were praying. Xavier, it is said, once seeing a mantis moving along in its solemn way, told it to sing hymns, and immediately it began to sing. I don't think any one has heard it since. The white ants are very troublesome in the houses, destroying everything. At one time of the year they come into the houses in such numbers that people are glad to go anywhere to be out of their way.

Large books have been written describing these living creatures and their wonderful habits, and still there is a great deal to tell. " The works of the Lord are great, sought out of all those who have pleasure therein." These beasts and birds and insects are some of his works ; and I hope you find pleasure in seeking out as much knowledge concerning them as possible.

I must just say a word about the plants of Burmah. There are many fine timber trees growing in the forests ; one of the principal is the teak tree, the wood of which is very hard, and another is the ironwood tree. Then there are pines and palms of many kinds ; and trees bearing most gorgeous flowers and most luscious fruits, such as jacks, bread-fruit trees, tamarinds, mulberries, citrons, oranges, guavas, mangoes, cocoa nuts, cashew nuts, and many more. There are vegetables and flowers in plenty for the gardens and fields : yams, beans, potatoes, tomatoes, mushrooms, pineapples, wheat, maize, rice, and so on. Ferns, mosses, and orchids grow in great luxuriance, and in wet seasons so quickly do they grow that long fern fronds are sometimes seen hanging from the half-finished brick-work of the pagodas, where masons were at work not many weeks before. The orchids are peculiarly beautiful, on account of their lovely fragrant flowers ; many of these which grow as wild flowers in Burmah we cultivate in England with great care in our hothouses.

These are a few, and but very few, of the plants found in Burmah ; but it will be enough to show how fertile a land it must be : a land in which God has made most ample provision for the wants of man.

CHAPTEE IT-

THE RELIGION AND CUSTOMS OF THE BURMESE.

WHEN God placed man on the earth, he blessed him, and said : " Have dominion over the fish of the sea, and over the fowl of the air, and over every living thing that moveth upon the earth. Behold, I have given you every herb bearing seed which is upon the face of all the earth, and every tree, in the which is the fruit of a tree yielding seed, to you it shall be for meat." " And God breathed into his nostrils the breath of life, and man became a living soul."

For many hundreds of years the inhabitants of Burmah have lived in their beautiful land, surrounded on every side with blessings which God has given to them, but God they have forgotten. " Their idols tire silver and gold, the work of men's hands ; they

G have mouths, but they speak not ; eyes have they, but they see not ; they have ears, but they hear not ; noses have they, but they smell not ; they have hands, but they handle not; feet have they, but they walk not ; neither speak they through their throats."

The religion of Burmah is Buddhism. This is the religion not only of Burmah but of many of the inhabitants of China, Siam, Tartary, and Ceylon. It is computed that there are as many as four hundred millions of people in the world who are worshippers of Buddha.

I could not explain to you all that the Buddhists believe. A Buddh is one who has made himself a god by his own virtues and by practising great self-denial. They say that already, since the beginning of time, there have been four great Buddhs — Kanthathan, Gaunagon, Kathapa, and Gaudama.

The last, Gaudama, is the one they worship now. They believe he was in existence for many ages before he became a man, but not as a god. Once he was a tiger, at one time a deer, at another an elephant ; at one time he ruled in heaven, and at another in hell. At last he was born as a child in India ; and when we compare the Burmese dates with our own, we find that this is said to have happened about six hundred years before Christ came to the earth, and about the time that the ten tribes were carried captive from Palestine to be scattered and sown among the nations of the earth.

Gaudama, the Burmese say, was born under a tree now called the Amherstia, and that as soon as he was born he got up, walked seven steps, and with a voice like the roaring of the king of lions exclaimed ' " I am the most excellent of men. I am the mos? famous of men. I am the most victorious of men." If this account were true, he must certainly have been very different to ordinary babies.

He was the son of a great Indian monarch ; but, instead of living in ease and luxury at his father's court, he fled away into the wilderness, where he practised very great self-denial. Many stories are told of the wonderful things that happened to him, but at last, when he was eighty years old, he died.

And now do you suppose the Buddhists think Gaudama is in heaven ? Not at all ; they believe he has gone out of existence altogether. They could not tell you anything about where their god is, and yet they worship him, and say they are to worship him for five thousand years. When the five thousand years are ended they expect another Buddh, named Aremaday, and he is to flourish eighty thousand years.

Some of the doctrines that Gaudama taught are very good. His great commands to his followers are these : " Kill not ; steal not ; commit no uncleanness ; lie not ; drink no intoxicating liquor."

The Buddhists, you will say, if they keep these commands are not bad people. Some of his commands are the very same that God gave to the Jews on Mount Sinai.

But they do not keep them. They make images of Gaudama and place them in temples; they bring offerings of gold leaf and flowers, of umbrellas and crackers, to show their devotion to him. They build pagodas over his relics, and expend large sums of money in gilding them handsomely. They support priests, who preach to them about him in the zayats ; all this they do, and yet do not obey his commands.

Are you surprised ? Do we obey the commands of our God ? No, they are broken ; you break them every day ; and yet a great many of us try very hard to do as God would have us do.

But, you will say, our religion is quite different to theirs ; ours is the true God, and theirs is a false god. That is true ; and there is one great difference between the true religion and all false religions. The difference lies in the two words, love and fear.

The great commands of God's religion are these : " Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy strength, and with all thy mind, and thy neighbour as thyself." " This do, and thou shalt live."

And then when we sinned, and did not obey these commands, and were worthy of nothing but death, "God so loved the world, that he gave his onlybegotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life." Now the two great commandments are : " Believe on the

RELIGION AND CUSTOMS OP THE BURMESE. 21

name of his Son Jesus Christ," and, "Love one another." And Jesus says to us — Jesus who has died for us : "If ye love me. keep my commandments." Should we not answer : " We have known and believed the love that God hath to us." " We love him because he first loved us." His commandments, which are all embraced in that one word, " love," are not grievous.

This, in short, is the religion the Bible teaches. The Buddhists know no Redeemer who has died to save them, though they are aware they constantly sin ; they know nothing of God's love and a Saviour's compassion, and life everlasting with him. Their religion is a religion of fear. They fear that when they die they shall again come into the world as a lion or a toad, a lizard or a rhinoceros, and believe that the better they are the sooner they shall come to what they call nigban, or a state in which they shall not exist at all.

The priests of the Buddhists in Burmah are more like monks than priests. They are called pongyees, and dwell in houses or kyoungs, apart from the people. These pongyees may not marry, and ought not even to look at a woman. The rules they have to observe about women are so strict that if a pongyee were to pass by a place where his own mother had fallen into the river, he might not put out his hands to assist her in her efforts to reach the bank. If no one else were near, he might, rather than allow her to drown, reach a pole or a stick to her to take hold of ; but then he must think it is nothing more than a log he is dragging out of the water. It must, you see, be difficult to be a good son and a good pongyee at the same time.

One day a priest from Ava called upon a missionary's wife — Mrs. Mason. She entered the room in which he was, and immediately the pongyee took a seat upon the table. Mrs. Mason did not approve of such manners, but she knew it was only in order to keep his head above hers that her visitor had chosen such a seat ; therefore she called for a mat and pillow for herself, and sat down upon the floor. Seeing her so low, he consented to move and sit down also. This priest had called to talk with Mrs. Mason about the Christian religion. She handed him a copy of the Bible in Burmese. He asked her to lay it on the mat for him to take, as he dared not defile himself by receiving it from her hand. This she did, and then he took the book and read portions of it aloud.

The pongyees dress in yellow robes and go about with shaven heads and bare feet. Some carry rice pots round the towns in the mornings, and go from door to door begging for food — or rather, they do not beg, but stand outside and wait till food is brought. They only eat once a day, and are not allowed to have gold, or silver, or ornaments.

In the kyoungs the boys are taught to read ; and the pongyees are their teachers. The books they use do not resemble ours, but are written on palm leaves. They have no slates, or pencils, or maps. They are principally taught to read the stories of Gaudama's life, and what is written in the sacred books about him and those who have refused to believe in him. When they go to school they wear a yellow dress like their teachers ; but this is not all the year round. The Burmese boys go to school in the rainy season, as the Scotch boys do in winter ; but in the dry warm weather they are either helping their fathers or amusing themselves.

Sometimes the priests preach to the people in the zayats, and here too they do very little more thaa recount the stories about Gaudama. The zayats are open sheds. They are built in all the towns and along the high roads of the country. They are used as inns and market places, and any one may go in and rest, or lie down and sleep in them. At Tavoy there is a very fine zayat.

There are in Burmah many immense images of Gaudama, and the temples are crowded with them. At the new and full moon the people go up to worship ; and from July to October they are very strict in their religious observances — indeed, they make that time a kind of Lent. In October especially they hold many religious festivals, and flock to the places where there are the most famous pagodas and temples. The pagodas hold the relics of Gaudama, the temples his images.

Numbers of boats filled with gaily-dressed people may be seen at these festival times gliding over the waters of the rivers ; and while listening to the music from the bands on board, you would suppose anything rather than that these people were going to worship. But when they reach the temples they at once become grave, and hasten in with their offerings and say their prayers as quickly as possible. I am afraid, although these people do it gravely, you and I would be inclined to laugh at the scenes in the temples. Some men may be seen gluing gold leaf upon the faces of the images, and others letting off crackers in their honour.

The numbers of paper umbrellas, fruits, and flowers, brought as offerings are enormous. At one temple — but this was in Ceylon, not in Burmah — it' is said that 6,480,320 flowers were brought on one occasion. I should like to know who counted them. The umbrellas are sometimes white, sometimes gold and white, sometimes they are made of many different coloured papers. But of what use these crackers, which fill the temples with smoke and noise, and these fruits, and flowers, and umbrellas, scattered about in all directions — of what use they can be, you and I would find it difficult to imagine.

How different these offerings from those our God asks of us ! " My son," he says, " give me thy heart." " A broken and a contrite heart, 0 God, thou wilt not despise." All other offerings Christ our Saviour made for us when he offered himself without spot to God.

We have spoken of kyoungs, zayats, temples, and pagodas, but have said nothing about the houses. Many of the houses are nothing but little bamboo dwellings, raised by posts a few feet from the ground. There is no cold to keep out, and the builders are not careful to make the walls air-tight. The bamboos are put up rough, and there are generally plenty of crevices through which the inhabitants can look out without troubling about windows. The floors of these houses are made of woven bamboo, and are elastic, which would be to us uncomfortable for walking on. The roofs are thatched with the leaves of the water palm, and most of the houses have a verandah. In the large towns there are some board and some brick houses, but most of the native dwellings are these slight bamboo buildings.

The men wear a long cloth, called a putso, wound around their bodies ; the women wear a smaller piece, called a termine ; and both use a white linen jacket, called an ingie. Men, women, and children all smoke.

Have you noticed that I have told you only of boys in the schools and of men in the temples ? Do you want to know where the girls are taught and where the women worship ? Women and girls are not taught to read at all, and they worship outside the temples— they are not considered worthy to come inside. The women are the slaves, not the companions of the men. They work hard, and do many things which in this country we think fit only for labouring men to do. No Burmese woman is permitted to leave the country.

Besides the Burmese there are other tribes dwelling in Burmah ; one especially, the Karen nation, is scattered far and wide over the land. The Karens have been conquered by the Burmese, and are heavily taxed and cruelly oppressed by them.

The Karens do not worship Gaudama — they believe there are a great many gods, a god of the earth, a god of the land, a god of the waters, a god of the sun, a god of the moon, a god of the trees, a god of the woods, and so on. They are great believers in ghosts, too, and fear them very much ;