't mean floors, they are hollow. There
is only one floor, for, of course, the King could never risk the
frightful indignity of having anyone's feet above his head. At the top
is a htee, or umbrella, as there is on the pagodas.

The palace is not all one big building, but a number of buildings, or
halls, each only one storey, grouped about with courtyards between. We
wander in and out of them, treading on polished floors and seeing
brilliant bits of colour framed in dark doorways. Some of the pillars
glow a dull red, others are a wonderful gold; some of the doorways are
set in frames of carved wood gilded all over. We see columns encrusted
with little bits of many-coloured looking-glass, like those we saw in
Rangoon. The halls are very dim in contrast with the brilliant light
outside, and there is a kind of tawdriness in the decoration which makes
one feel how different in nature these people must be from the ancient
Egyptians who built so solidly. Here all is gay, but you feel it is
gimcrack--it won't last. Look at that balustrade, gleaming deep green;
examine it--do you see what it is? Nothing in the world but a row of
green glass bottles turned upside down and embedded in cement! This
place isn't old at all. It has not been built sixty years; before that
the capital was elsewhere.

All at once Ramaswamy, who has been following noiselessly, pushes you
aside with a cry of "Scorpion, Master." There, on the ground, difficult
to see in this dim light, is a round black thing about as big as the
palm of your hand, with a tail sticking out from it. It is the shape of
a tadpole. In another minute you would have trodden on him, and if he
had got in above your shoe, well--it would have been unpleasant in any
case, and might have meant death!

He lies quite still, not attempting to run away until Ramaswamy's shout
brings one of the guardians, a tall man in a dark blue uniform and red
sash. He rushes to find a big stone. We won't stop to see it. Poor
beggar! Doubtless they'll "larn him to be a scorpion!"

When King Theebaw reigned here he thought himself invincible; the
many-roofed spire was "the centre of the universe." He imagined he could
treat as he liked not only his own subjects but that white-faced race
who had had the audacity to settle down in southern Burma. He soon
learnt his mistake.

Leaving the palace we go on to see a very curious thing not far off
outside the walls, this is the Kutho-daw, the Royal Merit-House