On
Drawing The Line Which Separates These Races, It Is Found To Come
Near To That Which Divides The Zoological
Regions, but somewhat
eastward of it; a circumstance which appears to me very
significant of the same causes having influenced
The distribution
of mankind that have determined the range of other animal forms.
The reason why exactly the same line does not limit both is
sufficiently intelligible. Man has means of traversing the sea
which animals do not possess; and a superior race has power to
press out or assimilate an inferior one. The maritime enterprise
and higher civilization of the Malay races have enabled them to
overrun a portion of the adjacent region, in which they have
entirely supplanted the indigenous inhabitants if it ever
possessed any; and to spread much of their language, their
domestic animals, and their customs far over the Pacific, into
islands where they have but slightly, or not at all, modified the
physical or moral characteristics of the people.
I believe, therefore, that all the peoples of the various islands
can be grouped either with the Malays or the Papuans; and that
these two have no traceable affinity to each other. I believe,
further, that all the races east of the line I have drawn have
more affinity for each other than they have for any of the races
west of that line; that, in fact, the Asiatic races include the
Malays, and all have a continental origin, while the Pacific
races, including all to the east of the former (except perhaps
some in the Northern Pacific), are derived, not from any existing
continent, but from lands which now exist or have recently
existed in the Pacific Ocean. These preliminary observations will
enable the reader better to apprehend the importance I attach to
the details of physical form or moral character, which I shall
give in describing the inhabitants of many of the islands.
CHAPTER II.
SINGAPORE.
(A SKETCH OF THE TOWN AND ISLAND AS SEEN DURING SEVERAL VISITS
FROM 1854 TO 1862.)
FEW places are more interesting to a traveller from Europe than
the town and island of Singapore, furnishing, as it does,
examples of a variety of Eastern races, and of many different
religions and modes of life. The government, the garrison, and
the chief merchants are English; but the great mass of the
population is Chinese, including some of the wealthiest
merchants, the agriculturists of the interior, and most of the
mechanics and labourers. The native Malays are usually fishermen
and boatmen, and they form the main body of the police. The
Portuguese of Malacca supply a large number of the clerks and
smaller merchants. The Klings of Western India are a numerous
body of Mahometans, and, with many Arabs, are petty merchants and
shopkeepers. The grooms and washermen are all Bengalees, and
there is a small but highly respectable class of Parsee
merchants. Besides these, there are numbers of Javanese sailors
and domestic servants, as well as traders from Celebes, Bali, and
many other islands of the Archipelago. The harbour is crowded
with men-of-war and trading vessels of many European nations, and
hundreds of Malay praus and Chinese junks, from vessels of
several hundred tons burthen down to little fishing boats and
passenger sampans; and the town comprises handsome public
buildings and churches, Mahometan mosques, Hindu temples, Chinese
joss-houses, good European houses, massive warehouses, queer old
Kling and China bazaars, and long suburbs of Chinese and Malay
cottages.
By far the most conspicuous of the various kinds of people in
Singapore, and those which most attract the stranger's attention,
are the Chinese, whose numbers and incessant activity give the
place very much the appearance of a town in China. The Chinese
merchant is generally a fat round-faced man with an important and
business-like look. He wears the same style of clothing (loose
white smock, and blue or black trousers) as the meanest coolie,
but of finer materials, and is always clean and neat; and his
long tail tipped with red silk hangs down to his heels. He has a
handsome warehouse or shop in town and a good house in the
country. He keeps a fine horse and gig, and every evening may be
seen taking a drive bareheaded to enjoy the cool breeze. He is
rich - he owns several retail shops and trading schooners, he
lends money at high interest and on good security, he makes hard
bargains, and gets fatter and richer every year.
In the Chinese bazaar are hundreds of small shops in which a
miscellaneous collection of hardware and dry goods are to be
found, and where many things are sold wonderfully cheap. You may
buy gimlets at a penny each, white cotton thread at four balls
for a halfpenny, and penknives, corkscrews, gunpowder, writing-
paper, and many other articles as cheap or cheaper than you can
purchase them in England. The shopkeeper is very good-natured; he
will show you everything he has, and does not seem to mind if you
buy nothing. He bates a little, but not so much as the Klings,
who almost always ask twice what they are willing to take. If you
buy a few things from him, he will speak to you afterwards every
time you pass his shop, asking you to walk in and sit down, or
take a cup of tea; and you wonder how he can get a living where
so many sell the same trifling articles.
The tailors sit at a table, not on one; and both they and the
shoemakers work well and cheaply. The barbers have plenty to do,
shaving heads and cleaning ears; for which latter operation they
have a great array of little tweezers, picks, and brushes. In the
outskirts of the town are scores of carpenters and blacksmiths.
The former seem chiefly to make coffins and highly painted and
decorated clothes-boxes. The latter are mostly gun-makers, and
bore the barrels of guns by hand out of solid bars of iron.
Enter page number
PreviousNext
Page 9 of 112
Words from 8229 to 9235
of 114260
