THE FORGOTTEN RUINS OF INDO-CHINA 
211 
this period may be extended two weeks 
earlier or two weeks later, but one is 
liable to be disappointed if he attempts 
the journey outside of these dates, and 
outside of the three months indicated it 
is utterly impracticable. 
A trip anywhere must have a begin- 
ning, and this begins at Saigon, the capi- 
tal of Cochin China, in the southeastern 
corner of the Asiatic mainland, because 
Saigon is the nearest practicable seaport. 
There are no hotels at Angkor, nor any 
place nor any people to provide you food 
or lodging. A rest-house is there, con- 
sisting of roof, floor, and walls, and that 
is all. 
And that is why I started for the ruins 
one morning early in December with a 
steamer-trunk full of tropical clothing, a 
steamer-rug, a camp-bed, a Cambodian 
mattress (splendid thing for comfort), a 
supply of provisions, and a Chinese cook. 
A railroad journey of 44 miles brought 
me to the end of the line at Mytho. 
From this point the journey is up the 
broad Mekong River by steamboat for 
the next 24 hours ; and you are not sorry 
when it is ended, either, for the accom- 
modations are anything but luxurious. 
The Mekong is one of the world's 
greatest streams ; it is the one great river 
of the peninsula of Indo-China. If you 
follow it up far enough, you will find its 
headwaters not far from the great cen- 
tral plateau of Asia. In its middle course 
it is a magnificent stream, and in its 
lower it is another Mississippi delta, 
spreading out over and embracing the 
broad, flat plain it has created, and reach- 
ing the sea at last through a number of 
bayous and passes. A few years ago the 
crocodile and rhinoceros frequented its 
banks, but these have now retreated far- 
ther up-stream. 
A sheet of yellow water a mile or so 
wide, fringed with cocoanut and arica 
palms ; some banyans, bananas, and a 
tangle of liana vines ; an occasional bird 
or two ; a native sampan, a Chinese junk ; 
patches of rice and acres of swamp land ; 
no hills in sight to relieve the monot- 
ony — such is the vista of the first day's 
journey, which lands you at Pnom Penh, 
the modern capital of Cambodia. 
An attractive little place is Pnom 
Penh, with well-paved streets — it takes 
the French to make good roads and keep 
them good — a gentle monsoon to cool the 
air ; a few characteristic buildings of the 
Cambodian royalty, suggesting "a gen- 
eral flavor of mild decay" ; a pagoda 
with a silver-plated floor and an absent- 
minded looking Buddha made out of 
glass, attended by a priestess clad in gold 
and glittering with diamonds ; a "library" 
without a book in it ; processions of 
Buddhist priests in bright yellow robes ; 
natives in bright-colored silks and cot- 
tons ; and, above all, the "Pnom" itself, 
a structure erected as a monument and 
possessing some lines of beauty that 
more than atone for its grotesque fea- 
tures. 
His Majesty King Sisowath appears 
to have an easy, comfortable time of it, 
and that is the greatest desideratum to a 
sovereign whose sway is in the tropics. 
He is surrounded by a numerous entour- 
age ; he has his ministers and all sorts of 
supernumeraries, and can go through the 
motions of governing, draw his pay for 
it right royally, and still be free from 
any distressing consequences and annoy- 
ing details. His minister of war has 
charge of his elephants, used now in his 
military parades rather than for warlike 
purposes. 
The story goes that a few years ago, 
like any up-to-date sovereign, he felt the 
need of a navy for his admiral to com- 
mand. A dismantled cruiser was kindly 
furnished him by the protectorate, and 
his majesty proceeded to pay a visit to 
the King of Annam. Returning from 
the visit, the whole royal party took to 
sampans, such as they had always been 
acquainted with, and the discredited 
cruiser was reduced to tugboat duty, 
and so returned to Pnom Penh convoy- 
ing a whole fleet of sampans. 
It is startling to hear a group of Cam- 
bodians talking and laughing together, 
especially after one has grown accus- 
tomed to the sound of Annamite and 
Chinese voices. The latter, being mono- 
syllabic and tonal, cannot change the 
quality of tone without at the same time 
changing the meaning of the word, 
whereas European languages can modu- 
late the tone at will, and are thus more 
flexible and expressive of feeling. When 
you hear the hum of Cambodian voices 
