every village and every house, and count all the people; and if he ordered it to be
done by the regular officers they would quickly understand what it was for, and
the census would be sure to agree exactly with the quantity of rice he got last
year. It was evident therefore that to answer his purpose no one must suspect
why the census was taken; and to make sure of this, no one must know that there
was any census taken at all. This was a very hard problem; and the Rajah
thought and thought, as hard as a Malay Rajah can be expected to think, but
could not solve it; and so he was very unhappy, and did nothing but smoke and
chew betel with his favourite wife, and eat scarcely anything; and even when he
went to the cock-fight did not seem to care whether his best birds won or lost.
For several days he remained in this sad state, and all the court were afraid some
evil eye had bewitched the Rajah; and an unfortunate Irish captain who had
come in for a cargo of rice and who squinted dreadfully, was very nearly being
krissed, but being first brought to the royal presence was graciously ordered to
go on board and remain there while his ship stayed in the port.
One morning however, after about a week's continuance of this unaccountable
melancholy, a welcome change took place, for the Rajah sent to call together all
the chiefs, priests, and princes who were then in Mataram, his capital city; and
when they were all assembled in anxious expectation, he thus addressed them:
"For many days my heart has been very sick and I knew not why, but now the
trouble is cleared away, for I have had a dream. Last night the spirit of the
'Gunong Agong'—the great fire mountain—appeared to me, and told me that I
must go up to the top of the mountain. All of you may come with me to near the
top, but then I must go up alone, and the great spirit will again appear to me and
will tell me what is of great importance to me and to you and to all the people of
the island. Now go all of you and make this known through the island, and let
every village furnish men to make clear a road for us to go through the forest and
up the great mountain."
So the news was spread over the whole island that the Rajah must go to meet
the great spirit on the top of the mountain; and every village sent forth its men,
and they cleared away the jungle and made bridges over the mountain streams
and smoothed the rough places for the Rajah's passage. And when they came to
the steep and craggy rocks of the mountain, they sought out the best paths,
sometimes along the bed of a torrent, sometimes along narrow ledges of the
black rocks; in one place cutting down a tall tree so as to bridge across a chasm,
in another constructing ladders to mount the smooth face of a precipice. The
chiefs who superintended the work fixed upon the length of each day's journey
beforehand according to the nature of the road, and chose pleasant places by the