Travels in the East Indian archipelago

by Albert S. Bickmore

I had now climbed up one thousand four hundred feet during my short ride, and was therefore two thousand one hundred feet above the sea. To the northwest there now opened out before me a long, narrow, gently descending valley, like the one I had left behind; in fact, this water-shed is merely a transverse ridge which unites the Barizan chain with the chain parallel to it, in the same way as it is done by the transverse ranges in which the Mérapi and the Sago rise. This appears to be naturally as fruitful a region as the Menangkabau country proper, and was undoubtedly included within the limits of that empire during its most flourishing period. This valley is generally very poorly cultivated, on account of the small numbers of its population. By the wayside were a number of coffee-gardens. The trees were well filled with fruit, but they had been greatly neglected, and the tall grass was rapidly choking them.

A few miles farther on I came to Lubu Siképing, where we were to rest until the next day. A native opziener, or “overseer,” was stationed here to receive the coffee from the adjoining plantations. He had not heard of our coming, and was quite surprised to see a stranger here in such a remote spot among the mountains, and not the less so when I informed him that the inspector was just behind me, and that I only chanced to be in advance because, from what I had heard of the road in the gorge, I had no fancy to ride through it in a wide carriage. He received us, however, like all the other officials, in the most polite manner, and was evidently glad that something had occurred to break up the dull routine of such a life of exile. It was market-day here, and, as soon as I met some of the natives returning to their homes, I saw that they were a different people from those of the Menangkabau country, and the overseer told me that they are not natives of this particular region, but belong to the wild tribe of Lubus, which I should see farther up the valley, and that it is for this reason that this place is called Lubu Siképing. They now build houses like those of other Malays. They are better-formed people than the Javanese, and closely resemble in their features the Oranglaut, or common Malays of the coast regions. Their favorite holiday-dress is chiefly a bright scarlet. Half an hour after I arrived here the inspector came. He had found the road so narrow in one or two places that the natives had to push out planks beyond the outer edge of the road to support the outside wheels of the carriage, and I was glad that I came on horseback, though, when I led the vicious brute, I had to keep a constant watch to prevent him from seizing my wrist in his teeth.

At 5 P. M. we walked out to enjoy the grand scenery in the vicinity. The level plateau here, which is one thousand five hundred feet above the sea, is bounded on the northeast side by an exceedingly steep, almost overhanging range of mountains, whose several crests appear to be five thousand feet above us. It was one of the most imposing sights I witnessed on that island of high mountains. Mount Ophir is just west of this place, and at sunset we saw it through a gap in the mountains near us, resting its lofty purple summit against the golden sky.

February 28th.—I find it much more agreeable to ride on horseback most of the time, because I can stop or turn round when I please, and the opziener has therefore given me a horse to go the next ten paals. For all that distance the scenery was much like that described last night, except that the valley kept widening as we progressed northward, and, therefore, the mountains, being farther from us, were not so imposing. When we had come to the limit of the overseer’s territory, another living in the next district met us and travelled with us to his little house, where we dined on venison while he entertained us with tiger-stories. Only a few days before we arrived he had seen a tiger in the road but little more than a rifle-shot from his house; and, indeed, the deer that supplied the venison we were eating had been shot in his own garden, where it had evidently been chased by one of those ferocious beasts. At the opziener’s houses there is a regular price for every thing furnished, and you order what you please, though one can seldom feast on venison, and must generally satisfy his hunger on chickens and eggs, and, to receive both of these different articles, he needs only to order the latter. In the houses of all officials of a higher rank than opzieners it would be considered no less than an insult to offer to pay for your lodging. From this place I rode with the inspector a distance of twenty-five miles to Rau, the chief village in this valley. We had not gone far before we came into herds of buffaloes, which are more than half-wild and said to be very dangerous, but the natives that accompanied us kept up a loud shouting, and the herd leaped to the right and left into the jungle and tall grass, and allowed us to pass on unmolested. The people here sometimes shoot them, but consider it a most dangerous kind of sport, for they say that when one is wounded, but not fatally, he will certainly turn and pursue the hunter, and, if he can overtake him, will quickly gore him to death.

On our way we crossed several long, covered bridges, one of which was so low and our horse so unmanageable, that we came near losing the top of our carriage before we could throw it back. Two or three of them were so bent down in the middle by only a buffalo and a native occasionally crossing them, that I was unwilling to risk myself in the carriage, and jumped out and crossed them on foot. One vibrated up and down in such a manner that I certainly expected at the next moment I should see the inspector, horse, bridge, and all, in the midst of the stream below. This stream begins at Lubu Siképing, and, after flowing northwest to Rau, where it is called Sumpur, it curves to the northeast, and, receiving tributaries during its course, flows on till it empties into the Strait of Malacca. The coffee raised in this valley is transported in padatis from Lunda, a small village south of this place, over a high, difficult way to Ayar Bangis, on the west coast. Sometimes a hot simoom sweeps up the valley from the south, parching up the vegetation and causing a severe illness to those foreigners who are exposed to it. The mountains here are much lower on the east than on the west, and, as there are no deep clefts in the Barizan chain here, as in the Menangkabau country, the Sumpur is obliged to find its outlet to the east.

The soil here is not as fertile as farther to the north, where it is somewhat higher, the elevation of this point being only one thousand feet. Here we see the benefit of the transverse ranges that connect the Barizan to its parallel chain. At Bondyol, in the next valley to the south, where we were yesterday, we found the bottom of the valley abounding in rich vegetation, though that was three hundred feet lower than this place, because that valley is so short that the air has no room to become heated to a dry simoom, which can wither the vegetation as it sweeps along. It is, therefore, in this valley that the simoom is formed, not on the high mountains that border it or on the adjacent ocean.

March 1st.—Left Rau at 6 A. M., for we have another long day’s journey before us. As yesterday, the road led along the bottom of the valley, but soon a range of mountains appeared before us, and we began to ascend along the side of a deep ravine. The rock here was exposed, and proved to be a soft sandstone covered with clay. Here we came to a third water-shed two thousand one hundred and fifty feet high, and could look back down the valley of Rau to the southeast. Its length in a right line, from this water-shed to that at the gorge near Lubu Siképing, is thirty geographical miles, but, instead of being straight, it curves to the northeast, and is of a crescent form, widest in the middle, and gradually narrowing toward the extremities. In its broadest part it is not more than six or eight miles wide. We now turned to the northwest, and began to descend into another valley, that of Mandéling. Here the mountains are quite devoid of forests, and only covered with a tall, rank, useless grass, the Andropogon caricosum.

At Marisipongi, the first village we came to in this valley, we found we were among an entirely new people, the Battas or Bataks. They also belong to the Malay race, but have an alphabet and a language of their own. Each of their villages usually consists of only a single street, which is straight, and not necessarily parallel to the road. Here it was market-day, and, while we stopped to rest, I had a good opportunity of observing them. The women generally wore only a sarong fastened at the waist and descending to the knee, the upper part of the body being wholly uncovered. As we passed, the younger women made up for this deficiency to the best of their ability with the scarf in which they were carrying their children. These young women have the odd custom of wearing from fifteen to twenty iron rings in each ear, and as many more on their arms above the wrist.

A great many persons of both sexes, and even some children, were afflicted with that unsightly malady, goitre, and had large swellings, generally on the neck, though I noticed one at the lower end of the breastbone. The cause assigned here by the Dutch officials for this disease is that these people have been accustomed to use very little salt, the iodine contained in that condiment being supposed to act as a preventive to the development of the disease. It is said to seldom or never appear among those Malays who have lived on the sea-coast for several generations, and I do not remember to have seen a single case in such a locality.