Page:Siam and Laos, as seen by our American missionaries (1884).pdf/510

 This man, after counting the rupees and testing their genuineness, one by one, by poising it on the tip of his finger and tapping it gently with another rupee, tied the money up in a piece of rag, and, rising, dropped it from the top into the hollow of one of the posts that supported the wall behind him. This post gave him a perfect concealment for his treasure. It was his "safe," answering the same purpose to him that the iron one, with its intricate locks, does to the banker, except that in the case of the Oriental a stray spark would soon set his house and his "safe" ablaze together. Still, he could linger near for the few moments it would take the flame to lick up his house, and very soon after he would have his silver rupees, melted, it might possibly be, into a common mass.

There is no time—nor is it necessary—to speak of the trees that throw around and over the houses of the native peasantary their cool and protecting shade. Many of these houses are hidden away among the trees, some of which, for size, vie with those of the forest. Among the most beautiful of these trees are clumps of bamboo, from which material has been obtained for the building or repair of the very houses which they now envelop in their shade.

The owners of this little cabin seem busy—and happy as they are busy—at work. The wife may be cleaning the fish which her husband caught