rom some lady
who is either of exalted rank, or of most surpassing beauty. The greater
the venom of the snake, the brighter, it is believed, are the qualities
with which the dreamer's future mistress is endowed. It is not only in
Europe, that venom enters into the soul of a man by reason of a woman,
and this is, perhaps, the explanation of how this dream comes to bear
this peculiar interpretation.

Tuan Bangau's position was a curious one. He did not desire Tungku Uteh
for herself; she was his King's daughter, and the wife of a royal
husband; and his duty and his interest alike forbade him to accept her
advances. If his intrigue with her was discovered, he was a ruined, if
not a dead man, and, moreover, he was at this time devoted to another
girl, whom he had recently married. The challenge which had been
conveyed to him, however, was one which, in spite of all these things,
his code of honour made it impossible for him to refuse. The extreme
danger, which lay in such an intrigue, gave him no choice but to accept
it. That was his point of view, 'His honour rooted in dishonour stood,'
and no self-respecting Malay, brought up in the poisonous atmosphere of
an Independent Malay State, could admit of any other opinion.

With Awang Itam things were different. I have already said that he was
passionately in love with Iang Munah, and he knew that he would at
length win his Heart's Desire. He would accompany his chief on his
nocturnal visits to the palace, and, while Tuan Bangau wooed the
Princess, the handmaiden would give herself to him. He felt the 'blood
run redder in every vein' at the bare thought, and he was the eager and
impatient lover when the twain crept into the palace in the noon of the
night.

They effected their entrance by a way known only to themselves, and left
by the same means before the breaking of the dawn, passing to their
quarters in the guard-house, through the slumbering town, and lay
sleeping far into the day. For more than a month they paid their secret
visits unobserved by any save those whom they sought, and by the old
crone who unbarred the door for them to enter; but, upon a certain
night, they narrowly escaped detection. The King, like many Malay
_Rajas_, kept curious hours. Sometimes, he slept all day, sometimes he
slept all night; some days he went to rest at noon, to awake at
midnight; and, on such occasions, he often wandered about the palace
alone, pouncing upon ill-doers, like the lion