CHAPTER L.
THE ALABAMA AT SINGAPORE—PANIC AMONG THE ENEMY’S SHIPPING IN THE CHINA SEA—THE MULTITUDE FLOCK TO SEE THE ALABAMA—CURIOUS RUMOR CONCERNING HER—AUTHOR RIDES TO THE COUNTRY, AND SPENDS A NIGHT—THE CHINESE IN POSSESSION OF ALL THE BUSINESS OF THE PLACE—ALABAMA LEAVES SINGAPORE—CAPTURE OF THE MARTABAN, ALIAS TEXAN STAR—ALABAMA TOUCHES AT MALACCA—CAPTURE OF THE HIGHLANDER AND SONORA—ALABAMA ONCE MORE IN THE INDIAN OCEAN.
It turned out as I had conjectured in the last chapter. The Wyoming had been at Singapore on the 1st of December. She had gone thence to the Rhio Strait, where a Dutch settlement had given her a ball, which she had reciprocated. Whilst these Yankee and Dutch rejoicings were going on, the Alabama was crossing the China Sea, from Borneo to Pulo Condore. All traces of the Wyoming had since been lost. She had doubtless filled with coal at Rhio, and gone northward. We had thus a clear sea before us.
A very gratifying spectacle met our eyes at Singapore. There were twenty-two American ships there—large India-men—almost all of which were dismantled and laid up! The burning of our first ship in these seas, the Amanda, off the Strait of Sunda, had sent a thrill of terror through all the Yankee shipping, far and near, and it had hastened to port, to get out of harm’s way. We had recent news here from all parts of the China seas, by vessels passing constantly through the Strait of Malacca, and touching at Singapore for orders or refreshments. There were two American ships laid up in Bankok, in Siam; one or two at Canton; two or three at Shanghai; one at the Phillippine Islands; and one or two more in Japanese waters. These, besides the twenty-two ships laid up in Singapore, comprised all of the enemy’s once numerous Chinese fleet! No ship could get a freight, and the commerce of the enemy was as dead, for the time being, as if every ship belonging to him had been destroyed. We had here the key to the mystery, that the Alabama had encountered no American ship, in the China Sea, since she had burned the Contest. The birds had all taken to cover, and there was no such thing as flushing them. This state of things decided my future course. I had, at first, thought of running up the China Sea, as far as Shanghai, but if there were no more than half a dozen of the enemy’s ships to be found in that part of the sea, and these had all fled to neutral ports for protection, cui bono? It would be far better to return to the western hemisphere, where the enemy still had some commerce left. Indeed, my best chance of picking up these very ships, that were now anchored under my guns in Singapore, and disconsolate for want of something to do, would be to waylay them on their homeward voyages. They would not venture out in a close sea like that of China, so long as I remained in it. After I should have departed, and they had recovered somewhat from their panic, they might pick up partial cargoes, at reduced rates, and once more spread their wings for flight.
I had another powerful motive influencing me. My ship was getting very much out of repair. The hard usage to which she had been subjected since she had been commissioned had very much impaired her strength, and so constantly had she been under way, that the attrition of the water had worn the copper on her bottom so thin that it was daily loosening and dropping off in sheets. Her speed had, in consequence, been much diminished. The fire in her furnaces, like that of the fire-worshipping Persian, had never been permitted to go out, except for a few hours at rare intervals, to enable the engineer to clink his bars, and remove the incrustations of salt from the bottoms of his boilers. This constant action of fire and salt had nearly destroyed them. I resolved, therefore, to turn my ship’s head westward from Singapore, run up into the Bay of Bengal, along the coast of Hindostan to Bombay, through the Seychelle Islands to the mouth of the Red Sea, thence to the Comoro Islands; from these latter to the Strait of Madagascar, and from the latter Strait to the Cape of Good Hope—thus varying my route back to the Cape.
We were received with great cordiality by the people of Singapore, and, as at the Cape of Good Hope, much curiosity was manifested to see the ship. After she had hauled alongside of the coaling wharf, crowds gathered to look curiously upon her, and compare her appearance with what they had read of her. These crowds were themselves a curiosity to look upon, formed, as they were, of all the nations of the earth, from the remote East and the remote West. Singapore being a free port, and a great centre of trade, there is always a large fleet of shipping anchored in its waters, and its streets and other marts of commerce are constantly thronged with a promiscuous multitude. The canal—there being one leading to the rear of the town—is filled with country boats from the surrounding coasts, laden with the products of the different countries from which they come. There is the pepper-boat from Sumatra, and the coaster of larger size laden with tin-ore; the spice-boats from the spice islands; boats with tin-ore, hides, and mats from Borneo; boats from Siam, with gums, hides, and cotton; boats from different parts of the Malay peninsula, with canes, gutta-percha, and India-rubber. In the bay are ships from all parts of the East—from China, with silks and teas; from Japan, with lacker-ware, raw silk, and curious manufactures of iron, steel, and paper; from the Phillippine Islands, with sugar, hides, tobacco, and spices. Intermixed with these are the European and American ships, with the products of their various countries. As a consequence, all the races and all the religions of the world were represented in the throngs that crowded the coaling jetty, to look upon the Alabama, wearing the new flag of a new nation, mysterious for its very distance from them. We were to their eastern eyes a curious people of the antipodes.
The physical aspect of the throng was no less curious than its moral. There was the Malay, the Chinese, the Japanese, the Siamese, the Hindoo, the Persian, the wild Tartar, the Bornese, the Sumatran, the Javanese, and even the New Zealander—all dressed, or undressed, as the case might be, in the garb of their respective tribes and countries. Some of the most notable objects among the crowd, were jet-black Africans, with the amplest of petticoat trousers gathered at the knee, sandalled feet, and turbaned heads—the more shining the jet of the complexion, the whiter the turban. The crowd, so far from diminishing, increased daily, so that it was at times difficult to pass into and out of the ship; and it was some time before we could learn what had excited all this curiosity among those simple inhabitants of the isles and continents. Some of these wonder-mongers actually believed, that we kept chained in the hold of the Alabama, several negro giants—they had heard something about the negro and slavery having something to do with the war—whom we armed with immense weapons and let loose, in time of battle, as they were wont to do their elephants! They waited patiently for hours, under their paper umbrellas, hoping to catch a sight of these monsters.
Singapore, which was a fishing village half a century ago, contains a hundred thousand inhabitants, and under the free-port system has become, as before remarked, a great centre of trade. It concentrates nearly all the trade of the southern portion of the China Sea. There are no duties on exports or imports; and the only tonnage due paid by the shipping, is three cents per ton, register, as a lighthouse tax. The currency is dollars and cents; Spanish, Mexican, Peruvian, and Bolivian dollars are current. Great Britain, with an infinite forecaste, not only girdles the seas with her ships, but the land with her trading stations. In her colonization and commerce consists her power. Lop off these, and she would become as insignificant as Holland. And so beneficent is her rule, that she binds her colonies to her with hooks of steel. A senseless party in that country has advocated the liberation of all her colonies. No policy could be more suicidal. Colonization is as much of a necessity for Great Britain as it was for the Grecian States and for Rome, when they became overcrowded with population. Probably, in the order of nature, colonies, as they reach maturity, may be expected to go off to themselves, but for each colony which thus puts on the toga virilis, Great Britain should establish another, if she would preserve her empire, and her importance with the nations of the earth.
The most notable feature about Singapore is its Chinese population. I consider these people, in many respects, the most wonderful people of the earth. They are essentially a people of the arts, and of trade, and in the changing aspect of the world must become much more important than they have hitherto been. It is little more than half a century since Napoleon twitted the English people with being a nation of “shop-keepers.” So rapid have been the changes since, that other nations besides Great Britain are beginning to covet the designation as one of honor. Even military France, the very country which bestowed the epithet in scorn, is herself becoming a nation of mechanics and shop-keepers. Industrial Congresses, and Palaces of Industry attract more attention, in that once martial country, than military reviews, and the marching and countermarching of troops on the Campus Martius. An Emperor of France has bestowed the cordon of the Legion of Honor on a Yankee piano-maker! These are some of the signs of the times in which we live. And they are signs which the wise statesman will not ignore. A nation chooses wisely and well, which prefers the pursuits of peace to those of war; and that nation is to be envied, which is better constituted by the nature of its people for peaceful, than for warlike pursuits. This is eminently the case with the Chinese. Nature has kindly cast them in a mould, gentle and pacific. They are human, and have, therefore, had their wars, but compared with the western nations, their wars have been few. The Taeping rebellion of our day, which has lasted so long, had its origin in the brigandage of an idle and leprous soldiery, who sought to live at ease, at the expense of the honest producer.
It is only lately that we have been able to obtain an interior view of these people. A few years back, and China was a sealed book to us. Our merchants were confined to certain “factories” outside of the walls of Canton, and we were permitted to trade at no other points. But since we have gotten a glimpse of these wonderful people, we have been astonished at the extraordinary productiveness and vitality of Chinese commerce. We have been amazed whilst we have looked upon the wonderful stir and hum and bustle of so immense a hive of human beings, all living and prospering by the mechanic arts and commerce. The Chinaman is born to industry, as naturally as the negro is to sloth. He is the cheapest producer on the face of the earth, because his habits are simple and frugal. The proof of this is, that no western nation can sell its goods in the Chinese market. We are all compelled to purchase whatever we want from them, for cash. When we can work cheaper than the Chinese, we may hope to exchange our manufactured goods with them, but not until then.