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Somdelat Phra-Paramendr Maha Mongkut, KING OF SIAM (d.1868). Autograph letter signed (‘S P P M Mongkut, the King of Siam’) to W.G. Butterworth, Governor of the Island of Malacca and Singapore, Grand Palace Bangkok, 23 July 1854 ('4th of the present reign in Siam').
In idiosyncratic English, 8 pages, 225 x 187mm, on two conjoined bifolia.
King Mongkut anticipates the arrival of Sir John Bowring, negotiator of the Bowring Treaty with Siam, and discusses Sir James Brooke, first White Rajah of Sarawak, and Siamese artwork. Writing in response to letters from Butterworth and Thomas Church [Resident Councillor of Singapore] requesting articles for an exhibition, the King demurs: ‘I am sorry to say that my country is remaining poor’; he worries that her goods may not please a European spectator. Nevertheless, he sends some examples of cloth and silverware, noting that ‘all are manufactured here by Siamese manufacturers for sale & use’, including the cloth painted with ‘our Budh’s stone image’. The significance of this is explained by the King, along with the importance of further articles he sends: ‘four figures of White Elephants’, items previously owned by his father and grandfather; a picture of ‘the curious She Elephant just brought from the province of Yasadhon [Yasothon]’; and a figurine depicting an elephant previously owned by the royal family, falsely ‘said by unlearned to be real White Elephant’. Turning to the news he has received from Sir John Bowring, he continues: ‘Regarding the announcing of the visit and negotiation [of] the treaty with Siam of His Excellency Doctor John Bowring KCB’, his appointment as British envoy, rather than an ‘unknown or little known noblepersons’, is thoroughly approved of by the King, who knows his character well: nobody could be a better envoy to Siam. He assures Butterworth that the delegation will be smoother than that of Sir James Brooke, it will proceed ‘without consternation’ as long as the Government is informed well in advance of Bowring’s arrival, at least two or three months.
Sir John Bowring (1792-1872), political economist, writer, and fourth Governor of Hong Kong, would give his name to the trade treaty he negotiated between Britain and the Kingdom of Siam, facilitating foreign free trade in Siam. Not all envoys to Siam met with such success, it seems: the actions of Sir James Brooke (1803-1868; Rajah of Sarawak), a great supporter of King Mongkut’s reign, may have stirred some resentment in the Government, the King suggests.
In idiosyncratic English, 8 pages, 225 x 187mm, on two conjoined bifolia.
King Mongkut anticipates the arrival of Sir John Bowring, negotiator of the Bowring Treaty with Siam, and discusses Sir James Brooke, first White Rajah of Sarawak, and Siamese artwork. Writing in response to letters from Butterworth and Thomas Church [Resident Councillor of Singapore] requesting articles for an exhibition, the King demurs: ‘I am sorry to say that my country is remaining poor’; he worries that her goods may not please a European spectator. Nevertheless, he sends some examples of cloth and silverware, noting that ‘all are manufactured here by Siamese manufacturers for sale & use’, including the cloth painted with ‘our Budh’s stone image’. The significance of this is explained by the King, along with the importance of further articles he sends: ‘four figures of White Elephants’, items previously owned by his father and grandfather; a picture of ‘the curious She Elephant just brought from the province of Yasadhon [Yasothon]’; and a figurine depicting an elephant previously owned by the royal family, falsely ‘said by unlearned to be real White Elephant’. Turning to the news he has received from Sir John Bowring, he continues: ‘Regarding the announcing of the visit and negotiation [of] the treaty with Siam of His Excellency Doctor John Bowring KCB’, his appointment as British envoy, rather than an ‘unknown or little known noblepersons’, is thoroughly approved of by the King, who knows his character well: nobody could be a better envoy to Siam. He assures Butterworth that the delegation will be smoother than that of Sir James Brooke, it will proceed ‘without consternation’ as long as the Government is informed well in advance of Bowring’s arrival, at least two or three months.
Sir John Bowring (1792-1872), political economist, writer, and fourth Governor of Hong Kong, would give his name to the trade treaty he negotiated between Britain and the Kingdom of Siam, facilitating foreign free trade in Siam. Not all envoys to Siam met with such success, it seems: the actions of Sir James Brooke (1803-1868; Rajah of Sarawak), a great supporter of King Mongkut’s reign, may have stirred some resentment in the Government, the King suggests.
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