Our Little Siamese CousinWade, Mary Hazelton Blanchard
General
Our Little Siamese Cousin
Wade, Mary Hazelton Blanchard
Children -- Thailand -- Juvenile literature
The mangosteens were placed in the first pile. They would surely be
sold, because they were not only beautiful to look at, but fragrant to
smell and delicious to taste. You may look for them in many parts of
the world, but you will fail to find them unless you visit Chin and
Chie Lo in their own country, or go to the islands near by.
The rind is of a brownish purple that changes its tints in the
sunlight. Cut the fruit carefully in halves and you will find a creamy,
white pulp, with a dark-red rim.
"They look too good to eat," you say. But if you have once tasted
them, you will long for more.
Chin and his sister are very fond of mangosteens, and so is nearly
every person who has the pleasure of eating them.
But Chie Lo likes the durions better still. When she sorted the
boat-load this morning, she was very careful to place this fruit so it
should not touch any other kind. What an odour came from it! Ugh! It
makes one think of bad eggs and everything else unpleasant.
But people who stop to-day to buy from the little girl will not
consider that. If they have lived in the country for only a short time,
they have grown to think of it as the finest of all fruits.
Picture the nicest things you have ever eaten,--walnuts, and cream and
strawberries, and a dozen other delicious things,--they are all mingled
together in the flavour of the durion.
Besides the durions and the mangosteens, there were great luscious
oranges, noble pineapples, mangoes and bananas, breadfruit and
sour-sops. Chie Lo would certainly have no trouble in selling her goods.
When she had rowed away from the house, Chin went inside and got his
shuttlecock. He must find his boy friends and have a game before the
day grew too hot. You mustn't blame him for letting his sister work
while he played. It is the way of his people, and the idea never
entered his head that girls should have, at least, as easy a life as
boys. Yet this cousin of ours is gentle and good-natured and loving.
An hour after Chie Lo had gone away, Chin and his friends were having
a lively game in the shade of some tall palm-trees, near the bank of
the river. It was great sport. The shuttlecock was made of bamboo and
was very light and easy to toss. But it took great skill to keep it
moving through the air for ten minutes at a time. The boys did not once
touch it with their hands. As it came bounding toward Chin, he held the
sole of his foot to receive it, and kicked it off in another direction.
Perhaps the next boy struck at it with his heel, and the next with the
side of his ankle or his knee. Forward and back it flew from one to
another.
These naked boys of Siam were wonderfully graceful in their play. They
must have spent many days of their short lives in gaining such skill as
this.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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