



Produced by Jeroen Hellingman and the Online Distributed
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                   Tales of the Malayan Coast

                 From Penang to the Philippines

                               By

                      Rounsevelle Wildman

        Consul General of the United States at Hong Kong

                  Illustrated by Henry Sandham


                             Boston

                   Lothrop Publishing Company




                        Copyright, 1899,
                               By

                  Lothrop Publishing Company.

                         Norwood Press
              J. S. Cushing & Co.--Berwick & Smith
                      Norwood Mass. U.S.A.





                               To
                            Our Hero
                         And my friend
                  Admiral George Dewey, U.S.N.
                      I Dedicate this Book





                                              Flagship Olympia,
                                        Manila, 21 Sept., 1898.

        My Dear Wildman:--

        Yours of 12th instant is  at hand. I am much flattered by
        your request to dedicate your book to me, and would be
        pleased to have you do so.

            With kindest regards, I am,
                Very truly yours,

                        George Dewey.







PREFACE


These stories are the result of nine years' residence and experience
on the Malayan coast--that land of romance and adventure which the
ancients knew as the Golden Chersonesus, and which, in modern times,
has been brought again into the atmosphere of valor and performance
by Rajah Brooke of Sarawak, the hero of English expansion, and
Admiral George Dewey of the Asiatic squadron, the hero of American
achievement. The author, in his official duties as Special Commissioner
of the United States for the Straits Settlement and Siam, and, later,
as Consul General of the United States at Hong Kong, has mingled with
and studied the diverse people of the Malayan coast, from the Sultan
of Johore and Aguinaldo the Filipino to the lowest Eurasian and "China
boy" of that wonderful Oriental land. These stories are based on his
experiences afloat and ashore, and are offered to the American public
at this time when all glimpses of the land that Columbus sailed to
find are of especial interest to the modern possessors of the land
he really did discover.







CONTENTS


                                                     Page
    Baboo's Good Tiger                                 9
    Baboo's Pirates                                   28
    How we Played Robinson Crusoe                     47
    The Sarong                                        66
    The Kris                                          74
    The White Rajah of Borneo                         81
    Amok!                                            101
    Lepas's Revenge                                  130
    King Solomon's Mines                             147
    Busuk                                            181
    A Crocodile Hunt                                 200
    A New Year's Day in Malaya                       219
    In the Burst of the Southwest Monsoon            230
    A Pig Hunt on Mount Ophir                        254
    In the Court of Johore                           270
    In the Golden Chersonese                         293
    A Fight with Illanum Pirates                     321










TALES OF THE MALAYAN COAST
FROM PENANG TO THE PHILIPPINES


BABOO'S GOOD TIGER

A Tale of the Malacca Jungle


Aboo Din's first-born, Baboo, was only four years old when he had
his famous adventure with the tiger he had found sleeping in the
hot lallang grass within the distance of a child's voice from Aboo
Din's bungalow.

For a long time before that hardly a day had passed but Aboo-Din,
who was our syce, or groom, and wore the American colors proudly on
his right arm, came in from the servants' quarters with an anxious
look on his kindly brown face and asked respectfully for the tuan
(lord) or mem (lady).

"What is it, Aboo Din?" the mistress would inquire, as visions of
Baboo drowned in the great Shanghai jar, or of Baboo lying crushed
by a boa among the yellow bamboos beyond the hedge, passed swiftly
through her mind.

"Mem see Baboo?" came the inevitable question.

It was unnecessary to say more. At once Ah Minga, the "boy"; Zim, the
cook; the kebuns (gardeners); the tukanayer (water-boy), and even the
sleek Hindu dirzee, who sat sewing, dozing, and chewing betel-nut,
on the shady side of the veranda, turned out with one accord and
commenced a systematic search for the missing Baboo.

Sometimes he was no farther off than the protecting screen of the
"compound" hedge, or the cool, green shadows beneath the bungalow. But
oftener the government Sikhs had to be appealed to, and Kampong Glam
in Singapore searched from the great market to the courtyards of
Sultan Ali. It was useless to whip him, for whippings seemed only
to make Baboo grow. He would lisp serenely as Aboo Din took down
the rattan withe from above the door, "Baboo baniak jahat!" (Baboo
very bad!) and there was something so charmingly impersonal in all
his mischief, that we came between his own brown body and the rod,
time and again. There was nothing distinctive in Baboo's features or
form. To the casual observer he might have been any one of a half-dozen
of his playmates. Like them, he went about perfectly naked, his soft,
brown skin shining like polished rosewood in the fierce Malayan sun.

His hair was black, straight, and short, and his eyes as black as
coals. Like his companions, he stood as straight as an arrow, and
could carry a pail of water on his head without spilling a drop.

He, too, ate rice three times a day. It puffed him up like a little
old man, which added to his grotesqueness and gave him a certain
air of dignity that went well with his features when they were in
repose. Around his waist he wore a silver chain with a silver heart
suspended from it. Its purpose was to keep off the evil spirits.

There was always an atmosphere of sandalwood and Arab essence about
Baboo that reminded me of the holds of the old sailing-ships that used
to come into Boston harbor from the Indies. I think his mother must
have rubbed the perfumes into his hair as the one way of declaring to
the world her affection for him. She could not give him clothes, or
ornaments, or toys: such was not the fashion of Baboo's race. Neither
was he old enough to wear the silk sarong that his Aunt Fatima had
woven for him on her loom.

Baboo had been well trained, and however lordly he might be in the
quarters, he was marked in his respect to the mistress. He would
touch his forehead to the red earth when I drove away of a morning to
the office; though the next moment I might catch him blowing a tiny
ball of clay from his sumpitan into the ear of his father, the syce,
as he stood majestically on the step behind me.

Baboo went to school for two hours every day to a fat old Arab
penager, or teacher, whose schoolroom was an open stall, and whose
only furniture a bench, on which he sat cross-legged, and flourished
a whip in one hand and a chapter of the Koran in the other.

There were a dozen little fellows in the school; all naked. They
stood up in line, and in a soft musical treble chanted in chorus the
glorious promises