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Full text of "Quedah; or, Stray leaves from a journal in Malayan waters"

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THE TRAVELLER'S LIBRARY, 

In Twenty-five Volumes, price Five Guineas, in cloth. 




fl>resenteo to 

TLhc xaniversttp of {Toronto Xtbrars 

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1bume Blake, JEsq. 

from tbe books of 

Zhc late Ibonourable lEfcwarfc Blafee 

Cbancellor of tbe Tflniversftg of Toronto 

(1876*1900) 



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Digitized by the Internet Archive 

in 2011 with funding from 

University of Toronto 



http://www.archive.org/details/quedahorstrayleaOOosbo 



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JOURNAL IN MALAYAN WATERS. 



BY 



Captain SHERARD OSBORN, R.N., C.B. 

OFFICIER DE LA LEGION D'HONNEUR. 



" Sweet Memory ! wafted by thy gentle gale, 
Oft up the stream of Time I turn my sail, 
To view the fairy-haunts of long-lost hours, 
Blest with far greener shades, far fresher flowers." 

; Rogers. 



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LONDON: 



LONGMAN, BROWN, GREEN, 

1857. 




. 



DATE 



MAT 4 1987 



The right of iranufntinJ ATWtrlWV} " ' """•■"■" 



1 



London : 

Trinted by SpottiswootjF. and Co. 
New-street-Square. 



gUiruatefr 



CAPTAIN WILLIAM WARREN, 

ROYAL NAVY, 

COMPANION OF THE MOST HONORABLE ORDER OF THE BATH, ETC. ETC. 
AND FORMERLY COMMANDER OF H.M.S. " HYACINTH," 

WITH 
THE WARMEST FEELINGS OF LOVE AND RESPECT, 

BY 
HIS NAVAL NOMINEE AND MIDSHIPMAN, 

SHERARD OSBORN. 



PREFACE. 



The majority of naval officers are self-taught men : 
the world their book — the midshipman's dingy berth 
their " Alma Mater." The author is no exception to 
the rule ; and as his confession may be profitable to 
others, he makes the public sufficiently a confidant, 
to say, that to a steady habit of journalising, noting 
down all he saw, read, or felt, and, in spite of 
defective spelling and worse grammar, still educating 
himself with his journal, he is mainly indebted for 
being able to fight his way up an arduous and emu- 
lative profession. 

This fact he would fain impress upon the younger 
branches of the Royal Navy : it will cheer and 
encourage the humble youth who dons the blue 
jacket, relying on his head and hand to win those 



VI PREFACE. 

honours and advancement which, in the natural 
course of things, appear only to have been created 
for the influential ; and should the author have 
thrown some bright lights on the character of a 
people much maligned and misunderstood, he and 
others will see that, in practising habits of obser- 
vation, not onty does the officer discover a source 
of amusement and instruction for himself, but that, 
at some time or other, he may be able to serve his 
fellow-man, or add, at any rate, in a humble way, 
to the fund of human knowledge. 

The general reader will be best able to judge 
whether the author was justified in troubling them 
with this second series of " Stray Leaves " from his 
journals. In transcribing them, the original cha- 
racter of the MS. has been adhered to as much as 
possible ; and, as far as lay in his power, the author 
has identified himself with that sunny period of life 
in which the tale of the Blockade of Quedah was 
originally written. 

Some apology is perhaps due to those persons 
whose names are introduced in the narrative ; but 



TREFACE. Vll 

forgiveness may be expected where no harm is said 
of them. 

And it is not less the author's grateful duty to 
express his warm acknowledgments to the unknown 
body of critics and reviewers who have so kindly 
encouraged him by liberal praise in his past efforts. 
Aspiring, however, to no lofty niche in the temple 
of literary fame, the author launches the good ship 
({ Quedah," confident that, while telling his sailor's 
yarn in a sailor's way, he will be sure of sympathy 
and kindly criticism from his countrymen and coun- 
trywomen. 



London : 
January^ 1857. 



CONTENTS. 



CHAPTER I. 

India Twenty Years ago. — Singapore jn the Month of May. 

— Chinese Junks ready for Sea. — Prahus. — Singapore 
Boats. — Miniature Junks. — Origin of the Form of Junks. 

— Sound Reason for Junks having one Eye on each Side. 

— Arab Boats. — Sampan-puchats. — Singapore of old. — 
Commercial Singapore. — A Sepoy Martyr. — Court House. — 
Churches with Steeples. — The " Hyacinth " in Port - Page 1 

CHAP. II. 

Internal Economy. — Fishing-Parties. — Rumours of Pirates. — 
News of an Illanoon Squadron. — A floating Menagerie. — 
An Encounter with Pirates. — The " Hyacinth " searches 
for Pirates. — A War-fleet heard of. — Quedah Politics. — 
We are required to aid the Siamese. — Rapid Equipment of 
Pirate Fleet. — The Malays are warned of the coming 
Retribution. — Captain Warren visits the Pirate Fleet. — 
Arrangements are made to equip a Flotilla. — The "Hya- 
cinth" and Gun-boats off Quedah. — My Gun- boat and 
Crew. — The Coxswain's Excitability. — The Interpreter's 
Appearance - - - - - -15 

CHAP. III. 

Commence to blockade Quedah Fort. — Jadee's imaginary 
Fight with a Tonkoo. — My Malay Coxswain's Appearance. 



X CONTENTS. 

— His Attire and Character. — Jadee's piratical Propensities. 
— Escapes Imprisonment by hanging a Man. — Quedah Fort 
and Town. — The Appearance of the adjacent Country. — 
A wet Night. — My Crew. — Jadee's Want of Bigotry. — 
Primitive Mode of eating - Page 35 

CHAP. IV. 

The Blockade rendered more stringent. — The Bounting Is- 
lands. — My Crew keeping Holiday. — "Hyacinths" poi- 
soned with Ground-nuts. — We discover Wild Bees'-Nests. 

— Arrangements made for robbing the Hives. — The Bees 
quit their Hives and settle on me. — No Honey. — A 
Malay Doctor. — The Koran and Chunam remedy for Bee 
Stings - - - - - - »49 



CHAP. V. 

The North-east Monsoon. — Unsatisfactory News of our 
Siamese Allies. — The Pelicans. — Alligators abound. — The 
Cowardice of the Alligators. — Encounter and Capture an 
Alligator. — Extraordinary Strength and Vitality of those 
Reptiles. — A Strange Antidote against Fever. — The Rah- 
madan and " Quedah Opera." — The Malays endeavour to 
evade the Blockade. — The Watchfulness of my Native 
Crew - - - - - - " - 59 



CHAP. VI. 

A Night Chase after a Prahu. — The Chase. — The Prahu 
manoeuvres admirably. — Jadee volunteers to board her. — 
The Capture. — A Piratical Saint. — The Saint at Prayers. 
— The Saint's Deportment. — The Saint's Martyrdom. — 
Defensive Measures. — Escape of Siamese Prisoners. — Suf- 
ferings of the Siamese Prisoners. — A curious Mode of 
Sketching - - - - - - 69 



CONTENTS. XI 



CHAP. VII. 



The Anxiety of the Officer commanding the Blockade. — In- 
telligence received of the Pirate Fleet. — My good Fortune 
in sailing with so excellent a Captain. — A Tropical Thunder- 
storm. — Jadee kills the Wind. — How Jadee learnt to kill 
the Wind. — The Dutch generally disliked. — Jadee's Pira- 
tical Friends attack a Junk. — The Defeat and Flight of 
Jadee's Friends. — They are saved by the Rajah of Jehore. 
— Killing the Wind ... - Page 81 



CHAP. VIII. 

Refreshing Effects of a Squall in the Tropics. — Scenery in the 
Malay Archipelago. — My Gun-boat "The Emerald" joins 
the Parlis Blockading Squadron. — The Malays try to 
stockade us out of the River. — Haggi Loiing comes on an 
Embassy. — Malayan Diplomacy. — Jadee's Disregard for a 
Flag of Truce. — Jadee and the one-eyed Enemy. — A Spy. 
— The Chase by Starlight. — The submerged Jungle. — An 
Indian Night-Scene. — The Chase lost. — The Whip and 
Mangrove Snakes - - - - - 94 



CHAP. IX. 

Mahomet Alee does not attack. — Start Crane-shooting. — Day- 
break in Malayia.— The Adjutant. — The " old Soldier ! "— 
The " old Soldier " fishing. — The " old Soldier " weathers a 
young Sailor. — No Cranes. — Plenty of Monkeys. — Monkeys 
in a Passion. — A sudden Chase of a Prahu. — Birds'-Nests and 
Pulo Bras Manna. — The edible-nest-building Swallow, Hi- 
rundo esculenta ; Food ; Habits. — Decide upon seeing the 
Nests collected. — Difficulties in the way of doing so. — Jam- 
boo enjoying Company's Pay. — Jamboo remonstrates. — A 
scramble for Birds'-Nests. — The Malays descend the Face of 



Xll CONTENTS. 



the Cliff. — The Home of the edible-nest-building Swallow. 
— The Birds'-Nest Trade. — The Nests composed of Ge- 
latin Page 108 



CHAP. X. 

Return to Parlis. — Datoo Mahomet Alee's sanguinary Threat. 
— Jadee has, we find, sent an abusive Message. — Jadee 
reproved. — Jadee's feelings are hurt. — Character of my 
Native Crew. — A Page about Native Prejudices. — One of 
the Malays mutinous. — Cure for Native Prejudices. — 
Malayan Jungle-Scenery by Daylight. — Black Monkeys. — 
A Monkey Parody upon Human Life. — English Seamen 
and the Monkeys. — Scarcity of Fresh Water. — The Village 
of Tamelan. — A Malay Chieftainess. — Watering. — Snakes 
disagreeably numerous. — Stories of large Snakes - 123 

CHAP. XI. 

Jadee declines to clean the Copper. — A Malay Prejudice. — 
A Malay Mutiny. — The lost Sheep return. — The Dif- 
ficulty surmounted. — Malayan mechanical Skill. — An 
Impromptu Dock. — An Accident, and quick Repairs. — 
Launch, and resume Station. — Loss of my Canoe. — A 
Sampan constructed. — The Malayan Axe or Adze. — In- 
genious mode of applying native Materials in Construction of 
Boats - - - - - - - 137 



CHAP. XII. 

Return to Quedah. — Native Defences. — The " Teda bagoose." 
— Scaring an Ally. — Difficulties which accounted for the 
Delay of the Siamese. — Inchi Laa acknowledges the Effects 
of our Blockade. — Severity towards the Malays. — A Prahu 
full of Fugitives captured. — Intelligence suddenly gained 
of Siamese Army. — Deserters. — The Malay Forces out- 



CONTENTS. Xlll 

manoeuvred. — Serious Losses of the Malays. — Inchi Laa. — 
Shameful Atrocities of the Malays. — Exchange of Cour- 
tesies. — Permission given for the Women to escape. — Pre- 
parations for Flight - Page 150 

CHAP. XIII. 

The Lull before the Storm. — The Exodus. — A Scene of 
Confusion and Distress. — The Malay Chieftain's Wife. — 
Baju-Mira. — The Convoy. — An extraordinary Appeal. — 
Midwifery simplified. — A Night-Scene. — A Midshipman's 
Emotions. — A Malayan Houri. — Resign my Charge and 
return. — An Attempt to enslave the Fugitives - 165 

CHAP. XIV. 

Malay Slave Trade fostered by the Dutch. — Brutal System 
pursued by the Portuguese. — Slavery doubtless founded by 
the Mahometans. — Retribution has overtaken the Portuguese. 
— An enlightened Policy most likely to eradicate Slavery 
and Piracy. — Close Blockade. — The Call of the Siamese 
Sentries. — The Call of the Malay Sentries. — Deaths from 
Want of Water. — Kling Cruelty. — The Trial and Verdict, 
and Punishment. — Siamese Tortures. — Novel Mode of 
impaling a Rebel. — Extraordinary Palm-spears. — Remarks 
upon Native Governments - - < - - 179 

CHAP. XV. 

The Massacre of the Prisoners in Quedah Fort. — The alarmed 
Barber. — Inchi Laa repudiates the Act. — The Vultures' 
Feast. — Captain Warren visits the Siamese Camp. — The 
Siamese Army. — Renewed Vigour in the Operations. — 
The Capture of the Battery. — The Flight of the Harem. — 
Fugitives no longer able to escape by Sea. — Narrow Escape 
of my Crew. — Inchi Laa surrenders. — Struck by a Whirl- 
wind. — The last Broadside. — The Chiefs escape. — Quedah 
Fort abandoned - - - - - 195 



XIV CONTENTS. 

CHAP. XVI. 

The Siamese in Possession of the Fort. — Description of the 
Fort. — A Siamese Military Swell. — The Divan. — A 
Naval Ambassador. — The Ambassador demands Beef. — 
Curiosity of the Siamese Officials. — The Appearance of the 
Soldiery. — Mobility of the Siamese Troops. — Arms and 
Equipments. — The Buffalo of Malayia. — Mr. Airey, Master 
of the " Hyacinth." — Siamese Ingratitude not singular. — 
We proceed to Parlis - Page 211 

CHAP. XVII. 

Return to Parlis. — A Case of Cholera-morbus. — An Irish 
Cure for Cholera. — Pat Conroy's Opinion of the Chinese. — 
Tamelan. — Parlis. — The Flight from Tamelan. — The 
Legacy of Queen Devi. — The Departure. — The Heart of 
a Cocoa-nut Tree. — Proceed to shoot a Buffalo. — Discover 
a Herd. — The Shot and the Chase. — Obtain plenty of 
Buffalo Meat - - - - - -224 

CHAP. XVIII. 

Jamboo frightened by a River Spirit The Aborigines of 

Malayia. — Malayan Superstitions. — An "Untoo," or Spirit, 
seen. — My Credulity taxed. — The Spirits of the Jungle. — 
On Superstitions in general. — The Charms of Superstition. 
— Musquitoes and Sand-flies. — The Village on Fire. — 
Flaming Cocoa-nut Trees. — Intentional Destruction. — 
Traces of Man rapidly obliterated in the East - - 238 

CHAP. XIX. 

A Crew of wretched Fugitives. — " Orang-laut," or Sea 
Gipsies. — Low Civilisation of the " Orang-laut." — Total 
Absence of all Religious Feeling. — Their Mode of Living 



CONTENTS. XV 

— The personal Appearance of Orang-laut. — Dearth of 
fresh Water. — Ordered to procure Water up the River. — 
Parlis and Pirate Fleet. — Interview with Ilaggi Loung. — 
Permission granted to procure Water. — Tom West's Address 
to the Malays. — Paddle up the River. — Tropical Malayan 
Scenery. — Pass Kangah. — Obtain Fresh Water - Page 253 

CHAP. XX. 

The Ladies of Kangah bathing. — Halt to lunch at Kangah. 

— Kangah, its Situation. — Mode of constructing Malay 
Houses. — The Mosque. — The Bazaar and its Occupants. — 
Arrival of armed Men. — Return to the Boat. — Praise- 
worthy Fidelity of the Malays. — Malay Independence of 
Character. — The Pleasures of Memory. — A Malay Family 
Scene. — Return to Parlis. — Pulo Quetam. — Trade during 
Blockade - - - - - -270 



CHAP. XXI. 

Social Evenings. — Quaintness of English Seamen. — The 
Adventures of Lucas. — Runs away to Liverpool. — Enters 
on board of an African Trader. — The Voyage to the Bights. 
— Fever. — Deaths. — Difficulty in leaving Port. — A new 
Captain joins. — Voyage Home. — Sufferings from want of 
Water. — Disorderly Scenes. — A Fight. — Villanous Be- 
verage. — A Man flogged to Death. — A horrid post- 
mortem Examination. — Temporary Relief. — Recklessness. — 
Sufferings. — A second Case of Murder. — Lucas a Sailor, 
nolens volens ------ 285 



CHAP. XXII. 

Jadee offers the Loan of a Love-Letter. — A Midshipman's 
Scruples. — The "Emerald" ordered to Pouchou. — Enter 
the River during the Night. — Jadee's Suggestions for ward- 



XVI CONTENTS. 

ing off Musquitoes. — Jadee foresees Trouble. — A nautical 
Superstition of the olden Day. — The Flight. — The Sampan 
repulsed. — The Chase. — A Prahu captured. — Proceed to 
Tangong Gaboose. — Starving piratical Fugitives. — A Threat 
of Cannibalism. — The Horrors of Asiatic Warfare. — Jam- 
boo's View of the Malays' Position. — Reflections - Page 304 

CHAP. XXIII. 

A Surprise. — The Stratagem. — Escape of Mahomet Alee. — 
Jadee indignant. — Disappointment and Consolation. — We 
report the Escape. — Raising of the Blockade. — The 
neglected Warning. — The Gig chases the Canoe. — The 
" Laddas." — A Malayan Night- Scene. — Dream-Land. — 
Return to Things earthly. — Unsuccessful Search for Prahus. 

— The Sea-breeze. — The Race. — Short Rations. — Eat 
Birds'-nests. — A long and distressing Pull. — Zeal and 
cheerful Conduct of the Crew. — Reflections - - 323 

CHAP. XXIV. 

A tropical Shower. — Early Breakfast. — The Malay piratical 
Soiree. — Jadee upbraids them for being surprised. — Pre- 
paring for Action. — Demeanour of English and Malay Sea- 
men. — Malay Charm for shooting straight. — My Coxswain ; 
his Piety. — Burning, sinking, and destroying. — The Rene- 
gade turns Traitor. — The large Reptiles of Langkawi. — 
The Tale of the Oular-besar, or Great Snake. — The Snake 
choked by a Holy Man. — A remarkable Fossil. — A Pirate's 
Hiding-place. — Lovely Scenery. — The Anger of the Skies. 

— Struck by Lightning. — Close of Operations against 
Quedah. — Conclusion - 341 



LIST OF ILLUSTKATIOINS. 



The Hyacinth — Moonlight Frontispiece. 

The Chart to face page 1 

Junk, attacked by Malay Prahus .... „ „ 88 

The Village and Jungle on fire „ „ 249 

Tornado, Coast of Malayia „ „ 337 






By the same Author 



STRAY LEAVES from an ARCTIC JOURNAL. By 

Lieutenant Sherard Osborn, R.N., Commanding: H.M.S.V. Pioneer in the 
late Expedition, 1850-51, under Capt. Austin, to rescue Sir John Franklin. 
With Map and 4 coloured Plates Post 8vo. 12s. 



" Those who with the latest map in 
hand like to follow the course of the navi- 
gators, may learn in what directions a 
search has been made, and where in all 
human probability Franklin's expedition 
is not. But these things are more readily 
ascertainable from Lieutenant Osborn's 
book and its companion map. It also 
brings the daily life of the expedition 
before us, not only in its details but its 



feelings. The impressions produced by 
the scenery— the hopes and fears as the 
ice, that is as the weather, fluctuated— the 
rivalry of the different squadrons, for four 
or five expeditions were navigating those 
seas— the amusements to vary the mono- 
tony of the winter— the cordiality, and the 
enthusiastic feelings that animated the 
men for the objects" of the expedition — are 
all vividly brought out." Spectator. 



THE DISCOVERY of the NORTH-WEST PASSAGE 

by H.M.S. Investigator, Captain R. M'Clure, 1850-54. Edited by Captain 
Sherard Osborn, C.B., from the Log's and Journals of Capt. M'Clure. 
With Chart, and coloured Illustrations from Sketches by Commander S. G. 
Cresswell, R.N. Second Edition, thoroughly revised; with considerable 
Additions to the Chapter on the Hybernation of Animals in the Arctic 
Regions, a Geological Paper by Sir Roderick I. Murchison, and a Portrait of 
Captain M'Clure 8vo. 15s. 



" The history of this famous discovery 
is well entitled to a special work ; and we 
feel certain that among the numerous 
volumes descriptive of Arctic enterprise, 
which have swelled to the proportions of 
a library, none will rank higher, or be 
more generally read, than that now pub- 
lished." Athenceum. 



" This is one of the books which form 
part of the nation's title-deeds to great- 
ness. It commemorates the achievement 
of one of the grandest exploits on record. 
Sir Robert M'Clure and his crew were the 
first men who ever passed from the Pacific 
to the Atlantic." Saturday Review. 



London : LONGMAN, BROWN, GREEN, LONGMANS, and ROBERTS. 



Q U E D A H. 



CHAPTEK I. 

India Twenty Years ago. — Singapore in the Month of May. 

— Chinese Junks ready for Sea. — Prahus. — Singapore 
Boats. — Miniature Junks. — Origin of the Form of Junks. 

— Sound Reason for Junks having one Eye on each Side. 

— Arab Boats. — Sampan-puchats. — Singapore of old. — 
Commercial Singapore. — A Sepoy Martyr. — Court House. 

— Churches with Steeples. — The " Hyacinth " in Port. 

On the 29th of May, 1838, the " Hyacinth," one of 
Her Majesty's 18-gun ship-rigged corvettes, made 
her number to the signal-staff over the Governor's 
residence at Singapore, and, aided by the light airs 
peculiar to that latitude, flapped, rather than sailed, 
into the anchorage. 

Twenty years have made vast improvements in 
that great emporium of the Eastern Archipelago; 

B 



2 INDIA TWENTY YEARS AGO. 

but even that most thoughtless of all human beings, 
a British midshipman — for such I then was — could 
not but remark the signs of vitality and active com- 
mercial enterprise which have since borne such good 
fruits. Perhaps this struck one all the more when 
coming from Ceylon and Hindostan, as we had 
done. There, it was true, the stranger from Europe 
could not but observe the air of English comfort 
and well-to-do which pervaded everything ; but, 
somehow or other, it struck one as being wonder- 
fully stagnated: the feeling that India was highly 
respectable, highly conservative, but very much 
mildewed and very much astern of the world, forced 
itself equally on the mind. Steam was still an agent 
which Indian quid-nuncs questioned the success of 
in India, whatever it might do elsewhere. A soli- 
tary steamer, the " Diana," was almost as much a 
curiosity to the European residents of the Straits of 
Malacca as she was to the Malays or Chinese ; and 
poor Lieut. Waghorn, of our navy, had not yet 
enlightened Leadenhall by showing them the ad- 
vantages of the Overland Route ; indeed, it was 
nothing unusual, even at that time, to receive letters 
five months old, and to consider oneself remarkably 
lucky in getting such late intelligence. Now, if a 
letter was as many weeks old, the merchant of Sin- 



SINGAPORE IN THE MONTH OF MAY. 3 

gapore would complain of the irregularities of the 
mail boats. 

However, it is with Singapore of the past I have 
to deal. Before the town, and at the distance of a 
mile from it, lay numerous huge junks, all glittering 
with white and red and green and black ; their 
strange eyes staring with all the vacuity of a China- 
man, and apparently w T ondering how they would 
ever find their way to China. Thither they were 
now bound, with the strength of the south-west 
monsoon to blow them, "viento a popa," into the 
ports of the provinces of Quantung and Fokien, 
whence they bad come with clandestine emigrants, 
teas, and silks, and sugars, aided by the north-east 
monsoon of the previous winter. Many a goodly 
yard of Manchester cottons, and manufactures by 
the ton of English handicraft, now filled their capa- 
cious holds. On their main-mast heads, which mast 
was, as usual, one long spar of stupendous girth, a 
most original arrangement in the shape of a dog- 
vane had been fixed, and from it long heavy, silken 
streamers waved in the hot sky. Around these ves- 
sels floated "full many a rood" their long rattan 
cables, and I began almost to believe in the sailor's 
story of a Chinaman's anchor floating, when I saw 
their cables do so, and that the anchors of their 

B 2 



4 PRAHUS. — SINGAPORE BOATS. 

largest vessels were constructed of wood. Unearthly 
cries, resembling swine in distress, issued from these 
ponderous arks, and evidently meant for songs by 
their sailors, as they hoisted in the long-boats pre- 
paratory to going to sea. 

Within these junks, in comparison with which we 
looked uncommonly small, were thousands of prahus 
of every size and form, stretching away into a narrow 
and shoal harbour which lies to the right of the town. 
They were traders from every port of the Archipe- 
lago ; they had held a constant floating fair until very 
lately, and had disposed of their wares, completed re- 
turn cargoes, and would likewise shortly depart for 
their different destinations. A merchant assured us, 
that as many as 4000 of these vessels had arrived 
during the past monsoon ; and, but for the Dutch 
interference and jealousy, many more would visit 
Singapore yearly. Skimming about amongst these 
vessels of curious forms and still more curious rigs, 
there were hundreds of boats in whose shape the in- 
genuity of man seemed to be exhausted in inventing 
bodies, intended for propulsion through the water, 
which should differ as much as possible from each 
other. The Singapore sampan decidedly carried off 
the palm for beauty and fleetness, approaching, in 
sharpness of outline and the chances of drowning 



MINIATURE JUNKS. 5 

the sitters, to one of our above-bridge racing wher- 
ries on the Thames: two Malay rowers, each pulling a 
single broad-bladed oar, could in these sampans beat 
our fleetest gig. Then, in contradistinction to these, 
came the Chinese boat — from which the name "sam- 
pan" had, I believe, been derived — a perfect minia- 
ture junk, except that she had no deck; painted with 
ports along the side, and green, white, red, and black 
eyes in the bow. In the large ones of this descrip- 
tion, which evidently belonged to the junks in the 
offing, the crews sometimes amounted to twelve or 
sixteen persons ; but in those which belonged to 
Singapore, and merely served as a means of com- 
munication between the vessels and the shore — or in 
some cases were owned by fishermen of the place — 
the pigmy junk was invariably rowed by one man. 
In all, however, whether big Chinese sampans or 
small ones, the mode of rowing was alike. The de- 
scendants of Confucius, differing from the Europeans 
in that as in every other respect, instead of sitting 
down to their oars, when rowing they always stand 
up ; instead of being before their oars, they are always 
abaft them ; and instead of the rowers facing aft, 
they always face forward. The form of the sampan 
and junk is, of course, that of the model, a slipper ; 

B 3 



6 CHINESE LEGEND. 

and that not a lady's one either, but a good broad- 
toed, broad-heeled, broad-soled one, — a good old- 
fashioned list slipper, in short. In case the reader 
should not have heard the legend upon the authority 
of which rests the fact that the slipper became the 
model for the Chinese ship-builders and waterman's 
companies, I may as well tell him that, in the time 
of that wise monarch who walled off China from the 
rest of the world by land, — between two and three 
hundred years before the birth of Christ, and about 
the time Alexander the Great invaded Persia — I 
like to be particular about dates ! — the Chinese ship- 
builders gave a great deal of anxiety to the heaven- 
descended monarch by introducing clippers, copper 
bottomed ships, and other abominable innovations — 
which quite threatened to subvert his wise intentions 
of keeping the Flowery Land free from the con- 
tamination of strangers. One day the monarch, 
pressed down with anxiety as to how his plans for 
the suppression of navigation in general were to be 
carried out, sat in public divan at Pekin to hear, as 
was the wont in those days, the petitions of his 
people. There was a rush through the crowd, and a 
subject with a wooden model under his arm threw 
himself a f the monarch's feet, rapping his head most 
devotedly upon the steps of the imperial throne ; he 



ORIGIN OF TIIE FORM OF JUNKS. 7 

was told to rise, and present his claim to heaven-born 
consideration. 

The wretch was a ship-builder of Southern China. 
He held a perfect model of a sharp-keeled vessel in 
his hands, such as barbarians two thousand years 
afterwards are seen to sail in, and implored his 
Majesty to patronise his improvement in the con- 
struction of imperial ships ! Sacrilege of the deepest 
dye ! Here, on the one hand, sat Inexpressible 
Wisdom, who desired to make the earth stand still ; 
on the other, Science, who wished to carry the people 
of the Flowery Land — their arts and peaceful dis- 
coveries, the printing-press, the magnet, the manu- 
facture of silks and paper — to nations who employed 
their leisure hours in butchering one another; and 
maybe bring back their bloodthirstiness as return 
cargoes. It was horrible — most horrible ! — but the 
monarch, though he sat cross-legged, was a merciful 
monarch : he grasped his slipper — for it was ready 
to his hand. " Avaunt, monster ! " he shouted ; and, 
with unerring aim, he hove his sacred slipper at the 
miscreant's head. " Avaunt ! — from henceforth build 
all thy vessels on the model of that old shoe ; and, 
ministers," said he, addressing the Court, "let an 
edict go forth that my slipper alone shall be the 
type of every floating thing in the Flowery Land ; 

B 4 



8 REASON FOR JUNKS HAVING ONE EYE. 

and " — lowering his voice to his prime minister and 
favourite, the heaven-born deigned to close one eye 
and leave the other open as he muttered — " and it's 
devilish funny cruising at sea they will have, if they 
adhere to that model, oh! Fan-tse!" Since that 
day China has adhered steadily to the imperial fancy ; 
and the royal act of winking is immortalised by the 
solitary eye which stares from the bow of their 
vessels ; the other one is supposed to be shut ; and 
that solitary eye says, as audibly as a wooden eye 
can say it, — 

"It's devilish funny cruising we have at sea, 
oh ! Fan-tse ! " 

Whilst cogitating profoundly, as jolly-boat mid- 
shipmen invariably do, on the profound wisdom of 
Chinese legislators, and wondering whether there are 
any more like them in the world at present, two 
other queer craft appear on the scene. 

The one is a boat built on English lines, though 
rather round and full in form ; she is painted with 
alternate streaks of every colour upon this earth, 
and resembles, as they are reflected on the polished 
surface of the calm sea and again re-reflected upon 
her sides, a dying dolphin, though a very ugly 
one. In her the crew — dressed in frocks of divers 
gay colours — are rowing in a peculiar manner, by 



AKAB BOATS. — SAMPAN-PUCHATS. 9 

rising off their seats as they clip their oars in the 
water, and then, when they throw their weight on 
the oars, coming down upon their seats with a 
" sough ! " which must have loosened the teeth in 
their heads. Yet they sang a wild and plaintive air, 
splashing the water about with their oars, and rap- 
ping down with an energy upon the thwarts which 
was charmingly original, and excited all my mirth — 
a mirth which the sitters — very obese -looking Par- 
sees from Bombay — looked very indignant at ; at 
least, as much so as a ton of flesh can ever look. 
These boats came from some Arab vessels which 
adorned the anchorage, vessels called grabs, rigged 
somewhat like brigs, but having a length of bow 
which was perfectly astounding ; indeed, in some of 
them, the long taper of the bow was one-third the 
length of the whole vessel, and the bowsprit was 
entirely inboard. 

The other strange boat which attracted mv attention 
was a craft, perhaps 120 feet long, with 20 feet beam, 
looking like an overgrown Malay sampan, and pulling 
50 or 80 oars : she resembled nothing so much in colour 
and appearance as some huge centipede scrambling over 
the sea ; these were the sampan-puchats — fast vessels, 
owned by the merchants of Singapore and manned by 
stalwart Chinese crews; they can outstrip the fleetest 



10 SINGAPORE OF OLD. 

prahus, and are able to sail or pull with equal facility. 
By them, an immense smuggling trade is done with 
the Dutch monopolists, and many a rich cargo of 
spices and gold-dust, antimony and pepper, repays 
the merchant of Singapore for his speculation in 
Sheffield and Birmingham goods. 

We pull into the little creek or river of Singapore, 
which splits the good town in two, and here the same 
Babel-like character is equally thrust upon the obser- 
vation. 

I am, however, to tell of the sea, and shall leave to 
others the details of Singapore on shore — premising 
that a good description has yet to be written of that 
Queen of the Malayan Archipelago. It will suffice 
for a sailor's narrative to say, that the whole town 
stands upon a level of no very great extent, which 
stretches along the base of gently swelling hills, on 
the top of the highest of which stands Government 
House, tenanted by the present Sir Samuel Bonham 
— then governor of the Straits of Malacca — a most 
able civil servant of the Hon. East India Company, 
beloved by all classes, and always spoken of by the 
Malays with a mixed feeling of awe and affection, 
in consequence of the active part he took as a 
commissioner in the suppression of piracy in the 
Straits. 



COMMERCIAL SINGAPORE. 11 

The creek separated Singapore into two distinct parts. 
The one was purely commercial, with its bazaar and 
market-places, its native town, and overflowing stores, 
a perfect commercial Babel, where, if a confusion of 
tongues would induce men to cease building temples to 
the goddess of wealth, they would have taken ship 
and fled the spot. There was an energy, a life, a go- 
aheadism about everything, that struck me much ; 
everybody was in a hurry, everybody pushing with a 
will. The boatmen condescended to tout for passen- 
gers, and were blackguards enough, we heard, to 
occasionally rap the passengers over the head if they 
objected to pay them the fare — a proceeding the pas- 
sengers in other parts of India often reverse by ill- 
treating the cowardly boatmen ; then came along a 
crowd of half-naked Chinese, staggering under some 
huge bale of goods, and working with a will which 
would put London porters or Turkish hammels to 
the blush ; a crowd of black and oily Hindostanees, 
screeching like jackdaws over a stack of bags of sugar, 
and Arabs, Englishmen, Jews, Parsees, Armenians, 
Cochin- Chinese, Siamese, half-castes, and Dutch- 
men, each struggling who should coin dollars fastest ; 
and as my coxswain, a Gosport boy, expressed himself, 
on his return from making some humble purchases — 
" Well, I thought they were a smart set on Common 



12 A SEPOY MARTYR. 

Hard, sir, but blest if they don't draw one's eye- 
teeth in Sincumpo! " 

It was pleasing to turn, from all these loud noises 
and strong smells of the commercial part of Singa- 
pore, to the opposite side of the river, where, nestling 
amongst green trees, lay the residences of the 
wealthy European merchants : all was as dreamy, 
sleepy, quiet, and picturesque as anyone could 
desire, and, I am bound to add, as hot; for there 
the bright equatorial sun was pouring down with- 
out shadow or breeze to take off its effects. The 
Sepoy sentry seemed to be frizzling in his leathern 
shako and hideous regimentals, and the sensation I 
felt on regarding his scarlet coat was that he might 
at any moment burst into flames. He was a military 
martyr lashed to a British musket instead of a stake. 
From that painful sight the eye instinctively sought 
repose upon a mass of cold dark-green foliage, against 
which the Court-House rose, — a long building, pos- 
sibly commodious, but decidedly of the Composite 
order of architecture. Within it, at stated periods, 
the British embodiment of the Goddess of Justice 
occasionally sat; whether in the classic pepper-and 
salt coloured wig and black gown which that deity 
disguises herself in on our own dear island, I know 
not; but as Mars adheres in the East to leather 



CHURCnES WITH STEErLES. 13 

stocks, pipeclay, and black-ball, it is quite possible 
that Astraea does not abandon horsehair and black 
silk. 

A pretty esplanade, and bungalows standing in 
pleasant detached patches of ground, stretched away 
until lost in the jungle and half-cleared country 
beyond ; these, with a very commodious church, 
constituted the west-end of Singapore : those who 
built the church, built it to give sitting-room to 
those who attended; heathens that they were, they 
forgot the steeple ! The good bishop of Calcutta 
could not — like the Chinese emperor with his old 
shoe — throw a steeple at their heads; but he did 
more : he preached a crusade against churches with- 
out steeples, and laboured, preached, and subscribed 
to have steeples put to all Protestant churches so 
successfully, that steeples went up in the air wherever 
he had trodden ; and I dare say by this time people 
in Singapore when they build churches build steeples, 
as they do in modern England, for birds to build in, 
instead of aisles in which Christians may pray. 

But what have I to do with the shore ? — Let us 
return to the " Hyacinth," and busy ourselves, 
painting and polishing, until every one belonging to 
her begins to believe she is the most beautiful thino- 
that ever floated. The first lieutenant has holy- 



14 THE "HYACINTTl" IN PORT. 

stoned the decks and scraped the masts, until both 
are as bright as a hound's tooth; the boatswain has 
been driven distracted by having to square and re- 
square the yards, in consequence of some slight flaw 
being detected in their parallelism, and confides to 
me, as I steer him on board for the sixth time, that 
" He'll be d — d if he doesn't think them yards are 
enchanted, for, somehow, he used to square the 
' Wapse's ' yards in five minutes ; " and the carpenter 
has been " cutting out " the white streak here, and 
" cutting in" the black paint of the hull there, until 
he fancies he has brought the appearance of the old 
sloop to as near perfection as it is possible for mortal 
man to do. 



INTERNAL ECONOMY. 15 



CHAP. II. 

Internal Economy. — Fishing-Parties. — Rumours of Pirates. 

— News of an Illanoon Squadron. — A floating Menagerie. 

— An Encounter with Pirates. — The " Hyacinth " searches 
for Pirates. — A War-fleet heard of. — Quedah Politics. — 
We are required to aid the Siamese. — Rapid Equipment of 
Pirate Fleet. — The Malays are warned of the coming 
Retribution. — Captain Warren visits the Pirate Fleet. — 
Arrangements are made to equip a Flotilla. — The " Hya- 
cinth " and Gun-boats off Quedah. — My Gun-boat and 
Crew. — The Coxswain's Excitability. — The Interpreter's 
Appearance. 

The Captain has gone ashore to take up his quarters 
with the Governor ; the second lieutenant says it is 
his duty to be out of the ship as much as possible in 
harbour, and has gone to carry his theory into prac- 
tice. Those of the subordinate officers who are 
blest with funds, go on shore to hire horses, and try 
and ride their tails off; those that have not, calcu- 
late the number of days that must intervene before 
they have a right to inform their affectionate relatives, 
through the Navy Agents, that they are alive, and of 
course doing well, and are heard to assert that they 
will commemorate the cashing of that prospective 



16 FISHING-PARTIES. 

bill by feats in horsemanship and gastronomy which 
would make both steeds and poultry tremble could 
they only hear them. Being of those whose happi- 
ness was involved in a cheque not yet arrived at 
maturity, I stayed on board ; and, by way of amuse- 
ment, cricket and fishing parties were made up. Of 
the former, I shall not speak : for any one can form 
an idea of what cricketing must be at a distance of 
sixty miles from the equator, the temperature at the 
time we played, 3 p.m., being about 84° in the shadiest 
part of Singapore. The seining-parties were decidedly 
the most pleasant and healthy. The plan of pro- 
ceedings usually consisted in either of the two seniors 
of the midshipman's berth obtaining permission from 
the first lieutenant to make up a fishing party; that 
done, there was a selection of volunteers from the 
seamen, marines, and boys, sufficient to man the cut- 
ter and jolly-boat. Into the latter boat, the seine- 
poles and lines were carefully placed, and in the 
cutter a goodly store of biscuit and pork, tea, coffee, 
and a little private stock of spirits. A couple of 
good frying-pans and some lard were of course a 
necessary addition, in order that we might enjoy a 
supper upon fish fresh from the water — a gastronomic 
treat in all climates, but doubly so in the East Indies. 
After evening quarters, the fishermen repaired to 



RUMOURS OF PIRATES. 17 

their boats, clad in any old clothes they chose to put 
on; and just as evening closed in wc would leave the 
s!iip, repair to some beautiful sandy beaches among 
the neighbouring islands, and there> through the 
early part of the night, fish away to our hearts' con- 
tent, then muster round a roaring fire, enjoy a merry 
supper of fried fish, rashers of pork, and biscuit, 
-..ashed down with tea or coffee made in a tea-kettle 
in gipsy fashion. The supper over, a glass of grog 
per man would be produced from the officers' private 
store, pipes would be lit, songs would be sung, 
and yarns told, until the small hours warned us 
to return to our floating home, and the next day's 
routine. These night parties, in after days, led us 
into strange adventures and funny scenes; but I will 
not forestall my narrative: suffice it that at that time 
we were novices in the East, and all was charming, 
strange, and exciting. 

Eagerly believing, eagerly listening to all that 
transpired around us, — it may be supposed that 
nothing was more keenly sought for, by all on board 
the " Hyacinth," than news about Malay pirates, 
those ogres, those bogies of the Archipelago ; and just 
then two events happened, sufficient to satiate the 
appetite for the piratical for some time to come. The 
one was of the past, but still not long since. The 

c 



18 NEWS OF A ILLANOON SQUADRON. 

" Wolf/' a sister-sloop that we had come out to 
relieve and send home, had twice fallen in with 
piratical squadrons. 

On the first occasion, her boats, consisting of a 
pinnace and cutter, fell in with the pirates in a fine 
bay near Cape Romania, the extreme southern point 
of the Malayan peninsula. The prahus, some 
twelve or thirteen in number, fought the boats and 
escaped, the forces being very disproportionate. This 
fact sharpened our eagerness, and we naturally 
longed for an equally good opportunity, an anxiety 
which was soon likely to be gratified, as the traders 
from Cochin-China and Siam had reported that an 
Illanoon squadron was cruising amongst the islands 
which lie on the eastern side of the peninsula, and 
intercepting prahus and junks bound to Singapore. 
The " "Wolf " had been despatched after these 
gentry, and the " Diana " steamer likewise, with a 
gun-boat in tow, when the fact became undoubted 
of the existence of Illanoons. We awaited intelli- 
gence of their movements, and shortly afterwards 
the " Diana ; ' arrived from a place called Tringanau, 
about sixty miles to the northward, and reported 
that an action had taken place, and the pirates, after 
fighting like heroes, had, it was supposed, retreated 
to their own country across the China Sea. 



A FLOATING MENAGERIE. 19 

One fine morning our gallant captain sent off to 
express his astonishment that the arrival of H. M. S: 
" Wolf" had not been reported to him. I hardly 
fancy his astonishment^ was greater than our own, 
on the fact being ascertained to be true ; for, al- 
though a vessel had been seen to come in, no one 
supposed she was a man-of-war. I fancy that it 
was the skill displayed in disguising the "Wolf" 
that had made her so successful in felling in with 
Malay pirates ; and I must say the effort made to 
give her the appearance of a merchantman was 
carried to a wonderful extent; for even when on 
board of her it was difficult to realise the fact that 
a pennant flew overhead. She was a perfect floating 
menagerie. Baboons flew playfully at your legs; 
a loathsome orang-outang, or (( man of the woods," 
crawled up to shake hands, and made you thank 
Providence that man, in the progressive theory, 
had at any rate advanced a stride or two above the 
creature before you ; pigs and peccaries, sheep, 
fowls, a honey bear, and a black panther, formed a 
scene Wombwell would have gloated over, whilst 
Mr. Gould, or any other ornithologist, might have 
found a week's work in classifying all the parrots, 
louries, and screeching and whistling pets which 

added to the riot below. 

c 2 



20 AN ENCOUNTER WITH PIRATES. 

However, we went on board the "Wolf" to hear 
about the pirates, and not to look at wild birds and 
beasts. 

They told us that, one day whilst cruising off 
Tringanau, reports arrived of pirates being among the 
neighbouring islands. Two Company's gun-boats 
with the pinnace and cutter were detached to seek 
them. The morning after the boats left, at day- 
light, six large prahus were seen attacking a junk 
about five miles to seaward of the ship. It was then 
a stark calm, and the " Wolf" was perfectly power- 
less to help the unfortunate junk ; the gun-boats and 
large boats being nowhere in sight. While in the 
greatest state of suspense, the steamer " Diana " was 
seen approaching from the south with a gun-boat in 
tow. The " Wolf " immediately sent every available 
man and officer into the (( Diana " to fight her guns, 
and she then steered for the junk, which was still 
making a manful resistance. 

Seeing her approach, the prahus formed in line 
abreast, with their bows pointed towards her, their 
guns, be it remembered, being always mounted for- 
ward and directed ahead. The prahus, six in 
number, were large-sized Illanoons, pulling two tiers 
of oars, and full of slaves and fighting men. The 
action was a severe one, but the " Diana " could not 



"hyacinth" searches for pirates. 21 

run the risk of attempting to board them, and had to 
take care that they did not succeed in executing 
that manoeuvre upon her, which they repeatedly 
attempted to effect. Many of their fighting men, 
creese in hand, were seen to leap into the water in 
the hope of boarding the steamer ; one or two were 
cut down as they actually had hold of the boats 
towing astern of her; and, in short, though they 
suffered tremendously, none of the prahus surren- 
dered, though one sunk, and from her some twenty 
wretches were taken : the other five prahus escaped, 
and had eluded all further search by the " Wolf " 
or her boats. 

Shortly after this event we sailed in the "Hyacinth" 
to seek the remnant of this piratical squadron. Our 
cruise was a delightfully interesting one in every 
revspect, and, although we picked up the trail of the 
pirates in the islands they had retreated to after the 
fight, we soon learnt from different sources that they 
had there destroyed three more of their prahus as 
being unfit for the voyage across the China or Sooloo 
Sea, in consequence of injuries received from the 
" Diana's" grape and canister,'and then embarking all 
their crews in the two sound vessels, they had borne 
up to return to their own homes — a sea voyage of 
about twelve hundred miles. 

c 3 



22 A WAR-FLEET HEARD OF. 

Returning empty handed and somewhat disap- 
pointed to Singapore, about the end of July, we 
were still further disgusted to learn] that Malay 
war-prahus, to the number of forty, had made their 
appearance at the opposite and western end of the 
Straits. 

They had, we learnt, fitted out on the Sumatran 
coast, at a place called Battu-putih, or " White 
Rocks," and carrying two thousand fighting men : 
the pirates had taken advantage of our absence from 
the Penang station to capture from the Siamese 
Government the important province of Quedah. 

This fleet of prahus, styled by us a piratical one, 
sailed under the colours of the ex-rajah of Quedah ; 
and although many of the leaders were known and 
avowed pirates, still the strong European party at 
Penang maintained that they were lawful belli- 
gerents battling to regain their own. 

The East India Company and Lord Auckland, 
then Governor-General of India, took however an 
adverse view of the Malay claim to Quedah, and 
declared them pirates, though upon what grounds no 
one seemed very well able to show. 

Quedah had always, in olden time, been a Malay 
state, though possibly tributary alternately to either 
the Emperor of Siam or the Emperor of Malacca, as 



QUEDAH POLITICS. 23 

the power of either happened to be in the ascendant. 
After the Portuguese crushed the Malay Empire by 
the capture of Malacca in 1511, it is possible the 
Rajah of Quedah presented his " golden flower" to 
the Emperor of Siam, and in a way swore fealty to 
that monarch. We, however, seem to have heeded 
the suzerainty of the Siamese very little, when it 
served the Honourable Company's interest ; for in 
1786 we find them inducing the Rajah of Quedah, 
on his own sole right and responsibility, to sell us the 
island of Penang for the yearly sum of ten thousand 
dollars, an annuity upon which the descendants of 
the rulers of Quedah now exist in Malacca. 

However, about the time we were engaged in the 
first Burmese war, and when it became highly de- 
sirable to keep the Siamese neutral in the fray, the 
Emperor of Siam chose to invade Quedah, and after 
committing unheard-of atrocities upon the Malay 
inhabitants, he established his rule, and was con- 
firmed in it by a treaty with us; with, I believe, 
an offensive and defensive alliance clause, so far as 
the respective boundaries of British and Siamese 
rule were concerned. The Malay chieftains con- 
sidered themselves aggrieved, and lost no opportunity 
of harassing the Siamese, and the present attack had 
been patiently conspired and prearranged at Malacca. 

c 4 



24 THE SIAMESE KEQUIRE OUR AID. 

Money, arms, and prahus, had been secretly col- 
lected at Battu-putih ; and then the chiefs raised 
the old red flag of Quedah, and there was no 
lack of enterprising and disaffected spirits to join 
them. 

A Prince Abdullah, a descendant of the ex-rajah, 
was the nominal head of the insurrection ; he was a 
wild, dissipated young man, but had around him a 
very able body of chiefs or ministers, called " Ton- 
koos," men of undoubted courage, and sons of that 
race which had so manfully struggled against Al- 
phonso Albuquerque and his powerful fleets in the 
heyday of Portugal's glory. Their plan of opera- 
tions was ably laid down by a Tonkoo Mahomet 
Said; and owing to the absence of ourselves — the 
" Diana," "Wolf," and gun-boats — there was no 
one to interfere with its successful execution. 

The Siamese, however, knew perfectly well how 
to appeal to a treaty when it involved their own 
interests, and a deputation from Bankok soon waited 
upon the Governor of the Straits of Malacca, calling 
upon the British to aid them in asserting their legal 
yet unjust rights. British good faith to one party had 
to be supported at the sacrifice of British justice 
towards the other; and, as usual, the unfortunate 
Malays were thrown overboard ; their rights ignored, 



RAPID EQUIPMENT OF PIRATE FLEETS. 25 

themselves declared pirates, and their leader, a rebel 
escaped from British surveillance. 

The Malays had, I have before said, calculated 
their operations admirably. Their fleet was fitted 
out on the Sumatran shore, near the province of 
Acheen ; arms, powder, and other stores were liber- 
ally, but covertly, supplied from European as well as 
native traders at Penang; the payment to be here- 
after made in rice and other products of the rich lands 
of Quedah. In the height of the south-west mon- 
soon, when the bad weather season prevails along the 
western seaboard of the Malayan peninsula, and the 
inhabitants naturally fancied themselves secure from 
such a visit, the Malay Tonkoos, or chiefs, watched for 
a good opportunity, crossed the Straits to a secure 
place, not many miles from Pulo Penang, there con- 
centrated their forces, and then like hawks pounced 
upon their prey. Dashing at once into the rivers 
with their light vessels, they stockaded the mouths ; 
and knowing that at that season our men-of-war 
could not approach close enough to injure them, and 
that open ships' boats could not live off the coast, the 
Malays felt that they had six months before them 
to establish and fortify their positions before the 
"white men" could commence operations, or the 
Siamese troops advance from Bankok. 



26 THE MALAYS ARE WARNED 

Knowing this, and feeling we had been perfectly 
checkmated, the " Hyacinth " was sent to warn the 
Malays of the coming retribution, and to make such 
observations as might serve for the forthcoming 
season of operations. 

Leaving Penang in September, we first proceeded 
to the town of Quedah, lying at the mouth of a river 
of the same name. On an old Portuguese fort which 
commands the town and entrance to the river, the 
Malayan colours were flying, and Tonkoo Mahomet 
Said was found to be in command. Captain Warren 
had a conference with that chief and Prince Ab- 
dullah, in which they were duly warned to abstain 
from a course which must bring down upon them the 
wrath of the all-potent Company, and pardon was 
promised in the event of their doing so immediately. 
The chief made out a very good case, as seen from a 
Malay point of view, and nothing but a sense of duty 
could prevent one sympathising in the efforts made 
by these gallant sea-rovers to regain their own. 
" Tell the Company," said Prince Abdullah, with 
that theatrical air and gesture so natural to the well- 
born Asiatic, " that we shall brave all consequences : 
we have reconquered Quedah, which was, and is, 
ours by a right which no law can abrogate; and, so 
long as we can wield a sword or hold a spear, we 



OF THE COMING RETRIBUTION. 27 

will maintain the heritage descended from our fore- 
fathers ! " No prahus were in sight at this place ; and 
it was not until after a long and arduous search 
amongst dangerous and intricate channels, at a tem- 
pestuous season of the year, that we discovered the 
Malay fleet, they being then at a place called Trang, 
on the northern boundary of the province of Quedah. 
Here, as at the capital, the ship could not approach 
the coast, and Captain Warren had to throw himself 
amongst the Malays, in an open boat, with some 
eight or ten English seamen. Passing a shallow 
entrance to a river, which was carefully stockaded 
and flanked with gingal * batteries, Captain Warren, 
after a short pull, found himself amongst a formida- 
ble fleet of fifty prahus, carrying guns and swivels, 
or culverins, and with crews varying from twenty to 
fifty men. 

A guard of 100 armed men marched down to 
receive the Rajah Lant, or sea-king, of the British 
Queen ; and, with great ceremony and state, con- 
ducted him to their admiral or leader, a noted old 
pirate named Datoo Mahomet Alee, Datoo being 
his title as chieftain or lord. 

* A gingal is a long and heavy wall-piece, much used by 
Asiatics, and very formidable in their hands. 



28 CArT, WARREN VISITS PIRATE FLEET. 

Had treachery been so common as it is generally- 
supposed to be amongst the much vilified Malays, 
assuredly it would have been an easy task to put to 
death the British captain and his boat's crew, for 
they were fairly in the lion's den, and the bearers oi 
a hostile message, apart from Mahomet Alee knowing- 
full well that a price had been fixed, for his capture 
as a felon, by the Company. Yet, on the contrary, 
they behaved with the utmost generosity and civility, 
listened respectfully to the warning given of future 
punishment, and, even here, as at Quedah, allowed a 
proclamation to be posted up, calling on all these 
pirates to disperse. 

The conference over, Captain Warren learnt that 
the Malay attack had been successful on every 
point, and, apart from organising the means of pre- 
serving their hold of the province, they intended in 
the coming monsoon to assail the Siamese in such 
strength as to prevent their detaching a force to re- 
conquer Quedah. To a wish expressed by Captain 
Warren, that they would come out and have a fair 
fight in open water, Mahomet Alee replied, that 
although he had never fought a British man-of-war, 
he was one who could boast of having beaten off a 
man-of-war's boats; and nothing would give him 
greater pleasure than trying to do so again, if Captain 



ARRANGEMENTS TO EQUIP A FLOTILLA. 29 

Warren would come to fight him in the spot he then 
was. With such mutual expressions of chivalrous 
desire to meet again, the "Hyacinth" returned to 
report proceedings to the Governor of the Straits of 
Malacca. 

During the month of November we went to 
Singapore to arrange a plan of operations, in con- 
junction with the Siamese, emissaries from his golden- 
tufted Majesty having been sent there for that pur- 
pose. Singapore was chosen as the place of outfit 
for the flotilla, because the Malays were less likely 
to glean information of our plans there than they 
would undoubtedly have been from their agents and 
sympathisers at Penang. 

It was arranged that directly the north-east mon- 
soon, or fine weather season, commenced, the British 
Government were to closely blockade the coast of 
Quedah, whilst a Siamese army of 30,000 men 
marched down to reconquer the province; and we 
were to treat as pirates all armed prahus fallen in 
with. 

The " Hyacinth," besides her own boats, had lent 
to her for this service three lugger-rigged and decked 
gun-boats, named, respectively, the " Diamond," 
" Pearl," and « Emerald," or Nos. 1, 2, and 3. They 
were all manned by Malays, and the " Diamond " 



30 THE " HYACINTH " AND GUN-BOATS 

was commanded by a half-caste native gentleman in 
the Company's service. A small steamer, the only 
one that at that time had been seen in those 
waters, was available in case of necessity; and the 
very terror inspired by the " Diana," — or "fire-ship," 
as the Malays called her — was a host in itself. 
When all was ready, we suddenly left Singapore ; 
and giving Penang as a rendezvous, the corvette and 
gun-boats made the best of their way there, com- 
pleted water and provisions, and gleaned all necessary 
information, prior to starting for Quedah ; off which 
place the "Hyacinth" anchored on December 7tb, 
with the gun-boats around her. 

Great was the delight and excitement through the 
ship when the fact of the boats being about to leave 
for months, manned and armed, came to our know- 
ledge. The pinnace and cutter were got out, and 
provisioned. All our lieutenants having either gone 
home on promotion, or died, the command of the 
boats generally fell to a mate, Mr. George Drake, 
in the pinnace ; the senior midshipman, Mr. Barclay, 
had the cutter ; whilst the two gun-boats fell respec- 
tively to Mr. Peter Halkett and myself. *" 

Not a little proud of my command, at an early 
hour on the 8th I found myself on board the Hon. 
Company's gun-boat "Emerald." She was a fine 



OFF QUEDAII. 31 

wholesome boat, about forty- eight feet long, carrying 
two large lugger sails, and with a crew of twenty- 
five stout Malays, besides a serang*, or boatswain. 
Completely decked over, she carried in her bow an 
18-pounder carronade, on a traversing carriage, and 
a brass 6-pounder gun on a pivot upon the quarter- 
deck ; and had, moreover, an ample store of all arms 
on board. 

My swarthy crew received their new commander 
in the height of Malay tenue. The gayest pocket- 
handkerchiefs tied round their heads, and their 
bodies wrapped in the tasteful cotton plaid of the 
country, called a sarong, and their bare legs and 
sinewy arms, with the warlike creese, gave them the 
air of as many game-cocks. Not a soul of them 
could speak a word of English ; and until I could 
master enough Malay to be understood, my sole 
means of communication lay through an individual 
who introduced himself to me as " Jamboo, sir ! — 
Interpreter, sir ! " " And a very dirty one too," I 
mentally added. 

The pantomime over, of passing a small valise, con- 
taining my kit, into a little cabin, which I saw abaft 
the mainmast, I desired Jamboo to direct the serang 

* Seranjj is a native term for boatswain, 



32 MY GUN-BOAT AND CREW. 

to get under weigh and follow the pinnace, for she 
was already pulling in for Quedah fort, whilst the 
" Hyacinth," spreading her wings, was running north- 
ward for another river called the Parlis. The crew in 
a trice ran the anchor to the bows, and got out the 
sweeps*, as there was no wind, and pulled so heartily 
as to show me that we had, at any rate, the legs of all 
our consorts. Checking the zeal of my serang, who, 
standing amongst the rowers, was exciting them by 
word and gesture to outstrip the senior officer, I 
dropped astern into my place, and proceeded to make 
myself acquainted with my strange shipmates and 
vessel. 

The interpreter Jamboo's history was a short one. 
He was one of that numerous class who do not know 
their own fathers. His mother, who was a Burmese 
woman of Moulmein, averred that a British officer was 
entitled to the honour of the parentage, though Jam- 
boo, with a smile, said, 6 1 don't know sar, she say so !" 
an assertion I was quite ready to believe. A half- 
caste he undoubtedly was, and, as such, passed for 
a Portuguese ! although his only reason for so saying 
was, that the people of that country were about as 

* Sweep is a nautical term applied to large oars used in 
heavy vessels ; for instance, those used in barges are " sweeps," 
properly speaking. 



THE INTERPRETER'S APPEARANCE. 33 

dark as himself, and that Jamboo, finding himself 
without a religion as well as a father, had, faute de 
micux, become a Roman Catholic, his faith being 
strongly mixed up with his poor mother's Buddhism 
and the wild superstitions of his Malayan companions. 
His face, of a dark olive colour, was perfectly beauti- 
ful ; his figure, although effeminate, was graceful and 
lithe to a degree ; his hands and feet might have 
served Phidias as a model ; and he was not wanting 
in intelligence. Weak and nervous in temperament, 
he was as obedient as a child, and it was painful to 
witness his cringing, fawning manner. 

Jamboo's account of my worthy crew was some- 
what startling: the majority of them had, I learnt, at 
various times been imprisoned in Singapore jail as 
pirates, the most notorious scamp being my serang, 
Jadee. "Pleasant company!" I ejaculated, as I scanned 
the rogues who, seated along the deck on either side, 
were throwing themselves back with a shout at every 
stroke of their " sweeps," and displaying twenty-five 
as reckless, devil-may-care countenances as any equal 
number of seamen ever exhibited. The serang, Jadee, 
was, to my astonishment, standing on the main -hatch, 
with a long Illanoon creese in his hand, which he 
waved as he gave utterance to a series of expressions, 
uttered with frantic energy and rapid pantomime, 

D 



34 THE COXSWAIN'S ORATION. 

stopping every now and then to allow his crew to 
express their approval of what he said, by a general 
chorus of Ugh 1 which sounded like a groan, or an 
exulting shout of Ya ! ya ! ya ! which was far more 
musical. tl He is only telling them what fighting and 
plunder is in store for them," said Jadee, " and point- 
ing out the certainty of victory while fighting with 
white men on their side, mixing it up with descrip- 
tions of re veilings they will have when this war is 
over." 



COMMENCE TO BLOCKADE QUEDAH FORT. 35 



CHAP. III. 

Commence to blockade Quedah Fort. — Jadee's imaginary 
Fight with a Tonkoo. — My Malay Coxswain's Appearance. 

— His Attire and Character. — Jadee's piratical Propensities. 

— Escapes Imprisonment by hanging a Man. — Quedah Fort 
and Town. — The Appearance of the adjacent Country. — 
A wet Night. — My Crew. — Jadee's Want of Bigotry. — 
Primitive Mode of eating. 

The pinnace, with the " Pearl " and " Emerald/' soon 
reached the shallow bar which lies across the Quedah 
river, a feature common to every river on this side of 
the Malayan peninsula, and doubtless occasioned by 
the action of the south-west monsoon against the 
natural course of the rivers, causing the sediment to 
be deposited at their entrances instead of being car- 
ried out into the deeper parts of the sea. The fort 
of Quedah hoisted its colours, and armed men showed 
themselves along the battlements ; but we merely 
placed ourselves in line across the entrance of the 
river, out of gunshot, and anchored to commence the 
blockade. The north-east monsoon, which is the 
fine weather season of this coast, had scarcely set in 

© 2 



36 jadee's imaginary fight 

yet, and flying showers, with occasional squalls, pro- 
mised a wet and cheerless night. Rain-awnings were 
spread at once, and after every preparation had been 
made for a sudden action with war-prahus, I sat down 
with Jamboo, and my serang, Jadee, to glean in- 
formation and pick up Malay. To my inquiry, 
through the interpreter, as to the opinion Jadee held 
of the line of conduct likely to be pursued by the 
occupants of Quedah, he assured me that the Malays 
would never voluntarily fight the "white men, Orang- 
putihs" as we, of all Europeans, are styled par ex- 
cellence. It was quite possible, if we were very 
careless, that they would try and capture Englishmen 
as hostages for their own safety ; and that, by way of 
inspiriting his men, a Malay chief might, if he found 
one of the gun-boats alone, which was manned by 
Malays, fight her in the hopes of an easier capture 
than they would find in the pinnace. The very 
prospect of such a piece of good fortune seemed to 
arouse all Jadee's recollections of by-gone forays 
and skirmishes ; for no sooner had Jamboo told him 
that I only hoped Tonkoo Mahomet Said might take 
it into his head to try the experiment upon the 
" Emerald," or (i Numero Tega,"* as she was called 

* " Tega " is Malay for u Three ;" the Malays preferred call- 
ing the vessel by her number, instead of by her name of 
" Emerald." 



WITH A TONKOO. 37 

by Jadee, than my serang sprang to his legs, and 
shouted, quivering with passion, for Campar ! Cam- 
par soon came : Campar being a swarthy giant, who 
did the double duty of armourer and carpenter. 

In reply to some order, he dived below, and brought 
up a thick quilted red vest, without arms, which the 
excited Jadee donned at once, girded up his loins, 
gave his head-dress a still more ferocious cock, and 
then baring his arms, with a long Illanoon creese in 
one hand and a short " badi," or stabbing knife, in the 
other, he enacted a savage pantomime of a supposed 
mortal fight between himself and Mahomet Said, in 
which he evidently conquered the Tonkoo ; and 
finished off, after calling him, his mother, sisters, and 
female relations, all sorts of unseemly names, by 
launching at him, in a voice of thunder, his whole 
stock of English : u Ah ! you d — d poul ! come along- 
side ! " Poul, or fool, being supposed to be something 
with which the white men emphatically cursed their 
enemies. 

Amused beyond measure, though somewhat dif- 
ferently to my crew, who, holding Jadee in the 
greatest awe, crowded aft and looked on, firmly be- 
lieving that Tonkoo Mahomet Said would be so 
treated, should his enterprise lead him to combat the 

noted Jadee, I quietly told him that I only trusted 

d 3 



38 MY MALAY COXSWAIN. 

he would do as well if the real fight ever came off, 
and meantime would dispense with such a perform- 
ance, especially as the row he made had caused 
"Numero Tega" to be hailed from the pinnace to 
know if anything was amiss. This piece of advice 
Jadee took in such good part, that he constantly re- 
hearsed the pantomime for my amusement whenever 
he saw me low-spirited, or in want of occupation. 

Jadee informed us that his cognomen amongst the 
people of Singapore, and white men generally, was 
Jack Ketch ; a nickname he pronounced so clippingly 
that it sounded not unlike his real one : and from 
Jambo I heard the following history of my re- 
doubted serang ; but, previous to repeating it, let 
me introduce the hero. 

Jadee stood about five feet seven inches in height ; 
his colour w T as of a light brown. His broad shoulders, 
small waist, and fine hips, with well-formed arms and 
legs covered with muscles in strong relief, denoted 
great strength and activity. His delicate yet far 
from effeminate hands and feet were but little re- 
concilable to an Englishman's ideas with a man who 
had lived from the cradle by the sweat of his brow. 
A square w r ell-formed head, well placed on a strong 
nervous neck, completed the man. The countenance, 
although that of a pure Malay, had nothing so re- 



HIS ATTIRE AND CHARACTER. 39 

pulsive about it as people generally suppose; the 
cheek-bones were high, and the face somewhat square, 
but his eyes were good and expressive, without being 
either deep set or with bloodshot eyeballs, as the 
regular " property Malays " of novel-writers usually 
are represented : a good nose and forehead, with a 
massive but beardless chin, gave much character to 
the face of Jadee, and his short black hair, brushed 
up on end, with a sort of rollicking laughing air 
about the man, required nothing to fill up the pic- 
ture of a Malayan buccaneer. Jadee was a beau 
withal. Round his waist, and falling to the knees 
like a Highland kilt, he wore a circular piece of cot- 
ton plaid, of a small blue and white pattern ; stiff 
with starch, it stuck out, and half hid in its folds his 
handsome creese, a weapon never from a Malay's 
side. Over one shoulder and across to the opposite 
hip, hung in an easy jaunty manner another sarong of 
brighter hues, generally red and yellow tartan ; it 
served as a covering to the upper part of the body 
when necessary, or, wrapped round the arm, acted as 
a shield in a skirmish. An ordinary red cotton hand- 
kerchief served as a head-dress, great coquetry being 
shown in the mode of wearing it. It was in the first 
place starched until almost as stiff as pasteboard, then 
folded across ; two ends were tied on one side of the 

D 4 



40 jadee's youth and antecedents. 

head in a jaunty knot, whilst the others stuck up or 
waved about in a very saucy manner. A mouthful 
of cere leaf, penang nut, and chunam, with a small 
quid of tobacco stuck under the upper lip, completed 
the appearance of Jadee. Poor fellow ! he was ge- 
nerous to a fault, and thoughtless as a child ; and 
when I afterwards came to know him well, I often 
thought how strong the similarity was between the 
disposition of him and his companions and the ma- 
jority of our untutored seamen. 

He was by birth a "Batta," or else had been 
stolen, at an early age, and carried off by that race 
from some sea-coast village. These Battas inhabit 
the hill country of Sumatra, and are reputed cannibals 
— at least, such is the charge brought against them 
by neighbours. 

Jadee, whilst still a youth, happened to accom- 
pany a party of Battas who visited the pepper 
plantation of a sea-coast chieftain, for some hostile 
and I fear no very reputable purpose ; the result was 
that, in a skirmish which took place, Jadee was cap- 
tured, and as a slave entered upon a different career 
to that of living amongst the branches of trees and 
eating fellow-men. 

Some Sooloo slave-dealers and pirates visited the 
district in which Jadee was detained, and he was ex- 



HIS riRATICAL PROPENSITIES. 41 

changed for various commodities that they disposed 
of to his master. Made at first to row, and bale 
water out of their prahus, he gave such proofs of 
courage and address, that in a short time they ad- 
vanced him to the rank of a fighting man. Jadee, 
however, did not like his masters, although he had an 
uncommon degree of respect for their enterprise and 
skill as sea-rovers ; and after some years of strange 
adventures against the Chinese, Spaniards, and 
Dutch — the latter of whom he never spoke of 
without execrating the memory of their mothers — 
he escaped, and took service under the Rajah of 
Jehore, or some chief who sailed prahus from the 
neighbourhood of our then youthful colony of Singa- 
pore. 

After a little active service, our hero found himself 
in possession of a perfect fortune in hard dollars and 
sycee silver ; and to spend it in the most approved 
manner, proceeded to Singapore. To take unto him- 
self a fresh wife was an easy task for such a gallant ; 
and Jadee kept open house in the neighbourhood of 
Singapore, in one of those neat native huts which 
may still be seen raised upon piles, although far 
enough from the water. 

The money flew fast, and, sailor-like, Jadee soon 
found himself compelled to take to the sea for a sub- 



42 JADEE ESCAPES IMPRISONMENT 

sistence. For a few years he led a chequered career : 
plenty one day — opium, curry and rice, and wives 
galore ; then pulling at an oar like a galley-slave to 
win more ; at last the white men spoilt his career. 
An expedition in which Jadee was engaged was 
attacked by a British man-of-war, and suffered a 
severe defeat. Jadee never bargained for fighting 
them: anything with a dark skin — let him be the 
Old Gentleman himself — he felt himself a match 
for. A Dutchman he did not mind, and a Spaniard 
he had often seen run; but the Orang-putihs 
— there was no charm, not even from the Koran, 
which had ever been efficacious against pirates so 
mighty as they. Jadee had sailed with distinguished 
Malay " Rajah Lauts," or Kings of the Sea, but 
their glory paled before the " Kajah Lauts" of the 
white men ; they were indeed rovers whom Malay 
men might envy but might not imitate. 

Driven with many of his companions from follow- 
ing up their profession in a wholesale way, Jadee and 
one or two roving spirits struck up a new business. 
They bought a fast-pulling sampan, lived at Singa- 
pore, and apart from an occasional honest fare, used 
at nights to waylay the market-boats and Chinese 
petty traders, and frighten them into paying black 
mail. Even this came to an end ; for, one day when 



BY HANGING A MAN. 43 

asleep in his sampan, Jadee was captured by a dozen 
Chinese, who carried him before the authorities, 
and swore, by all they could swear by, that he had 
been caught in an act of piracy. Jadee was fairly 
frightened ; he knew the English had a rapid way 
of hanging up his countrymen, and vowed to him- 
self that he would adopt the white men's mode of 
living, if he escaped this present peril. 

The judge, although a severe man, was a just 
one, and happily in this case suspected the veracity 
of the Chinese. Jadee was sent to jail to ruminate 
over his evil practices, and had remained there some 
time, when a reward was offered to anyone who 
would hang a Chinese murderer, the executioner 
having absconded. Oar friend was glad to earn his 
liberty so easily, the more so that a Chinaman was 
to be the unfortunate to be operated upon. 

The murderer was duly hung, and Jadee, or Jack 
Ketch, was free. Finding " the Company " too 
strong for him, Jadee wisely determined to enlist 
under their colours. He turned from pirate to 
pirate-catcher, and a more zealous, intelligent servant 
Governor Bonham, or the Touhan Besar*, did not 
possess. Jadee soon brought himself into notice, 
and, with one exception, on an occasion when 



* ct 



Touhan Besar," the great chief or officer. 



44 QUEDAH TOWN AND FORT. 

a jealous husband thrust a spear fourteen times 
into Jadee's body, for certain attentions to his cava 
sposa, he had maintained an unblemished character. 
Such was his history. 

Towards evening the rain ceased and the clouds 
cleared away, enabling us to see the place we had 
to starve into subjection. 

Our gun-boats lay at the distance of about twelve 
hundred yards from the mouth of the river, across 
which a stout stockade had been formed, leaving only 
one narrow outlet, and there the Malays had stationed 
a look-out man to give an alarm in case of necessity. 
Within the stockade, upon the north bank of the 
river, stood the town and fort of Quedah. 

The latter was a rectangular work built of stone, 
and said to have been constructed in the days when 
the Portuguese were in the zenith of their glory. 
The parapet was now sadly dilapidated, and armed 
with a few rusty guns, whilst on a bastion which, at 
one of the angles, served to flank the sea face of the 
works, and command the river entrance, several long 
formidable looking pieces of cannon were pointed 
threateningly at us. Beyond the fort, and on the 
same side of the river, a long continuation of neat- 
lookino; thatch-built houses constituted the town, and 
off it lay numerous trading prahus, and several topes, 



APPEARANCE OF ADJACENT COUNTRY. 45 

a Malay o- Chinese vessel peculiar to the Straits of 
Malacca. A dense and waving jungle of trees skirted 
round the town and fort of Quedah, and spread away 
on either hand in a monotonous line of green. The 
country, which was said to be particularly rich in 
the interior, was extremely flat towards the sea- 
coast ; and the only thing that broke its sameness was 
the remarkable hill which, under the name of Ele- 
phant Mount, rose above the jungle like an island 
from the sea. Far distant ranges of hills, the back- 
bone of the peninsula, stretched however as a back- 
ground to the scene. Slowly the setting sun tinged 
their peaks with rosy and purple tints, and then they 
gradually sank into darkness as the evening mists 
gathered strength along the seaward edge of the 
jungle, and, acted upon by light airs, sailed slowly 
along like phantoms : it was then night with a dew- 
laden atmosphere and a starlit sky. 

The English seamen in the pinnace loaded the 
air with noise, if not with melody, by singing their 
sailor-songs ; and the Malays, in their own peculiar 
way, amused themselves by singing extempore love- 
songs, to the melancholy accompaniment of a native 
drum played upon by the hand : gradually these 
sounds ceased, men and officers sought the softest 
planks, and, clad in blanket frocks and trousers, lay 



46 A WET NIGHT. — MY CREW. 

down to sleep, and the first day of the Quedah block- 
ade was over. During the night it rained hard, and 
the wet, in spite of our awnings being sloped, began 
to encroach upon the dry portions of the deck. I 
heard my men moving about ; but desirous of setting 
an example of not being easily troubled with such a 
discomfort as a wet bed, I kept my place, and was 
not a little pleased to see Jadee bring a mat called a 
hajang, and slope it carefully over me, evidently 
thinking I was asleep, and then the poor fellow went 
away to rough it as he best could. And this man is 
a merciless pirate ! I thought ; and I felt a friendship 
for my Malay coxswain from that moment, which 
nothing will ever obliterate. With early dawn all 
were awake, and shortly afterwards the usual man-of- 
war operations of scrubbing and cleaning commenced, 
Jadee exhibiting as much energy amongst buckets 
and brooms, as if such peaceful articles were the only 
things he knew how to use. Leaving him to do first 
lieutenant's duty, I perched myself — I was but a lad 
of seventeen — upon the pivot-gun, and, as the dif- 
ferent men of my crew came in sight, asked their 
names and characters of the interpreter. Jamboo's 
account of them was, to say the least of it, very un- 
satisfactory. One was a notorious pirate of Sumatra, 
another of Tringanau; those that were not pirates* 



jadee's want of bigotry. 47 

Jamboo vowed, had fled from Java, or Acheen, for 
acts of violence of one sort or another. Their looks 
were not in their favour; and walking with the pecu- 
liar strut of Malay seamen, I could not but repeat 
FalstatF's soliloquy : 

w Nay, and the villains march wide betwixt the 
legs, as if they had gyves ; for indeed I had most of 
them out of prison ! " 

The fears, however, of the redoubted Jamboo had 
much to do with the characters he gave the poor 
fellows ; and I afterwards discovered it was rather 
his opinion of what they must have been, than what 
they really had been. I was debating in my mind 
how my messing was to be carried on, in a vessel 
manned with Mahometans, where pork was an 
abomination and myself an unclean animal and an 
infidel, when Jadee, with the most graceful bow he 
could muster, came to announce that the ship's 
company's rice and fish were cooked, and that in a 
few minutes our curry and rice would be ready. 
Through the interpreter, I expressed a hope that he 
would not depart from any religious opinions as to 
feeding with a Christian, because I was set in autho- 
rity over him. To which the good fellow made a 
very neat answer, in a very modest way, that he was 
a servant of the same Great Rajah as the white officer, 



48 PRIMITIVE MODE OF EATING. 

and if I did not consider it beneath my dignity to 
eat out of the same dish as an Orang Malayu, it was 
not for him to do so. 

This difficulty over, we sat down cross-legged to 
our breakfast — a mountain of snow-white rice with 
a curried fowl. I was at first very awkward in the 
use of my right hand as a substitute for spoon and 
fork, etiquette not allowing the left hand to be used ; 
but I soon learnt how to pick up the rice, press it 
gently together between the extended fingers, and 
then by means of the thumb to slip what was taken 
up into my mouth ; a drink of pure water finished 
the repast, and then the ever useful Campar ap- 
peared, with water and towel for us to wash our 
hands and mouth. We had only two meals a day ; 
breakfast at about seven or eight o'clock, and dinner 
at three p.m. ; rice and salt fish, or rice and curry, 
being the constant fare. 



BLOCKADE RENDERED MORE STRINGENT. 49 



CHAP. IV. 

The Blockade rendered more Stringent. — The Bounting Is- 
lands. — My Crew keeping Holiday. — "Hyacinths" poi- 
soned with Ground-nuts. — We discover Wild Bees'-Nests. 
— Arrangements made for robbing the Hives. — The Bees 
quit their Hives and settle on me- — No Honey. — A Malay 
Doctor. — The Koran and Chunam remedy for Bee Stings. 

The first week or ten days was sadly monotonous : 
we had to be very guarded in our movements, as the 
policy intended to be pursued by the enemy had not 
developed itself, and we were yet ignorant of the 
force of armed prahus which they might possess up 
the river; but I was not idle, and, under Jadee's 
tuition, was fast learning the simple and beautiful 
language of Malaya. The interest taken by my 
serang, in repeating over for my information the 
Malay for every article or object upon which he saw 
my attention fixed for a moment, was a pretty con- 
vincing proof of the anxiety he entertained for our 
being able to understand one another without Jam- 
boo's assistance. 

About the middle of December, we had reason to 

E 



50 THE BOUNTING ISLANDS. 

believe that small prahus escaped out of the river, or 
entered it at top of high water, by keeping close in 
to the jungle; and as we had ascertained that there 
was deep water inside the bar, it was determined to 
cross the bar at night, directly the tide rose high 
enough to allow us to do so, and to remain close off 
the stockade until the tide again fell, so as to compel 
us to retreat rather than risk an action with fort and 
war-prahus combined. This measure gave great 
umbrage to " Tonkoo Mahomet Said," who sent to 
warn us that we might get fired into by accident 
during the night, if we persisted in such a manoeuvre. 
The reply to this threat was a promise of returning 
the compliment, if any such accident did occur; and 
after a while we found the people of Quedah sub- 
mitted quietly to this stricter blockade, and it was 
evident that they were reserving their fighting 
qualities for the Siamese army, of which we only 
knew that it was to co-operate with us; how, or 
when, none could guess. The want of wood arid 
fresh water in our little squadron obliged the senior 
officer to detach me to a group of islands, about 
twenty miles distant, in quest of some ; and this job 
I had regularly to execute every tenth day or so. 
The three islands are known under the names of the 
Bounting Group ; the Malays, with a playful fancy, 



MY CREW KEEPING HOLIDAY. 51 

having, in the outline of one of them, seen a resem- 
blance to a woman in that t€ state in which ladies 
wish to be who love their lords." That island is 
called "Bounting," and, in carrying out the idea, 
the next is named " Pangail" or "Call!" and the 
other is "Bedan" the "Accoucheur!" — a strange 
nomenclature, but the joke of which was evidently a 
great source of fun to my scamps. 

Having, then, no small boats, our mode of procuring 
wood and water was primitive enough ; the gun-boat 
used to be anchored in a convenient position, and then 
all hands, myself included, jumped overboard, swam 
ashore with casks and axes, and spent the day filling 
the former, cutting wood, bathing, and washing our 
clothing. It was a general holiday; and, like seamen 
of our own country, my Malays skylarked, joked, 
and played about with all the zest of schoolboys ; 
and I observed, with no small pleasure, that, in their 
practical jokes or witticisms, there w r as none of that 
grossness or unbecoming language which European 
sailors, be their nation what it may, would assuredly 
have indulged in — a state of things which I imputed 
to the knowledge they each had of the other's quick- 
ness of temper, and the moral certainty of an appeal 
to the creese should an insult be intentionally given. 
The Bountings, though clothed with trees, and the 

x 2 



52 "HYACINTHS" POISONED 

rankest vegetation of the East, were, like many other 
islands of the Malayan Archipelago, unproductive of 
a single wild fruit or vegetable capable of sustaining 
life. If the wild cocoa-nut tree or plantain had ever 
grown there, they had been eradicated to prevent 
pirates procuring refreshment on the islands — a step 
often pursued by the inhabitants of these buccaneer- 
haunted shores. Beyond turtles and their eggs on 
the beaches, and wild honey in the woods, nothing 
edible was there procurable. Some short time after- 
wards, however, our gallant corvette happened to be 
at anchor off the Bountings, and those of the crew left 
in her, asked permission to go on shore for a run. 
Uninhabited as it was, there appeared to be no 
reason why they should not go on shore ; and the 
commanding officer cheerfully assented, with a self- 
congratulatory feeling that, at any rate, as there were 
there neither ladies nor grog, Jack could not get 
himself into trouble. u Oh ! yes, by all means ; you 
may all go," was the reply, and the jolly-boat and gig 
soon landed every man but the sentry and quarter- 
master ; a parting warning was given to the worthies 
not to be tempted to touch any fruit, as they were 
poisonous. Having bathed, and washed their clothes 
over once or twice, by way of a jollification, and 
walked up and down the beaches until tired, one of 



WITn GROUND-NUTS. o3 

the old sailors expressed it as his opinion, that "it 
must be a d — d rum island, if there was nothing 
eatable to be found on it," and ventured a surmise, 
that the woods must have heaps of nuts in them, if 
they only knew where to find them. A young mizen- 
top-man jumped at the idea, and started away in 
search of nuts : finding none on the trees, he next 
sought for ground-nuts, and, as ill-luck would have 
it, soon found plenty, in the form of something which 
resembled strongly the common chesnut. Before 
long, all hands had had what they graphically termed 
'•a bowse-out," and soon afterwards became gene- 
rally ill, being sick and griped to a ridiculous extent. 
The officers who went to bring off the liberty- men 
could hardly believe their senses when they found all 
those so recently landed hearty and well, lying about 
like so many sick monkeys, and almost as much 
frightened as hurt by their thoughtlessness. They 
were taken off, and strong emetics given, which 
added still more to the general sickness, and all night 
long there were ejaculations heard of " Those infernal 
ground-nuts ! " and the unfortunate boy who had first 
discovered them was promised more thrashings than, 
it is hoped, he ever received. 

My Malays, being either more experienced or less 
enterprising than their English comrades, contented 

E 3 



54 WE DISCOVER WILD BEES'-NESTS. 

themselves with the honey and turtle-eggs; and as 
Jadee reported to me that a man called Alee had 
discovered a splendid wild bees' nest on Pulo Bedan, 
I expressed a strong desire to see the process by 
which the bees were robbed of their store. We 
happened to be standing in a wood on a part of that 
island, and the bees were flying about us, when I 
expressed this wish in my usual tone of voice. 
" Hush ! " said Jadee, putting his finger to his lips, 
"hush! speak low, or the bees will hear us!" And- 
then, in a whispering voice, he informed me that the 
honey would not be fit for capture for some time : 
and that, at any rate, it was wrong to disturb the 
bees except at the full of the moon. As he con- 
sidered it necessary to wait for that auspicious period, 
I assented, and only took care at the next full moon 
to be there. Alee and four other Malay seamen 
were told off to rob the bees'-nest, and they as well 
as myself were soon stripped and swimming ashore. 
I observed that each man carried with him a small 
bundle of the husk of cocoa-nut shells, and directly 
they landed they proceeded to cut branches of a 
species of palm, and in the leaves enveloped the 
husks they had brought with them, forming the 
whole into articles resembling torches ; a fire was 
then kindled upon the beach, fragments of the burn- 



ARRANGEMENTS FOR ROBBING THE HIVES. 55 

ing embers introduced into the heart of each torch, 
and then by swinging them round so as to cause a 
draught, the husk ignited, and, aided by the action of 
the green leaves, poured out of one end of the torch 
a solid column of smoke. The faithful Jamboo had 
been left on board; but I understood, from the little 
these Malays told me, that the torches were intended 
for the purpose of driving the bees away from the 
honey, but I did not understand that they were 
essential to one's safety and therefore declined to 
carry one when it was offered to me. 

Holding the torches in their hands and standing 
up, the Malays next enacted some mummery or 
incantation, which concluded with the usual repeti- 
tion of the Mahometan creed — one so beautiful and 
concise, that it appears a pity we cannot produce 
anything as graphic in our own faith. 

" God he is God ! and Mahomet is his Prophet ! " 
exclaimed we all ; and the torch-men leading the way, 
we left the pleasant shade of the jungle, and walked 
briskly along the shore until abreast of the bees' 
nest, which lay some three-quarters of a mile inland. 
Turning into the jungle, waving their smoke-torches, 
and keeping a sharp look-out for snakes, which 
appeared to me all the more dangerous from the 
novelty of my attire, — for like my men I had only 

E 4 



56 THE BEES SETTLE ON ME. 

one cloth round my hips and a handkerchief over my 
head, — we soon sighted, up a small vista in the 
forest, the aged trunk of a blighted tree, which was 
alive with bees. Three of the Malays now sat down, 
waved their torches gently, throwing a halo of smoke 
round their tawny persons, and commenced to re- 
cite, in a slow solemn manner, some verses from the 
Koran, whether to keep the bees away, or to insure 
there being honey in the nest, I don't know; for just 
as I, half-laughing, was putting the question to them, 
the fourth Malay, Mr. Alee, walked deliberately up 
to the nest and applied his torch. 

Thunder and lightning ! a thousand lancets were 
suddenly plunged into my body, and a black cloud of 
bees were around me. I shouted for Alee ; i( God 
he is God ! and Mahomet is his Prophet ! " groaned 
out the Malays, as they waved their torches, the bees 
threatening them as well as myself. It was more 
than I could bear ; with a yell of agony, I started 
off like a deer for the sea : it seemed but a stride to 
the rocks, and at once I plunged into the water, taking 
down many a bee which adhered tenaciously to my 
body and face. Keeping down as long as possible, 
I rose in the hope of being clear from the little 
brutes ; but, alas ! they were not so easily baffled, and 
a cloud of them was ready to descend upon my 



NO HONEY. — A MALAY DOCTOR. 57 

devoted head: it might have ended seriously, had 
not Alee found that there was no honey in the nest, 
and he and his comrades then ran down to assist me, 
frightening off the bees with their torches, and ac- 
companying me to the gun-boat, which I reached 
nearly blind, and rather disgusted with the result of 
my first Asiatic bee-hunt ; the more so that, in addi- 
tion to the lesson I had learnt upon the advisability 
of using smoke preservers, we had disproved the 
truth of the old axiom, that " Where there are bees, 
there must be honey." 

Jadee was in great distress at seeing me return in 
such sad plight, and vowed that Alee and his com- 
panions must have been lubbers at their work ; how- 
ever, he promised me almost instantaneous relief, and 
as I was willing to accept that on any terms, one of 
the men, a leading hand, who, from his strict obser- 
vance of his religious duties, was named the " Haggi," 
was sent for to cure me. 

The Haggi, proud of an opportunity of displaying 
his medical skill upon a white man, who are all sup- 
posed to be born doctors, proceeded immediately to 
roll up a quid of cere leaf, betel-nut, gambier, and 
chunam, in the right proportions for chewing — such 
a quid as a Malay so much delights in. Whilst I mas- 
ticated this in the most approved manner, the Haggi 



58 THE KORAN AND CHUNAM REMEDY. 

opened a small box of fine white chunam, made from 
the lime procured from burnt sea-shells; this chunam 
he carefully applied to my skin wherever it had been 
stung, muttering all the while, in a solemn strain, 
select sentences from the Koran, the responses or 
final portions of each chapter or sentence being taken 
up and repeated by my faithful coxswain, who for 
the time seemed desirous to entitle himself to a green 
turban by the fervour of his prayers, varying them, 
however, by shaking his tawny fist in the direction 
of the unconscious bees, and saying, with the utmost 
gravity, " Ah ! you d — d pouls ! " 

Whether it was the chunam or the Koran cured 
me, it would be ingratitude to my holy friend the 
Haggi to say, for he stoutly maintained one to be 
inefficacious without the other ; but this I can aver, 
that in a very short time all inflammation had sub- 
sided, and I was able to laugh over my adventure, 
making, however, a vow to bridle my curiosity for 
the future, where bees were in the question. 



THE NORTH-EAST MONSOON. f>9 



CHAP. V. 

The North-east Monsoon. — Unsatisfactory News of our 
Siamese Allies. — The Pelicans. — Alligators abound. — The 
Cowardice of the Alligators. — Encounter and Capture an 
Alligator. — Extraordinary Strength and Vitality of those 
Reptiles. — A Strange Antidote against Fever. — The Rah- 
madan and " Quedah Opera." — The Malays endeavour to 
evade the Blockade. — The Watchfulness of my Native 
Crew. 

The north-east monsoon had fairly set in. All day long 
we had a delightfully pleasant breeze off the land, for 
the Malayan peninsula has so small a breadth, that 
the winds which blow upon it from the China Sea 
reached us before they were robbed of their moisture 
or heated to an unpleasant degree by the action of 
the land : occasionally the monsoon would freshen, 
for a day or so, into a double reefed top-sail breeze, 
or at other times become squally without rain, l?ut 
our nights were invariably fine, with only just wind 
enough to fill the mat sails of a prahu. The sea 
was seldom ruffled, and more delightful weather for 
boat-work cannot be conceived. All we were required 
to do, was to guard against sleeping in the night-dews, 



60 UNSATISFACTORY NEWS OF 0¥R ALLIES. 

and by so doing, we all enjoyed better health than 
those cooped up in the ship. 

Our new position inside Quedah bar became at 
last to be acknowledged by the Malays as our right, 
and from that time we often had communications 
with the fishermen who came out to visit their fishing- 
weirs. Through them we learnt that fighting was 
going on with the Siamese, a long distance off: 
according to their version, the Malay rajahs were 
everywhere victorious ; several large towns and many 
slaves had fallen into their hands, and there was no 
probability of a Siamese army being able to act upon 
the offensive during that monsoon. 

This was decidedly very cheerless news, but the 
authority was a questionable one ; and we could see 
slight defensive preparations taking place in the fort, 
which betokened something else than entire confi- 
dence and security. 

Meantime, each day brought with it novelty and 
amusement. Anchored as we now were, within the 
river and close to the stockade, broad mud-banks ex- 
tended themselves on either hand whenever the tide 
was low. Asiatic birds and reptiles haunted these 
banks ; some of the former, such as the snipe and 
curlew, were well known to us, and, until scared 
away, added to our daily fare. The pelicans, at first, 



PELICANS. — ALLIGATORS ABOUND. 61 

were the sole robbers of the fishing-weirs, but they 
soon found themselves no match for the expert sea- 
men of the pinnace and gun-boats, and left us for 
some other spot. The alligators, however, were not 
to be frightened, although they took uncommonly 
good care not to enter into any of the personal com- 
bats upon the mud which the Malays, and after them 
the English sailors, were constantly trying to entrap 
them into. The numbers of these loathsome brutes 
to be seen at a time was extraordinary ; but what- 
ever might be the danger of falling in with them, if 
wading or swimming alone through these waters, 
there was no doubt of their beinsj arrant cowards 
when fallen in with on shore. With the rising tide, 
the alligators generally found their way up to the 
edge of the jungle, and there lay among the roots of 
the trees (which they strongly resembled), as if wait- 
ing for cattle, or wild animals, that might come down 
to drink : we, however, never saw them catch any- 
thing during a period of several months. The ebbing 
tide would often thus leave the brutes several hun- 
dred yards from the edge of the water, and very 
much they appeared to enjoy themselves when so 
left, with an Indian sun pouring down upon their 
tough hides ; and, as if in the very height of the 
clolce far niente, they would open back their hideous 



62 COWARDICE OF THE ALLIGATORS. 

jaws, and remain in that position for more than an 
hour at a time. As to trying to shoot them, we soon 
found it mere waste of time, as well as of powder and 
ball ; for, mortally wounded or not, they invariably 
carried themselves far beyond our reach. The Malay 
sailors showed us how, at any rate, we could frighten 
the alligators exceedingly, even if we could not cap- 
ture them — by landing lightly equipped with a sharp 
spear or boarding-pike, and thus obliging the reptile 
to make a long detour to escape being assailed. 
Occasionally I have seen the men, by dint of great 
activity, get near enough to fling their weapon and 
strike the alligators ; but as in such cases they in- 
variably struck the upper part of the back, they 
might as well have tried to spear a rock. The natives 
showed the utmost indifference to the presence of 
alligators in their neighbourhood, and, when ques- 
tioned upon the subject, asserted that in salt or 
brackish water, at the mouths of rivers, the alligator 
was never dangerous to man ; and that it was only 
up rivers, and in marshy places, where they lived, as 
it were, amongst human beings, that they screwed up 
their courage to indulge in such a dangerous luxury 
as eating men or women. 

Of the enormous strength and extraordinary 
vitality of these reptiles, we had a pretty good 



CArTUEE OF AN ALLIGATOR. 63 

proof; for one evening, when the pinnace, as usual, 
dropped alongside the weir to take out fish for the 
evening meal, the men who went into the u pocket " 
to see what had been caught, were obliged to move 
their legs nimbly to escape the gin-like jaws of a 
good-sized alligator which had got into the weir 
after the fish, and, having devoured them, could not 
escape. The pinnace-men cheered with delight, 
and proceeded at once to capture the prisoner. It 
was, however, a good tough job : the brute, some ten 
or twelve feet long, lay in the bottom of an enclosed 
space of about equal diameter ; the water was about 
three feet deep, and extremely muddy, rendered more 
so by the splashings and convulsions of the animal. 
Attempts were at first made to thrust sharp boarding- 
pikes down through his hide ; and from the height 
the seamen stood over the creature, and the weight 
they were able to bring to bear upon the pikes, it ap- 
peared probable that some weak spot would be found. 
But, no ; although sometimes eight or nine powerful 
men pressed down with as many pikes, the brute did 
not suffer a scratch ; and, incredible as it may ap- 
pear, more than one of our boarding- pikes, strong as 
they are, were bent in the neck. It was evident that 
a soft spot must be sought for under his " calipash," 
as, in imitation of turtle, the men called his upper 



64 STRENGTH AND VITALITY OF ALLIGATORS. 

coat of armour. Every man armed himself with some 
weapon or other, and stirred up the alligator with 
a vengeance. He became perfectly furious, and lashed 
about his tail and snapped his jaws in a very spiteful 
manner: the fun waxed warm; the "click" of the 
teeth as the mouth closed, sounded uncommonly un- 
pleasant, apart from the cracking of boat-hook staffs, 
and other articles, as if they were mere twigs. At 
last a good noose was slipped over the creature's 
head and hauled tight round his neck ; this enabled 
the seamen to administer a multitude of wounds 
which would have let its life out had it had more than 
the usual number. But it was a long time before it 
was deemed sufficiently safe to be hauled out of the 
weir, and towed to one of the gun-boats to be dis- 
sected and skinned : and even then the muscular 
action of portions of the body, the tail especially, 
whilst being cut into pieces, was something extra- 
ordinary, and denoted how strong is the vitality of 
all this reptile tribe. I, and others, tasted a cutlet of 
alligator's flesh, and although it was not particularly 
nice, still there was nothing about it disagreeable : 
some compared it to very bad veal cutlets ; for my 
part, it tasted very much as turtle collops would, 
which is not saying much in its favour. 

Observing the " Haggi " in quest of something, 



STRANGE ANTIDOTE AGAINST FEVER. 65 

I watched my surgical friend, and found him care- 
fully cutting open the head, to extract the brain. 
Through Jamboo, I asked what purpose it was to be 
applied to, and was informed, with a solemn shake of 
the head that would have qualified the Haggi for 
the College of Physicians, that " it was an invaluable 
remedy for all fevers ! " I need not say that, great 
as my faith was in the Koran and chunam-box of the 
holy mariner, I determined not to go through a 
course of alligator brains, come what might. Prior 
to our Christmas Day, the Mahometan fast*, or 
Lent, took place. Our Malays kept it in a parti- 
cularly lax manner; but our opponents in Quedah 
appeared to be far more orthodox, their devotions 
finding vent in a magnificent chaunt by male voices, 
which, heard in all the lonely stillness of a tropical 
night, was deeply impressive. Jadee assured me 
that the performers were, men of undoubted sanctity, 
having all made the pilgrimage to Mecca, and kissed 
the tomb of their prophet, without which qualification 
they could not take part in what the English seamen 
sacrilegiously styled the " Quedah Opera." The 
conclusion of the fast was a general holiday in the 

* During the month of Rahmadan, the Mussulman abstains 
from eating or drinking, smoking, or pleasure, from sunrise 
to sunset. 



66 CHRISTMAS-DAY. 

town and fort; a constant saluting and cheering 
took place, and men, women, and children were 
dressed in holiday attire, giving a great deal more 
animation to the tumble-down fort and the devoted 
town than we were wont to see them assume. 

Then came our Christmas. The " Hyacinth" ran 
down to the Bountings, and captured some very fine 
turtle. Turtle-soup and plum-pudding galore were 
prepared ; and, like a hen gathering her chicks, we 
all sailed off from our blockading posts, and tumbled 
on board the dear old craft in time for an early 
dinner. 

The Malay sailors got a holiday and a double 
allowance of rice and fish, and paid all due respect to 
the u white man's feast," whilst we talked over our 
adventures with shipmates and messmates, and hoped 
and prophesied for the future. As the evening closed 
in, all boat's crews were again piped away, and we 
rowed into Quedah, keeping time to the tune of 
some sentimental ditty, in which the lady of the 
sailor's love 

" Was a rich merchant's daughter, 
From London she did come," &c. &c; 

and winding up with a denouement far more comical 
than moral. 



EFFORTS TO EVADE THE BLOCKADE. 67 

Yet was our duty not all play or sight-seeing. 
The Malays in Quedah had to dispose of their pro- 
duce at Penang, and procure, in return, arms, powder, 
and salt, and our duty was to prevent them. When- 
ever the night tides were high, combined with a 
misty state of the atmosphere likely to cover their 
escape through our cordon, prahus would push out, 
and, by keeping close under the shadow of the jungle, 
strive to escape our vigilance. Their lofty mat sails 
caught the faintest breath of land-breeze, the beauti- 
fully sharp bow of the prahus made hardly a ripple 
as it cut through the water, and it required the 
keenest eye to detect them when stealing thus along 
in silence and shadow. The quick sight and hearing 
of our Malays was in this respect invaluable : they 
had themselves been engaged in similar feats, and 
knew all the tricks of their compatriots. On more 
than one occasion did the look-out man call me at 
night, when, although a clear sky overhead, nothing 
but the tops of the trees could be seen peering over 
a white mist which poured like smoke out of the 
unhealthy mangrove swamps. " A prahu !" the man 
would say, pointing into the mist, making a sign at 
the same time to listen. Holding my head low down 
and horizontally, I could at last distinguish what had 
caught the Malay's attention — a low creak occasion- 

f 2 



68 WATCHFULNESS OF MY NATIVE CKEW. 

ally, which I most decidedly should have thought to 
be the swaying of some branch in the forest, had he 
not assured me that it was the action of a prahu's 
oar in a rattan grummet.* At other times a rippling 
sound, such as water will make when running past 
any fixed object, was wafted on the night wind. " It 
is merely the tide running past the fishing-weirs, 
Jamboo," I might perhaps say. " Oh no, sir ! " he 
would reply, "the look-out man assures me the 
sound is altering its position, and that it 's the stem of 
a prahu cutting through the water." Silently and 
stealthily, but quickly, as men who had been all 
their lives at such work, the crew would be on their 
legs. " Baughan ! semoa-secalar, hancat sown ! " 
in a low and distinct whisper, would run along the 
deck ; or, in other words, " Arouse, ! hands up 
anchor ! " The anchor would be run up gently, and 
Numero Tega would be after her prey like a night- 
hawk. We had to deal, however, with keen hands 
and fast boats; and often have I chased to early 
dawn before being sure of my prize. 

* " Grummet," the piece of rope used for attaching an oar 
to the rowing-pin. 



A NIGHT CHASE AFTER A PRAHU. 69 



CHAP. VI. 

A Night Chase after a Prahu. — The Chase. — The Prahu 
manoeuvres admirably. — Jadee volunteers to board her. — 
The Capture. — A Piratical Saint. — The Saint at Prayers. 
— The Saint's Deportment. — The Saint's Martyrdom. — 
Defensive Measures. — Escape of Siamese Prisoners. — Suf- 
ferings of the Siamese Prisoners. — A curious Mode of 
Sketching. 

The pluck and zeal of my crew often struck me, 
but never perhaps more than on the occasion I am 
about to relate. 

We had had a long and unsuccessful chase one 
day after a fast-pulling prahu, and the crew being 
much exhausted, I anchored for the night at the 
mouth of a small river called the Furlong, about two 
miles north of Quedah fort. Heartily tired with the 
past day's exertion, all my crew soon dropped asleep, 
except the usual look-out man, and I donned my 
blanket frock and trousers, and threw myself on the 
deck to rest. About ten o'clock I was aroused 
by a fine old one-eyed fellow called "Souboo," 

F 3 



70 THE CHASE. 

"Touhan!"* whispered he, "a large two-masted 
prahu has just sailed past us !" " Where ? — in what 
direction?" I asked. "To leeward, sir!" said 
Souboo, as he dropped upon his knees and peered 
along the water, over which the night mists were 
moving; "there she is — a real c capel prahu,' and 
sailing very fast." To up anchor and make sail to 
the land-breeze did not take many minutes ; the 
sweeps were manned, and the guns cleared for 
action. 

Whilst my little craft was flying through the 
water, I questioned Souboo as to how it was he first 
got sight of the prahu. " The wind was rather 
along the land than off it," said he, " and I was 
watching the mouth of the river, when suddenly 
happening to turn my head to seaward, I saw a 
prahu come out of the mist and almost tumble on 
board of us, as she hauled in for the stream ; but in a 
minute her course was changed, and she bore up for 
the southward with flowing sheets." 

"All right," exclaimed Jadee, " we will have her — 
there is a twenty-mile run for her to the Bountings, 
and before that ground is gone over the fog will 
have cleared off and the wind fail." " How if she 

* Touhan., in this sense, was equivalent to "Sir;" it is 
generally used as Mr. would be in English. 



THE PRAHU MANOEUVRES ADMIRABLY. 71 

hauls up, and goes to the northward?" I suggested. 
<( No Malay man tries to sail against the wind with 
a prahu, when the white man is in chase of him, 
Touhan!" said Jadee; " and if Souboo's description 
of this vessel is correct, she is one of the war-prahus 
of Mahomet Alee's fleet! " 

Under this pleasing anticipation, Jadee got quite 
excited ; and I must say I joined in the feeling, as 
the gun-boat listed to the breeze, and her dashing 
crew bent with a will to their oars. The zealous 
Campar handed to Jadee the longest and ugliest 
creese in his stock, and I observed all the men stick 
their short knives in their girdles ready for a fray* 
t( No prahu yet !" I exclaimed, after running two or 
three miles through the mist. " We will catch 
her ! " responded Jadee ; and almost as he said the 
word, we seemed to be aboard of a large-sized 
prahu, running the same way as ourselves. There 
was a yell of delight from the Number Threes, as 
my crew styled themselves, and one as of astonish- 
ment from the prahu ; but in a moment she, what is 
termed, jibbed her sails, and slipped out of sight 
again before we could dip our heavy yards and 
lug-sails. Altering our course so as to intercept her 
in her evident intention to seek a hiding-place in the 
Bounting Islands, the bow-gun was cleared away and 

F 4 



72 JADEE OFFERS TO BOARD THE PRAHU. 

loaded with grape, ready to knock away her masts 
when another opportunity offered. Again we ran 
almost upon her, our sails being at the time boomed 
out " wing and wing." " Lower your sails, and sur- 
render!" Jadee shouted, as I fired, and brought 
down her mainsail. For a minute her capture seemed 
certain ; but we had to deal with no novice. As we 
shot past the prahu, going nearly eight knots, she 
dropped her foresail, put her helm hard down, and 
long before our sails could be furled and the gun- 
boat's head got round, the villanous prahu was out 
of sight astern. I fancy I swore ; for Jadee called 
the lost prize a " d — d poul," which she most de- 
cidedly was not, and added that he evidently was 
" a pig ! and would not fight." 

We still determined to adhere to our original 
course, confident of the prahu having no shelter 
nearer than the islands, and were rewarded as the 
mist cleared away by again sighting her. I soon 
saw that we were by far the faster sailer with the 
fresh breeze then blowing, and determined not to let 
her escape me this time. I proposed, if three or 
four men would follow me, to jump on board of her, 
and prevent her escape, until the gun-boat got fairly 
alongside. Jadee at once seized the idea, and only 
so far altered it as to persuade me, through the 



THE CAPTURE. 73 

assistance of the interpreter, that the Malays in 
the prahu would be more likely to surrender quietly 
to a countryman who could assure them of quarter, 
than they would be at the sight of a naval officer, 
when fright alone mi^ht make them run a muck, 
and cause a needless loss of life. 

Accordingly, Jadee and his three boarders stood 
ready at the bow, and, looking at them as they stood 
on the gunwale, eagerly eyeing the prahu as we 
rushed at her, they would have made a fine study for 
a painter. They were nearly naked, with the ex- 
ception of a sarong wrapped round the left arm, to 
ward off such blows as might be aimed at them ; in 
the waist-belt, across the small of their backs, each 
had stuck his creese, and a sharp short cutlass 
dangled from their wrists. Strange sights indeed do 
travellers see ! but, for disinterested devotion and 
bravery, I question whether a finer example could 
be shown than that of these dark-skinned subjects of 
Queen Victoria. 

As we closed the prahu, no answer was returned 
to our hail to surrender. " All ready ! " said Jadee, 
swinging himself almost out of the rigging with 
eagerness. " Look out ! " I shouted, and fired again 
at the sails. The prahu repeated her old manoeuvre, 
but we checkmated her this time, for as our side 



74 THE CAPTURE. 

scraped her stern, Jadee and his followers leapt into 
her with a shout. Our sails were down in a trice, 
and we swept alongside of the prize ; and, having heard 
so much as I had done of the desperate character of 
Malays, I was not a little delighted to find that they 
had, in this case, surrendered without resistance, 
directly Jadee made himself master of their helm, 
and announced his intention, with a vicious wave of 
his abominable creese, to maintain it against all 
comers until the gun-boat got alongside. 

The vessel had been a war-prahu ; but her breast- 
work for the guns had been removed, and, in the 
peaceful character of a trader, she was, we afterwards 
found, employed to keep up the communication be- 
tween the Malay chieftains in Quedah province and 
their friends in Penang. The emissary upon this 
occasion we made a prisoner of; the vessel we re- 
spected as a trader, but forced her to return into 
Quedah. 

The prisoner was a Malay of good extraction, and, 
having performed the pilgrimage to Mecca, wore the 
distinguished decoration of a considerable quantity 
of green calico about his head ; apart from his 
sanctity, he was, as his able efforts to escape had 
proved, an expert sailor, and, doubtless, a most 
worthy member of his piratical fraternity. There 



A PIRATICAL SAINT. 75 

was something about the man particularly com- 
manding. He was tall and slight for a Malay, and 
bore, like many of the higher caste in Malaya do, 
marks of Arab blood in his veins ; his face would 
have been good looking but for the high and square 
cheek-bones, and a fierce expression of the eye ; a 
small Vandyke-shaped beard, which was a mark of 
his holy rank, and a certain dignity of manner, 
showed him one accustomed to command ; and it 
amused me to see with what self-possession he was 
prepared, although my prisoner, to exercise his au- 
thority upon my men, who instinctively obeyed him 
as they would do their master. 

I did not, however, show any great awe for his 
piratical saintship, much to Jadee's astonishment ; for 
although my coxswain's knowledge of the creed of 
the faithful was but a mere glimmering, still he had 
vague superstitious fears about it, which would have 
made me laugh had Jadee not been so much in 
earnest about them. Out of consideration for Jadee's 
fears as to the evil consequences likely to arise 
through the imprisoned Haggi's influence with divers 
demons, spirits, et cetera, I consented that, whenever 
the position of the gun-boat brought the direction of 
the prophet's tomb over the stern, the Haggi might, 
in pursuance of the established form of Mahomet- 



76 THE SAINT AT PRAYERS. 

anism, bring his carpet on the quarter-deck, and 
pray ; at other times he was to remain forward. 
Accordingly, at the hour of prayer, the pirate-saint 
would stalk along to the stern of the gun-boat, 
spread his little carpet, turn towards Mecca, or, 
rather, the direction in which it lay, and then, indif- 
ferent to who were looking at him, or whatever might 
be going on, enter upon his devotions with a zeal and 
abstraction from the little world around him which 
could not but command admiration from men of any 
creed. His orisons finished, he returned to his place 
with the dignity of a rajah. 

He never made the slightest effort to conciliate 
either my good -will or that of any of my crew. I 
was evidently a Giaour, an infidel, and the Malays 
around me renegades ; but I rather admired him for 
this independence, and took good care nothing should 
occur to offend his religious scruples, so far as he per- 
sonally was concerned. Perhaps, in time, we should 
have appreciated each other better ; for, on my one 
day notifying to him that he was to proceed to 
Penang, to stand upon his trial before Governor 
Bonham, he relaxed for a few minutes, clasped 
both hands together, made a low bow, and " Hoped 
God would be with me, and that I should walk 
in health ! " expressions which I cordially returned ; 



DEFENSIVE MEASURES. 7 7 

and so we parted. From what I afterwards heard, I 
had reason to believe the " Company Sahib" had a 
long account with this holy man, and that, with some 
others, he was to be seen in after years innocently 
employed sweeping and keeping in order the fortifi- 
cations of Fort William at Calcutta. A bevy of houris 
in the world to come will doubtless reward him for 
the injury he has suffered from the infidel in this. 

Towards the commencement of the new year, our 
attention was called to a strong working party being 
seen every day to leave the fort, and proceed to clear 
away the jungle which had grown up close round 
the works ; this done, they commenced the construc- 
tion of an admirable battery, which flanked our 
anchorage as well as the landward side of Quedah 
fort. Observing that this working party was strongly 
guarded, we learnt, on inquiry from the fishermen, 
that the labourers were unfortunate Siamese — men, 
women, and children — who had been captured when 
the province was conquered by the Malays, and that 
the work they were now doing was merely to keep 
them out of mischief. We, however, plainly saw 
that the chiefs had some cause for anxiety, and anti- 
cipated an attack, though how or whence we had as 
yet no certain intelligence. We took some pains to 
get information carried to these poor creatures of 



78 ESCAPE OF SIAMESE PRISONERS. 

our readiness to give them shelter, and shortly after- 
wards two Siamese effected their escape under diffi- 
cult circumstances. The musquito squadron were 
just on the point of separating to take up their 
stations for the night — a step we always took care 
to carry out after dark, in order that the enemy 
might not know our position — when a voice was 
heard to hail us from a long tongue of mud which 
ran out to seaward from the northern point of the 
river. At first it was supposed to be the whoop of 
a night-hawk, but it was repeated, and our men 
declared it to be the voice of either Chinese or 
Siamese. Mr. Jamboo was called for, and, in a 
dialect which was so unmusical as to resemble the 
sounds emitted by knocking two hard pieces of 
wood together, he soon ascertained that they were 
two Siamese men who had escaped from the Malays, 
and in an attempt to cross the mud-flat had sunk into 
it exhausted, and unless we could reach them would 
assuredly be drowned or devoured by the alligators 
upon the return of the tide. The pinnace was now 
forced in as near as possible to the mud-bank, and three 
or four of the English seamen having volunteered 
to assist the unfortunates, they stripped themselves, 
and aided by oars and boards slipped over the mud 
to where the Siamese were fairly bogged, pulled 



THEIR SUFFERINGS. 79 

them out by sheer strength and activity, and brought 
them off amidst the cheers of all our party. The 
blue-jackets washed them, and clothed their shiver- 
ing frames in sailors' frocks and trousers, persuaded 
them to drink a glass of raw Jamaica rum each, and 
then, with considerable truth, said, half-laughing, 
" Why, Jack, your mother would not know you!" 
— a remark the Siamese would probably have ac- 
quiesced in, had they understood the rough but 
good-natured fellows. 

The tale of the Siamese was soon told : they were 
father and son, and had originally entered the pro- 
vince of Quedah from the neighbourhood of Bankok. 
At the time of the Malay inroad, the father was a 
petty merchant, barber, and painter, at an island 
called Lancavi. They were made prisoners, or 
rather slaves ; worked like horses, starved, and con- 
stantly saw their countrymen creesed before their 
eyes. They escaped, stole a boat, and sailed with 
her across to the mainland, by following the coast 
of which they knew they must reach English terri- 
tory. At last they observed our ship in the offing, 
and rightly conjecturing that some of her boats 
would be found off Quedah, had happily succeeded in 
reaching us without being seen by the lynx-eyed 
look-outs of Quedah. 



80 CURIOUS MODE OF SKETCHING. 

They stayed some clays with us, and appeared 
anxious to evince their gratitude in every possible 
way. The old man, as a Siamese artist, presented 
each officer with specimens of his skill ; the most 
remarkable point in his sketches being the fact of 
his wonderful departure from all our preconceived, 
notions of drawing. 

For instance, in a pencil sketch of Buddha, drawn 
for me, in which that divinity is represented reposing 
upon one leg, and looking uncommonly like Canova's 
famed figure of a dancing-girl reposing, and almost 
as unnatural, the draughtsman commenced with the 
toes and worked gradually up to the gorgeous head- 
dress, yet preserving a just proportion in all the 
parts of the figure ; as a whole, the result may be 
said to have been more curious than pleasing. When 
the Siamese eventually proceeded to Penang, they 
left us favourably impressed with their disposition 
and ability, although they evidently lacked the 
energy of character which marked the Malays about 
us. 



ANXIETY OF COMMANDING OFFICER. 81 



CHAP. VII. 

The Anxiety of the Officer commanding the Blockade. — In- 
telligence received of the Pirate Fleet. — My good Fortune 
in sailing with so excellent a Captain. — A Tropical Thunder- 
storm. — Jadee kills the Wind. — How Jadee learnt to kill 
the Wind. — The Dutch generally disliked. — Jadee's Pira- 
tical Friends attack a Junk. — The Defeat and Flight of 
Jadee's Friends. — They are saved by the Rajah of Jehore. 
— Killing the Wind. 

Our enterprising captain in the " Hyacinth" had, as 
it may be supposed, a very anxious time. The extent 
of coast to be blockaded was not less than fifty or sixty 
miles in extent much of it but little known ; nu- 
merous islands, rivers, and creeks existed of which 
charts and surveyors had no cognizance. He knew 
well that a large force of prahus and armed men 
were in the province ; their exact whereabouts, how- 
ever, was preserved a perfect secret, and Captain 
Warren's fear was, lest they should fall upon his boats 
or the gun-boats with vastly superior forces, and 
carry off an easy victory. The " Hyacinth" there- 
fore, like a troubled spirit, was ever flitting up and 

G 



82 INTELLIGENCE OF PIRATE FLEET. 

down between Quedah and a spot of equal impor- 
tance called the Parlis River, situated twenty miles 
farther north, and in the entrance of which the ship's 
cutter and No. 1. gun-boat, the Diamond, were sta- 
tioned. In the second week of January, information 
was received that a considerable number of the war- 
prahus seen by us at Trang during the previous 
autumn, had succeeded, under their renowned leader, 
Datoo Mahomet Alee, in getting into the Parlis River, 
and were employed in the defence of that neighbour- 
hood. It became therefore necessary to reinforce 
the Parlis blockading force, and I was ordered to 
proceed there for that purpose. Delighted at the 
prospect of seeing more of this interesting country, 
my craft was soon under weigh and spinning along 
the coast, which, to the northward of Quedah River, 
rapidly improved in appearance ; the picturesque 
group of islands known as the Lancavas, and 
beyond them the Laddas, lying to seaward, and 
spurs of mountain land from the central chain ap- 
proaching close to the coast of the mainland. 

All, at any rate, was bright and beautiful to me : 
placed, young as I was, in a position of trust and 
responsibility ; enjoying all the sweets of command, 
and still too young to feel its anxieties, it was indeed 
the sunny side of the world that I was then enjoying; 



MY EXCELLENT CAPTAIN. 83 

and as, with a throbbing pulse and zealous heart, I 
walked my own quarter-deck, how earnest, in all the 
honesty of youth, were my resolutions to deserve 
well of my profession, and those set in authority over 
me. Fortunate are those boys who, like me, sail 
their first trip as embryo admirals with such a cap- 
tain as mine was ; a gentleman in all things ; labour- 
ing in his profession quietly and earnestly ; not, upon 
the one hand, scorning it as being beneath his birth 
or abilities ; or, upon the other, degrading himself 
into a mere menial, and working for the dirty pounds, 
shillings, and pence it would yield him. The mid- 
shipman who sails and learns his profession with such 
a man may perhaps, in after life, suffer when he 
happens to be under the tyrant, schemer, or bully — 
for, alas ! such will be found in every noble profession ; 
but those principles early acquired will ever be a 
solace to him, and the love and recollection of such a 
man console him and cheer him in the hope of emu- 
lating his example. 

As we approached a long low point named Tan- 
gong Bouloo, or the Cape of Bamboos, from the 
numbers of those canes which were waving gracefully 
over it, my attention w T as called to the necessity of 
preparing for a heavy squall which was rapidly 
sweeping down towards us from the distant hill«„ 

Q 2 



84 A TROPICAL THUNDERSTORM. 

As the wind freshened, we reduced canvass until 
the " Emerald" was flying along under a close-reefed 
foresail, everything cracking withal. The squall 
swept on ; a dense black mass of clouds, charged with 
electricity, a burst of thunder which seemed to make 
the gun-boat tremble to her very keel, and a vivid 
flash of lightning which blinded one for a minute, 
showed how close it was. The tall trees bent to the 
gale, the bamboos were swept down like a long row of 
feathers, and a white streak of foam rushed towards 
us as we took in our sail, and prepared to receive 
it under bare poles. With a shriek it struck us ; the 
little " Emerald" lay down to it for a moment, the 
helm was put up, and away she flew before the storm 
like a snow-flake. Jadee stood by my side, (t A bad 
wind, Touhan ; we must kill it! " " Kill away ! Jadee," 
I replied, laughing at the idea of so fickle a personage 
as the Clerk of the Weather getting into a scrape with 
a Malay pirate, — " kill away, by all means !" " Cam- 
par !" shouted Jadee — poor Campar ! he had to be 
everywhere — "oh! Campar, thou son of a burnt 
mother, hand here the rice-spoon !" shouted Jadee, 
looking as solemn as a quaker or a haggi. This rice- 
spoon, by the way, was the only one in the vessel ; it 
was made of wood, and used for stirring the rice 
whilst cooking over the fire ; its value to us may-be 



JADEE KILLS THE WIND ! 85 

invested it with a certain degree of sanctity. The 
spoon was brought, and I tried to look as solemn as 
Jadee, who, calling to his aid the sanctimonious 
Alee, placed the spoon upon the deck between him 
and the wind, and the pair of true believers repeated 
some verses over it — bound themselves, by a vow, to 
sacrifice several game-cocks* upon a favourable occa- 
sion, and then the precious spoon was stuck through 
the lanyards of the main rigging, with the handle to 
leeward. I think I should have died from the effects 
of suppressed mirth, had not the fury of the squall 
and the quantity of water thrown on board of us 
given me enough to do to look after the safety of the 
craft. Jadee, however, sat quietly watching and 
waiting for the effect of his incantation : at last, 
down came the rain, not in drops, but in bucketsful, 
and, as usual, the wind fell entirely. Hastening 
to <ret under the rain-awnings and mats until the 
weather cleared up, I remarked to Jadee that " the 
wind was fairly killed." " Yes !" he replied, with a 
sly expression of countenance, " I never saw that 
charm fail; I never saw the wind that could long 
stand its effect. The Rajah of Jehore was the first 
man who taught it to me, and I have found it infal- 

* I fancy from game-cocks being introduced into this super- 
stitious observance, that it is purely of Malay origin. 

g 3 



86 HOW JADEE LEARNT TO KILL THE WIND. 

lible. If Jamboo was here, Touhan, I'd tell you 
how it happened." Jamboo was at once sent for; and 
making a proviso that my coxswain should speak 
slowly and distinctly, so as to enable me to call in the 
interpreter's aid as little as possible, he proceeded to 
tell his tale, somewhat as follows : — 

" Long before that action with the English man-of- 
war which drove me to Singapore, I sailed in a fine 
fleet of prahus belonging to the Rajah of Jehore.* 
We were all then very rich — ah ! such numbers of 
beautiful wives, and such feasting ! — but, above all, 
we had a great many most holy men in our force ! 
When the proper monsoon came, we proceeded to 
sea to fight the Bugismen and Chinamen bound from 
Borneo and the Celebes to Java ; for you must re- 
member our Rajah was at war with them (Jadee 
always maintained that the proceedings in which 
he had been engaged partook of a purely warlike, 
and not of a piratical character). 

" Our thirteen prahus had all been fitted out in and 
about Singapore. I wish you could have seen them, 
Touhan ! These prahus we see here are nothing to 

* I have said the Rajah of Jehore ; but Jadee called the in- 
dividual by some peculiar term not easily spelt, and described 
his place of abode and hiding-place as being near Cape Romania, 
in the Jehore district. 



THE DUTCH GENERALLY DISLIKED. 87 

them ; — such brass guns; such long pendants ; such 
creeses ! Allah-il- Allah ! our Datoos were indeed 
great men ! 

" Sailing along the coast up as high as Patani, we 
then crossed over to Borneo, two Illanoon prahus act- 
ing as pilots, and reached a place called Sambas : there 
we fought the Chinese and Dutchmen, who ill-treat 
our countrymen, and are trying to drive the Malays 
out of that country. Gold-dust and slaves in large 
quantities were here taken ; most of the latter being 
our countrymen of Sumatra and Java, who are cap- 
tured and sold to the planters and miners of the 
Dutch settlements." 

" Do you mean to say," I asked, " that the Dutch 
countenance such traffic ? " 

" The Hollanders," replied Jadee, fi have been the 
bane of the Malay race ; no one knows the amount of 
villany, the bloody cruelty of their system towards 
us. They drive us into our prahus to escape their 
taxes and their laws, and then declare us pirates, 
and put us to death. There are natives in our 
crew, Touhan, of Sumatra and Java, of Bianca and 
Borneo ; ask them why they hate the Dutchmen ; 
why they would kill a Dutchman. It is because 
the Dutchman is a false man, not like the white man 
(English). The Hollander stabs in the dark : he 

G 4 



88 jadee's pirate fleet 

is a liar ! However, from Borneo we sailed to Bi~ 
liton and Bianca, and there waited for some large 
junks that were expected. Our cruise had been so 
far successful, and we feasted away, — fighting cocks, 
smoking opium, and eating white rice. At last our 
scouts told us that a junk was in sight. She came ; 
a lofty-sided one of Fokien. We knew those Amoy 
men would fight like tiger-cats for their sugar and 
silks ; and, as the breeze was fresh, we only kept her 
in sight by keeping close in shore and following her. 
Not to frighten the Chinamen, we did not hoist 
sail, but made our slaves pull. Oh !" said Jadee, 
warming up with the recollection of the event, — 
" oh ! it was fine to feel what brave fellows we 
then were ! 

" Towards night we made sail, and closed upon the 
junk, and at daylight it fell a stark calm, and we 
went at our prize like sharks. All our fighting men 
put on their war dresses ; the Illanoons danced their 
war dance, and all our gongs sounded, as we opened 
out to attack her on different sides. 

" But those Amoy men are pigs ! They burnt joss- 
paper, sounded their gongs, and received us with 
such showers of stones, hot water, long pikes, and 
one or two well-directed shots, that we hauled off to 
try the effect of our guns ; sorry though we were to 




. 




■Kt- 



ATTACK A JUNK. 89 

do it; for it was sure to bring down the Dutchmen 
upon us. Bang ! bang ! we fired at them, and they 
at us ; three hours did we persevere, and whenever 
we tried to board, the Chinese beat us back every 
time, for her side was as high and smooth as a wall, 
with galleries overhanging. We had several men 

O DO 

killed and hurt ; a council was called ; a certain 
charm was performed by one of our holy men, a 
famous chief, and twenty of our best men devoted 
themselves to effecting a landing on the junk's deck, 
when our look-out prahus made the signal that the 
Dutchmen were coming ; and sure enough some 
Dutch gun-boats came sweeping round a headland. 
In a moment we were round and pulling like demons 
for the shores of Biliton, the gun-boats in chase of 
us, and the Chinese howling with delight. The sea- 
breeze freshened, and brought up a schooner-rigged 
boat very fast : we had been at work twenty-four 
hours, and were heartily tired ; our slaves could 
work no longer, so we prepared for the Hollanders ; 
they were afraid to close upon us, and commenced 
firing at a distance. This was just what we wanted ; 
we had guns as well as they, and, by keeping up the 
fight until dark, we felt sure of escape. The Dutch- 
men, however, knew this too, and kept closing gra- 
dually upon us, and when they saw our prahus 



90 PIRATES ENGAGE A DUTCH FLOTILLA. 

baling out water and blood, they knew we were 
suffering, and cheered like devils. We were despe- 
rate ; surrender to Dutchmen we never would : we 
closed together for mutual support, and determined 
at last, if all hope ceased of escape, to run our 
prahus ashore, burn them, and lie hid in the jungle 
until a future day. But a brave Datoo, with his shat- 
tered prahu, saved us ; he proposed to let the Dutch- 
men board her, creese all that did so, and then trust 
to Allah for his escape. 

" It was done immediately ; we all pulled a short 
distance away, and left the brave Datoo's prahu like 
a wreck abandoned. How the Dutchmen yelled, 
and fired into her ! The slaves and cowards jumped 
out of the prahu, but our braves kept quiet ; at last, 
as we expected, one gun-boat dashed alongside of 
their prize, and boarded her in a crowd : then was 
the time to see how the Malay man could fight ; the 
creese was worth twenty swords, and the Dutchmen 
went down like sheep. We fired to cover our coun- 
trymen, who, as soon as their work was done, jumped 
overboard, and swam to us; but the brave Datoo, 
with many more, died, as brave Malays should do, 
running a muck against a host of enemies. 

u The gun-boats were quite scared by this punish- 
ment, and we lost no time in getting as rapidly away 



FLIGHT OP JADEE'S COMPANIONS. 91 

as possible ; but the accursed schooner, by keeping 
more in the offing, held the wind, and preserved her 
position, signalling all the while for the gun-boats 
to follow her. We did not want to fight any more ; 
it was evidently an unlucky day. On the opposite 
side of the channel to that we were on, the coral reefs 
and shoals would prevent the Hollanders following us: 
it was determined at all risks to get there in spite of 
the schooner. With the first of the land-wind in the 
evening, we set sail before it, and steered across for 
Bianca. The schooner placed herself in our way like 
a clever sailor, so as to turn us back ; but we were 
determined to push on, take her fire, and run all 
risks. 

" It was a sight to see us meeting one another ; 
but we were desperate : we had killed plenty of 
Dutchmen ; it was their turn now. I was in the 
second prahu, and well it was so; for when the head- 
most one got close to the schooner, the Dutchman 
fired all his guns into her, and knocked her at once 
into a wrecked condition. We gave one cheer, fired 
our guns, and then pushed on for our lives. Ah ! 
sir, it was a dark night indeed for us. Three prahus 
in all were sunk, and the whole force dispersed. To 
add to our misfortunes, a strong gale sprang up. We 
were obliged to carry canvass ; our prahu leaked from 



92 THE PIRATES SAVED BY THE RAJAH. 

shot-holes ; the sea continually broke into her ; we 
dared not run into the coral reefs on such a night, 
and bore up for the Straits of Malacca. The 
wounded writhed and shrieked in their agony, and 
we had to pump, we fighting men, and bale like 
black fellows I By two in the morning, we were all 
worn out. I felt indifferent whether I was drowned 
or not, and many threw down their buckets, and sat 
down to die. The wind increased, and at last, as if 
to put us out of our misery, just such a squall as 
this came down upon us. I saw it was folly con- 
tending against our fate, and followed the general 
example. s God is great ! ' we exclaimed ; but the 
Rajah of Jehore came and reproved us : ( Work 
until daylight,' he said, ' and I will ensure your 
safety.' We pointed at the black storm which was 
approaching. 'Is that what you fear?' he replied, 
and, going below, he produced just such a wooden 
spoon, and did what you have seen me do ; and I 
tell you, my captain, as I would if the f Company 
Sahib ? stood before me, that the storm was nothing, 
and that we had a dead calm one hour afterwards, 
and were saved. God is great, and Mahomet is his 
Prophet ! — but there is no charm like the Jehore one 
for killing the wind ! " 

It did not take as long to tell as it does to write 



KILLING THE WIND ! 93 

this odd tale ; and it would be impossible to try to 
give an idea of how my coxswain's feelings were 
carried away with the recital of his narrative, or 
how genuine and child-like the credulity of the old 
pirate. I Avrote it down as a strange episode in 
Malay life, and possibly the prescription may get me 
a medal from the College of Physicians, even if it 
should be declared valueless by European navigators 
in general. 



94 KEFRESHING EFFECTS OF A SQUALL. 



CHAP. VIII. 

Refreshing effects of a Squall in the Tropics. — Scenery in the 
Malay Archipelago. — My Gun-boat "The Emerald" joins 
the Parlis Blockading Squadron. — The Malays try to 
Stockade us out of the River. — Haggi Loung comes on an 
Embassy. — Malayan Diplomacy. — Jadee's disregard for a 
Flao- of Truce. — Jadee and the one-eyed Enemy. — A Spy. 
— The Chase by Starlight. — The submerged Jungle. — An 
Indian Night-Scene. — The Chase lost. — The Whip and 
Mangrove Snakes. 

Again we made sail and sped on our way. How 
nature revives in those equatorial climes, after the 
revivifying effect of such a squall as we had just 
experienced ! Animate and inanimate objects gain 
fresh life as it were from the action of the passing 
storm ; the very sea glittered in the sunlight with a 
brighter and a deeper blue, and the forest-clad sides 
of the surrounding mountains looked even more 
gorgeous than was their wont, as they shone in all 
the thousand shades of which green and gold are 
susceptible. Away to the northward stretched a 
labyrinth of islands of every size and shape — some 



SCENERY IN MALAYAN ARCHIPELAGO. 95 

still wrapt in storm-clouds, others bathed in refulgent 
light, or softened by distance into u summer isles of 
Eden lying in dark purple spheres of sea." In 
short, it realised at such a moment all one's brightest 
dreams of the East ; and it required but little imagi- 
nation to people it with bloody pirates and fleet- 
footed prahus, in warring with whom I amongst 
others was to win bright honour. 

At the base of a range of hills which bound the 
broad valley of Quedah on the north, the river Parlis 
discharges itself over a bar into the Indian Ocean. 
I hauled in for it, and soon had the satisfaction of 
shaking the gallant Barclay by the hand. 

The river at its mouth was divided, by a small 
island half a mile long, into two branches. This 
island, called " Pulo Quetam," or Crab Island, by 
the natives, served for a dockyard, drying- ground, 
and place of recreation to our little force, and, to- 
gether with the fact of a large fleet of war-prahus 
being up the river, under the command of one of the 
most enterprising of pirates, gave to the blockade 
here a degree of interest which Quedah did not 
possess. 

Our force consisted of two gun-boats and a ship's 
cutter, carrying altogether four guns, and about 
seventy men. The Malays far outnumbered us, 



96 MY GUN-BOAT JOINS IN 

and Datoo Mahomet Alee had sent a derisive mes- 
sage, to say he could and should go in or out of 
the river whenever it suited his convenience. The 
consequence was, we lived in momentary expectation 
of a tousrti action with a set of heroes who had 
already fought the boats of H. M. S. "Zebra" and 
"Rose" on former occasions, and allowed them no 
decided advantage. 

During the day we used to lie together in the 
northern entrance of the river, but at night I was 
detached to blockade the southern branch, and pre- 
vent all ingress and egress by even the fishermen. 
Until the arrival of the " Emerald " this measure 
had been impracticable, and it gave great umbrage to 
the enemy. A pangleman, or petty chief, was 
therefore sent down from the town of Parlis, situated 
twelve miles up the stream, to try and induce us to 
desist. The ambassador was not wanting in skill. 
He said that Mahomet Alee sent all health to the 
officer in command of the English gun-boats, and 
begged to assure him that the presence of a vessel in 
the south branch of the river was an unnecessary 
measure, and an act of discourtesy which he hoped 
would cease. He knew from experience that white 
men (Orang-putihsv) never wantonly frightened women 
or children, but that my vessel rowing round to her 



THE BLOCKADE OF PARLIS. 97 

station every night had only that effect ! The pan- 
gleman alluded here to the inhabitants of a small 
village, situated in the fork of the river, which I had 
to pass nightly. 

Lastly, Mahomet Ali begged to remind us that 
such a ridiculous force as we were, was merely 
tolerated, and that we should not do as we liked. 

Mr. Barclay, our senior officer, gave a concise 
answer. That he should do his duty as he pleased, 
and that the women and children would cease to fear 
when they found we did them no harm ; and lastly, 
the sooner Datoo Mahomet Ali put his threat into 
execution the better pleased we should all be. 

We never understood what Mahomet Ali's real 
motive was ; but as if to show us that he did not care 
about the south channel being open or not, he took 
advantage of my absence one night, whilst chasing a 
prahu, to send a strong party of men down, who 
actually stockaded that branch entirely across, much 
to the astonishment of my brother officer, who 
found it completed in the morning. I was told of 
it on my return, and he gave me full permission 
to do what I pleased, to show our indifference to 
the authority or temper of "Mahomet Ali." I 
accordingly went round, and finding we could not 
easily otherwise remove the stakes, I lashed the 

H 



08 ATTEMPT TO STOCKADE THE RIVER. 

gun-boat to them at dead low water, and as the tide 
rose she lifted them out as easily as feathers, and on 
the ebb-tide we sent them floating to sea. Again 
did the enemy watch for an opportunity, and again 
did I uproot their stockade ; the expenditure of 
labour being but slight on our side, whilst with them 
the skill, energy, and labour necessary to construct 
such a work, although merely formed of the stems of 
young trees from the neighbouring jungle, were very 
remarkable. 

Several messages of a very uncivil nature came 
to our commanding officer, to which equally un- 
courteous answers were returned. 

One day the other gun-boat, the " Diamond," and 
the cutter had been obliged to weigh and proceed 
to sea in chase of piahus, leaving my vessel alone in 
the river. About noon two long row-boats, called 
sampans, with ten or twelve persons in each, swept 
suddenly round the point ahead, and made direct for 
us. Jadee saw them immediately, and his eyes 
glistened at the prospect of their intentions being 
warlike. Whatever their original purpose was, they 
were peaceable enough when they saw us all under 
arms ; Jadee, however, as a precautionary measure, 
putting on his fighting jacket, a long sleeveless one 
of red cloth, sufficiently quilted to turn the edge of 



IIAGOI loung's embassy. 99 

a " badi." * The leading canoe was hailed at pistol- 
shot distance, and called upon to state her mission. 
We were informed that they came with a communi- 
cation from Datoo Mahomet Ali, the bearer being no 
less a personage than his second in command, a man 
called " Haggi Loung." 

The canoe in which the Haggi was seated, was per- 
mitted to come alongside, and she had evidently a 
picked crew, armed to the teeth ; and I had no doubt 
that my serang was right in saying that, had they 
found the gun-boat with half a crew on shore, as was 
usually the case about noon, the reverend Haggi and 
his comrades were to have essayed her capture. 
However, I received the gentleman with all the 
dignity a youth could muster, although I was some- 
what piqued at the supercilious smile which played 
on the face of Haggi Loung as he eyed the pocket 
edition of the white man before him. 

Loung was rather tall, with square shoulders and 
bony limbs, evincing undoubted capability for en- 
forcing those maxims of the Koran which his high 
forehead and intellectual countenance showed he 
possessed mental capacity for acquiring and incul- 
cating. 



* A "badi" is a small stabbing-knife, used in a close fight 
or to administer a coup de grace to an enemy, 

H 2 



100 MALAY DIPLOMACY. 

Seating ourselves in a circle, consisting of Haggi 
Loung and his secretary, with Jadee on one side of 
me and the interpreter on the other, we proceeded to 
business. The message — if ever one was sent, which 
I strongly question — when divested of Eastern orna- 
ment and circumlocution, amounted merely to an 
attempt to persuade me to believe that the blockade 
of the southern branch of the river was totally need- 
less, and that the best proof that it was so, consisted 
in the fact of their having stockaded it across them- 
selves ; and they begged I would not touch that 
stockade. 

I told him, " He had already received an an- 
swer from my superior officer upon these points ; 
I had nothing to add ; and that Mahomet Ali 
must remember that, as English officers merely acted 
from a sense of duty, and in obedience to orders, I 
hoped the next time he asked me a favour it would 
be one that I could grant." 

The Haggi wanted to discuss the point; but as 
the arguments passed for the most part through the 
medium of Jadee and the interpreter, I suppose they 
lost their point, for I kept my ground. 

Failing in this respect, he gradually turned the 
conversation to the prospect of the Siamese regaining 
the province of Quedah, and with much finesse led 



JADEE AND A FLAG OF TRUCE. 101 

me into the error of believing that the Siamese army 
had been repulsed at all points. I now sent for 
boiled rice and fish, which I ordered to be set before 
the Haggi ; and Jadee proceeded, by my desire, to 
see that the Malays in the canoes had food supplied 
to them, though, from the expression of his face whilst 
so employed, I could plainly observe that he would 
have far preferred blowing them from the muzzle of 
the bow gun. Watching his opportunity, Jadee 
made a quiet sign that he wished to speak to me, 
and when I went to him, hurriedly said, " Now, sir, 
now is our opportunity ; capture this man ; send his 
canoes away to say so, and tell Mahomet Ali we are 
alone this afternoon, and that Numero Tega will 
fight him at once ! " I pointed out to Jadee that the 
challenge might be very well, but that the capture of 
Loung was out of the question, as he had come to us 
in the sacred character of a messenger. Jadee could 
not understand it at all, and walked away muttering 
something in which I heard, " Mahomet Ali — pigs 
— and poltroons " generally mixed up. 

Haggi Loiing was all smiles and civility, little 
thinking how hostile a proposition had just been made 
against him, and shortly afterwards rose to depart ; 
an event I rather hastened, as it was impossible, with 
such inflammable materials as his crews and mine 

H 3 



102 JADEE AND THE ONE-EYED ENEMY. 

were composed of, to tell the moment a disturbance 
might take place. Jadee was rustling about like a 
game-cock ready for a row ; and I saw him, and a 
wild-looking Malay who steered one of the canoes, 
exchanging glances and curls of the lip which be- 
tokened anything but amity. Desiring Jadee to do 
something at the other side of the gun-boat, I wished 
Haggi Loung " Good-bye," and had just lost sight 
of them round the point when my serang came 
aft, all smiles and sunshine : to my queries he only 
smiled mysteriously, and replied I should soon know ; 
and as this evidently referred to something connected 
with our late visitors, I began to have my fears lest 
a pleasant divertissement, in the shape of a creese fight, 
had been arranged between him and the Orson from 
Parlis. 

Directly it fell dark, our consorts rejoined us ; and 
whilst all the vessels were lashed together, prior to 
taking up their night positions, one of the look-out 
men maintained that a long canoe had crossed the river 
above us, his quick eye having sighted her as she 
darted over the bright streak of light which gleamed 
between the gloomy shadows of either side. From 
one of our prizes we had captured a long fairy-like 
canoe, scooped out of the trunk of a tree : with six 
paddles she would fly through the water. Barclay 



A SPY. — TIIE CHASE BY STARLIGHT. 103 

and I jumped into her at once, and, with a mixed 
crew of Malays and Englishmen, gave chase to the 
stranger. It was top of high water, or nearly so ; the 
tide as usual had overflowed all the neighbouring 
land (except the high patch of ground on which stood 
the little village previously referred to), and the dark 
stems of the mangrove and other trees, which seemed 
to flourish in an amphibious life, stretched away on 
cither hand from the river in a black and endless 
labyrinth. 

A few deep and silent strokes brought us up almost 
noiselessly to the spot where the stranger had been 
seen to cross, although we were in the shadow on 
the opposite side of the river ; the paddles were laid 
across our boat, and the steersman alone kept her 
going gently up the stream. We were all eyes ; 
now looking in among the dark waters, out of which 
rose the black and solemn trunks of the trees ; 
now eagerly gazing across to the opposite side of 
the river. Almost instinctively, we all pointed, with- 
out speaking a word, to a canoe twice as long as our 
own, which had evidently seen us, and was apparently 
waiting to see whether we were in search of her, or 
for us to show our intentions. We did not keep them 
long in suspense. 

H 4 



104 THE SUBMERGED JUNGLE. 

" Give way," exclaimed Barclay, " and get above 
them ! " In a moment our paddles struck the water, 
and our craft seemed to lift and jump at every 
stroke. The other canoe was not idle ; for a few 
minutes it was doubtful which would win, and we 
could hear the men cheering one another on to 
exertion. " A scout ! a scout ! " exclaimed our Ma- 
lays ; " the prahus will be down when the ebb-tide 
makes ! " I told Barclay this. " I hope to God 
they will ! " he exclaimed ; " we shall be ready for 
them ! " We now began to head the canoe : as 
soon as we saw we could do that, Barclay got his 
musket ready, and gave orders, directly he fired, for 
the helmsman to steer diagonally across the stream, 
so as to get on the same side as the craft we were in 
chase of. 

Taking a deliberate aim at the scout canoe he 
fired, and we with a shout struck across for her, 
hoping either to lay her alongside or drive her back 
upon the gun-boats ; but we had counted without 
our host, and the Malays of our party gave a yell of 
disgust as the enemy disappeared as it were into the 
jungle. We were soon on her heels, and guided by 
the sound she made in forcing through the mangrove 
swamp, held our course: now aground upon the 
straddling legs of a mangrove tree; then pushing 



AN INDIAN NIGHT-SCENE. 105 

through a thicket, out of which the affrighted birds 
flew shrieking ; then listening to try and distinguish 
the sound of the flying canoe from all the shrill 
whistles, chirrups, and drumming noises, which render 
an Indian jungle far more lively by night than by 
day. Once or twice we thought we were fast catch- 
ing her, when suddenly our canoe passed from the 
mangrove swamp into an open forest of trees, which 
rose in all their solemn majesty from the dark 
waters. We saw our chance of success was now 
hopeless, for the scout canoe had fifty avenues by 
which to baffle us, and terra Jirma was, w T e knew, 
not far distant. It was a strange and beautiful 
scene. The water was as smooth as burnished steel, 
and reflected, wherever the trees left an opening, 
the thousand stars which strewed the sky : the tall 
stems of the forest trees rose from this glittering 
surface, and waved their sable plumes over our 
heads ; whilst the fire-fly, or some equally luminous 
insect, occasionally lit up first one tree and then 
another, as if sparks of liquid gold were being 
emitted from the rustling leaves. 

Silently we lay on our oars, or rather pad- 
dles ; not a sound of the flying canoe could be 
heard : it w T as evident that the scout had escaped, 
and it only remained for us to make the best of 



106 THE WHIP AND MANGROVE SNAKES. 

our way back again — a task which, in the ab- 
sence of all excitement, we found an extremely 
tough one ; indeed, we grounded so often on the 
roots of the mangrove trees, that I proposed to 
wade through the mud and water, dragging the 
canoe after us. To this, however, the Malays would 
in nowise listen, and spoke so earnestly of the 
danger arising from a particular kind of snake, that 
we thought it better to listen to them — a piece of 
wisdom upon our part which gave rise to some con- 
gratulations on the morrow, when, in company with 
our advisers, we visited the mangrove swamp, and 
found in the fork of many of the trees a perfect nest 
of snakes. These, the Malays assured us, were 
very venomous, yet the reptiles were not above a 
foot or eighteen inches long, and about the girth of 
a man's little finger ; the greatest peculiarity being 
strong black markings about the body, which gave 
them an appearance somewhat in keeping with their 
bad reputation. Having, like most youths, read 
every book which I could get hold of, descriptive of 
wild beast, bird, and reptile, I, from my reading, 
had been led to believe that the whip-snake was 
everywhere most dangerous; and I must say — when 
I observed a number of these long green-coloured 
creatures hanging like tendrils from the trees we 



THE WHIP AND MANGROVE SNAKES. 107 

had in the darkness of the previous night been 
pushing our way through — I felt thankful for our 
escape. Touching one of the Malays who were 
with me, I pointed at them and said, " They are 
very bad." He smiled, and assured me they were 
not by any means so dangerous as those in the 
forks of the trees in the mangrove swamps. 



103 MAHOMET ALEE DOES NOT ATTACK. 



CHAP. IX. 

Mahomet Alee does not attack. — Start Crane shooting. — Day- 
break in Malay ia.— The Adjutant. — The " old Soldier ! "— 
The "old Soldier" fishing. — The "old Soldier " weathers a 
young Sailor. — No Cranes. — Plenty of Monkeys. — Monkeys 
in a Passion. — A sudden Chase of a Prahu. — Birds'-Nests and 
Pulo Bras Manna. — The edible-nest-building Swallow, Hi- 
rundo esculenta ; Food ; Habits. — Decide upon seeing the 
Nests collected. — Difficulties in the way of doing so. — Jam- 
boo enjoying Company's pay. — Jamboo remonstrates. — A 
scramble for Birds'-Nests. — The Malays descend the Face of 
the Cliff. — The Home of the edible-nest-building Swallow. 
— The Birds'-Nest Trade. — The Nests composed of Ge- 
latin. 

The chase by night was followed by no general 
attack from the piratical fleet, and we surmised that 
the scouts, having found us on the " qui vive" had 
reported unfavourably of the probability of sur- 
prising the blockading squadron, — a surmise which 
the inhabitants of the neighbouring village after- 
wards confirmed. 

One middle watch in January, the look-out man 
awoke me, and told me my sampan and gun were 
ready as I had desired. 



START CRANE-SHOOTING. 109 

I could hardly conceive it possible to feel so cold 
and cheerless at the short distance of 200 miles 
from the equator as I then did. The mist of the 
early night had fallen in the shape of dew, wetting 
the decks and awnings as if it had been raining 
heavily ; and a light breeze blowing down from the 
Patani Hills struck a chill into my bones, already 
stiffened by sleeping upon a hard and damp deck. 

Day had as yet hardly dawned, but I was anxious 
to try and get a shot at some flocks of elegant white 
cranes of a small size which nightly roosted on a 
clump of trees about a mile distant from my 
anchorage ; and my only chance of being able to get 
sufficiently near, was to be there before they flew 
off to their feeding-grounds. Half lamenting I had 
troubled myself with any such sporting mania, yet 
unwilling to let the Malay see what a lazy individual 
his captain was, I threw myself into the canoe, 
grasped the paddle, and by a stroke or two awoke 
to the interest of the spot before me, and the beau- 
ties of a morning in Malaya. 

The day dawn had already chased the stars away 
from one half the bright heaven overhead ; the insect 
world, so noisy from set of sun on the previous day, 
had ceased their shrill note, whilst the gloomy forest 
shook off its sombre hue, and, dripping with dew* 



110 THE ADJUTANT. 

glistened in many a varied tint, as the morning beams 
played upon it, or streamed down through the 
mountain gorges beyond. The Indian Sea laughed 
with a thousand rippling smiles, and the distant 
isles seemed floating on clouds of purple and gold as 
the night mists rose from their level sea-boards, 
and encircled the base of their picturesque peaks. 

One could have cheered with joy and heartfelt 
healthful appreciation of the glorious East ; but no ! 
not far beyond me, on a projecting shoal, stands the 
tall adjutant, who had as yet baffled all our attempts 
to shoot him — a very king of fishing-birds. He 
formerly used to fish in the Parlis river, but our 
seamen in the cutter, who would brook no competi- 
tors in their poaching pursuits, fired and fired at the 
poor adjutant without hitting it, until, by way of re- 
venge, they nicknamed it the "old soldier" — a term 
which in their estimation comprised all that was wary, 
and difficult to catch at a disadvantage. " The old 
soldier " loomed like a giant in the grey mist flowing 
from the forest, and he evidently saw me as soon as 
I did him ; but knowing from experience the distance 
to which his enemies might be allowed to approach 
with safety, he strutted out a pace or two into 
deeper mud or water and pursued his fishing. I, 
however, did not intend to fire until I reached the 



THE "OLD SOLDIER" FISHING. Ill 

crane?, which I could see clustering in some trees 
ahead ; and the adjutant, as if fathoming my inten- 
tions, or, what is more likely, taking me for a Malay 
(who never disturbed him), let me pass within mo- 
derate shot distance. 

I was interested in seeing how he captured his 
prey, and watched him narrowly. The bird stood 
like a statue, in a foot of water and mud, the long 
legs admirably supporting the comparatively small 
body, a long neck, and such a bill ! It looked as 
if it could cut a man in two and swallow him. Pre- 
sently, from a perfect state of quietude, the adjutant 
was all animation, the head moving rapidly about as 
if watching its unconscious prey ; a rapid stride 
or two into a deep gully of water, a dive with the 
prodigious beak, and then the adjutant held in the 
air what looked like a moderate-sized conger-eel. 
Poor fish ! it made a noble fight ; but what chance 
had it against an " old soldier " who stood ten feet 
without stockings, and rejoiced in a bill as big as 
one's thigh and some four feet long? The last I 
saw of the poor conger-eel was a lively kick in 
the air, as " the soldier " lifted his beak and shook 
his breakfast down. 

My resolution to shoot cranes alone was not proof 
against the temptation. I saw before me, not only 



112 "OLD SOLDIER" V. YOUNG SAILOR. 

a thumping bird, but — alas ! for the frailty of a mid- 
shipman's appetite! — a jolly good breakfast in the 
contents of his maw. A more convincing proof of 
my not being a thorough-bred sportsman could not 
be adduced, than my allowing such base feelings to 
actuate me. I stealthily laid my paddle into the 
boat, capped my fowling-piece before lifting it from 
between my feet ; but the " old soldier " had his eye 
upon me, and directly I stopped paddling, com- 
menced to walk away from his old position. By the 
time I took aim, a long range intervened between us, 
and, of course, all I did was to ruffle his feathers, 
and send the " old soldier" off, as usual, at "the 
double," — thus losing adjutant and fish, as well as 
the cranes, which took flight when the echoes of the 
forest carried the report to them. 

My firing had, however, disturbed more than 
cranes ; for a screeching and chattering noise in the 
jungle on my right made me load again rapidly, and 
paddle with all my strength for a nullah or water- 
course, from which these sounds were, I felt certain, 
coming. On obtaining a view of it, I saw at once 
what was the matter — a school of black monkeys 
had been alarmed ; and when I turned my canoe so 
as to go up the narrow creek of water which led 
into the forest, the fighting monkeys of the little 



MONKEYS IN A PASSION. 113 

party seemed determined to frighten me out of it. 
I never saw anything so comical : the ladies and 
babies retired, whilst about a dozen large monkeys, 
perfectly black except their faces — which were grey 
or white, giving them the appearance of so many 
old men — sprang along the branches, that reached 
across over my head. They worked themselves up 
into a perfect fury, shrieking, leaping, and grinning 
with rage. Once or twice they swung so close over 
my head, that I expected they were going to touch 
me ; but, amused beyond measure, I was determined 
not to fire at the poor creatures. Whether, as in the 
case of the " old soldier," my resolution was proof 
against all temptation, I had not time to prove ; 
for the sullen boom of a gun from Parlis river 
rolled along the forest ; and being the signal for an 
enemy in sight to seaward, I left the monkeys for 
a future day, and hurried back to my vessel, just 
reaching her in time to start in chase of a prahu that 
had been seen running for an island called Pulo Bras 
Manna. The breeze sprang up fresh and fair, and 
my little vessel soon rattled over the eight miles of 
distance which intervened, but not before the prahu 
had disappeared behind the island. Skirting the 
rocky shores of Pulo Bras Manna, we discovered the 
prahu at anchor in a pretty little sandy bay, the only 

I 



114 EDIBLE BIIIDS'-NESTS. 

one in the island. The nicodar, or master of the 
prahu, hailed to say he was a friend; and, on my 
getting alongside of him, showed proofs of her being 
a peaceful trader, employed in collecting the edible 
birds'-nests constructed by the " Hirundo esculenta?' 
of naturalists, with which all these islands abound. 
I was right glad to have an opportunity of gleaning 
any information about an article of commerce so 
novel and strange to all Europeans. The nicodar 
informed me that all the adjacent islands yielded 
birds'-nests for the Chinese market in a greater or 
less degree, the more rocky and precipitous islands 
yielding the larger quantity. The right of taking 
them was for the time vested in Tonkoo Maho- 
met Said of Quedah, on behalf of his sovereign ; 
but he had farmed them out for a year to some 
Penang merchant, who paid a certain rent, and 
screwed as much more as he could out of the birds'- 
nests. The nicodar of the prahu had entered into a 
speculation by which he promised a certain number 
of nests to the merchant, provided he might have the 
surplus — an engagement which he assured me would 
this year be a very losing one. 

My attention had often been previously called to 
the little birds which construct these curious nests. 
They might be constantly seen skimming about the 



EDIBLE-NEST-BUILDING SWALLOW. 115 

surface of the sea in the neighbourhood of the Ma- 
layan Islands. In form and feather they looked like 
a connecting link between the common swallow and 
the smallest of the petrel tribe — the Mother Carey's 
chicken — -ever restless, ever in motion. Sometimes 
they appeared to skim the water as if taking up 
some substance with the bill from the surface ; at 
other times darting, turning, and twisting in the air, 
as if after fleet-winged insects. Yet neither in the 
air nor on the water could the keenest eye amongst us 
detect anything upon which they really fed. How- 
ever, the Malays asserted that they fed upon insects 
and upon minute creatures floating upon the surface 
of the sea; and that, by some arrangement of the 
digestive organs, the bird, from its bill, produced 
the glutinous and clear-looking substance of which 
its nest was constructed — an opinion in some manner 
substantiated by the appearance of the nests, which 
in structure resembled long filaments of very fine 
vermicelli, coiled one part over the other, without 
much regularity, and glued together by transverse 
rows of the same material. 

In form, the edible nests resemble the bowl of a 
large gravy-spoon split in half longitudinally, and 
are, in all respects, much smaller than the common 
swallow's nest. The bird fixes the straight ed°-e 

I 2 



116 HABITS OF THE "HIRUNDO ESCULENTA." 

against the rocks, generally preferring some dark 
and shady crevice in a cliff, or a cave formed by the 
wash of the waves of the sea. I am rather inclined 
to believe that the swallow which constructs these 
edible nests is a night bird, and that the day is by 
no means its usual time for feeding ; indeed, I hardly 
ever remember observing them, except early in the 
morning, late in the evening, or in the deep shadow 
afforded by some tall and overhanging cliff, and they 
appeared to avoid sunlight or the broad glare of 
day. 

Although the nicodar of the prahu was necessarily 
very civil, he did not willingly assent to my proposal 
to accompany his men on their excursion to collect 
nests ; but Jadee recommended me to wait quietly 
until we saw his party starting, and then to proceed 
and join them, nolens volens ; though he warned me 
that curiosity would hardly induce me to undergo, 
a second time, the risk the nest-gatherers went 
through for large profits. 

In a couple of hours' time we saw a party land 
from the prahu and join some half-dozen Malays 
who lived in a hut on the beach. Awakening my 
interpreter, Jamboo, who being upon Company's pay 
gave way to sleeping and rice-eating with a degree 
of perseverance which astonished me, I hastened 



JAMDOO REMONSTRATES. 117 

uway with him, and before his eyes were well open 
we were scrambling through brake and jungle, at a 
headlong pace, the Malays having evidently deter- 
mined to shake us off by hard walking. The conse- 
quence was that poor Jamboo, with a howl, went 
rolling over the rocks, and tried hard to detain me. 
I saw only one remedy, and started off to catch the 
nearest party of nest-gatherers, and keep them until 
my worthy interpreter was able to join. I soon suc- 
ceeded in showing them that a young sailor's legs 
were as good as theirs ; and having a pistol with me, 
there was no difficulty in making two Malays sit 
down until Jamboo, in reply to my repeated hail, 
came up, muttering at the hardships his duty as 
a midshipman's interpreter was ever leading him into. 
Laughingly consoling him by the strong doubts I 
entertained of his ever again seeing his dear Penang, 
I added : " Now, then, Jamboo, tell these fellows we 
are going birds'-nesting with them." 

" By Gad, sar ! you kill me, sar ! Me poor man, 
sar ! What my mother do?" remonstrated poor 
Jamboo. 

" Never mind about the old lady," I replied ; "do 
what I tell you, and come along. — Why, Jamboo, you, 
the son of an Englishman, and not ashamed to talk 
in that strain!" I continued; "fancy if your father 

i 3 



118 A SCRAMBLE FOR BIRDS'-NESTS. 

could only see you, and hear that his son was afraid 
of going birds'-nesting ! " 

" Ah, sar !" replied Jamboo, " you only make play 
now. My father very brave man — so my mother 
say ; but I never see him ; and my mother never 
teach me to go down dark holes with a little bit of 
rope, and swing about in the air, all the same as 
one bird." 

I had at last to promise Jamboo that he should not 
have to ce swing about in the air, all the same as one 
bird," and thereupon he informed the two Malays 
they w r ere to go on in the execution of their voca- 
tion, but that we would keep with them. 

The Malays had on little if any clothing: each 
man carried a sharp bill hook, with which to cut 
his way through the underwood, with an iron spike 
of considerable length; and a torch made of bark 
and the resins exuded from forest trees. A small 
bag for containing the nests, and a coil of roughly- 
made rope strong enough to support their weight, 
together with a flint and steel, completed the equip- 
ment. 

We climbed a long though steep ascent which 
led to some precipitous cliffs on the opposite side of 
the little island. Our way led through a pretty close 
jungle, with much underwood overgrowing rocks, 



THE MALAYS DESCEND THE CLIFFS. 119 

fissures, and boulders, in all directions : a more 
break-neck walk I had never before undertaken ; and 
as we went straight across country, over and through 
everything, Jamboo's clothes, as well as mine, were 
torn into shreds and decorated every thorn, or ragged 
stump ; to add to the excitement, the Malays kept a 
sharp eye about them in the hollows or where the 
vegetation was very dank, and muttered the ominous 
word " Oular ! " snake, as a warning to us. How- 
ever, I felt that it was out of the question to depend 
upon one's keenness of vision for security against 
such reptiles, when the creepers and grass were up 
to my waist, and sought a little consolation in my 
friend the Haggi's creed of predestination. 

At last we reached the edge of the cliff, which 
stood about 200 feet above the sea, having many 
deep fissures in its face and several caves at its base. 
After sitting down to rest for a short time, the 
Malays went to work. Each man drove his spike 
very carefully in the ground, secured his rope to it, 
slung his bag and torch across his back, and, after 
repeating a Mahometan Pater-noster, lowered him- 
self down the cliff by means of his rope, and pro- 
ceeded to search the caves and crannies for birds'- 
nests. Accustomed though I was, as a sailor, to see 
great activity and much ri^k run, still it fell far short, 

i 4 



120 EDIBLE-NEST-BUILDING SWALLOW. 

in my estimation, of that undergone by these Malays : 
in some places they had to vibrate in the air like a 
pendulum, to gather sufficient momentum to swing 
in under some overhanging portion of the cliff, the 
wretched rope by w T hich the man was suspended a 
hundred feet above the chafing sea and rocks below, 
cutting against the sharp edge of the cliff, to use 
a nautical simile, " like a rope-yarn over a nail." 
Here and there the men picked up a nest or two, but 
at last one of them who had lowered himself down 
to within ten or twelve feet of the water, shouted out 
that he had discovered a cave thickly tenanted with 
the birds, of which we had ocular demonstration by 
the numbers that flew out when they heard his voice. 
Leaving Jamboo to help me, should 1 fail in climb- 
ing up as the Malays did, I slid down to the newly- 
discovered cave of nests. The nest-seekers smiled at 
my curiosity, and pointed into a cave with a narrow 
entrance, out of which a smell was issuing which 
partook neither of frankincense nor myrrh, and of an 
inky darkness which the keenest eye could not pene- 
trate. There was a narrow ledge of rock which led 
into the cave, and on this w T e advanced until out of 
the wind and daylight : the Malay now struck a light 
and lit his torch, and his doing so was the signal for 
the most infernal din mortal ears were ever pained 



THE BIRDS'-NEST TRADE. 121 

with ; the tiny chirp of the swallows being taken up 
and multiplied a thousandfold by the beautiful echoes 
of the cave, whilst huge bats flitted round us, and 
threatened not only to put our light out, but to knock 
us off the narrow ledge on which we stood, by a 
rap on the head, into the black cleft below, which 
seemed to descend to the very foundations of the 
cliffs. Holding both hands to my ears, I asked the 
Malay to show me the nests: he waved his torch about, 
and pointed some of them out in spots overhead, 
where it appeared as if only a gnome could have 
gathered them; the poor Malay, however, explained 
to me that he must go up and cut some saplings and 
branches to form a ladder by which he could reach 
those apparently inaccessible nests, though not, I 
could well see, without considerable risk. Satisfied 
with what I had seen, I returned to the top of 
the cliff aided materially by the Malay, who, like a 
goat, found footing where gulls could only have 
roosted, and, joining Jamboo, we returned alone 
through the forest to my little craft. 

Then and afterwards I gleaned, from different 
sources, that the trade in birds'-nests employed a 
very large amount of capital and men. The loss of 
life arising from accidents and exposure was ex- 
traordinarily large ; but the high prices obtained 



122 THE NESTS COMPOSED OF GELATIN. 

insured no lack of labour. One person largely en- 
gaged in the trade assured me that, on an average, 
two out of five men employed in birds' -nesting met 
with a violent death ; and, under those circum- 
stances, it is not to be wondered at that a catty 
(or pound and a quarter English) of the best nests 
cost generally forty dollars, or about nine pounds 
sterling ! 

The value of the nests depends upon their trans- 
lucent whiteness and freedom from feathers or dirt ; 
the first quality being those which evidently have 
not been lined, or used, by the unfortunate little 
swallows. Such nests are nothing but a morsel of 
pure gelatin ; and having often eaten them in their 
native state, I can vouch for their perfect tasteless- 
ness; indeed, upon one occasion, after being twenty- 
four hours without food, I enjoyed birds'-nests boiled 
down in cocoa-nut milk. 

The Chinese employ them largely, as well as beche 
de mer, shark-fins, and other gelatinous substances, in 
thickening their soups and rich ragouts. 



DATOO MAHOMET ALEE S THREAT. 123 



CHAP. X. 

.Return to Parlis. — Datoo Mahomet Alee's sanguinary Threat. 
— Jadee has, we find, sent an abusive Message. — Jadee 
reproved. — Jadee's feelings are hurt. — Character of my 
Native Crew. — A Page about Native Prejudices. — One of 
the Malays mutinous. — Cure for Native Prejudices. — 
Malayan Jungle-Scenery by Daylight. — Black Monkeys. — 
A Monkey Parody upon Human Life. — English Seamen 
and the Monkeys. — Scarcity of Fresh Water. — The Village 
of Tamelan. — A Malay Chieftainess. — Watering. — Snakes 
disagreeably numerous. — Stories of large Snakes. 

From Pulo Bras Manna and birds'-nests we re- 
turned again to Parlis, just saving daylight enough 
to find our way over the bar and its shallows. On 
reporting myself to the senior officer, I was not a 
little astonished to learn that, in consequence of the 
wanton insult received from me and my gun-boat, Da- 
too Mahomet Alee had sent down an uncivil message, 
declaring the (t Numero Tegas" hors de hi, and had 
sworn by his beard, that so surely as he caught me, 
or any of my crew, from the valiant Jadee to the 
toiling Cam par, no mercy would be shown. Quite 
at a loss to understand the origin of so sanguinary a 



124 JADEE SENDS AN ABUSIVE MESSAGE. 

threat — for I and Haggi Loang had parted the best 
of friends — I guessed that Jadee had been at some 
nefarious tricks. At first he pretended to suppose 
that the wrath of the pirate arose from my destruc- 
tion of his stockades ; but this I felt sure was not 
the sole offence, and at last he acknowledged that 
the Polyphemus who steered the canoe had jeered 
at him, and insinuated that it was unbecoming for 
Malay men to be commanded by a white boy, al- 
luding to myself. To which Jadee had replied 
by stating, it was his opinion that the mother of 
not only the one-eyed gentleman, but those of the 
gentry up the river in general, were no better than 
they should be, — that their fathers were dogs, and 
their chiefs pigs ! and the sooner they all came down 
to try the strength of the Company's powder, the 
better pleased he should be. I saw at once what 
had excited Datoo Mahomet Alee's ire, and that he no 
doubt identified me with Jadee. All my efforts to 
point out to my worthy coxswain the impropriety of 
his conduct failed: he was satisfied with having 
brought about a state of feeling which added mate- 
rially to the excitement of himself and crew ; and 
although, whilst I was speaking to him, he seemed as 
repentant as possible, I saw in a minute afterwards he 
had forgotten my admonition, and would be a Malay 



JADEE RE PROVED. — HIS FEELINGS IIURT. 125 

in spite of me. With any other than an Asiatic, such 
abuse and challenges would have partaken of the cha- 
racter of mere bravado ; but it was not so in Jadee's 
case ; and I had to be careful not to let him think I 
fancied it was so : for on one occasion, when he asked 
me what the Rajah Laut (Captain Warren) would 
think of it, I said I feared he would be very angry, 
and would rather doubt his courage than otherwise. 
Jadee, I saw, was sadly hurt at this, sulked for a 
day or two, and when I quietly got him into conver- 
sation, he said if Captain Warren should really 
express such an opinion, he had but one course, and 
that at any rate would prove he did not fear Mahomet 
Alee and all his crew put together. I knew what he 
meant — to run a muck amongst the pirates, a des- 
perate resource of every Malay when he fancies him- 
self irredeemably injured in character, or when ren- 
dered reckless by misery. Armed with his creese, one 
man will, in such a mood, throw himself upon any 
number of foes or friends, and stab right and left until 
himself shot down or creesed as a mad dog would be. 
With a little kindness, and a gentle introduction 
to my small store of grog, of which Jadee had not a 
Mahometan horror, I gradually brought him round 
to a better frame of mind ; indeed, by the end of 
the second month, I perfectly understood the cha- 



12G CHARACTER OF MY NATIVE CREW. 

racter and disposition of all my crew. Secure in the 
feeling of awe for a white master which the native of 
India and Malayia cannot shake off, I was enabled 
to treat them far more familiarly than I could have 
done English seamen, without subverting the disci- 
pline of a man-of-war. I found them all obedient to 
a degree, so far as I was personally concerned : but 
there were sometimes irregularities arising from Ja- 
dee's imperious treatment of them, or from the feel- 
ing of utter contempt in which they (the seamen) 
held my interpreter, the worthy Jamboo — a feeling 
arising purely, I fancy, from his being an unfortunate 
half-caste, a man of no nation nor blood. 

Whenever these cases did occur, I punished the 
Malays exactly as we were in the habit of doing 
Englishmen ; and although they sometimes stared at 
the novelty, the system answered admirably, notwith- 
standing that the native gentleman in the "Diamond" 
gun-boat assured me it must end in mutiny and 
danger to my person. Like all Asiatics, the Malay, 
if he finds you will listen to what are termed national 
prejudices, will produce an endless store of them, to 
avoid doing anything but what happens to please 
him. He sees a Sepoy soldier encouraged in all 
sorts of prejudices ; he sees a fellow who would 
quiver under your very look, were you alone with 



A TAGE ABOUT NATIVE PREJUDICES. 127 

him in an open field, allowed to be grossly abusive 
and insolent to an English officer, if the latter should 
by accident touch his water-jar, or cross the magic 
circle drawn round his cooking-place, under the plea 
that his Brahmin or Mahometan prejudices, forsooth, 
have been infringed upon; and the Malay, very 
naturally, would like to have some recognised pre- 
judices likewise. 

The one they wished to establish in our little 
squadron was the right of treating the wretched 
half-caste interpreter with contumely. I determined 
to dispute the prejudice; and although the affair 
occurred later in the blockade than the period I am 
now referring to, still I shall relate it now, as illus- 
trative of one of the many misapprehensions people 
labour under with respect to Malays. A prahu had 
escaped me one night, owing to the want of vigilance 
in the look-out men, and I, in consequence, made ar- 
rangements for Jadee, the interpreter, and myself, to 
take the watch in turn, besides stationing a look-out 
man as usual. One night, after Jamboo had re- 
lieved me at twelve o'clock, I lay upon deck, but 
could not sleep, fancying I heard some unusual 
noises in our neighbourhood. Jamboo went forward 
in a quarter of an hour's time, and found the look- 
out man sound asleep. On rousing him, the fellow 



128 OXE OF THE MALAYS MUTINOUS. 

• — a young, smart, but excessively saucy Malay — in- 
stead of thanking him, called him an abusive name. 
I desired Jamboo to give him an extra hour as 
sentry. Shortly afterwards, the Malay was again off 
his post, and again abusive. I got up, and spoke to 
him, assured him of a severe punishment if he per- 
sisted in such conduct and language ; but it was of 
no avail, and, about two o'clock, a, fracas took place, 
in which I heard the Malay apply the foulest epithet 
in his language to the interpreter ; and he persisted 
in repeating it when I ordered him to be silent ; in 
short, he became so violent and threatening, I had 
to iron and lash him down. 

I saw that there would be an end to my authority, 
if the fellow was not punished by a severe flogging ; 

and I sought Mr. B 's authority for carrying it 

into execution. He advised me to see the native 
officer, who commanded the senior gun-boat, in the 
first place, but fully sanctioned a severe punishment. 

Mr. S was very averse to any such thing, and 

wanted to stop the prisoner's rice or his pay. I 
was obstinate, however, and carried my point, al- 
though he warned me of all sorts of fatal conse- 
quences likely to ensue. 

Next day, with all due formalities, I carried the 
law into execution, lashing the culprit to the bow 



CURE FOR NATIVE PREJUDICES. 129 

gun. He could hardly believe his senses ; and when 
the first lash was laid on, shouted for a rescue, and 
appealed to his countrymen not to look on and 
see him beaten like a dog : he altered his tone, 
nevertheless, when he found no rescue likely to come, 
and vowed never to disobey me again — a promise 
he afterwards faithfully kept ; and from that time I 
had no more trouble in " No. 3." with that national 
prejudice, at any rate, and slept just as soundly, and 
placed just as much faith in my swarthy crew, as 
ever I had done, without having any cause to rue it, 
the culprit eventually becoming one of my right hand 
men. 

I had not forgotten the fact that monkeys abounded 
in our neighbourhood; and although both my bro- 
ther-midshipman and myself perpetrated all sorts of 
atrocities at first in shooting the poor creatures, we 
soon desisted, and satisfied ourselves with wasting 
pow T der and shot on less interesting creatures. Mon- 
key Creek, as we termed the place which they most 
frequented, was our usual afternoon lounge ; and 
after our light and necessarily wholesome dinner 
(consisting of Her Majesty's rations adorned with a 
little rice, and occasionally a plate of fish), Bar- 
clay and I did not, of course, feel a siesta by any 
means necessary, but jumping into the sampan, we 

K 



130 INDIAN JUNGLE-SCENERY. 

would paddle gently up Monkey Creek, to enjoy the 
cool shade of the forest and amuse ourselves. Pass- 
ing clear of the belt of mangrove, we soon floated 
amongst the luxuriant vegetation of an Indian 
jungle ; the underwood here and there giving place 
to small patches of grass or weed. Large alligators 
which had been ashore on either bank launched them- 
selves slowly into the creek, or turned round and 
kept a steady watch with their cruel-looking yellow 
eyes. Bright-coloured iguanas and strange-shaped 
lizards shuffled along the banks, or lay on the branches 
of trees, puffing themselves up so as to look like 
nothing earthly; the shrill call of the pea-hen and the 
eternal chattering of monkeys gave life and ani- 
mation to a scene which did not lack interest or 
beauty. Pushing our canoe in amongst the over- 
hanging wild vines and creepers so as to hide her, 
we sat quietly smoking our cigars to await the 
curiosity of the monkeys : it was not long before 
they commenced their gambols or attempts to frighten 
us. A string of black ones, whose glossy coats would 
have vied in beauty with that of a black bear, came 
breaking through the trees with frantic cries, and 
threw themselves across the creek, and back again, 
with amazing energy ; then a hoarse sound made us 
turn suddenly, with a flashing suspicion of Malay 



A MONKEY TAKODY UrON HUMAN LIFE. 131 

treachery, to meet the gaze of a face almost human, 
with a long grey beard, which was earnestly watch- 
ing us through the foliage of a withered tree ; bring 
a gun to the shoulder, and the old man's head would 
be seen to leap away upon the disproportionate body 
of some ape. But nothing could equal in ludicrous 
interest a family monkey-scene taking place in some 
clear spot at the base of a tree. There a respectable 
papa might be seen seated against the roots, stretch- 
ing out his legs, enjoying the luxury of a scratch, 
and overlooking with patriarchal pride, and no small 
degree of watchfulness, the gambols of his son or 
daughter ; while with fond solicitude his better 
half, a graceful female monkey, was employed 
turning aside the tufts of grass, as if seeking nuts 
or berries for the little one ; then she would clutch 
the little rascal, and roll over with him, in all 
the joyousness of a young mother, and he, the tiny 
scamp, shrieked, pouted, and caressed her, like any 
master Johnny or dear Billy would have done. The 
whole scene was a burlesque upon human na- 
ture : unable to contain ourselves any longer, we 
burst into roars of laughter. The father leapt at 
once on a neighbouring branch, and shaking it with 
rage, whoo-whoo'd ! at us through a very spiteful 
set of teeth ; the lady screamed, the baby squealed 

K 2 



132 ENGLISH SEAMEN AND THE MONKEYS. 

and jumped to her breast, clasped its little arms round 
her neck, and its legs round her chest, and then with 
a bound she was off and away with her " tootsy 
pootsy;" papa following, and covering her retreat 
with venomous grins at us, whom he evidently con- 
sidered only a superior breed of apes. 

Such scenes we often witnessed ; and, to the En- 
glishmen in the cutter, the monkeys afforded an 
endless source of mirth ; and the quaint comparisons 
they drew between some of these sylvans in the 
forests of Quedah, and sundry Daddies Brown, or 
Mothers Jones, at Portsmouth or Plymouth, though 
extremely laughable and witty, would, I fancy, have 
been thought far from flattering, had they been heard 
by the old people in question. 

The main difficulty experienced in maintaining a 
close blockade of a coast such as Quedah, arose from 
the want of fresh water with which to supply the 
daily wants of our men. On Crab Island, all the 
wells we dug yielded only salt water; the river was 
always brackish ; and as the dry season advanced, 
the wells upon the islands to which we usually re- 
sorted began to fail us. We were despatched in 
quest of water, and, at the suggestion of one of 
the men, who knew this neighbourhood, proceeded 
to a place called Tamelan. 



THE VILLAGE OF TAMELAN. 133 

This village was about twenty miles distant, and 
situated on a small river called the " Setoue," which 
discharges itself into a very picturesque but shallow 
bay. 

After some difficulty, we discovered the " Setoue," 
and proceeded up it a few miles, and alarmed the 
inhabitants of Tamelan not a little by our sudden 
arrival. The village was prettily situated on a high 
bank, and consisted of about a hundred neatly-built 
mat houses, scattered through a grove of cocoa-nut 
trees, which extended for a mile in a line along the 
Setoue river ; either end of the cocoa-nut grove 
rested on a dense jungle, which swept, with a large 
semicircular curve, behind the village, leaving ample 
clearance for the rice-fields and wells of the inha- 
bitants. Tamelan, strangely enough for a country 
where women are not held in high repute, was under 
the rule of a petty chieftainess, called "Nicodar 
Devi ; " her title of Nicodar arising from her pos- 
sessing the prahus which had carried these Malay 
settlers to the reconquered village. 

We of course gave her brevet rank, and christened 
her Queen Devi; and a perfect little queen she was. 
A messenger immediately waited upon me, offering 
all she had, and trusting we would not molest her 
people. I immediately visited the Malay queen, and 

k 3 



134 A MALAY CHIEFTIANESS. 

soon set her mind at rest by stating that we merely 
wanted water. She sent men to deepen the wells 
ready for the morrow, and, in short, did all that 
was possible to assist me. Nothing could exceed the 
respect and deference paid to this lady by her clan ; 
and we soon learnt to appreciate the kind and hos- 
pitable chieftainess — the first Indian woman I had 
as yet seen treated otherwise than as a drudge or a 
toy. 

She was not more than five-and -thirty, and still 
very good looking ; her manner was extremely lady- 
like and authoritative, and I took good care she 
should be treated with the utmost respect by all my 
people. The inhabitants of Tamelan and Numero 
Tega soon became great friends, and they willingly 
sold us all they could spare of fruit or fowl. 

While my crew filled the water-casks and embarked 
them, I generally employed myself butchering doves, 
wild pigeons, and orange-coloured orioles, which fed 
in large numbers in the open grounds or amongst the 
houses. 

There was only one serious drawback to sporting 
such as mine, and that consisted in the great number of 
snakes which were to be found in the cleared grounds, 
especially in the neighbourhood of the many holes dug 
as wells by the Malays. I fancy the great heats an 



SNAKES. 135 

long droughts had caused these reptiles to congre- 
gate where water was only to be found. The 
Malays killed them in numbers ; I counted on one 
occasion no less than eight of these reptiles lying 
together, all crushed in the head, and although not 
large in girth, they varied in length from five to seven 
feet 

The natives of Tamelan declared most of them to 
be of the boa-constrictor species, not dangerous in 
their bite, but, when large, capable of killing a man 
or a strong deer by enveloping him in their folds : 
they said it was their poultry which principally suf- 
fered, but spoke of monsters in the deep forests, 
which might, if they came out, clear off the whole 
village — a pleasant feat for which Jadee, with a wag 
of his sagacious head, assured me that an " Oular 
Bessar," or big snake, was quite competent. 

It was strange but interesting to find amongst all 
Malays a strong belief in the extraordinary size to 
which the boa-constrictors or Pythons would grow : 
they all maintained, that in the secluded forests of 
Sumatra or Borneo, as well as on some of the smaller 
islands which w T ere not inhabited, these snakes were 
occasionally found of forty or fifty feet in length ; 
and the vice of incredulity not being so strong in 
me then as it is now, I gave full credence to their 

K 4 



136 STORIES OF LARGE SNAKES. 

tales, and consoled myself by remembering, when my 
faith was taxed by some tougher tale than usual, that 
my respected schoolmaster in the village of Chud- 
leigh had birched into me the fact, attested by even a 
Pliny, that a snake 120 feet long had disputed the 
passage of a Roman army on the banks of the Ba- 
grada, and killed numbers of legionaries before its 
skin could be secured to adorn the Capitol. 



JADEE DECLINES TO CLEAN THE COPPER. 137 



CHAP. XL 

Jadee declines to clean the Copper. — A Malay Prejudice. 
— A Malay Mutiny. — The lost Sheep return. — The Dif- 
ficulty surmounted. — Malayan mechanical Skill. — An 
Impromptu Dock. — An Accident, and quick Repairs. — 
Launch, and resume Station. — Loss of my Canoe. — A 
Sampan constructed. — The Malayan Axe or Adze. — In- 
genious mode of applying native Materials in Construction of 
Boats. 

I HAD but one fracas in my gun-boat with my 
Malays, which, considering how young and inexpe- 
rienced I was as a commander, was less than might 
have been expected ; but as it assumed a rather 
serious character at one time, and showed the dispo- 
sition of my men, it may be worth relating. 

I had repeatedly pointed out to the coxswain, 
Jadee, that it was highly necessary, with a view to 
preserving the speed of the " Emerald," that the 
copper with which her bottom was covered should be 
kept as clean as possible, and where it was visible 
that it should shine like that of the "Hyacinth" — a 
vessel I naturally looked upon as my model in every 
nautical respect. 



138 A MALAY PREJUDICE. 

Jadee, however, shirked the question, and the 
copper did not improve. I then ordered him to 
clean it on the morrow, employing the whole crew 
for the purpose. He began a long rigmarole story 
about Malaymen not liking to clean copper. 

I cut him short by saying white men did not 
much like doing it, either ; but it was our principle to 
clean every part of a vessel, and that at 9 o'clock 
in the forenoon on the morrow I expected to see 
that the work had been done. I dined with Barclay 
on board the cutter, and paddled myself back in the 
evening in my canoe, and although Jadee received 
me respectfully, I saw he was sulky : like more 
civilised first-lieutenants, he wanted to have his own 
way ; but I took no notice of that until next morning, 
when at the proper time I looked over the side and 
found the copper still very dirty. I need scarcely 
say I was very angry. 

Jadee caught a thorough good wigging, and said 
something about being afraid of ordering the men to 
do it. I immediately desired him to pipe " Hands 
clean copper ! " He did so. <e Every man in a 
bowling knot and over the side ! " I next directed ; 
and then, seeing that they knew what I wanted 
done, and were at work, I said, in all the Malay I 
could muster, that the copper was to be cleaned 



A MALAY MUTINY. 139 

daily, and pointed out the necessity of a clean 
bottom to catch fast prahus — a truism I could see 
they were perfectly aware of. All hands were soon 
splashing about cleaning the copper, and I fancied 
my difficulties at an end ; addressing Jadee, I told 
him that I had had to do at 9 o'clock what he 
should have commenced at 5 o'clock ; but that 
when the copper was clean, he could call his people 
out of the water, and meantime I was going to shoot 
in my canoe. He bowed silently, as if accepting my 
reproof, and I left the " Emerald." Firing at alli- 
gators and kingfishers, cranes, fishhawks, and wild 
pigeons, I did not return for three or four hours. 
As I was paddling past the cutter, my friend Barclay 
hailed me, to say I had better go and see what had 
happened, as Mr. Jadee and all the crew had just 
passed him, swimming and wading towards the senior 
gun-boat, the " Diamond," but he could not under- 
stand what they said. On reaching the " Emerald," 
I found no one on board of her but the cook and 
Jamboo. The latter was in a great fright, and 
vowed he did not know what would next happen, as 
all the crew »had struck work after cleaning the 
copper, and, with Jadee at their head, had gone to 
the half-caste officer on board the " Diamond " to 
say so. Much amused at the novelty of a man-of- 



140 THE LOST SHEEP RETURN. 

war's crew swimming away from her, I disguised 
my anger, and leaving word with Jamboo to say, 
when they returned, that they should not have 
gone out of the " Emerald " without my permission, 
I proceeded to explain to Barclay all that had 
occurred. 

He of course was very indignant at what with 
Englishmen would have been accounted mutiny. I 
begged him, however, not to be too severe, and to 
give Jadee and his men an opportunity of coming 
round quietly. Leaving me, therefore, on board 
the cutter, he went to the "Diamond," and there 

found Mr. S in a state of great excitement at 

what had taken place, and vowing some direful acci- 
dent would occur to me, if I did not study the native 
character a little more, instead of carrying out my 
orders in so strict a manner. Barclay, however, was 
an excellent clear-headed officer, and he knew I 
was generally considerate to the men ; he there- 
fore desired Mr. S to point out to Jadee that 

he had committed a sad breach of discipline, and 
that so surely as I reported him or others officially, 
for deserting their colours in the face of an enemy, 
he would be put in irons and sent off for Captain 
Warren to adjudicate upon ; and, as an only alter- 
native, the best thing they could do was to hurry 



TIIE DIFFICULTY SURMOUNTED. 141 

back before I discovered that they were absent upon 
anything but amusement. 

Finding his little scheme fail, Jadee, like a wise 
man. yielded at once, swam ashore, crossed Pulo 
Quetam with his men, and went off to the gun- 
boat, resuming their usual avocations as if nothing 
had happened. 

About a couple of hours afterwards I returned 
on board, reprimanded him for going to collect shell- 
fish (a common employment during the day) with- 
out my sanction, and then, raising my voice, said, 
" Clean the copper again to-morrow morning, and 
give me the name of the first man who hesitates to 
doit!" 

Next morning Jadee reported all ready for quarters 
at nine o'clock ; and, with a roguish twinkle in his 
eye, asked if I was satisfied with the copper. I 
found it as bright as a new penny. Through the 
interpreter, I then quietly told the men that I had 
heard some of them did not like cleaning the copper. 
I was sorry for it ; and, in order that they might es- 
cape from it, I should, the very first opportunity I 
had, take to Captain Warren all those that objected. 
The copper soon became so bright that I had to 
check their polishing ardour; and some days after- 
wards I intentionally ran upon a sandbank, and was 



142 MALAYAN MECHANICAL SKILL. 

left high and dry by the ebbing tide, spending the 
whole of a tide cleaning every part of my gun-boat's 
bottom ; and found the crew work as if there never 
had been a difficulty upon the subject, Jadee setting 
the most zealous example. Henceforth the swim of 
Master Jadee became a joke ; and when I saw him 
looking sulky, I used generally to put all smooth 
again by saying, " Don't go swimming again, Jadee ; 
tell me what your reasons are for not liking what I 
have said, and I will give you a white man's reasons 
for desiring it should be done." 

The general skill of the Malays as handicraftsmen 
often struck me ; and they were in nowise inferior 
to our English seamen in that invaluable quality 
of finding expedients in a time of need where none 
appeared to exist — a quality known among sailors 
under the general term nous. No difficulty ever 
arose, in the shape of carpentering, sail-making, 
or seamanship, that I did not find among my thirty 
men some one capable of meeting it, although none 
of them were professed artificers. 

My gun-boat's rudder had become slightly injured 
at the lower part, in crossing the bar during a squally 
dark night, and I determined to construct a tidal 
dock on the mud-bank which ran out from Pulo 
Quetam, and there remedy the defect. 



AN IMPROMPTU DOCK. 143 

Directly I explained to Jadee what I wanted, he 
and a quarter-master said it could easily be done, 
and offered to construct it in such a way that, with 
a little trouble, we could launch into the river off the 
bank at any time of tide. I willingly assented, and 
next day all hands went to work. A spot was chosen 
at low water, and an excavation made, until good 
firm clay was reached ; the shovels and pickaxes 
being for the most part impromptu ones, made by 
the Malays out of the hard wood of the neighbour- 
ing jungle. Small trees were then cut in lengths 
the width of the dock, all the branches neatly lopped 
off, and the trunks were laid across, to form sleepers, 
secured firmly in their places by wooden pegs, driven 
down through them at either end into the clay ; 
these sleepers were carried down in a line reaching 
well into the water when the tide was at its lowest ; 
and then two stringers of squared-out timber were 
laid down longitudinally on the aforesaid sleepers, 
so as to take the gun-boat's bilge, should she incline 
on one side or the other ; and they likewise extended 
from the dock down to dead low-water mark. 

The object of these stringers was to form a way 
upon which the gun-boat might be launched at any 
time into the river without waiting for the tide to 
rise and float her. In six tides everything was as 



144 AN IMPROMPTU DOCK. 

neatly and cleverly finished as if I had had a body 
of English shipwrights. At high water we placed 
the " Emerald " over our dock, which was carefully 
marked out with poles; and as the water fell, 
although it was night time, the vessel was admirably 
squared and shored up : the whole strength of a 
British dockyard could have done no better. 

At low water we repaired the rudder ; and, as 
every movable article had been shifted out of the 
gun-boat, to make her as light as possible, we ad- 
journed under the trees of Pulo Quetam, to eat our 
breakfast, and listen to the various tales of my men, 
of how the natives of the different parts of the archi- 
pelago clock their prahus or secrete them in their 
low and tide-flooded jungles. 

Suddenly the " Hyacinth " hove in sight from 
Parlis, with the signal up, " I wish to commu- 
nicate ; " and Mr. Barclay sent me word that if 
I could get afloat at once I was to do so, as he 
was going off to the ship. I had my doubts; 
for the " Emerald " was built very solidly, and of 
heavy teak ; but Jadee smiled at my doubts, and 
although he acknowledged he had never played the 
prank before, still he felt confident of being able to 
launch her now. 

The plan was to ease her bilge down upon the 



AN ACCIDENT QUICKLY REPAIRED. 145 

longitudinal sleeper on one side, knock away the 
stern shores, and then, aided by the natural inclina- 
tion of the bank, let her slip down to the water, so 
as to float with the first of the flood-tide instead 
of at high water. We secured the masts carefully, 
lashed the stoutest tackles and hawsers half-way 
up them for easing the vessel down, drove two 
stout Sampson-posts into the mud to secure the 
easing-down tackles, and when all was done, the 
shores on one side were cut away, and the strain 
allowed to come on the posts and tackles ; unhappily, 
one of the latter got foul, jerked, and carried away, 
and in a moment my poor craft fell on her side 
with a heavy surge, and, as ill-luck would have it, 
a piece of one of the shores, left accidentally, stove 
a plank very badly between two of the floor- 
timbers. 

There was no time to be lost ; the tide would soon 
make, and if my gun- boat filled, I knew I should, in 
midshipman's phraseology, " catch it." My men set at 
once to work. Jadee and two good hands started off 
to cut wood to repair the damage, whilst I superin" 
tended the wedging-up of the gun-boat, so as to take 
the strain off the injured part, and disengage the 
piece of wood on which the vessel was impaled. By 
the time we were ready, Jadee returned with a piece 

L 



146 LOSS OF MY CANOE. 

of green but hard wood, cut out of a felled tree, and 
this formed an admirable patch. In a short time, the 
" Emerald " was as sound as ever ; and two hours 
after the accident had happened, we resumed our 
station off Parlis. 

Another example of their skilful handling of the 
raw materials the jungle afforded, was in the con- 
struction of a sampan, or native boat. I had lost my 
little canoe ; but on one of the islands called Pulo 
Pangang, or Long Island, good fortune threw in our 
way two long planks, of a wood named p on, about 
two inches thick, and maybe each was thirty feet 
long. Jadee exclaimed immediately, " Ah ! Sutoo 
(the quarter-master) will build you a sampan now, 
Touhan." I gave him full permission to do so, won- 
dering withal how it was to be done, for we had not, 
I knew, a handful of nails in the gun-boat, and our 
stock of carpenter's tools consisted of two native 
axes and an old hammer, which latter article, named 
a toukel4)esee, was, by the bye, always in Jadee's 
hands, for he delighted in noise ; and, when not 
better employed, his pleasure consisted in hammering 
home, for the hundred and fortieth time, all the un- 
fortunate nails in my argosy. 

Next day, the quarter- master (Sutoo) and his two 
assistants landed on Pulo Quetam, with the said tools 



THE MALAYAN AXE OR ADZE. 147 

and the quantity of plank I have mentioned : three 
weeks afterwards, a nice little boat, about twenty- 
two feet long, capable of containing ten persons, and 
pulling four ours, was launched ! The only expense 
or trouble I was put to consisted in the purchase of 
a rupee's worth of damar, a resinous substance 
applied generally in Malay ia to the same purposes 
for which we use pitch and tar. 

The little Malay axe, in the hands of these 
ingenious fellows, had done all the work, and, as a 
tool, it is unique. The handle is about two and a 
half feet long, light and tough, and capable of being 
used in one hand ; moreover, it has a curve in it like 
the handle of an English adze. Over the tool end 
of this handle, a neat rattan grafting is worked in 
such a manner that the haft of the tool may be held 
firmly in its place. This tool is in form very like a 
broad ripping-chisel, except that the blade is not more 
than three and a half inches long. The workman 
uses it as an axe or an adze, as he may wish, by 
simply turning the blade one way or the other in the 
groove of the handle ; and, when necessary, he can 
take it out of the long handle, fit it temporarily into 
any rough piece of wood, and make a chisel. 

No tree is too big, no wood too hard, for this little 
tool in the hands of these dexterous fellows : with it 

iu 2 



148 MODE OF APPLYING NATIVE MATERIALS. 

my men had cut out a keel, stern, and stern-post for 
my sampan, dove-tailed them together, and secured 
them with strong pegs. The planks were then 
bevelled and countersunk into the keel, secured 
there with more wooden pegs, which seemed to do 
as well as nails in their hands; and, by means of 
dowell-pins, the two planks were brought carver 
fashion on each side, one edge on top of the other, 
the interstices filled up w T ith damar and a felt-like 
substance collected from palm trees. 

The boat was still too low on each side to float, 
and as cutting a plank of two inches thick out of 
a tree with an adze would have been a tedious job, I 
was curious to see how that difficulty was to be sur- 
mounted. They did not keep me long in suspense. 
Long bamboo dowell-pins were let into the edge of 
the upper plank by means of a red-hot ramrod which 
was used as an auger. The stems (or, botanically 
speaking, the midribs) of the leaves of a dwarf palm 
were next collected, and driven down longitudinally 
one on top of another on these dowell-pins, until the 
gunwale had been raised to the necessary height, and 
then a neat rattan work secured all down to the 
slight timbers. The thwarts w T ere soon put in, de- 
pendent solely upon the timbers and a light sort of 
stringer of bamboo, which ran round the interior 



MODE OF APPLYING NATIVE MATERIALS. 149 

of the sampan, and served to bind all firmly in a 
longitudinal direction. A primitive species of thole- 
pin was next secured, and then the paddles cut out ; 
and thus the "Emerald junior" was built. On an 
emergency, such a simply constructed craft might 
have carried a crew from Quedah to Singapore ; 
and, at any rate, I hardly think we can say of a 
people capable of exhibiting such skill in the 
adaptation of the crude materials at hand to nautical 
purposes, that they are an unintelligent race or de- 
ficient in mechanical ingenuity ; and that we should 
allow them a higher place amongst Eastern nations 
than the earlier writers seem inclined to yield to 
them. The Portuguese historian, De Barros, for 
example, sums them up as " a vile people, whose 
dwelling was more on the sea than the land." If 
this be a crime in the Malay, I may say there are 
other nations of the present day most certainly to be 
included in the same category, 



c 3 



150 BETURN TO QUEDAH. 



CHAP. XII. 

Keturn to Quedah. — Native Defences. — The "Teda bagoose." 
— Scaring an Ally. — Difficulties which accounted for the 
Delay of the Siamese. — Inchi Laa acknowledges the Effects 
of our Blockade. — Severity towards the Malays. — A Prahu 
full of Fugitives captured. — Intelligence suddenly gained 
of Siamese Army. — Deserters. — The Malay Forces out- 
manoeuvred. — Serious Losses of the Malays. — Inchi Laa. 
Shameful Atrocities of the Malays. — Exchange of Cour- 
tesies. — Permission given for the Women to escape. — Pre- 
parations for Flight. 

About February the 20th, I returned to my old 
station oil Quedah, the two blockading divisions of 
boats changing their posts. The only perceptible 
alteration was the completion of a fascine battery 
we had remarked the Siamese prisoners to be at work 
upon in December, and that a few more guns had 
been placed in defensive positions around the old fort. 
A gingal battery, constructed for overlooking the ap- 
proaches of an enemy, was an interesting specimen of 
Malayan woodcraft and ingenuity. When clearing 
away the jungle to construct the fascine battery, we 
observed that they spared four or five lofty trees 



NATIVE DEFENCES. 151 

which were growing near together ; these trees now 
served as supports to a platform of bamboos, which 
was hoisted up and lashed as high as possible 
in a level position ; all superfluous branches were 
lopped off, and the whole well frapped* together 
with cords, so that the cutting away of one tree 
alone would not endanger the structure. A cross- 
piece, or breastwork, was built upon the platform, 
overlooking the landward side, and then a long and 
ugly swivel-gun was mounted, such as we, in the 
<lays of good Queen Bess, should have styled a demi- 
culverin ; and the whole was lightly thatched over 
to shelter the wardours, a light ladder of twisted 
withies enabling them to communicate with the bat- 
tery below. A more formidable obstacle in the way 
of scouting parties and skirmishers, or to prevent 
a sudden assault, could not, in a closely wooded 
country, have been extemporised. 

Our rigid blockade had evidently pressed sadly 
upon the Quedah folks : they looked big, but were 
low-spirited; the fishermen had ceased to visit their 
weirs ; few canoes were to be seen pulling about off 
the town, and when we inquired where they had all 

* " Frapping " is a term used when two spars, or stout 
ropes, are bound together by a cord which drags them out of 
their natural position or right lines. 

l 4 



152 THE "TEDA BAGOOSE." 

gone, we were informed that the fighting men had 
marched to ravage the Siamese territory. As yet no 
signs of our allies, and in a few weeks' time the dry 
season would be drawing to a close. To be sure, a 
queer-looking brig had joined us, under Siamese 
colours, and commanded by two captains ! the fight- 
ing captain a Siamese, the sailing one a Penang 
half-caste; but the care they took to keep out of gun- 
shot of Quedah fort argued but little for the pluck 
or enterprise of our allies. We gun-boats, unknown 
to Captain Warren, used often to run alongside the 
brig, which rejoiced in at least a dozen guns of dif- 
ferent size and calibre, and try hard to get the 
skippers to move sufficiently close in to draw the 
Malay fire ; but it was no use : the worthy fighting 
captain would only shake his head, and say, " Teda 
bagoose ! teda bagoose ! " or, No good ! no good ! We 
therefore named the brig the " Teda Bagoose," 
a sobriquet which, to say the least of it, was not 
complimentary to His Majesty of Siam. 

The skipper, however, was a man of a forgiving 
disposition, and evidently held me in great respect, 
after I presented him with a gold cap- band in token 
of our alliance ; and he often came to listen to 
Jadee's glowing death's-head and marrow-bone stories 
of what a thorough-bred Malay pirate would do with 






SCARING AN ALLY. 153 

the brig and her crew, if it should be her good for- 
tune to fall into the hands of such gentry. Jadee 
was sore that the Siamese should appear in the 
character of conquerors over his countrymen, and 
evidently took a malicious delight in frightening 
them, when he found we could not hope to draw 
them into a scrape — an amiable amusement in 
which I believe he perfectly succeeded. The brig, 
however, moved off to about half-way to where the 
" Hyacinth " usually anchored, and remained there 
until, one day, in a fit of heroism, they attacked and 
captured a messenger, called Inchi Laa, who used 
to pass, under a flag of truce, from the Malayan 
authorities to Captain Warren; and as they got a 
severe snubbing for doing so, and Jadee playfully 
informed them that our Rajah Laut was not unlikely, 
if they committed similar breaches of etiquette on 
the high seas (which, of course, all belonged to the 
Company), to blow them and their brig out of 
water, she weighed one fine morning, and was not 
again seen until the close of the blockade. 

" Hope deferred maketh the heart sick;" and when 
March came in without any appearance of the army 
of 30,000 Siamese that were on the 1st of December 
to have marched from Siam against Quedah province, 
we began to hold our dark-skinned allies uncommonly 



154 DIFFICULTIES OF THE SIAMESE ARMY. 

cheap as belligerents, whatever they might be in 
other respects. Looking, however, at a map of the 
Malayan peninsula., and taking into consideration the 
wild and, in many places, pathless jungle which covers 
it, it did appear to be an undertaking of some 
magnitude for any Asiatic army, unsupported with all 
the European appurtenances of war, to march from 
Bankok to Quedah, crossing numbers of deep and 
rapid, though short, streams which flow from the 
central mountains to the sea on either side, and by 
which the active and amphibious Malays could always 
threaten their flanks or throw themselves on their 
line of communication. To check this manoeuvre, 
however, was our purpose in blockading the piratical 
squadrons, and, as the result proved, we were per- 
fectly successful. On March 4th, the Secretary to 
Tonkoo Mahomet Said, a Malay gentleman in every 
acceptance of the word, named Inchi Laa, whom I 
have before mentioned, came off from Quedah to 
communicate with Captain Warren. We all ob- 
served an expression of anxiety in the generally calm 
and handsome face of the Inchi; and as he was 
detained some time on board the blockading boats, 
we had an opportunity of asking him a few questions. 
He owned that our rigid blockade of the coast was 
a sad calamity to the Malays; the more so that it 



THE EFFECT OF OUR BLOCKADE. 155 

showed we were determined to support the Siamese 
in their unjust sovereignty of Quedah. We pre- 
vented the Malays, he said, availing themselves of 
the sea and rivers, for carrying out the tactics of a 
race who had no equals upon the water except the 
" Orang-putihs ; " and that, apart from stopping rein- 
forcements and supplies of powder and arms, we 
distressed them sorely from the stoppage of supplies 
of salt, without which they could not live, and all 
of which had to be imported. 

To our queries about the present position of the 
Siamese forces Inchi Laa was more reserved, ex- 
cept that he said, with exultation, that the Siamese 
fled before Tonkoo Mahomet Type-etam, and that 
the latter — a distinguished Malay warrior, whom 
we all knew by ill-repute — had, after severe fight- 
ing, taken and destroyed the town of Sangorah, 
on the shores of the opposite sea. 

Sangorah we knew to be an important town, the 
seat of government in the Malay u- Siamese province 
of Ligor, and the authorities charged with the ad- 
ministration of the tributary Malay states — such as 
Patani, Calantan, and Quedah— usually resided there. 
It did not deserve the sounding term of " the great, 
the beautiful Sangorah ! " applied to it. by an editor 
of a local journal, in the Straits of Malacca; but 



156 SEVERITY TOWARDS THE MALAYS. 

it was, doubtless, a severe loss to the Siamese, and 
likely to raise the whole of the tributary states, in 
the hope of shaking off an allegiance at all times 
irksome. We naturally were disappointed at the 
news, in so far as our hopes of a brush with Quedah 
fort were concerned ; but, somehow or other, one 
could not help feeling admiration for the Malays — a 
people without a nation or dwelling-place — driven 
out of the peninsula by the Siamese and Portuguese 
in days long, long gone by ; persecuted and harassed 
into piracy, by the practice and example of the Spa- 
niard and Dutchman ; and then, in our day, hunted 
down, shot, and hung as felons, unless they would, 
on the instant, eschew evil practices which had been 
bred in their very nature by the rapacity and in- 
justice of European nations. 

The Inchi, however, left us impressed with the 
belief that there was a reservation in what he had 
told us — but what that reservation was, no one could 
guess until the morrow, when the facts came to us 
by mere accident. I had gone off with my gun- 
boat to the "Hyacinth," for the purpose of obtaining 
permission to practise my crew at firing at a target, 
when, from the ship, a prahu was seen to come out 
of the jungle some three or four miles south of Que- 
dah. We were sent after it, and, after a long chase, 



(JAPTUKE OF FUGITIVES. 157 

we caught and brought her to. She was full of women 
and children, packed as close as they could be stowed, 
to the fearful number of forty souls, in a craft of 
about the capacity of an ordinary pinnace. Unable 
to get any coherent account of who they were, owing 
to their fright and their evident desire to mislead us, 
I began to believe Jadee was right in asserting that 
she was a native slaver, and consequently made a 
prisoner of her nicodar, proceeding with him and my 
prize to the " Hyacinth." 

Jadee entered into conversation with my prisoner, 
and after a long harangue, in which I could perfectly 
understand that he was calling upon the man to 
speak the truth, and holding out, as an inducement 
to do so, the possible contingency of being blown 
away from our bow-gun, or hung at a yard-arm, or, 
as the mildest of all punishment, working in chains 
for the term of his natural life. The unfortunate 
nicodar, aghast at such threats, clasped him round 
the legs, and implored him to do anything rather 
than send him back to Quedah. He then briefly 
explained that all the poor creatures in his beat 
were fugitives from the province, on their way to 
Penang, or some other spot under the British flag ; 
that a numerous Siamese army had crossed the 
frontier, and was destroying every man, woman, 



158 INTELLIGENCE OF THE SIAMESE ARMY. 

and child ; and, pointing to long columns of smoke 
which we had been under the impression were 
distant jungle fires, the nicodar assured us they 
were caused by the ravages of our faithful allies, 
as well as by the Malay chieftains, to place a desert 
between the frontier and Quedah fort. 

I hastened on board the " Hyacinth " with what I 
knew would be grateful intelligence to my gallant 
captain, who was labouring under a severe attack of 
fever and ague, contracted in long and arduous ser- 
vice on the West Indian station many years pre- 
viously. The excitement on board the ship was in- 
tense, for they had long been heartily tired of lying 
off a coast at the distance of three or four miles, see- 
ing nothing and hearing little. The mast-heads 
were soon covered with men, who however could see 
nothing but a distant column of smoke rising here 
and there in the calm and hot atmosphere. I was 
desired to take the prahu close in off the fort, so as 
to let the garrison and inhabitants know that we had 
at last ascertained facts, and then to dismiss her 
on her way to Penang. This was done : the poor 
creatures went on their road rejoicing, whilst the 
English musquito squadron cheered heartily on 
learning the intelligence I had to communicate to 
them. 



DESERTERS. 159 

There was considerable excitement among the good 
folks of Quedah, at such an unwonted degree of mer- 
riment upon our part ; and Inchi Laa soon came off, 
under some pretext, but evidently to ascertain " what 
was up." 

We soon told him ; and he calmly replied, as he 
left us, that he thought it must be something far 
more important than the fact of a Siamese army ap- 
proaching, which would make us so joyful. But we 
saw, after he landed, that there was a great com- 
motion in the town; and towards dusk a small canoe 
sneaked out, under the plea of fishing, but eventually 
ran alongside our boats. 

The natives in her said that Mahomet Said had 
ill-treated them, and that they wished to desert from 
Quedah, carrying off their women and children ; we 
did not believe their excuse for u ratting," and there- 
fore detained them for the night, and next day sent 
them off to the ship for a permit. 

During the night we gleaned from them further 
particulars of the state of affairs in the interior ; and 
their tale fully accounted for the sudden arrival of 
the Siamese army. It appeared that, in execution of 
the plan of operations which Haggi Loving, at Par- 
lis, had told us was going to be pursued, the Malays 
organised an army, and sent it under their best sol- 



160 SERIOUS LOSSES OF THE MALAYS. 

dier, Tonkoo Mahomet Type-etam, to attack the 
province of Ligor, and so keep the Siamese acting 
on the defensive. Great success for awhile attended 
the Malays : they swept through the tributary state 
of Patani, gained numbers of adherents, put all of 
the enemy to the sword and eventually, as we al- 
ready knew, captured and sacked Sangorah. 

Meanwhile, a division of the Siamese forces, tan 
thousand strong, under the Rajah of Ligor, threw 
themselves across the Quedah frontier, intercepted 
all Type-etam's communications, cut him off from 
home, and, by forced marches and admirable gene- 
ralship, surprised an important military position 
called " Allegagou ; " stormed two batteries, which 
commanded it, and put to death the entire garrison 
of six hundred Malays. The unfortunate force un- 
der Type-etam, in Sangorah, was thus cut off and 
destroyed in detail; he and a few desperate men 
only escaped by cutting their way through the 
Siamese army, and rejoined their compatriots at 
Quedah. 

Until the capture of Si Allegagou," the Siamese 
army had been without cannon of any sort, either 
field or siege pieces, but there they had succeeded in 
capturing one of the former, besides several others 
fitted for position-guns ; and this, of course, rendered 



INCH I LA A. 161 

them all the more formidable to the Malays. The 
atrocities the Malays accused them of perpetrating 
were truly fearful, and a war of extermination was 
evidently their policy. A panic had consequently 
taken place in Quedah : and not only were the wo- 
men and children of the pirates connected with the 
late inroad anxious to escape, but we learned that 
the Malays who had formerly submitted to the Sia- 
mese rule, and lived in the province until Prince 
Abdullah made his rash attempt to repossess himself 
of it, were now flying before the irritated army of 
His Golden-tufted Majesty.* 

Hardly had we despatched our communicative 
friends to the " Hyacinth," when the emissary, Inchi 
Laa, was again seen coming off. He had ceased to 
be as reserved as of yore, returned very warmly 
our English salutation of shaking hands, and smiled 
with good-natured incredulity at our sanguine hopes 
of soon having possession of Quedah. He assured 
us that every mile the Siamese advanced into the 
disputed territory only rendered their perfect de- 
feat more certain ; and he explained away the loss 
of Allegagou, and the body of men under Tonkoo 
Mahomet Type-etam, by saying that the enemy far 



* 



" Golden- tufted Majesty," one of the many titles of the 
Emperor of Siam. 

M 



162 ATROCITIES OF THE MALAYS. 

outnumbered the Malays, and that the wisdom of 
attacking Sangorah, although it had cost many va- 
luable men, was proved by the long delay of the 
Siamese forces. 

The Inchi was most indignant — and we all cor- 
dially joined him in that feeling — at the fearful 
atrocities which, he told us, had been perpetrated 
by our Siamese allies ; and he swore by Allah no 
Malay man had ever been known to wantonly tor- 
ture women and children, as those devils did. "If," 
said Inchi Laa, " the woman and the child, because 
they are our country people, deserve death — let 
them die ! but, beyond death or slavery, there should 
be no punishment for those who cannot help them- 
selves." An opinion to which we all uttered an 
u Amen." He then craved permission to proceed 
to the " Hyacinth," to make arrangements for the 
departure of a number of defenceless creatures whom 
Mahomet Said wished to send to Penang and Pro- 
vince Welleslev, to save them from the wrath of 
the Siamese. 

We smiled at the cool confidence betokened by 
such a request ; and on asking Inchi Laa " Why he 
thought it probable the English would allow r the 
women and offspring of men declared to be pirates, 
to escape and seek an asylum under the very flag 



EXCHANGE OF COURTESIES. 163 

they had abused?" his reply was characteristic: 
"Every Malay-man knows, Tuhan, that the white 
men (Orang-putihs) can fight ; but every Malay- 
man knows that they war with men, and not against 
women and children ! " 

We accepted his neatly-turned compliment, politic 
though it might be at such a time, and determined 
not to do aught unworthy of so high a reputation. 
Inchi Laa returned a few hours afterwards, looking 
supremely happy, and delivered to the senior officer 
of the boats, Mr. Barclay, an order to allow all 
unarmed vessels to pass out, provided they only 
carried women and children ; but on no account to 
permit more than just men enough to navigate the 
craft to Penang, and they also to be unarmed. 

In the evening a message came from Tonkoo Ma- 
homet Said, to express his grateful thanks for the 
humanity extended to the defenceless portion of the 
population, and to warn us that they would start at 
midnight ! 

It was too late to remonstrate at the choice of an 
hour which looked very like an attempt to evade 
the necessary search by our boats, so we merely 
gave notice, that all vessels trying to pass would 
be sunk, and that they were to come alongside, to 

m 2 



164 PREPARATIONS FOR FLIGHT. 

enable us to assure ourselves of no breach In the 
agreement. 

For several days past we had observed that great 
numbers of canoes, small prahus, and native craft 
had accumulated along the face of the unfortunate 
town. These, doubtless, had been driven down from 
the upper part of the river by the progress of the 
enemy. As the day advanced, the signs of an ap- 
proaching exodus gave us some cause for anxiety 
lest, under the plea of a flight, a large body of men 
should be brought down to board the two gun-boats 
and cutter — which was all the force we had. We 
therefore took every precaution : cleared for action ; 
loaded our guns; placed one gun for sweeping the 
deck with musket-balls, and the other to command 
the narrow gap through the stockade, by which, 
whether as fugitives or foes, the pirates must come 
out. Sunset and the brief twilight of an Asiatic 
evening soon passed into a calm but very dark 
night, adding still more to the difficulties of our 
position ; and the obscurity, for a while, was so little 
broken by unusual appearances, that we began to 
fancy the Malays had postponed their flight. 



THE LULL BEFORE THE STORM. 165 



CHAP. XIII. 

The Lull before the Storm. — The Exodus. — A Scene of 
Confusion and Distress. — The Malay Chieftain's Wife. — 
Baju-Mira. — The Convoy. — An extraordinary Appeal. — 
Midwifery simplified. — A Night-scene. — A Midshipman's 
Emotions. — A Malayan Houri. — Resign my Charge and 
return. — An Attempt to enslave the Fugitives. 

The flood-tide continued to flow into the Quedah 
river until about ten o'clock, and beyond the hum of 
voices from the town, and the melancholy wailing 
noise made by the sentries in "calling their posts" — 
there was not until top of high water anything to 
denote the scene of activity which so soon ensued. 
But just after the ebb-tide commenced to run out, at 
eleven o'clock, the whole population of fort and 
town rose as if it were one man. The hoarse 
shouts of men, the shrill cries of womankind, and the 
bleating of goats, with many a shrill crow from the 
everlasting game cocks, betokened some unusual com- 
motion. Torches in great numbers soon threw their 
glare of light over a perfect multitude on the banks 

M 3 



166 THE EXODUS. 

of the stream beyond the fort, and evidently em- 
barking for the projected flight. 

The splash of oars and paddles was next heard, 
and then a perfect debacle took place, for out of 
the narrow opening of the stockade, where the pent- 
up tide caused the stream to shoot through like a 
rapid, flowed out upon us prahus of all sizes, ca- 
noes, topes, and even rafts, laden as heavily as they 
could be with human beings. 

It was indeed a wild and wretched scene, strange 
and exciting though it might be to us. The torches 
carried in some of the canoes threw a vivid light 
over the black river and jungle, and brought out 
in strong relief the groups of excited men and 
women. "Anchor! anchor! " we shouted, "or we 
must fire." " Mercy ! mercy ! " shrieked the women 
and old grey-bearded men. The nicodars yelled out 
orders, invoking all the saints of Islam. Babies 
struck in with their shrill piccolos, and the wifeless, 
womanless garrison left in Quedah seemed deter- 
mined to show what good heart they were still in, by 
the wild, yet not unmusical cry of " Jagga, jag-gaa !" 
or, " Watch there ! watch !" We, the blockaders, got 
under weigh, and slashed to and fro across the en- 
trance of the stream, firing an occasional blank cart- 
ridge at some craft that tried to escape being searched, 



SCENE OF CONFUSION AND DISTRESS. 167 

haying perhaps on board more than the proper com- 
plement of men, or, as in one case, because some 
notorious pirate who had rendered himself amenable 
to our laws, was desirous of escaping an interview 
with a petty jury and a British recorder at Penang. 

By four o'clock in the morning the exodus was 
over, and we lay at anchor with a black mass of native 
vessels of every size and shape around us : many of 
the canoes threatening to sink alongside, we were 
forced to take the unfortunates upon our decks, add- 
ing still more to the scene of confusion. My boat's 
crew, bloodthirsty Malays though they were, employed 
themselves from midnight to day-dawn boiling and 
serving out rice to the half-starved women and 
children. 

The sun rose upon the strange scene, just as all 
were falling to rest from an anxious and sleepless 
night. On counting the fugitive vessels we found one 
junk, one tope, five large prahus, and one hundred and 
fifteen smaller craft, the whole of them containing pro- 
bably three thousand souls, of which two-thirds were 
women and the remainder made up of children, old 
decrepit men, and a few adult Malays, to convoy the 
whole and navigate the different vessels to a place of 
safety. Two births took place during this sad night of 
confusion. 

M 4 



168 THE MALAY CHIEFTAIN'S WIFE. 

During the day we were employed thinning out the 
people embarked in some of the most unsafe canoes. 
We searched and discovered some secreted arms, and 
forced several men (where we found their numbers 
more than sufficient) to land and take their chance, 
instead of endangering the lives of the women and 
children. In the junk, independent of a mob of 
women and children of every shade and class, we 
discovered the wife and family of Tonkoo Mahomet 
Said. He had evidently been afraid to avow his 
intention of sending them, and merely trusted to 
the promise that had been given to respect all women 
and children. The Tonkoo was not disappointed; 
and Captain Warren ordered me to embark the 
chieftainess and family, and convoy them, as well as 
the junk and larger prahus, to Penang, not only to 
ensure them against shipwreck, but to guard against 
the dashing enterprise of His Siamese Majesty's 
brig, the " Teda Bagoose," which to our sorrow made 
her appearance off Quedah just at this juncture. 
She had ascertained that the Malay boats only con- 
tained women and children, and her captain was, to 
use our English seamen's phrase, " full of fight." 

Towards evening a fine fair wind sprang up off the 
land, and we prepared to start. I placed two trust- 
worthy men on board each of the junks, and in two 



THE MALAY CHIEFTAIN'S WIFE. 169 

of the largest prahus, and receiving on board Mahomet 
Said's family, we all weighed and made sail just at 
dark, the canoes, rafts, and other frail craft proceeding 
close along the jungle's edge. 

The largest junk sailed so badly that I had to take 
her in tow; and the breeze freshened so much as to 
make me feel very anxious for all my deeply-laden 
convoy, and so far as a youth of seventeen can feel 
the responsibility of his position, I think I did mine. 

The chieftainess was a slight graceful-looking 
woman, almost as fair as a Spaniard, with a very 
sweet expression of countenance, though it was not 
youthful, and bore deep traces of care stamped upon 
it. She was neatly clad in shawl-pattern materials. 
Her family consisted of a lovely girl, of perhaps 
twelve years old, and two babies in arms, attended 
by a nurse. Midshipmen are a susceptible race, and 
I was no exception to the rule. I felt as an embryo 
Nelson should do — a perfect knight errant, and I, in 
quest of a lady-love, had, by a freak of good fortune, 
lighted on a pirate's beautiful daughter : the whole 
thing was delightful, and I should like to have seen 
" John Company" dare to touch a hair of the head 
of Baju-Mira while I was by. Poor Baju-Mira, or 
Red-jacket, as I at once christened the object of my 
admiration, in consequence of her wearing the pret- 



170 BAJU-MIRA. 

tiest Indian-shawl jacket that ever was seen, was 
perfectly unconscious of the sudden attachment she 
had awakened in one who, from her frightened fawn- 
like ways, she evidently supposed was only one of 
the ruthless destroyers of the amiable fraternity to 
which her parents belonged. However, that was 
perfectly immaterial to me. I had made up my 
mind to be her slave ; that was enough for any- 
one whose poetry had not been, so to speak, knocked 
out of him by fair Dulcineas. We cleared out 
my cabin, removed all the hatches, put a screen 
across the deck, to give the party as much privacy 
as possible, and indeed did all we could to make 
our passengers at their ease. The lady descended 
into the cabin with her infants and nurse, and Baju- 
Mira had a couch formed upon deck on one side of 
the hatchway, whilst two of the chieftainess's retainers, 
most grim-looking Malays, squatted themselves down 
near at hand, evidently for the purpose of watching 
over the party — an arrangement I willingly assented 
to, though, Heaven knows, nothing could have been 
more kind or respectful to them than all my crew 
were, from Jadee downwards. 

The night was clear and starlit, but the north-east 
monsoon blew fresh, as it often does towards its close ; 
the prahus, which I had ordered to keep close tome, 



AN EXTRAORDINARY APPEAL. 171 

laboured heavily in the sea, and leaked so as to require 
constant baling, the women and children working for 
their lives with a very primitive sort of bucket, made 
from the bark of a species of palm-tree. In the middle 
watch one of the prahus sailed close alongside of us, 
and the men I had put in her hailed to say that 
one of the women was about to bless her lord with 
an addition to the family. I desired the fellows to 
hold their tongues and proceed on their course ; the 
nicodar, or captain of the prahu, would hear of no 
such thing, and begged to be allowed to speak to 
me. 

I lowered our sails, and consented that he should 
jump on board the gun-boat; and in a trice I found 
a Malay clutching me round the legs, and, with tears 
in his eyes, imploring me to go on board the prahu to 
help his wife. I assured the man I was no doctor, 
and could do no good, and desired Jadee to tell him 
as much, for by ill-luck I had left Jamboo on board 
the cutter with Mr. Barclay. My assurances were 
thrown away upon the husband ; I was a white man, 
and must be a doctor. Even Jadee seemed to think it 
purely false modesty upon my part, and argued, from 
my skill in curing slight derangements in the health 
of my crew (thanks to a few pills and some salts 
in the medicine-chest), that a knowledge of surgery 



172 MIDWIFERY SIMPLIFIED. 

in all its branches was the natural inheritance of his 
commander. I never was so puzzled in all my life ; 
and finding escape from their importunities impossible, 
I consented to give the only assistance in my power. 
The husband, delighted, shouted for the prahu to come 
alongside, and I heard him jump on board of her, 
shouting that the white doctor was coming, while I 
went below for my prayer-book. Jadee and I then 
went on board, and after much squeezing reached a 
miserable little cabin, inside which, behind a screen, 
and surrounded by a crowd of women, the poor suf- 
ferer lay. Jadee, fully impressed with the idea that I 
was about to perform some incantation only second 
to his recipe for " killing the wind," looked as solemn 
and nervous as if he expected a demon to be instantly 
raised. My medicine was, however, a very simple 
one: I made Jadee hold a lantern, and desiring all 
around me to be silent, I proceeded to read a few 
prayers from my prayer-book, addressed to Him who is 
the merciful God alike of Malay and white man; and 
then ordering the woman a good cup of tea from my 
little stock, I told the husband that God was great, 
and that, if He pleased, all would be well, and returned 
to my own vessel, leaving those in the prahu evidently 
much impressed with my value as a Bedan. In due 
time, about day-break, one of my scampish crew held 



A NIGHT -SCENE. 173 

up on board the prahu a diminutive reddish-looking 
morsel of humanity, and assured me the lady was 
" as well as could be expected," the wag informing 
me that he recommended the baby to be called after 
our gun-boat, " Numero Tega I " a name almost as 
characteristic as that of the sailor's child, who, to 
insure having a long one — none of your Jems and 
Bills — was christened " Ten Thousand Topsail- 
sheetblocks I " 

It was about three in the morning, just after my first 
essay in the surgical way, and as dawn was breaking, 
that I seated myself on the deck, close aft against the 
taffrail on the lee quarter of my vessel, and, heartily 
tired with six-and-thirty hours' work, dropped into 
a sort of dog-sleep, my head resting on the sheet of 
the mainsail, which was set. My thoughts, however, 
would not sleep, but continued to skip in all the 
odd jumble of a dream over the scenes which had 
been thrust upon me within so short a space of time. 
Inchi Lai came chasing the " Teda Bagoose " with 
thousands of torches ! Baju-Mira creesed me in the 
most approved style of Malay romance ! old Ton- 
koo Said made me read prayers to a whole hareem- 
ful of women in an interesting condition ! and the 
Lords of the Admiralty were busy trying me by a 
court-martial, for having women on board a vessel fly- 



174 A midshipman's emotions. 

ing Her Majesty's pendant ! when a cry on the quar- 
ter-deck suddenly awoke me to the realities of what 
my good- hearted first lieutenant used to call this 
" sublunary vale of tears." I saw poor little Baju- 
Mira standing up and rubbing her eyes, uttering 
that plaintive, subdued cry which children make when 
awakened suddenly from a sound sleep. I fancied 
she had awakened in alarm, and so did the helmsman, 
who was close by me ; but in another moment, as the 
gun-boat bent over to the breeze, she gave another 
sharp sob, and then, to my horror, walked or rather 
sprang overboard ; but happily the mainsail stopped 
her, and as it touched her breast she started on 
one side with a shriek, and awoke as I caught hold 
of her. 

Now would be the moment for a romantic climax, 
but, alas ! there was only a general hubbub. The 
two sleeping Malays on guard, and the mother, 
nurse, and poor weeping Baju-Mira, had to be 
soothed, and to have explained to them that the 
latter had in her sleep nearly walked overboard; 
and to complete the riot, Jadee, who had been 
sleeping forward, rushed aft waving his abomi- 
nable creese, followed by a dozen of his men. When 
Baju-Mira had had a good cry, — don't laugh reader, I 
kept the pocket-handkerchief in which the little Hebe 



A MALAYAN IIOURI. 175 

wept for a long, long time, and only sent it to the 
wash when I was equally bad about an ox-eyed peri 
of Ceylon — the good chieftainess said, "Ah ! Touhan, 
my poor child has seen and suffered enough these 
last few days to make her mad, much more to cause 
her to walk in her sleep ; " and I have no doubt she 
had. Badinage apart, Baju-Mira was lovely enough 
to have touched a tougher heart than mine: at her 
age, an Indian girl is just blooming into woman- 
hood, and as lovely and as fresh as a flower can be 
.whose beauty in that fiery clime is but of a day. 
The child, the woman, mother, and old age tread on 
one another's heels, under an equatorial sun, with 
painful rapidity ; perhaps it is on that account that 
the short heyday of an Indian or Malay girl is all 
the more romantic and lovable. Baju-Mira was 
not tall, but beautifully proportioned, and her slight 
waist seemed too small to support her exquisitely 
rounded bust; the neck and head were perfectly 
classical, and betokened Arab rather than Malay 
blood — an intermixture which was all the more 
evident in her oval face and beautiful features. Be- 
sides the usual quantity of petticoats, made in her 
case of very fine Indian shawls or Cashmeres, she had 
an under vest of red silk, fitting tightly to her figure, 
and over this another loose one of the same bright 



176 A MALAYAN HOTJRI. 

and becoming hue, not unlike an Albanian jacket. 

Her 

" ebon locks, 
As glossy as a heron's wing 
Upon the turban of a king," 

were gathered off her face by the edge of a silk tartan 
scarf of native manufact are, which she wrapped round 
her head or person as was necessary ; perfect feet and 
hands, strongly stained with henna, completed the 
picture of the little belle of Quedah ; though I feel 
my attempt to delineate her falls short, far short, o£ 
the pretty trembling dream-like creature. 

At sunrise, Jadee reported to me that one of the 
prahus was missing, and, strangely enough, one of 
those in which, for better security, I had stationed 
two of my own Malays. Desiring all the convoy to 
proceed to a spot called Quala Morbu, or Dove River, 
we altered course for the Bounting Islands, thinking 
the missing vessel might have parted company by 
accident, and gone there in the hope of meeting me. 
After four hours' search I discovered the truant quietly 
at anchor in a secluded cove. The men I had put 
into her did not give a very intelligible reason for 
having parted company, and I therefore removed 
them, and warned the master that martial law would 
be summarily applied if I saw any further attempt 



RESIGN MY CIIARGE AND RETURN. 177 

to evade my surveillance. Hardly had I again 
got my convoy together, and before a fine breeze all 
of us were rapidly nearing Penang, when I met the 
" Diamond" gun-boat, and in obedience to the orders 
I had received, handed over my charge to her, 
parting from the chieftainess and my angelic Baju- 
Mira with mutual expressions of kindness and good- 
will. 

The "Emerald," taut on a wind, began to make 
the best of her way back again, and after I had had 
a good rest, Jadee came to tell me that my two men 
(in the prahu which had parted company during the 
night, and given me so much trouble) had come aft 
to make a confession and beg forgiveness. It ap- 
peared that the nicodar, and three natives left in 
the prahu to navigate her, had during the night 
pointed out to my men an easy mode of realising 
a large sum of money, and escaping the drudgery 
of their present life: it was simply to give me 
the slip, and carry the prahu, with its freight of 
women and children, to the coast of Sumatra, where 
they might be sold at highly remunerative prices! 
My men, it appears, were afraid to accede at once 
to the proposal, but I fear they expressed a willing- 
ness to share in the profits and risk if the ni- 
codar could succeed in shaking off the society of the 

N 



178 ATTEMPT TO ENSLAVE FUGITIVES. 

gun-boat. I had, however, stopped their cruise by 
seeking them amongst the " Bountings." I must say 
I was very angry at my Malays for not giving me 
information of the treachery of the nicodar in time to 
have handed over that worthy to the mercy of the Sia- 
mese brig " Teda Bagoose," whose gallant captains 
were like raging lions at the escape of all the fugitives: 
but for the men themselves, I merely tried to point 
out the villany of selling poor creatures into slavery 
who were going under their escort to what they sup- 
posed a place of safety. They, however, were rather 
obtuse upon this point, and evidently looked upon 
the women and children as merely amounting to a 
certain total, at from forty to fifty dollars a head, and 
only sent into the world to minister to man's plea- 
sures, or to be sold for his especial benefit. 



MALAY SLAVE TRADE. 179 



CHAP. XIV. 

Malay Slave Trade fostered by the Dutch. — Brutal System 
pursued by the Portuguese. — Slavery doubtless founded by 
the Mahometans. — Retribution has overtaken the Portuguese. 
— An enlightened Policy most likely to eradicate Slavery 
and Piracy. — Close Blockade. — The Call of the Siamese 
Sentries. — The Call of the Malay Sentries. — Deaths from 
Want of Water. — Kling Cruelty. — The Trial and Verdict, 
and Punishment. — Siamese Tortures. — Novel Mode of 
impaling a Rebel. — Extraordinary Palm-spears. — Remarks 
upon Native Governments. 

There can be no doubt that slavery and the slave 
trade exist to a very serious extent throughout the 
Malayan archipelago : it is carried on in a petty way, 
but still with all the miseries of the middle passage. 
The great mart for the disposal of the slaves is the 
pepper plantations of Sumatra, which are in the 
hands of the natives, although the Dutch claim a 
sovereignty over them; and the native and Dutch 
planters on the coast of Borneo readily take the 
slaves off the hands of the Malay slave-catcher, and 
work them to death in the plantations and gold or 

N 2 



180 SLATE TRADE FOSTERED BY THE DUTCH. 

antimony mines of those countries. The Dutch 
say they discountenance the slave trade; they do 
so, however, merely in outward show. The first law 
they lay down for their Eastern subjects is, implicit 
submission to their cold-blooded system of political 
and commercial monopoly ; the next thing is, the 
Lowland motto of " Mak' money; honestly if you 
can, but mak' money ; " and I was told by both 
English and French captains of merchantmen em- 
ployed collecting cargoes of pepper, that boats full 
of slaves used to arrive as constantly for sale at the 
different places they had visited on the Sumatran 
coast, as they formerly did in Rio de Janeiro har- 
bour or the Havannah. We can understand, under 
such circumstances, what a harvest the slave-trader 
would reap in a province like Quedah, where the 
unhappy inhabitants were placed with the alternative 
of being impaled as rebels by Siamese, on the one 
hand, or hanged as pirates by Europeans, upon the 
other. To sell themselves, or fly for life and limb 
to the nicodar of a prahu, who would carry them 
elsewhere, and dispose of them for so much a head, 
was merely, in such a case, a happy alternative ; and 
in this, as in much else connected with the habits of 
the unfortunate Malay, we have incurred no small 
amount of responsibility, 



SYSTEM TURSUED BY PORTUGUESE. 181 

Much, however, as the Dutch are to blame for 
their present spirit of aggression and selfish monopoly, 
in awakening the reckless spirit of retaliation, tur- 
moil, and disorganisation of the Malays in the Eastern 
Archipelago, it falls far short of their former policy ; 
and it is a question whether they or the Portuguese 
did most for two centuries, by a cold-blooded system 
of cruelty, towards demoralising the unhappy Malays ; 
and assuredly, but for their warlike and nautical 
habits, the race would have been exterminated. 

A history of the system they pursued, I am not 
now purposing to write ; but inasmuch as it bears 
upon the Malay's present character of pirates and 
slave dealers, I may point out that, before European 
ships had as yet entered the Indian ocean, fleets of 
Chinese junks, as well as the un warlike traders of 
Indostan, used to carry on a brisk commercial traffic 
with, and through, the Malayan archipelago, which, 
had piracy been as rife in the thirteenth century as 
it was in the early part of the present one, would 
have been utterly impossible ; and slavery was, we 
know, unknown in Java at that time ; and that is 
the only Malayan state of which authentic historical 
records have been preserved. 

Doubtless with the introduction of the Mahometan 
creed into the Archipelago, slavery became a funda- 

n 3 



182 SLAVERY FOUNDED BY MAHOMET. 

mental institution of the Malays ; but the slavery- 
allowed by Mahomet is of the mildest form, and 
the Koran especially enjoins kindness to the slave. 

But the Pope and Mahomet had a hard race to 
win the souls of the Malays ; indeed, many native 
states only embraced Islamism after the conquest of 
Malacca by the Christians! God save the mark! 
The houris carried the point, maybe, against Pur- 
gatory. Indeed, the important group of islands 
known in the present day as the Celebes only ac- 
cepted Mahomet in 1495, and that was nine years 
after Bartolemo Diaz rounded the Cape of Tem- 
pests, as he honestly styled the southern promontory 
of Africa. The Portuguese treated the Malays as 
infidels; and, as one writer, De Conto, observes of 
them, " they are well made and handsome, but foul 
in their lives, and much addicted to heinous sin ; " 
ergo, the Portuguese robbed, shot down, and con- 
quered them, just as the Spaniards, more success- 
fully, did the Mexican and Peruvian. 

Resistance to this iniquity has, I believe, made 
the Malay what he now is ; and one can only rejoice 
in the decay, and pray for the total annihilation of a 
people who, like the Portuguese, so sadly abused the 
glorious mission the Almighty called upon them to 
fulfil, when to them were first given the keys of 



RETRIBUTION TO THE PORTUGUESE. 183 

the golden East — its docile millions and untold 
riches. 

When an Englishman, in the Straits of Malacca, 
sees a man with European features but dark skinned 
as the natives, wanting in courage, energy, or cha- 
racter — a pariah whom the very Indostanee con- 
temns, — and hears that that man is a Portuguese, he 
recognises the just retribution of an avenging God; 
and on reading such a paragraph as the follow- 
ing, — " All these people (Malays) that have fallen 
into the hands of the Portuguese have been made 
prisoners of war. Every year there is taken of 
them for sale a great number to Malacca."* He 
naturally exclaims, the Malays have had their re- 
venge ! 

One example of the Dutch policy may be quoted, 
and it is no singular instance of their phlegmatic 
cruelty: — John Peterson Koen, their most illustrious 
Governor-General of the Indies, exterminated the 
original inhabitants of the Banda, or Spice Islands, 
and replaced them by slaves. With such examples 
before them, can it be felony in the Malay to imitate 
the boasted civilisation of the white man? The 
piratical acts now committed in the Malayan archi- 

* The Decade, v. book vii. 
n 4 



184 POLICY LIKELY TO ERADICATE SLAVERY. 

pelago are, I firmly believe, the result of the iniquities 
practised upon the inhabitants in the olden day; and 
the Dutch, Spaniards, and English, even at the 
present time, are too prone to shoot down indiscri- 
minately any poor devils who, for the first time in 
their lives, are told, with powder and shot arguments, 
that war, as carried on by them, is piracy by our 
laws. We shall never eradicate by the sword an evil 
which has become the second nature of every Malay 
who is, or who aspires to be, a free man. For three 
centuries the Dutch and Spaniards have been fighting 
with the Hydra which their tyrannical despotism and 
commercial policy are ever fostering ; and our exten- 
sion of a free and enlightened system of government 
through the Straits of Malacca has done more to 
quell piracy and slavery there — by leading the 
naturally mercantile Malay to legitimate sources of 
emolument and occupation — than all the ball-car- 
tridge and grape-shot which have been so ruthlessly 
lavished upon them. 

Of slavery as it exists or existed amongst the 
Malays themselves, though it does not apply, I fear, 
to the poor creatures under Chinese, Dutch, or Spa- 
nish masters, we have the testimony of Mr. Craufurd, 
one of our best authorities. He says : " The distinc- 
tion between the slave and freeman, though it exists 



CLOSE BLOCKADE. 185 

amongst the Malays, is not offensively drawn : the 
slave is not a mere chattel ; he may possess or inherit 
property, purchase his freedom, and has in other 
respects his prescribed rights." 

Many of my crew in the gun-boat had in their 
youth been bought or sold as slaves ; Jadee himself 
had been one, and none of them appeared to think 
much of their sufferings whilst in that condition; — 
but I have dwelt long enough upon this subject, 
and will pass on to my tale. 

After reporting to Captain Warren the fulfilment 
of my task, I again returned to Quedah river, 
and anchored alongside my old friend the cutter. 
The Siamese advanced parties had already closed 
down upon the unlucky fortress, and throughout the 
night a constant fire between the respective outposts 
was kept up. Our friend the "Dove-cot" (described 
at page 151.) was rattling away at everything which 
moved along the edge of the jungle, and now and then 
the heavy boom of a gun, and the crashing sound of 
the grape-shot through the trees, gave testimony to 
the fact that the Siamese had indeed arrived. The 
night-calls of the opposing forces were peculiar, and 
seemed to be used as much for the purpose of 
cheering on their respective parties, as for the purpose 
of showing where they were. 



186 CALL OF THE SIAMESE SENTRIES. 

The Siamese used an instrument like a pair of 
castanets, made, I fancy, of two pieces of bamboo ; 
and admirably it answered its purpose. At certain 
intervals it would be sounded so faintly as to imitate 
some of the thousand insects of the jungle, then a 
long repetition of the same note would die faintly 
away in the distance ; after that came a sharp short 
note, taken up in the same way, followed by a ge- 
neral rattle, as if all the <s gamins" of London were 
playing upon pieces of slate. Hardly had the line 
of Siamese outposts ceased to show they were 
wide awake, when the Malay sentries would begin. 
Their cry consisted of the word " Jagga," each 
man taking up the cry before his comrade to the 
right or left had finished, and then with one long- 
drawn cry the whole of the sentries cried Jag-ga-a-a 
together in a very musical manner; a moment's silence, 
and again a popping commenced at one another, with 
an occasional melee, in which the sharp rattle of the 
Siamese castanets would be heard from right to left, 
showing how perfectly their skirmishers were belea- 
guering the poor fort. Towards day-break all the 
fighting would cease ; and we learnt that the Sia- 
mese light troops always then fell back upon the 
main body, still fifteen miles distant, near Elephant 
Mount. 



SUFFERINGS OF TIIE FUGITIVES. 187 

Every night fresh parties of Malays passed out 
of the river in prahus, and canoes, and topes, which 
had been carefully hidden away in the tide-flooded 
jungle, ready for such an occasion, and to avoid de- 
struction, should we have been called upon to make an 
attack by sea. The sufferings of these fugitives were 
truly harrowing; many of them had come down from 
distant parts of the peninsula, flying before the wrath 
of the Siamese, and finding but little sympathy 
from the Quedah Malays. Starved and wayworn, 
having lived for sad periods in constant dread of death 
and slavery, their appearance and the stories they told, 
realised a picture of such utter misery, that one almost 
wondered how life could be sweet enough to them to 
make it worth their while to flee onwards. Penang 
and Province Wellesley were however their Goshen, 
and all we could do for the poor creatures was to wish 
them God speed. One day, amongst the fugitive 
vessels, a large tope came out densely crowded with 
men, women, and children, of different nations: there 
were Chinese, Indostanees, and Malays; and the 
men were mostly shop-keepers and vagrants who 
followed on the heels of the Malayan pirates to 
buy and sell. Some delay naturally arose in ascer- 
taining that there were no known pirates amongst 
them, and next morning we were shocked to learn, 



188 KLING CRUELTY. 

on inquiring how all were on board of her, that 
several children and two women had died during the 
night from want of water! — a want not onlv we in 
the boats suffered from to some extent, but which we 
found to be very general with the people of Quedah; 
for the long-continued droughts had dried up all the 
wells, and obliged them to depend alone upon the 
river — a precarious means of supply now that the 
Siamese were at hand, and fired on all the watering 
parties. Going on board to relieve the sufferings of 
the unfortunate women, so far as our small stock of 
water would admit, we were informed by a Malay 
that there were two private jars of water in the 
(i tope," and after some search we discovered two fat 
Bengalee merchants, or rather Klines* — a race who 
live on the seaboard of the Madras Presidency, and 
form a large portion of the Straits population — actu- 



* Mr. Craufurd, in his valuable work upon the Archipelago, 
says Kling is a Malay term given to the natives of the Telinga 
nation, in Southern India. The trade and intercourse of the 
Telingas with the Archipelago is of great but unascertained 
antiquity, and still goes on. Many have settled in Malayia, 
and their mixed descendants are tolerably numerous. In 
the beginning of the sixteenth century, the Portuguese speak 
of them as carrying on trade at Malacca ; and Barbosa de- 
scribes them as " wealthy merchants of Coromandel, who 
traded in large ships." 



TRIAL AND VERDICT. — PUNISHMENT. 189 

ally seated upon water-jars, and refusing to share 
it amongst the dying creatures at their feet. They 
had been Ions: enough anions: Englishmen to know 
that we should not approve of their conduct, and had 
artfully arranged their robes and personal property 
so as to aid in concealing the water. 

I hardly know who was most indignant amongst 
us at this discovery ; but Barclay and I held a drum- 
head court-martial upon the two brutes, and decided, 
coute qui coute, to give the black villains a lesson in 
humanity. TY~e declared them guilty, and passed 
sentence of death, to be commuted for personal 
correction. The two culprits turned perfectly livid 
with fear ; for Jadee, as usual, had his creese at 
hand, and a great big-boned coxswain of the cutter 
tucked up his sleeves, and requested permission to, 
what he called, " polish them off." 

Barclay and I, however, did not want to figure in 
the Penang courts of law, and decided therefore on 
applying a correction to the Indian merchants where 
no bones would be broken, and where they would be 
very unwilling to produce proofs in open court of our 
illegal proceedings. Keeping our countenances like 
a pair of Solons, we had administered to them four 
dozen strokes with a piece of flat wood like a sleeve- 



190 SIAMESE TORTURES. 

board, to the extreme delight of all our seamen, and 
the astonishment of the fugitives, who had resigned 
themselves to the idea that the Klings were merely 
men of strong religious principles, who would not 
share their water with heretics. 

Inchi Laa paid us a long visit one evening, and, 
unsought by us, proceeded to detail fearful stories of 
the cruelties exercised by the Siamese. At the time, 
I gave him credit for magnifying facts ; but from other 
sources, such as Jamboo 3 who knew a good deal of the 
Siamese habits, and a Malay man in my crew, who 
had served in a Siamese naval force equipped at 
Bankok, I heard sufficient to verify some of the 
horrid atrocities committed. Many of their cruelties 
will not bear repetition ; but two refined modes of 
torture I will venture to describe ; and the Inchi 
assured me that some of their unhappy countrymen 
and women had been subjected to them. 

One was cooking a human being alive : a hollow 
tree, either naturally so, or scooped out by manual 
labour, was left with merely its bare stem standing ; 
into it a prisoner was put naked, his hands tied be- 
hind his back, and a large piece of fat lashed on his 
head ; the tree was then carefully coated with an unc- 
tuous mud, to prevent its ignition, or, if it did ignite, 



MODE OF IMPALING A REBEL. 191 

that it might merely smoulder, and then a slow steady 
fire was maintained round it, the unfortunate victim's 
sufferings being by these means terribly prolonged, 
his shrieks and exclamations being responded to by 
the exultant shouts of his executioners. 

Another torture was that of carrying the pirate 
or rebel down to the banks of a river where a peculiar 
species of palm-tree grows, and choosing a spot in the 
mud where the sprout of a young plant was just 
found shooting upwards, which it does at the rate 
of several inches in twenty-four hours, they would 
construct a platform around it, and lash their miser- 
able victim in a sitting posture over the young tree, 
so that its lance-like point should enter his body, 
and bring on mortification and death by piercing 
the intestines — in short, a slow mode of im- 
paling. 

Of the possibility of this last torture being per- 
formed, I can almost vouch; for although not botanist 
enough to name the peculiar species of palm tree 
which is used, I have often seen it growing both on 
the banks of the Setoue and Parlis rivers. I believe 
it to be the Nipa palm, but I am by no means cer- 
tain. It grows to no great height, and when full 
grown has little if any stem, the large and handsome 



192 EXTRAORDINARY PALM-SPEARS. 

leaves waving over the banks of the Malayan stream 
like a bunch of green feathers springing from the 
mud. The young plant springs up from the earth in 
a peculiar manner ; the embryo leaves are wrapped in 
solid mass together, round their own stems, forming 
one solid green triangular-shaped stick, ranging in 
length from four to six feet, and having a point as 
hard and sharp as a bayonet. 

These palm-spears, if I may use the term, the 
Malays pluck before the leaves attempt to expand, 
and in such a state they make a formidable lance. 
Jadee assured me, sufficiently so to enable a man 
to pierce the tough under cuticle of an alligator. 
I have often amused myself throwing them like a 
dart. The rapidity with which these young plants 
shoot up in the rich vegetation and sweltering heats 
of an equatorial jungle is almost inconceivable: the 
Malays declared that they might be seen growing, but 
Jamboo told me that he had often known a sprout to 
shoot an inch and a half in a night, from which we 
may picture to ourselves the sufferings of the unfor- 
tunate Malay impaled on one of them. 

The well-known torture of rubbing people over 
with wild honey, and lashing them to trees near the 
large venomous ants' nests of the country, until bit- 



REMARKS UPON NATIVE GOVERNMENTS. 193 

ten to death by them and other insects, was, we were 
told, commonly practised, but the climax to the tale 
of horror was the gambling which took place upon 
the capture of an unfortunate Malay woman who 
happened to be enceinte, the stakes depending upon 
whether the infant was a boy or a girl, the diabolical 
game concluding with the death of the mother, to 
decide who were winners. 

Such are the cruelties perpetrated by these wretched 
native monarchies; such have been the miseries which 
throughout Pegu, Birmah, Siam, and Malayia, first 
one master and then another has practised upon their 
unhappy subjects ; and yet philanthropists and poli- 
ticians at home maunder about the unjust invasion 
of native rights, and preach against the extension of 
our rule, as if our Government, in its most corrupt 
form, would not be a blessing in such a region, and as 
much, if not more, our duty to extend, as a Christian 
people, than to allow them to remain under native 
rulers, and then to shoot them for following native 
habits. In later years, it has been my sorrow to 
observe among another branch of this ill-starred 
Malayan race — the poor Otaheitians — the evil ef- 
fects of winning them from warlike habits without 
giving them British protection, for in that case our 
zeal in teaching them to turn their swords into 

o 



194 REMARKS UPON NATIVE GOVERNMENTS. 

pruning-hooks, has caused them to fall an easy 
prey to piratical Frenchmen. 

It is possible that Inchi Laa's sad tale of Malay 
suffering was purposely told us to prepare our minds 
for the bloody scene enacted upon the morrow, and 
to justify the horrid retaliation. 



THE ntlSOKEliS IN QUEDAII FORT. 195 



CHAP. XV. 

The Massacre of the Prisoners in Quedah Fort. — The alarmed 
Barber. — Inchi Laa repudiates the Act. — The Vultures' 
Feast. — Captain "Warren visits the Siamese Camp. — The 
Siamese Army. — llenewed Vigour in the Operations. — 
The Capture of the Battery. — The Flight of the Harem. — 
Fugitives no longer able to escape by Sea. — Narrow Escape 
of my Crew. — Inchi Laa surrenders. — Struck by a Whirl- 
wind. — The last Broadside. — The Chiefs escape. — Quedah 
Fort abandoned. 

The Siamese prisoners in the hands of the Malay 
chieftains had, after the completion of the defences 
of Quedah fort, been employed digging a reservoir, 
called, in India, a tank, for the purpose of collect- 
ing rain. Every day these wretches were marched 
out to their tasks and brought back again ; but on 
the day after the visit of the Inchi, we observed 
that a more than usual number of Malays accom- 
panied them, and that several chiefs of importance 
were among the escort. 

The spot was too distant for us to see all that took 
place, but our attention was attracted by piteous cries 
and loud shouts, and the rush and confusion of an 

o 2 



196 THE ALARMED BARBER, 

evident melee : the Malays in the garrison crowded 
upon the parapet, and appeared very excited in voice 
and gesture. Suddenly, a Chinaman from the town 
was seen running towards our anchorage, followed, 
directly his object was observed, by a couple of Ma- 
lays; several shots were fired at the fugitive, but 
when under cover of our vessels, we discharged a 
musket over his head, to show we claimed him, and 
his pursuers resigned him to our custody. I never, 
before or since, saw a man so horror-stricken as 
this poor Chinese barber was — for he had all the 
instruments of his trade about him, and had, appa- 
rently, dropped his razor and fled, stricken by some 
sudden fear. With much ado the man was soothed 
into telling us, crying all the while with nervous ex- 
citement, that the noise which was just subsiding on 
shore, had been the death-shrieks of all the ill-fated 
Siamese prisoners; that Tonkoo Mahomet Type- 
etam had been burning for revenge ever since his 
late discomfiture at Allegagou, and the Malays gene- 
rally were frantic at the horrors perpetrated on their 
countrymen : in retaliation, therefore, they had that 
morning marched out three hundred Siamese (all 
they had in their hands) to the margin of the 
tank, and there drawing his creese, Type-etam had 
given the signal to fall on, by plunging it into the 



MASSACRE OF THE PRISONERS. 197 

body of a prisoner; and the bodies were thrown into 
the tank, which lay in the road over which the Sia- 
mese troops must advance to the capture of Quedah. 
The Chinaman happened to be a witness of the mas- 
sacre, and not knowing whether Type-etam might 
not take it into his head to clear off the Chinese 
likewise, he, like a prudent barber, decamped at 
once. 

The murderers marched back soon afterwards, and 
lying, as we now did, close to the stockade, we did 
not think, from their appearance, they looked very 
elated with their bloody achievement ; still one or 
two ruffians were very excited, and waved their 
spears and muskets, as if promising us a similar 
fate should we fall into their hands. I need hardly 
say we were most indignant at such a cold-blooded 
act of cruelty, and it would have been an evil hour 
for Type-etam, had he fallen into the hands of our 
people : even Jadee declared it unmanly, and, as 
usual, took great care to explain to me, that the gen- 
tlemanly dogs by whom he had been brought up 
would have acted very differently. 

I upbraided Inchi Laa, the next time he visited 
us, for such an inhuman return to our captain's 
generous treatment of their defenceless women and 
children, and reminded him that, as pirates, there 

o 3 



198 THE vultures' feast. 

was an English law which entitled us to twenty 
pounds a head for every one of his countrymen we 
sent out of the world.* The Inchi, I was glad to 
see, blushed, and vowed that Mahomet Said pro- 
tested against the act, whilst Type-etam tried to 
justify it, on the ground of the dearth of provisions 
and water, the cruelty of the Siamese, and the bad 
policy of liberating such a body of enemies. 

The keen sight of the vulture, or possibly its 
power of scent, was wonderfully exemplified on the 
day of the massacre ; for although none of us had ever 
seen a vulture here before, within a few hours after 
it had taken place a number of those repulsive crea- 
tures were wheeling round and round over the bodies, 
and soon settled down to their filthy repast ; only to 
rise for a short and lazy flight, when startled by some 
exchange of shots between the besiegers and besieged. 

Habit reconciles many a disgusting sight to our 
ideas of what is natural ; but I know nothing that, to 
a European as yet unhardened to it, seems so repul- 
sive as that of a large bird feeding upon the corpse 
of a human being. Yet this soon became a common 
sight, for many a body floated down the stream, and, 
directly it grounded on the mud-flats, vultures would 

* The head-money for pirates has been most wisely done away 
with very lately, after having been sadly abused. 



VISIT TO THE SIAMESE CAMP. 199 

be seen napping their wings over their loathsome 
food. 

A week passed away : the Malays still spoke con- 
fidently of being able to hold out in the fort until 
the bad weather should force the Siamese to retreat, 
and ourselves to abandon the blockade ; and, more- 
over, they allowed it to leak out, that Datoo Ma- 
homet Alee, from Parlis, was operating against the 
flank of the Siamese army, and prevented them 
making an assault upon Quedah. 

On March 16th, a Siamese flag was seen waving 
on a tree at the mouth of the Jurlong river, north 
of Quedah river ; and with a view to hastening the 
Siamese operations, Captain Warren decided upon 
visiting their head-quarters, and a message was soon 
sent to the Siamese general, informing him of his 
wish to do so. 

Next day, elephants and a guard of honour were 
in waiting at the Jurlong. Captain Warren as- 
cended it as far as possible, and then, accompanied 
by his gig's crew and an interpreter, mounted 
the elephants, and proceeded to Allegagou, where 
the general still was, although a division of his 
army was closely blockading Quedah fort by land. 
Captain Warren was received with the greatest ho- 
nour, and had a house placed at his disposal, as well 

o 4 



200 THE SIAMESE ARMY. 

as necessary food. The general informed him, that 
the diversion attempted by Datoo Mahomet Alee had 
been a perfect failure ; the Datoo experiencing a 
total defeat, and losing a field-piece and abundance 
of powder and shot, which were now in the hands 
of the Siamese, to be used against the Quedah 
garrison. 

The forces seen by Captain Warren, forming the 
main division of the army, were at least 15,000 
strong, and consisted almost entirely of infantry and 
some elephants. Nearly 10,000 men were armed 
with good Tower flint muskets, which the General 
informed him had all been purchased from the 
Honourable Company, when they adopted the per- 
cussion-lock throughout the Indian army. 

On the whole, Captain Warren was favourably 
impressed with the materiel and personnel of the 
native army co-operating with us, though very 
different from what a European one would have 
been. With a promise from the General to push 
on operations with all possible energy, Captain 
Warren embarked, with his gig's crew, in one of the 
native canoes, descended Quedah river, and, much 
to all our astonishment, passed the town and fort of 
Quedah without having his right to do so even chal- 
lenged by the Malays; proving, at any rate, the 



SIAMESE ATTACK THE BATTERY. 201 

respect they entertained for the officer who had 
behaved so generously towards their wives and fa- 
milies. 

The day after Captain Warren's return, the Sia- 
mese appeared to be about to carry their promise 
into execution with a hearty will ; a heavy and con- 
tinuous fire was kept up by the outposts, and the 
Malays were evidently falling back : the scrub and 
jungle prevented us seeing much, except the wounded 
as they were carried to the rear. The Siamese light 
guns commenced to range over the fort, and were 
fiercely replied to by the heavy eighteen-pounders 
on the bastions. News was obtained by Mahomet 
Said at the same time, from a prisoner, that the 
Siamese had beaten back Mahomet Alee ; and the 
defence was thus rendered almost hopeless. 

The Malays in the fascine battery were suffering 
very much, and the Siamese, with their field-pieces 
andjpnusketry, were punishing the defenders terribly. 
We had to move a little out of range, so as to let 
these gentry fight out the duel. It soon became 
evident that the Siamese, sheltered by the jungle, 
had a great advantage over the Malays, who were in 
open ground ; the three or four guns in the battery 
soon became silent, but the gingal battery fired away 
manfully, under a perfect storm of musket-balls — 



202 THE CAPTURE OF THE BATTERY. 

fresh Malays ascending to take the place of those 
who were lowered down wounded. The Siamese 
dared not storm the battery, for it was commanded 
by the fort ; but, at last, a lucky shot from our allies 
struck the " Dove-cot," and, I fancy, dismounted the 
culverin, for, in a minute or two afterwards, we saw 
the Malays roll it off the platform, and let it fall into 
the battery below ; and then the whole garrison of 
the battery retreated into Quedah fort, carrying off 
their wounded and a couple of light guns. 

The Siamese shouted with delight, and rattled 
their castanets : we cheered them on ; and the Ma- 
lays slashed away grape and canister into the jungle, 
sweeping down all that dared to step on the open 
ground, which formed a glacis round the old fort. 

A cessation of firing took place in the afternoon, 
and that evening, the last instalment of women and 
children, and the last canoes in the river, escaped 
from Quedah. Amongst these fugitives were some 
fifteen damsels, the harem of Prince Abdullah ; and 
they showed, by their good looks, that His Royal 
Highness was not deficient in taste. We declared 
all veils contrary to a our national prejudices" and 
the ladies, with a little giggling, resigned themselves 
very good-naturedly to our white men's ideas, and 
repaid us for a liberal repast of curry and rice, to 



THE FLIGHT OF THE HAREM. 203 

which they were immediately invited, by the kindest 
of smiles and the warmest thanks. Poor souls ! the 
villanous " Teda Ba2;oose" had. in the name of His 
Siamese Majesty, protested against rebels being al- 
lowed to escape so easily, and had been placed in 
a commanding position, between Quedah and Penang, 
to intercept all the canoes and prahus. We, in con- 
sequence, had to refuse this last party a guarantee 
against capture, and recommended them to land, and 
walk down the coast into Province Wellesley — a 
journey of some forty or fifty miles. They willingly 
adopted our suggestion, but besought permission to 
encamp under shelter of our guns, until sufficient 
men could be got together to secure them an escort. 
The younger ladies, I may, without scandal, say, ap- 
peared far from unwilling to take advantage of the 
holiday they were now enjoying from the strict se- 
clusion of the harem; and, in spite of the prudish 
reprovals of some of the older ladies of the party, 
became upon such good terms with some of the Ma- 
lays who volunteered to protect them, that I fancy 
it was very doubtful whether Prince Abdullah would 
ever again recover the whole of the ladies of his 
household. An impromptu camp was rapidly formed 
on the southern point of the river, and we furnished 
them with sufficient food for present consumption. 



204 NARROW ESCAPE OF MY CREW. 

These last fugitives assured us, that the fort now 
only contained about two hundred fighting men, 
under the two chiefs, Mahomet Said and Type-etam, 
and that they had sworn not to surrender. 

All next day the firing was incessant on the land 
side of the works, and the Siamese were evidently 
taking advantage of the cover offered by the town, 
to make their approaches sufficiently close to try an 
escalade or assault. The excitement of being even 
spectators of the fight was naturally very great, 
and, as either party gained or lost an advantage, we 
cheered and shouted from the gun-boat and cutter. 
Occasionally, a round-shot or two, and then a shower 
of musket-balls, would oblige us to move out of im- 
mediate range, but only one attempt was fairly made 
to sink us, and this was the act of a desperate cut- 
throat in Quedah fort, called "Jaffa." He pointed 
a heavy twenty-four-pounder at my craft, only eight 
hundred yards distant, and, having loaded it with 
grape and canister, discharged it at us whilst we were 
seated at our afternoon meal of rice and fish. How 
all hands escaped seemed a miracle: the awnings 
were cut through in several places, the hull struck 
and grazed a good deal, but not one man was 
wounded. We cleared away our guns, and keenly 
watched all pieces pointed in our direction. The 



THE SALLY. 205 

attempt was not, however, repeated ; and as from 
the angle of the fort which fired at us, we saw 
three or four men lower themselves down, jump 
into the river, and swim across so as to escape by- 
land to the southward, we were led to anticipate, 
what we afterwards heard, that Jaffa and his friends, 
who had fired upon us, had been reproved by the 
chiefs, and made to fly the fort. 

Just as the night was closing in, the Malays fired 
several smart salvos of artillery, and with loud cheers 
sallied out upon the Siamese, who had already com- 
menced to occupy the town. Volumes of fire and 
smoke soon rolled over the unfortunate habitations, 
and the fight waxed hot and furious; reinforcements, 
however, soon arrived to our allies, and the Malays 
were beaten back with loss. To our astonishment, 
our old friend Inchi Laa, or " Gentleman Laa," 
as the sailors nicknamed him, came alongside, in 
a wretched canoe, and surrendered his sword. It 
bore marks of having been used to some purpose; 
but out of respect for the man's misfortunes, we 
did not ask many questions. He merely said, 
that they had made a sally from the fort, and 
been beaten back with loss; he had found himself 
cut off from the gate, and happily discovered a de- 



206 1NCHI LAA SURRENDERS. 

cayed canoe before the enemy had observed him. He 
did not wish to return to Quedah. Poor Inchi ! he 
seemed so alive to the kindness shown him ; his mild 
and gentlemanly countenance spoke volumes in its 
sadness ; and as he pressed us by the hand, bowing 
his head to touch it in token of gratitude, and in the 
same garb, and with his own sword in hand, swore to 
escort his countrywomen safely into Province Wel- 
lesley, and then surrender to our authorities if called 
upon. There was not a single soul of our party who 
did not sincerely regret that political expediency 
should have set us against a race which can produce 
such men. 

That night and next day the firing of the fort 
and Siamese was constant ; the Siamese were evi- 
dently puzzled ; their six-pounders were not likely 
to breach the walls, and scaling a fort full of Malays 
w r as a disagreeable contingency which they required 
time to think about. 

The north-east wind had now almost ceased to blow 
during the day-time, and the heat of the calm days 
was most oppressive ; its disagreeables considerably 
increased by the smoke of fires, and the foul smell 
arising from the tank full of slaughtered prisoners, 
and many bodies of Malays and Siamese which had 
floated down the stream, and become either fixed in 



STRUCK BY A WHIRLWIND. 207 

the interstices of the stockade, or grounded upon the 
mud-banks. 

In the afternoon, I experienced in the " Emerald " 
the first and only " white squall " which it has been 
my good fortune to fall in with — but "whirlwind" 
would be the more proper term. It was calm, and 
sultry to a degree, and we were listlessly lying about 
the decks, watching the desultory fight, when the 
town was suddenly enveloped in a storm of dust, 
straw, sticks, rags, and flags, flying up almost ver- 
tically in the air, as if enchanted ; and before we 
could take a single precaution, such as battening 
down, we were struck by a squall. With one 
furious gust it threw us over on our beam-ends — 
for we lay across its path, tore away awnings and 
awning stanchions, and whisked them out of the gun- 
boat, carried away the weather shrouds, blew the 
sails out of the gaskets, and half swamped us with 
w T ater. Happily, it went as quickly as it came, and 
made one rub one's head, and wonder whether the 
whole affair had really taken place. Having to send 
men away to fetch the awning back was, however, 
a pretty good proof of the extraordinary violence of 
such a whirlwind ; and the Malays assured me, that 
through the jungle such a violent squall will cut a 
lane, felling trees, as if so many woodmen had been 



208 THE LAST BROADSIDE. 

at work. The best term for it, though somewhat 
more French than English in character, was that 
used to me some years afterwards by a French naval 
officer, who, describing the horrors and dangers 
of a campaign dans les iles de l'Archipel, said, 
" Ah ! mais nous avons eu des vents la ! par ex- 
emple! des coups de vent effrayants — des vents du 
diable mon ami ! " 

We sat over our cup of tea discussing whether we 
should not, after all, have to take an active part in 
the fall of Quedah, when the black outline of the 
fort was illumined by flashes of artillery ; they lasted 
some few minutes, and were followed by a dead si- 
lence. That volley was the knell of Quedah ; for, in a 
short time, we heard cries, as of men drowning, near 
the stockade, and a number of my Malays, as well as 
some of Mr. Barclay's seamen, jumped into the water 
and swam to the rescue. They happily succeeded 
in saving six out of a dozen or fourteen men who 
had tried to swim across the river, but had failed. 
These men that we had saved were all natives of 
Upper India, and a fine six-foot fellow, directly he 
was able to speak, said, u We are the last of the 
garrison ! " 

Their tale was this: — Two nights ago, under 
cover of an attempt made by us against the Siamese, 



THE CHIEFS ESCAPE. 209 

Tonkoo Mahomet Said, Prince Abdullah, and Type- 
etam, with a select body of men, marched along the 
low-water mark of the sea, as far as the mouth of 
the Jurlong river, unseen by us or the Siamese ; 
there they were met by Datoo Mahomet Alee and 
Haggi Loung, who had marched from Parlis with 
some elephants to meet them ; and the united chiefs 
had thus escaped, to renew their resistance in another 
quarter. 

In order that the Siamese might still be detained 
off Quedah, a petty chieftain, whose name did not 
transpire, promised, with two hundred chosen men, 
to hold out for forty- eight hours : this he faithfully 
performed ; and he directed the desperate sally in 
which Inchi Laa had been cut off from re-entering 
the fort. 

Shortly afterwards, that chief, afraid to surrender 
to us after the treacherous attempt of one Jaffa to 
sink the gun-boat (an act all had disapproved of), 
swam across to the south side with the remaining 
men of his party, leaving fifteen Rajpoots, who were 
in the fort, to cover his escape by holding out, as they 
promised, for the space of two hours. 

They it was who had fired the last broadsides, 
and then endeavoured to make good their retreat as 
the others had done ; but not being as amphibious 

p 



210 QUEDAH FOKT ABANDONED. 

as the Malays, they had been swept down by the tide 
upon the stockade, and the majority were drowned, 
or killed by alligators. 

We respected these brave fellows; and although 
there was some suspicion of their being deserters 
from the Company's army, we gave them the benefit 
of the doubt ; and, having made them swear to escort 
the women with all speed to Province Wellesley, we 
put them all under charge of Inchi Laa, and has- 
tened their departure before the Siamese entered 
Quedah fort and observed their movements. 

Barclay and I crawled through the mud, aroused 
all the fair ladies from their al fresco slumbers, told 
Inchi Laa he must be off — a piece of advice which 
needed no repetition, — and in a few minutes we were 
left alone, the stars and a young moon shining on 
the grey walls of the deserted stronghold. 



SIAMESE IN POSSESSION OF THE FORT. 211 



CHAP. XVI. 

The Siamese in Possession of the Fort. — Description of the 
Fort. — A Siamese Military Swell. — The Divan. — A 
Naval Ambassador. — The Ambassador demands Beef. — 
Curiosity of the Siamese Officials. — The Appearance of the 
Soldiery. — Mobility of the Siamese Troops. — Arms and 
Equipments. — The Buffalo of Malayia. — Mr. Airey, Master 
of the " Hyacinth." — Siamese Ingratitude not singular. — 
We proceed to Parlis. 

At daybreak on March 20th, we observed the Sia- 
mese to be in possession of the fort, and shortly 
afterwards our Captain visited, and congratulated the 
authorities, who, however, did not appear to under- 
stand the immense moral aid we had afforded to his 
Golden-tufted Majesty of Siam, as well as the fatal 
hindrance we had been to fresh supplies being thrown 
into the unfortunate province. 

In the course of the day, I visited Quedah, accompa- 
nied by Jadee, Jamboo, and a guard of honour of four 
of my own Malays, who my worthy coxswain insisted 
should be armed to the teeth, lest a fray should arise 

p 2 



212 DESCRIPTION OF THE FORT. 

with any of the Siamese irregulars. The gun-boat 
passed through the stockade, and from her I landed 
at the river end of a moat, which we found flanked 
the fort on its landward side. Neglect and ruin 
were everywhere apparent; the moat was half filled 
with rubbish, and evidently was left dry at low water: 
across it, opposite the only gateway not built up 
with stones, a temporary bridge had been thrown by 
the Siamese ; this gateway faced the one long row of 
mat-built houses which constituted the once important 
town of Quedah ; and as we passed through it, we 
could not help stopping to admire two magnificent 
brass guns, of Portuguese manufacture, which pointed 
down the road. The arms of the House of Bra- 
ganza were still comparatively fresh upon the metal: 
but how have they, the descendants of Alfonso Albu- 
querque, degenerated ! 

The fort itself was of a rectangular form, and 
partook more of the character of a factory such as 
the Portuguese and Dutch, as well as ourselves, used 
to construct in the early days of Eastern discovery, 
than that of a place intended purely as a fortification. 
On the parapet, there were many handsome and 
heavy guns, mounted on very barbaric carriages ; and 
within the walls, besides an old mosque or temple, 
and one or two stone-built houses, there was no lack 



DESCRIPTION OF THE FORT. 213 

of mat residences of the usual Malay order of archi- 
tecture. 

It was a sad and ruinous scene : the robber and 
robbed had each been there in their turn ; their 
handiwork lay before me, and standing upon the 
battlements looking over the rich land and luxuriant 
forest, on the one side, and the fine river with the 
blue Indian Ocean upon the other, I could not help 
feeling that man had sadly abused God's bounty. 

Yet Quedah had not always been what it then 
was. When the first European visitor wrote of 
it, in 1516, he had occasion to say, that it was "a 
seaport to which an infinite number of ships resorted, 
trading in all kinds of merchandise ; here come," he 
adds, " many Moorish* ships from all quarters ; here, 
too, grows much pepper, very good and fine, which is 
conveyed to Malacca, and thence to China." And 
the province adjacent is still noted for the immense 
productiveness of its rice-fields, and the mountains 
are still rich in gold and tin. I was not left Ions; to 
cogitate upon what Quedah had been, and what it could 
now be, if in better hands ; for the Siamese soldiery 
were still ransacking every hole and corner for plunder, 
and failing in discovering much, some of them, who 
looked a little excited with " fighting water," or 

* Moor was the term applied to the Mahometan traders. 

p 3 



214 A SIAMESE MILITARY SWELL. 

" bang" ruffled up their feathers at my no less pug- 
nacious Malays. 

I therefore proceeded at once to pay my respects 
to the Siamese commandant, my interpreter addressing 
himself to a Siamese officer, or petty chief, who 
seemed to have charge of a guard at the gate. The 
worthy was leaning listlessly on some planks, and, 
when first addressed, gave himself as many airs as 
the most thoroughbred British subaltern in charge of 
three rank and file could have done. It made me smile 
to see how small the stride between the extremes of 
civilised and savage life: the listless apathy of fashion 
and the stoicism of the Indian are very, very close 
akin. Jamboo, however, understood the art of being 
a dragoman ; and I fancy stirred up the subaltern 
by a glowing description of who and what I was, and 
by his gesticulation and apparent solemnity of bear- 
ing when addressing me, moved the spirit of the sol- 
dier, and he got up, and conducted me to the pre- 
sence of the Siamese chief. 

Passing through a crowd of very uncivil officers, 
who could only be distinguished from the men by 
wearing silk tartans of a blue and white pattern, I 
was presented to a tall intelligent person, the com- 
mandant. Jamboo made, in a disagreeably abject 
manner, a long speech on my behalf; in which 



A NAVAL AMBASSADOR. 215 

the Siamese tongue grated harshly on the ear after 
the soft and harmonious language of Malayia. The 
hall of audience was in one of the bastions, and was 
evidently the proper Divan. The courtier-like super- 
ciliousness of all the officers in the chiefs retinue was 
deliciously amusing; and the great man was evidently 
wrath at something : maybe he was not struck with 
the importance of a British midshipman in his ambas- 
sadorial character; but I enjoyed the joke amazingly; 
for I had been ordered to give a message, and I deter- 
mined to give it to no one but the chief, were he 
the Rajah of Ligor himself. I got it from my chief; 
I intended it should go to theirs. Jamboo passed 
several compliments between us, almost going 
through the form of paying idolatrous worship to 
a Siamese general and a midshipman of H.M.S. 
" Hyacinth." I then said, in the most serious 
and formal manner, " Tell the general that I have 
a message from my rajah ! " and, added Jadee, " Re- 
member, oh Jamboo ! that these men are swine, and 
would never have been here but for us ; explain that 
to these sons of burnt mothers!" Requesting Jamboo 
to do no such thing, and desiring Jadee to hold his 
tongue, my message was duly delivered. 

" He says," said Jamboo, "that he is ready to hear. 
But, dear me, sir, this not Siamese fashion ; nobody 

p 4 



216 THE AMBASSADOR DEMANDS BEEF. 

can send a message to a great chief like this without 
a present ; suppose no got present, can do no good ! " 
" Never mind, Jamboo," I replied ; " you fire away 
as I tell you. Tell this old gentleman that my cap- 
tain wishes him to put the two bullocks he promised 
for the ship, on board my boat." 

Jamboo collapsed ; and I saw he was going to 
remonstrate at having to give such an unimportant 
message to so big a man, therefore checked it at 
once, by ordering him to do as he was told. 

The message was delivered, and its effect was richly 
comical on the audience around us: they stared open- 
mouthed at the impertinence of the whole affair, 
though I knew perfectly well I had done right ; for 
the devil a bullock should I have got from anyone 
but the chief, and to go off without two of them was 
not my intention. The chief seemed to divine my 
motive ; for though he stared at first, he soon smiled, 
and with becoming dignity replied that he did not 
look after bullocks, but that we should have two. 

"Will his Excellency be good enough to order one 
of these officers to go with me, and point them out ? 
I asked through Jamboo. And, wonderful to relate ! 
his Excellency did please to do so, and I put the 
gentleman under Jadee's especial care, and told him 
not to part from him until he had the two animals 



CUKIOSITY OF THE SIAMESE OFFICIALS. 217 

safe in his own custody. Jadee went away with 
him, looking as if any breach of contract would cause 
the Siamese officer to join the hecatomb in the 
tank. 

I was now retiring, when the small spyglass in 
my hand attracted the Siamese chief's attention ; and 
on inquiring if it was a pistol, its proper use was ex- 
plained to him, and very much delighted his Excel- 
lency was with a sight through the little Dollond ; and 
children at a peep-show were never more excited 
than were his attendants in their desire to be allowed 
to look through it. I need hardly say that I was 
not over liberal in that respect to those who had 
given themselves airs, and I soon beat a retreat. 
The crowd and the heat made the Divan disagreeable 
amongst people with whom fresh water had become 
a scarce commodity. 

The excessive self-conceit I observed amongst these 
officers is a national characteristic of the Siamese 
people: they style themselves, -par excellence, "Thai," 
or freemen; the Franks, in short, of the great penin- 
sula embraced by the Indian Ocean and China Sea — 
a title they most decidedly do not deserve as a body ; 
for the stick is in more common use amongst them 
than the bamboo is with the Chinese, as an arbitrator 
between master and man. 



218 APPEARANCE OF THE SOLDIERY. 

Great numbers of their soldiery were in both fort 
and town, and struck me as being a fine soldierlike 
body of men if measured by an Asiatic standard, 
and minus pipeclay, black-ball, and leather stocks, I 
might also add, regimental clothing. A cloth round 
their hips, falling to the knee, and another fashioned 
like a Malay sarang, hanging across the shoulders, 
formed their sole attire. In appearance, they struck 
me as a composite race, and betrayed strong signs of 
a mixed origin. They were taller than the Malays, 
long-backed, and better developed about the legs and 
hips, as a race should be who live more ashore than 
afloat. The features partook of the Burmese cast of 
countenance, with the eye just enough Chinese in 
outline to show that the sons of Ham were numerous 
on the banks of the deep Menam. In colour 3 they 
were a shade or two darker than the Malay and Chi- 
nese, exhibiting in that respect an affinity to the races 
of the Peninsula of Indostan, and substantiating 
their sacred traditions, that their religion was derived, 
as well as their earliest civilisation, from the banks of 
the Ganges. The power of endurance of these sol- 
diery I had often heard my Malays extol ; and look- 
ing at the spare athletic limbs, in which there was 
more bone than flesh, I could easily understand that 
they were capable of making long marches ; indeed, 



MOBILITY OF THE SIAMESE TROOPS. 219 

whilst I stood at the gate, two men, clothed as I have 
before described, marched in with a spring in their 
gait which betokened that they had still plenty of 
work le/t in them ; and on inquiring where they had 
come from, I was informed that they had marched 
from a place thirty miles distant. Beside their 
arms, these men each carried a slip of bamboo on 
his shoulder, at either extremity of which was sus- 
pended all their baggage, cooking-gear, and several 
days' rice tied up in a bag with a little salt. The 
celerity with which an army that thus carried its 
equipage and commissariat upon the men's shoulders, 
could move from point to point of an extensive em- 
pire like Siam, must be very remarkable, and fully 
supported the Malay acknowledgment of their being 
excellent soldiers. 

All those I saw had firearms of some description 
or other : the majority had flint muskets with the 
Tower mark ; round the waist of the soldiery was se- 
cured a primitive cartouche-box containing, in little 
movable reeds, the charges of powder, and in the 
same belt a bag was suspended filled with musket- 
balls and pieces of a felt-like vegetable substance for 
wads. 

The martial appearance of these Siamese was 
heightened by a very peculiar mode of wearing the 



220 THE BUFFALO OF MALAYIA. 

hair. Naturally jet black, and somewhat harsh in 
texture, the hair was cut to an equal length all over 
the head, leaving it about three and a half inches 
long, the object being to make each particular hair to 
stand on end, u like quills upon the fretful porcupine," 
and to ensure this, a fillet, of an inch and a half 
wide, of rattan, or some stiff substance, carefully 
covered with white linen, encircled the head, passing 
across the forehead close to the roots of the hair, and 
served to force it all into an erect position. 

It decidedly gave them a singularly fearless air, 
but, whether a national custom, or merely adopted by 
the Siamese general to make a marked distinction 
between his followers and the long-haired Malays, I 
am unable to say. 

I passed Jadee and his crew of twenty men, en- 
gaged in getting the two bullocks on board the {e Eme- 
rald," and they had had a pretty tough hour's work 
in doing so : for the animals, like most of the native 
cattle in Malayia, were only-half tamed buffalos — a 
set of savage long-horned brutes that will not turn 
from the tiger so common in those jungles. Indeed 
in many of the native states, the favourite sport 
of the chiefs is to capture a tiger alive, and turn 
him loose into an enclosed arena with a buffalo-bull, 
and in nine cases out of ten the latter will, in spite 



MR. AIREY, Ol' THE ""HYACINTH.'' 221 

of the fearful wounds it receives, kill the tiger with 
a blow or two of its horns, and then toss it about 
as an English bull would a dog. 

We had some difficulty in lashing down our freight 
of fresh beef, and taking it safely off to the " Hya- 
cinth ;" and the commanding officer, the kind and 
gallant Airey, laughed immoderately when I told him 
of my mode of carrying out his injunction, "not to 
return without the bullocks." " A midshipman's im- 
pertinence must," as he observed, (< have astonished 
the Rajah of Ligor !" for he it was, and no one less, 
that I had thus played the ambassador with ! 

Airey was the master of the " Hyacinth ;" but 
owing to the death of the second lieutenant, and the 
promotion of the first lieutenant*, he was now doing 
commanding officer's duty. He was a charming 
specimen of a generous, gallant sailor. Poor fellow ! 
he now lies in a humble grave on the pestilential 
shores of Labuan, having fallen a victim to fever 
and dysentery, so rife at the commencement of our 
settlement on that island. Heaven rest his soul ! a 
better, kinder man, or more zealous officer, never 



* The late Captain Giffard, who was mortally wounded, 
and his vessel, H.M.S. " Tiger," captured by the Russians off 
Odessa, in the commencement of the late war. 



222 SIAMESE INGRATITUDE. 

adorned our profession, although it never was his luck, 
in piping days of peace, to have sufficient opportunity 
for a display of his abilities, and the canker of dis- 
appointment and a worn-out constitution laid him 
under the turf. 

Arrangements were now made to proceed north- 
ward, so as to promote the rapid reduction of the rest 
of the province, a great portion of which was still in 
the hands of the Tonkoos and their adherents. The 
Siamese, as I have said, did not appear to understand 
the value of our passive form of co-operation, though it 
was undoubtedly very efficacious; and Jamboo assured 
me he had,, whilst in Quedah fort, heard many insult- 
ing inuendoes cast upon the British mode of block- 
ading. " Oh ! you have been eating white rice while 
we have starved upon black," was one of their expres- 
sions equivalent " to lying in clover " whilst they 
worked hard. Others wanted to know, " Why 
we allowed a set of Malay vermin to escape, that 
they might return, to harass the Siamese at a future 
day ? " In short, had Captain Warren expected much 
gratitude for all his hard work and anxious days and 
nights, he would have been bitterly disappointed, and 
we may say that our unhandsome treatment by the 
Siamese was only of a piece with the conduct of 
some other countries which we could mention in more 



WE PROCEED TO PAKLIS. 223 

civilised parts of the world, where policy, or gene- 
rosity, or Quixotism has caused Old England to 
lavish her treasure and her still more precious blood. 
It was with no small satisfaction that we saw the 
ls Hyacinth " weigh on the 22nd of March, and pro- 
ceed towards Parlis, leaving the Siamese and the 
" Teda Bagoose" to fulfil their mission, whatever 
that might be. By the bye, the fighting captain of 
the " Teda Bagoose " had vowed to report me offi- 
cially for giving such a name to his Imperial Ma- 
jesty's brig, and that added to my desire to see her a 
long way astern. 



224 KETUKN TO PARLIS. 



CHAP. XVII. 

Return to Pariis. — A Case of Cholera-morbus. — An Irish 
Cure for Cholera. — Pat Conroy's Opinion of the Chinese. — 
Tamelan. — Pariis. — The Flight from Tamelan. — The 
Legacy of Queen Devi. — The Departure. — The Heart of 
a Cocoa-nut Tree. — Proceed to shoot a Buffalo. — Discover 
a Herd. — The Shot and the Chase. — Obtain Plenty of 
Buffalo Meat. 

The cutter and gun-boat proceeded along the shore, 
whilst the " Hyacinth " made a straight course ; and 
the lack of wind in both cases caused the passage to 
Pariis to be longer than usual. Unable to continue 
at the oars and sweeps during the heat of the day, we 
anchored off Bamboo Point, whilst the "Hyacinth," 
in the distance, flapped lazily along with light airs 
and cats'-paws which never reached us. Towards 
sunset we weighed, and had not gone far before a 
small prahu was detected endeavouring to hide 
herself in the jungle : we of course made her come 
alongside ; and a wretched sight she was ! The crew 
on board consisted for the most part of Chinese 
settlers who were flying the province: they came 



A CASE OF CHOLERA-MORBUS. 225 

from Trang, and gave us the first intimation 
that that place was already in Siamese possession ; 
but on the way down, cholera and fever had broken 
out in the prahu, and many had died. 

Whilst with us, one poor creature was seized with 
Asiatic cholera. It was a sad sight, to see one in a 
sound healthy state suddenly seized with a mortal 
malady. After one or two rapidly successive cramps 
the very appearance of the man seemed to alter ; he 
became livid and looked collapsed. We had no medi- 
cine, and beyond rubbing his cramped muscles, could 
do nothing, until Barclay's stroke oarsman, a fine spe- 
cimen of "a boy" from Kinsale, called Paddy Conroy, 
said it was u a pithy to say a hathen dhoi in such a 
manner," and volunteered to cure him, if the officers 
would only give him five minutes' run of their spirits. 
Pat Conroy, we knew, looked on spirits — in a nate 
state> as he called it — as a sovereign remedy for every 
trouble flesh is heir to ; and it was necessary to keep 
an eye to his physicking, as in his zeal he might have 
administered counteractives to himself, whilst doing 
the good Samaritan to the cholera-stricken China- 
man. We opened our private store of spirits, which 
was kept in a box containing our stock of cayenne 
pepper, salt, chilies, pickles, and chutney. (( Be dad ! 
sir," said Conroy, as his Milesian nose disappeared 

Q 



226 AN IRISH CURE FOR CHOLERA. 

in the smiles which wreathed his honest countenance, 
" here is the rale physic here; the devil a sowl dies of 
cholera while there is all this whisky to be had," — 
and as he said so, he started a wine-glass of it into a 
tumbler. " And then there 's the beauthiful Jamaicy 
rhum too, — by the mother of Moses ! what is better 
than that too for cramps?" so saying, he added some 
of it. " Ah, now, sir, if you plaise, the smallest 
taste of gin; oh! it's wonderful what a power there 
is in that same, if so be there is plenty of it ; not 
that Paddy Conroy would exchange Kinsale harbour 
full of it for a bucketful of the rale crathur — but 
what can these hathens know about it ? Now for a 
spoonful of chili vinegar and a pinch of cayenne." So 
suiting the action to the word, he mixed up a dia- 
bolical potion, which would have horrified a horse- 
doctor. 

I remonstrated, but Barclay truly enough said, it 
gave the Chinaman one chance more of surviving, 
and accordingly a seaman forced the poor creature's 
mouth open with an iron spoon-handle, — for the teeth 
were set close together with spasms, — and Dr. Conroy 
poured his cure for cholera down the man's throat. 

" You have killed that man ! " I said. 

"The divil a fear, sir," replied Conroy; "good 
whisky never killed any man ; " a rash assertion 



CONROY S OPINION OF THE CHINESE. 227 

of his faith in his national liquor, which seemed 
somewhat supported by the rapid improvement 
which took place in the patient, who had perfectly 
shaken off his malady before we reached Parlis. 

Chinaman-like, the wretch seemed incapable of 
gratitude, and neither he nor his friend said, thank 
you! to Pat Conroy, who, when I remarked to him 
that I thought they might have done so, replied that 
" Nothing good ever came of men who wore tails, 
the dirty hathens ! and it was almost a pithy to have 
wasted good liquor on such bastes." 

Conroy was one of those light-hearted, devil-may- 
care Irishmen, one or two of whom are so invaluable 
on a man-of-war, just to keep up fun and light- 
headedness ; more than that is always a source of 
trouble, for they are seldom good sailors, and often 
troublesome and drunken. But wherever a good 
joke would lighten heavy work, or dispel monotony or 
care, such a diverting vagabond as Paddy Conroy was 
invaluable ; and though Paddy was bad at steering 
or seamanship, he could handle a musket with all the 
innate love of soldiering of an Irishman, and where 
dash or pluck was required, " Paddy Conroy," to 
use his own expression, "would be all there, your 
honour !" His love for being " all there" eventually 
led him into a powder-magazine in China, where 

q 2 



228 PAKLIS. — TAMELAN. 

firing a pistol at a retreating Tartar, he blew up 
the whole edifice, and himself with it. Paddy es- 
caped with serious injury to his hands and ears, and 
a general shake of the constitution from which he 
has not yet recovered. I am, however, going ahead 
too fast, and must return to Parlis, where we made 
all our sister gun-boats extremely happy by the in- 
formation we had to communicate of the fall of 
Quedah fort. 

Little change had taken place in the state of 
affairs in the river since my last visit ; but the diffi- 
culty of maintaining the blockade was not small, in 
consequence of the extraordinary distance we had to 
send for fresh water. In proof of this, I was next 
day despatched to Tamelan, to fill all the water- 
casks of the flotilla from the water-holes of that 
village. 

The good little Queen Devi was most anxious 
to assist me, and gave every gallon of water she 
could spare ; but her villagers were themselves some- 
what straitened for supplies, there having only 
been a couple of showers of rain during the last two 
months ; and the parched earth gaped everywhere in 
wide fissures, and looked as if longing for that rainy 
season which was not then far distant. Already had 
parties of her people been obliged to forage up the 



THE FLIGHT FROM TAMELAN. 229 

stream for fresh water, and been fired at by what 
they described as " orang-jahat" or bad people — 
evidently a sort of banditti, which, called into exist- 
ence by the hostilities in the province, waged war 
alike on either side. The news we brought the good 
folks of Tamelan of the fall of Quedah and Trang, 
decided the chieftainess upon taking a step for which 
it was evident she had some time made preparations. 
She therefore waited upon me next morning, and 
informed me that her people intended embarking 
all their movable property in their prahus, and to 
proceed to a more secure spot within the jurisdic- 
tion of the English Government. I tried hard to 
persuade her to remain, and that I was sure Captain 
Warren would explain to the Siamese how neutral 
her conduct had been, and would secure good terms 
for herself and followers, provided they submitted 
willingly to the new order of things. 

She assured me, however, that it was hopeless to ex- 
pect that the Siamese soldiery would obey their chiefs 
in showing any forbearance to the Malay inhabitants, 
and that if I refused her leave to depart, or she 
attempted to prevent her people doing so, they w r ould 
assuredly disperse into the neighbouring jungle, and 
escape as they best could from the sea-shore. Under 
these circumstances, I wished them God-speed, and 

q 3 



230 THE FLIGHT FROM TAMELAN. 

promised her a safe conduct to the ship, whence I 
knew she would be allowed to proceed to Penang. 

All th6 day was spent in hasty preparation ; the 
more so, that two or three fugitives from the upper 
part of the Setoue arrived with some horrid tale of 
atrocities committed by the invaders. Children and 
women were staggering under loads of household 
goods ; weeping and squalling going on on all sides ; 
and many of the prahus in which they were embark- 
ing were so leaky that the people were already baling. 
One could only think with a shudder, as visions of 
blue sharks and alligators floated before the imagina- 
tion, what it would be when on the high seas. Queen 
Devi, poor soul ! cried bitterly all day, and told me 
of some old hereditary right she had to the land 
hereabouts; that some eighteen or twenty years be- 
fore, the wrath of the Emperor of Siam had fallen 
with a fiftyfold greater force upon the Quedah 
Malays, because it was less expected than at present ; 
and that her family had been fugitives from that 
time until she had returned in the previous autumn, 
hoping to live quietly in the land of her birth — a 
hope which, of course, had now proved to be 
fallacious. 

As nearly all her best men had gone with their 
countrymen into the interior to fight in defence of 



THE LEGACY OF QUEEN DEVI. 231 

their rights, there was a sad want of hands to perform 
the necessary manual labour for the equipment of 
their prahus. I therefore ordered my crew to lend a 
hand in getting the sails, oars, and rudders of their 
vessels into order for their voyage. The gratitude 
of the poor souls for this piece of assistance knew 
no bounds; and the chieftainess, in return, told 
me that she gave me a legacy of all the cocoa-nut 
trees and mangoes in the village, and informed me 
that there were a number of half-wild buffaloes in 
the clearance, which we might shoot and eat if we 
liked to do so. 

In consequence of this information, I determined 
to wait and secure such a treat for my poor crew, 
who had not tasted a morsel of animal food during 
the four months I had been with them ; and for 
how much longer previously, they alone knew. 
During the night and morning the chieftainess 
and her followers left, in ten prahus, laden as 
deep as they would swim, and crammed like slavers 
with human beings. We gave them a parting 
cheer, and soon afterwards landed, to see what was 
to be picked up in the shape of food. Our search 
was not successful, and even fruit was scarce upon 
the cocoa-nut trees. My crew, however, soon struck 
upon a method of obtaining something to eat, in 

Q 4 



232 THE HEART OF A COCOA-NUT TREE. 

the shape of the heart of a cocoa-nut tree. This 
luxury could only have been enjoyed under the 
peculiar circumstances through which the trees had 
become our property, for they had to be cut down ; 
and then, on splitting open the gorgeous crown of 
leaves which forms the capital of that useful species 
of palm, a white vegetable substance was obtained, 
about three feet long and as thick as a woman's 
arm. Eaten raw, it tasted like a delicious nut, and 
when boiled it formed an excellent vegetable. 

The vandalism of destroying a noble tree for the 
sake of one dish of fruit or vegetable was, however, 
too great to be carried to any extent. I only allowed 
three or four to be cut down, and consoled the men 
by assuring them of beef ad lib. in the evening. 

Jadee reconnoitred the rice-fields for the bullocks 
or buffaloes, and reported to me that during the heat 
of the day they had naturally retreated into the 
shady depths of the jungle, and would only come out 
to feed in the clearings when the sun declined from 
the zenith. We therefore went on board to burnish 
up our arms, and get some salt ready for curing 
our anticipated surplus of beef. I found Jamboo 
anxious to proceed up the river, to procure from a 
certain bank a peculiar species of very delicious 
shellfish, which I never have tasted anywhere but in 



rilOCEED TO SHOOT A BUFFALO. 233 

the Setoue, although it is, I believe, common to the 
Straits of Malacca. I gave him permission, warning 
him to retreat immediately should war parties of 
Siamese or the orang-jahat fire upon him — an injunc- 
tion which I believe I might have well spared my- 
self the trouble of giving to the unwarlike descendant 
of the British Mars. About three o'clock Jadee and 
I started for our foray against the buffaloes, with 
a single barrel each, and two active men as beaters. 
As we went along, Jadee explained to me that the 
animals were perfectly wild, and all that the Malays 
knew of them in Tamelan was, that their young 
rice-fields had been sadly ravaged by them, and that 
we should have to be, in the first place, very 'cute to 
get within shot of them ; and in the next, it would 
require some generalship, if we hit them in the open 
ground, to escape their wrath ; for, as he sagely ob- 
served, " They don't care about tigers or snakes ; and 
a very wise man who I once knew, who understood 
all the buffaloes say to one another, told me that 
they don't care for a man either." 

" All right ! " I said to Jadee ; " but don't you 
know of any charm for getting near them, or, if we 
get near them, for being sure of killing them?" — 
Nothing, I knew, pleased Jadee so much as appealing 
to his powers of necromancy. 



234 AVE DISCOVER A HERD. 

" Well, Tuhan," he replied, " I do know an infal- 
lible charm for bringing down man or animal ; and 
that is, putting a small piece of pork-flesh (here he 
spat, and cursed the unclean animal) down a gun- 
barrel. I intend to practise it on Mahomet Alee ; 
but, Inshallah ! we will get these buffaloes without." 

" God is great ! " I reverentially replied ; " and it 
is lucky we are able to do without the flesh of swine 
on this occasion; but if it is a charm, may it be 
plentiful, oh, Jadee! when you meet the pirate 
Mahomet Alee ! " 

Thus chatting, we strolled rapidly along, skirting 
the western edge of the jungle, so that the strong 
shadow might in some measure serve to conceal us, 
and to keep to leeward of every animal in the 
cleared ground, the wind being from the eastward. 
At last the quick eyes of the Malays detected four 
or five animals feeding in a hollow ; and we com- 
menced to stalk them up as if they had been red deer. 
Aided by the wind and shadow, we at last reached a 
small knoll unobserved ; and there, through a mass 
of brushwood, had a good view of the brutes, and 
were well within range of them. Jadee peered over, 
and whispered that we were in a bad place, but no 
better could be had. There was a fine tree lying on 
its broadside not far off; its branches would have 



THE SHOT AND THE CHARGE. 235 

given a cover against any charge, for it formed a 
natural " abattis ; " but it was impossible to get there 
without being seen by the cattle, who would either 
charge us, or bolt immediately. I therefore arranged 
that our two beaters should at once fall back again 
into the jungle, out of which we had advanced some 
four hundred yards. When they were safe, Jadee 
and I were to single out a bull and fire, then run 
for the fallen tree, to obtain shelter before the rest of 
the herd were upon us. We accordingly carried this 
into execution, levelling our muskets at a great black 
bull buffalo, who was on the look-out whilst the rest 
fed. Something alarmed the brute : he evidently 
caught sight of the beaters retiring to the jungle, 
and, as if by magic, seemed to communicate an alarm 
to the herd, which contained not more than four or 
five cows with calves and another bull. Seeing by his 
vicious look that he was going to charge my men, I 
sang out " Fire !" Both our barrels went off together, 
and down dropped the look-out bull. I was so en- 
chanted that I looked only at him. " Lari-lacasse !" 
screamed Jadee, suiting the action to the word, by 
starting on his legs and running as fast as he could 
for the fallen tree. It required no repetition of the 
admonition for me to follow suit, and the more so 
as one glance showed me the other bull was in chase. 



236 DESCRIPTION OF A BUFFALO. 

The fifty yards I had to go over were done like 
lightning, and I leapt the stem and dashed after 
Jadee amongst the branches as the brute crashed 
against them. After trotting briskly round to see 
if there was an opening, it pawed the earth fiercely; 
and taking another volley from us, of which one 
ball alone wounded it, the bull beat a retreat, at 
which I was not sorry, for a more spiteful-looking 
beast than an enraged buffalo, I do not suppose the 
whole range of the animal kingdom can produce. 

It has none of that beauty of form which strikes 
one in looking at a European bull. Its black smooth 
skin is thinly covered with hair, not unlike that 
of an English pig; its frame is long, bony, and 
rather angular ; the feet or hoofs clumsy and mas- 
sive ; the head long, with an appearance of cunning 
ferocity about the eye, very unlike the fearless look of 
our British bull. The horns are long and sharp, 
thick as a man's arm close to the head, and forming 
so open a curve that they can be laid almost close 
back in the hollow of the shoulder; and their 
efficiency I was very ready to believe in, without 
further proof than Jadee's assurance. We now left 
our fortress and joined the beaters, who told us that 
the wounded bull had retreated into the jungle, but 
was bleeding too profusely to go far; we followed 



OBTAIN PLENTY OF BUFFALO-MEAT. 237 

up his trail, and soon found him in the centre of a 
thicket. After some trouble we dislodged him and 
administered the coup de grace, much to our delight, 
for neither Jadee nor I were sportsmen in the proper 
acceptance of the word ; and as we cheered over our 
trophy, I own to the soft impeachment of allowing 
my mind to recur to beefsteaks and marrow-bones, 
to which my rice-famished palate had been long a 
stranger. Ripping open the bull, we cut off as much 
meat as we could shoulder, and proceeded to the 
" Emerald," to send all hands up for the rest of the 
carcase. 



238 JAMBOO AND THE RIVER SPIRIT. 



CHAP. XVIII. 

Jamboo frightened by a River Spirit. — The Aborigines of 
Malayia. — Malayan Superstitions. — An " Untoo," or Spirit, 
seen. — My Credulity taxed. — The Spirits of the Jungle. — 
On Superstitions in general. — The Charms of Superstition. 
— Musquitoes and Sand-flies. — The Village on Fire. — 
Flaming Cocoa-nut Trees. — Intentional Destruction. — 
Traces of Man rapidly obliterated in the East. 

The men soon brought off all the meat from the 
dead buffalo, and as there was much more than we 
could eat at once, the surplus was cut into thin shreds 
and hung up about the vessel, so that on the mor- 
row the action of the sun should convert it into v 
what, in South America, is styled " charqui," or 
dried beef. 

Towards sunset, the sampan returned down the 
river with only half a load of shell-fish, Jamboo 
and his crew having been frightened off the 
fishing-ground by what Sutoo, the quarter-master, 
assured me was an Untoo, or evil spirit. He ex- 
plained to me, that while busy up to their knees in 
water, an odd noise had been heard under the over- 



JAMBOO AND THE RIVER SPIRIT. 239 

hanging trees on the opposite bank : looking in that 
direction, they saw a man's head come up out of the 
water ; the face was covered with hair, and it eyed 
them in a fierce, threatening manner ; they shouted, 
jumped into the sampan, and fired at the creature; 
it dived for a minute, and then appeared again, grin- 
ning horribly. Jamboo and his men decided that it 
was a demon, and thought it better to decamp whilst 
their skins were whole. I laughed heartily at their 
fears, and tried to explain to them that it might be a 
seal. Jamboo, however, stoutly insisted that no seals 
were ever seen in Malayia ; and as I found myself in 
the minority, I quietly acquiesced in the supposition 
that it was an unclean spirit. Jadee said, if not the 
Old Gentleman, that it must be one of the wild men 
who could imitate the appearance of monkeys or apes, 
the cry of birds, or the howlings of wild beasts, so as 
even to deceive animals. 

These wild men are the sad remnants of an ab- 
original race of diminutive negroes, who, at one time, 
were more numerous, but are now only found in 
small isolated parties, in the most inaccessible fast- 
nesses of Malayia, living amongst the branches of 
trees, to avoid the snakes and beasts of prey. They 
are human beings in their most cjegraded form — 
without religion, without any acknowledged form of 



240 ABORIGINES OF MALAYIA. 

government, and only gifted with animal instincts 
and passions. When found or caught by the Malays, 
they are tied up or caged just as we should treat 
chimpanzees. 

I argued that it was very unlikely such creatures 
should be down so close to the sea, and, least of all, 
would they voluntarily show themselves to our men. 
Jadee, however, suggested that the movements of 
large bodies of armed men had disturbed them in 
their haunts ; besides, that at one season of the year 
they were known to wander towards the sea-shore, 
either for the sake of procuring salt, or because 
shell-fish was easily procurable. Under these circum- 
stances, I was not sorry Jamboo had returned ; for 
these wild men use the sumpit, or blow- pipe, with 
fearful skill, and blow small poisoned arrows, a few 
inches long, with sufficient force to destroy even 
birds upon the wing. 

Sailors of every part of the world have a strong 
spice of the romantic and superstitious in their com- 
position, and the Malays are decidedly no exception 
to the rule. Indeed, the wild and enterprising life 
the majority of them lead, and the many curious phe- 
nomena peculiar to the seas and islands of their 
beautiful archipelago, could never be accounted for by 
an uneducated but observant and highly imaginative 



MALAYAN SUPERSTITIONS. 241 

race, by any other than supernatural agency. Often, 
during the evenings of the blockade, had Jamboo 
recounted to me strange tales of Malayian history: 
in all of them fiction and myth were deliciously 
blended with truth, and facts could be easily appealed 
to in corroboration of all he recounted. The natural 
and supernatural, the miracles of the Romish church, 
Hindoo mythology, and Mahometan fables were 
rolled one into the other, making tales of thrilling 
interest, which I cared not to unravel even had I 
been able to do so. 

There were proofs by the thousand amongst these 
poor fellows of that connection with the world of 
spirits which it seems to be the desire of man in 
every stage of civilisation to assure himself of; and 
I must say, I half began to believe in their assertions 
upon that head; their faith was so earnest and 
child like, that it worked strongly upon even my 
own tutored convictions to the contrary. Children 
never clustered round a winter fire at home with 
more intense credulity and anxious sympathy, than 
did my poor Malays to listen to some woful legend, 
derived from the blood-stained annals of the Por- 
tuguese or Dutch rule in Malayia and its islands. 
As an instance of their childlike belief in spirits, and 
of the strange way in which such an idea is sup- 
it 



242 MALAYAN SUPERSTITIONS. 

ported by optical delusions common to these latitudes, 
I may here recount an event which no more than 
amused me at the time, although the strange way in 
which Jamboo and his men swore to having this day 
seen an " Untoo" brought it back forcibly to my 
mind. 

Just after the blockade commenced, in December 
of the previous year, my gun-boat was lying one 
night close to the southern point of Quedah river. 
The mist fell for awhile like small rain upon us, but 
afterwards, at about ten o'clock, changed into fine 
weather, with heavy murky clouds overhead, through 
the intervals of which we had momentary gleams of 
light from a young moon. The air was cold and 
damp, and I naturally sought shelter under my tent- 
shaped mat, although until midnight I considered 
myself responsible for a vigilant look-out being kept. 
About eleven o'clock, my attention was called to the 
look-out man, who, seated upon the bow-gun, was 
spitting violently, and uttering some expressions as 
if in reproof or defiance, and continued to do so very 
frequently. Ignorant at that time of the character 
of my crew, such a peculiar proceeding made me 
restless. Presently I saw another man go up to 
him ; he pointed in the direction of the jungle, and 
both repeated the conduct which had attracted my 



AN UNTOO, OR SriKIT, SEEN. 243 

attention : the second man then walked below, as if 
glad to get off deck. Fairly puzzled, I walked for- 
ward. The look-out man had got his back turned 
to the jungle, but was every now and then casting 
glances over his shoulder in a very furtive manner, 
and muttering sentences in which Allah was in- 
voked very earnestly. He seemed glad to see me, 
and jumped up to salute me. 

" Anything new ? " I asked. " Prahus ? " 
" Teda, Touhan ; No, sir ! " was the answer ; and 
then seeing me looking towards the jungle, he made 
signs with his head that it was better to look else- 
where. 

I immediately called Jamboo, the interpreter, 

and desired him to ask what the Malay saw in the 
jungle. 

Jamboo, as usual, sat down, black-fellow fashion, 
on his hams, and, half asleep, drawled out my ques- 
tion, and then coolly said — 

et He says he saw a spirit, sir." 

iS Nonsense ! " I replied. " Ask him how ? or 
where ? It may be some Malay scouts." 

Again Jamboo made an effort, and the oracle in- 
formed me, that the man had distinctly seen an Un- 
too, or spirit, moving about among the trees close to 
the water's edge : he assured me he had seen it ever 

R 2 



244 MY CREDULITY TAXED. 

since the mist cleared off, and that he had been 
praying and expectorating, to prevent it approaching 
the gun-boat, as it was a very bad sort of spirit, 
very dangerous, and robed in a long dress. 

I expostulated with Jamboo for repeating such a 
nonsensical tale, and said, " Explain to the man it 
is impossible; and that, if anything, it must be an 
animal, or a man. 

Jamboo, however, assured me, very earnestly, that 
Malays often saw (( Untoos ; " that they were 
some of them dangerous, some harmless ; and that 
if I looked, the Malay said, I could see it as well 
as himself. 

I accordingly sat down by the man, and looked 
intently in the same direction. We were about one 
hundred and fifty yards off the jungle; the water was 
just up to its edge ; among the roots of trees, and 
for a few yards in, there were small ridges of white 
shingle and broken shells, which receded into dark- 
ness, or shone out in distinct relief as the moonlight 
struck upon them. 

When these patches of white shone out, I pointed 
immediately, and asked if that was what he saw. 

" No, no ! " said the Malay ; and Jamboo added, 
u He says he will tell you when he sees it." 



THE SPIRITS OF THE JUNGLE. 245 

Suddenly he touched me, and pointing earnestly, 
exclaimed, " Look ! look ! " 

I did so, and an odd tremor, I am not ashamed to 
say, ran through my frame, as I caught sight of what 
looked like the figure of a female with drapery 
thrown around her, as worn by Hindoo women : it 
moved out from the shade of the forest, and halted at 
one of the hillocks of white sand, not more than 300 
yards distant. I rubbed my eyes ! whilst the inter- 
preter called on a Romish saint, and the Malay spat 
vigorously, as if an unclean animal had crossed his 
path. Again I looked, and again I saw the same 
form : it had passed a dark patch, and was slowly 
crossing another opening in the forest. 

Feeling the folly of yielding to the impression of 
reality which the illusion was certainly creating on 
my mind, I walked away, and kept the Malay em- 
ployed in different ways until midnight : he, however, 
every now and then spat vehemently, and cursed all 
evil spirits with true Mahometan fervour. 

In the middle- watch the " Untoo " was again seen, 
but as it did not board us, — as Jadee assured me 
" Untoos " of a wicked description had been known 
to do, — I conjectured it was some good fairy, and at 
any rate we were not again troubled with an Untoo 

b 3 



246 ON SUPERSTITIONS IN GENERAL. 

until it appeared to the fishing party in the Setoue 
river. 

These spectral illusions are not peculiar to the 
jungles of Malayia; there is no part of the world 
where they do not exist in some form or other; and 
I, for my part, am not desirous of robbing them of 
their mystery : there is a poetry, a romance, about 
them which invests with awe or interest some wild 
spot or lonely scene that otherwise would be un- 
heeded. 

The phantom-ship which will not furl her royals 
to the storms of the Cape of Good Hope, and 
astonishes the tempest-tossed seaman as she glimmers 
amidst the clouds, sea, and mist of the great Southern 
Ocean, is too charming a spirit for us to be easily 
robbed of ; nay, where is the sailor who has long sailed 
in those seas, and not seen her ! The spirit of the 
old pirate is still observed, in stormy nights when 
the sea-bird cannot even keep the sea, to row his 
tiny skiff through the combing waves, visiting his 
hidden treasures in Nantucket bay. Among the sun- 
burnt reefs and on the lonely mangrove-covered 
isles of the West Indies and Gulf of Mexico, the 
restless bodies of the buccaneers of old are still 
8een to haunt the scenes of their former crimes. 
The broken-spirited Peruvian and the degenerate 



TIIE CHARMS OF SUPERSTITION. 247 

Spaniard attest that on the lofty table -lands of the 
Bolivian Andes, east of Lake Titicaca, the phantom 
forms of her departed kings still march by night, and 
watch over the vast treasures that they there con- 
cealed from the avarice of their conquerors. These 
are a few of the many examples which might be 
adduced of a general belief in the supernatural, of a 
belief in the connection between this gross earth and 
the world of spirits, whether bad or blessed. I care 
not to explain them away; for there is far more 
pleasure than fear in the very possibility that such 
things may be. 

Cold philosophy and the sceptic's science may 
build up walls of impossibilities, and steel our hearts 
to the belief that those who have laboured for good 
or evil upon earth shall return no more to encourage 
or to warn us in our wayfaring here. Who will 
believe them, but those that are of them? Rather 
let us rejoice that, even if it be an infirmity of 
imaginative minds, we are blest in believing that 
" the beloved and true-hearted come to visit us once 



more." 



" Mortal," they softly say, 
" Peace to thy heart ! 

We, too, yes, Mortal, 
Have been as thou art ; 

b 4 



248 MUSQUITOES AND SAND-FLIES. 

Hope-lifted, doubt-depressed 

Seeing in part ; 
Tried, troubled, tempted, 

Sustained, as thou art." 



The closing shades of night brought off from the 
adjacent jungle such clouds of musquitoes and sand- 
flies, that we, at any rate, were soon recalled from 
dreams of spirits and " Untoos," to the vile realities 
of mother earth. The crew lighted pans of cocoa- 
nut husks, and set them along the windward side of 
the vessel, so that we were enveloped in a pungent 
smoke which threatened to bring on ophthalmia ; but 
still I was a thin-skinned treat the wretches had not 
perhaps ever before partaken of: they pierced through 
my light cotton garments, and I felt morally certain 
Jadee would only discover the husk of a midshipman 
by the morning, as all that was succulent was fast 
being abstracted. I had promised to wait until the 
morrow, for the purpose of shooting some peacocks 
which had been seen, but my resolution failed me, 
and I determined to start at once if the night-breeze, 
which was fast freshening, did not mend matters. 
My attention was, however, soon attracted to a more 
important object. The land-breeze, as usual, came 



THE VILLAGE ON FIRE. 249 

with a smart gust, and almost simultaneously the 
deserted village burst into flames in two or three 
places. AVe went immediately to quarters, and pre- 
pared for an attack, fancying, from the sudden way 
in which the fire commenced, that it was the act of 
some of the banditti of whom the chieftainess had 
warned me. 

The flames spread with awful rapidity: everything 
was well calculated to promote ignition — houses, grass, 
leaves were as dry as three months of a broiling sun 
could make them ; in fifteen minutes, one broad 
wave of fire had enveloped the whole village, and 
being to windward of the gun-boat, we had to get 
the night awnings down, and drop the vessel very 
expeditiously out of the way. This done, I landed 
two parties of men, ten in number each ; one party 
to try and stay the fire, the other, armed, to resist 
any of the " Orang-jahat," if they were about. 

Sad as the scene was at first, it became truly ter- 
rible when the flames extended themselves to the 
tops of the cocoa-nut trees ! — the felt-like substance 
between the roots of the leaves, as well as the leaves 
themselves, catching fire, and communicating from 
one to the other, until the whole plantation resembled 
a row of gigantic torches flaming and waving in the 



250 FLAMING COCOA-NUT TREES. 

air. We were of course unable to make any further 
attempt to stay the conflagration, and some had 
narrow escapes of their lives from the fierce rapidity 
with which the fire leapt from one object to the 
other, and licked up with its fiery tongue everything 
as it went. 

No natives nor Siamese were to be seen in any 
direction ; and I afterwards pretty correctly ascer- 
tained the origin of the fire. Under every one of 
the houses, which, as usual, were raised some three 
feet from the earth, the natives of Tamelan had been 
in the habit of throwing the husks of the rice used 
daily in their families, forming, on the day they 
left, very moderate-sized heaps, and when they de- 
parted, the embers from their hearths had been 
thrown on those heaps of husks. So long as it 
was calm, the ignited husks of rice had merely 
smouldered, but directly the breeze sprang up, they 
were fanned into flames, and in a few minutes, as I 
have described, wrapt the whole village in a sheet of 
fire. 

The people of Tamelan had evidently determined 
that their conquerors should not dwell in the houses 
their industry had constructed; and my Malays 
seconded them, by not pointing out to me the conse- 



TRACES OF MAN RAPIDLY OBLITERATED. 251 

quencc likely to arise from leaving the smouldering 
fires in the deserted village. Next day, the sun rose 
on a row of calcined trees, and a patch of burnt 
fragments. Tamelan no longer existed, and the next 
monsoon, with its rains, would hand over to the do- 
minion of the jungle the very spot on which it stood. 
The footsteps of man are readily obliterated by the 
rapid growth of Eastern vegetation : its action is to 
be compared to nothing but that of the ocean, which 
bears but the impress of the stamp of the steamship 
for a minute, and then laughs and rolls on, scorning 
the pigmy that has crossed its surface. So the green 
forests of these lands of rank vegetation close in and 
wave over race after race of men, who battle with it 
for awhile, and pass away, leaving no more traces 
of their existence in the perishable records of this 
earth, than does the keel of the ship over the sur- 
face of the waters. 

In the forests of Malayia, the traveller already 
finds remains of temples and inscriptions, hidden in 
creepers, vines, and jungle-grass: they have not even 
a tradition attached to them, and the best-read 
Eastern historian cannot decide whether the once 
great kingdom of Pegu extended its boundaries thus 
far, or whether these ruins are those of some ancient 



252 TEACES OF MAN RAPIDLY OBLITERATED. 

Malay nation, winch held a sway in this peninsula 
before a pressure from the north forced them to push 
throughout the archipelago, nay, even Polynesia, for 
a resting-place, extinguishing, in their character of 
conquerors, the negro race which undoubtedly was 
the aboriginal one of those islands. 



A CREW OF WUETCIIED FUGITIVES. 253 



CHAP. XIX. 

A Crew of wretched Fugitives. — " Orang-laut," or Sea 
Gipsies. — Low Civilisation of the " Orang-laut." — Total 
Absence of all Religious Feeling. — Their Mode of Living. 
— The personal Appearance of Orang-laut. — Dearth of 
fresh Water. — Ordered to procure Water up the River. — 
Parlis and Pirate Fleet. — Interview with Haggi Loung. — 
Permission granted to procure Water. — Tom West's Ad- 
dress to the Malays. — Paddle up the River. — Tropical 
Malayan Scenery. — Pass Kanah. — Obtain fresh Water. 

Let us return, however, to Taraelan. I filled my 
water-casks with all the water that was procurable, 
and started out of the river. When crossing Setoue 
Bay a prahu was seen coasting along the edge of the 
jungle, and after a short chase we caught her. The 
people in her were devoid of the usual Malay 
clothing, and in a most abject condition ; they de- 
scribed themselves as Orang-Patani, or people of 
Patani (a Malayu- Siamese province on the opposite 
coast), and said they were flying before the Siamese 
army. 

My Malays owned they were countrymen, but 



254 ORANG-LAUT, OR SEA GIPSIES. 

spoke of them as barbarians of the lowest caste, 
pariahs of Malay ia, and summed them up by the 
title of Bad People, or Gipsies, who make war alike 
by petty theft upon Malays or Siamese. 

The specimens before us were decidedly very 
objectionable in every way : they were dirty to a 
degree, with a most villanou3 expression of coun- 
tenance. After their first fear wore off, the women 
exhibited a most shameless want of modesty, and the 
men evinced a total absence of all jealous feeling for 
their wives or regard for their children ; and yet, when 
one poor wretch offered me his two children for a 
half-bushel measure of rice, I could not help thinking 
their vices were the result of their sad, sad load of 
want and misery ; and, giving them rice without 
taking their unfortunate offspring, we sent them on 
their way rejoicing. 

These fugitives I believe to be identical with 
the Orang-laut, or Men of the Sea, spoken of by the 
earliest as well as modern writers when describing 
the different Malay races. Their proper home is in 
prahus, or canoes, although some of them occasionally 
settle upon the borders of the sea. Like the sons of 
Ishmael, their hand is against every man, and every 
man's hand against them. The Malay of more 
civilised communities holds them in contempt ; and 



ORANG-LAUT, OR SEA GIPSIES. 255 

he is the only man who can be expected to have any 
sympathies with them. They are found haunting in 
small groups — for their numbers do not entitle them 
to the appellation of tribes — the neighbourhood of 
our flourishing colonies, as well as the most secluded 
and barren places in Malayia. They are usually 
found east of the Straits of Malacca, although, as I 
have just shown, they reach the western side some- 
times. Under fifty different names, they are known 
to the inhabitants of Siam, Java, Sumatra, Borneo, 
and the Moluccas, and in all cases bear a bad reputa- 
tion. 

The best description of them is given by a Mr. 
Thomson, a gentleman who has written on the archi- 
pelago. I take the liberty of transcribing it entire, 
and can testify to the truth of the account, in so far 
as they came under my own observation. 

" This tribe takes its name, Salatar, from a creek 
in the island of Singapore, on the narrow strait 
which divides it from the mainland, not above eight 
miles distant from that flourishing and civilised 
British emporium. Its numbers are about 200, living 
in forty boats or canoes ; and their range in quest of 
subsistence does not exceed thirty square miles. 
Their language is the Malayan, and considerable 
pains were taken to elicit any words foreign to that 



256 STATE OF CIVILISATION. 

language, but without success. As a proof of their 
possessing the same language as the Malays, I may 
mention that the children were heard, when playing, 
to converse in this language, and were perfectly 
understood by the Malays amongst our crew. 

" They are possessed of no weapons, either offen- 
sive or defensive. Their minds do not find a higher 
range than necessity compels : the satisfying of hunger 
is their only pursuit. Of water they have abun- 
dance without search. With the sarkab, or fish- 
spear, and the parang, or chopper, as their only 
implements, they eke out a miserable subsistence 
from the stores of the rivers and forests. They 
neither dig nor plant, and yet live nearly independent 
of their fellow-men ; for to them, the staple of life in 
the East, rice, is a luxury. Tobacco they procure 
by the barter of fish, and a few marketables collected 
from the forests and coral reefs. Of esculent roots, 
they have the prion and kalana, both bulbous, and 
not unlike coarse yams. Of fruits, they eat the 
tampii, kledang, and buroh, when they come in 
season ; and of animals, they hunt the wild hog, but 
refrain from snakes, ignanas, and monkeys. 

" On their manners and customs I must need be 
short, as only long acquaintance with their prejudices 
and domestic feelings could afford a clue to the im- 



ORANG-LAUTS HAVE NO RELIGION. 257 

pulse of their actions. Of a Creator they have not 
the slightest comprehension, a fact so difficult to 
believe, when we find that the most degraded of the 
human race, in other quarters of the globe, have an 
intuitive idea of this unerring and primary truth im- 
printed on their minds, that I took the greatest care 
to find a slight image of the Deity within the chaos 
of their thoughts, however degraded such might be, 
but was disappointed. They knew neither the God 
nor the devil of the Christians or Mahometans, al- 
though they confessed they had been told of such ; 
nor any of the demi-gods of Hindoo mythology, many 
of whom were recounted to them. 

" In the three great epochs of their individual life, 
we consequently found no rites nor ceremonies en- 
acted. At birth, the child is only welcomed to the 
world by the mother's joy : at marriage, a mouthful of 
tobacco and one chupah (gallon) handed to one another 
confirm the hymeneal tie : at death, the deceased are 
wrapped in their garments, and committed to the 
parent earth, c The women weep a little, and then 
leave the spot,' were the words of our simple nar- 
rator. Of paris, dewas, mambangs, and other light 
spirits that haunt each mountain, rock, and tree, in 
the Malayan imagination, they did not know the 
names, nor had they anything to be afraid of, as 

S 



258 ORANG-LAUTS' MODE OF LIVING. 

they themselves said, than * the pirates of Galang, 
who are men like themselves.' With this I was 
forced to be contented, and teased them no more on 
the subject. 

* They do not practise circumcision, nor any 
other Mohammedan rite. Their women intermarry 
with the Malays not unfrequently : they also give 
their women to the Chinese; and an old wo- 
man told us of her having been united to in- 
dividuals of both nations at an early period of her 
life. Their tribe, though confining its range within 
the limits of thirty square miles, may still be con- 
sidered of a very wandering kind. In their sampans 
(canoes), barely sufficient to float their loads, they 
skirt the mangroves, collecting their food from the 
shores and forests as they proceed, exhausting one 
spot and then searching for another. To one accus- 
tomed to the comforts and artificial wants of civilised 
life, theirs, as a contrast, appears to be extreme. 
Huddled up in a small boat hardly measuring twenty 
feet in length, they find all the domestic comforts 
they are in want of. At one end is seen the fire- 
place ; in the middle are the few utensils they may 
be in possession of, and at the other end, beneath a 
mat not exceeding six feet in length, is found the 
sleeping apartment of a family often counting five 



PERSONAL APPEARANCE OF ORANG-LAUTS. 259 

or six, together with a cat and a dog. Under this 
they find shelter from the dews and rains of the 
night and heat of the day. Even the Malays, in 
pointing out these stinted quarters, cried out, ' How 
miserable!' But of this the objects of their com- 
miseration were not aware. In these canoes they 
have enough for all their wants. 

" Their children sport on the shore in search of 
shell-fish at low water ; and, during high water, they 
may be seen climbing the mangrove branches, and 
dashing from thence into the water with all the 
life and energy of children of a colder clime, at 
once affording us proof that even they have their 
joys. 

" The personal appearance of these people is un- 
prepossessing, and their deportment lazy and slovenly, 
united to much filthiness of person. The middle 
portion of the body of men and women is generally 
covered by a coarse wrapper made from the bark of 
the trap tree (a species of Atrocarpus), which extends 
from the navel to the knee. The women affected a 
slight degree of modesty at first approach, which 
soon gave way. The locks of the men are bound 
up with a tie of cloth, and sometimes by the Malay 
sapu-tangan (kerchief) ; those of the women fall 
in wild luxuriance over their face and shoulders. 

s 2 



260 DEARTH OF FRESH WATER. 

Their children go entirely naked until the age of 
puberty." 

That I should return empty handed to Parlis, 
in so far as a large supply of water was concerned, 
gave great cause of uneasiness to the officer in 
charge of the blockading flotilla; for it was self- 
evident that, without water, it would be utterly 
impossible for us to maintain a rigid blockade, and 
just now it became highly important to the safety 
and success of our allies that we should do so. 
Mr. Drake*, the senior mate, sent me off imme- 
diately to tell Captain Warren, who was then in the 
" Hyacinth, " watching the channel which exists 
between the Lancavas islands and Parlis, and to 
beg a little water from him. The ship was, how- 
ever, running short, and Captain Warren was deter- 
mined not to be foiled, by having to quit his post 
at such an important moment for water. He there- 
fore desired me to tell Mr. Drake that we must not 
come again to the ship for water ; it must be foraged 
for, and that water must be taken if it could not 
be obtained in any other manner. 

One of the other gun-boats was despatched to seek 
water elsewhere, and I was ordered to start next 

* The present Commander Thomas G. Drake, R.N". 



ORDERED TO TROCURE WATER. 261 

morning in a large sampan, with a couple of empty 
casks, to procure fresh water above the reach of the 
tide in Parlis river. My perfect confidence in the 
Malays, in spite of Mahomet Alee's threats, enabled 
me to look forward to my cruise into the very heart 
of their territory without any feeling but that of 
great curiosity, and a pardonable degree of pride at 
being the first to see all the war-prahus. 

Early in the forenoon I started, in a good sampan, 
with one English sailor, an interpreter, and six 
picked Malays, all well armed ; but their muskets 
and pistols were placed where they would be ready 
for use without attracting attention. The flood-tide 
ran strong, and we swept with it rapidly up the 
stream ; the first mile or two was very monotonous, 
the banks being for the most part mangrove, and 
another tree which seems to delight in an equally 
amphibious life. At a curve in the river we came 
suddenly on a stockade, and, being hailed imme- 
diately by some men on guard, I felt to what 
a thorough test we were going to put Malay 
chivalrv. 

The stockade across the stream was well and 
neatly constructed, having a couple of tidal booms 
fitted in such a way that the guard could at any 

s 3 



262 PARLIS AND THE PIRATE FLEET. 

moment, during either flood or ebb tide, stop up the 
only passage ; and on either hand, some hundred 
yards back from the river, rose conical-shaped hills, 
on whose summits formidable batteries, constructed 
of heavy timber, commanded the stream in every 
direction. 

The pangleman, or officer, at the guard-house 
smiled when I told him I was going up the river for 
water, and said he had no objection to my pro- 
ceeding to Parlis to ask for permission ; but, as to 
obtaining it, he laughed, and said all would depend 
upon the humour I should find Datoo Mahomet Alee 
in. Another three miles of fine open forest replete 
with Oriental interest now occurred, and the country 
improved in appearance after we had passed a spur 
of picturesque hills, through which the river had 
forced its way. Our approach to Parlis town was 
proclaimed by a line of war-prahus moored to either 
bank. The rapidity of the current, as well as my 
anxiety to reach the fresh-water point of the river, 
gave us but a flying glance at this much-talked-of 
and long-wished- for pirate fleet; and, besides which, 
I felt it desirable not to appear as if on a recon- 
noitring expedition. 

They were handsome-looking craft, not very nu- 



INTERVIEW WITH IIAGGI LOUNG. 263 

mcrous, but with fine long guns mounted in their 
bows: they had but few men in each of them, 
though otherwise ready for sea. 

Of Parlis we could not see much beyond that it 
was situated upon a plain on the south side of the 
river, and appeared capable of containing four or 
five thousand inhabitants. AYe pulled in for a light 
wharf constructed of bamboos, whereon an armed 
Malay had hailed to know what we wanted ; and 
he, in reply to my answer that we wished to see 
the Datoo, said that was his house. I landed with 
two or three men, and, surrounded by a crowd of 
armed Malays, who hastened from all sides, was 
escorted to Haggi Loung. 

That worthy received me, and said that Datoo 
Mahomet Alee was absent with his men fio;htino; the 
Siamese : but what might be my errand ? 

I told him I was sent by my senior officer for 
water. 

The Haggi laughed heartily for so holy a man, 
and having, much to my disgust, recalled to my un- 
willing recollection the visit he made me on a former 
occasion, asked how Mr. Barclay and Mr. Stewart 
were ? 

Bother the fellow's memory I I thought : he will 

s 4 



264 PERMISSION TO PROCURE WATER. 

next remember Jadec, and then, maybe, his aubsive 
opinion of Mahomet Alee's mother. The Haggi 
was inclined to be satirical, and asked if it was 
the custom of " white men " to cut off salt and 
powder from their enemies, and then to go to them 
for water? 

I said I did not know ; but that I supposed my 
senior officer had been given to believe no difficulty 
would be made, or otherwise I should not, assuredly, 
have been sent. And then I pointed to the tide, 
and asked him not to detain me, for I wanted to 
return with my load of water upon the ebb. 

The Haggi with good humour told me to go : he 
would not stop me, but warned me to be careful, 
as all the country was in arms, and neither he or 
Datoo Mahomet Alee could be responsible for our 
safety. 

That was all 1 wanted: so I bowed, and started 
back to the boat. Numbers of armed Malays — some 
of them, from their beautiful creeses and spears, 
doubtless men of importance — thronged the Haggi's 
anteroom and the pier; a few of them scowled in 
an unfriendly maimer, and some of the younger 
game-cocks ruffled up, as if anxious to throw a 
feather with my men. I kept an eye upon them, 
however, and got all safe down, without any farther 



TOM WEST'S ADDRESS TO THE MALAYS. 265 

interchange of civilities than a short address, which 
my English bodyguard made them off the end of the 
pier. 

Turning round upon the crowd, and eyeing them 
with a look which made those nearest to him back a 
little, as if wishing to increase the intervening dis- 
tance, he said — 

" Hah ! you 're mighty sarcy, you yellow-faced 
beggars ; but just you come down, Jack, with your 
prahus to the mouth of this here river of your'n " 
(here my bodyguard performed a pantomime, point- 
ing at their vessels), " and then, as sure as my name 's 
Tom West, if we do not give you plenty to eat " 
(here he added the Malay for eating), " darn me, say 
I'm a Dutchman." 

" Get in the boat, sir, immediately ! " I shouted. 

" Hi, hi !" said Tom West, as he jumped into the 
boat ; " but I likes to give a set of sarcy beggars 
a bit of my mind, sir. — Lor' bless you!" continued 
he, smiling derisively at the young Malays who 
were crowing on the pier ; " Lor' bless you ! you are 
nice young men indeed ! Please God and Lord 
Mount Edgecumbe, one of these days I'll have some 
of you by the scruff of the neck, and, if I don't 
give you a hug, say I never hailed from the west 
country !" 



266 PADDLE UP THE RIVER. 

Tom West, like all sailors, evidently took it for 
granted they must understand English, or, if they 
did not, that they ought to do so ; and, when I ex- 
plained to him that it was folly speaking to people 
who could not comprehend a word he said, he re- 
plied, " Ah ! sir, they are like their country mon- 
keys ; they never understands you until you thrashes 
them : give me a dozen shipmates with our pin- 
nace's stretchers* in Parlis, and I'm blest if we 
w r ould not soon make them understand English, and 
talk it too!" 

Unprepared to dispute this theory, I allowed the 
subject to drop, and we soon swept out of sight of 
Parlis, the Malays in my crew striking up their 
usual paddle song, each in turn repeating a short 
verse in a high key, sentimental or witty, and the 
whole breaking into a chorus which ran somewhat 
thus — 

Ah ! ya-no — nasi, na no 
Ah ! ya no! 

and sounded very prettily, while the movements of 



* A boat's stretcher is a piece of wood which goes across 
the bottom of a boat, to enable the rowers to throw a greater 
weight on their oars. It is a favourite weapon of offence with 
English boats' crews. 



TItOPICAL MALAYAN SCENERY. 267 

their bodies and stroke of their paddles kept time to 
the tune. 

The scenery improved rapidly. We appeared to 
be approaching a range of bills which would bar our 
farther ascent, and I expected every moment to 
come to a fall or a rapid ; instead of which we 
swept through another gapway in the hills, similar 
to the one where the stockade had been erected, 
and then we entered into the broad valley of 
Quedah ; for in the far distance the lofty and pic- 
turesque peaks of the Malayan Ghauts stretched in 
a north and south direction, with nothing interven- 
ing. The forest was open, and, although the long 
drought had told somewhat on the leaves of the trees 
as well as the grass and underwood, the varied and 
mellowed tint of withered vegetation softened and 
added to the beautiful variety of the scene. 

Birds were in places very numerous, and a species 
of pheasant ran along the banks of the river as if it 
was never fired at. Schools of monkeys and nume- 
rous alligators, with the glimpse of a couple of deer, 
showed what abundance of sport there was to be had. 
I had, however, too anxious a duty to perform to wait 
for shooting bird or beast, except in one instance, 
when I observed a large female alligator, with two 
young ones, not two feet long, lying by her, close to 



208 WE PASS KANGAIT. 

the bank. Desirous of shooting the dam, so as to 
capture the babies alive, I fired and struck her, as 
I fancied, mortally, for she sprang half round, and 
there lay champing her teeth together in a savage 
manner, as if in agony. There were several other 
alligators about, and I proposed to the men in my 
boat to get out and chase them away, as I had often 
seen them do at the mouth of the river. But they 
would not hear of it, and assured me it was a very 
different thing to attack alligators that were accus- 
tomed to men, as these brutes were ; besides which, 
fresh water always made them more savage and dan- 
gerous. Unwilling to be detained, I pushed on as 
hurriedly as possible; and when we had gone, by 
my calculation, a distance of sixteen miles from the 
entrance of the river, another town, called "Kangah," 
hove in sight. 

Desirous of making the most of the favourable 
tide, I determined, at all risks, to visit Kangah 
on my way down ; and except that a few children 
ran out and gazed upon us, our appearance at- 
tracted little curiosity. A mile or so above the 
town, we arrived opposite some powder-mills, where 
a Malay sentry hailed us, and having told him 
we had Haggi Loung's permission to go for water, 
he did not detain us. 



WE OBTAIN FRESH WATER. 269 

This fellow's confidence in his chief amused me. I 
asked him if Datoo Mahomet Alee was at Kangah. 

" No," he replied, "he is on his march to Quedah!" 

" How about the Siamese?" my interpreter asked. 

"Pish!" said the sentinel; "the Siamese! they 
will all be destroyed ! " 

We did not wait for further information, and, 
shortly afterwards, finding the water perfectly fresh, 
we being then about eighteen miles from the sea, 
we laid on our paddles, and filled our casks, bathed, 
washed, and drank w r ater, with all the abandon of 
men who had long been strangers to the luxury of 
fresh water in large quantities. 



270 THE LADIES OF KANGAH BATHING. 



CHAP. XX. 

The Ladles of Kangak bathing. — Halt to lunch at Kangah. 
— Kangah, its Situation. — Mode of constructing Malay 
Houses. — The Mosque. — The Bazaar and its Occupants. — 
Arrival of armed Men. — Return to the Boat. — Praise- 
worthy Fidelity of the Malays. — Malay Independence of 
Character. — The Pleasures of Memory. — A Malay Family 
Scene. — Return to Parlis. — Pulo Quetam. ~ Trade during 
Blockade. 

Our casks filled, we turned our head down the 
stream and dropped down to Kangah, where I pur- 
posed having our noon- day meal, and waiting for the 
tide to have ebbed sufficiently to ensure us a rapid 
passage down to the gun-boats. At a point just 
above the town, where some lofty trees threw a plea- 
sant shade half across the stream, all the female 
population of Kangah, as well as the children, were 
enjoying a bath. We passed through the scene of 
their enjoyment ; and, to say the least of it, it was 
amazingly novel, and carried one back to the days of 
Captain Cook in a very abrupt manner. The mar- 
ried women had on dark-blue cotton dresses, but the 



THE LADIES OF KANGAII BATHING. 271 

rest were in that cool attire which artists usually 
represent our first parents to have indulged in in 
Paradise. Gallantry compels me to allow that con- 
scious innocence formed a very charming mantle to 
the young ladies. A contrary and depraved state 
was fully exemplified in Tom West, who actually 
blushed through his bronzed cheeks, and expressed 
his opinion with "Dang ye! you're a rum lot. I 
wonder what my old mother would say, if she could 
only see ye. I wish Parson Hawker* was here!" 
My Malays, however, paddled through these water- 
nymphs, without uttering a word or making a gesture 
which could be construed into anything like disre- 
spect. Whether this propriety arose from a proper 
and generous feeling at intruding upon the privacy 
of the women, or from a knowledge that any insult, 
real or imaginary, would be quickly resented by the 
ready creeses of the kinsmen of these ladies, I know 
not ; but whatever the motive, it was equally a 
source of gratification to myself, and the comparison 
I drew in my own mind as to w T hat would have been 
the conduct, under similar circumstances, of six of 

* Parson Hawker is an imaginary clergyman, who, the west- 
country sailors assert used to marry them, per force, to the 
Devonport lasses, and exact his fee in savings out of their naval 
rations — such as flour, pork, &c. 



272 KANGAH, ITS SITUATION. 

our own English seamen, was not in favour of the 
latter. Choosing a convenient part of the river bank 
opposite " Kangah," we made our sampan fast, and 
proceeded to cook rice for lunch. A moderate crowd 
collected to look at the white men, who were Tom 
West and myself; but they were civil, and behaved 
very differently from those of Parlis. 

Some person in the town sent me down a basket 
of delicious mangoes, and others lent us some mats 
to shield ourselves from the rays of the sun, which 
poured down with equatorial fierceness upon our ex- 
posed boat. All the inhabitants were most anxious 
to know how they would be treated by our block- 
ading force, if obliged to fly before the Siamese ; and 
it was very evident, the description my Malays gave 
them of our kindness to those who fled from Quedah 
and Tamelan made a favourable impression. 

Kangah stands on the north bank of the Parlis 
river, and, like other towns in this country, has only 
just enough clear ground round it, to afford room for 
the growth of such rice, fruit, and vegetables as were 
required for the consumption of the inhabitants — 
the unreclaimed jungle sweeping round the cultivated 
land and orchards in a great curve, whose radius might 
possibly be a mile and a half. 

The houses were for the most part detached, 



INSTRUCTION OF MALAY HOUSES. 273 

standing in little gardens, or amongst pretty clusters 
of cocoa-nut and Penang (or beetle-nut) palms, as 
well as many other trees peculiar to this country : 
not the least pleasing of these was the graceful ban- 
nana which overshadowed almost every abode, and 
its deliciously cold-looking dark-green leaf was very 
grateful to the sight. 

It is almost impossible to convey a good idea of 
the beauty and neatness of abodes entirely con- 
structed of wood, bamboo, and matting or leaves. 
Those of Kangah, although far above the river, were, 
according to the constant rule, built upon piles three 
to four feet high; possibly this might be a necessary 
measure for the rainy season, but at that time, 
when the earth was baked as hard as rock, it seemed 
an act of supererogation. They, however, were ge- 
nerally oblong in the ground-plan, having a gallery 
extending along each of the long sides, to which a 
primitive ladder gave access from the ground. The 
floor (for each house was only one story high) con- 
sisted of strips of bamboo, sufficiently strong to bear 
the weight, but giving a pleasant spring to the 
tread ; over these bamboos, which were perhaps 
an inch apart, and kept so by a tranverse " snaking"' 
of strips of rat an, neat mats were spread, their 
number, fineness, and beauty depending upon th< 

T 



274 MODE OF CONSTRUCTING MALAY HOUSES. 

wealth of the owner and the skill of his women. 
The walls were constructed of cocoa-nut and other 
palm leaves, secured with such cunning and neatness 
as to be perfectly wind and water tight, and at the 
same time pleasing to the eye. The roofs were 
somewhat high and peaked, betokening heavy rains, 
and with broad, overhanging eaves, which added 
to the picturesque appearance of the buildings, and 
reminded me strongly of the "chalets" in Switzer- 
land. In some cases the houses were divided into 
two or more apartments, and the balcony then served 
as a means of communication between one room and 
the other, besides being at all times the favourite 
lounge of the inhabitants. In the centre of the 
town a mosquelike building rose amongst the trees, 
and proved that, although the many pretty houses 
scattered about might be as evanescent as their 
fragile construction indicated, nevertheless, the site 
of Kangah had, both in Siamese as well as in 
Malay annals, been always considered that of a 
town. 

Whilst the rice was cooking, I thought I might as 
well run up and see the town : a boy volunteered to 
show Jamboo and me the bazaar and Datoo Ma- 
homet Alee's elephants, and we accordingly started 
with a couple of followers. 



THE BAZAAR, AND ITS OCCUPANTS. 275 

The bazaar consisted of one narrow street, running 
at right angles to the river. Each shop had a 
sloping and open front, well shielded from the heat of 
the sun, on which was displayed the thousand strong- 
smelling fruits and vegetables, the gaudy Man- 
chester prints, glaring red and yellow handkerchiefs, 
pretty mats and neat kagangs, piles of rice and tubs 
of ghee, handsome creeses, and formidable swords 
or choppers, which may be seen in all bazaars of 
Singapore, Malacca, or Penang. There were Ma- 
hometan natives of the Madras Presidency, swathed 
in turbans and robes of calico — the embodied forms of 
the Great Moguls which figure on our playing-cards ; 
greasy, black, and very strong-smelling Klings chat- 
tered, lied, and cheated as Klings only can do ; 
Malays swaggered about, decked out in gay attire, 
and sporting beautiful arms and silver-mounted 
spears, looking so saucy and bold, that one felt half 
inclined to pat them on the back, and say, " Well 
done ! " for they knew as well as we did that their 
hour had struck, and all the scene would soon be 
dissipated like a dream, and they be pirating else- 
where. A few Chinese, the Jews of the Eastern 
Archipelago*, were there also. They were so ob- 

* It is but justice to these industrious emigrants to say that 
they have been invaluable as labourers, agriculturists, artisans, 

t 2 



276 THE BAZAAR, AND ITS OCCUPANTS. 

sequious, so anxious to attract the attention of a 
British midshipman, that he, with all the dignity of 
that proud caste, allowed them to change a dollar for 
him. The Chinese were mostly money-changers. 
The insolent contumely they endured at the hands of 
the Malays struck me much. The natives of India, 
when ill-treated, chattered like a nest of rooks. Not 
so the Chinese : they bore it with cringing and 
shrinking ; but one could see, by the twinkle of their 
little glittering eyes, that they only abided their 
time to bite the heel that bruised them. No one 
could have supposed, from the scene in the bazaar, 
that fifteen thousand Siamese were close at hand, 
ready to impale, disembowel, or play any of the 
many pranks I have elsewhere related, upon each or 
all of those before me. 

People, however, in the East, live with their lives 
in their hands ; and, most of all, such a floating popu- 
lation as that of Kangah, consisting of pirates and 
those bloodsuckers who lived upon them, wretches 
who fattened alike upon them and their prey. 

I now proposed to go to the elephants, which, from 
our guide's description, were at the other end of the 
town. We had just disengaged ourselves from the 

and merchants, throughout our colonies ; and better-conducted 
subjects Her Majesty Queen Victoria no where possesses. 



ARRIVAL OF ARMED MEN. 277 

crowd, heat, and strong smells of the bazaar, when a 
general commotion occurred in the town, which had 
hitherto exhibited no signs of life except in the 
bazaar. Boys ran along screaming, women ran out 
in the balconies, and appeared very excited ; and soon 
afterwards a large body of Malays, armed to the 
teeth, covered with dust, and looking much wayworn, 
passed rapidly along, marching, however, without 
order or military array. 

I was informed through Jamboo, that it was 
impossible for me to visit the royal stables to-day, 
as some important event had evidently just taken 
place, and a great chief — possibly the redoubted 
Datoo himself — had arrived. I did not much care 
about pushing the point, as I was on shore on my 
own responsibility ; and Haggi Loung's warning left 
me no excuse but that of curiosity, if we got into a 
scrape. One of my men now sidled up to me, and 
said that some of the natives were getting up a 
report that I was a spy, and that one of them had 
threatened him. I decided to return to my boat ; 
and, from expressions which were uttered by those 
around, found it was high time I did so. Indeed, 
I am not sure we should have escaped without a 
scuffle, had not a venerable-looking man joined 
us, and, by his authority, enforced a little more re- 

t 3 



278 FIDELITY OF THE MALAYS. 

spect from the rabble. He, however, though ex- 
tremely civil to me, told a deliberate falsehold, and said 
that the excitement arose from " the Malays under 
Datoo Mahomet Alee having retaken Quedah ! ,! 
whereas the truth was, that the Siamese were again 
victorious, and marching down on the good town of 
Kangah. 

The fidelity of the Malays generally to their chiefs 
was, in my opinion, most praiseworthy : they never 
betrayed any secrets, and never were otherwise than 
sanguine of eventual success. The most unfortunate, 
and even those apparently discontented, never prof- 
fered intelligence ; and if cross-examined, invariably 
told us tales which we afterwards would discover 
had been invented to satisfy our inquisitiveness, with- 
out betraying their countrymen or chiefs. Men who 
had escaped from the surprise and massacre of Alle- 
gagou, or the horrors of the march upon Sangorah, 
never upbraided their general, Mahomet Type-etam, 
but spoke of him as a very brave although harsh 
man ; and one could not help recognising this valu- 
able trait of fidelity in the Malays, and expressing a 
hope that in time we should find a way of enlisting 
that feeling generally on the side of their British 
rulers.* That they were hot-blooded and impetuous, 

* The Ceylon rifle regiments are a most valuable corps 
composed of Malays famous for their fidelity to their British 



MALAY INDEPENDENCE OF CHARACTER. 279 

there is no need to deny ; but that fiery indepen- 
dence of character could have been favourably moulded 
to their own advantage, had Europeans tried to con- 
ciliate the Malays instead of crushing them. 

Like spaniels, the natives of the whole sea-board 
of the Indian peninsula lick the hand that chastises 
them : not so the Orang-Malayau ; and we English- 
men should be the first to honour a race who will not 
basely submit to abuse or tyranny. 

The ebb-tide was running strong as I jumped 
into my boat, and casting off from the shore, we 
were soon "spinning" — to use a seaman's phrase — 
down the stream ; and Kangah, like a bright and 
sunny picture which one has seen but once in a life- 
time, left a pleasant impression on my youthful mind 
not easily eftaceable: one of those bright spots in the 
expanse of memory, which carry one back from man- 
hood, worldly struggles, and withered aspirations, to 
that blest time — 

" When the breeze of a joyful dawn blew free 
In the silken sail of infancy." 

It is, I think, still a question which is the happier 
man of the two; he who loving the beautiful in all 

officers, and have, during the war in Kandy, done right good 
service. Their present boast is, that if a pin is lost in the 
forests of Ceylon, they can find it. 

t 4 



280 THE PLEASURES OF MEMORY. 

its varied forms, finds it in some narrow spot, where 
his lot in life may have fixed him, some petty area in 
which he is born, exists, and dies; — or the wanderer, 
who for awhile is being pushed on from one gorgeous 
scene to the other, his recollection glowing with the 
memory of the exceeding beautiful — of the golden 
East, its flood of glowing light and depth of purple 
shade, the waving palms, and gloomy forests peopled 
by races who have borrowed their passions and 
feelings from the burning sun ; and then returns to 
some quiet nook in the gloomy north, to await the 
" canker and the worm," cheering his latter days 
by the reminiscences of the bright and beautiful he 
has elsewhere enjoyed. 

Some miles below Kangah the ebbing tide had 
rendered a spot in the river fordable, and we had 
some difficulty in passing it : whilst detained for this 
purpose, a Malay and his family crossed it. He, 
from his dress, was evidently of the better class, 
and armed like a very Rustan. The Asiatic indiffer- 
ence of this hero to the safety of his wives and 
family amused me : on reaching the water, he stalked 
across the ford, without even deigning to look behind 
to see how his three or four children fared. The two 
women were very modestly clad in blue sarangs, one 
of which crossed the chest close under the arms, and 



A MALAY FAMILY SCENE. 281 

the other hung like a petticoat from the hips to the 
ancles. They, poor souls ! were loaded with all the 
household goods of their lord, as well as those of 
their children, who, following at their heels, had few 
garments to boast of: indeed, the two youngest were 
perfectly naked, with the exception of a silver fig- 
leaf, or heart, which hung in front, and an amulet 
tied round the neck by a bit of string. These imps 
were not tall enough to ford the river, but took the 
water, to my astonishment, like fish, and gambolled 
across the stream. 

No interruption took place at Parlis, and, aided by 
a rapid tide, we reached the boats in good time ; no 
one being more cordial in his reception of me than 
my coxswain, the worthy Jadee. I slept soundly 
that night, and my lullaby was the voice of Jadee, 
holding forth to Jamboo on my good fortune in 
having found Mahomet Alee absent, for he could not 
be brought to believe that he would have allowed me 
to procure water. In this idea, however, Jadee was 
mistaken; for we afterwards knew that the Datoo 
had been perfectly aware of my visit to Kangah, 
but his policy was now to try and establish amicable 
relations with the white men in his rear, as the ten 
thousand muskets of His Bankokian Majesty pressed 
him sadly in his front. 



282 DESPERATE POSITION OF MALAY CHIEFS. 

Indeed, affairs were now in a desperate position 
with the Malay chieftains ; yet they determined to 
play the game out to the last card, in the hope of 
some lucky turn of chances in their favour. Eastern 
armies, they knew, were readily assembled and as 
quickly dispersed : famine or pestilence had, on a 
former occasion, swept away in a few days a Siamese 
host : it might do so again ; and, worse come to the 
worst, they had always their home — the sea — open 
to them, provided they could give us the slip. 

Intelligence now reached us that prahus had as- 
sembled in some part of the Lancavas, or Laddas, 
preparatory to covering the flight of the chiefs, and 
redoubled the anxieties of our captain's position. 
He despatched the Siamese brig, which had joined 
from Quedah, with two armed prahus under Siamese 
colours, to cruise about and endeavour to discover 
the position of the secreted prahus, and enjoined the 
utmost vigilance on all our parts. Anxiety for the 
denouement to take place lengthened out the last few 
days of March to an intolerable extent, and, per- 
haps, the torment we endured from the incessant on- 
slaught of musquitoes and sand-flies added lo our 
impatience. At night, all sleep was out of the 
question, until, worn with watchfulness and the 
painful irritation of thousands of bites, we dropped 



PTJLO QUETAM, OR CRAB ISLAKD. 283 

into a short and feverish slumber. Nothing served 
to keep the sand-flies off: they were smoke-proof and 
fire-proof; they bled you just as freely if the skin 
was rubbed over with oil or vinegar, lime or treacle : 
nothing seemed to check their abominable thirst for 
blood. Happily, this fearful pest had only lately 
commenced, and we could look forward to a speedy 
termination of it, not only from the end of the block- 
ade being at hand, but because, in April, the heavy 
squalls of wind and rain which mark the close of the 
north-east monsoon would destroy them, by blowing 
their hosts to sea. 

Pulo Quetam, or Crab Island, was now becoming 
quite a gay scene ; fugitives from the province com- 
menced to pass down, and many found their canoes 
so unsafe as to be obliged to stay there for repairs- — ■ 
forming little encampments, under temporary huts 
of boughs and branches, in which the curious might 
study the manners and customs of the Malays with 
the greatest facility. The inhabitants of the neigh- 
bouring village drove a roaring trade with the block- 
ading force in the sale of anything that was eatable, 
— whether flesh, fish, or fowl. The variety, how 7 ever, 
was not great ; poultry being the principal article 
they had for sale, and rice, which was of a very 
excellent quality, and still so cheap as to prove that 



28-i TRADE DURING BLOCKADE. 

the assertion was not without some foundation, that 
Quedah province is capable of growing rice enough 
to support all the population of the Straits of 
Malacca. There were no less than four different 
species of common rice — all excellent in quality; 
but there was a naturally sweet description, which 
could be converted into sweetmeats without the aid 
of sugar, and, if imported into England, would be 
invaluable for household purposes to pastrycooks. 



SOCIAL EVENINGS. 285 



CHAP. XXL 

Social Evenings. — Quaintness of English Seamen. — The 
Adventures of Lucas. — Runs away to Liverpool. — Enters 
on board of an African Trader. — The Voyage to the Bights. 
— Fever. — Deaths. — Difficulty in leaving Port. — A new 
Captain joins. — Voyage Home. — Sufferings from want of 
Water. — Disorderly Scenes. — A Fight. — Villanous Be- 
verage. — A Man flogged to Death. — A horrid post- 
mortem Examination. — Temporary Relief. — Recklessness. — 
Sufferings. — A second Case of Murder. — Lucas a Sailor, 
nolens volens. 

As the majority of the boats were now together, 
there was more sociability among the crews than we 
had ever before had ; and the dear old " Hyacinth " 
being notoriously one of the most united and smartest 
crews on the East India Station, everything that 
could relieve monotony was done by both seamen 
and officers in the best spirit of unselfishness. The 
crews of the pinnace and cutter had been re- 
markably healthy, although living in open boats for 
four months, and their spirits were proportionately 
light. For several hours in the evening, songs 
would be sung and yarns would be told over the 



286 QUAINTNESS OF ENGLISH SEAMEN. 

suppei pipe, or grog, and the loud chorus to the de- 
liciously quaint melodies of 

" On Gosport beach I landed, that place of noted fame, 
And I called for a bottle of good brandy, 
To treat my lovely, lovely dame ! " &c, 

or, 

" She gave unto me a gay gold ring, 
And a locket fill'd with hair," &c. &c, 

would roll through the jungles of Parlis, and put to 
flight all things earthly and unearthly ; but if the 
honest fellows' melodies partook of the rudely har- 
monious, their yarns were decidedly well worth 
hearing. In all cases, they merely related their own 
adventures ; and it required no fiction to make them 
deeply interesting. The hand is now cold which 
could truly tell a sailor's narrative, in all its original 
phraseology and strong characteristics — the naval 
Fielding, Captain Marryat ; and it is only in having 
sailors' histories told in their own way, that the ge- 
neral reader can ever form a correct idea of all their 
peculiarities of character. They have changed some- 
what from Marryat's day, but still preserve all the 
originality of character for which their forefathers 
were famous: they do not drink quite so hard, nor 
swear so much, but they are just as overflowing with 



THE ADVENTURES OF LUCAS. 287 

wit and humour ; and the smattering of education 
which enables the majority to read and the few to 
write, has in no way injured — on the contrary, im- 
proved — the original view they always take of what 
passes under their notice. I shall not attempt to 
repeat any one of their yarns in its original clothing ; 
but perhaps, whilst we are waiting for the closing 
scene in the blockade of Quedah, I may be pardoned 
for relating a strange tale, which I wrote down as it 
was told to me, by a young seaman ; and, as it is 
somewhat startling, I may assure the reader that I 
have reason to believe every word to be true. 

We had lately entered a young sailor, called Lucas, 
from a merchantman : he evidently was educated far 
beyond his station in life, and I heard some of the 
men remark that he had boasted of being the son of 
a gentleman. Watching for a good opportunity, I 
persuaded him to tell me who he was, and how he 
came to be in such a situation. 

" My father," he said, " was a respectable tenant- 
farmer living near one of the sea-ports in the north of 
Ireland. His family consisted of several daughters, 
and myself, his only son. He spent a good deal of 
money upon my education, and tried hard to stifle in 
me a strong and early inclination for the sea • — a taste 



2S8 THE ADVENTURES OF LUCAS. 

I had acquired by my visit to the shipping in the 
harbour. 

"I was sent to an inland school, to more effectu- 
ally wean me from salt-water. I was in one con- 
tinual row with my Dominie, and finding me very 
unruly, he reported me to my father, who caused me 
to be more severely punished and lectured. I deter- 
mined to escape from what I regarded as cruelty 
and oppression, and, in spite of father and schoolmas- 
ter, to go to sea. Watching a good opportunity, I left 
school, reached Belfast, got on board a billyboy* 
bound for Liverpool, and landed there with a few 
shillings in my pocket. The master of the lodging- 
house that I put up at introduced me to the en- 
gineer of a steamer running between Glasgow and 
Liverpool, and I shipped with him as engine-room 
boy. This life I soon became tired of: the engineer 
seemed to consider it his privilege to thrash me 
whenever anything went wrong in the engine-room. 
All day — and all night too, if we were under weigh — 
there was one incessant call for Boy Lucas ! 'Boy, oil 
that bearing !' 'Boy, wipe down this !' and, 'Clean 
up that ! ' In short, I became a perfect white slave : 
there was but one way of escape — I again ran away. 

* A small description of coasting vessel, common to the 
British Isles. 



LUCAS RUNS AWAY TO LIVERPOOL. 289 

" The abominable Scotch engineer and the steamer 
had not, however, sickened me of the sea ; I was de- 
termined to get out to foreign countries, and to avoid 
the coasting trade, which is all very well for grown- 
up sailors, but bitter work for boys or novices. I 
was afraid to go back to my old lodgings, for the 
master of the house would have handed me over to 
the engineer again, so I lived about as I best could : 
some of my poor Irish countrymen and women often 
gave me a bit of food, when I had starved through 
a long day, going from ship to ship, asking captains 
to take me to the East Indies. 

" I was almost despairing of success, and just on the 
point of returning to my father, when the master of 
an African trader offered to ship me as a boy. I 
jumped at the chance, and joined immediately. She 
was a large heavy -looking brig, bound to the Bonny* 
for palm oil. I afterwards had good cause to know 
that she was a crazy old craft that had been con- 
demned as being even unfit for the Quebec timber 
trade. I and one or two ship-keepers were only at 
first on board of the brig in the river : we had to 
pump her out every two hours, which I thought 

* The Bonny, a nautical phrase for the Bights of Benin, into 
which the river Bonny flows. 

U 



290 LUCAS ENTERS AN AFRICAN TRADER. 

rather strange ; the more so that the chief mate 
warned me, that he would break my neck if he 
heard me say it was necessary to do so to any of 
the seamen who came on board to enter. Starvation 
had humbled me, and I held my tongue, although I 
saw that during the day the mate kept the working 
pump-bolt *, which was as bright as silver, in his 
pocket, and substituted for it a rusty stiff bolt, which 
gave the pump the appearance of never being worked. 
This was done to prevent the men being afraid of 
entering on board a vessel in which the extra work 
of pumping would necessarily be very harassing. 

" The day came for the crew to sign the articles of 
agreement upon which they were to sail in the brig. 
Besides the captain and mate, there were a cooper anl 
thirteen hands; each of the latter before signing the 
articles, examined the pump-bolt, to see if it was 
bright, and expressed gratification at finding it as 
rusty as a tight ship's ought to be : they little thought 
how my arms were aching from labouring at the 
handle — or what rogues the ship-keepers and mate 
were ! A few days afterwards, we dropped to the 
fair-way buoy ; and one fine day all our men were 

* The pump-bolt is the pin or fulcrum upon which the 
handle of a ship's pump works. Of course, the more the pump 
is worked, the brighter the pump-bolt becomes. 



THE VOYAGE TO THE BIGHTS. 291 

brought off, the majority so dead drunk as to suffer 
afterwards from delirium tremens; and a steam -tug 
took us outside the river, and let us go to find our way 
as best we could. The captain, mate, cooper, and I 
set all the sails, and lived on deck for about six-and- 
thirty hours, until some of the sailors came to their 
senses, which they did not do until they had fought 
and wallowed like wild beasts in a miserable hole 
called the 'fore- peak,' where the seamen had to eat 
and sleep. We had a pretty good passage, although 
the men soon found out that the brig would neither 
sail nor steer very well, and was uncommonly leaky : 
they seemed, however, accustomed to being so en- 
trapped into bad vessels, and only abused the captain, 
who enjoyed the whole affair as a capital joke. The 
mate fell dangerously ill with some loathsome disease ; 
there was no doctor, and he soon became such a nui- 
sance that no one would help him. The captain let 
him take anything be liked out of the small medicine- 
chest, and at last death released the poor fellow from his 
miseries, though not before he had begged and prayed 
that he might die. His coffin was an original one : 
it consisted of his chest, into which they put him in a 
doubled-up posture, and launched him into the sea 
without so much as a prayer. Indeed, the crew 
were as bad a collection of men as could well be 

u 2 



292 FEVER. — DEATHS. 

brought together. Although a ship's boy, I did not 
like them ; their language was at all times gross, and 
they appeared for the most part to be — what they 
occasionally boasted they were — the scrapings of 
Hell, Bedlam, and Newgate! 

tt ^r e g j. directions at the Bonny from a ship's 
agent to go to a river, of which I forget the name : 
we went there, and laid the ship up, collecting palm 
oil by driblets. The fever soon broke out among 
the crew, which was not to be wondered at, consider- 
ing the dirt and the want of air in the horrid hole they 
lived in. Some of the men would go to bed in the 
standing bunks, of which each man had one, and 
remain there for a couple of days at a time without 
getting up : they died like sheep, and were pitched 
overboard to the sharks. The captain likewise was 
attacked by fever; and although a drunken wretch 
of a doctor, who was kicked out of another vessel, 
joined us, he could not save the poor skipper, who 
followed the major part of his crew. 

"Kroomen were entered to get on loading the ship, 
and, in time, we were ready for sea, with a full cargo 
of heavy wood and oil. But how to get the ship home 
would have puzzled anybody but the rascally agent 
who was employed by our owners ; for, in addition 
to the want of captain and mate, the former had, 



A NEW CAPTAIN JOINS. 293 

in his delirium, thrown overboard all our nautical 
instruments and charts. 

" Not far from us there was another vessel, belong- 
ing to different owners : her mate was a notorious 
ruffian in the African trade, and our agent promised 
him, if he would, on his own responsibility and risk, 
get our brig home to Liverpool, he should, over and 
above his just recompense, receive a bonus of £100 
sterling. Meantime, one or two seamen of bad 
character, and seven Kroomen, were shipped for the 
passage home. One evening, late, the new captain 
joined: he had stolen some instruments from his 
former ship, and, at day-dawn, we weighed and put 
to sea, having actually at that time only six casks 
of provisions ; and the greediness of the agent to fill 
us with oil had barely left in the brig twelve days' 
water. Some of the crew growled about it, and 
the new captain was evidently frightened, when he 
learnt how little there w r as in the vessel; but the 
agent knew he dare not now stay, and said, ' Never 
mind ; beg your way home ! you will soon be on the 
track of the homeward-bound ships.' Hardly were 
we clear of the mouth of the river, when the skipper 
who had been robbed came off in a boat to recover 
his property ; our hero swore he would knock the 
first man's brains out who tried to board us, and, 

u 3 



294 THE VOYAGE HOME. 

with an axe in his hand, seemed likely to do it. The 
boat satisfied herself with firing musketry at us ; 
we merely kept under cover, and escaped without 
injury, through the breeze freshening. So far as I 
was concerned, my joy was too great at the prospect 
of returning home, to care a fig who was injured by 
our doing so. 

" Next day we were put upon an allowance of 
water, and we all soon discovered that we had a 
perfect fiend to deal with in the skipper. Three 
weeks of foul wind now occurred, at the end of 
which time only a few gallons of water remained, 
and a horrible death threatened us. 

" The captain now kept the ship away for some 
island; but he ought to have done so sooner; and on 
the second day, he came on deck with a small pot of 
water, called all hands aft, and served out the last 
drop of water by spoonfuls at a time. A dreadful 
week now followed : the wind was scant, and our 
deep-laden leaky craft did not move through the 
water; we ceased to speak to each other; we seemed 
like so many dumb creatures, and sometimes ruffians 
who had long been strangers to tears would be seen 
weeping like so many children, and praying to God 
for mercy. It became dead calm, with a scorching 
sun, and the clouds, which sometimes mustered on 
the horizon, brought neither rain nor wind!" 



SUFFERINGS FROM WANT OF WATER. 295 

Lucas's description of the horrors they then en- 
dured, brought vividly to my mind the lines of 
Coleridge: — 

"Down dropt the breeze, the sails dropt down, — 
' Twas sad as sad could be ; 
And we did speak only to break 
The silence of the sea ! 

All in a hot and copper sky 

The bloody sun at noon 
Right up above the mast did stand, 

No bigger than the moon. 

Day after day, day after day, 

We stuck, nor breath, nor motion ; 

As idle as a painted ship 
Upon a painted ocean. 

Water, water, everywhere, 

And all the boards did shrink ; 
Water, water, everywhere, 

Nor any drop to drink." 

" How," said he, " we used to sit and watch the 
setting sun, and darkness closing in upon us; for 
then the dew would fall, and all night long the un- 
fortunate crew crawled about, licking the moisture 
from the spars, decks, and paintwork of the ship's 
side ! We all became hideously selfish. 1 remember 
that I had, by good chance, a strong iron kettle. I 
set to work to boil sea-water, and condense the va- 

u 4 



296 DISORDERLY SCENES. 

pour; but I hardly made a pint of fresh water in 
twenty-four hours. However, I succeeded in sup- 
porting myself, without having recourse, as the ma- 
jority of the crew had, to drinking salt water, and 
thus avoided being attacked with dysentery, as those 
poor creatures were. 

" A Frenchman whom we had shipped in Africa 
discovered that the captain had secreted several 
bottles of vinegar for his own consumption ; and, as 
discipline was now totally at an end, he purloined 
some of the bottles, and ran forward with them, 
chased by the captain, who fired several shots at him 
with his pistols, but was afraid to descend into the 
'fore-peak' after the culprit, or to otherwise call 
him to account. This prize was, of course, a great 
boon to us all, and had it been diamond-dust we 
could not have husbanded it more carefully than 
we did. 

" The skipper, at all times of a most unreasonable 
temperament, seemed now to have lost all restraint 
over his passions, and seldom did a day pass with- 
out an act of wanton cruelty. One first watch, 
the Frenchman happened to be licking the dew off 
the capstan on the quarter-deck ; this the skipper 
usually appropriated as his perquisite, and, in a fury 
at what he considered the Frenchman's insolence, he 



A FIGHT. 297 

took up a heavy piece of wood which happened to be 
at hand, and, as the sailor leaned over the capstan, 
struck him with full force on the back of the head. 
The Frenchman's cap saved his life, but his lips were 
cut through and his front teeth loosened ; he gave a 
yell of rage, and rushed into the cook's caboose for a 
knife. The captain, at the same time, got a pistol out 
of the cabin ; a scuffle ensued, in which the pistol 
was fired without effect, but the Frenchman gave 
the captain an ugly cut across the ear with his knife. 
The men then interfered, and they were separated. 

" The cabin-boy having been attacked with dy- 
sentery, I was ordered to take his place. It struck 
me that if all the empty wine and beer bottles in 
the store-room were drained out, a little liquid might 
be procured for us all. I mentioned this to the crew, 
and they adopted my suggestion, obtaining, in all, 
about two quarts of what, under other circumstances, 
would have been considered a villanous compound. 
The captain took charge of it, and gave us a spoonful 
apiece ; the remainder he placed below, on the cabin 
table, ready for a similar issue on the morrow. 

" Unhappily, a young man who was at the helm, 
half-delirious with fever and thirst, observed it, and 
fancying no one would detect him, he watched an 
opportunity, left the helm, ran down below, and 



298 A MAN FLOGGED TO DEATH. 

drank every drop of what was left. He was not 
quick enough to escape our lynx-eyed captain, who 
knocked him down, and, calling for his Kroomen, 
they lashed the poor wretch up to the rigging, 
stripped for a flogging. The captain first beat him 
unmercifully with a rope's end, and then made the 
Kroomen, in turn, do the same: the rest of the crew, 
myself included, were too broken down to interfere ; 
indeed, some of them never came on deck at all. I 
went to the man after he was cut down: he was 
almost flayed on the back, and insensible. I threw 
sea-water over him, and, after a while, he came-to, 
but he was evidently dying, and begged me, when I 
got to England, to remember how he had been mur- 
dered : that night he died. The captain seemed a 
little frightened ; the more so, that the crew became 
rather excited, and the Frenchman, as a ringleader, 
called him, murderer, and vowed he should be hung 
if God spared them to reach home. 

" His fears, however, seemed to render him the 
more insensible to humanity ; for, on the morrow, he 
insisted upon the drunken creature who called him- 
self a doctor, dissecting the corpse, and holding a 
post-mortem examination. Anything more horribly 
revolting than the whole scene, I defy the world to 
produce : the instruments used were the knives and 



TEMPORARY RELIEF. 299 

saws in daily use on board the ship, for, I need 
hardly say, such a doctor had none of his own. All 
hands were sent for, much nonsense was spoken by 
the captain and doctor, to prove the man died from 
natural causes; and the poor dead man's entrails and 
brains were handled as if they were those of an 
animal ; and then they were hove overboard, after 
which the body was thrown, just as it was, into the 
sea, for the sharks that were cruising about to fight 
over and gorge upon. It was enough to make one 
go mad to see such horrors perpetrated, and the 
feeling of utter misery was something I cannot 
describe. 

" Several men died : the poor Frenchman was of 
the number, and we were in the last stage of ex- 
haustion, when God sent us assistance, in the shape 
of a foreign vessel, that very humanely gave us a 
quantity of water and a little biscuit. Had she 
been a countryman, we should one and all have 
abandoned the brig; but we could not explain to 
them what we wanted : indeed, they did not appear 
to wish to have us as shipmates, which was not to 
be wondered at, considering what a cut-throat set of 
diseased villains all the crew looked. After utter 
want, we had now, with care, sufficient water and 
food to reach the chops of the Channel, where a 



300 RECKLESSNESS. 

man-of-war would be found, to help us if the winds 
were foul; and I must do our rascally skipper the 
justice to say, that be pointed this out to the crew, 
and begged them to refrain from taking more than 
a certain small allowance. 

"But no! they had been starved. We had a 
fair breeze, and provisions, and they determined to 
feast ; the consequence was, as had been foretold, 
we met foul winds after passing the Western 
Islands, which, through bad navigation, could not 
be sighted, and again did we run short of water; and 
although in a higher latitude and cooler climate, 
still we suffered terribly. The cabin-boy died, and 
nearly all the English seamen, and the cooper be- 
came dangerously ill ; and I was so weak as to 
be hardly able to walk, while the captain, though 
looking rather distressed at times, was, if possible, 
more brutal than ever. A fresh west wind sprang 
up : we squared yards to it ; but could not make 
much sail, for who was to reduce it if a gale came 
on ? Ships seemed to avoid us, for we wore all the 
signs of a ship with the plague — our yards and sails 
looking what sailors call 'no how,' and the vessel 
wallowed in, rather than sailed over the sea. 

" We had even ceased to go aloft to look for vessels 
in sight, and our crew, now reduced to six men, were 



SUFFERINGS. 301 

just keeping body and soul together by means of 
condensed steam caught in a swab that we sucked in 
turn. Scurvy, fever, and thirst had reduced us to 
perfect scarecrows; we no longer heeded the cruel- 
ties or curses of our skipper, and had only sense 
enough left to go to the helm in turn, and keep the 
brig's head upon her course. No help came until we 
were in soundings, and then merely through getting 
so close to a ship in the night that she could not in 
common humanity run away from us, when at day- 
light we hoisted the colours union downwards. 

" She bore down ; and when we saw her do so, I 
ran to the fore-peak, and said, ( We are saved ! here 
comes a ship! ' Only four men appeared upon our 
deck ! A cask was necessary, and as we were not 
strong enough to unstow and get up one from the hold, 
the cooper, who was very ill, was brought on deck 
to tighten up the hoops of the two scuttle-butts 
which were on the upper-deck. The poor wretch 
had to sit down, and hammer home the hoops whilst 
we turned the casks round. The work naturally did 
not proceed as fast as the rapid approach of the ship 
required. This so infuriated our insane skipper 
(for I believe he was mad at times), that he com- 
menced abusing the unfortunate man, who in reply 
telling him to go to the devil — whither he was most 



302 A SECOND CASE OF MURDER. 

undoubtedly bound — worked him into a fury. He 
struck the cooper several violent blows, and at his 
last one the man rolled over into the lee-scuppers, 
and in a few minutes was a corpse — the captain, a 
murderer twice ! 

" The strange ship was an American one : the 
master came on board, supplied us with water and 
some provisions, sent a mate and one or two men 
to help the brig into port, we being then only 150 
miles off Cape Clear, and then the American bore up 
on her course to New York. 

" We arrived at Liverpool without further accident, 
and the authorities there took charge of the case 
against the captain. There were sufficient witnesses 
without me ; and beyond having my deposition taken 
in writing, I was not troubled by the lawyers. The 
captain, I believe, was transported for life, or con* 
fined in a mad-house. 

" This cruise had thoroughly sickened me of the 
African trade, and I might add of the sea likewise. 
I started off to Belfast: my father had died, and 
my sisters, having raised all the ready cash they 
could upon his property, had with an uncle of mine 
started for Australia, and were supposed to have 
settled in Port Adelaide. The sea was now my only 
resource. I shipped in a vessel bound to India, and 



LUCAS A SEAMAN, NOLENS VOLENS. 303 

you know the rest, sir. I fancy I shall end, if I am 
lucky, in being a warrant-officer one of these days." 

Such was the tale of the sailor Lucas : the reader 
will allow it to be a strange one. It happened twenty 
years ago: yet strange things are still done where the 
blue sea and silent stars are the sole witnesses ; and 
the skippers of palm oil traders are not the only ones 
who act upon the Muscovite principle, that " the 
Heavens are high, and the Czar afar off." 



304 THE LOAN OF A LOVE-LETTER. 



CHAP. XXII. 

Jadee offers the Loan of a Love-Letter. — A Midshipman's 
Scruples. — The " Emerald " ordered to Pouchou. — 
Enter the River during the Night. — Jadee's Suggestions 
for warding off Musquitoes. — Jadee foresees Trouble. — A 
nautical Superstition of the olden Day. — The Flight. — The 
Sampan repulsed. — The Chase. — A Prahu captured. — 
Proceed to Tangong Gaboose. — Starving piratical Fugi- 
tives. — A Threat of Cannibalism. — The Horrors of Asiatic 
Warfare. — Jamboo's View of the Malays' Position. — Re- 
flections. 

About this time, we received from Tonkoo Mahomet 
Said formal expressions of his gratitude for the kind- 
ness shown to his wife and family. From them he 
had somehow received intelligence direct from Pe- 
nang. Of the lovely little Baju-Mira I did not 
again hear ; and Jadee proposed that I should send 
her a letter written by my interpreter. Amused at 
the idea, I suggested that he should compose one for 
me, as, by his own acknowledgment, he had been a 
perfect lady-killer at Singapore. Jadee was not easily 
abashed where his vanity was involved, and very 
handsomely placed at my disposal a love-letter which 



a midshipman's scruples. 305 

he was about to address to his Dulcinea at Penang. 
Before accepting it, however, I thought it as well to 
make Jamboo translate the document word for word 
to me — a measure which soon showed me the im- 
propriety of sending any such billet doux ; although 
it indulged in the usual amount of poetical allusions 
to the beauty of the fair one's eyes, nose, lips, 
teeth, and hair, with graceful compliments about 
her figure, her walk, and her voice, it wound up 
with an abrupt proposal of marriage, entering rather 
freely into the charms of that blessed state of 
bondage; and as a further inducement to overcome 
any scruples the young lady might entertain on the 
score of Jadee's matrimonial inexperience, he assured 
her that seven wives were already placed on his list, 
though she should alone be his Penang sultaness. 

These were lengths to which I, as a midshipman 
in the receipt of ten sovereigns a quarter, did not 
feel justified in going ; "alas, for the social wants that 
sin against the strength of youth!" But Jadee, like 
an evil spirit, whispered that an anna a day (three 
half-pence) would equip and support even such a 
Peri as Baju-Mira, in a style of princely magnifi- 
cence, only to be read of in the " Arabian Nights' 
Entertainments." Possibly, recollections of a stern- 
faced captain, and the " Pll stop your leave, sir," of 

x 



306 "emerald" ordered away. 

a ruthless first-lieutenant, kept me from disturbing 
the peace of mind of the fair Malay, and then other 
affairs distracted my attention. 

April the 2nd found us surrounded by a flying 
multitude, and a repetition of the wretched scenes 
enacted at Quedah. The Siamese were finally vic- 
torious, and Sauve qui peut ! was the cry. Ru- 
mours were flying about that the war prahus were 
going to make a dash out ; one or two threatening 
messages were sent, and it became every moment 
more certain that the Tonkoos must fly, or fall into 
Siamese hands. The excitement was intense, and 
no one knew the minute that the pirates might 
swoop down upon the little blockading squadron, 
and make us fight for our very lives. 

In the middle of all this, while, youngster-like, I 
was longing to " flesh my maiden sword," some in- 
structions arrived from Captain Warren to the 
officer commanding the boats (the present Captain 
G. Drake), ordering a gun-boat to be detached to 
watch another river called the " Pouchou," about 
four miles to the northward. As the junior officer, 
it fell to my lot to go ; and I own I left with the 
morr.l conviction that there would be a bloody fray, 
and the little " Emerald " would be left out of it ; a 
feeling not assuaged by my waggish brother officer 



THE RIVER POUCHOU. 307 

Ilalkett, who made a pen-and-ink caricature of a 
sulky midshipman tied by the leg at a distance, 
while he and others were slaying whole hecatombs 
of enemies. 

My gun-boat was soon off the mouth of the 
Pouchou : like all the western Malayan rivers, it 
had a tidal bar across its mouth, though abundance 
of water within. The tide being then on the ebb, 
we hauled to seaward for an Island called Pulo 
Pangang, or Long Island. We found it full of 
Malay fugitives — men, women, and children ; their 
sufferings from want of water were something hideous 
to contemplate. Some had already died, others were 
perishing; yet, what could we do ? The " Hyacinth " 
and her boats had long been on a rigid allowance ; 
every drop of water we could spare I ordered to be 
given away ; and a few days afterwards, as will be 
seen, we were reduced in consequence to great 
straits. 

How all these people had reached the island, we 
could not learn ; but they owned that they came from 
the neighbourhood of Parlis ; and some of the families 
remembered seeing me on the occasion of my visit to 
Kangah. From them we learnt that the Pouchou 
ran parallel to the Parlis river, and close past the 
town of that name. These fugitives had, I suspect, 

x 2 



308 ENTER THE RIVER DURING THE NIGHT. 

availed themselves of the former stream as a means 
of escape. All expressed sorrow and anxiety when 
they heard I was going to blockade it ; indeed, one 
man of superior aspect was evidently distressed when 
he learnt that it was to be so, and tried hard to per- 
suade me not to go there until the morrow ; e( for," 
said he, "there will be a number of women and 
children down to-night, and if frightened back by 
you, they will fall into the hands of the cruel 
Siamese." 

A beautiful night with a bright moon lighted up 
the sea and forest-clad shores, as with the first of the 
land-wind I sought my way into the Pouchou river. 
The rippling music of my gun-boat's stem, as she 
cut through the phosphorescent sea, the whirling 
eddies of molten silver, which in a long line astern 
showed our trail, and the low call of the leads- 
man, were the only signs of life. As we approached 
the bar in the shoal water, the fish, affrighted at our 
intrusion, darted singly away, leaving a long fiery 
streak behind them in the sea, such as a rocket leaves 
in its path through the air, and the night-hawk and 
other nocturnal birds swept round us, and uttered 
their characteristic cries. 

With some difficulty — for the tide only just afforded 
water enough for us to float over the shoals of the 



jadee's suggestions. 309 

bar — we got into the river, which I was sorry to find 
was very deep towards either bank, as this would 
entail a loss of time in getting under weigh to chase. 
However, there was nothing for it but to anchor ; for 
when I suggested the propriety of merely fastening 
to the trunks of some tall peon* trees, Jadee protested 
earnestly, assuring me that such a proceeding was 
contrary to all Malayan tactics ; "if," said he, 
pointing to the black water which flowed in amongst 
the jungle, enveloped in a darkness that the keenest 
eye could not penetrate, " if you would desire to see 
the sun rise, oh Tuhan, never secure the craft so close 
to a place where all the fighting men of Parlis might 
lie hid in canoes, and see us without our seeing 
them. Besides, did you not hear the cry of that 
night-bird ? — may it be cursed ! and assuredly it is so, 
being but the restless soul of an unbeliever! — that 
cry, my officer, denotes trouble !" 

Knowing that there was always some sound sense 
mixed up with my worthy subordinate's supersti- 
tions, I at once proceeded to the south side of the 
river, and anchored the vessel in the deep shadow 
thrown over the stream by the lofty jungle trees. 

* Peon, a tree common to the Malayan forests, and much used 
for masts and spars. 

x 3 



310 jadee's remedy eor musquitoes. 

We were close to a point, beyond which there was a 
pretty bend in the river now strongly lit up by the 
moon, so that we should have a few minutes' warning 
in the event of the pirates coming down. The guns 
were cleared away, the powder-magazine opened, the 
sweeps placed ready, and then each man at his post 
lay down to rest as best he might. For my part, 
had I been inclined, it would have been impossible 
to close an eye. Ye gods ! how the musquitoes and 
sand-flies fed upon me ! Surrounded with burning 
cocoa-nut husks, the pungent smoke threatening 
ophthalmia, I underwent a torture only to be com- 
pared to the Mexican warrior's bed of burning 
coals. 

My tender-hearted coxswain felt for me, and 
suggested many modes of relief. " Could I read 
Arabic?" "No." "It was a pity, for some re- 
freshing chapter of the Koran, which he named, 
would prevent anything harming me." 

" How, if I am not a believer, Jadee ? " I in- 
quired. 

" God is merciful !" he exclaimed, devoutly and 
cleverly. " Would I allow him to tie an amulet on 
my arm?" "For what purpose?" " To keep off 
all evil, and assuredly the musquitoes come under 
that denomination." 



JADEE FORESEES TROUBLE. 311 

Accordingly, an amulet was tied on. Like most 
others, it consisted, I fancy, of some extract from the 
Koran, stitched up in linen ; at any rate, as I antici- 
pated, the musquitoes did not respect it. " Jadee," 
I said, " I see that cry of the night-hawk was indeed 
a forewarning of my fate : you will only find in the 
morning the skin and bones of what was a tolerably 
fat midshipman ; take them to the big ship, and you 
shall be rewarded." 

For a moment the scamp laughed. " Hush ! oh, 
my officer," he said, " you white men laugh at what 
the poor Malay man says ; but if you lived like 
us in these great forests, and for years had no 
other home than a sampan, and no associates but 
the birds and beasts, you would know, as we 
do, what they wish to say to us." Honest old 
Jadee ! why should I ridicule thee ? How long is it 
since we could afford to laugh at others' supersti- 
tion ? Here, before me, lies the history of a voyage 
made by English sailors, and not very long ago 
either : let me transcribe a paragraph of it. 

A Captain Cowley is going a voyage round the 
world. It is the 29th June, 1686, and his ship is in 
19° 45' south latitude, longitude 21° 26' west. These 
facts assure us of the worthy sailor's exactness. " We 
had," he says, " this day great feasting on board us, 

x 4 



312 SUPERSTITIONS OF THE OLDEN DAY. 

and the commanders of the other two ships returning 
on board their vessels, we gave them some guns 
(that \s,jired), which they returned again. But it 
is strangely observable, that whilst they were loading 
their guns, they heard a voice in the sea, crying 
out, s Come, help ! come, help ! a man overboard ! 
come, help ! ' This made them forthwith bring their 
ship to the wind, thinking to take the man up, but 
heard no more of him. Then they came on board of 
us, to see if we had lost a man : but we, nor the 
other ship, had not a man w T anting ; for, upon strict 
examination, we found that in all three ships we had 
our complement of men, which made them all to 
conclude, that it was the spirit of some man that 
had been drowned in that latitude by accident !"* 

Hour after hour passed ; the dew fell cold, and the 
chilled crew sat drawn up in their sarongs, with their 
chins resting on their knees, sleeping a dog's sleep. 
The moon had sloped towards her setting, the flood 
tide was done, and my gun-boat had just canted to 
the ebb, when the look-out man and Jadee pointed 
towards a mere shell of a canoe with two men in it, 
which was already on our beam, but on the opposite 

* Capt. William Hacke's " Collection of Original Voyages," 
1699. Dedicated to John, Lord Somers, Lord High Chan- 
cellor of England. 



THE FLIGHT. 313 

side of the river. " Stop that canoe ! " I said im- 
patiently. 

" Hark ! " said Jadee. " Prahus ! In the name of 
Allah! don't make a noise: that is only a spy, to see 
the coast is all clear." 

The blood leapt through my veins, as I now dis- 
tinctly heard, borne on the faint land-wind, the 
creaking noise made by the ratan^ fastenings used 
for a Malay prahu's oars. Before the men could be 
roused, and our cable shortened-in, the strangers 
swept round the point ahead ; and as the light struck 
on them, I saw distinctly two fine large prahus, pull- 
ing eight or ten oars of a side, and a very long low 
canoe full of men. 

My plucky little quarter-master, Sutoo, asked 
permission to take two hands in the sampan, and to 
head them at once, whilst we got under weigh. The 
tide soon brought them close to. 

"Stop, O prahus, to be searched!" shouted 
Jamboo. They were evidently taken by surprise, 
and for a minute every oar and paddle ceased to 
ply ; but it was only for a minute : they saw us, and, 
determined to push by, gave way with vigour ; 
whilst female voices cried out, " Do not fire ; we are 
women — only women!" 

u Anchor, or we fire ! " Jamboo and I shouted ; 



314 THE SAMPAN REPULSED. 

whilst Jadee and his crew rattled in the cable like 
seamen. 

At that moment Sutoo with our sampan grappled 
one of the prahus, and gallantly tried to stop one 
of them at least ; there was a gleam of steel, and 
then a shout from Sutoo to fire away a for that they 
were armed. 

As the gun-bfcat swung round upon her heel, Sutoo 
came alongside with a spear sticking in his boat 
that had been aimed at him. A small ratan shield, 
which the man fortunately had on his arm when 
lie grasped the prahu's gunwale, showed a deep mark 
where a parang, the Malay sword, had come down 
on it. 

Directly the bow-gun would bear on the nearest 
prahu, I fired at her with grape, and a shriek rang in 
our ears which convinced me that there were women 
on board, for the purpose, as it was immediately 
suggested, of preventing us firing at them. I felt 
that to tow a boat-load of wounded Malay women 
alongside the "Hyacinth" was not likely to con- 
duce to my professional reputation, and I therefore 
ceased firing. There was nothing for it now but 
to chase and catch them ; no easy job, I knew well, 
for the channels were intricate, and the night mist 
hung heavy to seaward. 



THE CHASE. 315 

" Give way, my Malay men ; we must catch and 
board them." "Ya! ya ! ya!" shouted the crew 
as they bent to their sweeps. The excitement was 
gloriously intense : we could just see the prahus ; 
but the canoe, which Sutoo assured me was a very 
fine one, pulling at least twenty paddles, was gone. 
I naturally looked to the prahus alone. At first 
they made sail as if for the Lancavas Islands, keeping 
the wind abeam ; but we soon began to close with 
them : they then altered their course, and bore up 
among some small islands and shallows in Setoue 
Bay. At last, by a lucky accident, we cut off 
one prahu, and got her in a bight out of which she 
could not escape : an effort to push past we checked 
with a round of grape, which she replied to with 
some blunderbusses without doing any harm ; and 
then her crew put the helm up, and ran her over 
the shoals towards the jungle until she fairly stuck 
in the mud. 

Daylight was now breaking, and we could see the 
Malays of the prahu decamp with their arms to 
the shore. Leaving Jadee to cover me with the 
" Emerald's " guns, and to keep her in deep water, I 
took six hands and boarded the prahu. She was 
a fine vessel, with no guns mounted ; but doubt- 
less had had them at one time. Half a dozen old 



316 A PRAHU CAPTURED. 

women, and two men wounded by our fire, were all 
we found in her. Everything that would lighten the 
prahu was now thrown overboard, mainly bags of 
rice and salt, and we soon had the satisfaction of 
getting her afloat. We did all we could for the 
wounded men : they were neither of them seriously 
hurt, and I left two men in charge of the prize, whilst 
we made sail in search of the other craft. After 
cruising for three hours without sighting her, I re- 
turned to my prize, and took her to the island which 
I had, on the previous day, found peopled with starv- 
ing refugees. I told the poor creatures, that as 
many as liked might go on board of her, and proceed 
to the British settlements for shelter. The wounded 
men requested to be landed at the northern part of 
the Pouchou river, called Tangong Gaboose, where, 
they assured us, the woods were full of unfortunate 
Malays like themselves — pirates by our laws. 

Having seen the prahu off, we went over to 
Tangong Gaboose, to await for the tide to rise suffi- 
ciently to enable me to get back into my station in 
the river. 

All I could glean from the wounded men was, 
that they and the other vessel, as well as a canoe 
pulling many paddles, had left the neighbourhood of 
Parlis together. They owned to having fought with 



PROCEED TO TANGONG GABOOSE. 317 

Siamese more than once, and that they hoped to do 
so again : but more than that we could not learn ; for 
of the movements of their chiefs, or Tonkoos, they 
knew nothing, or would tell nothing. 

On landing at the spot indicated by these men, I 
was utterly astonished, after walking a few hundred 
yards into the jungle, to find myself amongst a per- 
fect crowd of fugitives. At first they showed signs of 
distrust ; but Jadee soon soothed them with the 
assurance, that provided Tonkoo Mahomet Alee was 
not there, he and I did not wish to maltreat the un- 
fortunates. The majority of the men were armed, 
carrying handsome spears, creeses, and parangs, 
or long chopper-shaped swords. There could not 
have been less than 700 souls in these woods, in- 
cluding women and children; an estimate verified by 
the assertion of a venerable Moolah or Islam divine. 

They gathered round and besought aid. I never 
was very hard-hearted, thank God ! but the scene was 
sufficient to have brought tears into the eyes of even 
the stern legislators who had declared every pirate, 
dead or alive, worth 20/. to the captor; for here 
they were, young and old, born and suckled in 
piracy ; knowing no better, and wishing for nothing 
better, than to be allowed to fight it out fairly with 
their present foes. 



318 THE STARVING PIRATICAL FUGITIVES. 

Poor creatures ! starvation and thirst were pinch- 
ing them fearfully, yet there was no escape : the sea 
behind them, and a ruthless enemy in front. The 
jungle yielded no fruit ; the earth, parched by the 
long drought, no water. I advised them to send and 
make terms of surrender to the Siamese. An old 
man said, " It was certain they must do it, or starve 
to death ; " another, who was by, said Ci He would as 
soon eat his own children, as run the risk of handing 
them over to the enemy's soldiery, who," he said, 
(l were composed of all the outcasts of the peninsula, 
and cared no more for the Siamese authorities — ex- 
cept in so far as they legitimised their villanies — 
than they did for the Governor of the Straits, Touhan 
Bonham." I took leave of these poor creatures with 
a heavy heart, and struck by the threat of cannibalism, 
asked both Jadee and my interpreter whether such 
a crime was ever committed amongst the Malays or 
Siamese. Jadee fought shy of the question, and 
merely said that there was one tribe in Sumatra 
who indulged in man-eating; but that if ever an 
Orang Malayu did it, it must be out of sheer 
necessity. 

My interpreter informed me, that it was a usual 
term of reproach between one tribe of wild Malays 
and another to say they were cannibals ; and that if 



HORRORS OF ASIATIC WARFARE. 319 

it was remembered what devastating wars were car- 
ried on, and had been for centuries, by the Birmese, 
Siamese, and Malays, and the fearful sufferings 
entailed upon the conquered, in a country where 
the jungles yielded little fitted to support life, it 
would seem more than likely that cannibalism was 
often committed. 

On this subject, quaint, earnest old Purchas tells 
us of a sad tale in the unparalleled extermination of 
the old Peguan race and kingdom by the Birmese, 
in about 1598. I will give his words: "But of all 
this wealth, then wanting no store, and of so many 
millions people, were scarcely left seven thousand 
persons. Men, women, and children had to par- 
ticipate in the king's siege, and those feeding on 
man's flesh ; the parents requiring of the children 
the life which before they had given to sustain their 
own ; and now laid them not in their bosoms, but in 
their bowels : — the children oftentimes becoming 
living sepulchres of their scarce-dead parents ! The 
stronger preyed upon the weaker ; and if their flesh 
was eaten up by their own hunger, leaving nothing 
but skin and bones to the hungry assaults of these 
ravenous creatures, they ripped the belly and de- 
voured their inward parts, and breaking the skull 
sucked out the brains. Yea, the weaker sex was, 



320 HORRORS OF ASIATIC WARFARE. 

by the strength of famine, armed with no less 
butcherly despight against whomsoever they could 
meet in the streets of the city, with their knives 
which they carried about them as harbingers to 
their teeth in these inhuman human banquets. 

" Pardon me, reader," adds the good parson of St. 
Martin's, by Ludgate Hill, (l if upon this spectacle 
I cause thee, with myself, to stay awhile and 
wonder. The sun, in his daily journey round about 
this vast globe, saw then few equal to this Pagan 
greatnesse, and yet in how short a space He that 
is Higher than the highest hath abated and abashed 
this magnificence lower than the lowest of his 
princes ! " 

A veritable dish of horrors ending with a fine 
moral, the reader will say ; but I fear the horrors are 
still not of uncommon occurrence in those parts of 
Asia, as well as Polynesia, where Mahometanism or 
Christianity have not yet spread their civilising in- 
fluence. The former, with all its faults and impu- 
rities, was a vast stride in the right direction for the 
Malayan races of the Archipelago and Polynesia, as 
any one who has wandered in those localities can 
attest. 

" I wonder," I said to Jamboo, " what will be- 
come of these poor wretches?" 



JAMBOO ON THE MALAYS' POSITION. 321 

" Perhaps all be dead in a few days' time, sar ! This 
very new to you ; but Malay man always go on this 
way ; no got no friends. Dutchmen hunt them and kill, 
because he don't want them to carry trade to Singa- 
pore. Englishmen don't like him, because he say, he 
d — d lazy rascal, always ready for a fight, but will not 
dig in the fields ; too much of a gentleman, sir, for 
the Company ; the Company want fellows, all the 
same Hindoo, he can kick when he got bad temper. 
And now come the Siamese. He not bad man, the 
Siamese, suppose true Siamese ; but when he go to 
war, he get hundred other sort of fellows, who say, 
'Come along, let us go rob these Malay pirates!' 
And so you see all the same you see to-day." 

I have no doubt Jamboo was right to a certain 
extent, though, living as he had done in our Anglo- 
Malayan settlements, there might be a certain degree 
of partiality in his heart for the Malayan people. 

We soon afterwards re-entered the Pouchou river, 
and I lent the perishing multitude my sampan to go 
up the river, and try and procure some water, and 
we gave them every grain of rice we could spare, 
poor unfortunates ! And I could not help thinking 
how sad it was, though, maybe, they had inflicted 
equal if not greater sufferings upon those they had 
forced to fly from the province of Quedah into the 

Y 



322 REFLECTIONS. 

forest of Patani during the previous year. One 
could sympathise with the sufferings of the conquerors 
as well as the conquered in these wretched native 
wars, and commiserate the thousands who had been 
victims to the wickedness of the few, repeating the 
words of an English poetess — 

" Yet not less terrible because unknown 
Is the last hour of thousands : they retire 
From life's throng' d path unnoticed to expire. 
As the light leaf, whose fall to ruin bears 
Some trembling insect's little world of cares, 
Descends in silence, while around waves on 
The mighty forest, reckless what is gone ! " 
* # # 



A SURPRISE. 323 



CHAP. XXIIL 

A Surprise. — The Stratagem. — Escape of Mahomet Alee. — 
Jadee indignant. — Disappointment and Consolation. — We 
report the Escape. — Raising of the Blockade. — The 
neglected Warning. — The Gig chases the Canoe. — The 
" Laddas." — A Malayan Night-Scene. — Dream- Land. — 
Return to Things earthly. — Unsuccessful Search for Prahus. 
— The Sea-breeze. — The Race. — Short Rations. — Eat 
Birds'-nests.— A long and distressing Pull. — Zeal and cheer- 
ful Conduct of the Crew. — Reflections. 

Hardly had the anchor reached the bottom, before 
we sought the rest which it had been impossible 
hitherto to get ; and it is needless to say, that after 
such a night and morning of excitement, I, and I 
believe all my people except the look-out men, slept 
soundly for some hours. 

The sun had passed the zenith, and all lay hushed 
in that death-like day-sleep in which nature, as well 
as man, seems to seek repose during the fervid 
heat of an equatorial afternoon, when I was roused 
and told that a boat full of men and women was 
coming down the river. On being hailed, they 

t 2 



324 THE STRATAGEM. 

came alongside, gave up their arms, which we broke 
and tossed overboard, and then to their joy we told 
them to go in health, — " Salamat gelan !" 

As they pushed off, I said in joke, " You may go, 
for we have caught the Tonkoos ! " 

"What !" exclaimed an old Malay who was steering 
the boat, " have you caught Datoo Mahomet Alee ? 
Did he not then escape last night ? God is merciful 
and great," continued he, throwing up his hands, and 
looking the picture of sorrow. 

A feather might have knocked me down ; and the 
old man's astonishment, at being abruptly called back 
and pulled by the neck and heels out of his canoe by 
the excited Jadee, was not small. 

"We told him that he evidently knew all about 
Mahomet Alee's movements, and unless he wished to 
be blown away from the bow gun, hung at the ensign- 
staff, boiled in the coppers — Heaven only knows what 
Jadee did not vow would be done to him ! — he must 
tell all. 

He soon enlightened us : it was simply, that on the 
previous night, Datoo Mahomet Alee, finding all fur- 
ther resistance against the Siamese unavailing, had 
embarked in a long low canoe, pulling a number of 
paddles, and, accompanied by two prahus filled with 
women and armed men, to screen his movements, 



ESCAPE OF MAHOMET ALEE. 325 

had with the first ebb of the tide pushed down. My 
guns had been heard, and it was supposed we had 
captured the prahus ; but all felt confident that the 
Datoo would escape from us, though he might be 
drowned, if the breeze freshened whilst he was 
crossing over to the Lancavas Islands, amongst which 
group a fleet of prahus was secreted. 

My disappointment and chagrin were beyond the 
power of language to express. I had been fairly out- 
witted ; my only consolation was in the fact that I 
was yet a novice in the art of war, and could not be 
expected to be a match for all the stratagems of so 
accomplished an adept as Mahomet Alee ; and in the 
next place, I felt that in chasing the prahus instead 
of the sampan, I had done my duty, for they would 
naturally be the war-boats. 

There was nothing for it now, but to go and tell 
my gallant captain. " Up anchor !" I said. " Jadee, I 
must go and tell the Rajah Laut, that ' Numero 
Tega' has had dirt thrown on her by Mahomet Alee." 

Jadee had been in a perfect state of frenzy since 
the intelligence was verified by some other men in 
the boat : he stamped, he swore, called every Maho- 
metan and pagan saint to witness, that such an act as 
the Datoo had committed was contrary to all ideas of 
Malay chivalry. Pie appealed to the crew, asked them, 

y 3 



326 JADEE INDIGNANT. 

in all their cruises — I ought perhaps to say villanies 
— had ever they heard of a Datoo who escaped a fight 
under the petticoats of a woman ? If there was, 
Jadee with his creese was ready to send that man to 
Jehanum, or some other pleasant spot rejoicing in 
intense heat or cold; consequently, all swore they 
had never heard of such a thino-. 

However, when the poor fellow saw how cut up I 
was at my misfortune, he calmed down, and tried 
hard to afford consolation. 

" Steer for the ship's usual position between Lan- 
cava and Parlis," I said. " Jadee, I am disgraced," 
and, youngster-like, I really felt as if I was ; and a 
vision that it would be necessary for me to run away 
and join an opium clipper as soon as possible already 
haunted me. 

" How could you be so ignorant of a Malay stra- 
tagem?" I said petulantly to Jadee. 

His unaffected efforts to take all the blame on his 
own shoulders, and to cheer me, were quite delightful. 

" Tell the Rajah Laut (Captain Warren) it was my 
fault, my officer !" said the honest fellow. <c I ought to 
have guessed the manoeuvre when the women screamed 
out ; of a surety, they are the source of all mischief, 
and limbs of the evil one!" Then he proceeded 
to anathematise his bronze-cheeked countrywomen 



DISAPPOINTMENT AND CONSOLATION. 327 

in rather strong terms, but wound up with saying — 
what was true enough, — " The Rajah Laut will not 
be angry, Tuhan ! He would have done the same, 
had he been there. Who would chase a eanoe when 
a prahu — a capel praham* — was in sight ?" " Give 
way! Numero Tegas " (No. 3.'s) — he shouted — 
" Mahomet Alee may be caught yet : he shall not 
escape us in a canoe next time !" (t Hurrah ! " 
shouted the poor fellows, and away flew the little 
" Number Three " under sails and sweeps towards 
the " Hyacinth ; " and by the time we reached her, 
I had begun to fancy that the chances were yet in 
favour of catching not only Mahomet Alee, but his 
reported fleet likewise. 

The ship soon hove in sight, and we altered course 
for her. Jadee seeing me somewhat consoled, edged 
to me, sat down at a respectful distance, and catching 
my eye, quietly remarked, "It was a pity we joked 
about the warning that bird gave us last night, 
Tuhan ! Allah be praised, worse has not befallen 
us. One should never laugh at the warnings he sends 
by the mouths of unclean creatures ; " here he expec- 
torated, to purify himself. " I ought to have known 

* " Capel praham'''' is a fighting prabu; they generally have 
a breast-work in the bows for the guns. 

t 4 



328 THE NEGLECTED WARNING. 

better," said he, with a self-upbraiding air : " after 
the number of times that accursed bird has warned 
me of evil, to think of my not heeding it ! " He con- 
tinued, u Allah be praised, it was no worse ! " It 
was evident that I might have had a tale of un- 
limited length, had I sought it ; but such was not 
then my humour, so I left Jadee to soliloquize 
away, until we anchored close to the " Hyacinth." 

My worthy captain heard my tale, and then very 
kindly said that it was unfortunate, but could not be 
helped, and that the escape had been cleverly effected 
by a simple but well-laid manoeuvre ; it would be 
a wrinkle to me for the future ; and I amused my 
dear friend the first lieutenant extremely, by vowing 
that in future, all the ladies in Quedah screaming 
should not stop my 18-pounder, if I had another 
chance at the rascally Datoo. 

The description we gave of the canoe excited no 
small interest on board the " Hyacinth ; " for it ap- 
peared that that same morning, directly it was day- 
light, the signal-man had descried from the masthead 
a boat paddling towards the Lancavas, answering 
exactly to the description of the one in which the 
pirate chieftain had escaped from the Pouchou. 
The captain's five-oared gig had been at once de- 
spatched in chase of her, in charge of Mr. Major, 



RAISING OF THE BLOCKADE. 329 

the gunner, a very gallant and determined officer. 
The canoe and gig had both run out of sight, and 
there being no wind, the " Hyacinth " could not weigh 
to go in chase and support her gig, against which 
the canoe had long odds in her 20 men. Just at 
this juncture, the "Diana" steamer had arrived from 
Penang with despatches from Governor Bonham, and 
she was immediately sent after the gig; and we all 
now were most anxious to see the upshot of the chase. 

Only one good had resulted from my pursuit and 
dispersion of the Datoo's attendant prahus on the 
previous night : it was that of compelling the canoe 
to make the traverse of the Strait so far to the 
southward as to bring her in sight of the " Hyacinth," 
which she otherwise would most decidedly not have 
done. 

There was just light enough left to make the " ge- 
neral recall" for all the blockading force off Parlis. 
It was certain from the intelligence I brought, 
as well as from what had reached the captain from 
other quarters, that the chiefs had all escaped over 
to the Lancavas, and that a persistence in the 
blockade would do no earthly good, but might 
cause a host of unfortunates to fall into the hands 
of the Siamese, who were now completely masters of 
the province. 



330 THE GIG CHASES THE CANOE. 

Dunns; the nis;ht the steamer ct Diana " returned 
with the gig in tow. The gunner had had a severe 
chase, and at one time had considerably gained upon 
the canoe, her crew being apparently much exhausted. 
The intense heat and several hours' pulling had, how- 
ever, distressed the <n°:'s crew likewise: the canoe 
was not caught ; and perhaps it was as well that the 
odds of a personal conflict of four to one had not to 
be risked, although the gallant gunner spoke of it as 
a fair fight, when Englishmen and black fellows 
were concerned. 

Directly the canoe reached the wonderful labyrinth 
of islands of which the Lancavas and Laddas are 
composed, she was safe, for it would have been diffi- 
cult there to have kept in sight of a friend even. At 
a sudden turn amongst the tortuous channels, through 
which the gig still dogged the heels of the canoe, 
the latter suddenly disappeared " like magic, " 
to use the gunner's phrase, and neither she nor her 
crew could again be seen. She was doubtless 
whipped out of sight into the jungle, and the Malays 
hid her and themselves where all the eyes of an 
Argus would not have discovered them. 

No one could help admiring the skill and pluck 
exhibited in this escape of the redoubted Datoo, and 
he had fully supported his high reputation in the 



A MALAYAN NIGHT-SCENE. 331 

cleverness with which he and his pious confrere the 
Haggi Loung had evaded us all. Of the Tonkoos we 
could learn nothing. 

By dark the <e Hyacinth " had all her Musquito 
squadron around her, three gun-boats and a pinnace 
and cutter. A rumour was afloat that Captain 
Warren had information of the position of the pira- 
tical nest on the Lancavas, and that the morrow would 
be a great day. All was curiosity and excitement, 
mixed with that pleasant dream-like feeling, that 
the coming day would bring something striking and 
novel; with the consciousness, come what might, 
that it would be acceptable, for one had health and 
strength to make it welcome and enjoy it — without 
one corroding thought, one anxiety to mar it. 

I see it now, that calm and beautiful Malayan 
night, robed in silence and Godlike majesty — the 
vast heaven over-head, resplendent with glitter- 
ing suns of other systems ; that stream of glorious 
stars, the Milky Way, which renders the blue vault 
about it of so intense and immeasurably deep a hue 
— an eternity of blue ; the young moon the while 
faintly sprinkling land and sea with a silvery light, 
tenfold more refreshing from the recollection of 
the past day of fervid, blazing sunlight ; the calm 
unruffled ocean, like a highly polished blade, reflect- 



332 A MALAYAN NIGHT-SCENE. 

ing stars and planets, ship and boats, in perfect but 
trembling outline — if touched by oar, or disturbed 
by the splash of fish feeding on the night-moths, it 
gleamed in many a whirl of lovely phosphorescent 
light, as if it were the surface of some huge crater 
of molten lava, iridescent where exposed to the air, 
but liquid fire beneath. 

The low long hull of the rakish corvette ; her lofty 
tapering spars ; the apertures in her sides, through 
which glistened the reflected light from her polished 
guns, and the long pendant which quivered as the 
night air touched it, — told of my country's naval 
power ; while around her lay, in the little gun-boats 
of the East India Company and their swarthy but 
loyal crews, evidences of that commercial greatness 
which had acquired for us tiie empire of the East, 
and made its many nations seek protection under the 
shadow of our old red ensigns. The Saxon cry of 
" All's well ! " and the Malay sentry's " Jagga jagga !" 
struck strangely on the ear; and then all the crowd 
of hopes for the "great to-morrow" of sweet seven- 
teen made the pulse throb wildly : you felt, indeed, 
it was a bright and glorious world we live in — a fig 
for those who say otherwise! 

It was a scene well calculated to impress any one, 
— even a thoughtless young seaman could appreciate 



DREAM-LAND. 333 

all its poetry and loveliness; and it gratified all 
those strange longings for the wonderful which God 
implants, for His own good reasons, in the bosom of 
restless yonth. 

Amid such scenes the mind realises all those 
strange aspirations and mysterious cravings which 
perhaps in earlier years may have crowded into the 
mind when musing, as I am not ashamed to own I 
have done, over such lines as these : — 



" There is a magnet-like attraction 
That links the viewless with the visible, 
And pictures things unseen. To realms beyond 
Yon highway of the world my fancy flies. 
When by her tall and triple masts we know 
Some noble voyager that has to woo 
The trade winds, and to stem th' ecliptic surge, 
The coral groves, the shores of conch and pearl, 
Where she will cast her anchor, and reflect 
Her cabin-window lights on warmer waves ; 
The nights of palmy isles that she will see 
Lit boundless by the fire-fly — all 
The pomp of nature, and the inspiriting 
Varieties of life she has to greet, 
Come swarming o'er the meditative mind." * 



Campbell. " Lines from St. Leonard's." 



334 RETURN TO THINGS EARTHLY. 

Yet, O reader ! by my beard I swear, that if thou 
hast not felt this, poetry and prose are alike 
lost upon thee ; and all I can say is, Heaven help 
thee ! Thou hadst need be sad if thou canst not quit 
this dull earth awhile and revel in the ideal, even as 
a light-hearted midshipman may. 

How much longer I should have given way to this 
vein, deponent knoweth not ; but, to my discomfiture 
— though possibly to the joy of those who may 
peruse these pages — the interpreter and Jadee in- 
terrupted me. They said I had given away all the rice 
and water, and that there was hardly enough left to 
give the people their breakfasts next morning. It was 
sad information to receive at such a juncture. I knew 
all the boats, as well as the ship, were at the end of 
their provisions and stores, consequently unable to 
replenish our wants ; and that if I made any appli- 
cation upon that head, we should be assuredly sent 
down to Penang, and lose our share in the closing 
scenes. 

I explained all this to Jadee : he fully entered into 
my feelings, begged me to say nothing about it ; 
assured me, if I did not mind it, that a few days of 
nothing to eat and nothing to drink were of very 
common occurrence for himself and his countrymen ; 
and that although it was his full intention to marry 



UNSUCCESSFUL SEARCH FOR PRAHUS. 335 

a certain lovely " Tedia " on his arrival at Penang, 
and that she was impatient for his return, he could 
not think of doing so before the operations against 
Quedah were finally and perfectly finished; " and as," 
said Jadee, " we have some cocoa-nuts, and birds'- 
nests on board, we shall not> at any rate, starve, 
Tuhan." 

Accordingly, it was decided that I should say 
nothing about the want of provisions, and that we 
were to trust in Providence for a wind-fall of rice 
and water, which, together with an occasional bite of 
salt fish, had long been mine as well as the crew's 
victualling. 

At cockcrow next morning — and in Malayia he 
must be a clever man who can escape the melody of 
chanticleer — the steamer " Diana" took all the gun- 
boats in tow, and we proceeded towards a small river 
called the Lungo, north of Setoue Bay. Casting off 
from her when she could not approach nearer from 
want of water, we pulled in for the place, expecting 
to find a squadron of seven war prahus : but here 
again the birds had flown ; we only found the nests. 
The Lancavas were still reported to hide the prahus 
of Mahomet Alee, and the Siamese brig had been 
beaten off from a place called Malacca, on those 
islands. Towards Malacca, therefore — or rather for 



335 THE RACE. 

the Lancavas Islands — we now rowed all that long 
scorching-hot afternoon, and anchored in the evening 
at 7 o'clock, after a heavy but unsuccessful day's 
search, our position then being on the eastern shores 
of the Lancavas Islands. 

The steamer and "Hyacinth" parted company, 
going to the southward, and we were next day to 
proceed northward, examining alongshore for pra- 
hus, and to join the ship off the town of Malacca. 
We had only had this day one meal of rice, and a 
couple of drinks of water each man, on board the "Eme- 
rald ;" fatigue, however, enabled us to sleep soundly 
until about one o'clock on the following morning, 
when I was ordered to weigh, in chase of a vessel 
that was seen to the southward. By daylight I had 
got sufficiently close to ascertain that it was No. 1. 
gun-boat, and then turned back, catching the Mus- 
quito squadron just as it had finished sweeping 
along the eastern shores of the Islands, and had made 
sail to a fine rattling sea-breeze which was rushing 
in between the Islands of Lancavas — or Langkawi, 
as the Malays called them — and Pulo Trotto. 

With the tacks of our sails well down and sheets 
fiat aft, we slashed our boats up against the fiery 
breeze (fiery only in the sailor's acceptation of that 
term), hatches on, and green seas flying four reefs 



SHORT RATIONS. 337 

high ! it was glorious excitement to feel every plank 
quivering with the momentum given by the sails. 
"One reef, and no more, Jadee, as you love me ! 
There's Halkett in the * Ruby ' carrying canvass as 
if he had ' the little cherub ' stowed away in his 
fore-peak, and knew no harm could come to masts 
or hull. Barclay in the cutter and Drake in the 
pinnace are just as bad as we, boys! they are fairly 
smothering themselves in spray. 

" Whew ! The gusts freshen, let fly the sheets for 
a minute, and then haul aft again. Talk of the 
excitement of Newmarket! it's nothing; to a chase to 
windward when the breeze is fresh and the sails 
are large ! " 

As my little craft passed the pinnace, Mr. Drake 
hailed, and desired me to proceed, make the best of 
my way to Malacca, prevent all egress until his 
arrival, and to look out for his signals durino- the 
night. We weathered the Islands in the afternoon, 
and then proceeded to see what could be scraped 
together in the shape of food. Not a drop of water 
or grain of rice was left, and first the night chase 
and then the breeze had prevented us procuring 
any from the other gun-boats. It was now that I 
saw the edible birds'-nests first eaten 5 — Jadee had 
got a bag of them out of some prahu ; and there 

z 



338 A LONG AND DISTRESSING PULL. 

were, moreover, some green cocoa-nuts : each man 
was given one of the latter, and any that liked might 
help themselves to the nests ! 

I partook of both, the nests tasting very like 
isinglass, but serving to stay the cravings of a very 
keen appetite. The wind now fell, which distressed me 
much, for my men, though not complaining, were very 
exhausted : however, lest we should be thrown upon 
an iron-bound coast, the oars had again to be manned, 
and with difficulty we made our way along, for the 
sea on the beam caused the vessel to roll so much 
that the men could hardly keep their seats. 

Night came on, and the coast was still a sheer cliff: 
however, my Malays behaved admirably, and pulled 
cheerily, encouraging one another with the prospect 
of plenty of rice and fish on the morrow. At last, 
after three long and anxious hours, a bay showed 
itself on our left hand : fancying it was that in 
which the hostile prahus and battery were situated, 
we loaded the guns afresh, and pulled carefully 
in, but made the circuit of it without finding any- 
thing. I almost had decided on awaiting daylight, 
when a dip in the land gave promise of another bay, 
and as we swept round a rocky point, numerous 
lights afloat and on shore showed we had reached 
our destination. The oars were now rapidly muffled, 



ZEAL OF MY MALAYS. 339 

my crew zealously wrapping part of their wearing 
apparel round the looms of their oars ; and thus we 
swept in, pulling a quiet minute-stroke. 

Directly we could distinctly make out the hulls of 
the prahus, the oars were laid in, and when the gun- 
boat had lost her way through the water, an anchor 
was bent to a hawser, and lowered cleverly down to 
the bottom, so as to make no noise in anchoring ; all 
lights were carefully hidden, the decks cleared for 
action, and thus we lay, watching the enemy's two 
outer vessels, a large schooner and a prahu, without 
their being aware of our presence in the bay, a light 
mist serving still further to conceal us. 

I have been thus minute in the last two days' 
operations, to show the reader how zealous, docile, 
and cheerful the Malays could be when the occasion 
required it. They had had no rations since the 
previous day at about 8 a.m, and no water since the 
previous night ; they had been twenty-four hours 
upon their oars during the last forty hours, yet not a 
murmur escaped them ; and I would defy seamen of 
any nation to have excelled them in any quality 
which renders a sailor valuable. I cannot but feel 
that, in a nation like ours, possessing a vast colonial 
empire, which, in the event of a war, either for our 
commercial supremacy with America, or for our civil 

z 2 



340 REFLECTIONS. 

and religious liberties with despotic Europe, we 
might be sorely pressed to defend, it behoves every 
loyal man to cherish and uphold a race of sailors 
who combine, with all their faults and all their 
vices, many of the finest attributes of a seafaring 
people. 

They may be pirates ; they may be buccaneers : 
so were we ; and we still pride ourselves upon the 
naval glories of men who founded our reputation 
as a naval nation upon what was nothing less than 
robbery upon the high seas. Restrain, and bring 
the Malays under our rule gently, and they will 
serve us heartily and zealously in the hour of 
England's need ; they are the best race of colonial 
sailors we possess: grind them down, shoot them 
down, paddle over them, and they will join the first 
enemy, and be their own avengers. 



A TROriCAL SHOWER, 341 



CHAP. XXIV. 

A tropical Shower. — Early Breakfast. — The Malay piratical 
Soiree. — Jadee upbraids them for being surprised. — Pre- 
paring for Action. — Demeanour of English and Malay Sea- 
men. — Malay Charm for shooting straight. — My Coxswain • 
his Piety. — Burning, sinking, and destroying. — The Rene- 
gade turns Traitor. — The large Reptiles of Langkawi. — The 
Tale of the Oular-besar, or Great Snake. — The Snake choked 
by a holy Man. — A remarkable Fossil. — A Pirate's Hiding- 
place. — Lovely Scenery. — The Anger of the Skies. — Struck 
by Lightning. — Close of Operations against Quedah. — Con- 
clusion. 

About midnight, down came the rain — vertically, 
mercilessly, as it only can and does in the tropics. 
We got up, for sleep was impossible, and drank and 
washed, washed and drank, of the water like veri- 
table ducks. Flashes of vivid lightning lighted up 
the bay occasionally, and showed us, not only that a 
considerable force of Malay vessels had at last been 
caught, but that our own flotilla was pulling in 
from to seaward. 

z 3 



342 EARLY BREAKFAST. 

That they too saw us was very evident from the 
occasional noise which was heard, and the number 
of lights dancing about on shore. At about three 
o'clock in the morning, we sent away to the " Dia- 
mond" gunboat, and got a bag of rice and some 
fish, as well as a cask of water : the fire was lighted 
at once, and I gave an order for " carte-blanche" 
in the gastronomic way. It was indeed a delightful 
breakfast, though an early one, for the dawn was 
only just breaking. Let any one fast eight-and-forty 
hours, and he will think the same, even supposing 
that he should have had, like ourselves, one green 
'cocoa-nut, and an unlimited quantity of birds'-nests 
to refresh himself with meanwhile. 

When the sun rose, and the night-mists rolled 
back from the lands around us, our little flotilla lay 
at anchor in the northern part of a beautiful bay, 
which revelled in all the loveliness of Malayan 
scenery. The " Hyacinth" was just appearing at 
the opposite extreme of the bay, having passed 
round the south end of the Lancavas as we had 
done by the north. 

The pirates were fairly caught. Their vessels 
consisted of two queer-looking schooners, mounting 
ten small guns cr.ch ; one of them had 12-pounder 
carronades, the other, 3-pounder and 6-pounder 



THE PIRATICAL MALAY FORCE. 343 

guns. Three large and handsome prahus and a 
tope constituted the rest of their force, the prahus 
showing three or four guns, and the tope a 32- 
pounder carronade. These vessels were all covered 
by an eight-gun battery, situated on a small conical 
hill in the elbow of the bay ; this battery it was 
that had so roughly handled the " Teda Bagoose," 
or " Good-for- Nothing, " the slashing brig of our 
imperial allies. There was much excitement on 
shore ; armed men were passing and repassing rapidly 
amongst the cocoa-nut trees that lined the beach, 
boats were paddling to and fro, but there was no 
village to be seen. The pirates were evidently sur- 
prised. They had doubtless counted upon the grace 
of another day or two, when this rear-guard would 
have escaped, as most of the forty prahus did that 
we had seen at Trang in the previous year. 

It was necessary to await Captain Warren's arrival 
in the gig of the "Hyacinth," before we could do 
anything against the enemy ; and I had plenty of 
time to hear Jadee descant in flowery terms upon the 
beauty and advantages of the Lancavas Islands over 
Quedah proper, of which, however, in the good old 
days, it formed a part. One of its chief merits in my 
sea-king of a coxswain's eyes, was the wonderful 

z 4 



344 PREPARING FOR ACTION. 

facilities its labyrinth of islands and channels offered 
for the safe hiding of a fleet of a thousand prahus. 

(i D — pouls ! " said Jadee, anglicising his opinion 
of the enemy's prahus now cut off. " Ah ! you d — 
pouls ! Had I been their captain, Tuhan, do you 
think I would have anchored in such a place as this, 
whilst Orang-putihs were cruising about ? Ah ! you 
d — pouls ! The Datoo cannot be here," added 
Jadee — for my coxswain did him the justice to 
believe that so experienced a tactician would not be 
caught in an open bay. Then my worthy Jadee 
proceeded to point out some localities famous in his 
recollection for Love and War, the onlv two deities 
he believed in, and of sundry foiled chases he had 
had of prahus in and amongst these Lancavas since 
he took Company's pay. 

Captain Warren was seen to be approaching, and 
the word was now passed to clear for action ! Jadee 
and his crew did so with extreme alacrity. He 
adorned himself according to the most approved 
rules of Malay military etiquette. His sarong 
was wrapped tighter round the waist, and brought 
round the thighs, so as to leave his nervous little 
legs more than usually free ; a red sleeveless waist- 
coat, quilted so as to resist a knife-cut, hung slack 
round his person, leaving his muscular chest and 



PREPARING FOR ACTION. 345 

arms ready for any exertion ; whilst a stiff and 
cocksy-looking handkerchief fluttered around his 
glossy and erect hair, and in combination with his 
square chin, high cheek-bones, and an enormous 
quid of tobacco stuck under his upper lip, made him 
look as ferocious an individual as ever figured in 
the character of a bloodthirsty Malay in a three- 
volume romance, even supposing that he had not 
bristled, as he did, with no less than three creeses. 
He had, first, his badi, or small knife, answering to 
the Highland skene-dhu, then the regular waving 
bladed creese of about a foot or fourteen inches long, 
and, lastly, a heavy straight double-edged Illanoon 
creese, resembling somewhat an old Roman sword. 

The rest of the crew were got up in a very 
similar manner, and strutted about with a martial 
ardour quite comical, in so far as it was a demon- 
strative mode of exhibiting the same feelings which 
fluttered in the breasts of our more stoical English 
seamen and marines. These were quietly examining 
percussion caps, or seeing the nipples of their mus- 
kets all clear, and indulging in some rough jest ; 
such as that of Joe Hutchinson, the marine, who, 
taking an imaginary aim at some object on shore, 
apostrophises his musket thus: — -"Well, this old 
gal (his musket) never misses fire at practice ; and 



346 MALAY CHARM 

if she only shoots straight to-day, and pitches my 
sixty rounds into them precious Malays, I'll cut a 
notch in the stock, and give her my grog, if she 
likes ; " or the light-hearted foretop-men, or skylark- 
ing flaxen-headed Lambies*, who, polishing their cut- 
lasses, wonder if they will be able to play the fifth- 
stick practice on the head of some unfortunate pirate 
with " this here cutlash," or suggest innocently to 
some old petty-officer, that they felt jolly well sure 
there were both grog-shops and women ashore, and 
hanged, if they had a chance, if they wouldn't look 
for them ! 

A playful tendency, or moral weakness, which of 
course the petty-officer mentally resolves they shall 
not indulge in, if a sharp pair of eyes can prevent 
these frolicsome individuals carrying out their in- 
tions. 

" Tuhan ! " said Jadee, looking the picture of mys- 
tery, " have you got a piece of pork that you could 
spare ? " 

" No ; but I can get a bit in a minute," I replied. 
" What are you going to do with the unclean 
animal?" 

" It 's a great charm," said Jadee. u I forgot it 

* Lambies, or lambs, a nickname for the youngest seamen in 
a man-of-war, generally the mizentop-men. 



FOR SHOOTING STRAIGHT. 347 

until the captain of the bow-gun reminded me; but 
it's invaluable against an enemy." 

" What ? How ? In what way, oh Jadee ? " 

" Simply by cutting it up into small pieces, and 
putting it into a gun upon the first round it fires." 

" Botheration !" I said, " why, you are like an old 
Malay lady, Jadee ! firing fids of pork at a man 
won't hurt him." 

He coloured up, and walked away ; but Jamboo 
came and said, ct Do get a bit of pork, sir ; these 
Malay men think it a charm to make a gun shoot 
straight ; they have some tradition about it, and it 
will not do any harm, at any rate." Accordingly, I 
got them a bit of pork, and Jamboo cut it up, and 
J adee loaded the bow-gun with grape, canister, and 
chopped pork, — a villanous compound to say the 
least about it, — and then resumed his station, 
perfectly ready for what Allah might in his wisdom 
send him. 

Captain Warren now joined us, inspected the boats 
to see that all were ready, of which he would have 
entertained no doubt, could he have only known 
the charge in my 18-pounder, — and then a message 
was sent in to the pirates, giving them five minutes 
for an unconditional surrender of their vessels. 

It is a great five minutes in a man's lifetime, that 



348 THE coxswain; his piety. 

five minutes before an action is commenced ; 
especially when, as was the case with us, there 
happens to be a disparity of forces on his side. 

" Jadee," I said, " Datoo Mahomet Alee will send 
you to join the houris to-night." 

He was not in a jocular mood : he drew his hand 
across his throat, and pointed his fingers upward, as 
if he felt perfectly certain his virtues would lead 
him that way, and said " his life was in the hand of 
Allah," adding that beautiful verse from the Koran, 
which is so often used as the war-chaunt of the true 
believer : " Exult not, and despond not, so shall ye 
prevail." * 

Jadee's chances of a heavenward flight were, how- 
ever, dashed to the ground, for the Malays showed 
evident intentions of surrendering their vessels ; in- 
deed, they decamped as fast as possible from them 
and the battery, before the expiration of the five 
minutes. The nicodar of one of the vessels, a 
tope, came to Captain Warren, and prayed for 
mercy, with the excuse that he was only an armed 
trader; and rather than be unjust, the very doubtful 
proof of his assertions were allowed to have weight, 
and he was ordered to be off as fast as the wind 
would let him. This hero was the renegade son of 

* The Koran, 3rd chapter. 



BURNING, SINKING, AND DESTROYING. 3 49 

an old English soldier, who lived at Penang ; he had 
adopted Mahometanism as his creed, and could not 
have been distinguished from a Malay in any respect. 

Orders were now given to pull in, and burn, sink, 
and destroy : this was done with no small good-will. 
The prahus and schooners were soon wrapt in flames, 
their guns being first thrown overboard, then the 
battery was dismantled, and the guns disabled most 
effectually. In a small creek we discovered two more 
very handsome prahus, just off the stocks, and a 
couple of long brass 9-pounders ; furthermore, we 
found abundant proofs that the Malay chieftains had 
been winding up their affairs, and that, had we been 
a few days later, they would have flitted back to 
their native haunts in Sumatra. 

As it was, there w T as still a possibility that their 
escape from the island would be now prevented, and 
that they might eventually fall into Siamese hands. 

As every fresh explosion took place, or a fresh 
outbreak of fire and smoke betokened the success of 
our work of destruction, loud cheers and shouts rose 
from the English and Malay seamen, and one could 
hardly recognise, in the excited actors of this scene, 
the men who a short week previously had been 
ministering to the wants of the fugitive pirates of 
Quedah fort and Parlis town, or dry-nursing their 



350 THE EENEGADE TURNS TRAITOR. 

infants. Funny fellows are sailors, whether English 
or Malay — a strange mixture of the tiger and the 
lamb. 

When everything was wrapt in flames beyond all 
possibility of the conflagration being quenched, we 
had a hasty noonday meal, and were then ordered 
to " make sail and man the oars," the renegade 
having offered to conduct us to a spot where he 
said there were fifteen prahus concealed. 

Yah ! Yah ! Yah ! responded the gun-boat's crew, 
to the Englishmen's hurrah at the joyful news ; and 
away we dashed for a place amongst the Laddas, 
called Bass Harbour, and, turning into lovely and 
tortuous channels, rushed on like bloodhounds after 
our prey. " Now," said my coxswain, " you will see 
Malay scenery and Malay men's haunts ! " 

The island of Lancavas — or islands, for there 
may be more than one — is surrounded by a host of 
islets, called the Grains of Pepper (from their num- 
ber), like an emerald set in seed pearls. Lancavas 
island is mountainous, but has broad valleys in its 
interior, and a considerable quantity of flat land 
bordering the eastern and southern shores. While 
the plains and rice-fields of Quedah are parched by 
a drought of many months' duration, the hills of 
Lancavi collect around their summits the vapours 



LARGE REPTILES OF LANGKAWI. 351 

of the sea, which, as they condense, fall in refreshing 
showers upon the thirsty vegetation at the base. 

It is not therefore to be wondered at that, even 
amongst the naturally dense jungles of Malayia, those 
of the valleys of the Lancavas are pre-eminent, and 
that in those dank and hot forests reptiles abound 
of enormous size. The great boa-constrictor here 
grows to a size which it will not do to talk of without 
being able to produce the original, though I am 
morally convinced that the skin of one which I 
saw, without its head, must have been from 25 to 
30 feet long, when complete. However, if I wanted 
to get a true and faithful account of a very father of 
snakes, I had only to refer to Jadee : he had a stock 
on hand which would have satisfied the most credu- 
lous glutton. 

Whilst crossing Malacca Bay, I suggested that 
he had spoken of a famous snake, which was only 
got rid of by a very devout Haggi, — perhaps Jadee 
would favour me with the history ? but mind, I 
wanted it unadorned — a really faithful tale which 
I could swear to. 

Jadee looked serious, put his hand upon his breast, 
and trusted his veracity was beyond all suspicion, 
and that, at any rate, I might swear to receiving all 
information just as unadulterated as it came to him : 
what more could I expect? 



352 THE TALE OF THE OULAR-BESAR. 

Crossing his legs, renewing his quid, and shout- 
ing to his men to " give way ! " and beat Number 
Two gun-boat, he then proceeded to relate how, in 
former days, the Rajahs of Quedah were bound by a 
law, whenever a new king ascended the throne, or 
when war was declared with another state, to sacri- 
fice a virgin daughter of the Royal family to an 
enormous boa-constrictor, or Oular-besar, that dwelt 
on the Lancavas, though it would occasionally visit 
the Malay continent. In return for this delicate 
tribute, the Oular-besar abstained from feeding 
largely on the Quedah folk, confining its attention to 
Siamese, or people of Mergui, and suchlike canaille; 
and it even extended its good offices to watching 
over the homes and wives of its Malay friends, who 
were absent upon little innocent cruises at sea. In- 
deed, so far had they succeeded in propitiating its 
good- will, that on a hostile fleet of prahus appear- 
ing suddenly off this very bay, the generous boa- 
constrictor stretched itself across from one point of 
it to the other as a boom, and defied all the efforts 
of the enemy to enter. Jadee pointed first to one 
horn of Malacca Bay and then the other, and though 
they were a couple of miles apart, I 'm bound to 
say Jadee did not blush, as he added, " and that will 
give you, oh ! my officer, some idea of its length ! " 
1 coughed, and said I should like to have seen that 



THE TALE OF THE OULAK-BESAR. 353 

snake's mother ! My coxswain's feelings were hurt, 
he was silent, until I gently smoothed down his 
feathers by asking what might have been the end 
of this very amiable monster. He continued, " When 
Mahomet, — may his tomb exhale unceasingly the 
odour of holiness ! — sent holy men to show the poor 
Malays the road to Paradise, the Haggis said it was 
wrong to sacrifice, even to such a big snake, and 
the Kings' daughters were not sent to feed the 
Oular-besar. 

u The creature became very annoyed, and the con- 
sequence was, he almost cleared the Island of Lan- 
cavas of its population and cattle. All schemes 
failed to check its wrath, prayers were offered up in 
all the mosques, but for our previous sins the Oular- 
besar still lived, and still kept swallowing up Malays, 
until the fields were left untilled, and the country 
was fast becoming one great forest. At last Allah 
sent relief, as he always does to the faithful. 

" One day, a most holy man, an Arab Sheik, 
famous for his piety and knowledge of the word of 
God, arrived at Quedah ; he exhorted all the people 
to remain firm in their new faith, for some of them 
were backsliders, and thought of the good old times. 
He pointed out to them, that the wrath of the Oular- 
besar was only a means to test their faith ; but that 

A A 



354 THE SNAKE CHOKED BY A HOLY MAN. 

now Allah was satisfied, and had sent him to put 
a stop to their sorrows. The holy man now prayed, 
and all the people with him, and then he took ship, 
and proceeded to the Lancavas, — anchoring near the 
place where we destroyed the prahus. The holy 
man performed his ablutions, said his prayers, put on 
his green turban, and balancing the Koran on his 
head, landed at once either to drive the Oular-besar 
away or to die. 

" Down came the snake from those distant valleys, 
and looked wistfully at the high-dried, tough old 
Arab ; and the poor boa-constrictor no doubt sighed 
at the remembrance of bygone tit-bits. The holy 
man spread his carpet, and began to pray ; the 
Oular-besar wrapt him in one fold of its deadly 
grasp, and a shriek of * God is great ! ' rang in the 
ears of his shipmates, as he disappeared down the 
throat of the monster — turban, Koran, and all! 

" Instead of the Oular-besar reposing, as was to 
be expected, while it digested the venerable Haggi, 
a violent fury seemed to seize it ; its whole body 
writhed in a perfect frenzy, it raised its head high 
above the loftiest trees, its eyes flashed lightning, 
and for a few minutes the creature seemed upon the 
point of dashing into the sea ; then, with a hiss that 
made the beholders' blood curdle in their veins, it 
shot swiftly away in the direction of the mountains, 



A REMARKABLE FOSSIL. 355 

and since that day the Oular-besar has never been 
seen, and its brethren generally prefer pigs, poultry, 
and game to true believers ! " 

" Wonderful ! " I exclaimed ; " and so no one has 
ever seen the big snake since ? " 

° No one, Tuhan ! The words of the holy man 
came true; for when did a Haggi tell a lie ? — but 
some of the gold-seekers who scale those mountains 
you see in the direction of Patani, report that in a 
deep and narrow valley, there is to be seen the vast 
bones of a big snake around a long green stone, 
which doubtless, as Allah is great, are the remains of 
the Oular-besar and that most virtuous priest." 

" Ah ! I see, Jadee," added I, " the priest, in English 
sailors' phrase, ' choked the luff' * of that snake." 

" Very probably," said Jadee, to whom I had not 
interpreted the expression. " Very probably, Tuhan ; 
but it was a happy day for Quedah when that holy 
man came to it." 

Meantime the boats had entered a wonderful laby- 
rinth of islands and deep water-channels : not only, 
as Jadee had said, might a thousand prahus have 

* "Choking the luff" is done by placing a piece of wood or 
rope in a block or pulley, in such a way, that the rope which 
is rove through the block will not run. The term is often 
applied to a tough story not easily swallowed. 

a a 2 



356 LOVELY SCENERY. 

been hidden away, bat a fleet of line-of-battle ships 
might as easily have been secreted in the tortuous 
channels and hundred creeks around us. It was 
a sight to make the heart leap, and the blood to 
flow fast, to be thus surrounded by such gorgeous 
Eastern scenery ; it was exactly the haunt one had 
imagined ought to exist for dashing pirates and 
fleet-footed prahus. 

Now we are passing through that heavenly blue 
water, — bright and clear as woman's eye, — which 
shows, over a coral bed, a diminutive and wonderful 
submarine forest of every fantastic form and colour, 
over which we are swiftly passing. On the one 
hand lies a long and picturesque mountain, clothed 
with luxuriant vegetation, aslant which the Western 
sun is casting a million tints of warm and luscious 
colouring; on the other, some fantastic islet throws 
its sharp outline up against the sky, whilst the 
graceful palm, the plantain, and pandanus, hang 
round it, here clinging to some grey rock, like old 
age in the arms of beauty, or feathering over the 
edge of a beetling cliff, as if they were ostrich-plumes 
round some grim warrior's head. 

A little farther, the trail winds through a maze 
of islets, and fe lustrous woodlands " each unlike its 
neighbour, and strangely beautiful, and just when all 
farther progress seems hopeless in such a tangled 



SUPERSTITION OF THE CREW. 357 

web, there bursts upon us a broad expanse of water, 
laughing in sunlight and breeze. It might be a 
lake, except that between the islets on the seaward 
side, the light of a declining sun streams in, in a 
flood of gold which contrasts richly with the deep 
purple of their shaded sides. 

On, on we went, now sailing, now rowing, — 
narrow channels, over which the trees appeared to 
arch, led away as if to the base of the tall peaks of 
the interior, around whose crests were fast mustering 
heavy clouds, which portended one of those fierce 
squalls for which the Straits of Malacca are famous, 
and generally known under the name of Sumatrans ; 
and then we swept along a beach so white, so glitter- 
ing, — flowers and coral, vegetation and sea, — it 
seemed as if Neptune and Flora were striving for 
mastery. 

At 9 o'clock that evening, the squall which threat- 
ened at sunset swept over the beautiful scene I have 
made a feeble effort to pourtray. As the thunder 
pealed over our heads, and the forked lightning 
crackled through the refreshing gale, we came to 
anchor, and rested after another long day's labour. 
I was surprised to observe the superstitious horror 
betrayed by my crew at the thunder and lightning ; 
for I thought these would have been to them very 
ordinary phenomena. 



358 THE ANGER OF THE SKIES. 

During the storm, some portion of the electric 
fluid, on its passage to the water, took a fancy to 
make a conductor of a chain-cable and an anchor 
that were hanging to the bows ; there was imme- 
diately a general appeal to Mahomet and the Koran ; 
and one man, more devout or more wealthy than the 
rest, made a vow to sacrifice sundry game-cocks and 
certain rice : be it said to the Malay's honour, that 
a few days after, when, as he believed, his prayers 
had been granted, and all danger over, his promise 
was faithfully performed. 

Jadee remarked, in a serious tone, to me during 
the squall, and referring to the thunder, (( that the 
skies were angry." I ventured jestingly to reply, 
that perhaps it was the Oular-besar suffering from 
indigestion, brought on by the Haggi ! Jadee was 
horrified, and said that Malay men knew too well 
what thunder and lightning were, to joke of them. 
I believe he began now to think me a scoffer — for, 
like all Malays, he held local legends and super- 
stitions in equal reverence with Mahomet's doctrines. 
Perhaps, too, it occurred to him that though he was 
no Haggi, yet his chances of entertainment amongst 
the houris would be smaller still if he was not more 
guarded in communications upon religious subjects 
with an Infidel like myself. 

The next morning, at early break of day, we were 



OPERATIONS AGAINST QUEDAH CLOSED. 359 

again pulling and sailing under the guidance of our 
renegade guide ; but after searching every spot he 
suggested, and chasing sundry imaginary prahus 
which, on close approach, resolved themselves into 
the stems of old trees, or rocks, it became certain 
that the birds, if there ever had been any, had flown, 
and our captain decided on returning to the ship. 

In obedience to our orders, and with a fair wind, 
we commenced to thread our way back again through 
the Laddas, reaching the " Hyacinth " late the same 
afternoon. 

The next day saw the close of our operations 
against the Malays of Quedah ; it was very evident 
that all those that could fly had done so ; those who 
remained, had no resource but to give their allegiance 
to the Siamese Government or stand the conse- 
quences. Numero Tega and the other gun-boats 
were ordered to proceed to Penang, whilst their 
quondam commanders returned to the " Hyacinth," 
after an absence of one hundred and fourteen days. 

It was not without regret I bid my crew good-bye ; 
for my first essay as a captain had been a very very 
happy one; and if ever a set of poor fellows tried to 
show that the feeling was mutual, it was exhibited 
in the warm good-bye of Jadee and his swarthy crew. 

My tale is told ; the " Hyacinth " remained on the 
coast only a few days longer, and Captain Warren 



360 CONCLUSION. 

communicated with the new Siamese authorities of 
Parlis and Quedah. He damped their military- 
ardour at Quedah fort, by obliging them to liberate 
very expeditiously a British subject whom they had 
captured, and upon whom they were about to practise 
some original cruelties. The Rajah of Ligor, Com- 
mander-in-chief of the Siamese forces, sent to express 
his gratitude for all the able assistance that had been 
received from us, accompanying it by a token of his 
Imperial master's favour in the shape of a valuable 
gold tea-pot for our gallant Captain, which he re- 
ceived official permission to retain, together with a 
most cordial letter of thanks for his able services 
from the Governor General of British India, the 
Earl of Auckland. 

Dear reader, fare \\ ell ! If, in my attempt to give 
you a fair impression of the much-abused Malay, I 
have succeeded in removing from your mind one 
prejudice against that people, I shall not have written 
in vain, and I shall have done my part towards 
making you think, as I would fain do, that 

" God framed mankind to be one mighty family, 
Himself our Father, and the world our home." 

THE END. 



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