The glaring eyes through the brushwood shine,
And the striped hide shows between
The trees and bushes, 'mid trailing vine
And masses of ever-green.
A snarling moan comes long and low,
We may neither flee nor fight,
For well our leaping pulses know
The Terror that stalks by Night.If you put your finger on the map of the Malay Peninsula an inch or two from its
exact centre, you will find a river in Pahang territory which has its rise in the
watershed that divides that State from Kĕlantan and Trĕnggânu. This river is
called the Tĕmbĕling, and it is chiefly remarkable for the number of its rapids
and the richness of its gutta-bearing forests. Its inhabitants are a ruffianly lot of
Malays, who are preyed upon by a family of Wans, a semi-royal set of nobles
who do their best to live up to their traditions. Below the rapids the natives are
chiefly noted for the quaint pottery that they produce from the clay which
abounds there, and the rude shapes and ruder tracery of their vessels have
probably suffered no change since the days when Solomon's fleets sought gold
and peafowl and monkeys in the jungles of the Peninsula, as everybody knows.
Above the rapids the Malays plant enough gambir to supply the wants of the
whole betel-chewing population of Pahang, and, as the sale of this commodity
wins them a few dollars annually, they are too indolent to plant their own rice.
This grain, which is the staple of all Malays, without which they cannot live, is
therefore sold to them by down river natives, at the exorbitant price of half a
dollar the bushel.
A short distance up stream, and midway between the mouth and the big rapids,
there is a straggling village, called Ranggul, the houses of which, made of
wattled bamboos and thatched with palm leaves, stand on piles, amid the groves
of cocoa-nut and areca-nut palms, varied by clumps of smooth-leaved banana
trees. The houses are not very close together, but a man can call from one to the
other with ease; and thus the cocoa-nuts thrive, which, as the Malays say, grow
not with pleasure beyond the sound of the human voice. The people of the
village are not more indolent than other Malays. They plant a little rice, when the
season comes, in the swamps behind the village. They work a little jungle