The women wear a coloured scarf, called the _pahom_, wound round the upper part of the body. This is the only addition to the costume of the men ever invented by the ladies of Siam. As for hats, there are no such things, except a few big straw-plaited erections that look like baskets turned upside down, and which are worn by the women who sit selling their goods in the markets. The _panoong_ and the _pahom_ are of brightly coloured material, and a Siamese crowd is always a picturesque sight. According to one of the many superstitions that prevail in the country, every day of the week is under the rule of some particular planet, and to be fortunate throughout the day one should wear garments and jewels of the same colour as the ruling planet. Many rich people do actually observe this custom, and wear red silk and rubies on Sundays in honour of the sun; white and moonstones on Monday, the day of the moon; light red and coral on Tuesday, the day of Mars; green and emeralds on Wednesday, the day of Jupiter; stripes and cat's-eyes for Jupiter's Thursday; silver blue and diamonds on Friday, when Venus rules; and dark blue and sapphires on Saturday, when the chief planet is Saturn. CHAPTER XIII FISHING One of the chief commandments of the Buddhist religion is, "Thou shalt not kill." This does not refer merely to the lives of human beings, but to all creatures--mosquitoes, fleas, flies, or elephants. The reason for the commandment is that, as we have already explained, when a person dies, his soul is reborn again in another body, and this body may possibly be that of some animal. Hence, if you kill a mosquito, you may possibly be killing your own or some one else's long-deceased relative. The rule about not taking life is very generally observed, but is neglected in the case of fish. The Siamese excuses himself for fishing, on the ground that he does not kill the fish. He only pulls them out of the water; they die a natural death. [Illustration: A FISHING BOAT OFF THE ISLAND PAGODA OF PAKNAM] In Lower Siam fish forms an important part of the food of the people. In Upper Siam it is looked upon as a great luxury, for the rivers in the north are singularly poor in animal life. The absence of fish in the streams of Upper Siam is probably due to the fact that in the dry season the water is too shallow to allow the fish to live, and that in the wet season the current, swollen by the heavy rains, is extremely rapid, and drives them down-stream.