We Landed By A Steep Ladder Upon A Jetty With A Gridiron Top, Only Safe
For Shoeless Feet, And Mr. Hawley And I Went Up To The Fort By Steps
Cut In The Earth.
There are fine mango-trees on the slopes, said to
have been planted by the Dutch two centuries ago.
The fort is nearly
oblong, and has a wall of stones and earth round it, in which, near the
entrance, some of the Dutch brickwork is still visible. The trees round
it are much tattered and torn by English shell. In front of the
entrance there is a large flat stone on a rude support. On this a young
girl was sacrificed some years ago, and the Malay guns were smeared
with her blood, in the idea that it would make them successful. I was
told this story, but have no means of testing its accuracy.
Within the fort the collector and magistrate - a very inert-looking
Dutch half-caste - has a wretched habitation, mostly made of attap. We
sat there for some time. It looked most miserable, the few things about
being empty bottles and meat-tins. A man would need many resources,
great energy, and an earnest desire to do his duty, in order to save
him from complete degeneracy. He has no better prospect from his
elevation, than a nearly level plateau of mangrove swamps and jungle,
with low hills in the distance, in which the rivers rise. It was
hot - rather.
In the meantime the Resident was trying a case, and when it was
concluded we steamed out to sea and hugged all day the most monotonous
coast I ever saw, only just, if just, above high-water mark, with a
great level of mangrove swamps and dense jungle behind, with high,
jungle-covered hills in the very far distance, a vast area of
beast-haunted country, of which nothing is known by Europeans, and
almost nothing by the Malays themselves.
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