When the Burmese King undertakes a war, he retains only the parents of the conquered as slaves, and he generously hands over the children to the generals and other subordinate officers. It follows from this method of sharing the spoils, that children are often separated for ever from their parents. Here is a touching example of the unhappiness of such innocent victims.
A child six years of age, having been left in a boat, cried ceaselessly for his parents from whom he had just been separated. His streaming eyes were fixed in the direction of the spot where they had last been seen. After two days he saw on the bank one of his aunts to whom he was much attached. This woman, grieved at the loss of her nephew, followed the boat to console herself with a sight which could only make her grief more intense. The child, for whom the sight of his aunt was only a new torture, cried and stretched out his arms and called to her to help him, and at last flung himself in the river to go and rejoin her. The Burmese, untouched by this victory of nature, saved the child only to make him feel the loss of his liberty more keenly. A tender heart had restored him to his relatives, but the brutal captain thrust him into the hold of the vessel so as to run no further risk of losing him.
The Burmese are desirous of great wealth, and, although by nature a warlike race, it is rather the lust of pillage than the mere idea of glory that incites them to risk their persons. War is but a trade, according to their way of thinking, and he who returns with the richest spoils receives the greatest honour from his country. Those who fall into their power have every thing to fear if they are unable to satisfy their greed, and it is quite certain that avarice is the mainspring of their cruelty. A poor Christian, who was believed to be possessed of great wealth, was put to the torture to make him reveal the hiding place of his non-existent riches; but no amount of suffering could extort a word from him. The angry Burman in the presence of his wife and dying mother drew his sword to cut off his head. Frightened at the near approach of death, he begged for a respite, in the vain hope of discovering some means whereby the greed of his savage master might be satisfied. He was unable to fulfil his promises, and, to punish his failure, he was bound hand and foot and cast into the river.