CAMBODIA.

Waimate Daily Advertiser, Volume XXIII, 17 May 1922, Page 6

CAMBODIA.

WONDERS OF LOST EMPIRE. Ten centuries ago, or thereabouts, the then people of Cambodia" built the town and temples of Angkor. Their ruins, in far-away Indo-China, are now among the greatest wonders of the world. Unfortunately, there is nothing to-day in the whole of the known earth with which these stupendous ruins may be aptly compared. Not in India, nor (Jhina, nor Java, nor in any country where the early civilisations still lie half-buried, is there anything exactly like Angkor, writes Viscount Northcliffe in the “Daily Mail.” Karnak I remember as a tremendous, an overpowering relic; but it’s extent is a hand’s breadth compared with only so much of Angkor as has already been freed from the jungle that engulfed it centuries ago. The area of the great temple itself is four times the area of the Place de la Concorde in Paris; and the area of the city is five times that of the temple. Full description of these wondrous, colossal fragments of a vanished empire is out of the question here. One can only state simply that size, proportion, beauty, originality, but again size, huge size, are the impressions left by the first visit. A giants’ causeway some 300 yards long leads over what originally was an immense moat (but is now a playground for the King’s elephants) to the steep steps in the middle of the interior. The facade (one of four) is about 500 yards long, and consists of wonderful cloisters, the walls of which are rich in bas-reliefs in almost perfect preservation. The cloisters are double-roofed, one roof, above the other, of a peculiar curved design ; while the vaulting of the cloisters is of a style much like Gothic, pointed, and almost truly angular. The openings between the supporting columns are filled with a kind of grille, the uprights ef which are small columns carved exactly like Jacobean table legs.

Above this extraordinary facade rise the five great remaining towers of the temple itself—towers whose design reminds one of no other architecture in the world.

Within is a labyrinth of lovely counts, cloisters; pools, shrines, one above the other, always at the head of at the foot of a flight of extremely steep steps. This steepness I feel to be one of the special beauties of Angkor, as it gives sudden relief to eyee grown accustomed to a profusion of the finest detail. If the stairs that, abound all over the temple were of normal pitch, their effect would probably be to flatten the whole aspect of the place and to throw the tremendous mass of buildings out of proportion. For Angkor temple, compared with other temples, is very low for its extent; and these remarkable stairs produce the illusion either that the temple is lofty or that it is built upon a steep hill. Of the .glimpses that we caught on that drive, two will remain for ever in my memory. The first was the great Bridge of the Djinns, the good and the bad. The bridge is a viaduct across another moat; and each balustrade consists of a stone cobra (Naga, the Sacred Snake), some 300 ft long. The balustrade on the righthand side is carried by 36 huge statues of the Good Djinns, each bearing his load of the great snake, all in imperturbable good humour, smiling blandly upon the best of worlds.

A like number of Bad Djinns carried the other cobra on the left; but their dismembered bodies lie in -horrid confusion. Evidently seme terrible celestial battle must have resulted' in the overthrow of the Forces of Evil. The other memorable glimpse was of the glorious terrace of the elephants; a terrace about 10ft high, along the face of which march armies of magnificent elephants in relief. At intervals there are buttresses, the faces and corners of which are formed by superb elephants* heads, their great trunks reaching down to the foot of the buttresses.

His Majesty the King called at the bungalow that night to do honour to Marshal Jofire. He came with a little train of candle-bearers and half-a-dozen whitetuniced court officials —a very dignified little figure, whose alert face wore a cheery smile. His Majesty is 83 years old, but his energy remains unabated.

We saw him again the next day in' the. resplendent 12th-century Durbar which he had personally organised and produced. I say “produced” advisedly, for no other word can describe the astonishing result of his minute and laborious supervision. The spectacle lasted for three-quarters of an hour; and the procession included over 2000 people. Princes, princesses, coure officials, mandarins, many bands of musicians, 50 elephants, the royal horses, and bullock-carls by the score. Yet there <Vas not* the slightest hitch of any kind; and the huge cortege unrolled itself along the great causeway of the temple without a single pause. The princes, the ministers, the princesses, the King’s, wives, old and young, the maids of honour, dressed in shot silks of ever}' hue and blazing with jewels, -went by in palanquins; and over the heads of princes and of great men nodded the many-tiered state umbrellas,

denoting by their number and the number of their tiers the rank of their owners.

Followed the dancers, all glittering in their tinselled attire, borne in bullockcarts; dancers, fan-bearers, royal servants lying in hammocks; priests, the official in charge of the royal elephants, the King’s horses, which no man but he may mount, white rober Brahmins, musicians, tumblers: and the King himself, sitting in a lofty palaquin of wonderful design, studded with jewels. After the procession had passed he came to the steps of the shrine farming the point of vantage whence the GovernorGeneral and his guests watched the great spectacle, and presented us to his latest wife, a charming- girl of 19, of whom his Majesty is exceedingly proud

King Sarokath is evidently well used to the fierce light which beats upon a throne, for he showed himself perfectly serene under the fusillade of snapshot cameras directed at him by the onlookers.

Later in the evening the King commanded dances for us and directed them in person, sitting at a little table covered with the gold boxes and jars (containing cigarettes, writing materials, and other necessaries), without vjhich he never stirs forth.