The Glass Palace

From aboard the ship, the king surveys the Shwe Dagon Pagoda through gold binoculars. The pagoda is in Rangoon and was founded by Thebaw’s ancestors but taken by the British before the king was born. He returns back below deck, noting that a number of his possessions have already been stolen, including the Ngamauk, a ruby ring.

The royal family arrive in Madras and are put up in a large, luxurious house. Locked up in the building, the king develops strange habits. He begins to sell his treasures–at first, for a fraction of their value. When Mr. Cox, the man supervising the family, finds out, he appropriates the family’s wealth and forbids them from spending it.

Dolly notices a change in mood among the other attendants. They become less servile, angering the queen. One day, the husband of an attendant comes from Burma to collect his wife and she decides to leave with him. Worrying that others will follow, the queen begins to hand out gifts to favored staff. Dolly receives a gift, but some of her colleagues do not. When they begin to act up, the queen has them beaten. This hardens their resolve and, the next morning, they refuse to wait on the queen.

The queen fires most of the servants, sparing Dolly. She hires local people instead, whom Dolly must teach. Though she begins to learn the language, she struggles to understand the new people. They seem clumsy and slow to learn. An English nurse refuses to adhere to the Mandalay customs–she will not crawl on her hands and knees before the queen. The queen gives birth to a baby girl.

Mandalay becomes a ghost town. Ma Cho sees little cause to run her food stall, which is then burglarized. Rajkumar suggests that they ask Saya John for help–Ma Cho bursts into tears. The two almost have sex before Ma Cho rejects Rajkumar and they never speak of the incident again. A few days later, she disappears. Alone, Rajkumar seeks out Saya John. The king is informed that his family is to be moved to Ratnagiri; Dolly goes with them.

Saya John’s business is flourishing and Rajkumar works for him. British occupation has changed Burma, which is now integrated into the British Empire’s trade with the rest of the world. The duo travel from port to port, journeying into the jungle to find the best teak. Due to his European clothes, Saya John is regularly afflicted by leaches and Rajkumar must burn them off with his cheroot. The wood is harvested all year round, moved down streams by teams of men and elephants. Saya John teaches Rajkumar about the kinship between mint plants and teak–they are distantly related, Saya John says, though one is a spice and the other topples dynasties.

During their journeys upstream, Saya John takes supplies and treats to the British teak camp assistants who control the jungle. While some invite him in for dinner and treat him politely, others become angry at any forgotten items and dismiss him with racial slurs. When Rajkumar offers to remonstrate with one such assistant, Saya John tells him to leave it be. Later, when Rajkumar asks about this, Saya John tells him how the companies use up these young camp assistants, having them run the teak camps for three years until their health becomes dire. In a way, Saya John admires the British and tells Rajkumar that he could learn a lot from the young camp assistant.