“I did not dream it, Claud. Is it probable that I should dream of such a man at all? Nevertheless, I know it. Prabu told me so.”
“Worse and worse,” said I, laughing. “Is it likely a slave should be acquainted with his mistress’s private affairs?”
“Yes!” replied my brother, triumphantly; “and for a very good reason. ‘My lady’ has promised him his liberty papers upon the day of her marriage. Now, will you believe it?”
There was no reason I should not believe it, for our aunt would not be the first widow who had married again; but so unpalatable was the idea of being under Ebberfeld’s guardianship, that I tried to disbelieve it. It mattered but little, however, what I believed or disbelieved, for married they were, within a month after that conversation; and from the time of that ceremony we dated the two most miserable years of our lives.
Mynheer Ebberfeld, the oily-tongued notary, the patron of young people, proved to be a domestic tyrant of the first water. His word was law, and a Draconic law, too, to all but “my lady” and, strange to say, Prabu. Of the first he was very proud; for although her father was a Dutchman, she was descended by the mother’s side from the Susunans, or ancient sovereigns of Java, and cousin-german to a rich Japanese pangeran, or prince. Himself a half-caste, Mynheer had hitherto, although very rich, been held but in small esteem by the colonists; his marriage, however, rendered him so important in his own estimation, that he became the most arrogant man in the island. But arrogant, exacting, avaricious, tyrannical as he was, Prabu seemed to care but little for him—nay, with such nonchalance did the freed slave treat both master and mistress (for he was still, after a manner, in their service), that at times I used to think he was in possession of some secret that placed them in his power.
To Marie, my brother, and me, this man was more hateful for his tyranny to his slaves, than for any overt acts to ourselves. But I will relate a tragedy that occurred within the first twelve months of his marriage through his brutality, and you may then judge for yourselves the kind of man we had for guardian.
Ebberfeld possessed an estate some ten miles from the upper town. Upon this was a family of slaves, consisting of a man, his wife, and three children, all natives of Bugis, one of the wildest of the Indian islands. The man, although of a race noted for its ferocity, had ever been hard-toiling, docile, and gentle, and, moreover, passionately attached to his wife and children. It was the latter most amiable passion that caused the poor fellow’s ruin, for he became goaded to madness by the wanton cruelty of Ebberfeld to those dear relatives. Unable to witness this brutality any longer, he ran “a muck” among those he so dearly loved, resolved to release them from their sufferings—that is, he slew mother and children with his creese; then, throwing the weapon into a neighboring canal, he ran till he met two Dutch merchants, to whom he surrendered himself, begging that they would kill him.
Now, such is the spirit of revenge, the impatience of restraint, and the repugnance to submit to insults, in the breasts of all the Indian islanders, that these “mucks,” or murders, are of frequent occurrence; and if the perpetrator survive, he is invariably punished with a disgraceful death; but in this case, the Governor-General not only pardoned the poor fellow, in consideration of the fearful provocation he had had, but severely reprimanded Ebberfeld for his wanton cruelty, and, moreover, deprived him of an office of importance to which he had recently been appointed. Deeply resenting the pardoning of a slave that had caused him so great a loss, and perhaps more so the deprivation of his appointment, Mynheer took to courses which led to his ultimate ruin, and that is why I have related this tragedy. But a few words about this peculiar form of revenge, which, although unknown to other people, is yet universal in the Indian islands.
“To run a muck,” says Dr. Johnson, “signifies to run madly, and attack all that we meet.” “A muck” among the Indian islanders means, generally, an act of desperation, in which the individual or individuals devote their lives, with few or no chances of success, for the gratification of their revenge. Sometimes it is confined to the individual who has offered the injury; at other times it is indiscriminate, and the enthusiast, with a total aberration of reason, assails the guilty and the innocent. On other occasions, again, the oppressor escapes, and the muck consists in the oppressed party’s taking the lives of those dearest to him, and then his own, that, as in the instance of Ebberfeld’s slave, they and he may be freed from some insupportable oppression and cruelty.
The most frequent mucks, by far, are those in which the desperado assails indiscriminately friend and foe, and in which, with disheveled hair and frantic look, he murders or wounds all he meets without distinction, until he be himself killed, falls exhausted by loss of blood, or is secured by the application of certain forked instruments, with which experience has suggested the necessity of opposing those who run a muck, and with which, therefore, the officers of police are always furnished. One of the most singular circumstances attending these acts of criminal desperation is the apparently unpremeditated, and always the sudden and unexpected, manner in which they are undertaken. The desperado discovers his intention neither by his gestures, his speech, nor his features; and the first warning is the drawing of the creese, the wild shout which accompanies it, and the commencement of the work of death. In 1814, a chief of Celebes surrendered himself to the British and a party of their allies headed by a chief. He was disarmed and placed under a guard, in a comfortable habitation, and the hostile chief kept him company during the night. His creese was lying on a table at a little distance from him. About twelve o’clock at night, while engaged in conversation, he suddenly started from his seat, ran to his weapon, and, having possessed himself of it, attempted to assassinate his companion, who, having superior strength, returned a mortal stab.