measures, which their Mahomedan and succeeding European!
visitors were by no means sparing in inflicting on them.
The present cast of the Malay character is of a very extraordinary
nature. In the pursuit of plunder they are as active,
restless, and courageous, as in their conquests they are ferocious
and vindictive. To their enemies they are remorseless,
to their friends capricious, and to strangers treacherous.
Ready at one moment to sacrifice his life in the defence of his
friend, the Malay, in the heat of passion, will not hesitate to
murder him the next. Like a beast of prey, he ravdk and
foams when beset with dangers; but his courage may rather b<?
considered of that ferocious and desperate kind which acts on
the impulse of the moment, a sort of mental frenzy, than that
steady and deliberate conduct which preserves its character
under all circumstances. I t is equally dangerous to offend
or to punish a Malay : in the one case he will stab privately,
in the other in the heat of his rage. A blow is an indignity,
which makes him lose at once all value for his own existence,
and to set death at defiance. He never fdrgives the author
of such disgrace, but seeks how he may best glut his revenge,
however certain that an Ignominious death will be the:
consequence.
By the same impetuous temper, which renders him impatient
of injuries, he is driven to desperation by misfortunes,
whether they arise from unavoidable circumstances, or from
his own misconduct. In either case he rarely submits to his
fate with coolness, but flies to his favourite opium, whose
7
p o w e r f u l effect on the brain is necessary to prepare him for
the commission of the desperate acts he may have premeditated.
Intoxicated with this drug, he tears loose his
long black hair, and rushing infuriated through the streets;
with a dagger in his hand, as if bent on doing all thè mischief
in his power the little while he has to live,
« He runs a muck, and tills at all he meets.”
An unconquerable propensity for gambling is onefofi thè
chief'fcauses which drives the Malay to this state o f desperatio
n . So passionately attached is lie to every species of
gaming, and more particularly so to Cock-fighting, that his
last morsel, the covering of his body, his wife and children,
are frequently staked on the issue of a battle to be fought by
his favourite cock. This bird, on the island of Java, grows
to a prodigious size, especially about Bantam, where, instead
of those little feathery-legged fowls, usually supposed to be
natives of this place from whence they take the name, they
are nearly as large as the Norfolk bustard. « I have seen
“ one of these cocks,” says Mr. Marsden, “ peck offa com-
*i mon dining table; when fatigued they sit down on the
“ first joint of the leg, and are then taller than the common
“ fowls.” This animal is the inseparable companion of the
Malay; but his affection, though apparently approaching to
infatuation, does not prevent him from exposing it to the risk
of a battle which, from the nature of the weapons, must
prove fatal to one of the combatants. Instead of spurs or
heels, he fixes on the bottom of his foot a piece of sharpened
iron,’about the size of the blade of a large penknife, and of
H H 2