10 TERN ATE. [chap. xxi. 



midnight on the Chinese New Year's festival, at which 

 time every one stays up nearly all night feasting at the 

 Chinamen's houses and seeing the processions. This pre- 

 vented any lives being lost, as every one ran out of 

 doors at the first shock, wliich was not very severe. The 

 second, a few minutes afterwards, threw down a great 

 many houses, and others, which continued all night and 

 part of the next day, completed the devastation. The line 

 of disturbance was very narrow, so that the native town a 

 mile to the east scarcely suffered at all. The wave passed 

 from north to south, through the islands of Tidore and 

 Makian, and terminated in Batchian, where it was not felt 

 till four the following afternoon, thus taking no less than 

 sixteen hours to travel a hundred miles, or about six miles 

 an hour. It is singular that on this occasion there was no 

 rushing up of the tide, or other commotion of the sea, as is 

 usually the case during great earthquakes. 



The people of Ternate are of three well-marked races : 

 the Ternate Malays, the Orang Sirani, and the Dutch. 

 The first are an intrusive Malay race somewhat allied to 

 the Macassar people, who settled in the country at a very 

 early epoch, drove out the indigenes, who were no doubt 

 the same as those of the adjacent mainland of Gilolo, and 

 established a monarchy. They perhaps obtained many of 

 their wives from the natives, which will account for tlie 

 extraordinary language they speak— in some respects closely 



