Portuguese. This first success was the cause of a new embassy in 1621 which assisted the progress of the Faith. Some Franciscans were demanded by the King to preach the Gospel in his realm. He built them a church at his own expense and wished to make them wealthy, to which latter proposal they turned a deaf ear. Their disinterested motives of which the country furnished so few examples, increased the admiration which their other virtues had evoked.

This Prince was a curious mixture of strength and weakness, of vice and of virtue. Brave to the point of foolhardiness, he was cruel and savage, and the cowardly and timorous side of his character sacrificed both innocent and guilty to his suspicions. An absolute despot, he was not over-scrupulous in financial transactions. He was tyrannical, but not miserly. Having a strict eye for justice he cast robbers and dacoits to crocodiles and to tigers and even found a savage pleasure in attending such functions. Ingenious in his methods of reprisal, he imprisoned a vassal King, who had made a rebellion, in a cage and gave him no other food than the flesh which he caused him to tear from his own body. He took delight in the torture of his subjects; he himself cut off the legs of seven of the Court ladies as a punishment for walking too quickly; and performed the same operation on three others who had been too slow to obey his orders. Thus it was an equally heinous offence to walk either to too fast or too slowly. His brutality was extended even to birds and animals. He caused the head of a horse to be struck off because the animal had been disobedient, and the same fate overtook a tiger which had spared the life of a criminal that it ought to have devoured.

This crowned monster of iniquity, died in his bed with all the complacency of a benevolent monarch. Perhaps the horror inspired by his crimes was modified by his brilliant talents and the other virtues he possessed. Faithful to his promises and lavish of rewards for services rendered, liberal and magnificent, he had many supporters who having become his accomplices guaranteed his immunity from revenge for his crimes.

He entrusted a large sum of money to a Portuguese to purchase certain articles from Malacca. This madman gambled away the money and then had the hardihood to return to Siam where he expected to meet with severe punishment. The King welcomed him graciously and said, "I think more highly of your confidence in my mercy than of all the rare articles that you ought to have brought me." Like all tyrants, this prince had a favourite who introduced five or six hundred Japanese, disguised as merchants, into the Kingdom as tools for his own aggrandisement. As soon as the King had closed his eyes; he made use of them to ensure possession of the crown. But the son of the late King rallied his forces and snatched the sceptre from the hand of the usurper. He was more fortunate in recovering it than in retaining it as he was shortly afterwards assassinated.

He left the throne to his younger brother who conceived a violent dislike to the Japanese as he considered them a dangerous gang, watching for an opportunity to take his life. Many of these Japanese were killed and the rest were compelled to leave the country. Peace having been restored, it was imperilled by the murder of the King's brother who had been suspected of aspirations to supreme power. A prince of the blood taking advantage of the feeling inspired by this crime, proclaimed himself King. This new usurper, under pretence of safeguarding the interests of the state maintained an armed force in time of peace, and this force was more vexatious to the citizens, than it was dangerous to foreign foes. However by keeping up a standing army he was able to dispose of the partisans of the legitimate heir to the throne. The Dutch to whom he gave trading facilities were his most zealous upholders.

It has been presumed that this usurper was the celebrated Chao Pasa Thong whom some maintain was of royal birth, but to whom others assign a lowly origin. For a long time he had held the office of Chacri or Chancellor during the tenure of which he deceived his master, oppressed the people, and made use of his ill gotten gains to consolidate his position. His wealth was lavished on his fellow conspirators. As soon as he was on the throne, he desired to marry the daughter of his predecessor, but the princess unwilling to bedeck herself with the spoils of his brothers who were the proper heirs to the throne, looked upon this criminal union with disgust. The tyrant enraged at their love for their sister ordered them to execution.

Having disposed of his rivals, he showed all the ferocity of his nature. The death of his daughter furnished an excuse for his harsh policy of removing all those who might have checked him in the path of crime. Having celebrated her funeral rites with the utmost pomp; he himself gathered up her ashes, and on seeing a morsel of flesh unconsumed by the fire, made up his mind that his daughter had been poisoned. Mad in his suspicions, he had all the women who had been in attendance on the poisoned Princess, put under guard, and tried to extort by torture an avowal from them of an imaginary crime. The whole court was a scene of punishments. Even so large a number of victims could not appear the cruelty of the tyrant. All the nobles of the Kingdom were summoned before him, and he caused trenches to be dug and filled with glowing charcoal so as to put them to the ordeal by fire. They began by scraping the soles of their feet with a sharp piece of iron and then made them pass over the burning matter. Those whose feet were injured by the fire were held to be guilty.

This tyrant, a cunning inventor of punishments, devised new methods. Some victims were crushed under the feet of elephants, others, buried up to the shoulders, begged for death which alone could terminate their sufferings. It was a heinous offence to give them the least assistance or to hasten their death. He employed fearsome tortures. The bodies of victims were squeezed so tightly by cloths that the cloth appeared to be part and parcel of the body of the sufferer. Some were pierced with needles of various shapes and then were cut in half, the upper portion being placed on a copperplate so as to stop the bleeding and to prolong the agony.

Three thousand persons were sacrificed to the barbarity of the tyrant, who under the pretext of avenging the death of his daughter, found a means of removing the enemies of his usurped power.

There still remained other important victims namely the two sons and the daughter of the late King. As he could only revile them for their misfortune and degradation, he brought a false charge against the eldest daughter whom he accused of having given an exhibition of unholy glee at the cremation of the Princess. She was condemned to the ordeal by fire together with all the ladies of her suite and the pain extorted from her the avowal of a crime of which she was innocent. The executioner at once received the order to cut off a piece of her flesh and to make her eat it. When she was offered this disgusting repast, she cried out. "Vile tyrant! you can rend my body, but remember that my spirit is not under your command. You will observe that the fixity of my purpose renders me superior to your tortures. Learn also that your crimes will not go unpunished and that my blood shall be a seed from which shall arise the avengers of my family and country."

At this, the tyrant highly enraged, ordered her to be cut in pieces and to be cast into the river. The brother of the Princess who at that time was twenty years of age met with the same fate. He had previously pretended to be insane but as soon as he was mounted on the scaffold, he made it known that it was the love of life that had caused him to act in a cowardly manner. The beauty of his countenance which his sad position rendered more touching,