The sight of the ruined temples of Bagan filled the Western traveler with a profound sense of the impermanence of even the mightiest empires, a reminder of 'the mutability of human things.'

118:37fill the Western traveler, accustomed for many centuries now to a relative stability, with a certain misgiving. Here and there in the jungle, far from any habitation, you will find ruined temples overgrown with trees, and among the dank verger, broken gods, and elaborate bass reliefs as the only sign that here was once a thriving city, and you will come across poverty-stricken villages that are all that remain of the capital of a rich and powerful kingdom.

119:13It is a somber reminding of the mutability of human things. For Maugham, the sight of these ruins reminded him that the empire he lived at the heart of might also one day be consigned to history. Maugham writes evocatively of his first visit to the ruined temples of Bagan, as he approached by steamboat along the great river Irrawaddy. A light rain was falling and the sky was dark with heavy clouds when I reached

119:49Bagan. In the distance I saw the pagodas for which it is renowned. They loomed huge, remote, and mysterious out of the mist of the early morning like the vague recollections of a fantastic dream. I do not know how many pagodas there are at Bagan. When you stand on an eminence, they surround you for as far as the eye can reach. They are almost as thickly strewn as the tombstones in a cemetery. They are

120:18of all sizes and in all states of preservation. Their solidity and size and magnificence are the more striking by reason of their surroundings, for they alone remain to show that here a vast and populous city once flourished. Today there is only a straggling village with broad untidy roads lined with great trees, a pleasant enough little place. Over the next few days, Maugham would explore the crumbling ruins of these temples and pagodas and walk among the dilapidated