44 THROUGH THE KLAWNGS 



tantamount to saying more conscientiously than 

 the Christian sects. Dying, they pass with confi- 

 dence into the unknown; and their bodies are 

 burned and the ashes scattered to the four winds. 

 Their attitude towards life is truly philosophic; 

 and friends left behind conduct themselves with 

 equal sanity. If they cannot afford a private 

 funeral pyre, there are public ghats where the 

 bodies of their relatives and friends may be 

 burned. To be sure, at some of these ghats vul- 

 tures aid in the disposal of the late lamented, but 

 as a rule fire consumes the greater part of the flesh. 

 The Siamese are not a sporting nation, but if there 

 is any time when they may be said to hold sports 

 it is at a private cremation. As Hibernian clans of 

 Tammany reckon the social importance and polit- 

 ical pull of a departed brother by the number of 

 carriages his friends muster at the funeral, so in 

 Siam the scale and variety of the funeral festivities 

 mark the wealth and status and the grief of the 

 bereaved family. The pyre is built within the pri- 

 vate walls of the family estate, and after the simple 

 ceremony of the yellow-robed priests of Buddha, 

 the nearest male relative applies the match. Then 

 while the flames crackle the grieving family and 

 friends of the deceased make merry over the 

 cakes and sweetmeats and wines provided for the 

 occasion, and sometimes hired talent performs at 



