The adoration and dread of Nats enters into all the life and legends of the Burmese. These Nats are spirits, both good and evil. Offerings are presented and ceremonies performed to obtain favors and advantages from the good, and to propitiate the evil Nats. The worship of Nats is intimately related to the old worship of spirits before Buddhism came to Burmah. The Nats are supposed to live in the six lower heavens, beyond the moon. They are able to transport themselves with the utmost rapidity to and about our world. They are believed to interfere in the affairs of man, even more than the gods. They correspond to the genii of the Arabian Nights’ Entertainment, to the fairies and elfins of Britain in olden times, with perhaps the added ideas of angels and devils. The story of King Tektha, which follows, will probably give a more correct impression of the Burmese notions of the Nats than any description could impart. This is but a single specimen of a great many such stories which are still current among the Burmese: A NAT STORY. Once upon a time, there lived, in Burmah, a king named Tektha. The kings that were before him had been devout worshipers of Gautama, and had listened to what their teachers and priests taught them. But Tektha did not believe in Gautama, but listened to strange teachers, who taught him that everything was God. He would not hear the Buddhist books, nor worship the relics nor the images. More than this, instead of behaving reverently to the priests, he destroyed their temples, and threw the idols into the water. He forbade his subjects also to worship Gautama, and threatened that if they did they should be severely punished. The people were in dismay. It was of no use for the priests to carry round their rice-pots; no one dared offer them food; the temples and pagodas were falling into ruins, and the images of Gautama were lying in the water, spoilt and decaying. What would be the consequence of this terrible treatment of their god? The people were afraid of the punishment with which the king threatened them if they worshiped Gautama; they feared the evils which the great spirits, the Nats, might bring upon them if they did not. But a few of the people would not give up the worship to which they had been so long accustomed; and among those who still in secret held to the old faith was a girl, twelve years of age, and her mother. I do not know the girl’s name; but, said she, “The king has thrown the idols into the water because he is afraid of them.” This was considered a very bold speech.