Seated from left: Crown Prince Maha Vajirunhis, the Tsarevitch, King Chulalongkorn. Taken at Bang Pa-In Summer Palace.
In 1893 the Tsarevitch – the future Tsar Nicholas II – who had been visiting India, arrived in Bangkok. Although no two men could have been less alike than the diffident future Emperor and the genial Chulalongkorn, perhaps partly because they were so dissimilar, a mutual liking sprang up between them which later ripened into a firm friendship .
The Tsarevitch was gratified by his welcome and the charm and beauty of Saranrom Palace with its wonderfully attentive servants put at the disposal of him and his suite. He marvelled especially at the curtains hung at his windows, made of multi-coloured freshly gathered flowers, sewn together with astonishing skill and renewed daily during his stay.
Despite a life of intense and demanding activity, Chulalongkorn also found time for agreeable diversions such as a picnic – employing the English word – though the event had little in common with the simple meal in the open air or even the far grander aristocratic picnic, waited on by flunkies in England. For one thing, a picnic in Siam might last several weeks, when three or four thousand people set out in six hundred boats, each rowed by a dozen men standing to their oars like gondoliers. At nightfall, the party would land to be housed in pavilions, built to last but a day, some beautified by the entrancing curtains composed of flowers that had so impressed the Tsarevitch.
Sometimes a smaller party – a mere four or five hundred strong – would cruise in the royal yacht down the Gulf of Siam. Canvas screens on each deck divided the Outside from the Inside, but once ashore on the tiny uninhabited island of the Gulf, the ladies of the Inside enjoyed perfect freedom, roaming in the woodlands and bathing with their children in the pellucid waters of the little coves.
There were also less highly organised escapades when the King, like a prince from the Arabian Nights, – stories which he loved and some of which he translated – would move freely among his subjects in disguise, landing with a band of close friends from small paddle-boats in remote villages where they might attend a peasant’s wedding or dine unrecognised at his table. These expeditions pleased Chulalongkorn mightily. So much so that in about 1902, on the further side of a canal called the Jade Basin, flanking the most delightful of his many palaces, Vimanmek, he constructed Ruan Ton. This was a group of modest traditional houses – a latter-day Petit Trianon – where, after leaving the palace dressed as usual, the King could assume a commoner’s clothes, and move about his realm as an ordinary man. Sometimes the friends he made on these occasions were invited to a delicious meal cooked by their Sovereign, the dish-washing being expertly performed afterwards by the highest ranking nobility. For although regarded as a divinity and waited on hand and foot, Chulalongkorn was an expert cook and even wrote a cookery book!
He also found opportunity to see much of his many children, who often sat beside him at meal times or on the steps of his throne, though here they had to bear in mind, they might have to answer sudden searching questions about their studies which, if unsatisfactory, meant disgrace and demotion to a lower step.
Moreover, despite the enormous weight of state affairs and the many other matters demanding his constant attention, those of his sons being educated abroad received regular letters from him, in one of which he advised: ‘The notion that you have been princes and can be comfortable in life without doing useful work is one which does not place you above the lower animals which come into life, eat and die!’
Dusit Palace and its surroundings.
In 1897 accompanied by the Heir-Apparent Vajiravudh, Chulalongkorn set out in his yacht ‘Maha Chakri’ on his first grand tour of Europe, visiting crowned heads and heads of state in France, Italy, Austria, Belgium, Germany, Russia and England, where he stayed in Buckingham Palace and was entertained by the Prince of Wales, as Queen Victoria was resting at Windsor before the fatigue of her forthcoming Diamond Jubilee.
During his absence, Queen Saowabha had been proclaimed Regent, and as he wrote to Chakrabongse: ‘Mother is upset at my departure and anxious over her heavy duties’.
The whole tour was an immense success, not least because Chulalongkorn was one of the first monarchs from South-East Asia with a fluent command of English, which enabled him to converse with most of his fellow monarchs without an interpreter but, in addition, his personality weighed heavily in his favour. Although an impressive figure on ceremonial occasions, he possessed an easy informality, rare indeed in those days, and his relaxed engaging expression in many of his portraits and photographs gives the impression of so lively and vital a personality that, over the distance of almost a century, one feels a warm admiration and affection for him.
King Chulalongkorn in Russia, 1896. Front row (left to right): HIH Grand Duchess Olga Alexandrovna of Russia (sister of Emperor Nicholas II). His Majesty King Chulalongkorn, Her Imperial Majesty Dowager Empress Marie Feodorovna of Russia, His Imperial Majesty Emperor Nicholas II of Russia and HRH Crown Prince Vajiravudh (later His Majesty King Vajiravudh). Back row: HRH Prince Svasti Sobhon (half-brother of King Chulalongkorn), Count Muravieff (Russian Minister of Foreign Affairs), HRH Prince Jayanta Mongol (half-brother of King Chulalongkorn) and HRH Prince Chirapravati Voradej, Prince of Nakorn Jaisri (son of King Chulalongkorn).
While undoubtedly stimulated and interested in such an extensive introduction to the Western world, the King, because of his already existing cordial relations with Tsar Nicholas, was particularly pleased to arrive in St Petersburg. Even the customary formal photograph taken with the Emperor and Empress, one of their daughters, Grand-Duchess Olga, the Empress’s Uncle, Prince Hans of Schleswig-Holstein-Sonderburg-Glucksburg, Prince Vajiravudh and two ADC’s reflects his evident pleasure. Seated between the Empress and the Grand-Duchess in that summer garden, he is smiling, holding negligently in one hand a rose he has picked, while his other arm is linked in an easy-going fashion through that of the Grand-Duchess, looking touchingly ‘jeune fille’ and timid in her high-necked white muslin.
This visit turned out to be fateful for Chulalongkorn’s son, Chakrabongse, for it was then that the Emperor put forward the proposal that, should Chulalongkorn agree, he would be happy to receive one of his sons at the Imperial Court and make himself entirely responsible for his future education. The Tsar’s offer must have been seen as a great opportunity by Chulalongkorn for, although he had many sons to choose from, his choice fell unerringly on his favourite Chakrabongse, as being likely to profit most from it and, in so doing, bring honour to his father and his country.
II
From Bangkok to St Petersburg
King Chulalongkorn and Prince Chakrabongse.
Prince Chakrabongse in full dress Hussar Uniform.
In 1896, the year before his father’s tour of Europe and Imperial Russia, Chakrabongse had already been settled in England in the house of a Dr Yarr near Camberley, while his brother Crown Prince Vajiravudh was staying with a Colonel Hume, who was coaching him for entry into Sandhurst.