Sketches of Our Life at Sarawak Part 1

Sketches of Our Life at Sarawak.

by Harriette McDougall.

PART I.

[Map: BORNEO]

SKETCHES OF OUR LIFE AT SARAWAK.

CHAPTER I.

INTRODUCTORY.

Nearly thirty years ago I published a little book of "Letters from Sarawak, addressed to a Child." This book is now out of print, and, on looking it over with a view to republication, I think it will be better to extend the story over the twenty years that Sarawak was our home, which will give some idea of the gradual progress of the mission.

This progress was often unavoidably impeded by the struggles of the infant State; for war drowns the voice of the missionary, and though the Sarawak Government always discouraged the Dyak practice of taking the heads of their enemies, still it could not at once be checked, and every expedition against lawless tribes, however righteous in its object, excited the old superst.i.tions of those wild people. When their warriors returned from an expedition, the women of the tribe met them with dance and song, receiving the heads they brought with ancient ceremonies--"fondling the heads," as it was called; and for months afterwards keeping up, by frequent feasts, in which these heads were the chief attraction, the heathen customs which it was the object of the missionary to discourage.

I dare say, when we first settled at Sarawak, we thought that twenty years would plant Christian communities, and build Christian churches all over the country: but it is as well that we cannot overlook the future; and perhaps, considering the many difficulties which arose from time to time, from the missionaries themselves, and the unsettled country in which they laboured, we ought not to expect more results than have appeared. At any rate we have much to be thankful for, and as every year makes Sarawak a more important State, consolidates its Government, and extends civilization to its subjects, we may look for more success for the missionaries, who can now point to the peace and prosperity of the people, and say, "This is the fruit of Christianity and Christian rulers."

In giving a short account of our life in Borneo, I shall avoid alike all political questions, or, as much as possible, individual histories among the English community. It is already so long ago since we lived in that lovely place, that events, trials, joys, and the usual vicissitudes of life, are wrapt in that mellowing haze of the past, which, while it dims the vividness of feeling, throws a robe of charity over all, and perhaps causes actors and actions to a.s.sume a more true proportion to one another than when we walked amongst them. I have, however, not depended on memory alone for the records of twenty years, but have journals and letters to refer to, which my friends in England have been good enough to keep for me. Some parts of "Letters from Sarawak" I shall incorporate into the present little book, for as it treats of the first six years we lived there, and was written at that time, it is sure to be tolerably correct.

In those days, from 1847 to 1853, Sir James Brooke was very popular in England. The story of his first occupation of Sarawak, published in his journals, and the cruizes of her Majesty's s.h.i.+ps in those eastern seas--the _Dido_ and the _Samarang_--were read with avidity, and furnished the English public with a romance which had all the charm of novelty. However difficult and inconvenient it might be for the English Government to recognize a native State under an English rajah, who was at the same time a subject of the Queen of Great Britain, this question had not then arisen; and all cla.s.ses, high and low, could applaud a brave and n.o.ble man, who had stepped out of the beaten track to spend his fortune and expose his life in the cause of savages. There were many fluctuations of sympathy and opinion in after years towards Sir James Brooke; but, through evil report and good report, through difficulty and danger, Sarawak has still advanced, and is as worthy of the interest of the best and wisest of mankind as it was in 1847. At this time, indeed, it seems to me to furnish a lesson in the management of native races which might be useful in our own colonies. English governors always set out with good intentions towards the natives of savage countries, but how is it that war almost always follows their occupation? Surely it is because the settlers go there, not in the interest of the native race, but their own, and the two interests are sure to clash in the long-run.

It requires great patience and forbearance to educate natives up to a rule of justice and righteous laws; but that it may be done, and carry the co-operation of the people themselves, is evident at Sarawak, where the Malays and Dyaks are a.s.sociated in the Government, and have always stood by their English rajah, even when it was necessary to punish or exile some of their own chiefs. I am aware that an English colony cannot be governed in this way; nevertheless, the spectacle of wild natives, rising by the influence of a few good Englishmen from lawless misrule to a settled government, where vice is punished without partiality, is very beautiful to philanthropists, and makes one think better of human nature and its capabilities. I wish I could portray the hilly and th.o.r.n.y road by which this has been attained! It would, methinks, create a new interest in Sarawak, if the past and the present could be fairly set before the discerning world; we should again hear of missionaries longing to help in the improvement of people who have shown themselves so open to good influences. I have said that I would not touch upon politics, but Church and State are so naturally bound together in the task of civilization, that it is difficult to relate the history of the mission without mentioning the Government. Of course they do not stand in the same relation to one another in a Mahometan country, where the English Church is but a tolerated sect, as they do in a Christian land; still the Christian Church strengthens the Christian ruler, and he in his turn protects the Church by good government, although he may not favour it except by individual preference. For my own part, I have always thought it an advantage to our Dyak Christians that no favour was shown them on account of their faith; at any rate, it was for no worldly interest that they became Christians.

Although our life in Sarawak extended over a period of twenty years, it might naturally be divided into three parts--of six, five, and six years respectively, the intervals being spent in visits to England. These visits, although absolutely necessary, were a drawback to the mission work. When the head of a family is absent, the responsibility is apt to fall upon the younger members, and is sometimes too much for them.

However, they always did their best, and always welcomed us home most warmly. It was a joyful sight, on our return, to find the missionaries and school-children waiting for us at the wharf below our houses, the children's dear little faces glad with smiles, and a warm welcome for any baby we brought home. The second time, it was our daughter Mab; and in 1862, our last baby, Mildred,--Mab, Edith, and Herbert being left in England, for no English child can thrive in that unchangeable climate after it is six years old.

The first chapters of this little book will describe the first six years of our stay at Sarawak; but, in speaking of subjects of interest, I shall not stop short at the end of those years, but carry on the subject to the end of our Sarawak experience. It is perhaps necessary to say this to prevent confusion.

CHAPTER II.

THE COURT-HOUSE.

While Sir James Brooke was in England, in 1847, he asked his friends to help him in his efforts to civilize the Dyaks, by sending a mission to live at Sarawak.

Lord Ellesmere, Admiral Sir H. Keppel, Admiral C. D. Bethune, Canon Ryle Wood, and the Rev. C. Brereton, formed themselves into a committee, with the Rev. I. F. Stocks for their honorary secretary, and soon collected funds for the purpose. The Rev. F. McDougall was chosen as the head of the mission, and with him were a.s.sociated the Rev. S. Montgomery and the Rev. W. Wright; but Mr. Montgomery died very suddenly, of fever caught when ministering to the poor of his parish, before the time came for us to embark, so the party was reduced to two clergymen and their wives, two babies and two nurses. We sailed from London in the barque _Mary Louisa_, four hundred tons, the end of December; Mr. Parr, a nephew of Mrs. Wright's, being also one of the pa.s.sengers. I had all my life loved the sea, and longed to take such a voyage as should carry us out of sight of land, and give us all the experiences which wait on those "who go down to the sea in s.h.i.+ps;" but I little thought how we should all long for land before we saw it again.

The barque was a poor sailer; we thought it a good run if she made eight knots an hour, so no wonder we did not reach Singapore till May 23, 1848. It was a long monotonous voyage, but we were well occupied, and I do not remember ever finding it dull. The sea was all I ever fancied by way of a companion, and, like all one's best friends, made me happy or unhappy, but was never stupid. Then we had to learn Malay and its Arabic characters, with the help of Marsden's grammar and dictionary, and the Bible translated into that language by the Dutch. We lived by rule, apportioning the hours to certain duties, and every one knows how fast time pa.s.ses under those conditions. The two clergymen busied themselves with teaching the sailors, and several of them presented themselves at Holy Communion in consequence, the last Sunday before we landed. The most trying time we pa.s.sed was on the coast of Java, becalmed under a broiling sun, the very sea dead and slimy with all sorts of creatures creeping over it. As for ourselves, we were gasping with thirst, for we had already been on short rations of water for six weeks, one of the tanks having leaked out. One quart of water a day for each adult, and none for the babies, so of course they had the lion's share of their parents' allowance. Our one cup of tea in the evening was looked forward to for hours; and what a wonderful colour it was, after all!--but that was the iron of the tank.

On the 23rd of May we landed at Singapore, and had to wait there for four weeks before the schooner _Julia_, then running between that place and Sarawak, came to fetch us. We reached Sarawak June 29th, entering the Morotabas mouth of the river, which is twenty-four miles from the town of Kuching, whither we were bound. The sail up the river, our first sight of the country and the people, was indeed exciting, and filled us with delight. The river winds continually, and every new reach had its interest: a village of palm-leaf houses built close to the water, women and children standing on the steps with their long bamboo jars, or peeping out of the slits of windows at the schooner; boats of all sizes near the houses, fis.h.i.+ng-nets hanging up to dry, wicked alligators lying basking on the mud; trees of many varieties--the nibong palm which furnishes the posts of the houses, the nipa which makes their mat walls, and close by the water the light and graceful mangroves, which at night are all alive and glittering with fire-flies. On the boughs of some larger trees hanging over the stream parties of monkeys might be seen eating the fruits, chattering, jumping, flying almost, from bough to bough. We afterwards made nearer acquaintance with these droll creatures.

At last we reached the Fort, a long white building manned by Malays, and with cannon showing at the port-holes. The _Julia_ was not challenged, however, but gladly welcomed, as she carried not only the missionaries but the mail, and stores for the bazaar; for at that time there were not many native trading-vessels--the fear of pirates was great, and there was good reason to fear!

The town of Kuching consisted in those days of a Chinese bazaar and a Kling bazaar, both very small, and where it was scarcely possible to find anything an English man or woman could buy. Beyond was the court of justice, the mosques, and a few native houses. Higher up the river lay the Malay town, divided into Kampongs, or cl.u.s.ters of houses belonging to the different chiefs or princ.i.p.al merchants of the place. Opposite the bazaar, on the other side of the river, stood the rajah's bungalow, as well as two or three others belonging to Europeans, embosomed in trees, cocoa-nuts and betel-nut palms, and other fruit-trees. Behind the rajah's house rose the beautiful mountain of Santubong, wooded to its summit nearly 3000 feet, with a rock cropping out here and there. At this bungalow we landed, and were hospitably entertained for a few days until the upper part of the court-house could be made ready for our party.

Shall I ever forget my first impressions of the rajah's bungalow? A peculiar scent pervaded it. You looked about for the cause till your eyes fell on two saucers, one filled with green blossoms, the other with deep golden ones, much the same shape--the kenanga and the chimpaka, flowering trees, which grew near the house. Their flowers were picked every day for the rooms, as the rajah loved the scent, and so did the Malays. The ladies steeped the blossoms in cocoa-nut oil and anointed themselves, placing them also in their long black hair, with wreaths of jessamine flowers threaded on a string. These perfumes were rather overpowering at first, but I learnt to like them after I had been some time in Sarawak. The large, bare, cool rooms were very refres.h.i.+ng after the little cabins of the _Julia_. And then the library! a treasure indeed in the jungle; books on all sorts of subjects, bound in enticing covers, always inviting you to bodily repose and mental activity or amus.e.m.e.nt, as you might prefer. This library, so dear to us all because we were all allowed to share it, was burnt in 1857 by the Chinese rebels. It took two days to burn. I watched it from our library over the water, and saw the ma.s.s of books glowing dull red like a furnace, long after the flames had consumed the wooden house. It made one's heart ache to see it. An old gentleman of our English society watched it too, and I wondered why his head shook continually as he sat with his eyes fixed on those sad ruins; but I found afterwards that the sight, and doubtless its cause, had palsied him from that day. But I must not linger too long in the rajah's bungalow, though the white pigeons seem to call to me from the verandahs; we must take boat again (for there are no bridges over the Sarawak river), and cross to the court-house.

This square wooden house, with latticed verandahs like a big cage, was built by a German missionary, who purposed having a school on the ground floor and living in the upper story; but as soon as he had built his house he was recalled to Germany, and the only trace of him that remained was a box full of torn Bibles and tracts, which, I am sorry to say, had been used as waste paper in the bazaar for tying up parcels since he left, but as the tracts were not in any language the people could understand they were scarcely to blame. Rajah turned the house into a court of justice, and we settled ourselves in the upper rooms, which were divided from one another by mat walls. The river flowed under this house at spring tides, and then nests of ants would swarm into it: the rapidity with which these little creatures would carry all their eggs up the posts and settle the whole family under a box in your bedroom was marvellous; but as they were not pleasant companions there, a kettle of hot water had to put an end to the colony.

These little black ants did not sting, but there was a large red ant, half an inch long, who was most pugnacious; he stood up on his hind legs and fought you with amazing courage, and his jaws were formidable. We made our first acquaintance with white ants while we lived in the court-house. On unpacking a box of books, which had been our solace during the voyage, we found them almost glued together by the secretion of these creatures. The box had been standing on the ground floor of the hotel. The white ants had eaten through and through the books, and picked all the surface off the bindings; they were disgusting to look at and to smell. Some years afterwards, one of our missionaries had a box of clothes sent her from Singapore. It was necessary clothing, for she had lost her effects, like the rest of us, during the Chinese rebellion.

I warned Miss Coomes that she must unpack the box directly, on account of the white ants; but she put it off till the next day, and at night these wretches ate through the bottom of the box, and munched up the new linen and stockings. We soon learnt to guard against their attacks by using no wood except balean, or iron-wood, which is too hard for them to bite. English oak seemed like a slice of cake to white ants.

No sooner were we settled at the court-house, than we had visits from all the princ.i.p.al Malays, and also some Dyaks who happened to be at Sarawak. My husband opened a dispensary in a little room behind the store-room, and had plenty of patients. I used to hear continual talking and laughing going on there, and by this means Mr. McDougall learnt to talk the Malay language, which he only knew from books when he first arrived. The pure Malay of books is very different from the colloquial _patois_ of Kuching. To my sorrow, I learnt this some time after, when I was trying to prepare two women for baptism: they listened to me for some time, and then one said to the other, "She talks like a book,"

which I fear meant that they only half understood me.

Soon after this we took four little half-caste children to bring up.

They were running about in the bazaar, and their native mothers were willing to part with them; so Mary, Julia, Peter, and Tommy were housed in a cottage close by, under the care of a Portuguese Christian woman, the wife of our cook. Every day I used to spend some hours with them, that we might become friends. The eldest of these children was only six years old, Tommy, the youngest, but two and a half; so they wanted a nurse. They were baptized on Advent Sunday, 1848, and were the beginning of our native school.

CHAPTER III.

COLLEGE HILL.

We stayed at the court-house a whole year, while our house on the hill was being prepared. The hill, and the ground beyond it, about forty acres in all, was given to the mission by Sir James Brooke. It was then some way out of the town, but as the Chinese population increased, the town grew quite to the foot of the hill--College Hill, as it was then called--and a blacksmith's quarter even invaded the mission land. At first, in order to cultivate the property, nutmegs and spice-trees were planted, but the soil was not good enough for them; when their roots pierced through the pit of earth in which they were planted, and reached the stiff clay of the hill, they died off. It was necessary to do something to keep the land clear of the coa.r.s.e lalang gra.s.s, which grew wherever the jungle was cut down. So after a while a herd of cattle was collected, and they improved the poverty of the land, at the same time furnis.h.i.+ng milk and a little b.u.t.ter. I say a _little_, because even when seven cows were in milk, as they only gave two quarts a day each, and there were always plenty of children in and out of the mission to consume it, but little was left for b.u.t.ter-making. Cocoa-nut trees were planted in the low ground, and some few grew up; but wild pigs were great enemies to them, for they liked to eat the cabbage out of the heart of the young tree, which of course killed it. In that seething warmth of Sarawak you could almost see plants grow. If you scattered seeds in the ground, they sprouted above it on the third day. I planted some of those little coral-looking seeds which are to be found in every box of Indian sh.e.l.ls, the seed of the satin-wood, and they grew up into beautiful forest trees in twelve years' time. We used to make long strings of these coral seeds, and use them in Christmas decorations.

By degrees we had a very bright garden about the house. The Gardenia, with its strongly scented blossom and evergreen leaves, made a capital hedge. Great bushes of the Hybiscus, scarlet and buff, glowed in the sun--they were called shoe-flowers, for they were used instead of blacking to polish our shoes. The pink one-hundred-leaved rose grew freely, and blossomed all the year round. Shrubs of the golden Allamander were a great temptation to the cows, if they strayed into the garden. The Plumbago was one of the few pale-blue flowers which liked that blazing heat. Then we had a great variety of creepers--jessamine of many sorts, the scarlet Ipomea, the blue c.l.i.torea, and pa.s.sion-flowers, from the huge Grenadilla with its excellent fruit, to the little white one set in a calyx of moss. The Moon-flower, a large white convolvulus, tight-shut all day, unfolded itself at six o'clock, and looked lovely in the flower-vases in the evening. The Jessamine and Pergolaria odorotissima climbed up the porch, and in the forks of the trees opposite I had air-plants fastened, which flowered every three months, and looked like a flight of white b.u.t.terflies on the wing. The great mountain of Matang stood in the distance, and when the sun sank behind it, which it always did in that invariable lat.i.tude about six o'clock, I sat in the porch to watch the glory of earth and sky. How dear a mountain becomes to you, is only known to those who live in hilly countries. One gets to think of it as a friend. It seems to carry a protest against the little frets of life, and, by its strength and invariableness, to be a visible image of Him who is "the same yesterday, to-day, and for ever." But I am running on too fast with the garden before the house is built.

The hill was first cleared of jungle, and flattened at the top, then the foundation was dug, and great sleepers were laid ready for the upright posts. A wooden house is joiner's work, and rather resembles a great bedstead. All the wood is first squared and cut, which takes a long time, because the balean-wood is extremely hard, and consumes a great deal of labour; but once ready, the house rises from the earth like magic, for every beam and post fits into its place.

We had brought a great box of carpenter's tools with us from England, among them valuable moulding-planes; we wished the carpenters to learn, in building the house, how to make the arches and ornamental mouldings for the church.

Happily for us, when the _Mary Louisa_ was wrecked in the straits on her way home, the crew were all saved, and the s.h.i.+p-carpenter came over to Sarawak to see if my husband would employ him. As he was a capital joiner, he was set over a gang of workmen at once. All the plans for the house and church were made by Frank (my husband), and I was set to draw patterns of the doors and windows, the verandah railings, and the porch.

Stahl was an intelligent German workman, and soon learnt Malay enough to direct the men. The Malays levelled the hill and dug the foundations; the Chinese were employed as carpenters, but they, too, could speak Malay. I remember making great friends with one of them, Johnny Jangot, John of the Beard, so called on account of a few long hairs at the tip of his chin, for the Chinese are a beardless race. Johnny used to eat his breakfast in the court-house to save himself trouble. What a set-out it was! Rice, of course; then three or four little basins with different messes--duck, fish, chicken, and plenty of soy-sauce; more basins with vegetables, all eaten with the help of chop-sticks; and a teapot snugly covered with a cosy. I asked one day to taste the tea, and Johnny poured me out a tiny cup of hot, sweet, spirits and water! Samchoo is a spirit made from rice, and very strong, as our poor English sailors used to find to their cost when her Majesty's s.h.i.+ps paid us a visit. The Chinese said that the English drank the samchoo cold and raw, and therefore it poisoned them, whereas they always qualified it with hot water. It did not taste strong, which made it all the more pernicious.

Johnny drank real tea all day long, and smoked a good deal of tobacco--it seemed to me he did very little else; but he was not a bad workman, though of course it was not such a day's work as an Englishman can do.

In the East you must accept the customs of the country, and be content with the people: they are not given to change. Stahl made some wheel-barrows for the men to use instead of little baskets in which they carried earth, and which held nothing. But it was no use; they laughed at the wheel-barrows, and said "Eh yaw!" but went on with the baskets.

Every evening we used to walk up the hill to see how the building was getting on, all the children with us; then, as we sat on the timber, I used to draw the letters of the alphabet on the white sand, and the little ones learnt them. We went home through a piece of ground we called our garden. In it grew plenty of pine-apples and sugar-cane, and the gardener always supplied us with pieces of the latter to eat--very refres.h.i.+ng and nice, but the juice ran all over your hands. As for pine-apples, we soon got tired of them; but they made good tarts, and, mixed with plantains and lime-juice, a very pleasant and useful jam.

In clearing the hill our workmen disturbed the haunts of many snakes. We were a good deal visited by cobras for some years. The natives said that the Adam and Eve of all the cobras lived in a cave under our hill.

One day we were having asphalte laid down in the printing-room, to keep away white ants. The room had been emptied to do this, and Stahl went in to inspect the work after the men had gone to their breakfast at eleven o'clock. He saw a large cobra at the end of the room, and hit it with a stick he had in his hand; but the stick broke in two, and the cobra reared itself up with inflated hood. Another minute must have seen Stahl a prey to the monster; but the Bishop, pa.s.sing by, heard him exclaim when the stick broke, and going quickly in saw Stahl standing, white, fascinated, and motionless, before the cobra. Happily he had a stout walking-stick, and at once felled the reptile; but he took a good deal of killing. It was ten feet long.

This was Adam.

Eve was killed under the verandah of the house almost a year afterwards.

She was eight feet long.