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Sir Hugh Charles Clifford. In Court and Kampong
In Court and Kampong
Table of Contents
PREFACE
THE EAST COAST
THE PEOPLE OF THE EAST COAST
THE EXPERIENCES OF RÂJA HAJI HAMID
THE BATTLE OF THE WOMEN
IN COCK-PIT AND BULL-RING
THE WERE-TIGER
THE AMOK OF DÂTO KÂYA BÎJI DĔRJA
THE FLIGHT OF CHÊP, THE BIRD
THE VAULTING AMBITION
'ONE MORE UNFORTUNATE'
AMONG THE FISHER FOLK
THE STORY OF BÂYAN THE PAROQUET
A TALE OF A THEFT
IN A CAMP OF THE SĔMANGS
'HIS HEART'S DESIRE'
A NIGHT OF TERROR
IN THE DAYS WHEN THE LAND WAS FREE
UN MAUVAIS QUART D'HEURE
UP COUNTRY
L'ENVOI
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Sir Hugh Charles Clifford
Being Tales and Sketches of Native Life in the Malay Peninsula
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Study, trade, the skill of the artisan, 'and fruitful strifes and rivalries of peace,' these are the things in which all the interests of the Trĕnggânu Malay are centred. From his earliest infancy he grows up in an atmosphere of books, and money and trade, and manufactures, and bargainings, and hagglings. He knows how to praise the goods he is selling, and how to depreciate the wares he is buying, almost as soon as he can speak; and the unblushing manner in which he will hold forth concerning the antiquity of some article which he has made with his own hands, and the entire absence of all mauvaise honte which he displays when detected in the fraud, have earned for him the reputation he proverbially bears of being the best liar in the Peninsula. The Pahang boy grows up amid talk of war and rumours of war, which makes him long to be a man that he may use his weapons, almost before he has learned to stand upon his feet. Not so the young idea of Trĕnggânu. Men go about armed, of course, for such is the custom in all Independent Malay States, but they have little skill with spear or knife, and, since a proficiency as a scholar, an artisan, or as a shrewd man of business wins more credit than does a reputation for valour, the people of Trĕnggânu generally grow up cowards, and are not very much ashamed of standing so confessed. In his own line, however, the Trĕnggânu Malay is far in advance of any other natives on the East Coast, or indeed in the Peninsula. He has generally read his Kurân through, from end to end, before he has reached his teens, and, as the Malay character differs but slightly from the Arabic, he thereafter often acquires a knowledge of how to read and write his own language.
But a study of the Muhammadan Scriptures is apt to breed religious animosity, in the crude oriental mind, and the race of local saints, who have succeeded one another at Pâloh for several generations, have been instrumental in fomenting this feeling. Ungku Saiyid of Pâloh—the 'local holy man' for the time being—like his prototype in the Naulahka, has done much to agitate the minds of the people, and to create a 'commotion of popular bigotry.' He is a man of an extraordinary personality. His features are those of the pure Arab caste, and they show the ultra-refinement of one who is pinched with long fasts and other ascetic practices. Moreover, he has the unbounded vanity and self-conceit which is born of long years of adulation, and is infected by that touch of madness which breeds 'Cranks' in modern Europe, and 'Saints' in modern Asia. He preaches to crowded congregations thrice weekly, and the men of Trĕnggânu flock from all parts of the country to sit at his feet. The Sultân, too, like his father, and his great-uncle, Băginda Ümar, has been at some pains to ensure the performance of religious rites by all his people, and, as far as outward observances go, he appears to have been successful. Moreover, the natives of Trĕnggânu love religious and learned discussions of all kinds, and most of them:
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