[ i6o ]
X. Jn Account of the J/land of Sumatra, &^c. By Mr.
Charles Miller. Communicated by EdmwcA King, Efq.
TO EDWARD KING, ESQ.
f\ 1? a f» c T 13 Beclfortl-row,
o £, A K a lit, December 12, 1777.
Read Jan. 29, 'T^ HE attention which has been paid by
' * •*• the learned world to the accounts
lately publiflied of the iflands of the South-fea, has led
me to think, that the inclofed account of the illand of
Sumatra, particularly of fome of its interior parts, toge-
ther with that of the neighbouring ifland of Enganho,
might not be wholly imacceptable.
It is compiled from feveral letters of Mr. charles
MILLER (fon of the late botanic gardener) now in the
ferviceof the Eaft India Company at Sumatra; and, as
they were addrefled to different friends, without the moft
diftant idea of their contents being communicated be-
yond that circle, allowance muft be made for inaccura-
cies of ftile and want of conne6lion ; tor I was unwilling
to attempt to fupply any thing that feemed wanting,
judging
Mr. miller's Account ofy &c. i6r
judging that authentic information is more valuable than
the beft wrought tale.
If you think this paper contains any thing likely to
afford either information or amufement to the Royal
Society, you will do me the honour to prefent it*
I am, &c.
JOHN PRE RE.
ExtraSs from feveralletters from Mr. charles miller
(fon of the late botanic gardener J mw fettled at Fort
Malbro' ;^^^r Bencoolen ; giving fome account of that
place y of tbe^ interior parts 0/ Sumatra, and of a neigb^
bouring ijland. never known to have been vijited by any
European^,
FORT MALBRO' is fituated about a mile and a
half to the South of the Malay town [Bencoolen] where
the company, formerly had their fadtory ; but removed
from thence about the year 17 10, on account of the
unhealthinefs of the place*
The fort, from which the fettlement takes its name,
ftill remains in the fame ftate in which the French left it
in
1 6a Mr. miller's Account of
in 1 761; when, after taking the place, they thought it
not worth keeping, and accordingly blew up the baftions,
and deferted the fettlement.
The hotifes here are, almoft all, built, cieled, roofed,
and floored, with a kind of reed called bamboo, and
thatched with the leaves of the fage-tree, and would all
be called cottages in England, making a very mean ap-
pearance. They are placed in no kind of order; moft of
them are raifed from the ground on wood or brick pil-
lars fix or eight feet high; within they are not much
unlike a fet of rooms in a college, as they confift of one
lai^ge room called a hall, out of which two doors lead,
the one to a bed-room, and the other to an office or ftudy.
The climate is far from being fo diHigreeably hot as it
is reprefented to be, or as one might expe6t from our
vicinity to the line ; the thermometer (of which I have
kept a journal for a year paft) is never lower in a morn-
ing at fix than 69°, or higher than 76°, At noon it
varies from ^(f to 88°; and at eight p. m. from 73'* to
78" or 80°. I have once only feen it at 90% and in the
Batta country, immediately under the line, I have feen
it frequently at fix a, m, as low as 6 1°, We have always
a fea^breeze, which fets in at about nine o'clock, and
continues to Sun-fet, and is generally pretty frefli: this
tempers the heat fo much, that I have never been incom-
moded
tBe I/Iand of Siimlitra. i (> 3
moded by it (even in the midft of the day) fo much as I
have frequently been on a fummer'vS day in England.
Rain is very frequent here; fomctimcs very heavy, and
almoft always attended with thunder and lightning.
E^thquakes are not uncommon; we have had one in
particular, jGnce my arrival, which %vas very violent, and
did ranch damage in the country. There are feveral vol-
canos on the ifland; one within light of Malbro', which
almoft conftantly emits fmoke, and, at the time of the
earthquake, emitted fire.
The Englifh fettled here (exclufive of the military)
are between feventy and eighty, of which about fifty are
at Malbro\ They live full as freely as in England, and
yet we have loft but one gentleman during the laft fix
months ; a proof that this climate is not very unhealthy.
The people who inhabit the coaft are Malays, who
came hither from the peninfula of Malacca : but the
interior parts are inhabited by a very different peo-
ple, and who have hitherto had no connexion with the
Europeans. Their language and character differ much
from thofe of the Malays, the latter tifing the Arabic
ch^after; but all the interior nations which I have
vifited, though they differ from one another in lan-
guage, ufe the fame character.
Vol. LXVIII. Y The
1 64 ^^^*» miller's Account of
The people between the difl:ri6ts of the Englifh com*
pany. and thofe of the Dutch at Palimban on the other
iide the iliand, write on long narrow flips of the bark of
a tree, with a piece of bamboo; they begin at the bottom^
and wTite from the J eft-hand to the rights which I think
is contrary to the cuftom of all other Eaftern nations.
This country is very hilly, and the accefs to it exceed-
ingly difficult, there being no poflibility of a horfe going
over the hills. I was obliged to walk the whole way, and
in many places bare- foot, on account of the fteepnefs of
the precipices. The inhabitants are a free people, and
live in fmall villages called Doofans, independant of each
other, and governed each by its own chief [Doopattee]*
All of them have laws, fome written ones, by which
they punifh offenders, and terminate difputes. They
have almofl all of them, particularly the women, large
fwellings in the throat, fom€ nearly as big as a man's
head, but in general as big as an oflrich's egg, like the
goitres of the Alps. It is by them faid to be owing to
their drinking a cold white water; I fancy it mufl: be
fome mineral water they mean. Near their country is a
volcano : it is very mountainous, and abounds with ful*
phur^ and I dare fay with metals too, though no mines
are workedhere. If this diftemper be produced here b^
this caufe, perhaps in the Alpine countries it may fake
its
Vv
tbe Ijiand of Sumatra. 1^5
Ifs origin from a fimilar one, and not, as has been ima*
gined, from fnow-water : certain it is, there is no fnow
here to occafion it. In almoft all the central parts from
Moco-moco northwards, they find gold and fome iron;
but this diftemper is unknown there. I have met here
with a rivulet of a ftrong fulphurated water, which was
fo hot a quarter of a mile below its fource, that I could
not walk acrofs it.
The country called the Caffia country lies in latitude
i^ N. inland of our fettlement of Tappanooly : it is well
inhabited by a people called Battas, who differ from all
the other inhabitants of Sumatra in language, manners,
and cuftoms. They have no religious worfliip, but have
fome confufed idea df three fuperior beings ; two of which
are of a benign nature; and the third an evil genius,
whom they ftile Murgifo, and to whom they ufe fome
kind of incantation to prevent his doing them hurt. They
feem to think their anceftors are a kind of fuperior
beings, attendant always upon them. They have no
king, but live in villages [Compongs] abfolutely inde-
pendant of each other, and perpetually at war with one
another: their villages they fortify very ftrongly with
double fences of camphire plank pointed, and placed
with their points proje£ling outwards, and between thefe
fences they put pieces of bamboo, hardened by fix-e, and
Y a likewife
1 66 Mr. miller's Jccount of
likewife pointed, which ai^e concealed by the grafs, but
will run quite through a man's foot. Without thefe
fences they plant a prickly fpecies of bamboo, which
foon forms an impenetrable hedge. They never ftir
out of thefe Compongs unarmed ; their arms are match-
lock guns, which, as well as the |K)w^der, are made in the
country, and fpears with long iron heads. They do not
fight in an open manner, but way-lay and flioot or take
prifoner fingie people in the woods or paddy-fields.
Thefe prifoners, if they happen to be the people who
have given the offence, they put to death and eat, and
their fkulls they hang up as trophies in the houfes where
the unmarried men and boys eat and fleep. They allow
of polygamy : a man may purchafe as many wives as he
pleafes; but their number feldom exceeds eight. They
have no marriage ceremony ; but, when the purchafe is
agreed on by the father, the man kills a buffalo or a
horfe, invites as many people as he can; and he and the
woman fit and eat together before the whole company^
and are afterwards confidered as man and wife. If after-
wards the man chufes to part with his wife, he fends her
back to her relations with all her trinkets, but they keep
the purchafe-money ; if the wife diflikes her hufband^
her relations muft repay double the purchafe-money.
A man detected in adultery is punifhed with death,
and the body eaten by the offended party and his friends i
the
the Ifland of Sumatra. 167
the woman becomes the flave of her hufband, and is
rendered infamous by cutting off her hair. Public theft
is alfo puniflied with death, and the body eaten. All
their wives live in the fame houfe with the hulband, and
the houfes have no partition; but each wife has her
feparate fire-place.
Girls and unmarried women wear fix or eight large
rings of thick brafs wire about their neck, and great
numbers of tin rings in their ears; but all thefe orna-
ments are laid afide when they marry.
They often preferve the dead bodies of their Radjas
(by which name they call every freeman that has pro-
perty, of which there are fometimes one, fometimes
more, in one Compcmgi and the reft are vaffals) for three
months and upwards before they bury them : this they
continue to do by putting the body into a coffin well
caulked with dammar (a kind of rezin) : they place the
coffin in the upper part of the houfe, and having made a
hole at the bottom, fit thereto a piece of bamboo, which
reaches quite through the houfe, and three or four feet
into the ground: this ferves to convey all putrid moif-
ture from the corpfe without occafioning any fmell^
They feem to have great ceremonies at thefe funerals ;
but they woiild not allow me to fee them. 1 faw feveral
figures dreffed up like men, m^ heard a kind of finging
ei and
i68 Mr. miller's Jccouni of
and dancing all night before the body was interred : they
alfo fired a great many guns. At thefe funerals they kill
a great many buflaloes ; every Radja, for a confiderable
diftance, brings a buffalo and kills it at the grave of the
deceafed, fometimes even a year after his interment ; v^e
affifted at the ceremony of killing the i o6th bujEFalo at a
radja's grave.
The Battas have abundance of black cattle, buffaloes,
and horfes, all which they eat. They alfo have great
quantities of fmall black dogs, with ere6t pointed ears,
which they fatten and eat. Rats and all forts of wild
animals, whether killed by them or found dead, they eat
indifferently. Man's flefli may rather be faid to l)e eaten
in ferrorem^ than to be their common food; yet they
prefer it to all others, and fpeak with peculiar raptures of
the foles of the feet and palms of the hands. They ex-
piefTed much furprize on being informed that white
people did not kill, much lefs eat, their prifoners.
Thefe people, though cannibals, received me with
great hofpitality and civility; and though it was thought
very dangerous for any European to venture among
them, as they are a warlike people, and extremely jea-
lous of ftrangers; yetl took only fix Malays as a guard,
but wjas efcorted from place to place by thirty, forty, and
fometimes
the IJland of Sumatra. 169
fometimes one hundred of the natives, armed with
match-lock guns and matches burning.
It is from this country that moft of the caffia fent to
Europe is procured ; and I went there in hopes of finding
the cinnamon, but without fuccefs. The caffia tree
grows to fifty or fixty feet, with a ftem of about two feet
diameter, with a beautiful regular fj^reading head; its
flowers or fruit I could not then fee, and the country peo-
ple have a notion that it produces neither.
Camphire and Benjamin trees are in this country in
great abundance ; the former grows to the fize of our
largeft oaks, and is the common timber in ufe : I have
fcen trees near one hundred feet high. Its leaves are acu-
minated and very different from the camphire tree feen
in the botanic gardens, which is the tree from which the
Japanefe procure their camphire by a chemical procefs;
whereas in thefe trees the camphire is found native in a
concrete form. Native camphire fells here at upwards of
200^./)^r Cwt. to carry to China; what the Ghinefe do
to it, I cannot fay ; but, though they purchafe it at 250^-
or 300;^. they fell it again for Europe at about a quarter
of the money. I have never been able to fee the flower
of the camphire tree ; fome abortive fruit I have fre-
quently fou^nd under the trees, they are in a cup, like an
.^ acorn.
j>jo Mr. MILLER^ Account of
acorn, but the lacinut calycis are four or five times longer
than the feed,
I have taken other journies into different parts of the
interior country, never before viiited by any Europeans.
Thefe journies were performed on foot, through fuch
I'oads, fwamps, &:c. as were to appearance almofl impaf^
fable. I have been hitherto fo fortunate as to meet with
no obflru6tion from the natives; but, on the contrary,
have been hofpitably received every where. Almofl all
the country has been covered with thick woods of trees
moftly new and undefcribed, and is not one-hundredth
part inhabited.
It is amazing how poor the Fauna of this country is,
particularly in the mammalia znd aves. We have abun-
dance of tliQjimia gibbon of buffon: they are quite
black, about three feet high, and their arms reach to the
ground when they ftand erecSt; they walk on their hind
legs only, but I believe very rarely come down to the
ground. I have k^n hundreds of them together on the
tops of high trees. We have feveral other fpecies of the
Jimia alfo; but one feldom fees them but at a great
diflance. The oerang oatan^ or wild-man (for that is the
meaning of the words) I have heard much talk of, but
never feen; nor can I find any of the natives here that
have feen it. The tiger is to be heard of in alxnoft every
part
the I/land of Sumatra* 171
part of this ifland : I have never feen one yet, though I
have frequently heard them when I have flept in the
woods, and often feen the marks of their feet. They
annually deftroy near one hundred people in the coun-
try where the pepper is planted ; yet the people are fo
infatuated that they feldom kill them, having a notion
that they are animated by the fouls of their anceftors.
Of tiger-cats we have two or three forts ; elephants,
rhinoceros, elks, one or two other kind of deer, buf-
faloes, two or three forts of muftelae, porcupines, and
the fmall hog-deer, almoft compleat the catalogue of
our mammalia.
Birds I have feen very few indeed, and very few fpe-
cies of infedls. Ants, of twenty or thirty kinds, abound
here fo much as to make it almoft impoffible to preferve
birds or infeas. I have frequently attempted it, but in
vain.
I have met with one inftance, and one only, of a ftra-
tum of foffil lliells. I had fome notion that it was an
obfervation (of condamine^s I think) that no fuch thing
was to be found between the tropics.
The ifland of Enganho, though fituated only about
ninety miles to the Southward of MalbrQ',was fo little
known, on account of the terrible rocks and breakers
which entirely furround it, that it was even doubtful
Vol. LXVIII. Z whether
172 Mf. miller's Account of
whether it was inhabited : to this ifland I have made a
voyage. With great difficulty and danger we beat up
the whole South -weft iide of it, without finding any
place where we could attempt to land; and we loft two
anchors, and had very near fuffered ihip wreck before we
found a fecure place into which we might run the vefleL
At laft, however, we difcovered a fpacious harbour at the
South-eaft end of the ifland, and I immediately wentinta
it in the boat, and ordered the veflel to follow me as foon
a^ poffible, for it was then a dead calm. We rowed di^
recStly into this bay; and as foon as we had got round the
points of an ifland which lay off the harbour, we dif-
covered all the beach covered with naked favages^ who
were all armed with lances and clubs ; and twelve canoes
fiillof them, who^ till we had pafl^ed them, had Min con-
cealed, immediately rufliedout upon me^m^aking a horrid
noife : this, you may fuppofe, alarmed us greatly ; and as
I had only one European and four black foldiers, befides
the four lafears that rowed the boat, I thoughtit beft to re*-
turn, if poffible, under the guns of the veffel, before I
ventured to fpeak with th^m. Iti cafe we were attacked^ I
ordered the feapoys to referve their fire till they could be
fure their balls would take effeft; and then to take ad-
vantage of the eonfufion our firing would throw the
favages into^ and attack them, if poffible, with their
^ bayonets I.
the I/land of Sumatra. 173
bayonets. The canoes, however, after having purfued
for a mile, or a mile and a half, luckily flopped a little to
confult together, which gave tis an opportvinity to efcape
them, as they did not care to purfue lis out to fea. The
fame afternoon the veffel came to an anchor in the bay,
and we were prefently vifited by fifty or fixty canoes
full of people. They paddled round the veflel, and
called to us in a language which nobody on board under-
ftood, though I had people with me who understood the
languages fpoken on all the other iflands. They feemed
to look at every thing about the veffel very attentively;
but more from the motive of pilfering than from cu-
riofity, for they watched an opportunity and unlliipped
the rudder of the boat, and paddled away with it. I fired
a mufquet over their heads, the noife of which frightened
them fo, that all of them immediately leaped into the
fea, but foon recovered themfelves and paddled off.
They are a tall, well-made people; the men in ge-
neral about five feet eight or ten inches high; the wo-
men Ihorter and more clumfily built. They are of a
red colour, and have ttraight, black hair, which the men
cut fliort, but the women let grow long, and roll up in a
circle on the top of their heads very neatly. The men
go entirely naked, and the women wear nothing more
than a very narrow flip of plantain leaf. The men
Z 2 always
174 ^^* miller's Accotmt of
always go armed with fix or eight lances^ madfe of the
wood of the cabbage-tree, which is extremely hard ; they
are about fix feet long, and topped with the large bones
of filli Iharpened and barbed, or with a piece of bamboo
hardened in the fire, very fliarp-pointed, and its concave
part armed with the jaw bones and teeth of fifh, fo that
it would be almoft impofllible to cxtvzdi them from a
wound. They have no iron or o&er metal that I could
fee, yet they build very neat canoes ; they are formed of
two thin boards fewed together, and the feam filted with
a refinous fubftance. They are about ten feet long, and
about a foot broad, and have an outrigger on each fide,
to prevent their over-fetting. They Iplit trees into boards
with ftone wedges*
Their houfes are circular, fiipported on ten or twelve
iron- wood flicks about fix feet long: they are neatly
floored with planfc, and the roof rifes immediately from
the floor in a conical forjn% fo as to refemble a flxaw bee-
hive; their diameter is not above eight feet.
Thefe people have no rice, fowls, or cattfe, of any
kind : they feem to live upon cocoa-nuts, fweet potatoes,
and fugar-canes. They catch fifli^ and dry them in the
fmoke; thefe fiflithey either ftrike with their lances, pr
catch in a drawing mt^ of which they make very neat
ones.
They
tie IJland of Sumatra. y 75
They do not chew betel, a cuftom which prevails uni-
Terfally among the Eaftern nations*
I went on fliore the day after the veflel anchored in
the bay, hoping to be able to fee fomething of the coun-
try, and to meet with fbme of the chiefs. I faw a few
houfes near the beach, and went towards them; but the
natives flocked down to the beach, to the number of
iixty o^ feventy men, well armed with their lances. See.
and pmt themfelves in om way ; yet, when we approached
them, they retreated flowly, making fome few threaten,
ing geftureSi I then ordered my companions to halt and
to be well on their guard, and went alone towards them :
they permitted me to come amongft them, and I gave
them fome knives, pieces of cloth, and looking-glafles,
with all whichthey feemed well pleafed, and allowed me
to take from them their lances, &c. and give them to
my fervant, whom I called to take them* Finding them
to behave civilly, I ra^de figns that I wanted ta go to their
houfes and eat with them; they immediately fent people
who brought me cocoaruuts, but did not feem to approve
€>f my going to their houfes r however, I determined to
venture thither, and feeing a p^h leading towards them,
I went forward attended by about twenty oi them, who,
as foon as we had got behind fome trees, which pre-
vented niy people feeing us, began to lay violent hands
6 oa
1 76 Mr. miller's Account of
on my cloaths, and endeavour to pull them off; but hav-
ing a fmall hanger, I drew it, and, making a ftroke at
the moft officious of them, retreated as faft as poffi-
ble to the beach. Soon after we heard the found of
a conch-fhell ; upon which all the people retired, with all
poffible expedition, to a party of about two hundred, who
were affembled at about a mile diftance* It was now
near Sun-fet, and we were near a mile from our boat;
and, as I was apprehenfive we might be way-laid in our
return if we ftaid longer, I ordered my people to return
with all poffible fpeed; but firfl: went to the houfes the
natives had abandoned, and found them ftripped of
every thing; fo that I fuppofe this party had been
amufing us while others had been employed in remov-
ing their wives, children, &c. into the woods. I intended
to have attempted another day to have penetrated into
the country, and had prepared my people for it; but the
inconfiderate refentment of an officer, who was fent with
me, rendered my fcheme abortive. He had been in the
boat to fome of the natives who had waded out on a reef
of rocks and called to us ; they had brought fome cocoa-
nuts, for which he gave them pieces of cloth : one of
them feeing his hanger lying befide him in the boat,
fnatched it and ran away; upon which he fired upon
them, and purfued them to force of their houfes, which,
finding
the IJland of Sumatra- 177
finding empty, he burnt. This fet the whole country in
alarm; conch-lhells were founded all over the bay, and
in the morning we faw great multitudes of people affem-
bled in different places, making ufe of threatening
geftures ; fo that finding it would be unfafe to venture
among them again, as, for want of underftanding their
language, w^ could not come to any explanation with
them, I ordered the anchor to be weighed, and failed out
of the bay, .bringing away two of the natives Avith me.
In our return home my defire of feeing fome yet un-
explored parts of the ifland of Sumatra, occafioned me
to order the veffel to put me on ihore at a place called
Flat Point, on the Southern extremity of the ifland, from
whence 1 walked to Fort Malbro'. In this journey 1
underwent great hardfhips, being fometimes obliged to
walk on the fandy beach, expofed to the Sun, from fix in
the morning till fix at night, without any refrefhment;
fometimes precipices to afcend or defcend, fo fleep that
we could only draw ourfelves up, or let ourfelves down^
by a rattan; at other times rapid rivers to crofs, and then
to walk the remaining part of the day in wet cloaths*
The confequence of thefe hardfhips has been a violent
fever; but, much as I then regretted having -quitted the
fliipy I had, when I came to Fort Malbro', more reafon to
rejoice; for I then found, that the veffel, in her voyage
home^
178 Mr. miller's Account of
home, was loft, and every foul on board periflied. This
has, however, been a fe vera ftroke upon me ; for as I
was obliged to leave all my baggage on board, it being
impraiticable to carry it over land, I loft all my cloaths,
books, fpedmens, manufcripts, note?, arms, &:c. from
Enganho ; in Ihort, altnoft every thing which I had either
brought with m^, or collected during my refidence in
this ifland,
I forgot to mention, that when I was at Tappanooly I
faw what I find in purchases Pilgrim called the zvonder-
fid plant of Sombrero : his accoimt, however, is fomewhat
exaggerated, when he fays it bears leaves and grows to
be a great tree. The name by which it is known to the
Malays is Lalan-lout^ that is, fea-grafs. It is found in
fandy bays, in ftiallow water, where it appears like a
flender ftrait ftick, but, when you attempt to touch it,
immediately withdraws itfelf into the fand. I could
never obferve any tentacula: a broken piece, near a foot
long, which, after many unfuccefsful attempts, I drew
out, was perfe(Slly ftrait and uniform, and refembled a
worm drawn over a knitting-needle; when dry it is a
coral.
The fea cocoa-nut, which has long been erroneoufly
confidered as a marine production, and been fo extremely
fcarce and valuable, is now difcovered to be the fruit of
a palm
the IJland of Sumatra. 179
a palm with flabelliform leaves, which grows abundantly
on the fmall iflands to the Eaftward of Madagafcar,
called in our charts Mahi, &:c. and by the French Les
IJles de Secbelles. To thefe iflands the French have fent
a large colony, and planted them with clove and nutmeg-
trees, as they have likewife the iflands of Bourbon and
Mauritius.
Vol. LXVIIL
A a
