—and turned inquiringly to the naked punkah-wallah, who stood just outside in
the shade of the wide veranda, listlessly pulling the rattan rope that moved the
stiff fan above me.
His brown, open palm went respectfully to his forehead.
“His Highness, the Rajah of Sarawak,” he answered proudly in Malay. “He
come in gunboat Raneé to the Gymkhana races,—bring gold cup for prizes and
fast runners. Come every year, Tuan.”
I had forgotten that it was the first day of the long-looked-for Gymkhana races.
A few hours later I met this remarkable man, whose thrilling exploits had
commanded my earliest boyish admiration.
The kindly old Sultan of Johore, the old rebel Sultan of Pahang, the Sultan of
Lingae, in all the finery of their native silks and jewels, the nobles of their
courts, and a dozen other dignitaries, were on the grandstand and in the paddock
as we entered, yet no one but a modest, gray-haired little man by the side of the
English governor had any place in my thoughts. We knew his history. It was as
romantic as the wild careers of Pizarro and Cortez; as charming as those of
Robinson Crusoe and the dear old Swiss Family Robinson; as tragic as Captain
Kidd’s or Morgan’s; and withal, it was modelled after our own Washington. In
him I saw the full realization of every boy’s wildest dreams,—a king of a
tropical island.
The bell above the judges’ pavilion sounded, and a little whirlwind of running
griffins dashed by amid the yells of a thousand natives in a dozen different
tongues. The Rajah leaned out over the gayly decorated railing with the
eagerness of a boy, as he watched his own colors in the thick of the race.
The surging mass of nakedness below caught sight of him, and another yell rent
the air, quite distinct from the first, for Malayan and Kling, Tamil and Siamese,
Dyak and Javanese, Hindu, Bugis, Burmese, and Lascar, recognized the famous
White Rajah of Borneo, the man who, all unaided, had broken the power of the
savage head-hunting Dyaks, and driven from the seas the fierce Malayan pirates.
The yell was not a cheer. It was a tribute that a tiger might make to his tamer.
The Rajah understood. He was used to such sinister outbursts of admiration, for