Читать книгу A Half Century Among the Siamese and the Lāo: An Autobiography онлайн

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There could at least be no objection to making an experimental visit, and then continuing it as long as might seem wise. Pechaburī is within thirty hours of Bangkok. If taken sick, I could run over in a day or two. With that understanding, and with the tacit rather than the expressed sanction of the mission, I began to make preparations.

At last my preparations were complete, even to baking bread for the trip. I had fitted up a touring-boat of my own, and had engaged captain and boatmen; when, on the day before I was to start, cholera, which for some time had been sporadic in Bangkok, suddenly became epidemic. Till then Dr. James Campbell, physician to the British Consulate, and our medical authority, thought that with caution and prudence I might safely go. A general panic now arose all over the land. Dr. Bradley came to tell me that deaths were occurring hourly on the canal by which I was to travel. To go then would be to tempt providence. I had earnestly sought direction, and it came in a way little expected.