The Pearl of Asia/Chapter 9
IX.
Peculiar Manner of Scaring Away
the Dragon.
While lying on the river at Petchaburee, an inland city, about seventy-five miles from Bangkok, I was awakened by the most hideous noise; the firing of guns, shooting of crackers, beating of drums and tom-toms and the shouting of a vast multitude. Looking out of the window of my boat a weird spectacle presented itself to my vision. The whole place was lighted up by huge bonfires on the banks of the stream and the air full of glittering rockets. Calling my kavass I inquired what was the occasion of the hubbub? With his usual vye, touching the points of his fingers together and raising them up on a level with his breast, he replied, "Your Excellency, the great dragon has the moon swallowed up." Having heard that the natives thus celebrated the approach of an eclipse, I stepped ashore and mingled with the crowd which was mate up of all classes, old and young, with a large sprinkling of yellow-robed priests who were as active as the others in keeping up the unearthly din. It was a lovely morn, the southern cross hung like a gleaming jewel in the upper deep, gentle zephyrs perfumed by myriads of flowers fanned the brow and waved the feathery bamboo as gently as the coquette her fan, the round orbed moon, a bright silver disk, was suspended in the western heavens, burnished like the shield of Achilles, while all around burned the many fires which shed a glare on the crowd of half-clad adults and naked children. A shadow had just fallen upon the surface of the queen of night, slowly if spread over it until the face of the great luminary was covered, and it hung in the cloudless heavens an orb of roseate hue, its radiance all gone. Then the noise became terrific, the reports of guns and crackers were almost deafening, which increased as a gleam of silver tinged the outer rim of the dimmed goddess. Slowly the shadow passed away, the light growing brighter and brighter, the great, dragon Asura Rahu, that had attempted to swallow the moon, had been driven away and it again shone in all of its brilliancy, but soon faded away before the corruscations of the coming dawn. It was a scene photographed on the memory worthy the pen of an Arnold or the pencil of a Titian: the ruddy glow of the flowing water, the multitude upon the river banks with its white houses embowered in dense foliage, the frantic efforts of the people as the shadow drifted across the disk of the moon and fell across the landscape and the glare of the fires that lighted up the immediate surroundings, a spectacle that could be witnessed nowhere else save in the interior of Siam, where no white man dwells and the native clings to his superstitions as religiously as did his forefathers ere the present dynasty ascended the throne of this kingdom. It was early morn ere peace reigned once more, and when, the sun rose amid the pearliest of skies its beams lit up a lovely scene, gilding the spires of the wats and roofs of the palaces; business had resumed its sway, the fisherman was hawking fish, the fruitier his fruit, the merchant had displayed his goods on the counter, the priests were gathering their food into their rice pots for the day's provender and the moon and the dragon seemed to have passed into oblivion, the only evidence of the nocturnal saturnalia being the smoking pyres that had been lighted and the exploded red and white crackers that strewed the ground.
Upon inquiry I learned that it has been the custom of the people of Siam from time immemorial to thus drive off the dragon Rahu and the legend runs thus: According to Buddhistic belief, in a former state of transmigration the sun (Athil), the moon (Chen), and the Asura Rahu were brothers. They gave alms to the priests, the first on a golden salver, the second in a silver vase and the latter in a black pot, which led to their all being born as angels; the first as angel of the sun, second as angel of the noon and the third as the angel Rahu. The latter, who had been on bad terms with his brethren, sinned and became one of the Asuras, or fallen angels, who were expelled from heaven by Indra, king of the lower heavens, in a drunken state and driven to a region underneath Meru, the central mountain, from which they make continual sallies, vainly attempting to regain their former abode, the most powerful of which is Asura Rahu, who is always known to be abroad by his attempting to swallow the sun and moon, his brothers, which occasions the eclipses; but the rapid motion of these bodies make it impossible for him to hold them for any length of time. At some great Siamese ceremonies one may see an enormous serpent or dragon, made of lamps, ingeniously joined together, and borne about by a number of men, intended to represent Rabu chasing the moon. Conversing with some of the leading Princes in regard to this legend, they smilingly remarked that the ceremonies now attending the eclipse was but the more keeping up of an ancient custom, like the western nations hanging up stockings for St. Nicholas to fill with sweets; that the belief in the dragon Rahu of Siam was but a myth, as was that of St. George and the dragon of Britain.
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