Its Endless
Afternoon Remains Unbroken Except By The Dreamy, Colored, Slow-Moving
Malay Life Which Passes Below The Hill.
There is never any hurry or
noise.
So had I written without prescience! The night of the awful silence
which succeeded the thunderstorm was also the eve of the Chinese New
Year, and Captain Shaw gave permission for "fireworks" from 7 P.M. till
midnight. The term "fireworks" received a most liberal construction.
The noise was something awful, and as it came into the lonely
Stadthaus, and red, blue, crimson, and greenish-yellow glares at short
intervals lighted up the picturesque Malacca steam and its blue and
yellow houses, with their steep red-tiled roofs and balconies and
quaint projections, and the streets were traced in fire and smoke,
while crackers, squibs, and rockets went off in hundreds, and cannon,
petards, and gingalls were fired incessantly, and gongs, drums, and
tom-toms were beaten, the sights, and the ceaseless, tremendous,
universal din made a rehearsal of the final assault on a city in old
days. At 1 A.M., every house being decorated and illuminated, the
Chinese men began to make their New Year's calls, and at six the din
began again. After breakfast the Governor drove out in state to visit
the leading Chinese merchants, with whom he is on terms of the most
cordial amity, and at each house was offered two dishes of cakes,
twelve dishes of candied and preserved fruits, mandarin tea (the price
of this luxury is from 25s. to 45s. a pound), and champagne from the
finest Rhenish vineyards! At eleven all the Chinese children came forth
in carriages shaped like boats, turned up at both ends, painted red and
yellow, and with white-fringed canopies over them. These were drawn by
servants, and in the case of the wealthy, a train of servants
accompanied each carriage. It was a sight worthy of a fabled age. The
wealth of the East in all its gorgeousness was poured out upon these
dignified and solemn infants, who wore coronals of gold and diamonds,
stuffs of cloth of gold brocade, and satin sewn with pearls, and whose
cloth-of-gold shoes flashed with diamonds!
During the morning four children of a rich Chinese merchant, attended
by a train of Chinese and Malay servants, came to see Mrs. Shaw. There
were a boy and girl of five and six years old, and two younger
children. A literal description of their appearance reads like fiction.
The girl wore a yellow petticoat of treble satin (mandarin yellow) with
broad box plaits in front and behind, exquisitely embroidered with
flowers in shades of blue silk, with narrow box plaits between, with a
trail of blue silk flowers on each. Over this there was a short robe of
crimson brocaded silk, with a broad border of cream-white satin, with
the same exquisite floral embroidery in shades of blue silk. Above this
was a tippet of three rows of embroidered lozenge-shaped "tabs" of
satin.
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