e concoction look as though
it were suffering from a severe attack of jaundice. These relishes are
cooked, or rather re-warmed, by the simple process of suspending them
in a sort of sieve in a pot of boiling water, the same pot and the same
water serving for all customers alike. By this arrangement, the man who
takes his snack at the close of the day has the advantage of receiving
not merely what he orders, but also flavors and even floating remnants
from the dishes ordered by all those who have preceded him. The ice
cream vendors drive a roaring trade in a concoction the basis of which
is finely shaven ice, looking like half-frozen and very dirty slush,
sweetened with sugar and flavored, according to the purchaser's taste
from an array of metal-topped bottles such as barbers use for bay rum
and hair oil. But, being cold and sweet, "Isa-kee," as the Chinese
vendors call it, is as popular among the lower classes in Siam as ice
cream cones are in the United States.

Though the streets of Bangkok are crowded with vehicles of every
description--ramshackle and disreputable rickshaws, the worst to be
found in all the East, drawn by sweating coolies; the boxes of wood and
glass on wheels, called gharries, drawn by decrepit ponies whose
harness is pieced out with rope; creaking bullock carts driven by
Tamils from Southern India; bicycles, ridden by natives whose European
hats and coats are in striking contrast to their bare legs and
brilliant _panungs_; clanging street cars, as crowded with humanity as
those on Broadway; motors of every size and make, from jitneys to
Rolls-Royces--the bulk of the city's traffic is borne on the great
river and the countless canals which empty into it. Bangkok has been
called, and not ineptly, the Venice of the East, for it is covered with
a net-work of canals, or _klongs_, which spread out in every direction.
In sampans, houseboats and other craft, moored to the banks of these
canals, dwells the major portion of the city's inhabitants. The city's
water population is complete in itself and perfectly independent of its
neighbors on land, for it has its own shops and dwellings, its own
markets and restaurants, its own theaters, and gambling establishments,
its own priests and police. When you go to Bangkok, I strongly advise
you to hire a sampan and visit the floating portion of the city after
nightfall. The houseboats are open at both ends and you will see many
things that the guidebooks fail to m