Jumping off his horse, and taking his gun, which his servant carried, he ran towards them. They did not appear to notice him until he was within shot of them. He fired, when one fell and the rest took to flight, quickly scrambling up the trees of the forest, which extended towards us to within a short distance where they were lost to sight. On examining the creature he had killed I found it to be about the size of a spaniel, of a jet black colour, with the projecting dog-like muzzle and overhanging brows of a baboon. It had large callosities, and a scarcely visible tail, not an inch in length.
Our friend told us that these creatures were monkeys, though more like baboons, that descending from the trees where they live, they often invade orchards and gardens, and commit great havoc. Our friend’s house was something like an Indian bungalow, though of rougher materials, and was surrounded by a fine garden and orchard, with extensive plantations in the rear. I cannot describe more than two of the animals in his menagerie. One was the Tapiutan, which from its appearance I could not say whether it should be called a cow, a buffalo, or an antelope. It was of the size of a very small Highland cow, and had long straight horns, which were ringed at the base, and sloped backwards over the neck.
The strangest animal he showed us was called the Babirusa, which resembled in general appearance a pig, but it had long and slender legs, and tusks curved upwards so as to look like horns. Those of the lower jaw were long and sharp, but the upper ones grew upwards out of bony sockets through the skin on each side of the snout, curving backwards to near the eyes, and were ten inches long. Our friend told us that it is found over the whole island. He supposed the object of the curling tusks was to preserve the eyes of the animal when searching for the fallen fruits on which it lives among the tangled thickets of spring plants. Though the female does not possess them, perhaps the male gallantly clears the way for her so as to render them unnecessary. However, I must not stop to give a longer description of this interesting place, or many others we saw; I indeed made only two trips ashore, as I had to be on board attending to my duty.
Chapter Five.
Once more the anchor was weighed, and we were about to stand out of the picturesque bay of Menado the moment a boat, in which Mr Blyth had gone on shore to bring off a supply of fresh provisions, returned.
Ned, who had been one of the crew, as soon as the sails were set, came up to me. “I’ve just heard something, sir, which may or may not be of importance,” he said. “I was talking to one of the men we brought off from Sanguir, when he confessed to me that he had been on board the prahu which took me off the shore where we were wrecked. I think he spoke the truth when he told me how I kicked when the pirates made me take an oar and pull with the black fellows they had, I suppose, made slaves of. I asked him if he could tell me where the place was. He answered that it was on the shores of a large island—a very large one, I should think, and away somewhere to the eastward, for he pointed in that direction, though I could not make out exactly how far off it was.”
I was deeply interested, and told him that he ought to have brought the man on board that we might have examined him more particularly with the aid of Bell and Kalong.
“He would have been afraid to trust himself, sir,” answered Ned; “as he owned that he had been a pirate, he was afraid that the captain or the Dutch might punish him.”