WANDERINGS IN THE MALAY ARCHIPELAGO.—GOOD-BYE.
"There is an interesting point in the Aru Islands," the gentleman remarked, after a short pause, "known as Dobbo."
GREAT STREET OF DOBBO IN THE TRADING SEASON.
"It is not regularly visited by steamers, as it is out of the routes of travel, and for a part of the year it is almost deserted. In May and June it is filled to overflowing with a mixed lot of people from all parts of the East. There are Chinese in considerable number, who come to buy the articles brought to market by the inhabitants of the islands for a long distance; and there are men from Macassar, Timor, Ceram, and other parts of the Archipelago, as well as the natives of Aru, who belong to the Papuans I have already described. The town consists of a single street of mat-covered huts and sheds, with a lot of straggling buildings in the rear that are set down without any regard to order or regularity.
"I went to Dobbo in a native boat from Macassar. It was very much like a Chinese junk in general appearance, and about seventy tons burden, with a native crew of thirty men and a Javanese captain. Four or five of the men were slave-debtors of the captain, and the rest were hired, like the crew of a ship in Europe or America."
"Excuse me for interrupting," said Fred, "but let me ask what these slave-debtors are."
"Slave indebtedness," replied the gentleman, "is a system introduced by the Dutch, who borrowed it from the Chinese, for the protection of traders in these thinly-peopled regions. Goods must be intrusted to agents and small dealers, who frequently gamble them away, and leave the merchant unpaid. He trusts them again and again, with the same result; and finally, when he can stand it no longer, he brings them before a police court, where he establishes his claim. The magistrate then binds the debtor over to the creditor, and requires him to work out the account. The plan seems to answer very well, as the creditor is secure so long as the debtor lives and has his health; while the debtor does not consider himself disgraced, but rather enjoys his relief from responsibility."
"But it is a system of slavery," Fred answered; "though, after all, it is more sensible than the European practice of locking a debtor up in jail, where he can earn nothing, but is a constant expense to himself and all others concerned."
"A good deal depends on the character of the master," was the reply. "Some masters get along very pleasantly with their debtors—allow them to trade a little on their own account—and associate with them on equal terms.
WEARING THE CANGUE.
"Others treat them harshly—perhaps not without cause—sometimes, and punish them severely for disobedience. While I was at Dobbo, a Chinese merchant fastened one of his slave-debtors in a cangue, and kept him there an entire day, chained to the wall of his shop. The man had been caught stealing from his master, and the latter made himself judge, jury, and police-officer without delay. The cangue is a wooden collar around the neck; it is about three feet square, and made of planks from one to two inches thick. It is a heavy article of wearing apparel, and not at all ornamental."
Frank asked if the native captains understood navigation after the European form, and could take the positions of the sun and moon with instruments like those used on American or European ships.
"They are not good navigators," responded their informant, "as we understand navigation, but they manage to get along wonderfully well with very rude appliances. They take the altitude of the sun with a stick, to which is attached a string with a peculiar arrangement of knots; and they understand the use of the compass. They have a water-clock, which is very simple, and much more accurate than you would suppose.
"It consists of a bucket of water, and the half of a cocoa-nut shell. There is a tiny hole like the prick of a needle in the bottom of the shell, and when you put it on the water you can just see a stream like a thread spurting up. It takes an hour to fill the shell, and when it is full it goes plump to the bottom of the bucket, making a bubbling noise that attracts the attention of the man on duty, who immediately puts the shell in place again. I used to try it with my watch, and found that it never varied more than a minute from the hour, which is quite accurate enough for an Oriental. The motion of the boat had no effect on it, as the water in the bucket was always on a level.
"The voyages of these boats are made with the monsoons, so that the course is largely guided by studying the direction of the wind. Only one voyage can be made in a year from Macassar—the boats starting in December or January with the west monsoon, and returning in July or August with the east monsoon. The distance is about a thousand miles, and is made in from twenty to thirty days each way.
A NATIVE OF ARU.
"The trade at Dobbo amounts to something near a hundred thousand dollars a year, and is carried on in the most primitive way. It is almost entirely a barter trade; there is no money in use except copper coins from Java and China, and many of the natives do not even know their value. It requires a great deal of talk to make a bargain, and sometimes they will haggle for hours over a transaction that amounts to only a few cents.
SEA-CUCUMBER.
"The things brought from the islands, and bought by the traders, are pearl-shells, tortoise-shell, edible birds'-nests, pearls, timber, and birds of paradise. There is also a large supply of tripang, or 'beche-de-mer,' of which the Chinese make many soups. It is known in English as the sea-cucumber, and is taken on the reefs and among the rocks all through the Eastern seas, and in some parts of the Pacific Ocean. After being boiled in its own liquid, and dried on racks over a fire, it is ready for market.
A PAPUAN PIPE.
"The goods used in purchasing these articles are as varied as the purchasers. The most important item is that of arrack—a spirit distilled from rice, and resembling rum; about twenty thousand gallons of it are sold at Dobbo every year, and sometimes as many as twenty-five thousand. English and American cottons are sold; and also tobacco, crockery, knives, muskets, gunpowder, Chinese gongs, small cannons, and elephants' tusks. The last three articles are the luxuries with which the natives of Aru buy their wives, and display in their houses or conceal as valuable property. They use tobacco both for chewing and smoking, and will not accept it unless it is very strong. The native pipe is similar to that used in Papua, or New Guinea, and is made of wood, with a long upright handle, which is set in the ground while the owner is using it. He squats before the pipe, and when in this position his mouth is just on a level with the end of the stem.
"I went from Dobbo to Amboyna and Banda, which are small islands not far from the much greater one of Ceram. They formerly belonged to the Portuguese, but are now in possession of the Dutch, and known to the commercial world for their products of cloves and nutmegs."
"I have read somewhere," said Frank, "that the Dutch destroyed the spice-trees on all the other islands, so as to have a monopoly in Banda and Amboyna. Was it not very unjust to the natives to do that?"
"All the facts in the case are not generally known," was the reply. "The Portuguese traders maintained high prices for these luxuries, and used to oppress the natives to obtain them. Sometimes the competition led to their paying such figures to the native princes that the latter became very wealthy, but their subjects were not benefited by them. When the Dutch came into possession, they determined to concentrate the culture in a few places, so that they could control it, and to this end they offered an annual subsidy to the native princes to destroy the spice-trees in their dominions. The latter were thus made sure of their revenue, while the people were able to devote more time to the cultivation of articles of food, and were relieved from taxes.
"The cultivation of the clove was restricted to the island of Amboyna, while Banda was made the seat of the nutmeg culture. There was so much complaint on the part of the English that the monopoly was finally removed in part; the trade is still surrounded with restrictions, as the Dutch are in possession of the islands where the culture can be conducted to the best advantage. It is a curious circumstance that the birds had much to do with the suppression of the monopoly."
"The birds?"
A BIRD OF AMBOYNA.
"Yes, a bird known as the nutmeg-pigeon. He lives on the mace which envelops the nutmeg; the latter is undigested and uninjured in his stomach, and he carries it to islands of whose existence the Dutch were not aware. The nutmeg is the seed of the tree, and as fast as the Dutch suppressed the cultivation in an island the birds restored it. Banda is still the centre of the nutmeg trade, as the article is produced more cheaply there than in any other spot, and it sends about two million pounds of this spice to market every year. The climate of Amboyna was found not altogether suited to the production of the clove; and as the clove-tree flourishes in other parts of the world, the monopoly could not be kept up. The clove is not the fruit of the tree, as many persons suppose, but the blossom; it is gathered before it is unfolded, and if you look at a clove you will see how much it resembles a bud just ready for opening.
"From Banda I went to Ceram, to see the process of obtaining sago. Perhaps you are fond of sago-pudding, and may be interested to know where sago comes from, and how it is prepared."
The boys nodded their assent, and Frank remarked that he had many times wished he knew more about the delicious article.
"The sago-tree belongs to the palm family; it is thicker and larger than the cocoa-palm, but not so tall, and its leaves are very large and long. The stem of the leaf is twelve or fifteen feet long, and six inches in diameter at the butt, and is used for a great many purposes. Whole houses are built of these stems, from the framework to the thatch-poles and flooring, and they never shrink or bend, or require any paint or varnish. The leaf forms an admirable thatch, and the trunk of the tree is the food of many thousands of people.
SAGO CLUB.
"When it is about fifteen years old the tree blossoms, and then dies. Just as it is about to blossom, it is cut down close to the ground, and stripped of its leaves. The upper part of the trunk is then taken off, so as to expose the pith of the tree, which is broken into a coarse powder by means of a club of heavy wood, having a piece of iron or sharp stone in one end. The whole inside of the tree is broken up till the trunk forms a trough not more than half an inch thick.
PREPARING SAGO.
SAGO OVEN.
"The dry powder is then washed, and strained through a coarse sieve; the water flows into a deep trough with a depression in the centre, where the sago sinks to the bottom and is secured. It is then pressed into cylinders weighing about thirty pounds each, or it is baked into cakes in a clay oven, with a series of compartments an inch wide, and six inches long and deep. The cakes will keep a long while if they are dried in the sun after baking. I have eaten sago that was said to be ten years old, and found it perfectly good."
Fred wished to know how much sago there was in a tree, and how much it costs for a man to live in the sago country.
"A single tree will produce from eight hundred to one thousand pounds of sago," was the reply, "which will support a man for a year. Two men can reduce a tree to dry powder in five days, and therefore we may say that ten days' labor will support a man for a year. The result is that in the sago country the people are indolent, and not at all prosperous; they have no incentive to work, and therefore make no effort to do anything. They wear very little clothing; and as for their houses, they have no occasion for anything more than rude huts, which can be built by a couple of men in a few hours. It has been observed by all who have visited Ceram that the inhabitants are not as well off as the people of the islands that produce rice, as the latter must work a great deal harder to support themselves, and will lose their whole crop unless they pay attention to their fields.
SUGAR-PALM OF MACASSAR.
"From Ceram I went to Macassar, where they have a palm-tree producing a sweet juice that may be made into beer, or boiled down into sugar, like the sap of a maple-tree. It is not unlike the sago-palm in general appearance, and will grow wherever it can find sufficient soil for its roots. The island is very rough and mountainous, and the variety of soil enables it to produce a great many things. I was invited to stay on the plantation of a friend who lived among the hills, and promised me a pleasant time.
CLIMBING THE MOUNTAIN.
"The road to the plantation was very steep in several places, and the mules that we rode had all they could do to carry us. The path wound in and out among the rocks, and under the trees peculiar to the tropics; and one of the trees came near being the cause of my falling over a high cliff."
"How was that?"
"Fruit was so abundant that the natives did not gather all of it as fast as it ripened; every little while I saw mangoes or bananas lying in the path, and the incident I mention was caused by my mule stepping on a banana and slipping to the ground. He left me sprawling just on the edge of the cliff; if he had pitched me a foot farther, I should have gone over and been dashed to death on the rocks below.
"I stayed with my friend a week, and found that he had a most delightful residence. He was fond of hunting, and was able to supply his table with meat by means of his gun and dogs. There were many wild pigs in the neighborhood, and he shot two of them while I was there, so that we had pork in abundance. Then there were several kinds of birds that were excellent eating. He had all the milk he wanted from his buffaloes, and made his own butter, raised his own rice and coffee, and smoked cigars from his own tobacco. He had ducks and chickens, and eggs in any desired quantity; his palm-trees supplied him with palm-wine and sugar, and he had nearly every tropical fruit that can be named. You see, by this account of his plantation, how well a man may live in one of the islands of the Archipelago, provided he can reconcile himself to the absence of society, and be contented with the sport that the hilly country affords.
COMING DOWN THE MOUNTAIN.
"When I came away my friend accompanied me down the mountain, and I found the journey much easier than going up; in fact, it was too easy, and the mules were inclined to go faster than we liked to have them. A part of the way I hired a boy to hang on to the tail of my beast, which he did, somewhat to the annoyance of the latter. This kind of check was evidently new to him, and he tried to elevate his heels sufficiently to shake off the encumbrance. But he could not do so without danger of turning a somersault; and consequently his kicking was confined to a few slight movements. When the path became less steep I dismissed the boy, and the animal went along as demurely as ever.
"But my time is up," said the gentleman, looking at his watch, "and your note-books are full. I am sorry I have not another hour or two in which to tell you of Celebes, where the Dutch have established the same system of culture that has made Java so prosperous; of Borneo, where the people and the products form a study of unusual interest; of New Guinea, a country rarely visited by Europeans; and of many other parts of the Eastern Archipelago. Perhaps we will meet again one of these days, and then I will try to give you more information similar to what I have been narrating, and trust you will not find it without interest."
Frank and Fred were earnest in their thanks to their kind informant; and the Doctor added his words of indebtedness to theirs. Expressions of regret at their separation were made on both sides, and the final hand-shaking was the cause of little lumps in youthful and manly throats that choked the voices, and made the "good-byes" a trifle husky in their utterance.
At the stipulated time the repairs to the carriage were completed, and our friends made all haste back to Buitenzorg, and thence to Batavia. At their banker's they found a large parcel of letters, which had just arrived by the last mail from Singapore; and the evening of their return from the interior was devoted to the perusal of the precious missives from home. The next day found them busy with plans for their future movements, and you may be sure that the map of the eastern hemisphere was thoroughly studied, and the routes of travel and commerce carefully examined. In this occupation we will leave the Doctor and his young companions, with the assurance that in due time the Bassett and Bronson families, and all their friends, Miss Effie included, will be fully informed of the adventures that befell
THE BOY TRAVELLERS IN THE FAR EAST.
"GOOD-BYE!"