On his death, in September 1878, a terrible tragedy was enacted. Mindon, being an Oriental, had many wives and many sons; these latter he had dispersed as rulers of provinces with very good effect. When the old king lay dying, one of his wives devised a scheme by which to secure the succession to Prince Theebaw, for the reason that he was her son-in-law by his marriage with Supya-lat, her daughter. With the most fiendish designs Theebaw and the queen, in the king's name, summoned all the princes to Mandalay. They arrived each with {45} his Oriental retinue of women of all ages. The royal ladies were lodged in the prison, which had been cleared for their reception; the princes were received into the palace. "Under instructions from the King," a massacre was perpetrated on the nights of February 15, 16, and 17, 1879. The queens and princesses and even royal children were done to death by the "ruffians released for the purpose from the jail which was now the scene of their cruelties, and their bodies were flung into a hole already dug in the jail."[1] The princes were compelled to pass through a certain doorway in the palace, where each one was in turn cut down; it is even said that the queen-mother and Supya-lat with their own hands did the deed. "Eight cartloads of the bodies of the Princes of the Blood were conveyed out of the city by the western or 'Funeral Gate,' and thrown into the river according to custom." [1] _Parliamentary Papers_ (Burma), 1886. Quotations from the _Mandalay Confidential Diary_, by Mr. R. B. Shaw, Resident, of February 19, 1879, and later dates. It was calculated that some eighty souls thus perished. Even the people were horrified. Our Resident, Mr. Shaw, could do no more than express with vigour the light in which his Government would regard these atrocities; but King Theebaw was inaccessible to argument, and reasserted his right to take "such measures to prevent disturbance as might be desirable," stating that such acts were in accordance with the custom of the State, and that he would {46} go his own way without regard to "censure or blame."[2] [2] _Parliamentary Papers_ (Burma), 1886. [Sidenote: 1883] Owing to further gross outrages, the Resident was driven to fulfil his threat of breaking off friendly relations with such a ruler; the British flag was hauled down in August 1879, and the Residency evacuated. There were now no governors to keep order in the provinces: dacoits sprang up, traders were robbed and killed, the people were oppressed, and the land neglected. English merchants, however, continued to carry on their business at their own risk; their boats plied up and down the broad stream, and it was in their hospitable company that Gatacre spent Christmas 1882 at Mandalay. RANGOON, _January_ 11, 1883. "MY DEAR FATHER,