Busuk

BusukThe Story of a Malayan GirlhoodThey called her Busuk, or “the youngest” at her birth. Her father, the oldpunghulo, or chief, of the littlekampong, or village, of Passir Panjang, whispered the soft Allah Akbar, the prayer to Allah, in her small brown ear.The subjects of thepunghulobrought presents ofsarongsrun with gold thread, and not larger than a handkerchief, for Busuk to wear about her waist. They also brought gifts of rice in baskets of cunningly woven cocoanut fibre; of bananas, a hundred on a bunch; ofdurians, that filled the bungalow with so strong an odor that Busuk drew up her wrinkled, tiny face into a quaint frown; and of cocoanuts in their great green, oval shucks.Busuk’s old aunt, who lived far away up the river Maur, near the foot of Mount Ophir, sent a yellow gold pin for the hair; her husband, the Hadji Mat, had washed the gold from the bed of the stream that rushed by their bungalow.Busuk’s brother, who was a sergeant in his Highness’s the Sultan’s artillery at Johore, brought a tiny pair of sandals all worked in many-colored beads. Never had such presents been seen at the birth of any other of Punghulo Sahak’s children.Two days later the Imam Paduka Tuan sent Busuk’s father a letter sewn up in a yellow bag. It contained a blessing for Busuk. Busuk kept the letter all her life, for it was a great thing for the high priest to do.On the seventh day Busuk’s head was shaven and she was named Fatima; but they called her Busuk in thekampong, andsome even called her Inchi Busuk, the princess.From the low-barred window of Busuk’s home she could look out on the shimmering, sunlit waters of the Straits of Malacca. The loom on which Busuk’s mother wove thesarongsfor thepunghuloand for her sons stood by the side of the window, and Busuk, from the sling in which she sat on her mother’s side, could see the fishingprausglide by, and also the big lumbertonkangs, and at rare intervals one of his Highness’s launches.Sometimes she blinked her eyes as a vagrant shaft of sunlight straggled down through the great green and yellow fronds of the cocoanut palms that stood about the bungalow; sometimes she kept her little black eyes fixed gravely on the flying shuttle which her mother threw deftly back and forth through the many-colored threads; but best of all did she love to watch thelittle gray lizards that ran about on the palm sides of the house after the flies and moths.She was soon able to answer the lizards’ call of “gecho, gecho,” and once she laughed outright when one, in fright of her baby-fingers, dropped its tail and went wiggling away like a boat without a rudder. But most of the time she swung and crowed in her wicker cradle under the low rafters.When Busuk grew older, she was carried every day down the ladder of the house and put on the warm white sand with the other children. They were all naked, save for a little chintz bib that was tied to their necks; so it made no difference how many mudpies they made on the beach nor how wet they got in the tepid waters of the ocean. They had only to look out carefully for the crocodiles that glided noiselessly among the mangrove roots.One day one of Busuk’s playmates was caught in the cruel jaws of a crocodile, and lost its hand. The men from the village went out into the labyrinth of roots that stood up above the flood like a huge scaffolding, and caught the man-eater with ropes of thegamootypalm. They dragged it up the beach and put out its eyes with red-hot spikes of the hard billion wood.Although the varnished leaves of the cocoanuts kept almost every ray of sunlight out of the little village, and though the children could play in the airy spaces under their own houses, their heads and faces were painted with a paste of flour and water to keep their tender skins from chafing in the hot, moist air.At evening, when the fierce sun went down behind the great banian tree that nearly hid Mount Pulei, thekateebwould sound the call to prayer on a hollow logthat hung up before the little palm-thatched mosque. Then Busuk and her playmates would fall on their faces, while the holy man sang in a soft, monotonous voice the promises of the Koran, the men of thekamponganswering. “Allah il Allah,” he would sing, and “Mohammed is his prophet,” they would answer.Every night Busuk would lie down on a mat on the floor of the house with a little wooden pillow under her neck, and when she dared she would peep down through the open spaces in the bamboo floor into the darkness beneath. Once she heard a low growl, and a great dark form stood right below her. She could see its tail lashing its sides with short, whip-like movements. Then all the dogs in thekampongbegan to bark, and the men rushed down their ladders screaming, “Harimau! Harimau!” (A tiger! A tiger!) The next morning she found that her pet dog, Fatima, named afterherself, had been killed by one stroke of the great beast’s paw. Once a monster python swung from a cocoanut tree through the window of her home, and wound itself round and round the post of her mother’s loom. It took a dozen men to tie a rope to the serpent’s tail, and pull it out.Busuk went everywhere astride thepunghulo’sbroad shoulders as he collected the taxes and settled the disputes in the little village. She went out into the straits in the bigprauthat floated the star and crescent of Johore over its stern, to look at the fishing-stakes, and was nearly wrecked by a great water-spout that burst within a few feet of them.Then she went twice to Johore, and gazed in open-eyed wonder at the palaces of the Sultan and at the fort in which her uncle was an officer.“Some day,” she thought, “I may see his Highness, and he may notice me andsmile.”For had not his Highness spoken twice to her father and called him a good man? So whenever she went to Johore she put on her bestsarongandkabaya> and in her jetty black hair she put the pin her aunt had given her, with a spray of sweet-smellingchumpakaflower.When she was four years old she went to thepenagerto learn to read and write. In a few months she could outstrip any one in the class in tracing Arabic characters on the sand-sprinkled floor, and she knew whole chapters in the Koran.So the days were passed in the littlekampongunder the gently swaying cocoanuts, and the little Malayan girl grew up like her companions, free and wild, with little thought beyond the morrow. That some day she was to be married, she knew; for since her first birthday she had been engaged to Mamat, the son of her father’s friend, thepunghuloof Bander Bahru.She had never seen Mamat, nor he her; for it was not proper that a Malay should see his intended before marriage. She had heard that he was strong and lithe of limb, and could beat all his fellows at the game calledragga. When the wicker ball was in the air he never let it touch the ground; for he was as quick with his head and feet, shoulders, hips, and breast, as with his hands. He could swim and box, and had once gone with his father to the seaports on New Year’s Day at Singapore, and his ownprauhad won the short-distance race.Mamat was three years older than Busuk, and they were to be married when she was fifteen.At first she cried a little, for she was sad at the thought of giving up her playmates. But then the older women told her that she could chew betel when she was married, and her mother showed her a little set of betel-nut boxes, for which she had sent to Singapore.Each cup was of silver, and the box was cunningly inlaid with storks and cherry blossoms. It had cost her mother a month’s hard labor on the loom.Then Mamat was not to take her back to his father’s bungalow. He had built a little one of his own, raised up on palm posts six feet from the ground, so that she need not fear tigers or snakes or white ants. Its sides were of plaited palm leaves, every other one colored differently, and its roof was of the choicestattap, each leaf bent carefully over a rod of rattan, and stitched so evenly that not a drop of rain could get through.Inside there was a room especially for her, with its sides hung withsarongs, and by the window was a loom made ofkamooningwood, finer than her mother’s. Outside, under the eaves, was a house of bent rattan for her ring-doves, and a shelf where her silver-haired monkey could sun himself.So Busuk forgot her grief, and she watched with ill-concealed eagerness the coming of Mamat’s friends with presents of tobacco and rice and bone-tippedkrises. Then for the first time she was permitted to open the camphor-wood chest and gaze upon all the beautiful things that she was to wear for the one great day.Her mother and elder sisters had been married in them, and their children would, one after another, be married in them after her.There was asarongof silk, run with threads of gold and silver, that was large enough to go around her body twice and wide enough to hang from her waist to her ankles; a belt of silver, with a gold plate in front, to hold thesarongin place; akabaya, or outer garment, that looked like a dressing-gown, and was fastened down the front with golden brooches of curious Malayan workmanship; a pair of red-tipped sandals;and a black lace scarf to wear about her black hair. There were earrings and a necklace of colored glass, and armlets, bangles, and gold pins. They all dazzled Busuk, and she could hardly wait to try them on.A buffalo was sacrificed on the day of the ceremony. The animal was “without blemish or disease.” The men were careful not to break its fore or hind leg or its spine, after death, for such was the law. Its legs were bound and its head was fastened, and water was poured upon it while thekadiprayed. Then he divided its windpipe. When it was cooked, one half of it was given to the priests and the other half to the people.All the guests, and there were many, brought offerings of cooked rice in the fresh green leaves of the plantain, and baskets of delicious mangosteens, and pink mangoes and great jack-fruits. A curry was made fromthe rice that had fortysambulsto mix with it. There were the pods of the moringa tree, chilies and capsicums, prawns and decayed fish, chutneys and onions, ducks’ eggs and fish roes, peppers and cucumbers and grated cocoanuts.It was a wonderful curry, made by one of the Sultan’s own cooks; for the Punghulo Sahak spared no expense in the marriage of this, his last daughter, and a great feast is exceedingly honorable in the eyes of the guests.Busuk’s long black hair had to be done up in a marvellous chignon on the top of her head. First, her maids washed it beautifully clean with the juice of the lime and the lather of the soap-nut; then it was combed and brushed until every hair glistened like ebony; next it was twisted up and stuck full of the quaint golden and tortoise-shell bodkins, with here and there a spray of jasmine andchumpaka.Busuk’s milky-white teeth had to be filed off more than a fourth. She put her head down on the lap of the woman and closed her eyes tight to keep back the hot tears that would fall, but after the pain was over and her teeth were blackened, she looked in the mirror at her swollen gums and thought that she was very beautiful. Now she could chew the betel-nut from the box her mother had given her!The palms of her hands and the nails of her fingers and toes were painted red with henna, and the lids of her eyes touched up with antimony. When all was finished, they led her out into the great room, which was decorated with mats of colored palm, masses of sweet-smelling flowers and maidenhair fern. There they placed her in the chair of state to receive her relatives and friends.She trembled a little for fear Mamat would not think her beautiful, but when,last of all, he came up and smiled and claimed the bit of betel-nut that she was chewing for the first time, and placed it in his mouth, she smiled back and was very happy.Then thekadipronounced them man and wife in the presence of all, for is it not written, “Written deeds may be forged, destroyed, or altered; but the memory of what is transacted in the presence of a thousand witnesses must remain sacred?Allah il Allah!” And all the people answered, “Suka! Suka!” (We wish it! We wish it!)Then Mamat took his seat on the dais beside the bride, and thepunghulopassed about the betel-box. First, Busuk took out asyrahleaf smeared with lime and placed in it some broken fragments of the betel-nut, and chewed it until a bright red liquid oozed from the corners of her mouth. The others did the same.Then the women brought garlands of flowers—red allamandas, yellow convolvulus, and pink hibiscus—and hung them about Busuk and Mamat, while the musicians outside beat their crocodile-hide drums in frantic haste.The great feast began out in the sandy plaza before the houses. There was cock-fighting and kicking theraggaball, wrestling and boxing, and some gambling among the elders.Toward night Busuk was put in a rattan chair and carried by the young men, while Mamat and the girls walked by her side, a mile away, where her husband’s bigcadjang-coveredpraulay moored. It was to take them to his bungalow at Bander Bahru. The band went, too, and the boys shot off guns and fire-crackers all the way, until Busuk’s head swam, and she was so happy that the tears came into her eyes and trickled down through the rouge on her cheeks.So ended Busuk’s childhood. She wasnot quite fifteen when she became mistress of her own little palm-thatched home. But it was not play housekeeping with her; for she must weave thesarongsfor Mamat and herself for clothes and for spreads at night, and the weaving of each cost her twenty days’ hard labor. If she could weave an extra one from time to time, Mamat would take it up to Singapore and trade it at the bazaar for a pin for the hair or a sunshade with a white fringe about it.Then there were the shell-fish and prawns on the sea-shore to be found, greens to be sought out in the jungle, and thepadi, or rice, to be weeded. She must keep a plentiful supply of betel-nut and lemon leaves for Mamat and herself, and one day there was a little boy to look after and make tinysarongsfor.So, long before the time that our American girls are out of school, and about thetime they are putting on long dresses, Busuk was a woman. Her shoulders were bent, her face wrinkled, her teeth decayed and falling out from the use of thesyrahleaf. She had settled the engagement of her oldest boy to a little girl of two years in a neighboringkampong, and was dusting out the things in the camphor-wood chest, preparatory to the great occasion.I used to wonder, as I wandered through one of these secluded little Malay villages that line the shores of the peninsula and are scattered over its interior, if the little girl mothers who were carrying water and weaving mats did not sometimes long to get down on the warm, white sands and have a regular romp among themselves,—playing “Cat-a-corner” or “I spy”; for none of them were over seventeen or eighteen!Still their lives are not unhappy. Their husbands are kind and sober, and they are never destitute. They have their familiesabout them, and hear laughter and merriment from one sunny year to another.Busuk’s father-in-law is dead now, and the last time I visited Bander Bahru to shoot wild pig, Mamat waspunghulo, collecting the taxes and administering the laws.He raised the back of his open palm to his forehead with a quiet dignity when I left, after the day’s sport, and said, “Tabek!Tuan Consul. Do not forget Mamat’s humble bungalow.” And Busuk came down the ladder with little Mamat astride her bare shoulders, with a pleasant “Tabek! Tuan!(Good-by, my lord.) May Allah’s smile be ever with you.”A Crocodile HuntAt the foot of Mount OphirThe little pleasant-faced Malay captain of his Highness’s three-hundred ton yachtPantecalled softly, close to my ear, “Tuan—Tuan Consul, Gunong Ladang!” I sprang to my feet, rubbed my eyes, and gazed in the direction indicated by the brown hand.I saw not five miles off the low jungle-bound coast of the peninsula, and above it a great bank of vaporous clouds, pierced by the molten rays of the early morning sun. As I looked around inquiringly, the captain, bowing, said: “Tuan,” and I raised my eyes. Again I saw the lofty mountain peak surmounting the cushion of clouds, standing out bold and clear against the almost fierce azure of the Malayan sky.“Mount Ophir!” burst from my lips. The captain smiled and went forward to listen to the linesman’s “two fathoms, sir, two and one half fathoms, sir, two fathoms, sir”; for we were crossing the shallow bar that protects the mouth of the great river Maur from the ocean.The tide was running out like a mill-race. ThePantewas backing from side to side, and then pushing carefully ahead, trying to get into the deep water beyond, before low tide.Suddenly there was a soft, grating sound and the captain came to me and touched his hat.“We are on the bar, sir. Will you send a despatch by the steam-cutter to Prince Suliman, asking for the launch? We cannot get off until the night tide.”ThePantehad so swung around that we could plainly see the big redistana, or palace, of Prince Suliman close to the sandy shore,surrounded by a grove of graceful palms. With the aid of our glasses the white and red blur farther up the river resolved itself into the streets and quays of the little city of Bander Maharani, the capital of the province of Maur in dominions of his Highness Abubaker, Sultan of Johore. Above and overshadowing all both in beauty and historical interest was the famous old mountain where King Solomon sent his diminutive ships for “gold, silver, peacocks, and apes.”By the time the ladies were astir, the mists had vanished and Gunong Ladang, or as it is styled in Holy Writ Mount Ophir, presented to our admiring gaze its massive outlines, set in a frame of green and blue. The dense jungle crept halfway up its sides and at the point where the cloud stratum had rested but an hour before, it merged into a tangled network of vines and shrubs which in their turn gave place to the black, red rock that shone like burnished brass.If our minds wandered away from visions of future crocodile-shooting to dreams of the past wealth that had been taken from the ancient mines that honeycombed the base of the mountain, it is hardly to be wondered at. IfDatoor “Lord” Garlands told us queer stories of woods and masonry that antedated the written history of the country, stories of mines and workings that were overgrown with a jungle that looked as primeval as the mountain itself, he was to be excused on the plea that we, waiting on a sandy bar with the metallic glare of the sea in our eyes, were glad of any subject to distract our thoughts.The Resident’s launch brought out Prince Mat and the Chief Justice, both of whom spoke English with an easy familiarity. Both had been in Europe and Prince Mat had dined with Queen Victoria. One night at table he related the incidents of that dinner with a delightful exactness that might havepleased her Britannic Majesty could she have listened.I waited only long enough to see the ladies installed in a suite of rooms in the Residency, then donned a suit of white duck, stepped into a river launch in company with Inchi Mohamed, the Chief Justice, and steamed out into the broad waters of the Maur.The southernmost kingdom of the great continent of Asia is the little Sultanate of Johore, ruled over by one of the most enlightened Princes of the East. Fourteen miles from Singapore, just across the notorious old Straits of Malacca, is his capital and the palace of the Sultan.We had been guests of the State for the past two weeks. Its ruler, among other kind attentions to us, had suggested a visit to his out province Maur and a crocodile hunt along the banks of the broad river that wound about the foot of Mount Ophir.Fifteen hours’ steam in his beautiful yachtalong the picturesque shores of Johore brought us to the realization of a long-cherished dream,—the seeing for ourselves the mountain whose exact location had been a subject of conjecture for so many centuries. Were I a scholar and explorer and not a sportsman, I might again and more explicitly set forth facts which I consider indubitable proof that the Mount Ophir of Asia and not the Mount Ophir of Africa is, as I have already claimed, the Mount Ophir of the Bible. But here, I wish only to narrate the record of a few pleasant days spent at its foot.The Maur River, at its mouth, is a mile across; it is so deep that one can run close up to its muddy banks and peer in under the labyrinth of mangrove roots that stand like a rustic scaffold beneath its trunks, protecting them from the highest flood-tides.It was some time before I could pick out a crocodile as he lay sleeping in his muddy bath, showing nothing above the slime exceptthe serrated line of his great back, which was so incrusted that, but for its regularity, it might pass for the limb of a tree or some fantastically shaped root.“There you are!” said the Chief Justice, pointing at the bank almost before we had reached the opposite side. I strained my eyes and raised the hammer of my “50 x 110” Winchester; for I was to have a shot at my first live crocodile.We drew nearer and nearer the shore and yet I failed to see anything that resembled an animal of any sort. The little launch slowed down and the crew all pointed toward the bank. I cannot now imagine what I expected then to see, but something must have been in my mind’s eye that blinded my bodily sight; for there, right before me, was a little fellow not over three feet long.He had just come up from the river, and his hide was clean and almost a dark birch color. His head was raised and he wasregarding us suspiciously from his small green eyes.I put down my rifle in disgust, and took up my revolver. I had no idea of wasting a hundred and ten grains of powder on a baby. I took careful aim and fired. The revolver was a self-cocker, and yet before I could fire again, he had whirled about and was out of reach. He was gone and I drew a long breath. The Malays said I struck him. If I did, I had no means of proving it.The only way to bag crocodiles is to kill them outright or nearly so. If they have strength enough to crawl into the river and die, they will come to the surface again two days later; but the chances are that they will get under a root, or that in some way you will lose them. Out of forty or fifty big and small ones that we hit only five floated down past the Residency.I also soon found out that my hundredand ten grain cartridges were none too large for even the smaller crocodiles. As for those eighteen and twenty feet long, it was necessary that the Chief Justice and I should fire at the same time and at the same spot in order to arrest the big saurians in their wild scramble for the water.We had tried some half-dozen good shots at small fellows, varying from two to five feet in length, when I began to lose interest in the sport; so I turned to watch a colony of little gray, jungle monkeys, that were swinging and chattering and scolding among the mangrove trees.One of them picked a long dart-shaped fruit off the tree and essayed to drop it on the head of his mate below. I was about to call my companion’s attention to it, when I heard a crash among the roots near where the missile had fallen, and a crocodile, so large that I distrusted my senses, turned his great log-like head to one side and gazed up at thefrightened monkeys. I raised my hand, and the launch paused not over twenty yards from where he lay patiently waiting for one of the monkeys to drop within reach of his great jaws.The sun had dried the mud on his back until the entire surface reminded me of the beach of a muddy mill-pond that I used to frequent as a boy.“Boyah besar!” (A royal crocodile) repeated our Malays under their breaths.The Chief Justice and I fired at the same time, and the massive fellow who, but a moment before, had looked to be as stiff and clumsy as a bar of pig iron, now seemed to be made of india-rubber and steel springs. I should not have been more surprised had the greattimbosotree, beside which he lay, arisen and danced a jig. He seemed to spring from the middle up into the air without the aid of either his head or his tail. Then he brought his tail around in a circleand struck the skeleton roots of the mangrove with such force as to dislodge a small monkey in its top, which fell whistling with fright into the lower limbs, while the crocodile’s great jaws, which seemed to measure a third of his length, opened and shut viciously, snapping off limbs and roots like straws.“He sick!” shouted the Chief Justice. “Fire quick.”I threw the cartridge from the magazine into the barrel, and raised the gun to my shoulder just as the huge saurian struck the water. My bullet caught him underneath, near the back legs. My companion’s must have had more effect, for the crocodile stopped as though stunned. I had time to drop my gun and snatch up my revolver.It was an easy shot. The bullet sped true to its mark and entered one of the small fiery eyes. The huge frame seemed to quiver as though a charge of electricity hadgone through it and then stiffened out,—dead.Our Malay boys got a rope of toughgamootyfibres around the great head, and we towed our prize out into the stream just as the Resident’s launch, bearing the Prince and the ladies, steamed up the river to watch the sport.A crowd of servants got the crocodile up on the bank near the palace grounds and drew it two hundred yards to their quarters. Now comes the strangest part of the story.My servants had half completed the task of skinning him, for I wished to send his hide to the Smithsonian, when the muezzin sounded the call to prayers from the little mosque near by. In an instant the devout Mohammedans were on their faces and the crocodile in his half-skinned state was left until a more convenient time. At six o’clock the next morning I was awakened by a knock at my door:—“Tuan, Tuan Consul, come seeboyah(crocodile).”I got up, wrapped asarongabout me, put my feet into a pair of grass slippers, and followed my guide out of the palace, through the courts to where the crocodile had been the night before, but no crocodile was to be seen. My guide grinned and pointed to a heavy trail that looked like the track of a stone-boat drawn by a yoke of oxen.We followed it for a hundred yards in the direction of the river, and came upon the crocodile, covered with blood and mud. His own hide hung about him like a dress, and his one eye opened and shut at the throng of wondering natives about. It was not until he had been put out of his misery and his hide taken entirely off that we felt confident of hisbona fidedemise.One day I had a real adventure while out shooting, which, like many real adventures,was made up principally of the things I thought and suffered rather than of the things I did. Hence I hardly know how to write it out so that it will look like an “adventure” and not a mere mishap.My companion had told me of a trail some thirty miles up the river that led into the jungle about three miles, to some old gold workings that date back beyond the written records of the State. So one day we drew our little launch close up under the bank of the river, and I sprang ashore, bent on seeing for myself the prehistoric remains. Contrary to the advice of the Chief Justice, I only took a heavy hunting-knife with me, and it was more for slashing away thorns and rattans than for protection.It was the heat of the day, and the dense jungle was like a furnace. Before I had gone a mile I began to regret my enthusiasm. I found the path, but it was so overgrown with creepers, parasites, and rubber-vinesthat I had almost to cut a new one. Had it not been for the company of a small English terrier, Lekas,—the Malay for “make haste,”—I believe I should have turned back.However, I found the old workings, and spent several hours making calculations as to their depth and course, taking notes as to the country formation, and assaying some bits of refuse quartz. Rather than struggle back by the path, I determined to follow the course of a stream that went through the mines and on toward the coast. So I whistled for Lekas and started on.For the first half-hour everything went smoothly. Then the stream widened out and its clay bottom gave place to one of mud, which made the walking much more difficult. At last I struck the mangrove belt, which always warns you that you are approaching the coast.As long as I kept in the centre of thechannel, I was out of the way of the network of roots; but now the channel was getting deeper and my progress becoming more labored. It was impossible to reach the bank, for the mangroves on either side had grown so thick and dense as to be impenetrable.When I had perhaps achieved half the distance, the thought suddenly crossed my mind—how very awkward it would be to meet a crocodile in such a place! One couldn’t run, that was certain, and as for fighting, that would be a lost cause from the first.Right in the midst of these unpleasant cogitations I heard a quiet splash in the water, not far behind, that sent my heart into my mouth. In a moment I had scrambled on to a mangrove root and had turned to look for the cause of my fears.For perhaps a minute I saw nothing, and was trying to convince myself that my previous thoughts had made me fanciful, when, not many yards off, I saw distinctlythe form of a huge crocodile swimming rapidly toward me. I needed no second look, but dashed away over the roots.Before I had gone half a dozen yards I was down sprawling in the mud. I got entangled, and my terror made me totally unable to act with any judgment. Despair nerved me and I turned at bay with my long hunting-knife in my hand. How I longed for even my revolver!A crocodile hunt on the maurA crocodile hunt on the maur“I turned at bay with my long hunting knife in my hand”Whatever the issue, it could not be long delayed. The uncouth, hideous form, which as yet I had only seen dimly, was plain now. I took my stand on one of the largest roots, steadied myself by clasping another with my left hand, and waited.My chances, if it did not seem a mockery to call them such, were small indeed. I might, by singular good luck, deprive my adversary of sight; but hemmed in as I was by a tangled mass of roots, I felt that even then I should be but little better off.All manner of thoughts came unbidden to my mind. I could see Inchi Mohamed propped up on cushions in the launch reading “A Little Book of Profitable Tales” that had just been sent me by its author. I started to smile at the tale ofThe Clycopeedy. Then I caught sight of the peak of Mount Ophir through a notch in the jungle and all sorts of absurd hypotheses in regard to its authenticity flashed through my mind. All this takes time to relate, but those who have stood in mortal peril will know how short a time it takes to think.From the moment I left the water, but a few seconds had elapsed and the saurian was not two yards from me. The abject horror and hopelessness of that moment was something I can never forget. Suddenly Lekas came floundering through the mud; a second more, and he perceived my enemy when almost within reach of his jaws.Barking furiously, Lekas began to backaway. One breathless moment, and the reptile turned to follow this new prey. I sank down among the roots regardless of the slime and watched the crocodile crawl deliberately away, with the gallant little dog retreating before him, keeping up a succession of angry barks.When I arrived at the mouth of the creek, weak, faint, and covered from head to foot with mud, I found the Chief Justice awaiting me. The barking of the dog had attracted his attention and he had steamed up to see what was the matter.I had not strength left to stroke the head of the brave little fellow who had thus twice done me a most welcome service. I had, indeed, but just strength enough to spring in, throw myself down on the cushions, and let my “boys” pull off my clothes and bring me a suit of clean pajamas and cool grass slippers.A New Year’s Day in MalayaAnd some of its Picturesque CustomsMy Malaysycecame close up to the veranda and touched his brown forehead with the back of his open hand.“Tuan” (Lord), he said, “have got oil for harness, two one-half cents; black oil forcudah’s(horse) feet, three cents; oil, one cent one-half for bits; oil, seven cents forcretah(carriage). Fourteen cents, Tuan.”I put my hands into the pockets of my white duck jacket and drew out a roll of big Borneo coppers.Thesycecounted out the desired amount, and handed back what was left through the bamboochicks, or curtains, that reduced the blinding glare of the sky to a soft, translucent gray. I closed my eyes and stretchedback in my long chair, wondering vaguely at the occasion that called for such an outlay in oils, when I heard once more the quiet, insistent “Tuan!” I opened my eyes.“No got red, white, blue ribbon for whip.”“Sudah chukup!” (Stop talking) I commanded angrily. Thesyceshrugged his bare shoulders and gave a hitch to his cottonsarong.“Tuan, to-morrow New Year Day. Tuan,mem(lady) drive to Esplanade. Governor, general, all white tuans and mems there. Tuan Consul’s carriage not nice. Shallsycebuy ribbons?”“Yes,” I answered, tossing him the rest of the coppers, “and get a new one for your arm.”I had forgotten for the moment that it was the 31st of December. Thesycetouched his hand to his forehead and salaamed.Through the spaces of the protectingchicksI caught glimpses of my Malaykebun, or gardener, squatting on his bare feet, with his bare knees drawn up under his armpits, hacking with a heavy knife at the short grass. The mottled crotons, the yellow allamanda and pink hibiscus bushes, the clump of Eucharist lilies, the great trailing masses of orchids that hung among the red flowers of the stately flamboyant tree by the green hedge, joined to make me forget the midwinter date on the calendar. The time seemed in my half-dream July in New York or August in Washington.Ah Minga, the “boy” in flowing pantalets and stiffly starched blouse, came silently along the wide veranda, with a cup of tea and a plate of opened mangosteens. I roused myself, and the dreams of sleighbells and ice on window-panes, that had been fleeting through my mind at the first mention of New Year’s Day by thesyce, vanished.Ah Minga, too, mentioned, as he placedthe cool, pellucid globes before me, “To-mollow New Year Dlay, Tuan!”On Christmas Day, Ah Minga had presented the mistress with the gilded counterfeit presentment of a Joss. The servants, one and all, from Zim, the cookee, to the wretched Klingdhobie(wash-man), had brought some little remembrance of their Christian master’s great holiday.In respecting our customs, they had taken occasion to establish one of their own. They had adopted New Year’s as the day when their masters should return their presents and good will in solid cash.At midnight we were awakened by a regular Fourth of July pandemonium. Whistles from the factories, salvos from Fort Canning, bells from the churches, Chinese tom-toms, Malay horns, rent the air from that hour until dawn with all the discords of the Orient and a few from Europe. By daylight the thousands of natives from all quarters of thepeninsula and neighboring islands had gathered along the broad Ocean Esplanade of Singapore in front of the Cricket Club House, to take part in or watch the native sports by land and sea.The inevitable Chinaman was there, the Kling, the Madrasman, the Sikh, the Arab, the Jew, the Chitty, or Indian money-lender,—they were all there, many times multiplied, unconsciously furnishing a background of extraordinary variety and picturesqueness.At ten o’clock the favored representatives of the Anglo-Saxon race took their place on the great veranda of the Cricket Club, and gave the signal that we would condescend to be amused for ten hours. Then the show commenced. There were not over two hundred white people to represent law and civilization amid the teeming native population.In the centre of the beautiful esplanade or playground rose the heroic statue of SirStamford Raffles, the English governor who made Singapore possible. To my right, on the veranda, stood a modest, gray-haired little man who cleared the seas of piracy and insured Singapore’s commercial ascendency, Sir Charles Brooke, Rajah of Sarawak. A little farther on, surrounded by a brilliant suite of Malay princes, was the Sultan of Johore, whose father sold the island of Singapore to the British.The first of the sports was a series of foot-races between Malay and Kling boys, almost invariably won by the Malays, who are the North American Indians of Malaysia—the old-time kings of the soil. They are never, like the Chinese, mere beasts of burden, or great merchants, nor do they descend to petty trade, like the Indians or Bengalese. If they must work they become horsemen.Next came a jockey race, in which a dozen long-limbed Malays took each a five-year-old child astride his shoulders, and raced forseventy-five yards. There were sack-races and greased-pole climbing and pig-catching.Now came a singular contest—an eating match. Two dozen little Malay, Kling, Tamil, and Chinese boys were seated at regular intervals about an open circle by one of the governor’s aids. Not one could touch the others in any way. Each had a dry, hard ship-biscuit before him. A pistol shot and two dozen pairs of little brown fists went pit-a-pat on the two dozen hard biscuits, and in an instant the crackers were broken to powder.Then commenced the difficult task of forcing the powdered pulp down the little throats. Both hands were called into full play during the operation, one for crowding in, the other for grinding the residue and patting the stomach and throat. Each little competitor would shyly rub into the warm earth, or hide away in the folds of his many-coloredsarong, as much as possible, or whena rival was looking the other way, would snap a good-sized piece across to him.The little brown fellow who won the fifty-cent piece by finishing his biscuit first simply put into his mouth a certain quantity of the crushed biscuit, and with little or no mastication pushed the whole mass down his throat by sheer force.The minute the contest was decided, all the participants, and many other boys, rushed to a great tub of molasses to duck for half-dollars. One after another their heads would disappear into the sticky, blinding mass, as they fished with their teeth for the shining prizes at the bottom.Successful or otherwise, after their powers were exhausted they would suddenly pull out their heads, reeking with the molasses, and make for the ocean, unmindful of the crowds of natives in holiday attire who blocked their way.Then came a jinrikisha race, with Chinesecoolies pulling Malay passengers around a half-mile course. Letting go the handles of their wagons as they crossed the line, the coolies threw their unfortunate passengers over backward.Tugs of war, wrestling matches, and boxing bouts on the turf finished the land sports, and we all adjourned to the yachts to witness those of the sea. There were races between men-of-war cutters, European yachts, rowing shells, Chinese sampans, and Malaycolehswith great, dart-like sails, so wide-spreading that ropes were attached to the top of the masts, and a dozen naked natives hung far out over the side of the slender boat to keep it from blowing over. In making the circle of the harbor they would spring from side to side of the boat, sometimes lost to our view in the spray, often missing their footholds, and dragging through the tepid water.Between times, while watching the races,we amused ourselves throwing coppers to a fleet of native boys in small dugouts beneath our bows. Every time a penny dropped into the water, a dozen little bronze forms would flash in the sunlight, and nine times out of ten the coin never reached the bottom.Last of all came the trooping of the English colors on the magnificent esplanade, within the shadow of the cathedral; the march past of the sturdy British artillery and engineers, with their native allies, the Sikhs and Sepoys; then thefeu-de-joie, and New Year’s was officially recognized by the guns of the fort.That night we danced at Government House,—we exiles of the Temperate Zone,—keeping up to the last the fiction that New Year’s Day under a tropic sky and within sound of the tiger’s wail was really January first. But every remembrance and association was, in our homesick thoughts,grouped about an open arch fire, with the sharp, crisp creak of sleigh-runners outside, in a frozen land fourteen thousand miles away.

BusukThe Story of a Malayan GirlhoodThey called her Busuk, or “the youngest” at her birth. Her father, the oldpunghulo, or chief, of the littlekampong, or village, of Passir Panjang, whispered the soft Allah Akbar, the prayer to Allah, in her small brown ear.The subjects of thepunghulobrought presents ofsarongsrun with gold thread, and not larger than a handkerchief, for Busuk to wear about her waist. They also brought gifts of rice in baskets of cunningly woven cocoanut fibre; of bananas, a hundred on a bunch; ofdurians, that filled the bungalow with so strong an odor that Busuk drew up her wrinkled, tiny face into a quaint frown; and of cocoanuts in their great green, oval shucks.Busuk’s old aunt, who lived far away up the river Maur, near the foot of Mount Ophir, sent a yellow gold pin for the hair; her husband, the Hadji Mat, had washed the gold from the bed of the stream that rushed by their bungalow.Busuk’s brother, who was a sergeant in his Highness’s the Sultan’s artillery at Johore, brought a tiny pair of sandals all worked in many-colored beads. Never had such presents been seen at the birth of any other of Punghulo Sahak’s children.Two days later the Imam Paduka Tuan sent Busuk’s father a letter sewn up in a yellow bag. It contained a blessing for Busuk. Busuk kept the letter all her life, for it was a great thing for the high priest to do.On the seventh day Busuk’s head was shaven and she was named Fatima; but they called her Busuk in thekampong, andsome even called her Inchi Busuk, the princess.From the low-barred window of Busuk’s home she could look out on the shimmering, sunlit waters of the Straits of Malacca. The loom on which Busuk’s mother wove thesarongsfor thepunghuloand for her sons stood by the side of the window, and Busuk, from the sling in which she sat on her mother’s side, could see the fishingprausglide by, and also the big lumbertonkangs, and at rare intervals one of his Highness’s launches.Sometimes she blinked her eyes as a vagrant shaft of sunlight straggled down through the great green and yellow fronds of the cocoanut palms that stood about the bungalow; sometimes she kept her little black eyes fixed gravely on the flying shuttle which her mother threw deftly back and forth through the many-colored threads; but best of all did she love to watch thelittle gray lizards that ran about on the palm sides of the house after the flies and moths.She was soon able to answer the lizards’ call of “gecho, gecho,” and once she laughed outright when one, in fright of her baby-fingers, dropped its tail and went wiggling away like a boat without a rudder. But most of the time she swung and crowed in her wicker cradle under the low rafters.When Busuk grew older, she was carried every day down the ladder of the house and put on the warm white sand with the other children. They were all naked, save for a little chintz bib that was tied to their necks; so it made no difference how many mudpies they made on the beach nor how wet they got in the tepid waters of the ocean. They had only to look out carefully for the crocodiles that glided noiselessly among the mangrove roots.One day one of Busuk’s playmates was caught in the cruel jaws of a crocodile, and lost its hand. The men from the village went out into the labyrinth of roots that stood up above the flood like a huge scaffolding, and caught the man-eater with ropes of thegamootypalm. They dragged it up the beach and put out its eyes with red-hot spikes of the hard billion wood.Although the varnished leaves of the cocoanuts kept almost every ray of sunlight out of the little village, and though the children could play in the airy spaces under their own houses, their heads and faces were painted with a paste of flour and water to keep their tender skins from chafing in the hot, moist air.At evening, when the fierce sun went down behind the great banian tree that nearly hid Mount Pulei, thekateebwould sound the call to prayer on a hollow logthat hung up before the little palm-thatched mosque. Then Busuk and her playmates would fall on their faces, while the holy man sang in a soft, monotonous voice the promises of the Koran, the men of thekamponganswering. “Allah il Allah,” he would sing, and “Mohammed is his prophet,” they would answer.Every night Busuk would lie down on a mat on the floor of the house with a little wooden pillow under her neck, and when she dared she would peep down through the open spaces in the bamboo floor into the darkness beneath. Once she heard a low growl, and a great dark form stood right below her. She could see its tail lashing its sides with short, whip-like movements. Then all the dogs in thekampongbegan to bark, and the men rushed down their ladders screaming, “Harimau! Harimau!” (A tiger! A tiger!) The next morning she found that her pet dog, Fatima, named afterherself, had been killed by one stroke of the great beast’s paw. Once a monster python swung from a cocoanut tree through the window of her home, and wound itself round and round the post of her mother’s loom. It took a dozen men to tie a rope to the serpent’s tail, and pull it out.Busuk went everywhere astride thepunghulo’sbroad shoulders as he collected the taxes and settled the disputes in the little village. She went out into the straits in the bigprauthat floated the star and crescent of Johore over its stern, to look at the fishing-stakes, and was nearly wrecked by a great water-spout that burst within a few feet of them.Then she went twice to Johore, and gazed in open-eyed wonder at the palaces of the Sultan and at the fort in which her uncle was an officer.“Some day,” she thought, “I may see his Highness, and he may notice me andsmile.”For had not his Highness spoken twice to her father and called him a good man? So whenever she went to Johore she put on her bestsarongandkabaya> and in her jetty black hair she put the pin her aunt had given her, with a spray of sweet-smellingchumpakaflower.When she was four years old she went to thepenagerto learn to read and write. In a few months she could outstrip any one in the class in tracing Arabic characters on the sand-sprinkled floor, and she knew whole chapters in the Koran.So the days were passed in the littlekampongunder the gently swaying cocoanuts, and the little Malayan girl grew up like her companions, free and wild, with little thought beyond the morrow. That some day she was to be married, she knew; for since her first birthday she had been engaged to Mamat, the son of her father’s friend, thepunghuloof Bander Bahru.She had never seen Mamat, nor he her; for it was not proper that a Malay should see his intended before marriage. She had heard that he was strong and lithe of limb, and could beat all his fellows at the game calledragga. When the wicker ball was in the air he never let it touch the ground; for he was as quick with his head and feet, shoulders, hips, and breast, as with his hands. He could swim and box, and had once gone with his father to the seaports on New Year’s Day at Singapore, and his ownprauhad won the short-distance race.Mamat was three years older than Busuk, and they were to be married when she was fifteen.At first she cried a little, for she was sad at the thought of giving up her playmates. But then the older women told her that she could chew betel when she was married, and her mother showed her a little set of betel-nut boxes, for which she had sent to Singapore.Each cup was of silver, and the box was cunningly inlaid with storks and cherry blossoms. It had cost her mother a month’s hard labor on the loom.Then Mamat was not to take her back to his father’s bungalow. He had built a little one of his own, raised up on palm posts six feet from the ground, so that she need not fear tigers or snakes or white ants. Its sides were of plaited palm leaves, every other one colored differently, and its roof was of the choicestattap, each leaf bent carefully over a rod of rattan, and stitched so evenly that not a drop of rain could get through.Inside there was a room especially for her, with its sides hung withsarongs, and by the window was a loom made ofkamooningwood, finer than her mother’s. Outside, under the eaves, was a house of bent rattan for her ring-doves, and a shelf where her silver-haired monkey could sun himself.So Busuk forgot her grief, and she watched with ill-concealed eagerness the coming of Mamat’s friends with presents of tobacco and rice and bone-tippedkrises. Then for the first time she was permitted to open the camphor-wood chest and gaze upon all the beautiful things that she was to wear for the one great day.Her mother and elder sisters had been married in them, and their children would, one after another, be married in them after her.There was asarongof silk, run with threads of gold and silver, that was large enough to go around her body twice and wide enough to hang from her waist to her ankles; a belt of silver, with a gold plate in front, to hold thesarongin place; akabaya, or outer garment, that looked like a dressing-gown, and was fastened down the front with golden brooches of curious Malayan workmanship; a pair of red-tipped sandals;and a black lace scarf to wear about her black hair. There were earrings and a necklace of colored glass, and armlets, bangles, and gold pins. They all dazzled Busuk, and she could hardly wait to try them on.A buffalo was sacrificed on the day of the ceremony. The animal was “without blemish or disease.” The men were careful not to break its fore or hind leg or its spine, after death, for such was the law. Its legs were bound and its head was fastened, and water was poured upon it while thekadiprayed. Then he divided its windpipe. When it was cooked, one half of it was given to the priests and the other half to the people.All the guests, and there were many, brought offerings of cooked rice in the fresh green leaves of the plantain, and baskets of delicious mangosteens, and pink mangoes and great jack-fruits. A curry was made fromthe rice that had fortysambulsto mix with it. There were the pods of the moringa tree, chilies and capsicums, prawns and decayed fish, chutneys and onions, ducks’ eggs and fish roes, peppers and cucumbers and grated cocoanuts.It was a wonderful curry, made by one of the Sultan’s own cooks; for the Punghulo Sahak spared no expense in the marriage of this, his last daughter, and a great feast is exceedingly honorable in the eyes of the guests.Busuk’s long black hair had to be done up in a marvellous chignon on the top of her head. First, her maids washed it beautifully clean with the juice of the lime and the lather of the soap-nut; then it was combed and brushed until every hair glistened like ebony; next it was twisted up and stuck full of the quaint golden and tortoise-shell bodkins, with here and there a spray of jasmine andchumpaka.Busuk’s milky-white teeth had to be filed off more than a fourth. She put her head down on the lap of the woman and closed her eyes tight to keep back the hot tears that would fall, but after the pain was over and her teeth were blackened, she looked in the mirror at her swollen gums and thought that she was very beautiful. Now she could chew the betel-nut from the box her mother had given her!The palms of her hands and the nails of her fingers and toes were painted red with henna, and the lids of her eyes touched up with antimony. When all was finished, they led her out into the great room, which was decorated with mats of colored palm, masses of sweet-smelling flowers and maidenhair fern. There they placed her in the chair of state to receive her relatives and friends.She trembled a little for fear Mamat would not think her beautiful, but when,last of all, he came up and smiled and claimed the bit of betel-nut that she was chewing for the first time, and placed it in his mouth, she smiled back and was very happy.Then thekadipronounced them man and wife in the presence of all, for is it not written, “Written deeds may be forged, destroyed, or altered; but the memory of what is transacted in the presence of a thousand witnesses must remain sacred?Allah il Allah!” And all the people answered, “Suka! Suka!” (We wish it! We wish it!)Then Mamat took his seat on the dais beside the bride, and thepunghulopassed about the betel-box. First, Busuk took out asyrahleaf smeared with lime and placed in it some broken fragments of the betel-nut, and chewed it until a bright red liquid oozed from the corners of her mouth. The others did the same.Then the women brought garlands of flowers—red allamandas, yellow convolvulus, and pink hibiscus—and hung them about Busuk and Mamat, while the musicians outside beat their crocodile-hide drums in frantic haste.The great feast began out in the sandy plaza before the houses. There was cock-fighting and kicking theraggaball, wrestling and boxing, and some gambling among the elders.Toward night Busuk was put in a rattan chair and carried by the young men, while Mamat and the girls walked by her side, a mile away, where her husband’s bigcadjang-coveredpraulay moored. It was to take them to his bungalow at Bander Bahru. The band went, too, and the boys shot off guns and fire-crackers all the way, until Busuk’s head swam, and she was so happy that the tears came into her eyes and trickled down through the rouge on her cheeks.So ended Busuk’s childhood. She wasnot quite fifteen when she became mistress of her own little palm-thatched home. But it was not play housekeeping with her; for she must weave thesarongsfor Mamat and herself for clothes and for spreads at night, and the weaving of each cost her twenty days’ hard labor. If she could weave an extra one from time to time, Mamat would take it up to Singapore and trade it at the bazaar for a pin for the hair or a sunshade with a white fringe about it.Then there were the shell-fish and prawns on the sea-shore to be found, greens to be sought out in the jungle, and thepadi, or rice, to be weeded. She must keep a plentiful supply of betel-nut and lemon leaves for Mamat and herself, and one day there was a little boy to look after and make tinysarongsfor.So, long before the time that our American girls are out of school, and about thetime they are putting on long dresses, Busuk was a woman. Her shoulders were bent, her face wrinkled, her teeth decayed and falling out from the use of thesyrahleaf. She had settled the engagement of her oldest boy to a little girl of two years in a neighboringkampong, and was dusting out the things in the camphor-wood chest, preparatory to the great occasion.I used to wonder, as I wandered through one of these secluded little Malay villages that line the shores of the peninsula and are scattered over its interior, if the little girl mothers who were carrying water and weaving mats did not sometimes long to get down on the warm, white sands and have a regular romp among themselves,—playing “Cat-a-corner” or “I spy”; for none of them were over seventeen or eighteen!Still their lives are not unhappy. Their husbands are kind and sober, and they are never destitute. They have their familiesabout them, and hear laughter and merriment from one sunny year to another.Busuk’s father-in-law is dead now, and the last time I visited Bander Bahru to shoot wild pig, Mamat waspunghulo, collecting the taxes and administering the laws.He raised the back of his open palm to his forehead with a quiet dignity when I left, after the day’s sport, and said, “Tabek!Tuan Consul. Do not forget Mamat’s humble bungalow.” And Busuk came down the ladder with little Mamat astride her bare shoulders, with a pleasant “Tabek! Tuan!(Good-by, my lord.) May Allah’s smile be ever with you.”

They called her Busuk, or “the youngest” at her birth. Her father, the oldpunghulo, or chief, of the littlekampong, or village, of Passir Panjang, whispered the soft Allah Akbar, the prayer to Allah, in her small brown ear.

The subjects of thepunghulobrought presents ofsarongsrun with gold thread, and not larger than a handkerchief, for Busuk to wear about her waist. They also brought gifts of rice in baskets of cunningly woven cocoanut fibre; of bananas, a hundred on a bunch; ofdurians, that filled the bungalow with so strong an odor that Busuk drew up her wrinkled, tiny face into a quaint frown; and of cocoanuts in their great green, oval shucks.

Busuk’s old aunt, who lived far away up the river Maur, near the foot of Mount Ophir, sent a yellow gold pin for the hair; her husband, the Hadji Mat, had washed the gold from the bed of the stream that rushed by their bungalow.

Busuk’s brother, who was a sergeant in his Highness’s the Sultan’s artillery at Johore, brought a tiny pair of sandals all worked in many-colored beads. Never had such presents been seen at the birth of any other of Punghulo Sahak’s children.

Two days later the Imam Paduka Tuan sent Busuk’s father a letter sewn up in a yellow bag. It contained a blessing for Busuk. Busuk kept the letter all her life, for it was a great thing for the high priest to do.

On the seventh day Busuk’s head was shaven and she was named Fatima; but they called her Busuk in thekampong, andsome even called her Inchi Busuk, the princess.

From the low-barred window of Busuk’s home she could look out on the shimmering, sunlit waters of the Straits of Malacca. The loom on which Busuk’s mother wove thesarongsfor thepunghuloand for her sons stood by the side of the window, and Busuk, from the sling in which she sat on her mother’s side, could see the fishingprausglide by, and also the big lumbertonkangs, and at rare intervals one of his Highness’s launches.

Sometimes she blinked her eyes as a vagrant shaft of sunlight straggled down through the great green and yellow fronds of the cocoanut palms that stood about the bungalow; sometimes she kept her little black eyes fixed gravely on the flying shuttle which her mother threw deftly back and forth through the many-colored threads; but best of all did she love to watch thelittle gray lizards that ran about on the palm sides of the house after the flies and moths.

She was soon able to answer the lizards’ call of “gecho, gecho,” and once she laughed outright when one, in fright of her baby-fingers, dropped its tail and went wiggling away like a boat without a rudder. But most of the time she swung and crowed in her wicker cradle under the low rafters.

When Busuk grew older, she was carried every day down the ladder of the house and put on the warm white sand with the other children. They were all naked, save for a little chintz bib that was tied to their necks; so it made no difference how many mudpies they made on the beach nor how wet they got in the tepid waters of the ocean. They had only to look out carefully for the crocodiles that glided noiselessly among the mangrove roots.

One day one of Busuk’s playmates was caught in the cruel jaws of a crocodile, and lost its hand. The men from the village went out into the labyrinth of roots that stood up above the flood like a huge scaffolding, and caught the man-eater with ropes of thegamootypalm. They dragged it up the beach and put out its eyes with red-hot spikes of the hard billion wood.

Although the varnished leaves of the cocoanuts kept almost every ray of sunlight out of the little village, and though the children could play in the airy spaces under their own houses, their heads and faces were painted with a paste of flour and water to keep their tender skins from chafing in the hot, moist air.

At evening, when the fierce sun went down behind the great banian tree that nearly hid Mount Pulei, thekateebwould sound the call to prayer on a hollow logthat hung up before the little palm-thatched mosque. Then Busuk and her playmates would fall on their faces, while the holy man sang in a soft, monotonous voice the promises of the Koran, the men of thekamponganswering. “Allah il Allah,” he would sing, and “Mohammed is his prophet,” they would answer.

Every night Busuk would lie down on a mat on the floor of the house with a little wooden pillow under her neck, and when she dared she would peep down through the open spaces in the bamboo floor into the darkness beneath. Once she heard a low growl, and a great dark form stood right below her. She could see its tail lashing its sides with short, whip-like movements. Then all the dogs in thekampongbegan to bark, and the men rushed down their ladders screaming, “Harimau! Harimau!” (A tiger! A tiger!) The next morning she found that her pet dog, Fatima, named afterherself, had been killed by one stroke of the great beast’s paw. Once a monster python swung from a cocoanut tree through the window of her home, and wound itself round and round the post of her mother’s loom. It took a dozen men to tie a rope to the serpent’s tail, and pull it out.

Busuk went everywhere astride thepunghulo’sbroad shoulders as he collected the taxes and settled the disputes in the little village. She went out into the straits in the bigprauthat floated the star and crescent of Johore over its stern, to look at the fishing-stakes, and was nearly wrecked by a great water-spout that burst within a few feet of them.

Then she went twice to Johore, and gazed in open-eyed wonder at the palaces of the Sultan and at the fort in which her uncle was an officer.

“Some day,” she thought, “I may see his Highness, and he may notice me andsmile.”For had not his Highness spoken twice to her father and called him a good man? So whenever she went to Johore she put on her bestsarongandkabaya> and in her jetty black hair she put the pin her aunt had given her, with a spray of sweet-smellingchumpakaflower.

When she was four years old she went to thepenagerto learn to read and write. In a few months she could outstrip any one in the class in tracing Arabic characters on the sand-sprinkled floor, and she knew whole chapters in the Koran.

So the days were passed in the littlekampongunder the gently swaying cocoanuts, and the little Malayan girl grew up like her companions, free and wild, with little thought beyond the morrow. That some day she was to be married, she knew; for since her first birthday she had been engaged to Mamat, the son of her father’s friend, thepunghuloof Bander Bahru.

She had never seen Mamat, nor he her; for it was not proper that a Malay should see his intended before marriage. She had heard that he was strong and lithe of limb, and could beat all his fellows at the game calledragga. When the wicker ball was in the air he never let it touch the ground; for he was as quick with his head and feet, shoulders, hips, and breast, as with his hands. He could swim and box, and had once gone with his father to the seaports on New Year’s Day at Singapore, and his ownprauhad won the short-distance race.

Mamat was three years older than Busuk, and they were to be married when she was fifteen.

At first she cried a little, for she was sad at the thought of giving up her playmates. But then the older women told her that she could chew betel when she was married, and her mother showed her a little set of betel-nut boxes, for which she had sent to Singapore.Each cup was of silver, and the box was cunningly inlaid with storks and cherry blossoms. It had cost her mother a month’s hard labor on the loom.

Then Mamat was not to take her back to his father’s bungalow. He had built a little one of his own, raised up on palm posts six feet from the ground, so that she need not fear tigers or snakes or white ants. Its sides were of plaited palm leaves, every other one colored differently, and its roof was of the choicestattap, each leaf bent carefully over a rod of rattan, and stitched so evenly that not a drop of rain could get through.

Inside there was a room especially for her, with its sides hung withsarongs, and by the window was a loom made ofkamooningwood, finer than her mother’s. Outside, under the eaves, was a house of bent rattan for her ring-doves, and a shelf where her silver-haired monkey could sun himself.

So Busuk forgot her grief, and she watched with ill-concealed eagerness the coming of Mamat’s friends with presents of tobacco and rice and bone-tippedkrises. Then for the first time she was permitted to open the camphor-wood chest and gaze upon all the beautiful things that she was to wear for the one great day.

Her mother and elder sisters had been married in them, and their children would, one after another, be married in them after her.

There was asarongof silk, run with threads of gold and silver, that was large enough to go around her body twice and wide enough to hang from her waist to her ankles; a belt of silver, with a gold plate in front, to hold thesarongin place; akabaya, or outer garment, that looked like a dressing-gown, and was fastened down the front with golden brooches of curious Malayan workmanship; a pair of red-tipped sandals;and a black lace scarf to wear about her black hair. There were earrings and a necklace of colored glass, and armlets, bangles, and gold pins. They all dazzled Busuk, and she could hardly wait to try them on.

A buffalo was sacrificed on the day of the ceremony. The animal was “without blemish or disease.” The men were careful not to break its fore or hind leg or its spine, after death, for such was the law. Its legs were bound and its head was fastened, and water was poured upon it while thekadiprayed. Then he divided its windpipe. When it was cooked, one half of it was given to the priests and the other half to the people.

All the guests, and there were many, brought offerings of cooked rice in the fresh green leaves of the plantain, and baskets of delicious mangosteens, and pink mangoes and great jack-fruits. A curry was made fromthe rice that had fortysambulsto mix with it. There were the pods of the moringa tree, chilies and capsicums, prawns and decayed fish, chutneys and onions, ducks’ eggs and fish roes, peppers and cucumbers and grated cocoanuts.

It was a wonderful curry, made by one of the Sultan’s own cooks; for the Punghulo Sahak spared no expense in the marriage of this, his last daughter, and a great feast is exceedingly honorable in the eyes of the guests.

Busuk’s long black hair had to be done up in a marvellous chignon on the top of her head. First, her maids washed it beautifully clean with the juice of the lime and the lather of the soap-nut; then it was combed and brushed until every hair glistened like ebony; next it was twisted up and stuck full of the quaint golden and tortoise-shell bodkins, with here and there a spray of jasmine andchumpaka.

Busuk’s milky-white teeth had to be filed off more than a fourth. She put her head down on the lap of the woman and closed her eyes tight to keep back the hot tears that would fall, but after the pain was over and her teeth were blackened, she looked in the mirror at her swollen gums and thought that she was very beautiful. Now she could chew the betel-nut from the box her mother had given her!

The palms of her hands and the nails of her fingers and toes were painted red with henna, and the lids of her eyes touched up with antimony. When all was finished, they led her out into the great room, which was decorated with mats of colored palm, masses of sweet-smelling flowers and maidenhair fern. There they placed her in the chair of state to receive her relatives and friends.

She trembled a little for fear Mamat would not think her beautiful, but when,last of all, he came up and smiled and claimed the bit of betel-nut that she was chewing for the first time, and placed it in his mouth, she smiled back and was very happy.

Then thekadipronounced them man and wife in the presence of all, for is it not written, “Written deeds may be forged, destroyed, or altered; but the memory of what is transacted in the presence of a thousand witnesses must remain sacred?Allah il Allah!” And all the people answered, “Suka! Suka!” (We wish it! We wish it!)

Then Mamat took his seat on the dais beside the bride, and thepunghulopassed about the betel-box. First, Busuk took out asyrahleaf smeared with lime and placed in it some broken fragments of the betel-nut, and chewed it until a bright red liquid oozed from the corners of her mouth. The others did the same.

Then the women brought garlands of flowers—red allamandas, yellow convolvulus, and pink hibiscus—and hung them about Busuk and Mamat, while the musicians outside beat their crocodile-hide drums in frantic haste.

The great feast began out in the sandy plaza before the houses. There was cock-fighting and kicking theraggaball, wrestling and boxing, and some gambling among the elders.

Toward night Busuk was put in a rattan chair and carried by the young men, while Mamat and the girls walked by her side, a mile away, where her husband’s bigcadjang-coveredpraulay moored. It was to take them to his bungalow at Bander Bahru. The band went, too, and the boys shot off guns and fire-crackers all the way, until Busuk’s head swam, and she was so happy that the tears came into her eyes and trickled down through the rouge on her cheeks.

So ended Busuk’s childhood. She wasnot quite fifteen when she became mistress of her own little palm-thatched home. But it was not play housekeeping with her; for she must weave thesarongsfor Mamat and herself for clothes and for spreads at night, and the weaving of each cost her twenty days’ hard labor. If she could weave an extra one from time to time, Mamat would take it up to Singapore and trade it at the bazaar for a pin for the hair or a sunshade with a white fringe about it.

Then there were the shell-fish and prawns on the sea-shore to be found, greens to be sought out in the jungle, and thepadi, or rice, to be weeded. She must keep a plentiful supply of betel-nut and lemon leaves for Mamat and herself, and one day there was a little boy to look after and make tinysarongsfor.

So, long before the time that our American girls are out of school, and about thetime they are putting on long dresses, Busuk was a woman. Her shoulders were bent, her face wrinkled, her teeth decayed and falling out from the use of thesyrahleaf. She had settled the engagement of her oldest boy to a little girl of two years in a neighboringkampong, and was dusting out the things in the camphor-wood chest, preparatory to the great occasion.

I used to wonder, as I wandered through one of these secluded little Malay villages that line the shores of the peninsula and are scattered over its interior, if the little girl mothers who were carrying water and weaving mats did not sometimes long to get down on the warm, white sands and have a regular romp among themselves,—playing “Cat-a-corner” or “I spy”; for none of them were over seventeen or eighteen!

Still their lives are not unhappy. Their husbands are kind and sober, and they are never destitute. They have their familiesabout them, and hear laughter and merriment from one sunny year to another.

Busuk’s father-in-law is dead now, and the last time I visited Bander Bahru to shoot wild pig, Mamat waspunghulo, collecting the taxes and administering the laws.

He raised the back of his open palm to his forehead with a quiet dignity when I left, after the day’s sport, and said, “Tabek!Tuan Consul. Do not forget Mamat’s humble bungalow.” And Busuk came down the ladder with little Mamat astride her bare shoulders, with a pleasant “Tabek! Tuan!(Good-by, my lord.) May Allah’s smile be ever with you.”

A Crocodile HuntAt the foot of Mount OphirThe little pleasant-faced Malay captain of his Highness’s three-hundred ton yachtPantecalled softly, close to my ear, “Tuan—Tuan Consul, Gunong Ladang!” I sprang to my feet, rubbed my eyes, and gazed in the direction indicated by the brown hand.I saw not five miles off the low jungle-bound coast of the peninsula, and above it a great bank of vaporous clouds, pierced by the molten rays of the early morning sun. As I looked around inquiringly, the captain, bowing, said: “Tuan,” and I raised my eyes. Again I saw the lofty mountain peak surmounting the cushion of clouds, standing out bold and clear against the almost fierce azure of the Malayan sky.“Mount Ophir!” burst from my lips. The captain smiled and went forward to listen to the linesman’s “two fathoms, sir, two and one half fathoms, sir, two fathoms, sir”; for we were crossing the shallow bar that protects the mouth of the great river Maur from the ocean.The tide was running out like a mill-race. ThePantewas backing from side to side, and then pushing carefully ahead, trying to get into the deep water beyond, before low tide.Suddenly there was a soft, grating sound and the captain came to me and touched his hat.“We are on the bar, sir. Will you send a despatch by the steam-cutter to Prince Suliman, asking for the launch? We cannot get off until the night tide.”ThePantehad so swung around that we could plainly see the big redistana, or palace, of Prince Suliman close to the sandy shore,surrounded by a grove of graceful palms. With the aid of our glasses the white and red blur farther up the river resolved itself into the streets and quays of the little city of Bander Maharani, the capital of the province of Maur in dominions of his Highness Abubaker, Sultan of Johore. Above and overshadowing all both in beauty and historical interest was the famous old mountain where King Solomon sent his diminutive ships for “gold, silver, peacocks, and apes.”By the time the ladies were astir, the mists had vanished and Gunong Ladang, or as it is styled in Holy Writ Mount Ophir, presented to our admiring gaze its massive outlines, set in a frame of green and blue. The dense jungle crept halfway up its sides and at the point where the cloud stratum had rested but an hour before, it merged into a tangled network of vines and shrubs which in their turn gave place to the black, red rock that shone like burnished brass.If our minds wandered away from visions of future crocodile-shooting to dreams of the past wealth that had been taken from the ancient mines that honeycombed the base of the mountain, it is hardly to be wondered at. IfDatoor “Lord” Garlands told us queer stories of woods and masonry that antedated the written history of the country, stories of mines and workings that were overgrown with a jungle that looked as primeval as the mountain itself, he was to be excused on the plea that we, waiting on a sandy bar with the metallic glare of the sea in our eyes, were glad of any subject to distract our thoughts.The Resident’s launch brought out Prince Mat and the Chief Justice, both of whom spoke English with an easy familiarity. Both had been in Europe and Prince Mat had dined with Queen Victoria. One night at table he related the incidents of that dinner with a delightful exactness that might havepleased her Britannic Majesty could she have listened.I waited only long enough to see the ladies installed in a suite of rooms in the Residency, then donned a suit of white duck, stepped into a river launch in company with Inchi Mohamed, the Chief Justice, and steamed out into the broad waters of the Maur.The southernmost kingdom of the great continent of Asia is the little Sultanate of Johore, ruled over by one of the most enlightened Princes of the East. Fourteen miles from Singapore, just across the notorious old Straits of Malacca, is his capital and the palace of the Sultan.We had been guests of the State for the past two weeks. Its ruler, among other kind attentions to us, had suggested a visit to his out province Maur and a crocodile hunt along the banks of the broad river that wound about the foot of Mount Ophir.Fifteen hours’ steam in his beautiful yachtalong the picturesque shores of Johore brought us to the realization of a long-cherished dream,—the seeing for ourselves the mountain whose exact location had been a subject of conjecture for so many centuries. Were I a scholar and explorer and not a sportsman, I might again and more explicitly set forth facts which I consider indubitable proof that the Mount Ophir of Asia and not the Mount Ophir of Africa is, as I have already claimed, the Mount Ophir of the Bible. But here, I wish only to narrate the record of a few pleasant days spent at its foot.The Maur River, at its mouth, is a mile across; it is so deep that one can run close up to its muddy banks and peer in under the labyrinth of mangrove roots that stand like a rustic scaffold beneath its trunks, protecting them from the highest flood-tides.It was some time before I could pick out a crocodile as he lay sleeping in his muddy bath, showing nothing above the slime exceptthe serrated line of his great back, which was so incrusted that, but for its regularity, it might pass for the limb of a tree or some fantastically shaped root.“There you are!” said the Chief Justice, pointing at the bank almost before we had reached the opposite side. I strained my eyes and raised the hammer of my “50 x 110” Winchester; for I was to have a shot at my first live crocodile.We drew nearer and nearer the shore and yet I failed to see anything that resembled an animal of any sort. The little launch slowed down and the crew all pointed toward the bank. I cannot now imagine what I expected then to see, but something must have been in my mind’s eye that blinded my bodily sight; for there, right before me, was a little fellow not over three feet long.He had just come up from the river, and his hide was clean and almost a dark birch color. His head was raised and he wasregarding us suspiciously from his small green eyes.I put down my rifle in disgust, and took up my revolver. I had no idea of wasting a hundred and ten grains of powder on a baby. I took careful aim and fired. The revolver was a self-cocker, and yet before I could fire again, he had whirled about and was out of reach. He was gone and I drew a long breath. The Malays said I struck him. If I did, I had no means of proving it.The only way to bag crocodiles is to kill them outright or nearly so. If they have strength enough to crawl into the river and die, they will come to the surface again two days later; but the chances are that they will get under a root, or that in some way you will lose them. Out of forty or fifty big and small ones that we hit only five floated down past the Residency.I also soon found out that my hundredand ten grain cartridges were none too large for even the smaller crocodiles. As for those eighteen and twenty feet long, it was necessary that the Chief Justice and I should fire at the same time and at the same spot in order to arrest the big saurians in their wild scramble for the water.We had tried some half-dozen good shots at small fellows, varying from two to five feet in length, when I began to lose interest in the sport; so I turned to watch a colony of little gray, jungle monkeys, that were swinging and chattering and scolding among the mangrove trees.One of them picked a long dart-shaped fruit off the tree and essayed to drop it on the head of his mate below. I was about to call my companion’s attention to it, when I heard a crash among the roots near where the missile had fallen, and a crocodile, so large that I distrusted my senses, turned his great log-like head to one side and gazed up at thefrightened monkeys. I raised my hand, and the launch paused not over twenty yards from where he lay patiently waiting for one of the monkeys to drop within reach of his great jaws.The sun had dried the mud on his back until the entire surface reminded me of the beach of a muddy mill-pond that I used to frequent as a boy.“Boyah besar!” (A royal crocodile) repeated our Malays under their breaths.The Chief Justice and I fired at the same time, and the massive fellow who, but a moment before, had looked to be as stiff and clumsy as a bar of pig iron, now seemed to be made of india-rubber and steel springs. I should not have been more surprised had the greattimbosotree, beside which he lay, arisen and danced a jig. He seemed to spring from the middle up into the air without the aid of either his head or his tail. Then he brought his tail around in a circleand struck the skeleton roots of the mangrove with such force as to dislodge a small monkey in its top, which fell whistling with fright into the lower limbs, while the crocodile’s great jaws, which seemed to measure a third of his length, opened and shut viciously, snapping off limbs and roots like straws.“He sick!” shouted the Chief Justice. “Fire quick.”I threw the cartridge from the magazine into the barrel, and raised the gun to my shoulder just as the huge saurian struck the water. My bullet caught him underneath, near the back legs. My companion’s must have had more effect, for the crocodile stopped as though stunned. I had time to drop my gun and snatch up my revolver.It was an easy shot. The bullet sped true to its mark and entered one of the small fiery eyes. The huge frame seemed to quiver as though a charge of electricity hadgone through it and then stiffened out,—dead.Our Malay boys got a rope of toughgamootyfibres around the great head, and we towed our prize out into the stream just as the Resident’s launch, bearing the Prince and the ladies, steamed up the river to watch the sport.A crowd of servants got the crocodile up on the bank near the palace grounds and drew it two hundred yards to their quarters. Now comes the strangest part of the story.My servants had half completed the task of skinning him, for I wished to send his hide to the Smithsonian, when the muezzin sounded the call to prayers from the little mosque near by. In an instant the devout Mohammedans were on their faces and the crocodile in his half-skinned state was left until a more convenient time. At six o’clock the next morning I was awakened by a knock at my door:—“Tuan, Tuan Consul, come seeboyah(crocodile).”I got up, wrapped asarongabout me, put my feet into a pair of grass slippers, and followed my guide out of the palace, through the courts to where the crocodile had been the night before, but no crocodile was to be seen. My guide grinned and pointed to a heavy trail that looked like the track of a stone-boat drawn by a yoke of oxen.We followed it for a hundred yards in the direction of the river, and came upon the crocodile, covered with blood and mud. His own hide hung about him like a dress, and his one eye opened and shut at the throng of wondering natives about. It was not until he had been put out of his misery and his hide taken entirely off that we felt confident of hisbona fidedemise.One day I had a real adventure while out shooting, which, like many real adventures,was made up principally of the things I thought and suffered rather than of the things I did. Hence I hardly know how to write it out so that it will look like an “adventure” and not a mere mishap.My companion had told me of a trail some thirty miles up the river that led into the jungle about three miles, to some old gold workings that date back beyond the written records of the State. So one day we drew our little launch close up under the bank of the river, and I sprang ashore, bent on seeing for myself the prehistoric remains. Contrary to the advice of the Chief Justice, I only took a heavy hunting-knife with me, and it was more for slashing away thorns and rattans than for protection.It was the heat of the day, and the dense jungle was like a furnace. Before I had gone a mile I began to regret my enthusiasm. I found the path, but it was so overgrown with creepers, parasites, and rubber-vinesthat I had almost to cut a new one. Had it not been for the company of a small English terrier, Lekas,—the Malay for “make haste,”—I believe I should have turned back.However, I found the old workings, and spent several hours making calculations as to their depth and course, taking notes as to the country formation, and assaying some bits of refuse quartz. Rather than struggle back by the path, I determined to follow the course of a stream that went through the mines and on toward the coast. So I whistled for Lekas and started on.For the first half-hour everything went smoothly. Then the stream widened out and its clay bottom gave place to one of mud, which made the walking much more difficult. At last I struck the mangrove belt, which always warns you that you are approaching the coast.As long as I kept in the centre of thechannel, I was out of the way of the network of roots; but now the channel was getting deeper and my progress becoming more labored. It was impossible to reach the bank, for the mangroves on either side had grown so thick and dense as to be impenetrable.When I had perhaps achieved half the distance, the thought suddenly crossed my mind—how very awkward it would be to meet a crocodile in such a place! One couldn’t run, that was certain, and as for fighting, that would be a lost cause from the first.Right in the midst of these unpleasant cogitations I heard a quiet splash in the water, not far behind, that sent my heart into my mouth. In a moment I had scrambled on to a mangrove root and had turned to look for the cause of my fears.For perhaps a minute I saw nothing, and was trying to convince myself that my previous thoughts had made me fanciful, when, not many yards off, I saw distinctlythe form of a huge crocodile swimming rapidly toward me. I needed no second look, but dashed away over the roots.Before I had gone half a dozen yards I was down sprawling in the mud. I got entangled, and my terror made me totally unable to act with any judgment. Despair nerved me and I turned at bay with my long hunting-knife in my hand. How I longed for even my revolver!A crocodile hunt on the maurA crocodile hunt on the maur“I turned at bay with my long hunting knife in my hand”Whatever the issue, it could not be long delayed. The uncouth, hideous form, which as yet I had only seen dimly, was plain now. I took my stand on one of the largest roots, steadied myself by clasping another with my left hand, and waited.My chances, if it did not seem a mockery to call them such, were small indeed. I might, by singular good luck, deprive my adversary of sight; but hemmed in as I was by a tangled mass of roots, I felt that even then I should be but little better off.All manner of thoughts came unbidden to my mind. I could see Inchi Mohamed propped up on cushions in the launch reading “A Little Book of Profitable Tales” that had just been sent me by its author. I started to smile at the tale ofThe Clycopeedy. Then I caught sight of the peak of Mount Ophir through a notch in the jungle and all sorts of absurd hypotheses in regard to its authenticity flashed through my mind. All this takes time to relate, but those who have stood in mortal peril will know how short a time it takes to think.From the moment I left the water, but a few seconds had elapsed and the saurian was not two yards from me. The abject horror and hopelessness of that moment was something I can never forget. Suddenly Lekas came floundering through the mud; a second more, and he perceived my enemy when almost within reach of his jaws.Barking furiously, Lekas began to backaway. One breathless moment, and the reptile turned to follow this new prey. I sank down among the roots regardless of the slime and watched the crocodile crawl deliberately away, with the gallant little dog retreating before him, keeping up a succession of angry barks.When I arrived at the mouth of the creek, weak, faint, and covered from head to foot with mud, I found the Chief Justice awaiting me. The barking of the dog had attracted his attention and he had steamed up to see what was the matter.I had not strength left to stroke the head of the brave little fellow who had thus twice done me a most welcome service. I had, indeed, but just strength enough to spring in, throw myself down on the cushions, and let my “boys” pull off my clothes and bring me a suit of clean pajamas and cool grass slippers.

The little pleasant-faced Malay captain of his Highness’s three-hundred ton yachtPantecalled softly, close to my ear, “Tuan—Tuan Consul, Gunong Ladang!” I sprang to my feet, rubbed my eyes, and gazed in the direction indicated by the brown hand.

I saw not five miles off the low jungle-bound coast of the peninsula, and above it a great bank of vaporous clouds, pierced by the molten rays of the early morning sun. As I looked around inquiringly, the captain, bowing, said: “Tuan,” and I raised my eyes. Again I saw the lofty mountain peak surmounting the cushion of clouds, standing out bold and clear against the almost fierce azure of the Malayan sky.

“Mount Ophir!” burst from my lips. The captain smiled and went forward to listen to the linesman’s “two fathoms, sir, two and one half fathoms, sir, two fathoms, sir”; for we were crossing the shallow bar that protects the mouth of the great river Maur from the ocean.

The tide was running out like a mill-race. ThePantewas backing from side to side, and then pushing carefully ahead, trying to get into the deep water beyond, before low tide.

Suddenly there was a soft, grating sound and the captain came to me and touched his hat.

“We are on the bar, sir. Will you send a despatch by the steam-cutter to Prince Suliman, asking for the launch? We cannot get off until the night tide.”

ThePantehad so swung around that we could plainly see the big redistana, or palace, of Prince Suliman close to the sandy shore,surrounded by a grove of graceful palms. With the aid of our glasses the white and red blur farther up the river resolved itself into the streets and quays of the little city of Bander Maharani, the capital of the province of Maur in dominions of his Highness Abubaker, Sultan of Johore. Above and overshadowing all both in beauty and historical interest was the famous old mountain where King Solomon sent his diminutive ships for “gold, silver, peacocks, and apes.”

By the time the ladies were astir, the mists had vanished and Gunong Ladang, or as it is styled in Holy Writ Mount Ophir, presented to our admiring gaze its massive outlines, set in a frame of green and blue. The dense jungle crept halfway up its sides and at the point where the cloud stratum had rested but an hour before, it merged into a tangled network of vines and shrubs which in their turn gave place to the black, red rock that shone like burnished brass.

If our minds wandered away from visions of future crocodile-shooting to dreams of the past wealth that had been taken from the ancient mines that honeycombed the base of the mountain, it is hardly to be wondered at. IfDatoor “Lord” Garlands told us queer stories of woods and masonry that antedated the written history of the country, stories of mines and workings that were overgrown with a jungle that looked as primeval as the mountain itself, he was to be excused on the plea that we, waiting on a sandy bar with the metallic glare of the sea in our eyes, were glad of any subject to distract our thoughts.

The Resident’s launch brought out Prince Mat and the Chief Justice, both of whom spoke English with an easy familiarity. Both had been in Europe and Prince Mat had dined with Queen Victoria. One night at table he related the incidents of that dinner with a delightful exactness that might havepleased her Britannic Majesty could she have listened.

I waited only long enough to see the ladies installed in a suite of rooms in the Residency, then donned a suit of white duck, stepped into a river launch in company with Inchi Mohamed, the Chief Justice, and steamed out into the broad waters of the Maur.

The southernmost kingdom of the great continent of Asia is the little Sultanate of Johore, ruled over by one of the most enlightened Princes of the East. Fourteen miles from Singapore, just across the notorious old Straits of Malacca, is his capital and the palace of the Sultan.

We had been guests of the State for the past two weeks. Its ruler, among other kind attentions to us, had suggested a visit to his out province Maur and a crocodile hunt along the banks of the broad river that wound about the foot of Mount Ophir.

Fifteen hours’ steam in his beautiful yachtalong the picturesque shores of Johore brought us to the realization of a long-cherished dream,—the seeing for ourselves the mountain whose exact location had been a subject of conjecture for so many centuries. Were I a scholar and explorer and not a sportsman, I might again and more explicitly set forth facts which I consider indubitable proof that the Mount Ophir of Asia and not the Mount Ophir of Africa is, as I have already claimed, the Mount Ophir of the Bible. But here, I wish only to narrate the record of a few pleasant days spent at its foot.

The Maur River, at its mouth, is a mile across; it is so deep that one can run close up to its muddy banks and peer in under the labyrinth of mangrove roots that stand like a rustic scaffold beneath its trunks, protecting them from the highest flood-tides.

It was some time before I could pick out a crocodile as he lay sleeping in his muddy bath, showing nothing above the slime exceptthe serrated line of his great back, which was so incrusted that, but for its regularity, it might pass for the limb of a tree or some fantastically shaped root.

“There you are!” said the Chief Justice, pointing at the bank almost before we had reached the opposite side. I strained my eyes and raised the hammer of my “50 x 110” Winchester; for I was to have a shot at my first live crocodile.

We drew nearer and nearer the shore and yet I failed to see anything that resembled an animal of any sort. The little launch slowed down and the crew all pointed toward the bank. I cannot now imagine what I expected then to see, but something must have been in my mind’s eye that blinded my bodily sight; for there, right before me, was a little fellow not over three feet long.

He had just come up from the river, and his hide was clean and almost a dark birch color. His head was raised and he wasregarding us suspiciously from his small green eyes.

I put down my rifle in disgust, and took up my revolver. I had no idea of wasting a hundred and ten grains of powder on a baby. I took careful aim and fired. The revolver was a self-cocker, and yet before I could fire again, he had whirled about and was out of reach. He was gone and I drew a long breath. The Malays said I struck him. If I did, I had no means of proving it.

The only way to bag crocodiles is to kill them outright or nearly so. If they have strength enough to crawl into the river and die, they will come to the surface again two days later; but the chances are that they will get under a root, or that in some way you will lose them. Out of forty or fifty big and small ones that we hit only five floated down past the Residency.

I also soon found out that my hundredand ten grain cartridges were none too large for even the smaller crocodiles. As for those eighteen and twenty feet long, it was necessary that the Chief Justice and I should fire at the same time and at the same spot in order to arrest the big saurians in their wild scramble for the water.

We had tried some half-dozen good shots at small fellows, varying from two to five feet in length, when I began to lose interest in the sport; so I turned to watch a colony of little gray, jungle monkeys, that were swinging and chattering and scolding among the mangrove trees.

One of them picked a long dart-shaped fruit off the tree and essayed to drop it on the head of his mate below. I was about to call my companion’s attention to it, when I heard a crash among the roots near where the missile had fallen, and a crocodile, so large that I distrusted my senses, turned his great log-like head to one side and gazed up at thefrightened monkeys. I raised my hand, and the launch paused not over twenty yards from where he lay patiently waiting for one of the monkeys to drop within reach of his great jaws.

The sun had dried the mud on his back until the entire surface reminded me of the beach of a muddy mill-pond that I used to frequent as a boy.

“Boyah besar!” (A royal crocodile) repeated our Malays under their breaths.

The Chief Justice and I fired at the same time, and the massive fellow who, but a moment before, had looked to be as stiff and clumsy as a bar of pig iron, now seemed to be made of india-rubber and steel springs. I should not have been more surprised had the greattimbosotree, beside which he lay, arisen and danced a jig. He seemed to spring from the middle up into the air without the aid of either his head or his tail. Then he brought his tail around in a circleand struck the skeleton roots of the mangrove with such force as to dislodge a small monkey in its top, which fell whistling with fright into the lower limbs, while the crocodile’s great jaws, which seemed to measure a third of his length, opened and shut viciously, snapping off limbs and roots like straws.

“He sick!” shouted the Chief Justice. “Fire quick.”

I threw the cartridge from the magazine into the barrel, and raised the gun to my shoulder just as the huge saurian struck the water. My bullet caught him underneath, near the back legs. My companion’s must have had more effect, for the crocodile stopped as though stunned. I had time to drop my gun and snatch up my revolver.

It was an easy shot. The bullet sped true to its mark and entered one of the small fiery eyes. The huge frame seemed to quiver as though a charge of electricity hadgone through it and then stiffened out,—dead.

Our Malay boys got a rope of toughgamootyfibres around the great head, and we towed our prize out into the stream just as the Resident’s launch, bearing the Prince and the ladies, steamed up the river to watch the sport.

A crowd of servants got the crocodile up on the bank near the palace grounds and drew it two hundred yards to their quarters. Now comes the strangest part of the story.

My servants had half completed the task of skinning him, for I wished to send his hide to the Smithsonian, when the muezzin sounded the call to prayers from the little mosque near by. In an instant the devout Mohammedans were on their faces and the crocodile in his half-skinned state was left until a more convenient time. At six o’clock the next morning I was awakened by a knock at my door:—

“Tuan, Tuan Consul, come seeboyah(crocodile).”

I got up, wrapped asarongabout me, put my feet into a pair of grass slippers, and followed my guide out of the palace, through the courts to where the crocodile had been the night before, but no crocodile was to be seen. My guide grinned and pointed to a heavy trail that looked like the track of a stone-boat drawn by a yoke of oxen.

We followed it for a hundred yards in the direction of the river, and came upon the crocodile, covered with blood and mud. His own hide hung about him like a dress, and his one eye opened and shut at the throng of wondering natives about. It was not until he had been put out of his misery and his hide taken entirely off that we felt confident of hisbona fidedemise.

One day I had a real adventure while out shooting, which, like many real adventures,was made up principally of the things I thought and suffered rather than of the things I did. Hence I hardly know how to write it out so that it will look like an “adventure” and not a mere mishap.

My companion had told me of a trail some thirty miles up the river that led into the jungle about three miles, to some old gold workings that date back beyond the written records of the State. So one day we drew our little launch close up under the bank of the river, and I sprang ashore, bent on seeing for myself the prehistoric remains. Contrary to the advice of the Chief Justice, I only took a heavy hunting-knife with me, and it was more for slashing away thorns and rattans than for protection.

It was the heat of the day, and the dense jungle was like a furnace. Before I had gone a mile I began to regret my enthusiasm. I found the path, but it was so overgrown with creepers, parasites, and rubber-vinesthat I had almost to cut a new one. Had it not been for the company of a small English terrier, Lekas,—the Malay for “make haste,”—I believe I should have turned back.

However, I found the old workings, and spent several hours making calculations as to their depth and course, taking notes as to the country formation, and assaying some bits of refuse quartz. Rather than struggle back by the path, I determined to follow the course of a stream that went through the mines and on toward the coast. So I whistled for Lekas and started on.

For the first half-hour everything went smoothly. Then the stream widened out and its clay bottom gave place to one of mud, which made the walking much more difficult. At last I struck the mangrove belt, which always warns you that you are approaching the coast.

As long as I kept in the centre of thechannel, I was out of the way of the network of roots; but now the channel was getting deeper and my progress becoming more labored. It was impossible to reach the bank, for the mangroves on either side had grown so thick and dense as to be impenetrable.

When I had perhaps achieved half the distance, the thought suddenly crossed my mind—how very awkward it would be to meet a crocodile in such a place! One couldn’t run, that was certain, and as for fighting, that would be a lost cause from the first.

Right in the midst of these unpleasant cogitations I heard a quiet splash in the water, not far behind, that sent my heart into my mouth. In a moment I had scrambled on to a mangrove root and had turned to look for the cause of my fears.

For perhaps a minute I saw nothing, and was trying to convince myself that my previous thoughts had made me fanciful, when, not many yards off, I saw distinctlythe form of a huge crocodile swimming rapidly toward me. I needed no second look, but dashed away over the roots.

Before I had gone half a dozen yards I was down sprawling in the mud. I got entangled, and my terror made me totally unable to act with any judgment. Despair nerved me and I turned at bay with my long hunting-knife in my hand. How I longed for even my revolver!

A crocodile hunt on the maurA crocodile hunt on the maur“I turned at bay with my long hunting knife in my hand”

A crocodile hunt on the maur

“I turned at bay with my long hunting knife in my hand”

Whatever the issue, it could not be long delayed. The uncouth, hideous form, which as yet I had only seen dimly, was plain now. I took my stand on one of the largest roots, steadied myself by clasping another with my left hand, and waited.

My chances, if it did not seem a mockery to call them such, were small indeed. I might, by singular good luck, deprive my adversary of sight; but hemmed in as I was by a tangled mass of roots, I felt that even then I should be but little better off.

All manner of thoughts came unbidden to my mind. I could see Inchi Mohamed propped up on cushions in the launch reading “A Little Book of Profitable Tales” that had just been sent me by its author. I started to smile at the tale ofThe Clycopeedy. Then I caught sight of the peak of Mount Ophir through a notch in the jungle and all sorts of absurd hypotheses in regard to its authenticity flashed through my mind. All this takes time to relate, but those who have stood in mortal peril will know how short a time it takes to think.

From the moment I left the water, but a few seconds had elapsed and the saurian was not two yards from me. The abject horror and hopelessness of that moment was something I can never forget. Suddenly Lekas came floundering through the mud; a second more, and he perceived my enemy when almost within reach of his jaws.

Barking furiously, Lekas began to backaway. One breathless moment, and the reptile turned to follow this new prey. I sank down among the roots regardless of the slime and watched the crocodile crawl deliberately away, with the gallant little dog retreating before him, keeping up a succession of angry barks.

When I arrived at the mouth of the creek, weak, faint, and covered from head to foot with mud, I found the Chief Justice awaiting me. The barking of the dog had attracted his attention and he had steamed up to see what was the matter.

I had not strength left to stroke the head of the brave little fellow who had thus twice done me a most welcome service. I had, indeed, but just strength enough to spring in, throw myself down on the cushions, and let my “boys” pull off my clothes and bring me a suit of clean pajamas and cool grass slippers.

A New Year’s Day in MalayaAnd some of its Picturesque CustomsMy Malaysycecame close up to the veranda and touched his brown forehead with the back of his open hand.“Tuan” (Lord), he said, “have got oil for harness, two one-half cents; black oil forcudah’s(horse) feet, three cents; oil, one cent one-half for bits; oil, seven cents forcretah(carriage). Fourteen cents, Tuan.”I put my hands into the pockets of my white duck jacket and drew out a roll of big Borneo coppers.Thesycecounted out the desired amount, and handed back what was left through the bamboochicks, or curtains, that reduced the blinding glare of the sky to a soft, translucent gray. I closed my eyes and stretchedback in my long chair, wondering vaguely at the occasion that called for such an outlay in oils, when I heard once more the quiet, insistent “Tuan!” I opened my eyes.“No got red, white, blue ribbon for whip.”“Sudah chukup!” (Stop talking) I commanded angrily. Thesyceshrugged his bare shoulders and gave a hitch to his cottonsarong.“Tuan, to-morrow New Year Day. Tuan,mem(lady) drive to Esplanade. Governor, general, all white tuans and mems there. Tuan Consul’s carriage not nice. Shallsycebuy ribbons?”“Yes,” I answered, tossing him the rest of the coppers, “and get a new one for your arm.”I had forgotten for the moment that it was the 31st of December. Thesycetouched his hand to his forehead and salaamed.Through the spaces of the protectingchicksI caught glimpses of my Malaykebun, or gardener, squatting on his bare feet, with his bare knees drawn up under his armpits, hacking with a heavy knife at the short grass. The mottled crotons, the yellow allamanda and pink hibiscus bushes, the clump of Eucharist lilies, the great trailing masses of orchids that hung among the red flowers of the stately flamboyant tree by the green hedge, joined to make me forget the midwinter date on the calendar. The time seemed in my half-dream July in New York or August in Washington.Ah Minga, the “boy” in flowing pantalets and stiffly starched blouse, came silently along the wide veranda, with a cup of tea and a plate of opened mangosteens. I roused myself, and the dreams of sleighbells and ice on window-panes, that had been fleeting through my mind at the first mention of New Year’s Day by thesyce, vanished.Ah Minga, too, mentioned, as he placedthe cool, pellucid globes before me, “To-mollow New Year Dlay, Tuan!”On Christmas Day, Ah Minga had presented the mistress with the gilded counterfeit presentment of a Joss. The servants, one and all, from Zim, the cookee, to the wretched Klingdhobie(wash-man), had brought some little remembrance of their Christian master’s great holiday.In respecting our customs, they had taken occasion to establish one of their own. They had adopted New Year’s as the day when their masters should return their presents and good will in solid cash.At midnight we were awakened by a regular Fourth of July pandemonium. Whistles from the factories, salvos from Fort Canning, bells from the churches, Chinese tom-toms, Malay horns, rent the air from that hour until dawn with all the discords of the Orient and a few from Europe. By daylight the thousands of natives from all quarters of thepeninsula and neighboring islands had gathered along the broad Ocean Esplanade of Singapore in front of the Cricket Club House, to take part in or watch the native sports by land and sea.The inevitable Chinaman was there, the Kling, the Madrasman, the Sikh, the Arab, the Jew, the Chitty, or Indian money-lender,—they were all there, many times multiplied, unconsciously furnishing a background of extraordinary variety and picturesqueness.At ten o’clock the favored representatives of the Anglo-Saxon race took their place on the great veranda of the Cricket Club, and gave the signal that we would condescend to be amused for ten hours. Then the show commenced. There were not over two hundred white people to represent law and civilization amid the teeming native population.In the centre of the beautiful esplanade or playground rose the heroic statue of SirStamford Raffles, the English governor who made Singapore possible. To my right, on the veranda, stood a modest, gray-haired little man who cleared the seas of piracy and insured Singapore’s commercial ascendency, Sir Charles Brooke, Rajah of Sarawak. A little farther on, surrounded by a brilliant suite of Malay princes, was the Sultan of Johore, whose father sold the island of Singapore to the British.The first of the sports was a series of foot-races between Malay and Kling boys, almost invariably won by the Malays, who are the North American Indians of Malaysia—the old-time kings of the soil. They are never, like the Chinese, mere beasts of burden, or great merchants, nor do they descend to petty trade, like the Indians or Bengalese. If they must work they become horsemen.Next came a jockey race, in which a dozen long-limbed Malays took each a five-year-old child astride his shoulders, and raced forseventy-five yards. There were sack-races and greased-pole climbing and pig-catching.Now came a singular contest—an eating match. Two dozen little Malay, Kling, Tamil, and Chinese boys were seated at regular intervals about an open circle by one of the governor’s aids. Not one could touch the others in any way. Each had a dry, hard ship-biscuit before him. A pistol shot and two dozen pairs of little brown fists went pit-a-pat on the two dozen hard biscuits, and in an instant the crackers were broken to powder.Then commenced the difficult task of forcing the powdered pulp down the little throats. Both hands were called into full play during the operation, one for crowding in, the other for grinding the residue and patting the stomach and throat. Each little competitor would shyly rub into the warm earth, or hide away in the folds of his many-coloredsarong, as much as possible, or whena rival was looking the other way, would snap a good-sized piece across to him.The little brown fellow who won the fifty-cent piece by finishing his biscuit first simply put into his mouth a certain quantity of the crushed biscuit, and with little or no mastication pushed the whole mass down his throat by sheer force.The minute the contest was decided, all the participants, and many other boys, rushed to a great tub of molasses to duck for half-dollars. One after another their heads would disappear into the sticky, blinding mass, as they fished with their teeth for the shining prizes at the bottom.Successful or otherwise, after their powers were exhausted they would suddenly pull out their heads, reeking with the molasses, and make for the ocean, unmindful of the crowds of natives in holiday attire who blocked their way.Then came a jinrikisha race, with Chinesecoolies pulling Malay passengers around a half-mile course. Letting go the handles of their wagons as they crossed the line, the coolies threw their unfortunate passengers over backward.Tugs of war, wrestling matches, and boxing bouts on the turf finished the land sports, and we all adjourned to the yachts to witness those of the sea. There were races between men-of-war cutters, European yachts, rowing shells, Chinese sampans, and Malaycolehswith great, dart-like sails, so wide-spreading that ropes were attached to the top of the masts, and a dozen naked natives hung far out over the side of the slender boat to keep it from blowing over. In making the circle of the harbor they would spring from side to side of the boat, sometimes lost to our view in the spray, often missing their footholds, and dragging through the tepid water.Between times, while watching the races,we amused ourselves throwing coppers to a fleet of native boys in small dugouts beneath our bows. Every time a penny dropped into the water, a dozen little bronze forms would flash in the sunlight, and nine times out of ten the coin never reached the bottom.Last of all came the trooping of the English colors on the magnificent esplanade, within the shadow of the cathedral; the march past of the sturdy British artillery and engineers, with their native allies, the Sikhs and Sepoys; then thefeu-de-joie, and New Year’s was officially recognized by the guns of the fort.That night we danced at Government House,—we exiles of the Temperate Zone,—keeping up to the last the fiction that New Year’s Day under a tropic sky and within sound of the tiger’s wail was really January first. But every remembrance and association was, in our homesick thoughts,grouped about an open arch fire, with the sharp, crisp creak of sleigh-runners outside, in a frozen land fourteen thousand miles away.

My Malaysycecame close up to the veranda and touched his brown forehead with the back of his open hand.

“Tuan” (Lord), he said, “have got oil for harness, two one-half cents; black oil forcudah’s(horse) feet, three cents; oil, one cent one-half for bits; oil, seven cents forcretah(carriage). Fourteen cents, Tuan.”

I put my hands into the pockets of my white duck jacket and drew out a roll of big Borneo coppers.

Thesycecounted out the desired amount, and handed back what was left through the bamboochicks, or curtains, that reduced the blinding glare of the sky to a soft, translucent gray. I closed my eyes and stretchedback in my long chair, wondering vaguely at the occasion that called for such an outlay in oils, when I heard once more the quiet, insistent “Tuan!” I opened my eyes.

“No got red, white, blue ribbon for whip.”

“Sudah chukup!” (Stop talking) I commanded angrily. Thesyceshrugged his bare shoulders and gave a hitch to his cottonsarong.

“Tuan, to-morrow New Year Day. Tuan,mem(lady) drive to Esplanade. Governor, general, all white tuans and mems there. Tuan Consul’s carriage not nice. Shallsycebuy ribbons?”

“Yes,” I answered, tossing him the rest of the coppers, “and get a new one for your arm.”

I had forgotten for the moment that it was the 31st of December. Thesycetouched his hand to his forehead and salaamed.

Through the spaces of the protectingchicksI caught glimpses of my Malaykebun, or gardener, squatting on his bare feet, with his bare knees drawn up under his armpits, hacking with a heavy knife at the short grass. The mottled crotons, the yellow allamanda and pink hibiscus bushes, the clump of Eucharist lilies, the great trailing masses of orchids that hung among the red flowers of the stately flamboyant tree by the green hedge, joined to make me forget the midwinter date on the calendar. The time seemed in my half-dream July in New York or August in Washington.

Ah Minga, the “boy” in flowing pantalets and stiffly starched blouse, came silently along the wide veranda, with a cup of tea and a plate of opened mangosteens. I roused myself, and the dreams of sleighbells and ice on window-panes, that had been fleeting through my mind at the first mention of New Year’s Day by thesyce, vanished.

Ah Minga, too, mentioned, as he placedthe cool, pellucid globes before me, “To-mollow New Year Dlay, Tuan!”

On Christmas Day, Ah Minga had presented the mistress with the gilded counterfeit presentment of a Joss. The servants, one and all, from Zim, the cookee, to the wretched Klingdhobie(wash-man), had brought some little remembrance of their Christian master’s great holiday.

In respecting our customs, they had taken occasion to establish one of their own. They had adopted New Year’s as the day when their masters should return their presents and good will in solid cash.

At midnight we were awakened by a regular Fourth of July pandemonium. Whistles from the factories, salvos from Fort Canning, bells from the churches, Chinese tom-toms, Malay horns, rent the air from that hour until dawn with all the discords of the Orient and a few from Europe. By daylight the thousands of natives from all quarters of thepeninsula and neighboring islands had gathered along the broad Ocean Esplanade of Singapore in front of the Cricket Club House, to take part in or watch the native sports by land and sea.

The inevitable Chinaman was there, the Kling, the Madrasman, the Sikh, the Arab, the Jew, the Chitty, or Indian money-lender,—they were all there, many times multiplied, unconsciously furnishing a background of extraordinary variety and picturesqueness.

At ten o’clock the favored representatives of the Anglo-Saxon race took their place on the great veranda of the Cricket Club, and gave the signal that we would condescend to be amused for ten hours. Then the show commenced. There were not over two hundred white people to represent law and civilization amid the teeming native population.

In the centre of the beautiful esplanade or playground rose the heroic statue of SirStamford Raffles, the English governor who made Singapore possible. To my right, on the veranda, stood a modest, gray-haired little man who cleared the seas of piracy and insured Singapore’s commercial ascendency, Sir Charles Brooke, Rajah of Sarawak. A little farther on, surrounded by a brilliant suite of Malay princes, was the Sultan of Johore, whose father sold the island of Singapore to the British.

The first of the sports was a series of foot-races between Malay and Kling boys, almost invariably won by the Malays, who are the North American Indians of Malaysia—the old-time kings of the soil. They are never, like the Chinese, mere beasts of burden, or great merchants, nor do they descend to petty trade, like the Indians or Bengalese. If they must work they become horsemen.

Next came a jockey race, in which a dozen long-limbed Malays took each a five-year-old child astride his shoulders, and raced forseventy-five yards. There were sack-races and greased-pole climbing and pig-catching.

Now came a singular contest—an eating match. Two dozen little Malay, Kling, Tamil, and Chinese boys were seated at regular intervals about an open circle by one of the governor’s aids. Not one could touch the others in any way. Each had a dry, hard ship-biscuit before him. A pistol shot and two dozen pairs of little brown fists went pit-a-pat on the two dozen hard biscuits, and in an instant the crackers were broken to powder.

Then commenced the difficult task of forcing the powdered pulp down the little throats. Both hands were called into full play during the operation, one for crowding in, the other for grinding the residue and patting the stomach and throat. Each little competitor would shyly rub into the warm earth, or hide away in the folds of his many-coloredsarong, as much as possible, or whena rival was looking the other way, would snap a good-sized piece across to him.

The little brown fellow who won the fifty-cent piece by finishing his biscuit first simply put into his mouth a certain quantity of the crushed biscuit, and with little or no mastication pushed the whole mass down his throat by sheer force.

The minute the contest was decided, all the participants, and many other boys, rushed to a great tub of molasses to duck for half-dollars. One after another their heads would disappear into the sticky, blinding mass, as they fished with their teeth for the shining prizes at the bottom.

Successful or otherwise, after their powers were exhausted they would suddenly pull out their heads, reeking with the molasses, and make for the ocean, unmindful of the crowds of natives in holiday attire who blocked their way.

Then came a jinrikisha race, with Chinesecoolies pulling Malay passengers around a half-mile course. Letting go the handles of their wagons as they crossed the line, the coolies threw their unfortunate passengers over backward.

Tugs of war, wrestling matches, and boxing bouts on the turf finished the land sports, and we all adjourned to the yachts to witness those of the sea. There were races between men-of-war cutters, European yachts, rowing shells, Chinese sampans, and Malaycolehswith great, dart-like sails, so wide-spreading that ropes were attached to the top of the masts, and a dozen naked natives hung far out over the side of the slender boat to keep it from blowing over. In making the circle of the harbor they would spring from side to side of the boat, sometimes lost to our view in the spray, often missing their footholds, and dragging through the tepid water.

Between times, while watching the races,we amused ourselves throwing coppers to a fleet of native boys in small dugouts beneath our bows. Every time a penny dropped into the water, a dozen little bronze forms would flash in the sunlight, and nine times out of ten the coin never reached the bottom.

Last of all came the trooping of the English colors on the magnificent esplanade, within the shadow of the cathedral; the march past of the sturdy British artillery and engineers, with their native allies, the Sikhs and Sepoys; then thefeu-de-joie, and New Year’s was officially recognized by the guns of the fort.

That night we danced at Government House,—we exiles of the Temperate Zone,—keeping up to the last the fiction that New Year’s Day under a tropic sky and within sound of the tiger’s wail was really January first. But every remembrance and association was, in our homesick thoughts,grouped about an open arch fire, with the sharp, crisp creak of sleigh-runners outside, in a frozen land fourteen thousand miles away.

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