They must have been in hiding close by, for it was early next morning that the boy came into my tent alone and very much abashed, and it was some little time before he could recover himself and talk freely as he would before, for he was greatly ashamed of himself.
But, after all, could he help it?
If you can imagine the tropic night, and the boy, full of high resolve, passing up the village street, now half asleep, and the girl, with shining eyes, coming to him out of the hibiscus shadows, and whispering in his ear words—words that I need not say—if you imagine all that, you will understand how it was that I lost my servant.
They both came to see me later on in the day after the marriage, and there was no bashfulness about either of them then. They came hand-in-hand, with the girl's father and mother and some friends, and she told me it was all her fault: she could not wait.
'Perhaps,' she said, with a little laugh and a side-glance at her husband—'perhaps, if he had gone with the thakin to Rangoon, he might have fallen in love with someone there and forgotten me; for I know they are very pretty, those Rangoon ladies, and of better manners than I, who am but a jungle girl.'
And when I asked her what it was like in the forest, she said it was the most beautiful place in all the world.
Things do not always go so well. Parents may be obdurate, and flight be impossible; or even her love may not be returned, and then terrible things happen. I have held, not once nor twice alone, inquests over the bodies, the fair, innocent bodies, of quite young girls who died for love. Only that, because their love was unreturned; and so the sore little heart turned in her trouble to the great river, and gave herself and her hot despair to the cold forgetfulness of its waters.
They love so greatly that they cannot face a world where love is not. All the country is full of the romance of love—of love passionate and great as woman has ever felt. It seems to me here that woman has something of the passions of man, notonly the enduring affection of a woman, but the hot love and daring of a man. It is part of their heritage, perhaps, as a people in their youth. One sees so much of it, hears so much of it, here. I have seen a girl in man's attire killed in a surprise attack upon an insurgent camp. She had followed her outlawed lover there, and in the mêlée she caught up sword and gun to fight by his side, and was cut down through neck and shoulder; for no one could tell in the early dawn that it was a girl.
She died about an hour afterwards, and though I have seen many sorrowful things in many lands, in war and out of it, the memory of that dying girl, held up by one of the mounted police, sobbing out her life beneath the wild forest shadow, with no one of her sex, no one of her kin to help her, comes back to me as one of the saddest and strangest.
Her lover was killed in action some time later fighting against us, and he died as a brave man should, his face to his enemy. He played his game, he lost, and paid; but the girl?
I have seen and heard so much of this love of women and of its tragedies. Perhaps it is that to us it is usually the tragedies that are best remembered. Happiness is void of interest. And this love may be, after all, a good thing. But I do not know. Sometimes I think they would be happier if they could love less, if they could take love more quietly, more as a matter of course, as somethingthat has to be gone through, as part of a life's training; not as a thing that swallows up all life and death and eternity in one passion.
In Burmese the love-songs are in a short, sweet rhythm, full of quaint conceits and word-music. I cannot put them into English verse, or give the flow of the originals in a translation. It always seems to me that Don Quixote was right when he said that a translation was like the wrong side of an embroidered cloth, giving the design without the beauty. But even in the plain, rough outline of a translation there is beauty here, I think:
The moon wooed the lotus in the night, the lotus was wooed by the moon, and my sweetheart is their child. The blossom opened in the night, and she came forth; the petals moved, and she was born.
She is more beautiful than any blossom; her face is as delicate as the dusk; her hair is as night falling over the hills; her skin is as bright as the diamond. She is very full of health, no sickness can come near her.
When the wind blows I am afraid, when the breezes move I fear. I fear lest the south wind take her, I tremble lest the breath of evening woo her from me—so light is she, so graceful.
Her dress is of gold, even of silk and gold, and her bracelets are of fine gold. She hath preciousstones in her ears, but her eyes, what jewels can compare unto them?
She is proud, my mistress; she is very proud, and all men are afraid of her. She is so beautiful and so proud that all men fear her.
In the whole world there is none anywhere that can compare unto her.
'The husband is lord of the wife.'Laws of Manu.
'The husband is lord of the wife.'Laws of Manu.
'The husband is lord of the wife.'Laws of Manu.
'The husband is lord of the wife.'
Laws of Manu.
Marriage is not a religious ceremony among the Burmese. Religion has no part in it at all; as religion has refrained from interfering with Government, so does it in the relations of man and wife. Marriage is purely a worldly business, like entering into partnership; and religion, the Buddhist religion, has nothing to do with such things. Those who accept the teachings of the great teacher in all their fulness do not marry.
Indeed, marriage is not a ceremony at all. It is strange to find that the Burmese have actually no necessary ceremonial. The Laws of Manu, which are the laws governing all such matters, make no mention of any marriage ceremony; it is, in fact, a status. Just as two men may go into partnership in business without executing any deed, so a man and a woman may enter into the marriage state without undergoing any form. Amongst the richer Burmese there is, however, sometimes a ceremony.
Friends are called to the wedding, and a ribbon is stretched round the couple, and then their hands are clasped; they also eat out of the same dish. All this is very pretty, but not at all necessary.
It is, indeed, not a settled point in law what constitutes a marriage, but there are certain things that will render it void. For instance, no marriage can be a marriage without the consent of the girl's parents if she be under age, and there are certain other conditions which must be fulfilled.
But although there be this doubt about the actual ceremony of marriage, there is none at all about the status. There is no confusion between a woman who is married and a woman who is not. The condition of marriage is well known, and it brings the parties under the laws that pertain to husband and wife. A woman not married does not, of course, obtain these privileges; there is a very strict line between the two.
Amongst the poorer people a marriage is frequently kept secret for several days. The great pomp and ceremony which with us, and occasionally with a few rich Burmese, consecrate a man and a woman to each other for life, are absent at the greater number of Burmese marriages; and the reason they tell me is that the girl is shy. She does not like to be stared at, and wondered at, as a maiden about to be a wife; it troubles her that the affairs of her heart, her love, her marriage, should be so public. The young men come at night and throw stonesupon the house roof, and demand presents from the bridegroom. He does not mind giving the presents; but he, too, does not like the publicity. And so marriage, which is with most people a ceremony performed in full daylight with all accessories of display, is with the Burmese generally a secret. Two or three friends, perhaps, will be called quietly to the house, and the man and woman will eat together, and thus become husband and wife. Then they will separate again, and not for several days, or even weeks perhaps, will it be known that they are married; for it is seldom that they can set up house for themselves just at once. Often they will marry and live apart for a time with their parents. Sometimes they will go and live together with the man's parents, but more usually with the girl's mother. Then after a time, when they have by their exertions made a little money, they build a house and go to live there; but sometimes they will live on with the girl's parents for years.
A girl does not change her name when she marries, nor does she wear any sign of marriage, such as a ring. Her name is always the same, and there is nothing to a stranger to denote whether she be married or not, or whose wife she is; and she keeps her property as her own. Marriage does not confer upon the husband any power over his wife's property, either what she brings with her, what she earns, or what she inherits subsequently; it all remains her own, as does his remain his own. Butusually property acquired after marriage is held jointly. You will inquire, for instance, who is the owner of this garden, and be told Maung Han, Ma Shwè, the former being the husband's name and the latter the wife's. Both names are used very frequently in business and in legal proceedings, and indeed it is usual for both husband and wife to sign all deeds they may have occasion to execute. Nothing more free than a woman's position in the marriage state can be imagined. By law she is absolutely the mistress of her own property and her own self; and if it usually happens that the husband is the head of the house, that is because his nature gives him that position, not any law.
With us marriage means to a girl an utter breaking of her old ties, the beginning of a new life, of new duties, of new responsibilities. She goes out into a new and unknown world, full of strange facts, leaving one dependence for another, the shelter of a father for the shelter of a husband. She has even lost her own name, and becomes known but as the mistress of her husband; her soul is merged in his. But in Burma it is not so at all. She is still herself, still mistress of herself, an equal partner for life.
I have said that the Burmese have no ideals, and this is true; but in the Laws of Manu there are laid down some of the requisite qualities for a perfect wife. There are seven kinds of wife, say the Laws of Manu: a wife like a thief, like an enemy, like a master, like a friend, like a sister, like a mother, likea slave. The last four of these are good, but the last is the best, and these are some of her qualities:
'She should fan and soothe her master to sleep, and sit by him near the bed on which he lies. She will fear and watch lest anything should disturb him. Every noise will be a terror to her; the hum of a mosquito as the blast of a trumpet; the fall of a leaf without will sound as loud as thunder. Even she will guard her breath as it passes her lips to and fro, lest she awaken him whom she fears.
'And she will remember that when he awakens he will have certain wants. She will be anxious that the bath be to his custom, that his clothes are as he wishes, that his food is tasteful to him. Always she will have before her the fear of his anger.'
It must be remembered that the Laws of Manu are of Indian origin, and are not totally accepted by the Burmese. I fear a Burmese girl would laugh at this ideal of a wife. She would say that if a wife were always afraid of her husband's wrath, she and he, too, must be poor things. A household is ruled by love and reverence, not by fear. A girl has no idea when she marries that she is going to be her husband's slave, but a free woman, yielding to him in those things in which he has most strength, and taking her own way in those things that pertain to a woman. She has a very keen idea of what things she can do best, and what things she should leave to her husband. Long experience has taught herthat there are many things she should not interfere with; and she knows it is experience that has proved it, and not any command. She knows that the reason women are not supposed to interfere in public affairs is because their minds and bodies are not fitted for them. Therefore she accepts this, in the same way as she accepts physical inferiority, as a fact against which it is useless and silly to declaim, knowing that it is not men who keep her out, but her own unfitness. Moreover, she knows that it is made good to her in other ways, and thus the balance is redressed. You see, she knows her own strength and her own weakness. Can there be a more valuable knowledge for anyone than this?
In many ways she will act for her husband with vigour and address, and she is not afraid of appearing in his name or her own in law courts, for instance, or in transacting certain kinds of business. She knows that she can do certain business as well as or better than her husband, and she does it. There is nothing more remarkable than the way in which she makes a division of these matters in which she can act for herself, and those in which, if she act at all, it is for her husband.
Thus, as I have said, she will, as regards her own property or her own business, act freely in her own name, and will also frequently act for her husband too. They will both sign deeds, borrow money on joint security, lend money repayable to them jointly. But in public affairs she will never allow her nameto appear at all. Not that she does not take a keen interest in such things. She lives in no world apart; all that affects her husband interests her as keenly as it does him. She lives in a world of men and women, and her knowledge of public affairs, and her desire and powers of influencing them, is great. But she learnt long ago that her best way is to act through and by her husband, and that his strength and his name are her bucklers in the fight. Thus women are never openly concerned in any political matters. How strong their feeling is can better be illustrated by a story than in any other way.
In 1889 I was stationed far away on the north-west frontier of Burma, in charge of some four thousand square miles of territory which had been newly incorporated. I went up there with the first column that ever penetrated that country, and I remained there when, after the partial pacification of the district, the main body of the troops were withdrawn. It was a fairly exciting place to live in. To say nothing of the fever which swept down men in batches, and the trans-frontier people who were always peeping over to watch a good opportunity for a raid, my own charge simply swarmed with armed men, who seemed to rise out of the very ground—so hard was it to follow their movements—attack anywhere they saw fit, and disappear as suddenly. There was, of course, a considerable force of troops and police to suppress these insurgents, but the whole country was so roadless, sounexplored, such a tangled labyrinth of hill and forest, dotted with sparse villages, that it was often quite impossible to trace the bands who committed these attacks; and to the sick and weary pursuers it sometimes seemed as if we should never restore peace to the country.
The villages were arranged in groups, and over each group there was a headman with certain powers and certain duties, the principal of the latter being to keep his people quiet, and, if possible, protect them from insurgents.
Now, it happened that among these headmen was one named Saw Ka, who had been a free-lance in his day, but whose services were now enlisted on the side of order—or, at least, we hoped so. He was a fighting-man, and rather fond of that sort of exercise; so that I was not much surprised one day when I got a letter from him to say that his villagers had pursued and arrested, after a fight, a number of armed robbers, who had tried to lift some of the village cattle. The letter came to me when I was in my court-house, a tent ten feet by eight, trying a case. So, saying I would see Saw Ka's people later, and giving orders for the prisoners to be put in the lock-up, I went on with my work. When my case was finished, I happened to notice that among those sitting and waiting without my tent-door was Saw Ka himself, so I sent to call him in, and I complimented him upon his success. 'It shall be reported,' I said, 'to the Commissioner, who will, nodoubt, reward you for your care and diligence in the public service.'
As I talked I noticed that the man seemed rather bewildered, and when I had finished he said that he really did not understand. He was aware, he added modestly, that he was a diligent headman, always active in good deeds, and a terror to dacoits and other evil-doers; but as to these particular robbers and this fighting he was a little puzzled.
I was considerably surprised, naturally, and I took from the table the Burmese letter describing the affair. It began, 'Your honour, I, Maung Saw Ka, headman,' etc., and was in the usual style. I handed it to Saw Ka, and told him to read it. As he read, his wicked black eyes twinkled, and when he had finished he said he had not been home for a week.
'I came in from a visit to the river,' he said, 'where I have gathered for your honour some private information. I had not been here five minutes before I was called in. All this the letter speaks of is news to me, and must have happened while I was away.'
'Then, who wrote the letter?' I asked.
'Ah!' he said, 'I think I know; but I will go and make sure.'
Then Saw Ka went to find the guard who had come in with the prisoners, and I dissolved court and went out shooting. After dinner, as we sat round a great bonfire before the mess, for the nightswere cold, Saw Ka and his brother came to me, and they sat down beside the fire and told me all about it.
It appeared that three days after Saw Ka left his village, some robbers came suddenly one evening to a small hamlet some two miles away and looted from there all the cattle, thirty or forty head, and went off with them. The frightened owners came in to tell the headman about it, and in his absence they told his wife. And she, by virtue of the order of appointment as headman, which was in her hands, ordered the villagers to turn out and follow the dacoits. She issued such government arms as she had in the house, and the villagers went and pursued the dacoits by the cattle tracks, and next day they overtook them, and there was a fight. When the villagers returned with the cattle and the thieves, she had the letter written to me, and the prisoners were sent in, under her husband's brother, with an escort. Everything was done as well, as successfully, as if Saw Ka himself had been present. But if it had not been for the accident of Saw Ka's sudden appearance, I should probably never have known that this exploit was due to his wife; for she was acting for her husband, and she would not have been pleased that her name should appear.
'A good wife,' I said to Saw Ka.
'Like many,' he answered.
But in her own line she has no objection to publicity. I have said that nearly all women work,and that is so. Married or unmarried, from the age of sixteen or seventeen, almost every woman has some occupation besides her own duties. In the higher classes she will have property of her own to manage; in the lower classes she will have some trade. I cannot find that in Burma there have ever been certain occupations told off for women in which they may work, and others tabooed to them. As there is no caste for the men, so there is none for the women. They have been free to try their hands at anything they thought they could excel in, without any fear of public opinion. But nevertheless, as is inevitable, it has been found that there are certain trades in which women can compete successfully with men, and certain others in which they cannot. And these are not quite the same as in the West. We usually consider sewing to be a feminine occupation. In Burma, there being no elaborately cut and trimmed garments, the amount of sewing done is small, but that is usually done by men. Women often own and use small hand-machines, but the treadles are always used by men only. As I am writing, my Burmese orderly is sitting in the garden sewing his jacket. He is usually sewing when not sent on messages. He seems to sew very well.
Weaving is usually done by women. Under nearly every house there will be a loom, where the wife or daughter weaves for herself or for sale. But many men weave also, and the finest silks are allwoven by men. I once asked a woman why they did not weave the best silks, instead of leaving them all to the men.
'Men do them better,' she said, with a laugh. 'I tried once, but I cannot manage that embroidery.'
They also work in the fields—light work, such as weeding and planting. The heavy work, such as ploughing, is done by men. They also work on the roads carrying things, as all Oriental women do. It is curious that women carry always on their heads, men always on their shoulders. I do not know why.
But the great occupation of women is petty trading. I have already said that there are few large merchants among the Burmese. Nearly all the retail trade is small, most of it is very small indeed, and practically the whole of it is in the hands of the women.
Women do not often succeed in any wholesale trade. They have not, I think, a wide enough grasp of affairs for that. Their views are always somewhat limited; they are too pennywise and pound-foolish for big businesses. The small retail trade, gaining a penny here and a penny there, just suits them, and they have almost made it a close profession.
This trade is almost exclusively done in bazaars. In every town there is a bazaar, from six till ten each morning. When there is no town near, the bazaar will be held on one day at one village and on another at a neighbouring one. It depends on thedensity of population, the means of communication, and other matters. But a bazaar within reach there must always be, for it is only there that most articles can be bought. The bazaar is usually held in a public building erected for the purpose, and this may vary from a great market built of brick and iron to a small thatched shed. Sometimes, indeed, there is no building at all, merely a space of beaten ground.
The great bazaar in Mandalay is one of the sights of the city. The building in which it is held is the property of the municipality, but is leased out. It is a series of enormous sheds, with iron roofs and beaten earth floor. Each trade has a shed or sheds to itself. There is a place for rice-sellers, for butchers, for vegetable-sellers, for the vendors of silks, of cottons, of sugars and spices, of firewood, of jars, of fish. The butchers are all natives of India. I have explained elsewhere why this should be. The firewood-sellers will mostly be men, as will also the large rice-merchants, but nearly all the rest are women.
You will find the sellers of spices, fruit, vegetables, and other such matters seated in long rows, on mats placed upon the ground. Each will have a square of space allotted, perhaps six feet square, and there she will sit with her merchandise in a basket or baskets before her. For each square they will pay the lessee a halfpenny for the day, which is only three hours or so. The time to go is in the morning from six till eight, for that is the busy time.Later on all the stalls will be closed, but in the early morning the market is thronged. Every householder is then buying his or her provisions for the day, and the people crowd in thousands round the sellers. Everyone is bargaining and chaffing and laughing, both buyers and sellers; but both are very keen, too, on business.
The cloth and silk sellers, the large rice-merchants, and a few other traders, cannot carry on business sitting on a mat, nor can they carry their wares to and fro every day in a basket. For such there are separate buildings or separate aisles, with wooden stalls, on either side of a gangway. The wooden floor of the stalls is raised two to three feet, so that the buyer, standing on the ground, is about on a level with the seller sitting in the stall. The stall will be about eight feet by ten, and each has at the back a strong lock-up cupboard or wardrobe, where the wares are shut at night; but in the day they will be taken out and arranged daintily about the girl-seller. Home-made silks are the staple—silks in checks of pink and white, of yellow and orange, of indigo and dark red. Some are embroidered in silk, in silver, or in gold; some are plain. All are thick and rich, none are glazed, and none are gaudy. There will also be silks from Bangkok, which are of two colours—purple shot with red, and orange shot with red, both very beautiful. All the silks are woven the size of the dress: for men, about twenty-eight feet long and twenty inches broad;and for women, about five feet long and much broader. Thus, there is no cutting off the piece. Theanas, too, which are the bottom pieces for a woman's dress, are woven the proper size. There will probably, too, be piles of showy cambric jackets and gauzy silk handkerchiefs; but often these are sold at separate stalls.
But prettier than the silks are the sellers, for these are nearly all girls and women, sweet and fresh in their white jackets, with flowers in their hair. And they are all delighted to talk to you and show you their goods, even if you do not buy; and they will take a compliment sedately, as a girl should, and they will probably charge you an extra rupee for it when you come to pay for your purchases. So it is never wise for a man, unless he have a heart of stone, to go marketing for silks. He should always ask a lady friend to go with him and do the bargaining, and he will lose no courtesy thereby, for these women know how to be courteous to fellow-women as well as to fellow-men.
In the provincial bazaars it is much the same. There may be a few travelling merchants from Rangoon or Mandalay, most of whom are men; but nearly all the retailers are women. Indeed, speaking broadly, it may be said that the retail trade of the country is in the hands of the women, and they nearly all trade on their own account. Just as the men farm their own land, the women own their businesses. They are not saleswomen for others,but traders on their own account; and with the exception of the silk and cloth branches of the trade, it does not interfere with home-life. The bazaar lasts but three hours, and a woman has ample time for her home duties when her daily visit to the bazaar is over; she is never kept away all day in shops and factories.
Her home-life is always the centre of her life; she could not neglect it for any other: it would seem to her a losing of the greater in the less. But the effect of this custom of nearly every woman having a little business of her own has a great influence on her life. It broadens her views; it teaches her things she could not learn in the narrow circle of home duties; it gives her that tolerance and understanding which so forcibly strikes everyone who knows her. It teaches her to know her own strength and weakness, and how to make the best of each. Above all, by showing her the real life about her, and how much beauty there is everywhere, to those whose eyes are not shut by conventions, it saves her from that dreary, weary pessimism that seeks its relief in fancied idealism, in a smattering of art, of literature, or of religion, and which is the curse of so many of her sisters in other lands.
And yet, with all their freedom, Burmese women are very particular in their conduct. Do not imagine that young girls are allowed, or allow themselves, to go about alone except on very frequented roads. I suppose there are certain limits in all countries tothe freedom a woman allows herself, that is to say, if she is wise. For she knows that she cannot always trust herself; she knows that she is weak sometimes, and she protects herself accordingly. She is timid, with a delightful timidity that fears, because it half understands; she is brave, with the bravery of a girl who knows that as long as she keeps within certain limits she is safe. Do not suppose that they ever do, or ever can, allow themselves that freedom of action that men have; it is an impossibility. Girls are very carefully looked after by their mothers, and wives by their husbands; and they delight in observing the limits which experience has indicated to them. There is a funny story which will illustrate what I mean. A great friend of mine, an officer in Government service, went home not very long ago and married, and came out again to Burma with his wife. They settled down in a little up-country station. His duties were such as obliged him to go very frequently on tour far away from his home, and he would be absent ten days at a time or more. So when it came for the first time that he was obliged to go out and leave his wife behind him alone in the house, he gave his head-servant very careful directions. This servant was a Burman who had been with him for many years, who knew all his ways, and who was a very good servant. He did not speak English; and my friend gave him strict orders.
'The mistress,' he said, 'has only just come hereto Burma, and she does not know the ways of the country, nor what to do. So you must see that no harm comes to her in any way while I am in the jungle.'
Then he gave directions as to what was to be done in any eventuality, and he went out.
He was away for about a fortnight, and when he returned he found all well. The house had not caught fire, nor had thieves stolen anything, nor had there been any difficulty at all. The servant had looked after the other servants well, and my friend was well pleased. But his wife complained.
'It has been very dull,' she said, 'while you were away. No one came to see me; of all the officers here, not one ever called. I saw only two or three ladies, but not a man at all.'
And my friend, surprised, asked his servant how it was.
'Didn't anyone come to call?' he asked.
'Oh yes,' the servant answered; 'many gentlemen came to call—the officers of the regiment and others. But I told them the thakin was out, and that the thakinma could not see anyone. I sent them all away.'
At the club that evening my friend was questioned as to why in his absence no one was allowed to see his wife. The whole station laughed at him, but I think he and his wife laughed most of all at the careful observances of Burmese etiquette by the servant; for it is the Burmese custom for awife not to receive in her husband's absence. Anyone who wants to see her must stay outside or in the veranda, and she will come out and speak to him. It would be a grave breach of decorum to receive visitors while her husband is out.
So even a Burmese woman is not free from restrictions—restrictions which are merely rules founded upon experience. No woman, no man, can ever free herself or himself from the bonds that even a young civilization demands. A freedom from all restraint would be a return, not only to savagery, but to the condition of animals—nay, even animals are bound by certain conventions.
The higher a civilization, the more conventions are required; and freedom does not mean an absence of all rules, but that all rules should be founded on experience and common-sense.
There are certain restrictions on a woman's actions which must be observed as long as men are men and women women. That the Burmese woman never recognises them unless they are necessary, and then accepts the necessity as a necessity, is the fact wherein her freedom lies. If at any time she should recognise that a restriction was unnecessary, she would reject it. If experience told her further restrictions were required, she would accept them without a doubt.
'For women are very tender-hearted.'Wethandaya.
'For women are very tender-hearted.'Wethandaya.
'For women are very tender-hearted.'Wethandaya.
'For women are very tender-hearted.'
Wethandaya.
'You know, thakin,' said a man to me, 'that we say sometimes that women cannot attain unto the great deliverance, that only men will come there. We think that a woman must be born again as a man before she can enter upon the way that leads to heaven.'
'Why should that be so?' I asked. 'I have looked at the life of the Buddha, I have read the sacred books, and I can find nothing about it. What makes you think that?'
He explained it in this way: 'Before a soul can attain deliverance it must renounce the world, it must have purified itself by wisdom and meditation from all the lust of the flesh. Only those who have done this can enter into the Great Peace. Many men do this. The country is full of monks, men who have left the world, and are trying to follow in the path of the great teacher. Not allthese will immediately attain to heaven, for purification is a very long process; but they have entered into the path, they have seen the light, if it be even a long way off yet. They know whither they would go. But women, see how few become nuns! Only those who have suffered such shipwreck in life that this world holds nothing more for them worth having become nuns. And they are very few. For a hundred monks there is not one nun. Women are too attached to their home, to their fathers, their husbands, their children, to enter into the holy life; and, therefore, how shall they come to heaven except they return as men? Our teacher says nothing about it, but we have eyes, and we can see.'
All this is true. Women have no desire for the holy life. They cannot tear themselves away from their home-life. If their passions are less than those of men, they have even less command over them than men have. Only the profoundest despair will drive a woman to a renunciation of the world. If on an average their lives are purer than those of men, they cannot rise to the heights to which men can. How many monks there are—how few nuns! Not one to a hundred.
Yet in some ways women are far more religious than men. If you go to the golden pagoda on the hilltop and count the people kneeling there doing honour to the teacher, you will find they are nearly all women. If you go to therest-houses by the monastery, where the monks recite the law on Sundays, you will find that the congregations are nearly all women. If you visit the monastery without the gate, you will see many visitors bringing little presents, and they will be women.
'Thakin, many men do not care for religion at all, but when a man does do so, he takes it very seriously. He follows it out to the end. He becomes a monk, and surrenders the whole world. But with women it is different. Many women, nearly all women, will like religion, and none will take it seriously. We mix it up with our home-life, and our affections, and our worldly doings; for we like a little of everything.' So said a woman to me.
Is this always true? I do not know, but it is very true in Burma. Nearly all the women are religious, they like to go to the monastery and hear the law, they like to give presents to the monks, they like to visit the pagoda and adore Gaudama the Buddha. I am sure that if it were not for their influence the laws against taking life and against intoxicants would not be observed as stringently as they are. So far they will go. As far as they can use the precepts of religion and retain their home-life they will do so; as it was with Yathodaya so long ago, so it is now. But when religion calls them and says, 'Come away from the world, leave all that you love, all that your heart holds good, for it is naught; see the light, and prepare your soul for peace,' theyhold back. This they cannot do; it is far beyond them. 'Thakin, wecannot do so. It would seem to us terrible,' that is what they say.
A man who renounces the world is called 'the great glory,' but not so a woman.
I have said that the Buddhist religion holds men and women as equal. If women can observe its laws as men do, it is surely their own fault if they be held the less worthy.
Women themselves admit this. They honour a man greatly who becomes a monk, not so a nun. Nuns have but little consideration. And why? Because what is good for a man is not good for a woman; and if, indeed, renunciation of the world be the only path to the Great Peace, then surely it must be true that women must be born again.
'They are to each other as a burning poison falling into a man's eye.'—Burmese saying.
'They are to each other as a burning poison falling into a man's eye.'—Burmese saying.
I remember a night not so long ago; it was in the hot weather, and I was out in camp with my friend the police-officer. It was past sunset, and the air beneath the trees was full of luminous gloom, though overhead a flush still lingered on the cheek of the night. We were sitting in the veranda of a Government rest-house, enjoying the first coolness of the coming night, and talking in disjointed sentences of many things; and there came up the steps of the house into the veranda a woman. She came forward slowly, and then sat down on the floor beside my friend, and began to speak. There was a lamp burning in an inner room, and a long bar of light came through the door and lit her face. I could see she was not good-looking, but that her eyes were full of tears, and her face drawn with trouble. I recognised who she was, the wife of thehead-constable in charge of the guard near by, a woman I had noticed once or twice in the guard.
She spoke so fast, so fast; the words fell over each other as they came from her lips, for her heart was very full.
I sat quite still and said nothing; I think she hardly noticed I was there. It was all about her husband. Everything was wrong; all had gone crooked in their lives, and she did not know what she could do. At first she could hardly tell what it was all about, but at last she explained. For some years, three or four years, matters had not been very smooth between them. They had quarrelled often, she said, about this thing and the other, little things mostly; and gradually the rift had widened till it became very broad indeed.
'Perhaps,' she said, 'if I had been able to have a child it would have been different.' But fate was unkind and no baby came, and her husband became more and more angry with her. 'And yet I did all for the best, thakin; I always tried to act for the best. My husband has sisters at Henzada, and they write to him now and then, and say, "Send ten rupees," or "Send five rupees," or even twenty rupees. And I always say, "Send, send." Other wives would say, "No, we cannot afford it;" but I said always, "Send, send." I have always done for the best, always for the best.'
It was very pitiable to hear her opening her whole heart, such a sore troubled heart, like this. Herwords were full of pathos; her uncomely face was not beautified by the sorrow in it. And at last her husband took a second wife.
'She is a girl from a village near; the thakin knows, Taungywa. He did not tell me, but I soon heard of it; and although I thought my heart would break, I did not say anything. I told my husband, "Bring her here, let us live all together; it will be best so." I always did for the best, thakin. So he brought her, and she came to live with us a week ago. Ah, thakin, I did not know! She tramples on me. My head is under her feet. My husband does not care for me, only for her. And to-day, this evening, they went out together for a walk, and my husband took with him the concertina. As they went I could hear him play upon it, and they walked down through the trees, he playing and she leaning upon him. I heard the music.'
Then she began to cry bitterly, sobbing as if her heart would break. The sunset died out of the sky, and the shadows took all the world and made it gray and dark. No one said anything, only the woman cried.
'Thakin,' she said at last, 'what am I to do? Tell me.'
Then my friend spoke.
'You can divorce him,' he said; 'you can go to the elders and get a divorce. Won't that be best?'
'But, thakin, you do not know. We are bothChristians; we are married for ever. We were both at the mission-school in Rangoon, and we were married there, "for ever and for ever," so the padre said. We are not married according to Burmese customs, but according to your religion; we are husband and wife for ever.'
My friend said nothing. It seemed to him useless to speak to her of the High Court, five hundred miles away, and a decree nisi; it would have been a mockery of her trouble.
'Your husband had no right to take a second wife, if you are Christians and married,' he said.
'Ah,' she answered, 'we are Burmans; it is allowed by Burmese law. Other officials do it. What does my husband care that we were married by your law? Here we are alone with no other Christians near. But I would not mind so much,' she went on, 'only she treads me under her feet. And he takes her out and not me, who am the elder wife, and he plays music to her; and I did all for the best. This trouble has come upon me, though all my life I have acted for the best.'
There came another footstep up the stair, and a man entered. It was her husband. On his return he had missed his wife, and guessed whither she had gone, and had followed her. He came alone.
Then there was a sad scene, only restrained by respect for my friend. I need not tell it. There was a man's side to the question, a strong one. The wife had a terrible temper, a peevish, nagging,maddening fashion of talking. She was a woman very hard for a man to live with.
Does it matter much which was right or wrong, now that the mischief was done? They went away at last, not reconciled. Could they be reconciled? I cannot tell. I left there next day, and have never returned.
There they had lived for many years among their own people, far away from the influence that had come upon their childhood, and led them into strange ways. And now all that was left of that influence was the chain that bound them together. Had it not been for that they would have been divorced long ago; for they had never agreed very well, and both sides had bitter grounds for complaint. They would have been divorced, and both could have gone their own way. But now, what was to be done?
That is one of my memories: this is another.
There was a girl I knew, the daughter of a man who had made some money by trading, and when the father died the property was divided according to law between the girl and her brother. She was a little heiress in her way, owning a garden, where grew many fruit-trees, and a piece of rice land. She had also a share in a little shop which she managed, and she had many gold bracelets and fine diamond earrings. She was much wooed by the young men about there, and at last she married. He was a young man, good-looking, a sergeant of police, andfor a time they were very happy. And then trouble came. The husband took to bad ways. The knowledge that he could get money for nothing was too much for him. He drank and he wasted her money, and he neglected his work, and at last he was dismissed from Government employ. And his wife got angry with him, and complained of him to the neighbours; and made him worse, though she was at heart a good girl. Quickly he went from bad to worse, until in a very short time, six months, I think, he had spent half her little fortune. Then she began to limit supplies—the husband did no work at all—and in consequence he began to neglect her; they had many quarrels, and her tongue was sharp, and matters got worse and worse until they were the talk of the village. All attempts of the headman and elders to restrain him were useless. He became quarrelsome, and went on from one thing to another, until at last he was suspected of being concerned in a crime. So then when all means had failed to restore her husband to her, when they had drifted far apart and there was nothing before them but trouble, she went to the elders of the village and demanded a divorce. And the elders granted it to her. Her husband objected; he did not want to be divorced. He claimed this, and he claimed that, but it was all of no use. So the tie that had united them was dissolved, as the love had been dissolved long before, and they parted. The man went away to Lower Burma. They tell me hehas become a cultivator and has reformed, and is doing well; and the girl is ready to marry again. Half her property is gone, but half remains, and she has still her little business. I think they will both do well. But if they had been chained together, what then?
In Burma divorce is free. Anyone can obtain it by appearing before the elders of the village and demanding it. A writing of divorcement is made out, and the parties are free. Each retains his or her own property, and that earned during marriage is divided; only that the party claiming the divorce has to leave the house to the other—that is the only penalty, and it is not always enforced, unless the house be joint property.
As religion has nothing to do with marriage, neither has it with divorce. Marriage is a status, a partnership, nothing more. But it is all that. Divorce is a dissolution of that partnership. A Burman would not ask, 'Were they married?' but, 'Are they man and wife?' And so with divorce, it is a cessation of the state of marriage.
Elders tell me that women ask for divorce far more than men do. 'Men have patience, and women have not,' that is what they say. For every little quarrel a woman will want a divorce. 'Thakin, if we were to grant divorces every time a woman came and demanded it, we should be doing nothing else all day long. If a husband comes home to find dinner not cooked, and speaks angrily, his wifewill rush to us in tears for a divorce. If he speaks to another woman and smiles, if he does not give his wife a new dress, if he be fond of going out in the evenings, all these are reasons for a breathless demand for a divorce. The wives get cross and run to us and cry, "My husband has been angry with me. Never will I live with him again. Give me a divorce." Or, "See my clothes, how old they are. I cannot buy any new dress. I will have a divorce." And we say, "Yes, yes; it is very sad. Of course, you must have a divorce; but we cannot give you one to-night. Go away, and come again in three days or in four days, when we have more time." They go away, thakin, and they do not return. Next day it is all forgotten. You see, they don't know what they want; they turn with the wind—they have no patience.'
Yet sometimes they repent too late. Here is another of my memories about divorce:
There was a man and his wife, cultivators, living in a small village. The land that he cultivated belonged to his wife, for she had inherited it from her father, together with a house and a little money. The man had nothing when he married her, but he was hardworking and honest and good-tempered, and they kept themselves going comfortably enough. But he had one fault: every now and then he would drink too much. This was in Lower Burma, where liquor shops are free to Burmans. In Upper Burma no liquor can be sold to them. He did not drinkoften. He was a teetotaler generally; but once a month, or once in two months, he would meet some friends, and they would drink in good fellowship, and he would return home drunk. His wife felt this very bitterly, and when he would come into the house, his eyes red and his face swollen, she would attack him with bitter words, as women do. She would upbraid him for his conduct, she would point at him the finger of scorn, she would tell him in biting words that he was drinking the produce of her fields, of her inheritance; she would even impute to him, in her passion, worse things than these, things that were not true. And the husband was usually good-natured, and admitted his wrong, and put up with all her abuse, and they lived more or less happily till the next time.
And after this had been going on for a few years, instead of getting accustomed to her husband, instead of seeing that if he had this fault he had many virtues, and that he was just as good a husband as she was a wife, or perhaps better, her anger against him increased every time, till now she would declare that she would abide it no longer, that he was past endurance, and she would have a divorce; and several times she even ran to the elders to demand it. But the elders would put it by. 'Let it wait,' they said, 'for a few days, and then we will see;' and by that time all was soothed down again. But at last the end came. One night she passed all bounds in her anger, using wordsthat could never be forgiven; and when she declared as usual that she must have a divorce, her husband said: 'Yes, we will divorce. Let there be an end of it.' And so next day they went to the elders both of them, and as both demanded the divorce, the elders could not delay very long. A few days' delay they made, but the man was firm, and at last it was done. They were divorced. I think the woman would have drawn back at the last moment, but she could not, for very shame, and the man never wavered. He was offended past forgiveness.
So the divorce was given, and the man left the house and went to live elsewhere.
In a few days—a very few days—the wife sent for him again. 'Would he return?' And he refused. Then she went to the headman and asked him to make it up, and the headman sent for the husband, who came.
The woman asked her husband to return.
'Come back,' she said, 'come back. I have been wrong. Let us forgive. It shall never happen again.'
But the man shook his head.
'No,' he said; 'a divorce is a divorce. I do not care to marry and divorce once a week. You were always saying "I will divorce you, I will divorce you." Now it is done. Let it remain.'
The woman was struck with grief.
'But I did not know,' she said; 'I was hot-tempered. I was foolish. But now I know. Ah!the house is so lonely! I have but two ears, I have but two eyes, and the house is so large.'
But the husband refused again.
'What is done, is done. Marriage is not to be taken off and put on like a jacket. I have made up my mind.'
Then he went away, and after a little the woman went away too. She went straight to the big, lonely house, and there she hanged herself.
You see, she loved him all the time, but did not know till too late.
Men do not often apply for divorce except for very good cause, and with their minds fully made up to obtain it. They do obtain it, of course.
With this facility for divorce, it is remarkable how uncommon it is. In the villages and amongst respectable Burmans in all classes of life it is a great exception to divorce or to be divorced. The only class amongst whom it is at all common is the class of hangers-on to our Administration, the clerks and policemen, and so on. I fear there is little that is good to be said of many of them. It is terrible to see how demoralizing our contact is to all sorts and conditions of men. To be attached to our Administration is almost a stigma of disreputableness. I remember remarking once to a headman that a certain official seemed to be quite regardless of public opinion in his life, and asked him if the villagers did not condemn him. And the headman answered with surprise: 'But he is an official;'as if officials were quitesuper grammaticamof morals.
And yet this is the class from whom we most of us obtain our knowledge of Burmese life, whom we see most of, whose opinions we accept as reflecting the truth of Burmese thought. No wonder we are so often astray.
Amongst these, the taking of second, and even third, wives is not at all uncommon, and naturally divorce often follows. Among the great mass of the people it is very uncommon. I cannot give any figures. There are no records kept of marriage or of divorce. What the proportion is it is impossible to even guess. I have heard all sorts of estimates, none founded on more than imagination. I have even tried to find out in small villages what the number of divorces were in a year, and tried to estimate from this the percentage. I made it from 2 to 5 per cent. of the marriages. But I cannot offer these figures as correct for any large area. Probably they vary from place to place and from year to year. In the old time the queen was very strict upon the point. As she would allow no other wife to her king, so she would allow no taking of other wives, no abuse of divorce among her subjects. Whatever her influence may have been in other ways, here it was all for good. But the queen has gone, and there is no one left at all. No one but the hangers-on of whom I have spoken, examples not to be followed, but to be shunned.
But of this there is no manner of doubt, that this freedom of marriage and divorce leads to no license. There is no confusion between marriage or non-marriage, and even yet public opinion is a very great check upon divorce. It is considered not right to divorce your husband or your wife without good—very good and sufficient cause. And what is good and sufficient cause is very well understood. That a woman should have a nagging tongue, that a man should be a drunkard, what could be better cause than this? The gravity of the offence lies in whether it makes life unbearable together, not in the name you may give it.
The facility for divorce has other effects too. It makes a man and a woman very careful in their behaviour to each other. The chain that binds them is a chain of mutual forbearance, of mutual endurance, of mutual love; and if these be broken, then is the bond gone. Marriage is no fetter about a man or woman, binding both to that which they may get to hate.
In the first Burmese war in 1825 there was a man, an Englishman, taken prisoner in Ava and put in prison, and there he found certain Europeans and Americans. After a time, for fear of attempts at escape, these prisoners were chained together two and two. He tells you, this Englishman, how terrible this was, and of the hate and repulsion that arose in your heart to your co-bondsman. Before they were chained together theylived in close neighbourhood, in peace and amity; but when the chains came it was far otherwise, though they were no nearer than before. They got to hate each other.
And this is the Burmese idea of marriage, that it is a partnership of love and affection, and that when these die, all should be over. An unbreakable marriage appears to them as a fetter, a bond, something hateful and hate inspiring. They are a people who love to be free: they hate bonds and dogmas of every description. It is always religion that has made a bond of marriage, and here religion has not interfered. Theirs is a religion of free men and free women.
'The ignorant commit sins in consequence of drunkenness, and also make others drunk.'—Acceptance into the Monkhood.
'The ignorant commit sins in consequence of drunkenness, and also make others drunk.'—Acceptance into the Monkhood.
The Buddhist religion forbids the use of all stimulants, including opium and other drugs; and in the times of the Burmese rule this law was stringently kept. No one was allowed to make, to sell, or to consume, liquors of any description. That this law was kept as firmly as it was was due, not to the vigilance of the officials, but to the general feeling of the people. It was a law springing from within, and therefore effectual; not imposed from without, and useless. That there were breaches and evasions of the law is only natural. The craving for some stimulant amongst all people is very great—so great as to have forced itself to be acknowledged and regulated by most states, and made a great source of revenue. Amongst the Burmans the craving is, I should say, as strong as amongst other people; and no mere legal prohibition would have had much effect in a country like this, full of jungle, where palms grow inprofusion, and where little stills might be set up anywhere to distil their juice. But the feelings of the respectable people and the influence of the monks is very great, very strong; and the Burmans were, and in Upper Burma, where the old laws remain in force, are still, an absolutely teetotal people. No one who was in Upper Burma before and just after the war but knows how strictly the prohibition against liquor was enforced. The principal offenders against the law were the high officials, because they were above popular reach. No bribe was so gratefully accepted as some whisky. It was a sure step to safety in trouble.
A gentleman—not an Englishman—in the employ of a company who traded in Upper Burma in the king's time told me lately a story about this.
He lived in a town on the Irrawaddy, where was a local governor, and this governor had a head clerk. This head clerk had a wife, and she was, I am told, very beautiful. I cannot write scandal, and so will not repeat here what I have heard about this lady and the merchant; but one day his Burman servant rushed into his presence and told him breathlessly that the bailiff of the governor's court was just entering the garden with a warrant for his arrest, for, let us say, undue flirtation. The merchant, horrified at the prospect of being lodged in gaol and put in stocks, fled precipitately out of the back-gate and gained the governor's court. The governor was in session, seated on a little daïs,and the merchant ran in and knelt down, as is the custom, in front of the daïs. He began to hurriedly address the governor:
'My lord, my lord, an unjust complaint has been made against me. Someone has abused your justice and caused a warrant to be taken out against me. I have just escaped the bailiff, and came to your honour for protection. It is all a mistake. I will explain. I——'
But here the governor interposed. He bent forward till his head was close to the merchant's head, and whispered:
'Friend, have you any whisky?'
The merchant gave a sigh of relief.
'A case newly arrived is at your honour's disposal,' he answered quickly. 'I will give orders for it to be sent over at once. No, two cases—I have two. And this charge is all a mistake.'
The governor waved his hand as if all explanation were superfluous. Then he drew himself up, and, addressing the officials and crowd before him, said:
'This is my good friend. Let no one touch him.' And in an undertone to the merchant: 'Send it soon.'
So the merchant went home rejoicing, and sent the whisky. And the lady? Well, my story ends there with the governor and the whisky. No doubt it was all a mistake about the lady, as the merchant said. All officials were not so bad asthis, and many officials were as strongly against the use of liquor, as urgent in the maintenance of the rules of the religion, as the lowest peasant.
It was the same with opium: its use was absolutely prohibited. Of course, Chinese merchants managed to smuggle enough in for their own use, but they had to bribe heavily to be able to do so, and the people remained uncontaminated. 'Opium-eater,' 'gambler,' are the two great terms of reproach and contempt.
It used to be a custom in the war-time—it has died out now, I think—for officers of all kinds to offer to Burmans who came to see them—officials, I mean—a drink of whisky or beer on parting, just as you would to an Englishman. It was often accepted. Burmans are, as I have said, very fond of liquor, and an opportunity like this to indulge in a little forbidden drink, under the encouragement of the great English soldier or official, was too much for them. Besides, it would have been a discourtesy to refuse. And so it was generally accepted. I do not think it did much harm to anyone, or to anything, except, perhaps, to our reputation.
I remember in 1887 that I went up into a semi-independent state to see the prince. I travelled up with two of his officials, men whom I had seen a good deal of for some months before, as his messengers and spokesmen, about affairs on the border. We travelled for three days, and came at last to where he had pitched his camp in the forest.He had built me a house, too, next to his camp, where I put up. I had a long interview with him about official matters—I need not tell of that here—and after our business was over we talked of many things, and at last I got up to take my leave. I had seen towards the end that the prince had something on his mind, something he wanted to say, but was afraid, or too shy, to mention; and when I got up, instead of moving away, I laughed and said:
'Well, what is it? I think there is something the prince wants to say before I go.'
And the prince smiled back awkwardly, still desirous to have his say, still clearly afraid to do so, and at last it was his wife who spoke.
'It is about the whisky,' she said. 'We know that you drink it. That is your own business. We hear, too, that it is the custom in the part of the country you have taken for English officers to give whisky and beer to officials who come to see you—toourofficials,' and she looked at the men who had come up with me, and they blushed. 'The prince wishes to ask you not to do it here. Of course, in your own country you do what you like, but in the prince's country no one is allowed to drink or to smoke opium. It is against our faith. That is what the prince wanted to say. The thakin will not be offended if he is asked that here in our country he will not tempt any of us to break our religion.'
I almost wished I had not encouraged the princeto speak. I am afraid that the embarrassment passed over to my side. What could I say but that I would remember, that I was not offended, but would be careful? I had been lecturing the prince about his shortcomings; I had been warning him of trouble to come, unless he mended his ways; I had been telling him wonderful things of Europe and our power. I thought that I had produced an impression of superiority—I was young then—but when I left I had my doubts who it was that scored most in that interview. However, I have remembered ever since. I was not a frequent offender before—I have never offered a Burman liquor since.