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Chow Khoon Sah, or "His Lordship the Lake," whose functions in the Watt P'hra Keau I have described, was the High-Priest of Siam, and in high favor with his Majesty. He had taken holy orders with the double motive of devoting himself to the study of Sanskrit literature, and of escaping the fate, that otherwise awaited him, of becoming the mere thrall of his more fortunate cousin, the king.
The royal physicians and the Supreme Council were sworn to secrecy; and the woman Kliep, and her accomplice Khoon Hate-nah, together with nine female slaves, were tortured and publicly paraded through the environs of Bangkok, though their crime was never openly named.
However that may be, it is certain that the king and the high-priest were now fast friends. Chow Khoon Sah lived at some distance from the palace, at the Watt Brahmanee Waid. As the friendship between the cousins ripened, his Majesty considered that it would be well for him to have the contemplative student, prudent adviser, and able reasoner nearer to him.
In the centre of the temple stood a long table, finely carved, and some gilt chairs. The king and most of the nobler ladies of the court were present, with a few of the chief priests, among whom I recognized, for the first time, his Lordship Chow Khoon Sah. His Majesty received me and my little boy most kindly.
The women sat in circles, and each displayed her vase of flowers and her lighted taper before her. In front of all were a number of my younger pupils, the royal children, in circles also. Close by the altar, on a low square stool, overlaid with a thin cushion of silk, sat the high-priest, Chow Khoon Sah.
The only woman who ever managed him with acknowledged edged success was Khoon Chom Piem: hardly pretty, but well formed, and of versatile tact, totally uneducated, of barely respectable birth, being Chinese on her father's side, yet withal endowed with a nice intuitive appreciation of character.
Her mother, the Lady Khoon Chom Kioa, who had once found favor with the king, had, at the time of my coming to the palace, fallen into disgrace by reason of her gambling, in which she had squandered all the patrimony of the little princess. This fact, instead of inspiring the royal father with pity for his child, seemed to attract to her all that was most cruel in his insane temper.
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