hands towards the sea, by way of
explaining our voyage, and then pointed to my mouth. If he understood
he seemed in no hurry. He tapped O'Hara's cornet gingerly with two
fingers. I unstrung it and made shift to play 'Home, Sweet Home.'
This delighted him; he nodded, rubbed his hands, and stepped a few paces
from me, then turned and began fingering his spear in a way I did not
like at all. 'It's a matter of taste, sir,' said I, or words to that
effect, dropping the cornet like a hot potato; but he pointed towards
it, and then over a ridge inland, and I gathered I must pick it up and
follow him--which I did, and pretty quick.

"From the top of this ridge we faced across a small plain bounded on the
north with a tier of hills, most of which seemed by their shape to be
volcanoes, and out of action--for the sky lay quite blue and clear above
them. The way down into this plain led through jungle; but the plain
itself had been cleared of all but small clumps dotted here and there,
which gave it, you might say, the look of an English park; and about
half-way across, in a clear stretch of lalang grass, stood a village of
white huts huddling round a larger and much taller house.

"The old man led me straight towards this, and, coming closer, I saw
that the large house had a rough glacis about it and a round wall
pierced with loopholes. A number of goats were feeding here and a few
small cattle; also the ground about the village had been cleared and
planted with fruit-trees,--mangoes, bananas, limes, and oranges,--but as
yet I saw no inhabitants. The old Malay, who had kept ahead of me all
the way, walking at a fair pace, here halted and once more signed to me
to blow on the cornet. I obeyed, of course, this time with 'The British
Grenadiers.' I declare to you it was like starting a swarm of bees.
You wouldn't believe the troops that came pouring out of those few
huts--the women in loose trousers pretty much like the men's, but with
arms bare and loose _sarongs_ flung over their right shoulders, the
children with no more clothes than a pocket-handkerchief apiece.
I can't tell you what first informed me of my guide's rank among them--
whether the salaams they offered him, or the richness of his dress--
he was the only one with gold lace and the only one who carried
pistols--or the air with which he paraded me through the crowd, waving
the people back to right and left, and clearing a way to a narrow door
in the wall arou