One
Part Of Babu's Self-Imposed Duty Is To Look Under Our Pillows For
Snakes And Centipedes, And The Latter Have Been Found In All Our Rooms.
I must now make you acquainted with our host, Captain Murray.
He was
appointed when the Datu Klana asked for a Resident four years ago. He
devotes himself to Sungei Ujong as if it were his own property, though
he has never been able to acquire the language. He is a man about
thirty-eight, a naval officer, and an enterprising African traveler;
under the middle height, bronzed, sun-browned, disconnected in his
conversation from the habit of living without anyone in or out of the
house to speak to; professing a misanthropy which he is very far from
feeling, for he is quite unsuspicious, and disposed to think the best
of every one; hasty when vexed, but thoroughly kind-hearted; very
blunt, very undignified, never happy (he says) out of the wilds;
thoroughly well disposed to the Chinese and Malays, but very impatient
of their courtesies, thoroughly well meaning, thoroughly a gentleman,
but about the last person that I should have expected to see in a
position which is said to require much tact if not finesse. His
success leads me to think, as I have often thought before, that if we
attempt to deal with Orientals by their own methods, we are apt to find
them more than a match for us, and that thorough honesty is the best
policy.
He lives alone, unguarded; trusts himself by night and day without any
escort among the people; keeps up no ceremony at all, and is
approachable at all hours.
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