over they still squat upon the floor, smoking huge cigarettes of rank tobacco wrapped in the leaf of the banana, and exchanging occasional words or greetings with some friend or acquaintance passing homewards in his boat. These floating structures are comparatively clean, cool, and comfortable, and possess one great advantage over a fixed dwelling upon land, in the fact that, provided the house is the property of the tenant, he may remove to a new locality without any of the inconvenience of an ordinary removal, by the simple process of shifting at the same time both his habitation and all that it contains. It is an amusing and not uncommon sight to see a father and his family, aided by a few muscular friends or relatives, tugging away at ponderous shovel-shaped oars, fastened fore and aft, as they pilot their house through a crowd of smaller craft on their way to settle in some more desirable or convenient locality. [Illustration: SIAMESE CANOES.] Behind the floating houses, either situated on the banks or overhanging the water, are houses built on piles. They are raised sufficiently high to escape the floods that come with the rainy season. Their general construction is the same as that of the floating dwellings, but as their inhabitants throw most of their rubbish into the space between the ground and floor instead of into the river, they are by no means such healthy habitations as those that float in the river below. In the river are moored the coasting steamers that carry the rice of Siam to Singapore or Hong-kong, that transport lean cattle to the Malay States and Archipelago, and bring back goods of European or Asiatic manufacture, as well as thousands of Chinese coolies for the labour market. There are great Norwegian sailing vessels taking in teak, and tank steamers discharging kerosine oil. Chinese junks and "lighters" pass slowly by with heavy, yellow, mat-like sails, bearing cargo to the island in the gulf, where it will be transferred to the larger steamers. On the prow of every junk is painted a big wide-open eye, whose powerful optical properties are supposed to aid the vessel in steering a safe and speedy course. Says the Chinese maritime philosopher, "No have got eye; how can see?" There are no Siamese junks or steamers, for the trade of the country is in the hand of foreigners, who, for commercial purposes, use either the steamers that owe their design and construction to modern invention, or else the huge unwieldy junks that the conservative Chinese crews would be exceedingly loth to relinquish.