A FRUIT-STORE IN SARAWAK.
"We took a walk through the principal street of Sarawak, and saw lots of men who were doing nothing, and evidently didn't wish to be employed. The most of the hard work is performed by the Chinese, and our observation is that they are the most industrious people of the Far East, and the best at a trade. The commerce here, apart from that which the English control, is mostly in Chinese hands, so the Doctor tells us, and some of their merchants have made large fortunes. They trade in anything they can buy and sell, and are satisfied with small profits when they cannot get large ones, and some of their shops manage to get along with very few goods. We passed a fruit-store, where there were two or three boxes of oranges visible near the door, and a large bunch of bananas was hung outside for a sign, or perhaps to allow them to get ripe in the open air. One old fellow was smoking on the front step with his cat behind him, and three others were inside talking something we could not understand. They all appeared to belong to the establishment, but the whole stock of fruit, as far as we could see, wasn't worth ten dollars.
"The houses are not very substantial, and the Doctor said that an ordinary building in Sarawak ought not to cost over fifty dollars, while a cheap one, sufficient for protection against the weather, could be built for five or ten. There are a few substantial buildings; one is called the Government House, and is where the governor and his officials live; and there is an English Protestant church and mission. There is a considerable population of Mohammedans here, and they have a mosque where they go to worship every Friday. Friday, you know, is the Moslem Sunday, and on that day the faithful followers of Mohammed are unwilling to do any hard work; Fred says it must be Sunday all the time for a good many of them, if we are to judge by their perpetual idleness. But there isn't much inducement for a man to work here, when a very little will support him. He does not need any thick clothes where there is no winter, and if it were not for the rules of politeness some of them wouldn't wear any clothes at all.
"We should have been surprised to see the English flag flying over the place if we had not already learned something about the history of Sarawak. The town was formerly known as Kuching, and to this day some of the natives call it by that name. The river was the resort of the Malay pirates, who used to plunder all the coast and make it impossible for the natives to live there. The natives are called Dyaks; they seem to belong to both the Mongolian and Malay races, as they have the oblique eyes of the former, with the complexion and hair of the latter. They are said to be an honest and inoffensive people, and for this reason they were robbed by the Malays in former times, and are now cheated by both Malays and Chinese. They have a good deal of ingenuity about them, and some of their work would do credit to civilized people.
"We saw a party of them climbing a tree just back of the town to get some cocoa-nuts; it was straight as an arrow, and about two feet in diameter, and hadn't a branch for at least forty feet. How do you suppose they did it?
"They made some pegs of pieces from a bamboo pole; then they drove one of them into the tree about three feet from the ground, and another the same distance higher up. Next they took a long pole, also of bamboo, rested one end of it on the ground, and lashed it firmly to the two pegs. Then a man stood on the lowest peg and drove another in at about the level of his face, and as soon as it was driven he lashed the pole to it. So he went on and on, and when the pole gave out another was passed up and lashed in the same way as the first. It took them about fifteen minutes to make a very nice ladder—one side being the tree, and the other the bamboo pole; and as soon as they had got to the lower branches of the tree, the nuts came tumbling to the ground, and the man scrambled down after them. The whole thing appeared very easy and simple, but it would take an American some time to accomplish it.
A DYAK YOUTH.
"The Dyaks are very fond of ornaments, and where they can afford it they cover their necks with beads and brass wire, and decorate their arms with large rings of brass or silver. Most of them wear gay-colored handkerchiefs on their heads, and it is easy to distinguish them from the foreign Malays by this mark alone. We saw one Dyak youth of ten or twelve years, who had an intelligent face and bright, flashing eyes; he belonged to one of the hill tribes, and had come down from his home in the mountains with his father to see the strangers on the coast. His hair floated over his shoulders in great masses, and his ears had rings in them that looked as though they weighed a pound. His only clothing, apart from the rings and beads and handkerchief, was a strip of cotton cloth around his waist; and he carried a spear to indicate that he belonged to one of the best families of the country."