; and they have obtained
the practical abolition of French and British jurisdiction over certain
of their domestic affairs, while a treaty which provides that the
United States shall likewise surrender its extra territorial rights and
permit its citizens to be tried in Siamese courts has recently been
signed.

The future of Siam should be of interest to Americans if for no other
reason than that it is the one remaining independent state of tropical
Asia. Indeed, it is known to its own people as Muang-Thai--the
"Kingdom of the Free." Whether it will remain so only the future can
tell. I should be more sanguine about the continued independence of the
Land of the White Elephant, however, were it not for the colonial
records of its two nearest neighbors, which heretofore, in their
dealings with Asiatic peoples, have usually followed

"The good old rule ... the simple plan,
That they should take who have the power,
And they should keep who can."

CHAPTER XI

TO PNOM-PENH BY THE JUNGLE TRAIL

Indo-China is a great bay-window bulging from the southeastern corner
of Asia, its casements opening on the China Sea and on the Gulf of
Siam. Of all the countries of the Farther East it is the most
mysterious; of them all it is the least known. Larger than the State of
Texas, it is a land of vast forests and unexplored jungles in which
roam the elephant, the tiger and the buffalo; a land of palaces and
pagodas and gilded temples; of sun-bronzed pioneers and priests in
yellow robes and bejeweled dancing girls. Lured by the tales I had
heard of curious places and strange peoples to be seen in the interior
of the peninsula, I refused to content myself with skirting its edges
on a steamer. Instead, I determined to cross it from coast to coast.

I had looked forward to covering the first stage of this journey, the
four hundred-odd miles of jungle which separate Bangkok, in Siam, from
Pnom-Penh, the capital of Cambodia, on an elephant. Everyone with whom
I had discussed the matter in Singapore had assured me that this was
perfectly feasible. And as a means of transportation it appealed to me.
It seemed to fit into the picture, as a wheel-chair accords with the
spirit of Atlantic City, as a caleche is congruous to Quebec. To my
friends at home I had planned to send pictures of myself reclining in a
howdah, rajah-like, as my ponderous mount rocked and rolled along the
jungle trails. To me the idea sounded fine. But i