umbering
carts, and thereby frightening horses into fits; tugging and frequently
running away with, all manner of primitive ploughs and sledges; and
humiliating as publicly as possible, any white man that it does not
gore. It seems to cherish a peculiar spite against all Europeans; for a
buffalo, that is as mild as a lamb with the most unattractive native,
cannot be brought to tolerate the proximity of the most refined, and
least repulsive of white men. Which one is there amongst us, who does
not bear a grudge against the water-buffalo as a class, and against some
one black or pink bully in particular? Which of us is there, who has not
passed moments in the company of these brutes, such as might well 'score
years from a strong man's life'? Some of us have been gored by the
brutes, and most of us, who have pursued the crafty snipe bird in his
native _padi_ swamps, have put in various _mauvais quarts d'heure_, with
some of these sullenly vindictive animals mouching after us, much in
the way that a _gendarme_ pursues a _gamin_. Then has entered upon the
scene a Delivering Angel, in the shape of a very small, very muddy, very
naked child of exceedingly tender years. This tiny _deus ex machina_ has
straightway tackled the angry monster, with all the fearlessness of a
child, has struck it twice in the face, in a most business-like manner,
has piped '_Diam! Diam!_'[8]--which sounds like a curse word,--in a
furious voice, and finally has hooked his finger into the beast's nose
ring, and has led it away reluctant, and crestfallen, but unresisting.
Most of us, I say, have experienced these things at the hands of the
small boy and the water-buffalo; and, when both have disappeared in the
brushwood, and the sweat of fear has had time to dry on our clammy
foreheads, we have one and all cursed the Devil who made the brute, and
have felt not a little humiliated at the superiority of the minute
native boy over our wretched and abject selves.

[Footnote 8: _Diam!_ = Be still!]

All these bitter memories crowd into our minds, when we find ourselves
in a Malay bull-ring, and we should be more than human if we felt any
keen sympathy for the combatant buffaloes. We are apt to experience also
an intense sense of relief at the thought that the brutes are about to
fight one another, and will be too busy to waste any of their energies
in persecuting the European spectators, with the amiable intention of
putting them to the shame of open sh