The Straits of Malacca, 279 



and their hungry gaze wandered over the pine apple gardens 

 and cocoa nut groves of the island opposite, as if Paradise 

 itself lay beneath the bright green foliage and bowers deeply 

 shaded by tropical vegetation. Those heaps of matting on 

 the foredeck covered dead men ; the eight natives on the 

 main deck were rebel prisoners, very jolly indeed with their 

 games and laughter, though knowing well enough that their 

 brief hours were numbered. The flat-faced Javanese women 

 cumbering the ship laughed and chatted and strolled with 

 their miserable white owners j the Chinese and Hindoo 

 hawkers displayed their wares ; the business of the vessel 

 went on briskly ; and on the bare decks, wherever you 

 turned, the haggard victims of jungle fever and dysentery 

 lay silently staring into space. 



This, I fear, is not a cheerful beginning for a description 

 of the Straits of Malacca, but it is a natural one. Here we 

 had proof that the fairy scenes which had, greeted our eyes 

 on entering those lovely waters are fatal to the Europeans 

 fighting against fearful odds to subdue the Acheenese in their 

 jungle fastnesses. The country is fair to the passing eye, 

 but pestilence is the real enemy against which the Hollanders 

 have to contend, and against which no weapon yet discovered 

 can prevail. The war, therefore, still drags its slow length 

 along. Sometimes another stockade is carried, and the 

 general's despatches give three or four more of the foe killed 

 or wounded. Meanwhile regular relays of soldiers arrive 

 from Batavia to replace worn-out detachments such as those 

 of whom we had specimens on board the troopship. 



The Dutchmen shrug their shoulders and are content. It 

 is certain enough that if they had at the outset (four years ago) 

 wedded a liberal expenditure of money to energetic action 

 in the field, the Acheenese would have been at once brought 

 to their senses. Just what we did in the Ashantee bush 



