release. But, lo ! a savage yell, and in sprang fifty
Burmans, savagely shouting revenge. The " teachers"
were seized everything was stripped from them but
their pantaloons their naked arms were corded
behind and as tightly as the strength of one man
would permit ; and, dragging them forth, they carried
them through the streets to the place of execution,
11 almost literally upon the points of their spears."

The " spotted man" was in waiting. The pri-
soners were ordered to " sit upon their knees, with
their bodies bending forward," that the executioner
might " more conveniently" do his work. The order
to " behead" was already given, and the weapon of
death uplifted, when one of the teachers, requesting
him to desist for a moment, proposed to the Yawoon
to send him on board the ships, and he would intercede
with the English commander to prevent any farther
firing upon the town. " If the English fire again,"
said he, momentarily relenting, and catching at the
proffered mediation, " there shall be no reprieve. But
will you positively promise to put an immediate stop to
the firing?" Just at that instant the guns which
had been silent from the moment when the keepers in
the prison fled fired, upon the very spot where the



A SURPRISE. 137

ruffians were gathered, sundry heavy shots. The autho-
rities, fleeing from the seat of judgment, took refuge
under the banks of a neighbouring tank ; whilst the
others, in a frenzy of terror, took to their heels out
of the town.

The prisoners, meanwhile, were kept in the van,
compelled to accompany the fugitives, and expecting
each moment to be their last. They had proceeded
about half a mile, when they were overtaken by the
authorities on horseback, likewise escaping for their
life. Now another mile from the town, they halted
for a few moments, and again placed the prisoners
before them. The "teacher" renewed his petition;
and, after a brief consultation, his irons were taken off,
and he was sent on board the frigate, with a threatening
of " certain death if he did not succeed."

The other prisoners were obliged to move for-
ward, until they reached a strong building at the foot
of a golden pagoda, where they were confined for the
night. The keeper, as it began to grow dark, was
induced, by the promise of a present, to remove them
into " a kind of vault," with a small aperture, just
sufficient to admit air for breathing. During the
night, scarcely an hour passed without some fresh
alarm, the keeper himself at last making off. In the
morning, the villains entered the pagoda, and not
finding their victims in the room where they had left
them, they concluded that they had escaped. Outside
there . was an unceasing buzz all the morning, the
captives dreading every instant they would be dis-



138 A CONFESSOR.

covered, and dragged forth to death. At last the cry
was heard, " The English are coming ! " and the Bur-
mans took to flight. Still they dared not cry out for
help; and it was as well, for after an hour or two
voices were again heard, and they found themselves
once more surrounded by natives. It was now noon ;
and the English troops at length came up, to their
inexpressible relief and joy. Released from the vault,
and from his galling chains, the remaining teacher
hastened to the mission, where he found his companion
already arrived.

The natives had fled to the jungles ; and any one
betraying a desire to return to the town was put to
death by the Yawoon. The result was an entire sus-
pension of all missionary work. But the Lord's candle
was not extinguished. " Do you intend to preach
Jesus Christ?" said the governor to a disciple one
day. " I shall preach," replied Moung Thah-a,
meekly, but resolutely. " Jesus Christ is the true
God." He did preach, and was put in the stocks for
it more than once or twice the last time with his
head downward, and with every conceivable indignity.
But his faith did not fail. That man was to be
honoured at a future day to baptize more than two
hundred Burmans.



PRISON-LIFE. 139



CHAPTER VII.

PRISON LIFE " Death-prison " The gaol-circle The gaolers The
"tiger-cat" A ministering angel The first interview The
New Testament The pillow A scene in the shed The mince-
pie "Touch of nature " The mission-cottage The pale infant

Felon-chains First kiss The flickering sun-beam New
catastrophe The fetters False alarm British triumphs
Retaliations An audience "I pity you" A secret Slow
fever The Court- lion The charmer Iron-cage The British
lion The den and the cage Burman dictator Fresh 'cruelties
The prisoners carried off " Take care of yourself " The old
pillow The "roll of hard cotton" Journey to the new prison

A good Samaritan A victim The hovel The chained father
and his babe Fall of the dictator Release New sufferings
The bamboo hut " That is noble" Scene in mission-cottage
"She is dead" British advance Prisoner at Ava The governor

Scene in the shed " What can it mean ? " Once more free
Visit to the cottage The sick-bed " A human object " Scene
on the Irriwadi.

" DEVOUT faith," says Foster, alluding to a prison-
scene elsewhere, " has, in some instances, risen so
high, that a man in peril has been enabled to feel as
if the question of his life or of his death was more
God's concern than his own. ' If God wants my life
for farther service, He will preserve it : if He does not



140 THE DEATH-PRISOX.

want it, / do not/ " Such a faith was now to shine
forth in Burmah ; and out of it was to come a harvest
of souls without a parallel in modern missions.

The Burmah " death -prison" was a structure of
boards, without windows, and with no means of ad-
mitting air, except " such crevices as always exist in a
simple board-house." Its lack of security was com-
pensated by a ghastly array of stocks and shackles,
and by the sleepless surveillance of a ruffian guard.
Whoever entered its " one small outer door" was
regarded as a condemned felon whom nothing but the
possible clemency of the sovereign could rescue from
an ignominious death. Its inmates were a .motley
crew from the court-favourite of yesterday, whom
the caprice of the autocrat had thrust into its dismal
cells, to the burglar or the murderer, who was await-
ing the scaffold. That man in the corner is a decent
tradesman, who has failed to execute with sufficient
skill some royal order ; and this other, nearer us, is a
merchant, whose growing wealth has awakened the
avarice of some favoured noble; whilst between them
are two villainous countenances, which could have
been graven with such lineaments of badness only
in the robber's den, or in the assassin's lair. From
the prison's damp earth-floor was continually rising
" a poisonous miasma," which, with the absence of all
ventilation, caused " a sickening sense of suffocation,"
almost beyond endurance. To crown the horror, the
wretched prisoners, " having no regular supply of food,
were often brought to the very verge of starvation."



THE KEEPERS. 141

On some worship-day the women would come in, as a
religious duty, with rice and fruit ; and " the miserable
sufferers, maddened by starvation, would eat and die."
Corpse after corpse was carried forth the victim of
disease, or of hunger, or of violence ; but " the place
was always full."

And those hideous beings the keepers or " chil-
dren of the prison ! " They were branded criminals of
the lowest grade ; some having their crime burned into
the flesh of their foreheads or breasts ; others having a
dark ring upon the cheek, or about the eye; whilst
others had mutilated noses, were blind of an eye, or had
their ears cut quite away. They formed a distinct class,
" intermarrying only amongst themselves, and thus per-
petuating vice." The wickedness which had prompted
the first crime was " deepened and rendered indelible
by constant familiarity with every species of human
torture," until these creatures "seemed really to be
actuated by some demoniac spirit." The most dis-
gusting of the gang was the head-gaoler, who was
branded on the breast "murderer," and passed in the
prison by the terribly significant sobriquet of " the
tiger-cat." Affecting great jocoseness in the midst of
his most hideous tortures, he would " bring down his
hammer with a jest when fastening manacles," and
would affectionately embrace the prisoners as his "be-
loved children/' pricking them meanwhile with sharp
pins.

In that den of horrors lay, week after week, and
month after month, the saintly man who had forsaken



142 THE MINISTERING ANGEL.

friends, and country, and home, for the sake of these
tormentors. The foreigners were "strung" on a bamboo
pole, which, with three pairs of fetters for each, kept
them fixed in a row on the floor, without mattress or
covering, and denied even the poor consolation of a little
wooden block for a pillow. They were nine in number,
and so closely crowded together that the outside berth
was welcomed with the greatest joy. When suffered
to walk in the little prison-yard, it was to the clanking
of the three heavy fetters ; their ankles only a few
inches apart ; and, behind, the hideous guards.

And that "ministering angel" at the gateway, on
her daily errand of love ! To win from the natives a
kindlier welcome, Mrs. Judson had long worn the
Burmese style of dress; and it gave to her graceful
person an air singularly commanding. Her rich
Spanish complexion not to be mistaken for the
tawny hue of the native ; her " dark curls, carefully
straightened, drawn back from her forehead, and a
fragrant cocoa-blossom drooping like a white plume
from the knot upon the crown ;" her " saffron vest,
thrown open to display the folds of crimson beneath ;"
and " a rich silken skirt, wrapped closely about her
fine figure, parting at the ankle, and sloping back upon
the floor, completed a whole whose attractions often-
times would soften even these iron hearts. And all
this at a time when her own inward anguish would
have led her rather to wash her Lord's feet with her
tears and to wipe them with her hair !

One day she waited on the governor, who had sent



A GOOD CONFESSION. 143

for her in great displeasure. " You are very bad ! "
said he, angrily, as she entered; "why did you tell the
royal treasurer that you had given me so much money?"
" The treasurer enquired," she replied, alluding to the
confiscation-visit at the mission : " what could I say ?"
" Say ? to be sure, that you had given nothing. I
would have made the teachers comfortable in prison;
but now I know not what will be their fate." " But I
cannot tell a falsehood ; my religion differs from yours ;
it forbids prevarication ; and, had you stood beside me
with your knife raised, I could not have said what you
suggest." " Very true ! " instantly interposed his
wife, who sat at his side, and who from that day
became her firm friend; "what else could she have
done ? I like such straightforward conduct : you must
not," turning to the governor, who had been asked by
the royal treasurer to give up the money, and had been
ever since in a dreadful rage, threatening to put all the
prisoners back into their original place, " no, you must
not be angry with her ! " His stern features relaxing,
Mrs. Judson adroitly seized the auspicious moment to
present him with a beautiful opera-glass which she had
just received from England, adding, with her own pecu-
liar grace, " Pray do not let your anger at me cause you
to treat the prisoners with unkindness ; and I shall
endeavour, from time to time, to make your highness
such presents as will compensate you for your loss."
" You may intercede for your husband only," said he,
visibly softening down ; " for your sake, he shall remain
where he is : but let the other prisoners take care of



144 THE PILLOW.

themselves." She " pleaded hard " for Dr. Price ; but
he would not listen, and Price was again thrown into
the inner prison. At the end of ten days, however,
the governor was mollified by a present of " a piece of
broadcloth and two pieces of handkerchiefs ;" and he
ordered him back to the outer court.

For some days, the devoted woman succeeded in
conveying, by a native, communications to her husband
in writing ; but one night the messenger was detected,
and was beaten and put in the stocks. A few weeks
elapsed; and, by virtue of sundry bribes, she was
permitted, after hanging about all day, to enter the
yard after dark, and to converse for some moments
with the captive. On one of the earliest of these visits,
they were intent on a plan to preserve the manuscript
translation of the New Testament, which Mrs. Judson
had secreted, with her silver and a few articles of value,
in the earth under the house. It was now the rainy
season ; and the paper could not remain there any time
without being ruined by the mould, whereas, if placed
in the house, it might, at any moment, be carried away
and destroyed. What was to be done ? The manuscript
contained the greater part -of the New Testament, and
many important corrections of the part already in
print; it was, therefore, a treasure not to be lightly en-
dangered. It was at last decided to sew it up in a
pillow, " so mean in its appearance, and withal so hard
and uncomfortable, that even the avarice of a Burman
would not covet it;" and Mr. Judson was to be its
guardian. "When people are loaded with chains/'



SCENE IN THE PRISON. 145

was his remark long afterwards, to one who was
expressing surprise at his successful execution of the
little scheme, "and sleep half their time on a bare
board, their senses become so obtuse that they do not
know the difference between a hard pillow and a soft
one."

After a few weeks, she succeeded in bribing the
officer to allow her to spend some hours with the
prisoners in an open shed in the gaol-yard ; and, some-
what later, she was permitted to build in the yard a
little bamboo hut, where Mr. Judson might be a while
alone, and where she might, at times, be privileged to
spend with him two or three hours. His only food
was what she provided ; and often it was not allowed to
reach him. For weeks together, nothing was permitted
but a little rice, savoured with an unpalatable preparation
of fish. One day, however, the native disciple came
into the prison-enclosure, bearing a little dish carefully
wrapt up. It was a mince-pie, which Mrs. Judson,
wishing to surprise her husband with something which
should remind him of home, had, after much ingenious
planning, contrived to concoct ' ' by the aid of buffalo
beef and plantains." Moung Ing entered smiling, not
doubting that his master must welcome the mysterious
preparation which had cost Mrs. Judson so much labour.
But the brave heart was thrilled by a pang almost
deeper than it could bear. He had seen her in the
prison-yard, calmly enduring taunts and insults ; and,
when they had met in the bamboo hovel, they had
sustained each other's drooping souls : he had heard of

L



146 VISION OF THE PAST.

her heroic mien before kings and governors, softening
their iron hearts and not seldom moving them to tears ;
and he had thanked God for the trials which developed
a character so truly noble : but in this simple, home-like
act (it is his own pen which delineates the scene), in
this unpretending effusion of a loving heart, there was
something so touching, so unlike the part she had just
been acting, and yet so illustrative of what she really
was, that he bowed his head upon his knees, and the
tears flewed down to the chains about his ankles. The
scene is changed ; and there flits before him a vision of
the past. He sees again the home of his boyhood. His
stern, strangely revered father, his gentle mother, his
rosy, curly-haired sister, and pale young brother, are
gathered for the noon-day meal ; and he is once more
among them, and his fancy revels there. But he
lifted his head ! Oh, the misery that surrounded him !
He moved his feet, and the rattling of the heavy chains
was as a death-knell. The carefully prepared dinner
was thrust into the hand of his associate; and, as
quickly as his fetters would allow, he hurried to his
own little shed.

We are again in the mission-cottage ; and, late at
night, reclining on a rocking-chair in one of its little
rooms, is the noble woman just returned from the
dreary prison, worn out with fatigue and anxiety,
and forecasting the dark future. A premature labour
comes on ; and there is ushered into the world a pale,
puny infant the successor of that " baby-martyr"
who already sleeps beneath the waters of the Bay of



THE FIRST KISS. 147

Bengal, "a victim to Anglo-Indian persecution/' and
of that "meek, blue-eyed Roger/' who has "his bed
in the jungle-graveyard at Rangoon." Three weeks
elapse; and she is in the prison-doorway, one day,
bearing on her bosom the " little wan stranger," with
its low, faint wail. The father comes crawling forth, in
his felon chains, and imprints oil its brow, as it sleeps,
the first parental kiss. In some lines, "composed in
his mind at the time, and afterwards written down," he
pours out his tender soul, thus :

" Sleep, darling infant ! sleep,

Hush'd on thy mother's breast !

Let no rude sound of clanking chains
Disturb thy balmy rest.

Sleep, darling infant ! sleep ;

Blest that thou canst not know
The pangs that rend thy parents' hearts,
The keenness of their woe.

Why ope thy little eyes ?

What would my darling see ?
Thy sorrowing mother's bending form ?
Thy father's agony ?

Wouldst view this drear abode,

Where fettered felons lie,

And wonder that thy father here

Should as a felon sigh ?

Wouldst mark the dreadful sight,
Which stoutest hearts appal
The stocks, the cord, the fatal sword,
The torturing iron-mall ?



148 THE DARLING INFANT.

No, darling infant, no !

Thou seest them not at all ;

Thou only mark'st the rays of light

Which flicker on the wall.

Thy lips one art alone,

One loving, simple grace,
By nature's instinct have been taught :
Seek, then, thy nestling-place !

Go, darling infant, go !

Thine hour has pass'd away ;
The gaoler's harsh, discordant voice,
Forbids thy longer stay."

Maria had been two months in this vale of tears,
and her father seven months in prison, when a hand of
ruffians rushed, one day, into the yard, and, seizing
" the white prisoners " and tearing half the clothing off
their persons, riveted upon each of them two additional
fetters, and dragged them into the inner cell. It was
the beginning of the hot season ; and immured in that
horrible dungeon were more than a hundred human
beings. Night came on, and a whisper passed round
the prison that at three in the morning the foreigners
were to be led forth to death. " And am I to go at
last/' was Mr. Judson's secret thought, " without one
farewell word or even look to my unsuspecting wife and
child?" But he thought again "Will it not spare
her much anxious suffering, to know that all at once
and for ever I am safe in glory ? The rudest of the
Burmans will not dare to harm her ; and, fruitful in
resources, will not she contrive some plan for making



NEW CRUELTIES. 149

her way to the English camp, and placing herself under
their protection ? " And then, the execution at night
was not that a mercy ? As he passed his own door
on the way, he might breathe out a silent farewell,
whilst she was " spared the parting agony." And his
beloved Burmah would not the English conquer it,
and thus a free way be opened for the gospel ? And
that pillow, which had just gone amissing in the hubbub
might not its precious treasure be restored one day,
and the land be illumined by its light ? But the
fatal hour was drawing nigh ; and in the prison there
was a death-like silence, broken, at intervals, only by
the voice of Mr. Judson, as it rose in the accents of
prayer. The morning wore on, and still no movement,
till at length the door opened, and the gaoler entered,
grinning maliciously at the terror depicted on sundry
countenances ; for it was he who had originated the
false alarm about the execution. " Ah ! " said he,
" chucking under the chin " one after another, as
they crept up to him with their anxious inquiries, ' ' I
cannot spare my beloved children yet, just after I have
taken so much trouble to procure them fitting orna-
ments." And, suiting the action to the word, he
" kicked the bamboo-rod, till all the chains rattled and
the five rows of fetters dashed together, pinching
sharply the flesh which they caught betwixt them."
The Burmese army had been defeated by the Eng-
lish in a pitched battle ; and the fresh severities inflicted
on the unhappy prisoners seemed intended as a cowardly
retaliation. That morning a message reached Mrs.



150 THE CATASTROPHE.

Judson, announcing the new catastrophe ; and, seeing
in it only a prelude to darker evils, she hastened to the
governor to intercede. He was out ; but, anticipating
her visit, he had, before leaving home, left with his
wife this message " You are not to ask to have the
additional fetters taken off, or the prisoners released;
for it cannot possibly be done/' She next repaired to
the prison ; and, as she stood in the gateway, all was
still as the grave. She looked into the enclosure;
everything was gone mat, pillow, the little bamboo
hut ; and not a white face was to be seen. She asked
to be admitted, but was sternly refused. In the even-
ing she was once more at the governor's ; and, now at
home, he gave her audience. As she entered, he looked
up without speaking, his countenance betokening a
mixture of shame and of affected anger. "Your high-
ness," she proceeded, with that queenly dignity and
womanly gentleness which were so peculiar to her,
u has hitherto treated us with the kindness of a father.
Our obligations to you are very great. We have looked
to you for protection from cruelty and oppression. You
have promised that you would stand by me to the last,
and that, though you should receive an order from the
king, you would not put Mr. Judson to death. What
crime has he committed, to deserve such additional
punishment ?" "I pity you, Tsa-yah-ga-dau," replied
the old man, weeping like a child. " I knew you would
make me feel; I, therefore, forbad your application.
But you must believe me when I say that I do not
wish to increase the sufferings of the prisoners. When



THE COURT LION. 151

I am ordered to execute them, the least I can do is to
put them out of sight. I will now tell you/' he con-
tinued, " what I have never told you before, that three
times I have received intimations from the queen's
brother to assassinate all the white prisoners privately,
but I would not do it. And I now repeat it," he
added, though I execute all the others, I will never
execute your husband. But I cannot release him
from, his present confinement, and you must net
ask it."

Mr. Judson had been now a month in the horrible
dungeon, worn out with incessant perspiration and loss
of appetite, when he was attacked with a slow fever
which threatened to destroy his life. His guardian
angel, who had lately been allowed to go sometimes
to the door for five minutes and to gaze upon the place
of suffering, now removed from her own house, and,
after many struggles, succeeded in putting up a small
bamboo room in the governor's enclosure, nearly op-
posite the prison-gate. A day or two afterwards a
scene occurred, possessing a strange significance.

Tidings had reached Ava that Bandoola, the king's
favourite general, had fallen in battle ; and that the
English, after completely destroying his army, were
marching upon Prome. The court was panic-stricken,
the Emperor 'giving up all for lost, and the Empress
smiting upon her breast, and crying, " Alas ! alas ! "
In the palace was a magnificent lion, which the
king, solne time before, had received as a present from
Bengal, and which, ever since, had been a special fa-



152 THE CAGE.

vourite with his majesty and with all his courtiers. A
whisper began to circulate, that on the English standard
was emblazoned a lion rampant ; and, at a loss to ac-
count for their recent alarming discomfiture, the queen's
brother and sundry others about court had ever and
anon of late been casting strange glances towards the
noble beast, as possibly the demon whose evil influence
gave to the enemy a certain charmed power. At first,
not venturing to give the suspicion shape in words,
they gradually had argued themselves into the belief,
until at length it was demanded one. day that the royal
pet should be committed to the death-prison ; and the
queen 5 s brother had resolved that he should die. One
morning an iron cage arrived in the yard, and in it the