Măluka

“ Sure enough, when you saw the shut doors and open windows of those empty houses, all white without in the sun and dark within, and not a human to be seen, you could believe almost anything. You can think how proud Malachi was. She used to get plenty of presents from the men who had no wives or children to care for—little silver and gold things as well as others. ”

“ These thoughts occupied Malaeska for days and weeks. She became active in her little chamber. The bow and sheaf of arrows that had given her the appearance of a young Diana when she came to Manhattan in her canoe, were taken down from the wall, newly strung, and the stone arrow-heads patiently sharpened. Her dress, with its gorgeous embroidery of fringe and wampum, was examined with care. She must return to her people as she had left them. The daughter of a chief—the mother of a chief—not a fragment of the white man's bounty should go with her to the forest. ”

“ The daughter of a great chief dies only by the hands of a chief. To the warrior of her tribe, whom she has wronged, her life belongs."
Malaeska lifted her sorrowful eyes to his face—how changed it was since the day he had asked her to share his lodge.
"And it is you that want my life?" she said.
"By the laws of the tribe it is mine," he answered. "Turn your face to the east—it is growing dark; the forest is deep; no one shall hear Malaeska's cries when the hatchet cleaves her forehead. Come!" ”

“ And at seven years he was stolen by the bushmen, who cannot even swim and who are afraid of salt water. Thereafter Mauki saw the sea only from a distance, through rifts in the jungle and from open spaces on the high mountain sides. He became the slave of old Fanfoa, head chief over a score of scattered bush-villages on the range-lips of Malaita, the smoke of which, on calm mornings, is about the only evidence the seafaring white men have of the teeming interior population. For the whites do not penetrate Malaita. ”

“ The Indian wife obeys her chief."
A warrior, whom Malaeska knew as the friend of her father, arose with austere gravity, and spoke:
"It is many years since Malaeska took the young chief to his white fathers. The hemlock that was green has died at the top since then. Why does Malaeska come back to her people alone? Is the boy dead?"
Malaeska turned pale in the twilight, and her voice faltered. "The boy is not dead—yet Malaeska is alone!" she answered plaintively.
"Has the woman made a white chief of the boy? Has he become the enemy of our people?" ”

“ After a few moments of exhaustion, he fixed his eyes on the Indian girl's face with a look of solemn and touching earnestness.
"Malaeska," he said, "talk not of putting yourself and the boy to death. That would be a sin, and God would punish it. To meet me in another world, Malaeska, you must learn to love the white man's God, and wait patiently till he shall send you to me. Go not back to your tribe when I am dead. Down at the mouth of the great river are many whites ”

“ No flower ever opened to the sunshine more sweetly than her soul received the holy revelations of that good man. He had no time or place for teaching, but seized any opportunity that arose where a duty could be performed. His mission lay always where human souls required knowledge. So he never left the lonely woman till long after they had passed the mouth of the Mohawk, and were floating on the Hudson. When they came in sight of the Catskill range, Malaeska was seized with an irresistible longing to see the graves of her husband and father. ”

“ With these thoughts in her mind, Malaeska took leave of the missionary with many a whispered blessing, and took her way to "the Straka." There she found an old lodge, through whose crevices the wind had whistled for years; but she went diligently to work, gathering moss and turf with which this old home, connected with so many sweet and bitter associations, was rendered habitable again. Then she took possession, and proceeded to invent many objects of comfort and even taste, with which to beautify the spot she had consecrated with memories of her passionate youth, and its early, only love. ”

“ There's Martha Fellows, if you can find enough of your darnationed queer English to tell her what you want."
As he spoke, the rough, but kind-hearted old man entered the hut, pushing the wretched Malaeska and her child before him.
"Martha! why what in the name of nature makes you look so white about the mouth? You needn't be afraid of this little varmint, no how. She's as harmless as a garter-snake. Come, see if you can find out what she wants of you. She can talk the drollest you ever heard. But I've scared away her senses, and she only stares at me like a shot deer." ”

“ That was the beginning of 'Exit Malachi.' The man was clever and bad, the girl believing and good. He was young, but he knew how to win a woman's heart. When that is done, there is nothing more to do—she is yours for good or evil; and if a man, through a woman's love, makes her to sin, even his mother cannot be proud of him—no. But the man married Norice, and took her away to Madison, down in Wisconsin. Malachi was left alone—Malachi and Trevoor, for Trevoor felt towards her as a father. ”

“ I have very little time for writing here, and even that is abridged by the night mosquitoes, which muster their forces for a desperate attack as soon as I retire to the Stadthaus for two hours of quiet before dinner, so I must give the features of Malacca mainly in outline. Having written this sentence, I am compelled to say that the feature of Malacca is that it is featureless! It is a land where it is "always afternoon"—hot, still, dreamy. Existence stagnates. Trade pursues its operations invisibly. Commerce hovers far off on the shallow sea. ”

“ Malaeska had, even in her frozen state, some thought of saving her boy. With her cold hands she had fitted the arrow and lifted the bow, but as the serpent grew passive, the weapon dropped again; for he lay on the other side of the child, and to kill him she was obliged to shoot over that sleeping form. But the reptile crested himself again, and now with a quiver of horrible dread at her heart, but nerves strained like steel, she drew the bowstring, and, aiming at the head which glittered like a jewel, just beyond her child, let the arrow fly. ”

“ And when the two malaki met, they began to fight; and the seven brothers of the Malaki Lindig that live at the edge of the sky, likewise came out to fight. But when the battle had gone on but a little time, all the eight malaki of the horizon fell down dead. Then the angry Malaki who had slain the Bia and the eight young men went looking for more people to kill; and when he had shed the blood of many, he became a buso with only one eye in his forehead, for the buso with one eye are the worst buso of all. ”

“ We started with an overcast and rainy sky, and by the next morning had reached Malacca, a small British settlement, essentially Malay, more a village than a town. It lies very low and close to the water's edge, the houses of the natives being all constructed on piles driven into the mud, and embowered in a dense framework of cocoa palms. In the distance rises the high cone-shaped peak of Ophir, now a lovely sight because of the misty covering which envelopes it to near its summit. Bananas are very plentiful; so, too, are monkeys and the canes so highly prized at home. ”

“ There was much good sense and knowledge of the human heart in the observation of Malachi, who, although he was aware that all search would be useless, could not resolve to destroy at once all hope in the mind of the afflicted and anxious mother. ”

“ The governors of the land do not punish the pirates; far from punishing them, they share in the gains. That is a wicked land indeed, where the governors encourage the people in their sins.
Malacca has no king of her own; the land belongs to Siam, except a very small part. The inhabitants are called Malays. They are not like the Siamese in character; for instead of being cowardly, they are fierce. Neither have they the same religion, for instead of being Buddhists, they are Mahomedans. Yet they know very little about the Koran, or its laws. ”

“ She never sat down, and seldom entered any dwelling, preferring to sell her merchandise in the open air, and using as few words as possible in the transaction. She was never seen to be angry, and a sweet patient smile always hovered about her lips when she spoke. In her face there was more than the remains of beauty; the poetry of intellect and of warm, deep feeling, shed a loveliness over it seldom witnessed on the brow of a savage. In truth, Malaeska was a strange and incomprehensible being to the settlers. ”

“ MALACCA, n.p. The city which gives its name to the Peninsula and the Straits of Malacca, and which was the seat of a considerable Malay monarchy till its capture by the Portuguese under D'Alboquerque in 1511. One naturally supposes some etymological connection between Malay and Malacca. And such a connection is put forward by De Barros and D'Alboquerque (see below, and also under MALAY) . ”

“ There was another—Malachy Blake his name was—a great man, full of gosther and brag; you’d think it was the world he must have for himself, the whole world, no less, from Liscanor Head to Renvyle Point out yonder, and farther still. Well, I will tell you now about Malachy Blake. The heart of him was no better than the heart of a pullet—of a sick pullet, when the eyes of it begin to turn up, and it squeaks when you take it in your hand and turns over and dies on the floor. That was what Malachy Blake’s heart was like—no better! ”

“ Majapahit, originally only one of several Javan kingdoms, rapidly acquired strength and subjugated her neighbours and the nearest portions of the islands around. Malacca, formed when the Malay colony of Singapore was overwhelmed by Javanese, became the great commercial depot of the Straits and the chief centre of Mohammedanism in the Archipelago. The two powers therefore stood for two faiths and two cultures: Majapahit for Brahminism and Hindu influence, Malacca for Islam and the more practical civilisation of Arabia. ”

“ But daylight brought a cutter, in which were two white men, who were not afraid of eleven Malaita men armed with twelve rifles. Mauki and his companions were carried back to Tulagi, where lived the great white master of all the white men. And the great white master held a court, after which, one by one, the runaways were tied up and given twenty lashes each, and sentenced to a fine of fifteen dollars. They were sent back to New Georgia, where the white men knocked seven bells out of them all around and put them to work. But Mauki was no longer house-boy. ”

“ When they reached the meadow, there were many people there. The Malaki's wife was sitting on the grass, with men grouped around her, and she was laughing with them. But she did not recognize her husband when he came riding up. After everybody had arrived, they set fire to the long grass, and burned off the meadow, so as to bring the wild pigs and the deer out of ambush. Then many men entered the chase and ran their horses; but none could catch the deer or the wild boar, except only the great Malaki, who had been the Basolo: he alone speared much game. ”

“ She came from behind a clump of trees, carrying a patridge in her hand, pierced through the heart with her arrow. She flung the bird on the rock at William's feet, [Pg 49] and kneeling down before him, kissed his feet, his hands, and the folds of his tunic, smoothing his hair and his garments with pathetic fondness.
"When shall we go home, Malaeska?" cried the lad, a little anxiously. "Grandfather will want us."
"This is the home for a young chief," replied the mother, looking around upon the pleasant sky and the forest-turf, enameled with wild-flowers. "What white man has a tent like this?" ”

“ Now old Malachi has, I think, a solemn reverence for the Divine Being, and strict notions of duty, so far as he understands it,—but as he never goes to any town or mixes with any company, so the rites of religion, as I may call them, and the observances of the holy feast, are lost to him, except as a sort of dream of former days, before he took to his hunter's life. ”

“ Malaeska was greatly distressed, and gathered the tired boy lovingly to her bosom for shelter.
"Have patience, William; nothing shall hurt you. To-morrow we will row the boat all day. You shall pull the oars yourself."
"Shall I, though?" said the boy, brightening a little; "but will it be on the way home?"
"We shall go across the mountains where the Indians live. The brave warriors who will make William their king."
"But I don't want to be a king, Malaeska!"
"A chief—a great chief—who shall go to the war-path and fight battles."
"Ah, I should like that, with your pretty bow and arrow, Malaeska ”

“ Malaeska sprang to the door, and looked out with the air of a frightened doe. Darting back to the pile of furs, she laid the sleeping child on the bare earth, and motioning her husband to lie down, heaped the skins over his prostrate form; then taking the child in her arms, she stretched herself on the pile, and drawing a bear-skin over her, pretended to be asleep. She had scarcely composed herself, when three savages entered the wigwam. One bore a blazing pine-knot, with which he proceeded to search for the fugitive. ”

“ This is an interesting fact, in its way, as it tends to prove that it is not only the unhappy Malay of Malacca who feels that he is born possessing some rights in the soil from which he springs, and on which he lives, moves, and has his being. ”

“ A little way off, on a hillock, purple with flowers, lay a beautiful child, beckoning to the birds as they fluttered by—plucking up the flowers, and uttering his tiny shout of gladness, as if death and sorrow were not all around him. There, by the side of the dead hunter, sat Malaeska, the widow, her hands dropping nervously by her side, her long hair sweeping the moss, and her face bowed on her bosom, stupefied with the overwhelming poignancy of her grief. ”