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MISSIONARY LADIES IN THE KING'S PALACE.

Paint to your fancy a village of curious Oriental houses, with a high, thick wall, three miles in circuit, surrounding it. In this village, or miniature city, are the king's quarters. Here are temple-grounds with their temples and idols and all their rich adornings, whither people of many generations have gone to worship at shrines which their own hands have made. Here are the dwellings of the king's wives and the residences of the princesses, old and young, who cannot be allowed to marry beneath their royal rank. Each lady has a separate house and has her retinue of servants—all women. There is also a market, conducted entirely by women. The census of the dwellers in this palace was once taken, and it amounted to three thousand females. This included the king's wives, princesses with their servants, the market-women and the female officers of the court.

In 1851 the priest-prince came to the throne. He was the son of a queen, and he looked upon his older brother (the son of an inferior wife,