An unusually protracted total eclipse of the sun was to occur this year in August, and the Siamese dominions afforded the very best place in the world to observe it. His Majesty the king of Siam, himself a practical astronomer and very fond of the science, generously invited the French astronomical expedition to be his guests on the occasion――the governor of Singapore also, and the foreigners in Bangkok generally, including the missionaries. He went himself with his entire court, with quite a fleet of steamers, down the west coast of the gulf, some two hundred miles, to Hua Wan, the point selected, where the jungle had been cleared and a bamboo palace with other buildings had been put up, expending upon his right royal hospitalities in the whole affair about ninety-six thousand dollars. A malarial fever taken there brought on, not long after his return to his capital, the death of this martyr to science, the most enlightened of all the sovereigns of Asia. He died with Buddha’s last words as the last upon his lips: “All that exists is unreliable.” He used to say to the missionaries, “The sciences I receive, astronomy, geology, chemistry,――these I receive; the Christian religion I do not receive; many of your countrymen do not receive it.” And now he died as the philosopher dieth, stepping out into the darkness beyond, on which neither science nor Buddhism shed a ray-of light or gleam of comfort. As he had chosen to live without God in the world, so he died without hope――the blessed hope of eternal life which sustains the dying Christian, and might have been his. In the death of the king the missionaries lost, some of them, a kind personal friend and “well-wisher,” as he used to sign himself, and all a friendly-disposed, liberal-minded sovereign, who put no obstacles in the way of their evangelizing his people. The king’s eldest son, Prince Chulalongkorn, then a youth of fifteen years only, was made his successor by the unanimous choice of the grandees of the realm. His royal father prized too highly the knowledge and all that came to him through the study of English not to have his heir-apparent taught that tongue. So from his early boyhood an English governess had been provided for him and his numerous brothers and sisters. From this accomplished lady he doubtless derived many excellent ideas and principles, though by the terms of her engagement she was expressly forbidden to teach Christianity to any in the palace. After she left Siam he was for several months under the tuition of Mr. Chandler. The young king won golden opinions from the missionaries――who sought an early audience to express their condolence, congratulations and best wishes――by his prepossessing manners, his intelligence and the evident sincerity of his assurances of good-will.