musement_. _It is the outcome
of long and luminous talks with your distinguished husband in the
Temple and on the river_, _in the days when I was meditating writing a
novel as beautiful and as intricate as a Persian praying-rug_. _I
hope that I have caught the atmosphere_.

_I should like to see it acted in your Garden House on some night when
the sky is a sheet of violet and the stars like women's eyes_. _Alas_,
_it is not likely_.

_I am in the throes of a new comedy_. _I met a perfectly wonderful
person the other day who unconsciously has irradiated my present with
sinuous suggestion_: _a Swedish Baron_, _French in manner_, _Athenian
in mind_, _and Oriental in morals_. _His society is a series of
revelations_. . . .

_I was at Oakley Street on Thursday_; _my mother tells me she sends
you a letter nearly every week_.

_Constance desires to be warmly remembered_, _while I_, _who am
bathing my brow in the perfume of water-lilies_, _lay myself at the
feet of you and yours_.

_OSCAR WILDE_

PRINCIPAL CHARACTERS OF THE PLAY

KING MENG BENG (_Lord of a Thousand White Elephants_, _Countless
Umbrellas and other attributes of greatness_).

U. RAI GYAN THOO (_A Prime Minister_).

SHAH MAH PHRU (_A Girl_, _half Italian_, _half Burmese_, _of dazzling
beauty_).

DHAMMATHAT (_Legal Adviser to the Court_).

HIP LOONG (_A Chinese Wizard of great repute_).

MOUNG PHO MHIN (_Minister of Finance_).

TWO ENVOYS FROM THE KING OF CEYLON.

NOBLES, COURTIERS, SOOTHSAYERS, POONYGEES, DANCING GIRLS, BETEL-NUT
CARRIERS, UMBRELLA BEARERS, FOLLOWERS, SERVANTS, SLAVES, amongst whom are
several CHINESE but no INDIANS.

TIME: _The Sixteenth Century_.

ACT I

SCENE I

_The palace of the_ KING OF BURMAH. _The scene is laid in the Hall of a
Hundred Doors_. _In the distance can be seen the moat_, _the waiting
elephants_, _and the peacocks promenading proudly in the blinding
sunshine of late afternoon_. _The scene discovers_ KING MENG BENG
_seated on a raised cushion sewn with rubies_, _under a canopy supported
by four attendants_, _motionless as bronze figures_. _By his side is a
betel-nut box_, _glittering with gems_. _On either side of him_, _but
much lower down_, _are the_ TWO AMBASSADORS OF THE KING OF CEYLON,
_bearers of the King of Ceylon's consent to the marriage of his only
daughter to Meng Beng in two years' time_, _men of grave_, _majesti