CORONATION OF THE KING OF SIAM 
413 
taken from the Germans, and an exag- 
gerated swinging of the disengaged arm 
to accentuate the time ; they also took a 
very long step and marched very fast. 
It could not be kept up for any length 
of time. 
After the march past, all the senior 
officers assembled, mounted, in front of 
the King, when the Minister for War 
(a prince of the blood) was promoted 
to the rank of field marshal and pre- 
sented with a gold baton. The King's 
younger brother and heir apparent was 
at the same time made a full general of 
the army. Three hours were taken up 
by the ceremony. 
That evening a reception was given 
by the head of the Ministry for War at 
the War Department building. About 
4,000 troops marched past in a torchlight 
procession, and then filed into the inner 
court, where they performed various 
evolutions, making complicated figures 
of light, ending with an enormous out- 
line of the royal crown. 
In the early morning of Friday, the 
8th, there was an excursion by rail in the 
King's luxurious private train, for such 
official visitors as desired to see the an- 
cient capital atAyuthea, some forty miles 
up the Menam River, and to Bang-Pa-In, 
the royal country palace. The appoint- 
ments of the train and royal launches 
that met us were of the usual lavish and 
luxurious type, with every detail of hos- 
pitality. 
In the evening a reception and exhibi- 
tion of fireworks were given by the 
Ministry of Marine at the royal landing, 
near the palace, on the river. All the 
ships on the stream were decorated with 
electric lights. The daylight water pa- 
rade was practically repeated, with the 
royal barges outlined in electric lights of 
various colors. The crews chanted a 
lauditory welcome to their ruler as they 
passed. The exhibition closed by there 
suddenly appearing from out the gloom, 
a mile or more down river, a beautiful 
white temple (Wat Chang), illuminated 
by colored Bengal fires. 
On Saturday, the 9th, a grand muster 
by the Honorable Corps of the Wild 
Tigers was given on their club-house 
grounds. This corps is a sort of grown- 
up Boy Scout aggregation, and was in- 
stituted by the present King. They wear 
a similar uniform to the Boy Scouts. It 
is composed of office-holders and others 
who are not subject to conscription for 
the army, and is a purely volunteer asso- 
ciation, with the King as its head. Wild 
Tigers was the native name for the an- 
cient militia of the land, revived for this 
organization. There were fully 5,000 on 
the field, and as they would mass up at 
a run suggested, in their black uniforms 
with yellow trimmings, the swarming of 
a lot of bumble bees. A mounted de- 
tachment of them acted as special escort 
to the King, and were very effective, 
with tiger-skin saddle cloths and long 
lances with drooping white plumes mid- 
way of the shaft. 
Next evening there was a reception at 
their club-house. The extensive grounds 
were beautifully decorated, a veritable 
dream of fairy-land. Each company — 
and there must have been at least fifty — ■- 
had a booth where they dispensed drinks, 
food, and souvenirs to all their friends 
who called. The mounted companv's 
booth represented a bivouac camp, with 
their ponies under nipa shelters. An- 
other booth was an enormous prone 
papier-mache tiger, one hundred and 
thirty feet long. Entertainment inside. 
Another, just the head of a tiger, teeth, 
eyes, and claws, containing electric lights 
The lake was covered with paper lotus 
flowers, electric lighted, and the drives 
and paths were a mass of lighted lan- 
terns and bunting hangings. 
This function closed the fetes in honor 
of the coronation. During the whole 
gala week there was a continuous suc- 
cession of elaborate dinners, luncheons, 
and receptions by the various officials. 
Two dinners were given at the palace 
by the King, with two hundred plates at 
each. The service was perfect. 
Bangkok is situated thirty miles up the 
IMenam River from the coast, and is hot 
at all seasons, though near the 15th par- 
allel of latitude. It is in the center of 
an immense "paddy" (rice) field, ex- 
tending in all directions to the horizon. 
This great extent of paddy country ac- 
counts for the nation, as rice is their 
