en at once; but he was demoralized by self-indulgence, and allowed
himself to be governed by his queen, the daughter of a superintendent of
gaols; and through her, by her brother, who was cruel, rapacious and
violent, and the chief author of all the sufferings inflicted on the
prisoners. Among these were seven or eight British officers, and the
King had commanded that a daily allowance of rice should be served to
these, but scarcely half of it ever reached them; Mrs. Judson did her
best to supply them as well as her husband, but their health gave way
under their sufferings, and all died but one.

At the end of seven months, it was reported that the English army was
advancing into the interior; and in the passionate alarm thus excited,
the English captives were all loaded with five pairs of fetters and
thrown into the common prison among Burman thieves and robbers,--a
hundred in a room without a window, and that in the hottest season of the
year. Mrs. Judson again besought the governor to relieve them from this
horrible condition, by at least allowing them to sit outside the door,
and he actually shed tears at her distress, but he told her that he had
been commanded to put them all to death privately, and that he was doing
his best for them by massing them with the rest. The Queen's brother had
really given this order, but the governor delayed the execution in case
they should be required of him by the King, and they continued in this
frightful state for a whole month, until Mr. Judson sickened with violent
fever, and the governor permitted him to be removed into a little bamboo
room, six feet long and four wide, where his wife was allowed to visit
him and bring him food and medicine, she meantime living in a bamboo
house in the governor's compound, where the thermometer rose daily to 106
degrees, but where she thought herself happy as she saw her husband begin
to recover.

One day, however, when the governor had sent for her and was kindly
conversing with her, a servant came in and whispered to him that the
white strangers had suddenly been taken away, no one knew whither. The
governor pretended to be taken by surprise, but there could be no doubt
that he had occupied Mrs. Judson to hinder her from witnessing the
removal; and it was not till the evening that she learnt that the
prisoners had been taken to Umerapoonah, whither she proceeded with her
three months old baby and one servant. There she found that the
pr