Page:The Marquess of Dalhousie.djvu/117

Rh had settled at Rangoon, the seaport of the Irawadi. Rangoon, however, together with the Irawadi delta and its upper valley, continued to form the Burmese Empire. The lofty barrier of the Yoma mountains and their outlying spurs separated the British coast strip on the Bay of Bengal from the inner Burmese dominions. A British Resident at the inland Burmese capital of Ava maintained the treaty and protected our frontier.

The bitterest part of the treaty of 1826 to the Burmese Emperor had been this compulsory acceptance of a British Resident at his capital. That Buddhist potentate boasted himself to be 'The Elder Brother of China,' and 'The Lord who is the Greatest of Kings.' He regarded the presence of a barbarian envoy as a personal humiliation, and a pollution to his sacred metropolis. While the prince with whom we had made the treaty remained in power, however, its provisions were fairly carried out. But on a change of dynasty in 1837, the successful usurper killed off the previous reigning family, and by studied insults to the British Resident, drove him from the imperial capital of Ava down to the seaport of Rangoon.

In 1840, the Resident had to be formally withdrawn from the dominions of the Burmese Emperor. A long series of provocations and insolent extortions on our merchants followed; for which the sufferers vainly endeavoured to obtain redress