1874.] 
9 
Sir Arthur P. Phayre —On the History of Pegu. 
The emperor, anxious to preserve the empire unbroken, determined once more 
to invade Siam, in order to subdue that country. But the large armies 
which his father had assembled could no longer he raised. The expedition 
was entrusted to the Upa Badza, who marched in November 1590. Nearly 
the whole of this army was destroyed by incessant attacks from the Siamese. 
The Upa Badza was severely rebuked by his father on his return, and many 
of the superior officers were put to death. As some compensation for this 
disaster, the kings of Prome and Ava were successful in an expedition against 
Mogaung, where the Tsaubwa had rebelled. 
The emperor once more sent an invading army against Siam under the 
Upa Badza. He succeeded in reaching near to Yodaya, hut in a battle 
with Byanarit, in February 1593, the Upa Badza was killed, and but few 
of the invaders lived to return home. Meng-re-kyau-tswa, the king of 
Ava, was now appointed Upa Badza. 
Pegu was now utterly exhausted. Discontent was universal, and the 
emperor, suspicious of every one, became wantonly cruel. The Buddhist 
monks of Talking race excited his hatred. Numbers of them he forced to 
become laymen, and then either exiled or killed them. Thousands of the 
Mun people abandoned their country and fled, while those caught in their 
flight were put to death for the attempt. The country of' the delta became 
depopulated, and an attempt was then made to drive down the people from the 
upper Erawati, to till the fertile land of Pegu. But famine and plague raged, 
and there was no help.* During this calamity, the king of Siam having 
come with an army to Martaban, the whole Talking population joined him. 
He advanced to Hanthawati, but hearing that a force was moving down 
from Taungu, he retreated to Martaban, and thence to his own country. 
The king of Prome now rebelled against his father, and determined to take 
possession of Taungu, the native state of the family. He marched there, but 
as the Siamese had retreated from Pegu, the king of Taungu set out to 
return home and recover his capital. His brother of Prome then retired, 
carrying off all the cattle he could seize. At this time, the younger brother 
* The traveller Bernier, writing from Dilili in 1663 to the minister Colbert, alludes 
to these dreadful events. Commenting on the internal disorder and the weakness of 
most Asiatic states, he observes : “ To remove the danger of commotion, and put an 
“ end to all fears on that subject, nothing more appears necessary than the measure 
“ adopted by a Brahmin of Pegu, who actually caused the death of half that population 
“ by famine, converted the country into forests, and prevented for many years the 
“ tillage of the land. But all this did not suffice. Even the Brahmin’s plan was unsuc- 
“ cessful; a division of the kingdom took place, and Ava the capital was very lately on 
“ the point of being captured by a handful of fugitives from China.” The Brahmin of 
Pegu here mentioned is the “ Brahma king of Pegu” of the Portuguese, the Burma king 
as we now write it. In 1662, a Chinese army did advance to Ava, to demand a fugitive 
Prince, whom the king of Ava delivered up, pretending to suspect him of hostile designs. 
E 
