Throughout the long dinner the native band played the airs of Europe and America, intermixed with bits of weird Malayan song. After we had lighted our cigars from the golden censer, the British Governor arose and proposed the health of the Sultan and the young heir apparent. His Highness raised his glass of pineapple juice to his lips in acknowledgment, and said smilingly to me as the Prime Minister said the magic word that stirs every Englishman’s heart,—
“The Queen!”
“Your people think all Orientals very bad.”
I protested.
“Oh, yes, you do; that is why you send so many missionaries among us. But,” he went on pleasantly, “look around my table. Not one of my court has touched the wine. A Mohammedan never drinks. Can you say as much for your people?”
Then he raised his glass once more to his lips and said quietly, while his eyes twinkled at my confusion:—
“Tell your great President that Abubaker, Sultan of Johore, drank his health in simple pineapple juice.”
As the sun sank behind the misty dome of Mount Pulei we embarked once more at the broad palace steps in the royal barges, amid the booming of guns and the strains of the international “God Save the Queen,” “My Country, ’tis of Thee,” and bared our heads to the royal standard of Johore that floated so proudly above the palace, thankful for this short peep into the heart of an Oriental court.
So the young Prince received the crown from the hands of his father. To-day, the bones of that grand old statesman, the Sultan of Johore, rest beside those of his royal fathers within the shadow of the mosque.