The Governor, Sir William Robinson (Now Sir F. A. Weld), Is Assisted By
An Executive Council Of Eight Members, And
A Legislative Council
consisting of nine official and six non-official members, including Mr.
Whampoa, C.M.G., a Chinaman
Of great wealth and enlightened public
spirit, who is one of the foremost men in the colony. Then on the Civil
Establishment there are a legion of departments, the Colonial
Secretary's office with a branch office and Chinese Protectorate, a
Land Office, Printing Office, Treasury, Audit Office, Post Office,
Public Works and Survey Department, Marine Department, Judicial
Department, Attorney-General's Department, Sheriff's Department, Police
Court and Police Department, and Ecclesiastical, Educational, Medical,
and Prison Staffs.
It is natural that when the mail has been worn threadbare and no
stirring incidents present themselves, such as the arrival of a new
ship of war or a touring foreign prince, and the receptions of Mr.
Whampoa and the Maharajah of Johore have grown insipid, that much of
local conversation should consist of speculations as to when or whether
Mr. - - will get promotion, when Mr. - - will go home, or how much he
has saved out of his salary; what influence has procured the
appointment of Mr. - - to Selangor or Perak, instead of Mr. - - ,
whose qualifications are higher; whether Mr. - - 's acting appointment
will be confirmed; whether Mr. - - will get one or two years' leave;
whether some vacant appointment is to be filled up or abolished, and so
on ad infinitum. Such talk girdles the colonial world as completely as
the telegraph, which has revolutionized European business here as
elsewhere.
The island is far less interesting than the city. Its dense, dark
jungle is broken up mainly by pepper and gambier plantations, the
latter specially in new clearings. The laborers on these are Chinese,
and so are the wood-cutters and sawyers, who frequent the round-topped
wooded undulations. The climate is hotter and damper, to one's
sensations at least, than the hottest and dampest of the tropical
houses at Kew, and heat-loving insects riot. The ants are a pest of the
second magnitude, mosquitoes being of the first, the palm-trees and the
piles of decaying leaves and bark being excellent nurseries for larvae.
The vegetation is luxuriant, and in the dim, green twilight which is
created by enormous forest trees there are endless varieties of ferns,
calladiums, and parasitic plants; but except where a road has been cut
and is kept open by continual labor, the climbing rattan palms make it
impossible to explore.
My short visit has been mainly occupied with the day at the Colonial
Secretary's Lodge, and in walking and driving through the streets. The
city is ablaze with color and motley with costume. The ruling race does
not show to advantage. A pale-skinned man or woman, costumed in our
ugly, graceless clothes, reminds one not pleasingly, artistically at
least, of our dim, pale islands. Every Oriental costume from the Levant
to China floats through the streets - robes of silk, satin, brocade, and
white muslin, emphasized by the glitter of "barbaric gold;" and Parsees
in spotless white, Jews and Arabs in dark rich silks; Klings in Turkey
red and white; Bombay merchants in great white turbans, full trousers,
and draperies, all white, with crimson silk girdles; Malays in red
sarongs, Sikhs in pure white Madras muslin, their great height rendered
nearly colossal by the classic arrangement of their draperies; and
Chinamen of all classes, from the coolie in his blue or brown cotton,
to the wealthy merchant in his frothy silk crepe and rich brocade, make
up an irresistibly fascinating medley.
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