[8] Silver has lately been found to exist also.
CHAPTER III.
Kuching—Society—The Club—Amusements—The Sarawak Gazette—The Bazaar—Health of Kuching—Life in Kuching—Rats—Preparations for Journey to the Matang Mountain.
Kuching, the capital of Sarawak, although smaller than Pontianak and other Dutch settlements on the coast of Borneo, is generally acknowledged to be the first town in Borneo so far as civilisation and comfort are concerned, and is renowned for its Bazaar, which is the best-built and cleanest in the island. There are two good roads extending at right angles from the town to a distance of seven miles each, at which point they are united by a third. These form a pleasant drive or ride, an amusement unknown in most Bornean townships, where the jungle and undergrowth are usually so dense as to defy any attempts at walking, to say nothing of riding or driving.
The number of Europeans in Kuching, although limited, and consisting of but some twenty in all (five of whom are ladies), form a pleasant little coterie, and there is a marked absence of the scandal and squabbling which generally seems inseparable from any place wherein a limited number of our countrymen and women are assembled. The occasional presence of an English or Dutch man-of-war, also, breaks the monotony of life, and enlivens matters considerably.
The Club, a comfortable stone building, was founded by the Government a few years ago, and contains bed-rooms for the use of out-station officers when on a visit to Kuching. A lawn-tennis ground and bowling alley are attached to it, and serve to kill the time, which, however, rarely hung heavily on our hands in this cheerful little place.
Riding and driving are but still in their infancy, and Kuching boasted of only some dozen horses and four carriages—including a sporting little tandem of Deli (Sumatra) ponies, owned by the Resident. The Deli pony is a rare-shaped little animal, standing from 13 hands to 13.2, with immense strength, and very fast. They would be worth their weight in gold in Europe, and an enterprising Dutch merchant lately shipped a cargo of them to Amsterdam from Singapore, via the Suez Canal, with what result I never ascertained. A new road was being cut when we were there from Kuching to Penrisen, a mountain some thirty miles off, which, when completed, may bring a few more horses here; but Borneo (except far north) can never become a riding or driving country.
Kuching has its newspaper, which is published fortnightly, in the English language, and brought out under the editorship of the Postmaster. This journal contains, among other subjects, the doings of the law courts, reports from the various Residencies, and arrivals and departures of ships, with occasionally an interesting account of a journey inland made by the Resident of one of the up-coast districts. The Sarawak Gazette was organised in 1871, and will form an interesting history of the country in years to come.