File:Indian pictures and problems (1907) (14775363944).jpg

Identifier: indianpicturespr00malc (find matches)
Title: Indian pictures and problems
Year: 1907 (1900s)
Authors: Malcolm, Ian, Sir, 1868-1944
Subjects: India -- Description and travel Burma -- Description and travel
Publisher: London : E. Grant Richard
Contributing Library: University of California Libraries
Digitizing Sponsor: MSN

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se scenes of bygonesplendour, with their memories of kingly pageantsand of savage torture, now buried in desertedvillages with their crumbling monuments of anancient faith. Still further down the river isPagan—the capital of Burma in the ninth century—at that date remarkable for the beauty andextent of its numberless pagodas and secularbuildings. Alas, the ravages of time, and of aChinese army twenty-six millions strong in thethirteenth century, have reduced this famouscapital to a city of the dead; like Angkor onthe Cambodian frontier, and like Ayothia in Siam,its ruins alone remain to mark its historicalexistence. In spite, however, of this melancholy archaso-logical fact, the people from the neighbourhoodof Pagan were anything but dead when theViceroys flotilla arrived amongst them. Weanchored in the foreground of a brilliant sunset,which lent additional colour to the animated sceneupon the river banks. A huge barge of honour,in the likeness of an immense green red and gold 282
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THE GREAT RIVER dragon, was brought out to meet the party,and was then towed to land by the semi-nudecrews of a dozen dug-outs. Upon the shore waserected the reception hall, decorated and hungwith lanterns; the chiefs of the neighbourhoodwere assembled within, and their daughters andwives, dressed in their best, performed a dancein honour of the illustrious guest. But nightwas approaching, and a visit had yet to be paidto the great pagodas of Pagan. Imagine thescene as darkness drew on. A multitude of cheeryfaces and miles of gay silk clothing lined the roadfor all its length, and lightened our way withthousands of coloured flares and lanterns. Atthe head of the procession rode the native escort,and then the Viceroy; following him came LadyCurzon, carried in a great golden chair (once theprocessional throne of King Theebaw) high uponthe shoulders of forty natives, who chanted asthey ambled along; and the cavalcade closed withthe staff, mounted upon sturdy little Burmeseponies. Most my

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