of the spmmng-wheel, also Sanscrit, jantra, signifying “ a machine.” What raw
material would have been employed before the introduction of cotton from India, it
is not easy to understand, although there are several native textile fibres on the spot
which were available, such as the fibre of the banana, and of several urticas, or nettles.
As nearly all the terms now enumerated are found in all the languages of the
Malay Archipelago, it is natural to conclude that the art of manufacturing woven
cloth irom thread was the invention of one country, and not unreasonable to fancy that
country to have been Java, the one in which civilisation earliest sprung up, and in
which it made the greatest progress. Although the terms connected with the art of
weaving a textile fabric have extended to all the languages of the civilised nations of
the Malay, they have not extended to those of the Philippine Archipelago, which
have their own peculiar ones, and even a native word for cotton, along with the
Sanscrit one, received, like other words of the same tongue, through the Malayan
languages. The art of weaving a cloth, as is well known, had never spread to the
tribes of the islands of the Pacific, and this is one of the many facts which show
how little they really received through the Malayan nations. I t is remarkable, however,
that the Malayan words for weaving and sewing should have found their way
into the language of remote Madagascar. All the cloths manufactured by the inhabitants
of the Malayan islands are strong, coarse, and durable fabrics, and the fine
textures woven by the Hindus are wholly unknown to them. The native manufactures
are purely domestic, and the women the only manufacturers. The best are the fabrics
of Celebes and Java, and these continue to form a considerable article of external
commerce, although competing with the manufactures of Manchester and Glasgow.
WEIGHTS and MEASURES. The original measures of the Malays and Javanese
were evidently by capacity (takar) and not by weight, for which there are no words
in their language, except such as signify heaviness or balance. The lowest denomination
for a measure of capacity among the Malays goes under the name of chupak,
most probably taken from the shell of the coco-nut or the joint of the bamboo. Of
this, 4 make a gantang, and 800 of the last a koyan. These are native words, with the
literal meaning of which, however, I am unacquainted. The measures of length, as
with other people, are taken from the members or parts of the human body, as finger-
length, span, foot, pace, fathom, with the length from the foot of one side to the tip
of the outstretched hand on the opposite one. Superficial or land measure is still
more rude. Thus the Javanese, in reference to their irrigated land, the only description
on which they set a special value, have, for the largest measure, what they term a
jong, which, literally signifies a ship, and this divided into halves called kikil, or a leg,
and into fourths called bau, which means a shoulder. Another admeasurement of land
goes under the name of chachah, of which gawe-ning-wong is the synonym, the first
word signifying “ count” or “ census,” and the last, “ a man’s work,” that is, the
quantity of irrigated land that a family of peasantry can till. This last term is of
the same nature as our own “ plough-land.”
All such weights and measures are vague and uncertain, and vary, not only in the
different countries of the Archipelago, but often in districts of the same country.
Strangers have in some degree contributed to give them precision by the introduction
of their own, the native names being generally preserved. To judge by the
name, the Persians seem to have introduced the balance (trazu), and the Chinese,
probably, the steelyard (d-achin). The weighing of gold was, of course, an important
operation, which required to be conducted with nicety in a country producing gold,
and where all large payments were made in this metal by weight and assay. I t seems
immemorially, to have been conducted, as it still is, by the Telingas, and these people
introduced the Hindu gold weights. The denominations of these correspond in value
with the Indian, although in some places, having native terms, as the saga or “ counting
bean, the mayam, the bungkal, and the kati, In others they are expressed by
corruptions of the Sanscrit ones. Thus the scarlet bean is called rak&t, from the
Sanscrit raktaka; the weight of 12 beans, a mas ; frommaska, andthe tail or 16 maskas,
from the tolaka or tola. For long measure the Hindu hasta or cubit has generally
superseded the native measures, at least for commercial purposes. The only weight
introduced by the Arabs is the bahar, usually considered as equal to three pikuls, mid
this was in U3e even as far as the Moluccas, when the Portuguese first arrived.
The business-like Chinese have introduced their own well-defined weights
although under native names. Thus we have the tail or weight of 23 drams’
avoirdupois, the kati, consisting of 16 tails, and the piknul, which literally signifies a
mans load or burden, composed of 100 katis or 133§ pounds, avoirdupois. The
weights and measures of the Malays, with their denominations, have not only extended
over the whole Malay Archipelago, but are also prevalent in the Philippines. In the
settlements of European nations the weights and measures of the natives have been
fixed with precision.
WETTER. The name of a considerable island on the northern side of Timur,
and towards its eastern end. Its most northerly point is in south latitude 8° 6', and
east longitude 125° 58'. Its length from east to west is 60 miles, with a breadth of
about 25 miles. The northern coast is mountainous, but the southern has some open
plains and valleys. The inhabitants are of the same race as those of Timur, that
which is intermediate between the Malay and Negro. The conjectural population
is made to amount to 82,000, probably an exaggeration, since it would give not less
than 70 inhabitants to the square mile, a proportion not to be looked for in a poor
mountainous country, and in a very rude state of society. The bread-corn of Wetter,
like that of Timur, is maiz and the principal export, bees’-wax.
WHEAT. This corn, known to the natives of the Indian Islands only by its
Persian name of gandum, or its Portuguese of trigo, is cultivated in small quantities
for the consumption of European settlers in Java and Luzon, with a few other parts
of the Philippines, at an elevation above the level of the sea of from 4000 to 6000
feet.
WIDADAREN'. The name of a mountain of Java, with an active volcano
rising to the height of 8000 feet above the level of the sea. I t is one of a range
which divides the districts of Besuki and Banuwangi, the last forming the eastern
extremity of the island. The name signifies place or abode of the Widari, a class of
celestial nymphs, according to the local mythology of the Javanese.
WILIS. The name of a mountain of Java, without an active volcano, 7957 feet
above the level of the sea. I t forms the eastern boundary of the plain of Madiyun,
as Lawu does the western. The name in Javanese signifies “ green,” but for what
reason does not appear, since every mountain of the island is equally verdant.
WOWONI. The name of an island lying north of th a t of Boeteon, and divided
from the south-eastern peninsula of Celebes by a strait about two miles broad. As
laid down in the maps, it appears to be about seventeen miles in length, and ten in its
broadest part. I can discover nothing recorded about it, and suppose it to be almost
unknown to Europeans.
WRITING, in Malay and Javanese tulis, b u t in the last of these i t has two
synonyms, chiri and tanu. All these are native words, but in both languages the
Arabic surat is also of frequent use. All the native words signify “ to paint” as well
as to write. See Language.
X.
XULLA. This, with an epithet to each, is the name given in our maps to three
islands, which, with a fourth, much smaller, form a group lying east of Celebes, and
west by north of Boeroe, in the Molucca Sea. They lie from one to two degrees and a
half south of the equator, and run as far east as longitude 126°. The group extends
over thirty-six leagues, and has been estimated to contain an area of 1808 square geographical
miles. Respecting the natural history of these islands, or the condition of
their inhabitants, I have seen no notices. That they were discovered and named by
the Portuguese, there can be little doubt. The odd orthography can, I think, be
explained. The initial x, in Portuguese is equivalent in power to our sh, or the
French ch, but such a sound is not known in any of the Malayan languages, and the
real one intended was most probably our own, and the Spanish ch, which would make
the xula, chula, a word which in Malay and Javanese signifies a horn, or a homy protuberance,
like the horn of the rhinoceros. The name of one of the islands, Xulla-b&si,
would, in this case, be Chula-basi, literally, “ iron horn.” Another of the islands is
called Xulla-mangola, and this is probably meant for Chula-manggala, which, in
Javanese, would be literally “ elephant horn,” for in that language manggala is one of
several synonyms for the elephant. The name of the third, Xulla-taliabo, is not so
clear, but it may be meant for Chula-tariabuh, or Chula-talabuh, which would literally
be, “ horn let fall” or “ horn at anchor.”