“All these fights are brutal, and in time they will, we trust, be made illegal. To pass a prohibitionary regulation, however, without the full consent of the Chiefs and people of Pahang would be a distinct breach of the understanding on which British Protection was accepted by them. The Government is pledged not to interfere with native customs, and the sports in which animals are engaged are among the most cherished institutions of the people of Pahang. To fully appreciate the light in which any interference with these things would be viewed by the native population, it is necessary to put oneself in the position of a keen member of the Quorn, who saw Parliament making hunting illegal, on the grounds that the sufferings inflicted on the fox rendered it an inhuman pastime. As I have said in a former chapter, the natives of Pahang are, in their own way, very keen sportsmen indeed; and, when all is said and done, it is doubtful whether hunting is not more cruel than anything which takes place in a Malay cock-pit or bull-ring. The longer the run the better the sport, and more intense and prolonged the agony of the fox, that strives to run for his life, even when he is so stiff with exertion that he can do little more than roll along. All of us have, at one time or another, experienced in nightmares the agony of attempting to fly from some pursuing phantom, when our limbs refuse to serve us. This, I fancy, is much what a fox suffers, only his pains are intensified by the grimness of stern reality. If he stops he loses his life, therefore he rolls, and flounders, and creeps along when every movement has become a fresh torture. The cock, quail, dove, bull, ram, or fish,[156] on the other hand, fights because it is his nature to do so, and when he has had his fill he stops. His pluck, his pride, and his hatred of defeat alone urge him to continue the contest. He is never driven by the relentless whip of stern, inexorable necessity. This it is which makes fights between animals, that are properly conducted, less cruel than one is apt to imagine.”[157]
I will now pass to the subject of cock-fighting, of which the following vivid description is also taken from Mr. Clifford’s In Court and Kampong.[158]
“In the Archipelago, and on the West Coast of the Peninsula, cock-fights are conducted in the manner known to the Malays as bĕr-tâji, the birds being armed with long artificial spurs, sharp as razors, and curved like a Malay woman’s eyebrow. These weapons make cruel wounds, and cause the death of one or other of the combatants almost before the sport has well begun. To the Malay of the East Coast this form of cock-fighting is regarded as stupid and unsportsmanlike, an opinion which I fully share. It is the marvellous pluck and endurance of the birds that lend an interest to a cock-fight—qualities which are in no way required if the birds are armed with weapons other than those with which they are furnished by nature.
“A cock-fight between two well-known birds is a serious affair in Pahang. The rival qualities of the combatants have furnished food for endless discussion for weeks, or even months, before, and every one of standing has visited and examined the cocks, and has made a book upon the event. On the day fixed for the fight a crowd collects before the palace, and some of the King’s youths set up the cock-pit, which is a ring, about three feet in diameter, enclosed by canvas walls, supported on stakes driven into the ground. Presently the Juâra, or cock-fighters, appear, each carrying his bird under his left arm. They enter the cock-pit, squat down, and begin pulling at, and shampooing the legs and wings of their birds, in the manner which Malays believe loosen the muscles, and get the reefs out of the cocks’ limbs. Then the word is given to start the fight, and the birds, released, fly straight at one another, striking with their spurs, and sending feathers flying in all directions. This lasts for perhaps three minutes, when the cocks begin to lose their wind, and the fight is carried on as much with their beaks as with their spurs. Each bird tries to get its head under its opponent’s wing, running forward to strike at the back of its antagonist’s head, as soon as its own emerges from under its temporary shelter. This is varied by an occasional blow with the spurs, and the Malays herald each stroke with loud cries of approval. Bâsah! Bâsah! ‘Thou hast wetted him! Thou hast drawn blood!’ Ah itu dia! ‘That is it! That is a good one!’ Ah sâkit-lah itu! ‘Ah, that was a nasty one!’ And the birds are exhorted to make fresh efforts, amid occasional burst of the shrill chorus of yells, called sôrak, their backers cheering them on, and crying to them by name.
“Presently time is called, the watch being a small section of cocoa-nut in which a hole has been bored, that is set floating on the surface of a jar of water, until it gradually becomes filled and sinks. At the word, each cock-fighter seizes his bird, drenches it with water, cleans out with a feather the phlegm which has collected in its throat, and shampoos its legs and body. Then, at the given word, the birds are again released, and they fly at one another with renewed energy. They lose their wind more speedily this time, and thereafter they pursue the tactics already described until time is again called. When some ten rounds have been fought, and both the birds are beginning to show signs of distress, the interest of the contest reaches its height, for the fight is at an end if either bird raises its back feathers in a peculiar manner, by which cocks declare themselves to be vanquished. Early in the tenth round the right eye-ball of one cock is broken, and, shortly after, the left eye is bunged up, so that for the time it is blind. Nevertheless, it refuses to throw up the sponge, and fights on gallantly to the end of the round, taking terrible punishment, and doing but little harm to its opponent. One cannot but be full of pity and admiration for the brave bird, which thus gives so marvellous an example of its pluck and endurance. At last time is called, and the cock-fighter who is in charge of the blinded bird, after examining it carefully, asks for a needle and thread, and the swollen lower lid of the still uninjured eye-ball is sewn to the piece of membrane on the bird’s cheek, and its sight is thus once more partially restored. Again time is called, and the birds resume their contest, the cock with the injured eye repaying its adversary so handsomely for the punishment which it had received in the previous round, that, before the cocoa-nut shell is half full of water, its opponent has surrendered, and has immediately been snatched up by the keeper in charge of it. The victorious bird, draggled and woebegone, with great patches of red flesh showing through its wet plumage, with the membrane of its face and its short gills and comb swollen and bloody, with one eye put out, and the other only kept open by the thread attached to its eyelid, yet makes shift to strut, with staggering gait, across the cock-pit, and to notify its victory by giving vent to a lamentable ghost of a crow. Then it is carried off followed by an admiring, gesticulating, vociferous crowd, to be elaborately tended and nursed, as befits so gallant a bird. The beauty of the sport is that either bird can stop fighting at any moment. They are never forced to continue the conflict if once they have declared themselves defeated, and the only real element of cruelty is thus removed. The birds in fighting follow the instinct which nature has implanted in them, and their marvellous courage and endurance surpass anything to be found in any other animals, human or otherwise, with which I am acquainted. Most birds fight more or less—from the little fierce quail to the sucking doves which ignorant Europeans, before their illusions have been dispelled by a sojourn in the East, are accustomed to regard as the emblems of peace and purity; but no bird, or beast, or fish, or human being fights so well, or takes such pleasure in the fierce joy of battle, as does a plucky, lanky, ugly, hard-bit old fighting-cock.
“The Malays regard these birds with immense respect, and value their fighting-cocks next to their children. A few years ago, a boy, who was in charge of a cock which belonged to a Râja of my acquaintance, accidentally pulled some feathers from the bird’s tail. ‘What did you do that for? Devil!’ cried the Râja.
“‘It was not done on purpose, Ungku!’ said the boy.
“‘Thou art marvellous clever at repartee!’ quoth the Prince, and, so saying, he lifted a billet of wood, which chanced to be lying near at hand, and smote the boy on the head so that he died.
“‘That will teach my people to have a care how they use my fighting-cocks!’ said the Râja; and that was his servant’s epitaph.
“‘It is a mere boyish prank,’ said the father of the young Râja, when the matter was reported to him, ‘and, moreover, it is well that he should slay one or two with his own hand, else how should men learn to fear him?’ And there the matter ended; but it should be borne in mind that the fighting-cock of a Malay Prince is not to be lightly trifled with.”