At The Top There Was A Primitive Gridiron
Of Loose Nibong Bars, And The River Swirled So Rapidly And Dizzily
Below That I Was Obliged Ignominiously To Hold On To A Chinaman In
Order To Reach The Causeway Safely.
To add to the natural insecurity of
the foothold, some men were killing a goat at the top of the ladder,
and its blood made the whole gridiron slippery.
The banks of the river
are shining slime giving off fetid exhalations under the burning sun;
there is a general smell of vegetable decomposition, and miasma fever
(one would suppose) is exhaling from every bubble of the teeming slime
and swamp.
In the veranda of Mr. Hawley's house a number of forlorn-looking
Rajahs are sitting, each with his forlorn-looking train of followers,
and in front of the police station a number of forlorn-looking Malays
are sitting motionless hour after hour. The Chinese have a row of shops
above the river bank, and even on this deadly-looking shore they
display some purpose and energy. Mrs. Daly and I are sitting in Mr.
Hawley's side veranda with the bubbling swamp below us. She reads a
dull novel, I watch the dead life, pen in hand, and think how I can
convey any impression of it to you. The Resident has gone snipe-
shooting to replenish our larder. A boat now and then crosses from the
Perak side, a sauntering Malay occasionally joins the squatting group,
a fishing hawk now and then swoops down upon a fish, a policeman
occasionally rouses up the wretch in the cage, and so the torrid hours
pass.
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