The
gilded pagoda looks over everything from a hill. The crowds in the
streets are Eastern, Chinamen, Malays, and Bengalees, and mainly the
Burman of the Irrawaddy. I was anchored over against the timber
yards. I says to myself:
"Rangoon! Pagoda! Why, Green Dragons and Kid Sadler!" I wondered if
he was there to be asked, "How's business? How's the dyspeptic soul?"
and whether he had an office maybe near the custom house, and
exported gold leaf and bronze images of Buddha. I started to find the
temple of Green Dragons, and followed a broad street, leading to the
right, for nearly a mile. Then it grew wooded on each side. Gateways
with carved stone posts and plaster griffins, took the place of
shops, and behind them you could see the slanting roofs of the
monasteries, and their towers, strung to the top with rows of little
roofs. A stream of people moved drowsy in the road, monks in yellow
robes with their right shoulders bare, women with embroidered skirts,
men with similar skirts, men with tattooed legs, and men in straw
hats with dangling brims. There were covered carts looking like
sun-bonnets on wheels and pulled by humped-necked oxen. There were
little skylarking children, and Chinamen, and black-bearded Hindoos.
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