I Hope That It Is Not True That They Look At Us, As A Singularly
Able And Highly Educated Chinaman Lately Said To Me That They Do, As
"The Incarnation Of Brute Force Allied To Brute Vices!" This Is A
Chinese Region, So The Degression Is Excusable.
It was bright and hot, the glorious, equable equatorial heat, and when
we got out of the mangrove swamps through which the road is causewayed,
there was fine tropical foliage, and the trees were festooned with a
large, blue Thunbergia of great beauty.
It is eight miles from the
landing at Teluk Kartang to Taipeng, where the British Residency is.
The road crosses uninteresting level country, but every jolt brings one
nearer to the Hijan mountains, which rise picturesquely from the plain
to a height of over three thousand feet. In the distance there is an
extraordinary "butte" or isolated hill, Gunong Pondok, a landmark for
the whole region, and on the right to the east a grand mountain range,
the highest peak of which cannot fall far short of eight thousand feet;
and the blue-green ranges showing the foam of at least one waterfall
almost helped one to be cool.
We reached Permatang, another Chinese village of some pretensions and
population, near which are two very large two-storied Malay houses in
some disrepair, in which the wife of the banished Mentri of Larut
lives, with a number of slaves. A quantity of mirthful-looking slave
girls were standing behind the window bars looking at us
surreptitiously.
Enter page number
PreviousNext
Page 317 of 437
Words from 87052 to 87307
of 120530
