Produced by Sue Asscher
(PLATE 16. A MALAY BOY, NATIVE OF BENCOOLEN.
T. Heaphy delt. A. Cardon fecit.
Published by W. Marsden, 1810.)
THE HISTORY OF SUMATRA,
CONTAINING AN ACCOUNT OF
THE GOVERNMENT, LAWS, CUSTOMS, AND MANNERS
OF
THE NATIVE INHABITANTS,
WITH
A DESCRIPTION OF THE NATURAL PRODUCTIONS,
AND A RELATION OF THE
ANCIENT POLITICAL STATE OF THAT ISLAND.
BY
WILLIAM MARSDEN, F.R.S.
THE THIRD EDITION, WITH CORRECTIONS, ADDITIONS, AND PLATES.
LONDON:
PRINTED FOR THE AUTHOR,
BY J. M'CREERY, BLACK-HORSE-COURT,
AND SOLD BY
LONGMAN, HURST, REES, ORME, AND BROWN, PATERNOSTER-ROW.
1811.
...
THE HISTORY OF SUMATRA.
CONTENTS.
PREFACE.
CHAPTER 1.
SITUATION.
NAME.
GENERAL DESCRIPTION OF THE COUNTRY, ITS MOUNTAINS, LAKES, AND RIVERS.
AIR AND METEORS.
MONSOONS, AND LAND AND SEA-BREEZES.
MINERALS AND FOSSILS.
VOLCANOES.
EARTHQUAKES.
SURFS AND TIDES.
CHAPTER 2.
DISTINCTION OF INHABITANTS.
REJANGS CHOSEN FOR GENERAL DESCRIPTION.
PERSONS AND COMPLEXION.
CLOTHING AND ORNAMENTS.
CHAPTER 3.
VILLAGES.
BUILDINGS.
DOMESTIC UTENSILS.
FOOD.
CHAPTER 4.
AGRICULTURE.
RICE, ITS CULTIVATION, ETC.
PLANTATIONS OF COCONUT, BETEL-NUT, AND OTHER VEGETABLES FOR DOMESTIC USE.
DYE STUFFS.
CHAPTER 5.
FRUITS, FLOWERS, MEDICINAL SHRUBS AND HERBS.
CHAPTER 6.
BEASTS.
REPTILES.
FISH.
BIRDS.
INSECTS.
CHAPTER 7.
VEGETABLE PRODUCTIONS OF THE ISLAND CONSIDERED AS ARTICLES OF COMMERCE.
PEPPER.
CULTIVATION OF PEPPER.
CAMPHOR.
BENZOIN.
CASSIA, ETC.
CHAPTER 8.
GOLD, TIN, AND OTHER METALS.
BEESWAX.
IVORY.
BIRDS-NEST, ETC.
IMPORT-TRADE.
CHAPTER 9.
ARTS AND MANUFACTURES.
ART OF MEDICINE.
SCIENCES.
ARITHMETIC.
GEOGRAPHY.
ASTRONOMY.
MUSIC, ETC.
CHAPTER 10.
LANGUAGES.
MALAYAN.
ARABIC CHARACTER USED.
LANGUAGES OF THE INTERIOR PEOPLE.
PECULIAR CHARACTERS.
SPECIMENS OF LANGUAGES AND OF ALPHABETS.
CHAPTER 11.
COMPARATIVE STATE OF THE SUMATRANS IN CIVIL SOCIETY.
DIFFERENCE OF CHARACTER BETWEEN THE MALAYS AND OTHER INHABITANTS.
GOVERNMENT.
TITLES AND POWER OF THE CHIEFS AMONG THE REJANGS.
INFLUENCE OF THE EUROPEANS.
GOVERNMENT IN PASSUMMAH.
CHAPTER 12.
LAWS AND CUSTOMS.
MODE OF DECIDING CAUSES.
CODE OF LAWS.
CHAPTER 13.
REMARKS ON, AND ELUCIDATION OF, THE VARIOUS LAWS AND CUSTOMS.
MODES OF PLEADING.
NATURE OF EVIDENCE.
OATHS.
INHERITANCE.
OUTLAWRY.
THEFT, MURDER, AND COMPENSATION FOR IT.
ACCOUNT OF A FEUD.
DEBTS.
SLAVERY.
CHAPTER 14.
MODES OF MARRIAGE, AND CUSTOMS RELATIVE THERETO.
POLYGAMY.
FESTIVALS.
GAMES.
COCK-FIGHTING.
USE AND EFFECTS OF OPIUM.
CHAPTER 15.
CUSTOM OF CHEWING BETEL.
EMBLEMATIC PRESENTS.
ORATORY.
CHILDREN.
NAMES.
CIRCUMCISION.
FUNERALS.
RELIGION.
CHAPTER 16.
THE COUNTRY OF LAMPONG AND ITS INHABITANTS.
LANGUAGE.
GOVERNMENT.
WARS.
PECULIAR CUSTOMS.
RELIGION.
CHAPTER 17.
ACCOUNT OF THE INLAND COUNTRY OF KORINCHI.
EXPEDITION TO THE SERAMPEI AND SUNGEI-TENANG COUNTRIES.
CHAPTER 18.
MALAYAN STATES.
ANCIENT EMPIRE OF MENANGKABAU.
ORIGIN OF THE MALAYS AND GENERAL ACCEPTATION OF NAME.
EVIDENCES OF THEIR MIGRATION FROM SUMATRA.
SUCCESSION OF MALAYAN PRINCES.
PRESENT STATE OF THE EMPIRE.
TITLES OF THE SULTAN.
CEREMONIES.
CONVERSION TO MAHOMETAN RELIGION.
LITERATURE.
ARTS.
WARFARE.
GOVERNMENT.
CHAPTER 19.
KINGDOMS OF INDRAPURA, ANAK-SUNGEI, PASSAMMAN, SIAK.
CHAPTER 20.
THE COUNTRY OF THE BATTAS.
TAPPANULI-BAY.
JOURNEY INTO THE INTERIOR.
CASSIA-TREES.
GOVERNMENTS.
ARMS.
WARFARE.
TRADE.
FAIRS.
FOOD.
MANNERS.
LANGUAGE.
WRITING.
RELIGION.
FUNERALS.
CRIMES.
EXTRAORDINARY CUSTOM.
CHAPTER 21.
KINGDOM OF ACHIN.
ITS CAPITAL.
AIR.
INHABITANTS.
COMMERCE.
MANUFACTURES.
NAVIGATION.
COIN.
GOVERNMENT.
REVENUES.
PUNISHMENTS.
CHAPTER 22.
HISTORY OF THE KINGDOM OF ACHIN, FROM THE PERIOD OF ITS BEING VISITED BY
EUROPEANS.
CHAPTER 23.
BRIEF ACCOUNT OF THE ISLANDS LYING OFF THE WESTERN COAST OF SUMATRA.
LIST OF PLATES.
PLATE 1. THE PEPPER-PLANT, Piper nigrum.
E.W. Marsden delt. Engraved by J. Swaine, Queen Street, Golden Square.
Published by W. Marsden, 1810.
PLATE 2. THE DAMMAR, A SPECIES OF PINUS.
Sinensis delt. Swaine Sc.
Published by W. Marsden, 1810.
PLATE 3. THE MANGUSTIN FRUIT, Garcinia mangostana.
Engraved by J. Swaine.
Published by W. Marsden, 1810.
PLATE 4. THE RAMBUTAN, Nephelium lappaceum.
L. Wilkins delt. Engraved by J. Swaine.
Published by W. Marsden, 1810.
PLATE 5. THE LANSEH FRUIT, Lansium domesticum.
L. Wilkins delt. Hooker Sc.
Published by W. Marsden, 1810.
PLATE 6. THE RAMBEH FRUIT, A SPECIES OF LANSEH.
Maria Wilkins delt. Engraved by J. Swaine.
Published by W. Marsden, 1810.
PLATE 7. THE KAMILING OR BUAH KRAS, Juglans camirium.
L. Wilkins delt. Engraved by J. Swaine.
Published by W. Marsden, 1810.
PLATE 8. Marsdenia tinctoria, OR BROAD-LEAFED INDIGO.
E.W. Marsden delt. Swaine fct.
Published by W. Marsden, 1810.
PLATE 9. A SPECIES OF Lemur volans, SUSPENDED FROM THE RAMBEH-TREE.
Sinensis delt. N. Cardon fct.
Published by W. Marsden, 1810.
PLATE 9a. THE MUSANG, A SPECIES OF VIVERRA.
W. Bell delt. A. Cardon fc.
Published by W. Marsden, 1810.
PLATE 10. THE TANGGILING OR PENG-GOLING-SISIK, A SPECIES OF MANIS.
W. Bell delt. A. Cardon fct.
Published by W. Marsden, 1810.
PLATE 11. n.1. THE ANJING-AYER, Mustela lutra.
W. Bell delt. A. Cardon fc.
PLATE 11a. n.2.
1. SKULL OF THE KAMBING-UTAN.
2. SKULL OF THE KIJANG.
W. Bell delt. A. Cardon sc.
PLATE 12. n.1. THE PALANDOK, A DIMINUTIVE SPECIES OF MOSCHUS.
Sinensis delt. A. Cardon fc.
PLATE 12a. n.2. THE KIJANG OR ROE, Cervus muntjak.
W. Bell delt. A. Cardon sc.
Published by W. Marsden, 1810.
PLATE 13. n.1. THE LANDAK, Hystrix longicauda.
Sinensis delt. A. Cardon fc.
Published by W. Marsden, 1810.
PLATE 13a. n.2. THE ANJING-AYER.
Sinensis delt. A. Cardon fc.
Published by W. Marsden, 1810.
PLATE 14. n.1. THE KAMBING-UTAN, OR WILD-GOAT.
W. Bell delt.
PLATE 14a. n.2. THE KUBIN, Draco volans.
Sinensis delt. A. Cardon sc.
Published by W. Marsden, 1810.
PLATE 15. BEAKS OF THE BUCEROS OR HORN-BILL.
M. de Jonville delt. Swaine sc.
Published by W. Marsden, 1810.
PLATE 16. A MALAY BOY, NATIVE OF BENCOOLEN.
T. Heaphy delt. A. Cardon fecit.
Published by W. Marsden, 1810.
PLATE 17. SUMATRAN WEAPONS.
A. A Malay Gadoobang.
B. A Batta Weapon.
C. A Malay Creese.
One-third of the size of the Originals.
W. Williams del. and sculpt.
Published by W. Marsden, 1810.
PLATE 17a. SUMATRAN WEAPONS.
D. A Malay Creese.
E. An Achenese Creese.
F. A Malay Sewar.
One-third of the size of the Originals.
W. Williams del. and sculpt.
PLATE 18. ENTRANCE OF PADANG RIVER.
With Buffaloes.
PLATE 18A. VIEW OF PADANG HILL.
Published by W. Marsden, 1810.
PLATE 19. A VILLAGE HOUSE IN SUMATRA.
W. Bell delt. J.G. Stadler sculpt.
Published by W. Marsden, 1810.
PLATE 19a. A PLANTATION HOUSE IN SUMATRA.
W. Bell delt. J.G. Stadler sculpt.
INDEX.
...
PREFACE.
The island of Sumatra, which, in point of situation and extent, holds a
conspicuous rank on the terraqueous globe, and is surpassed by few in the
bountiful indulgences of nature, has in all ages been unaccountably
neglected by writers insomuch that it is at this day less known, as to
the interior parts more especially, than the remotest island of modern
discovery; although it has been constantly resorted to by Europeans for
some centuries, and the English have had a regular establishment there
for the last hundred years. It is true that the commercial importance of
Sumatra has much declined. It is no longer the Emporium of Eastern riches
whither the traders of the West resorted with their cargoes to exchange
them for the precious merchandise of the Indian Archipelago: nor does it
boast now the political consequence it acquired when the rapid progress
of the Portuguese successes there first received a check. That
enterprising people, who caused so many kingdoms to shrink from the
terror of their arms, met with nothing but disgrace in their attempts
against Achin, whose monarchs made them tremble in their turn. Yet still
the importance of this island in the eye of the natural historian has
continued undiminished, and has equally at all periods laid claim to an
attention that does not appear, at any, to have been paid to it.
The Portuguese being better warriors than philosophers, and more eager to
conquer nations than to explore their manners or antiquities, it is not
surprising that they should have been unable to furnish the world with
any particular and just description of a country which they must have
regarded with an evil eye. The Dutch were the next people from whom we
had a right to expect information. They had an early intercourse with the
island, and have at different times formed settlements in almost every
part of it; yet they are almost silent with respect to its history.* But
to what cause are we to ascribe the remissness of our own countrymen,
whose opportunities have been equal to those of their predecessors or
contemporaries? It seems difficult to account for it; but the fact is
that, excepting a short sketch of the manners prevailing in a particular
district of the island, published in the Philosophical Transactions of
the year 1778, not one page of information respecting the inhabitants of
Sumatra has been communicated to the public by any Englishman who has
resided there.
(*Footnote. At the period when this remark was written, I was not aware
that an account of the Dutch settlements and commerce in Sumatra by M.
Adolph Eschels-kroon had in the preceding year been published at
Hamburgh, in the German language; nor had the transactions of a literary
society established at Batavia, whose first volume appeared there in
1779, yet reached this country. The work, indeed, of Valentyn, containing
a general history of the European possessions in the East Indies, should
have exempted a nation to which oriental learning is largely indebted
from what I now consider as an unmerited reflection.)
To form a general and tolerably accurate account of this country and its
inhabitants is a work attended with great and peculiar difficulties. The
necessary information is not to be procured from the people themselves,
whose knowledge and inquiries are to the last degree confined, scarcely
extending beyond the bounds of the district where they first drew breath;
and but very rarely have the almost impervious woods of Sumatra been
penetrated to any considerable distance from the sea coast by Europeans,
whose observations have been then imperfect, trusted perhaps to memory
only, or, if committed to paper, lost to the world by their deaths. Other
difficulties arise from the extraordinary diversity of national
distinctions, which, under a great variety of independent governments,
divide this island in many directions; and yet not from their number
merely, nor from the dissimilarity in their languages or manners, does
the embarrassment entirely proceed: the local divisions are perplexed and
uncertain; the extent of jurisdiction of the various princes is
inaccurately defined; settlers from different countries and at different
periods have introduced an irregular though powerful influence that
supersedes in some places the authority of the established governments,
and imposes a real dominion on the natives where a nominal one is not
assumed. This, in a course of years, is productive of innovations that
destroy the originality and genuineness of their customs and manners,
obliterate ancient distinctions, and render confused the path of an
investigator.
These objections, which seem to have hitherto proved unsurmountable with
such as might have been inclined to attempt the history of Sumatra, would
also have deterred me from an undertaking apparently so arduous, had I
not reflected that those circumstances in which consisted the principal
difficulty were in fact the least interesting to the public, and of the
least utility in themselves. It is of but small importance to determine
with precision whether a few villages on this or that particular river
belong to one petty chief or to another; whether such a nation is divided
into a greater or lesser number of tribes; or which of two neighbouring
powers originally did homage to the other for its title. History is only
to be prized as it tends to improve our knowledge of mankind, to which
such investigations contribute in a very small degree. I have therefore
attempted rather to give a comprehensive than a circumstantial
description of the divisions of the country into its various governments;
aiming at a more particular detail in what respects the customs,
opinions, arts, and industry of the original inhabitants in their most
genuine state. The interests of the European powers who have established
themselves on the island; the history of their settlements, and of the
revolutions of their commerce I have not considered as forming a part of
my plan; but these subjects, as connected with the accounts of the native
inhabitants and the history of their governments, are occasionally
introduced.
I was principally encouraged to this undertaking by the promises of
assistance I received from some ingenious and very highly esteemed
friends who resided with me in Sumatra. It has also been urged to me here
in England that, as the subject is altogether new, it is a duty incumbent
on me to lay the information I am in possession of, however defective,
before the public, who will not object to its being circumscribed whilst
its authenticity remains unimpeachable. This last quality is that which I
can with the most confidence take upon me to vouch for. The greatest
portion of what I have described has fallen within the scope of my own
immediate observation; the remainder is either matter of common notoriety
to every person residing in the island, or received upon the concurring
authority of gentlemen whose situation in the East India Company's
service, long acquaintance with the natives, extensive knowledge of their
language, ideas, and manners, and respectability of character, render
them worthy of the most implicit faith that can be given to human
testimony.
I have been the more scrupulously exact in this particular because my
view was not, ultimately, to write an entertaining book to which the
marvellous might be thought not a little to contribute, but sincerely and
conscientiously to add the small portion in my power to the general
knowledge of the age; to throw some glimmering light on the path of the
naturalist; and more especially to furnish those philosophers whose
labours have been directed to the investigation of the history of Man
with facts to serve as data in their reasonings, which are too often
rendered nugatory, and not seldom ridiculous, by assuming as truths the
misconceptions or wilful impositions of travellers. The study of their
own species is doubtless the most interesting and important that can
claim the attention of mankind; and this science, like all others, it is
impossible to improve by abstract speculation merely. A regular series of
authenticated facts is what alone can enable us to rise towards a perfect
knowledge in it. To have added one new and firm step in this arduous
ascent is a merit of which I should be proud to boast.
...
Of this third edition it is necessary to observe that, the former two
having made their appearance so early as the years 1783 and 1784, it
would long since have been prepared for the public eye had not the duties
of an official situation occupied for many years the whole of my
attention. During that period, however, I received from my friends abroad
various useful, and, to me at least, interesting communications which
have enabled me to correct some inaccuracies, to supply deficiencies, and
to augment the general mass of information on the subject of an island
still but imperfectly explored. To incorporate these new materials
requiring that many liberties should be taken with the original
contexture of the work, I became the less scrupulous of making further
alterations wherever I thought they could be introduced with advantage.
The branch of natural history in particular I trust will be found to have
received much improvement, and I feel happy to have had it in my power to
illustrate several of the more interesting productions of the vegetable
and animal kingdoms by engravings executed from time to time as the
drawings were procured, and which are intended to accompany the volume in
a separate atlas.
...
THE HISTORY OF SUMATRA.
CHAPTER 1.
SITUATION.
NAME.
GENERAL DESCRIPTION OF THE COUNTRY, ITS MOUNTAINS, LAKES, AND RIVERS.
AIR AND METEORS.
MONSOONS, AND LAND AND SEA-BREEZES.
MINERALS AND FOSSILS.
VOLCANOES.
EARTHQUAKES.
SURFS AND TIDES.
If antiquity holds up to us some models, in different arts and sciences,
which have been found inimitable, the moderns, on the other hand, have
carried their inventions and improvements, in a variety of instances, to
an extent and a degree of perfection of which the former could entertain
no ideas. Among those discoveries in which we have stepped so far beyond
our masters there is none more striking, or more eminently useful, than
the means which the ingenuity of some, and the experience of others, have
taught mankind, of determining with certainty and precision the relative
situation of the various countries of the earth. What was formerly the
subject of mere conjecture, or at best of vague and arbitrary
computation, is now the clear result of settled rule, founded upon
principles demonstratively just. It only remains for the liberality of
princes and states, and the persevering industry of navigators and
travellers, to effect the application of these means to their proper end,
by continuing to ascertain the unknown and uncertain positions of all the
parts of the world, which the barriers of nature will allow the skill and
industry of man to approach.
SITUATION OF THE ISLAND.
Sumatra, the subject of the present work, is an extensive island in the
East Indies, the most western of those which may be termed the Malayan
Archipelago, and constituting its boundary on that side.
LATITUDE.
The equator divides it obliquely, its general direction being north-west
and south-east, into almost equal parts; the one extremity lying in five
degrees thirty-three minutes north, and the other in five degrees
fifty-six minutes south latitude. In respect to relative position its
northern point stretches into the Bay of Bengal; its south-west coast is
exposed to the great Indian Ocean; towards the south it is separated by
the Straits of Sunda from the island of Java; on the east by the
commencement of the Eastern and China Seas from Borneo and other islands;
and on the north-east by the Straits of Malacca from the peninsula of
Malayo, to which, according to a tradition noticed by the Portuguese
historians, it is supposed to have been anciently united.
LONGITUDE.
The only point of the island whose longitude has been settled by actual
observation is Fort Marlborough, near Bencoolen, the principal English
settlement, standing in three degrees forty-six minutes of south
latitude. From eclipses of Jupiter's satellites observed in June 1769,
preparatory to an observation of the transit of the planet Venus over the
sun's disc, Mr. Robert Nairne calculated its longitude to be 101 degrees
42 minutes 45 seconds; which was afterwards corrected by the Astronomer
Royal to 102 degrees east of Greenwich. The situation of Achin Head is
pretty accurately fixed by computation at 95 degrees 34 minutes; and
longitudes of places in the Straits of Sunda are well ascertained by the
short runs from Batavia, which city has the advantage of an observatory.
MAP.
By the general use of chronometers in latter times the means have been
afforded of determining the positions of many prominent points both on
the eastern and western coasts, by which the map of the island has been
considerably improved: but particular surveys, such as those of the bays
and islets from Batang-kapas to Padang, made with great ability by
Captain (now Lieutenant-Colonel) John Macdonald; of the coast from
Priaman to the islands off Achin by Captain George Robertson; and of Siak
River by Mr. Francis Lynch, are much wanted; and the interior of the
country is still very imperfectly known. From sketches of the routes of
Mr. Charles Campbell and of Lieutenant Hastings Dare I have been enabled
to delineate the principal features of the Sarampei, Sungei Tenang and
Korinchi countries, inland of Ipu, Moco-moco, and Indrapura; and
advantage has been taken of all other information that could be procured.
For the general materials from which the map is constructed I am chiefly
indebted to the kindness of my friend, the late Mr. Alexander Dalrymple,
whose indefatigable labours during a long life have contributed more than
those of any other person to the improvement of Indian Hydrography. It
may be proper to observe that the map of Sumatra to be found in the fifth
volume of Valentyn's great work is so extremely incorrect, even in regard
to those parts immediately subject to the Dutch government, as to be
quite useless.
UNKNOWN TO THE ANCIENTS. TAPROBANE.
Notwithstanding the obvious situation of this island in the direct track
from the ports of India to the Spice Islands and to China, it seems to
have been unknown to the Greek and Roman geographers, whose information
or conjectures carried them no farther than Selan-dib or Ceylon, which
has claims to be considered as their Taprobane; although during the
middle ages that celebrated name was almost uniformly applied to Sumatra.
The single circumstance indeed of the latter being intersected by the
equator (as Taprobane was said to be) is sufficient to justify the doubts
of those who were disinclined to apply it to the former; and whether in
fact the obscure and contradictory descriptions given by Strabo,
Pomponius Mela, Pliny, and Ptolemy, belonged to any actual place, however
imperfectly known; or whether, observing that a number of rare and
valuable commodities were brought from an island or islands in the
supposed extremity of the East, they might have been led to give place in
their charts to one of vast extent, which should stand as the
representative of the whole, is a question not to be hastily decided.
OPHIR.
The idea of Sumatra being the country of Ophir, whither Solomon sent his
fleets for cargoes of gold and ivory, rather than to the coast of Sofala,
or other part of Africa, is too vague, and the subject wrapped in a veil
of too remote antiquity, to allow of satisfactory discussion; and I shall
only observe that no inference can be drawn from the name of Ophir found
in maps as belonging to a mountain in this island and to another in the
peninsula; these having been applied to them by European navigators, and
the word being unknown to the natives.
Until the discovery of the passage to India by the Cape of Good Hope the
identity of this island as described or alluded to by writers is often
equivocal, or to be inferred only from corresponding circumstances.
ARABIAN TRAVELLERS.
The first of the two Arabian travellers of the ninth century, the account
of whose voyages to India and China was translated by Renaudot from a
manuscript written about the year 1173, speaks of a large island called
Ramni, in the track between Sarandib and Sin (or China), that from the
similarity of productions has been generally supposed to mean Sumatra;
and this probability is strengthened by a circumstance I believe not
hitherto noticed by commentators. It is said to divide the Sea of
Herkend, or Indian Ocean, from the Sea of Shelahet) Salahet in Edrisi),
and Salat being the Malayan term both for a strait in general, and for
the well-known passage within the island of Singapura in particular, this
may be fairly presumed to refer to the Straits of Malacca.
EDRISI.
Edrisi, improperly called the Nubian geographer, who dedicated his work
to Roger, King of Sicily, in the middle of the twelfth century, describes
the same island, in the first climate, by the name of Al-Rami; but the
particulars so nearly correspond with those given by the Arabian
traveller as to show that the one account was borrowed from the other. He
very erroneously however makes the distance between Sarandib and that
island to be no more than three days' sail instead of fifteen. The island
of Soborma, which he places in the same climate, is evidently Borneo, and
the two passages leading to it are the Straits of Malacca and of Sunda.
What is mentioned of Sumandar, in the second climate, has no relation
whatever to Sumatra, although from the name we are led to expect it.
MARCO POLO.
Marco Polo, the celebrated Venetian traveller of the thirteenth century,
is the first European who speaks of this island, but under the
appellation of Java minor, which he gave to it by a sort of analogy,
having forgotten, or not having learned from the natives, its appropriate
name. His relation, though for a long time undervalued, and by many
considered as a romantic tale, and liable as it is to the charge of
errors and omissions, with some improbabilities, possesses,
notwithstanding, strong internal evidence of genuineness and good faith.
Containing few dates, the exact period of his visit to Sumatra cannot be
ascertained, but as he returned to Venice in 1295, and possibly five
years might have elapsed in his subsequent tedious voyages and journeys
by Ceylon, the Karnatick, Malabar, Guzerat, Persia, the shores of the
Caspian and Euxine, to Genoa (in a prison at which place he is said to
have dictated his narrative), we may venture to refer it to the year
1290.
Taking his departure, with a considerable equipment, from a southern port
of China, which he (or his transcriber) named Zaitum, they proceeded to
Ziamba (Tsiampa or Champa, adjoining to the southern part of
Cochin-China) which he had previously visited in 1280, being then in the
service of the emperor Kublai Khan. From thence, he says, to the island
of Java major is a course of fifteen hundred miles, but it is evident
that he speaks of it only from the information of others, and not as an
eyewitness; nor is it probable that the expedition should have deviated
so far from its proper route. He states truly that it is a mart for
spices and much frequented by traders from the southern provinces of
China. He then mentions in succession the small uninhabited islands of
Sondur and Condur (perhaps Pulo Condore); the province of Boeach
otherwise Lochac (apparently Camboja, near to which Condore is situated);
the island of Petan (either Patani or Pahang in the peninsula) the
passage to which, from Boeach, is across a gulf (that of Siam); and the
kingdom called Malaiur in the Italian, and Maletur in the Latin version,
which we can scarcely doubt to be the Malayan kingdom of Singa-Pura, at
the extremity of the peninsula, or Malacca, then beginning to flourish.
It is not however asserted that he touched at all these places, nor does
he seem to speak from personal knowledge until his arrival at Java minor
(as he calls it) or Sumatra. This island, lying in a south-eastern
direction from Petan (if he does not rather mean from Malaiur, the place
last mentioned) he expressly says he visited, and describes it as being
in circumference two thousand miles (not very wide of the truth in a
matter so vague), extending to the southward so far as to render the
Polar Star invisible, and divided into eight kingdoms, two of which he
did not see, and the six others he enumerates as follows: Ferlech, which
I apprehend to be Parlak, at the eastern extremity of the northern coast,
where they were likely to have first made the land. Here he says the
people in general were idolaters; but the Saracen merchants who
frequented the place had converted to the faith of Mahomet the
inhabitants of the towns, whilst those of the mountains lived like
beasts, and were in the practice of eating human flesh. Basma or Basman:
this nearly approaches in sound to Pasaman on the western coast, but I
should be more inclined to refer it to Pase (by the Portuguese written
Pacem) on the northern. The manners of the people here, as in the other
kingdoms, are represented as savage; and such they might well appear to
one who had long resided in China. Wild elephants are mentioned, and the
rhinoceros is well described. Samara: this I suppose to be Samar-langa,
likewise on the northern coast, and noted for its bay. Here, he says, the
expedition, consisting of two thousand persons, was constrained to remain
five months, waiting the change of the monsoon; and, being apprehensive
of injury from the barbarous natives, they secured themselves, by means
of a deep ditch, on the land side, with its extremities embracing the
port, and strengthened by bulwarks of timber. With provisions they were
supplied in abundance, particularly the finest fish. There is no wheat,
and the people live on rice. They are without vines, but extract an
excellent liquor from trees of the palm kind by cutting off a branch and
applying to it a vessel which is filled in the course of a day and night.
A description is then given of the Indian or coconut. Dragoian, a name
bearing some though not much resemblance to Indragiri on the eastern
coast; but I doubt his having proceeded so far to the southward as that
river. The customs of the natives are painted as still more atrocious in
this district. When any of them are afflicted with disorders pronounced
by their magicians to be incurable their relations cause them to be
suffocated, and then dress and eat their flesh; justifying the practice
by this argument, that if it were suffered to corrupt and breed worms,
these must presently perish, and by their deaths subject the soul of the
deceased to great torments. They also kill and devour such strangers
caught amongst them as cannot pay a ransom. Lambri might be presumed a
corruption of Jambi, but the circumstances related do not justify the
analogy. It is said to produce camphor, which is not found to the
southward of the equinoctial line; and also verzino, or red-wood (though
I suspect benzuin to be the word intended), together with a plant which
he names birci, supposed to be the bakam of the Arabs, or sappan wood of
the eastern islands, the seeds of which he carried with him to Venice. In
the mountainous parts were men with tails a palm long; also the
rhinoceros, and other wild animals. Lastly, Fanfur or Fansur, which
corresponds better to Campar than to the island of Panchur, which some
have supposed it. Here the finest camphor was produced, equal in value to
its weight in gold. The inhabitants live on rice and draw liquor from
certain trees in the manner before described. There are likewise trees
that yield a species of meal. They are of a large size, have a thin bark,
under which is a hard wood about three inches in thickness, and within
this the pith, from which, by means of steeping and straining it, the
meal (or sago) is procured, of which he had often eaten with
satisfaction. Each of these kingdoms is said to have had its peculiar
language. Departing from Lambri, and steering northward from Java minor
one hundred and fifty miles, they reached a small island named Necuram or
Norcueran (probably Nancowry, one of the Nicobars), and afterwards an
island named Angaman (Andaman), from whence, steering to the southward of
west a thousand miles, they arrived at that of Zeilan or Seilam, one of
the most considerable in the world. The editions consulted are chiefly
the Italian of Ramusio, 1583, Latin of Muller, 1671, and French of
Bergeron, 1735, varying much from each other in the orthography of proper
names.
ODORICUS.
Odoricus, a friar, who commenced his travels in 1318 and died at Padua in
1331, had visited many parts of the East. From the southern part of the
coast of Coromandel he proceeded by a navigation of twenty days to a
country named Lamori (perhaps a corruption of the Arabian Al-rami), to
the southward of which is another kingdom named Sumoltra, and not far
from thence a large island named Java. His account, which was delivered
orally to the person by whom it was written down, is extremely meagre and
unsatisfactory.
MANDEVILLE.
Mandeville, who travelled in the fourteenth century, seems to have
adopted the account of Odoricus when he says, "Beside the isle of Lemery
is another that is clept Sumobor; and fast beside a great isle clept
Java."
NICOLO DI CONTI.
Nicolo di Conti, of Venice, returned from his oriental travels in 1449
and communicated to the secretary of Pope Eugenius IV a much more
consistent and satisfactory account of what he had seen than any of his
predecessors. After giving a description of the cinnamon and other
productions of Zeilam he says he sailed to a great island named Sumatra,
called by the ancients Taprobana, where he was detained one year. His
account of the pepper-plant, of the durian fruit, and of the
extraordinary customs, now well ascertained, of the Batech or Batta
people, prove him to have been an intelligent observer.
ITINERARIUM PORTUGALLENSIUM.
A small work entitled Itinerarium Portugallensium, printed at Milan in
1508, after speaking of the island of Sayla, says that to the eastward of
this there is another called Samotra, which we name Taprobane, distant
from the city of Calechut about three months' voyage. The information
appears to have been obtained from an Indian of Cranganore, on the coast
of Malabar, who visited Lisbon in 1501.
LUDOVICO BARTHEMA.
Ludovico Barthema (Vartoma) of Bologna, began his travels in 1503, and in
1505, after visiting Malacca, which he describes as being the resort of a
greater quantity of shipping than any other port in the world, passed
over to Pedir in Sumatra, which he concludes to be Taprobane. The
productions of the island, he says, were chiefly exported to Catai or
China. From Sumatra he proceeded to Banda and the Moluccas, from thence
returned by Java and Malacca to the west of India, and arrived at Lisbon
in 1508.
ODOARDUS BARBOSA.
Odoardus Barbosa, of Lisbon, who concluded the journal of his voyage in
1516, speaks with much precision of Sumatra. He enumerates many places,
both upon the coast and inland, by the names they now bear, among which
he considers Pedir as the principal, distinguishes between the Mahometan
inhabitants of the coast and the Pagans of the inland country; and
mentions the extensive trade carried on by the former with Cambaia in the
west of India.
ANTONIO PIGAFETTA.
In the account given by Antonio Pigafetta, the companion of Ferdinand
Magellan, of the famous circumnavigatory voyage performed by the
Spaniards in the years 1519 to 1522, it is stated that, from their
apprehension of falling in with Portuguese ships, they pursued their
westerly route from the island of Timor, by the Laut Kidol, or southern
ocean, leaving on their right hand the island of Zamatra (written in
another part of the journal, Somatra) or Taprobana of the ancients.
Mention is also made of a native of that island being on board, who
served them usefully as an interpreter in many of the places they
visited; and we are here furnished with the earliest specimen of the
Malayan language.
PORTUGUESE EXPEDITIONS.
Previously however to this Spanish navigation of the Indian seas, by the
way of South America, the expeditions of the Portuguese round the Cape of
Good Hope had rendered the island well known, both in regard to its local
circumstances and the manners of its inhabitants.
EMANUEL KING OF PORTUGAL.
In a letter from Emanuel King of Portugal to Pope Leo the Tenth, dated in
1513, he speaks of the discovery of Zamatra by his subjects; and the
writings of Juan de Barros, Castaneda, Osorius, and Maffaeus, detail the
operations of Diogo Lopez de Sequeira at Pedir and Pase in 1509, and
those of the great Alfonso de Alboquerque at the same places, in 1511,
immediately before his attack upon Malacca. Debarros also enumerates the
names of twenty of the principal places of the island with considerable
precision, and observes that the peninsula or chersonesus had the epithet
of aurea given to it on account of the abundance of gold carried thither
from Monancabo and Barros, countries in the island of C(cedilla)amatra.
Having thus noticed what has been written by persons who actually visited
this part of India at an early period, or published from their oral
communication by contemporaries, it will not be thought necessary to
multiply authorities by quoting the works of subsequent commentators and
geographers, who must have formed their judgments from the same original
materials.
NAME OF SUMATRA.
With respect to the name of Sumatra, we perceive that it was unknown both
to the Arabian travellers and to Marco Polo, who indeed was not likely to
acquire it from the savage natives with whom he had intercourse. The
appellation of Java minor which he gives to the island seems to have been
quite arbitrary, and not grounded upon any authority, European or
Oriental, unless we can suppose that he had determined it to be the
I'azadith nesos of Ptolemy; but from the other parts of his relation it
does not appear that he was acquainted with the work of that great
geographer, nor could he have used it with any practical advantage. At
all events it could not have led him to the distinction of a greater and
a lesser Java; and we may rather conclude that, having visited (or heard
of) the great island properly so called, and not being able to learn the
real name of another, which from its situation and size might well be
regarded as a sister island, he applied the same to both, with the
relative epithets of major and minor. That Ptolemy's Jaba-dib or dio was
intended, however vaguely, for the island of Java, cannot be doubted. It
must have been known to the Arabian merchants, and he was indefatigable
in his inquiries; but at the same time that they communicated the name
they might be ill qualified to describe its geographical position.
In the rude narrative of Odoricus we perceive the first approach to the
modern name in the word Sumoltra. Those who immediately followed him
write it with a slight, and often inconsistent, variation in the
orthography, Sumotra, Samotra, Zamatra, and Sumatra. But none of these
travellers inform us from whom they learned it; whether from the natives
or from persons who had been in the habits of frequenting it from the
continent of India; which latter I think the more probable. Reland, an
able oriental scholar, who directed his attention to the languages of the
islands, says it obtains its appellation from a certain high land called
Samadra, which he supposes to signify in the language of the country a
large ant; but in fact there is not any spot so named; and although there
is some resemblance between semut, the word for an ant, and the name in
question, the etymology is quite fanciful. Others have imagined that they
find an easy derivation in the word samatra, to be met with in some
Spanish or Portuguese dictionaries, as signifying a sudden storm of wind
and rain, and from whence our seamen may have borrowed the expression;
but it is evident that the order of derivation is here reversed, and that
the phrase is taken from the name of the land in the neighbourhood of
which such squalls prevail. In a Persian work of the year 1611 the name
of Shamatrah occurs as one of those places where the Portuguese had
established themselves; and in some very modern Malayan correspondence I
find the word Samantara employed (along with another more usual, which
will be hereafter mentioned) to designate this island.
PROBABLY DERIVED FROM THE SANSKRIT.
These, it is true, are not entirely free from the suspicion of having
found their way to the Persians and Malays through the medium of European
intercourse; but to a person who is conversant with the languages of the
continent of India it must be obvious that the name, however written,
bears a strong resemblance to words in the Sanskrit language: nor should
this appear extraordinary when we consider (what is now fully admitted)
that a large proportion of the Malayan is derived from that source, and
that the names of many places in this and the neighbouring countries
(such as Indrapura and Indragiri in Sumatra, Singapura at the extremity
of the peninsula, and Sukapura and the mountain of Maha-meru in Java) are
indisputably of Hindu origin. It is not my intention however to assign a
precise etymology; but in order to show the general analogy to known
Sanskrit terms it may be allowed to instance Samuder, the ancient name of
the capital of the Carnatik, afterwards called Bider; Samudra-duta, which
occurs in the Hetopadesa, as signifying the ambassador of the sea; the
compound formed of su, good, and matra, measure; and more especially the
word samantara, which implying a boundary, intermediate, or what lies
between, might be thought to apply to the peculiar situation of an island
intermediate between two oceans and two straits.
NOT ENTIRELY UNKNOWN TO THE NATIVES.
When on a former occasion it was asserted (and with too much confidence)
that the name of Sumatra is unknown to the natives, who are ignorant of
its being an island, and have no general name for it, the expression
ought to have been confined to those natives with whom I had an
opportunity of conversing, in the southern part of the west coast, where
much genuineness of manners prevails, with little of the spirit of
commercial enterprise or communication with other countries. But even in
situations more favourable for acquiring knowledge I believe it will be
found that the inhabitants of very large islands, and especially if
surrounded by smaller ones, are accustomed to consider their own as terra
firma, and to look to no other geographical distinction than that of the
district or nation to which they belong. Accordingly we find that the
more general names have commonly been given by foreigners, and, as the
Arabians chose to call this island Al-rami or Lameri, so the Hindus
appear to have named it Sumatra or Samantara.
MALAYAN NAMES FOR THE ISLAND.
Since that period however, having become much better acquainted with
Malayan literature, and perused the writings of various parts of the
peninsula and islands where the language is spoken and cultivated, I am
enabled to say that Sumatra is well known amongst the eastern people and
the better-informed of the natives themselves by the two names of Indalas
and Pulo percha (or in the southern dialect Pritcho).
INDALAS.
Of the meaning or analogies of the former, which seems to have been
applied to it chiefly by the neighbouring people of Java, I have not any
conjecture, and only observe its resemblance (doubtless accidental) to
the Arabian denomination of Spain or Andalusia. In one passage I find the
Straits of Malacca termed the sea of Indalas, over which, we are gravely
told, a bridge was thrown by Alexander the Great.
PERCHA.
The latter and more common name is from a Malayan word signifying
fragments or tatters, and the application is whimsically explained by the
condition of the sails of the vessel in which the island was
circumnavigated for the first time; but it may with more plausibility be
supposed to allude to the broken or intersected land for which the
eastern coast is so remarkable. It will indeed be seen in the map that in
the vicinity of what are called Rupat's Straits there is a particular
place of this description named Pulo Percha, or the Broken Islands. As to
the appellation of Pulo Ber-api, or Volcano Island, which has also
occurred, it is too indefinite for a proper name in a region of the globe
where the phenomenon is by no means rare or peculiar, and should rather
be considered as a descriptive epithet.
MAGNITUDE.
In respect to magnitude, it ranks amongst the largest islands in the
world; but its breadth throughout is determined with so little accuracy
that any attempt to calculate its superficies must be liable to very
considerable error. Like Great Britain it is broadest at the southern
extremity, narrowing gradually to the north; and to this island it is
perhaps in size more nearly allied than in shape.
MOUNTAINS.
A chain of mountains runs through its whole extent, the ranges being in
many parts double and treble, but situated in general much nearer to the
western than the opposite coast, being on the former seldom so much as
twenty miles from the sea, whilst on the eastern side the extent of level
country, in the broader part of the island, through which run the great
rivers of Siak, Indragiri, Jambi, and Palembang, cannot be less than a
hundred and fifty. The height of these mountains, though very great, is
not sufficient to occasion their being covered with snow during any part
of the year, as those in South America between the tropics are found to
be. Mount Ophir,* or Gunong Pasaman, situated immediately under the
equinoctial line, is supposed to be the highest visible from the sea, its
summit being elevated thirteen thousand eight hundred and forty-two feet
above that level; which is no more than two-thirds of the altitude the
French astronomers have ascribed to the loftiest of the Andes, but
somewhat exceeds that of the Peak of Tenerife.
(*Footnote. The following is the result of observations made by Mr.
Robert Nairne of the height of Mount Ophir:
Height of the peak above the level of the sea, in feet: 13,842.
English miles: 2.6216.
Nautical miles: 2.26325.
Inland, nearly: 26 nautical miles.
Distance from Massang Point: 32 nautical miles.
Distance at sea before the peak is sunk under the horizon: 125 nautical
miles.
Latitude of the peak: 0 degrees 6 minutes north.
A volcano mountain, south of Ophir, is short of that in height by: 1377
feet.
Inland, nearly 29 nautical miles.
In order to form a comparison I subjoin the height, as computed by
mathematicians, of other mountains in different parts of the world:
Chimborazo, the highest of the Andes, 3220 toises or 20,633 English feet.
Of this about 2400 feet from the summit are covered with eternal snow.
Carazon, ascended by the French astronomers: 15,800 English feet.
Peak of Tenerife. Feuille: 2270 toises or 13,265 feet.
Mount Blanc, Savoy. Sr. G. Shuckburgh: 15,662.
Mount Etna, Sr. G. Shuckburgh: 10,954.
Between these ridges of mountains are extensive plains, considerably
elevated above the surface of the maritime lands, where the air is cool;
and from this advantage they are esteemed the most eligible portion of
the country, are consequently the best inhabited and the most cleared
from woods, which elsewhere in general throughout Sumatra cover both
hills and valleys with an eternal shade. Here too are found many large
and beautiful lakes that extend at intervals through the heart of the
country, and facilitate much the communication between the different
parts, but their dimensions, situation, or direction, are very little
known, though the natives make frequent mention of them in the accounts
of their journeys. Those principally spoken of are: one of great extent
but unascertained situation in the Batta country; one in the Korinchi
country, lately visited by Mr. C. Campbel; and another in the Lampong
country, extending towards Pasummah, navigated by boats of a large class
with sails, and requires a day and night to effect the passage across it;
which may be the case in the rainy season, as that part of the island
through which the Tulang Bawang River flows is subject to extensive
inundations, causing it to communicate with the river of the Palembang.
In a journey made many years since by a son of the sultan of the latter
place, to visit the English resident at Croee, he is said to have
proceeded by the way of that lake. It is much to be regretted that the
situation of so important a feature in the geography of the island should
be at this day the subject of uncertain conjecture.
WATERFALLS.
Waterfalls and cascades are not uncommon, as may be supposed in a country
of so uneven a surface as that of the western coast. A remarkable one
descends from the north side of Mount Pugong. The island of Mansalar,
lying off and affording shelter to the bay of Tappanuli, presents to the
view a fall of very striking appearance, the reservoir of which the
natives assert (in their fondness for the marvellous) to be a huge shell
of the species called kima (Chama gigas) found in great quantities in
that bay, as well as at New Guinea and other parts of the east.* At the
bottom of this fall ships occasionally take in their water without being
under the necessity of landing their casks; but such attempts are liable
to extreme hazard. A ship from England (the Elgin) attracted by the
appearance from sea of a small but beautiful cascade descending
perpendicularly from the steep cliff, that, like an immense rampart,
lines the seashore near Manna, sent a boat in order to procure fresh
water; but she was lost in the surf, and the crew drowned.
(*Footnote. The largest I have seen was brought from Tappanuli by Mr.
James Moore of Arno's Vale in the north of Ireland. It is 3 feet 3 1/2
inches in its longest diameter, and 2 feet 1 1/4 inches across. One of
the methods of taking them in deep water is by thrusting a long bamboo
between the valves as they lie open, when, by the immediate closure which
follows, they are made fast. The substance of the shell is perfectly
white, several inches thick, is worked by the natives into arm-rings, and
in the hands of our artists is found to take a polish equal to the finest
statuary marble.)
RIVERS.
No country in the world is better supplied with water than the western
coast of the island. Springs are found wherever they are sought for, and
the rivers are innumerable; but they are in general too small and rapid
for the purpose of navigation. The vicinity of the mountains to that side
of the island occasions this profusion of rivulets, and at the same time
the imperfections that attend them, by not allowing them space to
accumulate to any considerable size. On the eastern coast the distance of
the range of hills not only affords a larger scope for the course of the
rivers before they disembogue, presents a greater surface for the
receptacle of rain and vapours, and enables them to unite a greater
number of subsidiary streams, but also renders the flux more steady and
uniform by the extent of level space than where the torrent rolls more
immediately from the mountains. But it is not to be understood that on
the western side there are no large rivers. Kataun, Indrapura, Tabuyong,
and Sinkel have a claim to that title, although inferior in size to
Palembang, Jambi, Indragiri, and Siak. The latter derive also a material
advantage from the shelter given to them by the peninsula of Malacca, and
Borneo, Banca, and the other islands of the Archipelago, which, breaking
the force of the sea, prevent the surf from forming those bars that choke
the entrance of the south-western rivers, and render them impracticable
to boats of any considerable draught of water. These labour too under
this additional inconvenience that scarcely any except the largest run
out to sea in a direct course. The continual action of the surf, more
powerful than the ordinary force of the stream, throws up at their mouths
a bank of sand, which in many instances has the effect of diverting their
course to a direction parallel with the shore, between the cliffs and the
beach, until the accumulated waters at length force their way wherever
there is found the weakest resistance. In the southerly monsoon, when the
surfs are usually highest, and the streams, from the dryness of the
weather, least rapid, this parallel course is of the greatest extent; and
Moco-moco River takes a course, at times, of two or three miles in this
manner, before it mixes with the sea; but as the rivers swell with the
rain they gradually remove obstructions and recover their natural
channel.
AIR.
The heat of the air is by no means so intense as might be expected in a
country occupying the middle of the torrid zone. It is more temperate
than in many regions without the tropics, the thermometer, at the most
sultry hour, which is about two in the afternoon, generally fluctuating
between 82 and 85 degrees. I do not recollect to have ever seen it higher
than 86 in the shade, at Fort Marlborough; although at Natal, in latitude
34 minutes north, it is not unfrequently at 87 and 88 degrees. At sunrise
it is usually as low as 70; the sensation of cold however is much greater
than this would seem to indicate, as it occasions shivering and a
chattering of the teeth; doubtless from the greater relaxation of the
body and openness of the pores in that climate; for the same temperature
in England would be esteemed a considerable degree of warmth. These
observations on the state of the air apply only to the districts near the
sea-coast, where, from their comparatively low situation, and the greater
compression of the atmosphere, the sun's rays operate more powerfully.
Inland, as the country ascends, the degree of heat decreases rapidly,
insomuch that beyond the first range of hills the inhabitants find it
expedient to light fires in the morning, and continue them till the day
is advanced, for the purpose of warming themselves; a practice unknown in
the other parts of the island; and in the journal of Lieutenant Dare's
expedition it appears that during one night's halt on the summit of a
mountain, in the rainy season, he lost several of his party from the
severity of the weather, whilst the thermometer was not lower than 40
degrees. To the cold also they attribute the backwardness in growth of
the coconut-tree, which is sometimes twenty or thirty years in coming to
perfection, and often fails to produce fruit. Situations are uniformly
colder in proportion to their height above the level of the sea, unless
where local circumstances, such as the neighbourhood of sandy plains,
contribute to produce a contrary effect; but in Sumatra the coolness of
the air is promoted by the quality of the soil, which is clayey, and the
constant and strong verdure that prevails, which, by absorbing the sun's
rays, prevents the effect of their reflection. The circumstance of the
island being so narrow contributes also to its general temperateness, as
wind directly or recently from the sea is seldom possessed of any violent
degree of heat, usually acquired in passing over large tracts of land in
the tropical climates. Frost, snow, and hail I believe to be unknown to
the inhabitants. The hill-people in the country of Lampong speak indeed
of a peculiar kind of rain that falls there, which some have supposed to
be what we call sleet; but the fact is not sufficiently established. The
atmosphere is in common more cloudy than in Europe, which is sensibly
perceived from the infrequency of clear starlight nights. This may
proceed from the greater rarefaction of the air occasioning the clouds to
descend lower and become more opaque, or merely from the stronger heat
exhaling from the land and sea a thicker and more plentiful vapour. The
fog, called kabut by the natives, which is observed to rise every morning
among the distant hills, is dense to a surprising degree; the extremities
of it, even when near at hand, being perfectly defined; and it seldom is
observed to disperse till about three hours after sunrise.
WATERSPOUT.
That extraordinary phenomenon, the waterspout, so well known to and
described by navigators, frequently makes its appearance in these parts,
and occasionally on shore. I had seen many at sea; but the largest and
most distinct (from its proximity) that I had an opportunity of
observing, presented itself to me whilst on horseback. I was so near to
it that I could perceive what appeared to be an inward gyration, distinct
from the volume surrounding it or body of the tube; but am aware that
this might have been a deception of sight, and that it was the exterior
part which actually revolved--as quiescent bodies seem to persons in
quick motion, to recede in a contrary direction. Like other waterspouts
it was sometimes perpendicular and sometimes curved, like the pipe of a
still-head, its course tending in a direction from Bencoolen Bay across
the peninsula on which the English settlement stands; but before it
reached the sea on the other side it diminished by degrees, as if from
want of the supplies that should be furnished by its proper element, and
collected itself into the cloud from which it depended, without any
consequent fall of water or destructive effect. The whole operation we
may presume to be of the nature of a whirlwind, and the violent
ebullition in that part of the sea to which the lower extremity of the
tube points to be a corresponding effect to the agitation of the leaves
or sand on shore, which in some instances are raised to a vast height;
but in the formation of the waterspout the rotatory motion of the wind
acts not only upon the surface of the land or sea, but also upon the
overhanging cloud, and seems to draw it downwards.
THUNDER AND LIGHTNING.
Thunder and lightning are there so very frequent as scarcely to attract
the attention of persons long resident in the country. During the
north-west monsoon the explosions are extremely violent; the forked
lightning shoots in all directions, and the whole sky seems on fire,
whilst the ground is agitated in a degree little inferior to the motion
of a slight earthquake. In the south-east monsoon the lightning is more
constant, but the coruscations are less fierce or bright, and the thunder
is scarcely audible. It would seem that the consequences of these awful
meteors are not so fatal there as in Europe, few instances occurring of
lives being lost or buildings destroyed by the explosions, although
electrical conductors have never been employed. Perhaps the paucity of
inhabitants in proportion to the extent of country and the unsubstantial
materials of the houses may contribute to this observation. I have seen
some trees, however, that have been shattered in Sumatra by the action of
lightning.*
(*Footnote. Since the above was written accounts have been received that
a magazine at Fort Marlborough, containing four hundred barrels of
powder, was fired by lightning and blown up on the 18th of March 1782.)
MONSOONS.
The causes which produce a successive variety of seasons in the parts of
the earth without the tropics, having no relation or respect to the
region of the torrid zone, a different order takes place there, and the
year is distinguished into two divisions, usually called the rainy and
dry monsoons or seasons, from the weather peculiar to each. In the
several parts of India these monsoons are governed by various particular
laws in regard to the time of their commencement, period of duration,
circumstances attending their change, and direction of the prevailing
wind according to the nature and situation of the lands and coasts where
their influence is felt. The farther peninsula of India, where the
kingdom of Siam lies, experiences at the same time the effects of
opposite seasons; the western side, in the Bay of Bengal, being exposed
for half the year to continual rains, whilst on the eastern side the
finest weather is enjoyed; and so on the different coasts of Indostan the
monsoons exert their influence alternately; the one remaining serene and
undisturbed whilst the other is agitated by storms. Along the coast of
Coromandel the change, or breaking up of the monsoon as it is called, is
frequently attended with the most violent gales of wind.
On the west coast of Sumatra, southward of the equinoctial, the
south-east monsoon or dry season begins about May and slackens in
September: the north-west monsoon begins about November, and the hard
rains cease about March. The monsoons for the most part commence and
leave off gradually there; the months of April and May, October and
November generally affording weather and winds variable and uncertain.
CAUSE OF THE MONSOONS.
The causes of these periodical winds have been investigated by several
able naturalists, whose systems, however, do not entirely correspond
either in the principles laid down or in their application to the effects
known to be produced in different parts of the globe. I shall summarily
mention what appear to be the most evident, or probable at least, among
the general laws, or inferences, which have been deduced from the
examination of this subject. If the sea were perfectly uninterrupted and
free from the irregular influence of lands, a perpetual easterly wind
would prevail in all that space comprehended between the twenty-eighth or
thirteenth degrees of north and south latitude. This is primarily
occasioned by the diurnal revolution of the earth upon its axis from west
to east; but whether through the operation of the sun, proceeding
westward, upon the atmospheric fluid, or the rapidity of revolution of
the solid body, which leaves behind it that fluid with which it is
surrounded, and thereby causes it virtually to recede in a contrary
direction; or whether these principles cooperate, or unequally oppose
each other, as has been ingeniously contended, I shall not take upon me
to decide. It is sufficient to say that such an effect appears to be the
first general law of the tropical winds. Whatever may be the degree of
the sun's influence upon the atmosphere in his transient diurnal course,
it cannot be doubted but that, in regard to his station in the path of
the ecliptic, his power is considerable. Towards that region of the air
which is rarefied by the more immediate presence of the heat, the colder
and denser parts will naturally flow. Consequently from about, and a few
degrees beyond, the tropics, on either side, the air tends towards the
equator; and, combining with the general eastern current before
mentioned, produces (or would, if the surface were uniform) a north-east
wind in the northern division, and a south-east in the southern; varying
in the extent of its course as the sun happens to be more or less remote
at the time. These are denominated the trade-winds, and are the subject
of the second general observation. It is evident that, with respect to
the middle space between the tropics, those parts which at one season of
the year lie to the northward of the sun, are, during another, to the
southward of him; and of course that an alteration of the effects last
described must take place, according to the relative situation of the
luminary; or in other words, that the principle which causes at one time
a north-east wind to prevail at any particular spot in those latitudes
must, when the circumstances are changed, occasion a south-east wind.
Such may be esteemed the outline of the periodical winds, which
undoubtedly depend upon the alternate course of the sun northwards and
southwards; and this I state as the third general law. But although this
may be conformable with experience in extensive oceans, yet, in the
vicinity of continents and great islands, deviations are remarked that
almost seem to overturn the principle. Along the western coast of Africa
and in some parts of the Indian seas, the periodical winds, or monsoons
as they are termed in the latter, blow from the west-north-west and
south-west, according to the situation, extent, and nature of the nearest
lands; the effect of which upon the incumbent atmosphere, when heated by
the sun at those seasons in which he is vertical, is prodigious, and
possibly superior to that of any other cause which contributes to the
production or direction of wind. To trace the operation of this irregular
principle through the several winds prevalent in India, and their
periodical failures and changes, would prove an intricate but, I
conceive, by no means an impossible task.* It is foreign however to my
present purpose, and I shall only observe that the north-east monsoon is
changed, on the western coast of Sumatra, to north-west or
west-north-west by the influence of the land. During the south-east
monsoon the wind is found to blow there, between that point and south.
Whilst the sun continues near the equator the winds are variable, nor is
their direction fixed till he has advanced several degrees towards the
tropic: and this is the cause of the monsoons usually setting in, as I
have observed, about May and November, instead of the equinoctial months.
(*Footnote. It has been attempted, and with much ingenious reasoning, by
Mr. Semeyns in the third volume of the Haerlem Transactions which have
but lately fallen into my hands.)
LAND AND SEA BREEZES.
Thus much is sufficient with regard to the periodical winds. I shall
proceed to give an account of those distinguished by the appellation of
land and sea breezes, which require from me a minuter investigation, both
because, as being more local, they more especially belong to my subject,
and that their nature has hitherto been less particularly treated of by
naturalists.
In this island, as well as all other countries between the tropics of any
considerable extent, the wind uniformly blows from the sea to the land
for a certain number of hours in the four and twenty, and then changes
and blows for about as many from the land to the sea; excepting only when
the monsoon rages with remarkable violence, and even at such time the
wind rarely fails to incline a few points, in compliance with the efforts
of the subordinate clause, which has not power, under these
circumstances, to produce an entire change. On the west coast of Sumatra
the sea-breeze usually sets in, after an hour or two of calm, about ten
in the forenoon, and continues till near six in the evening. About seven
the land-breeze comes off, and prevails through the night till towards
eight in the morning, when it gradually dies away.
CAUSE OF THE LAND AND SEA-BREEZES.
These depend upon the same general principle that causes and regulates
all other wind. Heat acting upon air rarefies it, by which it becomes
specifically lighter, and mounts upward. The denser parts of the
atmosphere which surround that so rarefied, rush into the vacuity from
their superior weight; endeavouring, as the laws of gravity require, to
restore the equilibrium. Thus in the round buildings where the
manufactory of glass is carried on, the heat of the furnace in the centre
being intense, a violent current of air may be perceived to force its way
in, through doors or crevices, on opposite sides of the house. As the
general winds are caused by the DIRECT influence of the sun's rays upon
the atmosphere, that particular deviation of the current distinguished by
the name of land and sea breezes is caused by the influence of his
REFLECTED rays, returned from the earth or sea on which they strike. The
surface of the earth is more suddenly heated by the rays of the sun than
that of the sea, from its greater density and state of rest; consequently
it reflects those rays sooner and with more power: but, owing also to its
density, the heat is more superficial than that imbibed by the sea, which
becomes more intimately warmed by its transparency and by its motion,
continually presenting a fresh surface to the sun. I shall now endeavour
to apply these principles. By the time the rising sun has ascended to the
height of thirty or forty degrees above the horizon the earth has
acquired, and reflected on the body of air situated over it, a degree of
heat sufficient to rarefy it and destroy its equilibrium; in consequence
of which the body of air above the sea, not being equally, or scarcely at
all, rarefied, rushes towards the land and the same causes operating so
long as the sun continues above the horizon, a constant sea-breeze, or
current of air from sea to land, prevails during that time. From about an
hour before sunset the surface of the earth begins to lose the heat it
has acquired from the more perpendicular rays. That influence of course
ceases, and a calm succeeds. The warmth imparted to the sea, not so
violent as that of the land but more deeply imbibed, and consequently
more permanent, now acts in turn, and by the rarefaction it causes draws
towards its region the land air, grown cooler, more dense, and heavier,
which continues thus to flow back till the earth, by a renovation of its
heat in the morning, once more obtains the ascendancy. Such is the
general rule, conformable with experience, and founded, as it seems to
me, in the laws of motion and the nature of things. The following
observations will serve to corroborate what I have advanced, and to throw
additional light on the subject for the information and guidance of any
future investigator.
The periodical winds which are supposed to blow during six months from
the north-west and as many from the south-east rarely observe this
regularity, except in the very heart of the monsoon; inclining, almost at
all times, several points to seaward, and not unfrequently blowing from
the south-west or in a line perpendicular to the coast. This must be
attributed to the influence of that principle which causes the land and
sea winds proving on these occasions more powerful than the principle of
the periodical winds; which two seem here to act at right angles with
each other; and as the influence of either is prevalent the winds draw
towards a course perpendicular to or parallel with the line of the coast.
Excepting when a squall or other sudden alteration of weather, to which
these climates are particularly liable, produces an irregularity, the
tendency of the land-wind at night has almost ever a correspondence with
the sea-wind of the preceding or following day; not blowing in a
direction immediately opposite to it (which would be the case if the
former were, as some writers have supposed, merely the effect of the
accumulation and redundance of the latter, without any positive cause)
but forming an equal and contiguous angle, of which the coast is the
common side. Thus, if the coast be conceived to run north and south, the
same influence, or combination of influences, which produces a sea-wind
at north-west produces a land-wind at north-east; or adapting the case to
Sumatra, which lies north-west and south-east, a sea-wind at south is
preceded or followed by a land-wind at east. This remark must not be
taken in too strict a sense, but only as the result of general
observation. If the land-wind, in the course of the night, should draw
round from east to north it would be looked upon as an infallible
prognostic of a west or north-west wind the next day. On this principle
it is that the natives foretell the direction of the wind by the noise of
the surf at night, which if heard from the northward is esteemed the
forerunner of a northerly wind, and vice versa. The quarter from which
the noise is heard depends upon the course of the land-wind, which brings
the sound with it, and drowns it to leeward--the land-wind has a
correspondence with the next day's sea-wind--and thus the divination is
accounted for.
The effect of the sea-wind is not perceived to the distance of more than
three or four leagues from the shore in common, and for the most part it
is fainter in proportion to the distance. When it first sets in it does
not commence at the remoter extremity of its limits but very near the
shore, and gradually extends itself farther to sea, as the day advances;
probably taking the longer or shorter course as the day is more or less
hot. I have frequently observed the sails of ships at the distance of
four, six, or eight miles, quite becalmed, whilst a fresh sea-breeze was
at the time blowing upon the shore. In an hour afterwards they have felt
its effect.*
(*Footnote. This observation as well as many others I have made on the
subject I find corroborated in the Treatise before quoted from the
Haerlem Transactions which I had not seen when the present work was first
published.)
Passing along the beach about six o'clock in the evening when the
sea-breeze is making its final efforts, I have perceived it to blow with
a considerable degree of warmth, owing to the heat the sea had by that
time acquired, which would soon begin to divert the current of air
towards it when it had first overcome the vis inertiae that preserves
motion in a body after the impelling power has ceased to operate. I have
likewise been sensible of a degree of warmth on passing, within two hours
after sunset, to leeward of a lake of fresh water; which proves the
assertion of water imbibing a more permanent heat than earth. In the
daytime the breeze would be rendered cool in crossing the same lake.
Approaching an island situated at a distance from any other land, I was
struck with the appearance of the clouds about nine in the morning which
then formed a perfect circle round it, the middle being a clear azure,
and resembled what the painters call a glory. This I account for from the
reflected rays of the sun rarefying the atmosphere immediately over the
island, and equally in all parts, which caused a conflux of the
neighbouring air, and with in the circumjacent clouds. These last,
tending uniformly to the centre, compressed each other at a certain
distance from it, and, like the stones in an arch of masonry, prevented
each other's nearer approach. That island, however, does not experience
the vicissitude of land and sea breezes, being too small, and too lofty,
and situated in a latitude where the trade or perpetual winds prevail in
their utmost force. In sandy countries, the effect of the sun's rays
penetrating deeply, a more permanent heat is produced, the consequence of
which should be the longer continuance of the sea-breeze in the evening;
and agreeably to this supposition I have been informed that on the coast
of Coromandel it seldom dies away before ten at night. I shall only add
on this subject that the land-wind on Sumatra is cold, chilly, and damp;
an exposure to it is therefore dangerous to the health, and sleeping in
it almost certain death.
SOIL.
The soil of the western side of Sumatra may be spoken of generally as a
stiff, reddish clay, covered with a stratum or layer of black mould, of
no considerable depth. From this there springs a strong and perpetual
verdure of rank grass, brushwood, or timber-trees, according as the
country has remained a longer or shorter time undisturbed by the
consequences of population, which, being in most places extremely thin,
it follows that a great proportion of the island, and especially to the
southward, is an impervious forest.
UNEVENNESS OF SURFACE.
Along the western coast of the island the low country, or space of land
which extends from the seashore to the foot of the mountains, is
intersected and rendered uneven to a surprising degree by swamps whose
irregular and winding course may in some places be traced in a continual
chain for many miles till they discharge themselves either into the sea,
some neighbouring lake, or the fens that are so commonly found near the
banks of the larger rivers and receive their overflowings in the rainy
monsoons. The spots of land which these swamps encompass become so many
islands and peninsulas, sometimes flat at top, and often mere ridges;
having in some places a gentle declivity, and in others descending almost
perpendicularly to the depth of a hundred feet. In few parts of the
country of Bencoolen, or of the northern districts adjacent to it, could
a tolerably level space of four hundred yards square be marked out. I
have often, from an elevated situation, where a wider range was subjected
to the eye, surveyed with admiration the uncommon face which nature
assumes, and made inquiries and attended to conjectures on the causes of
these inequalities. Some choose to attribute them to the successive
concussions of earthquakes through a course of centuries. But they do not
seem to be the effect of such a cause. There are no abrupt fissures; the
hollows and swellings are for the most part smooth and regularly sloping
so as to exhibit not unfrequently the appearance of an amphitheatre, and
they are clothed with verdure from the summit to the edge of the swamp.
From this latter circumstance it is also evident that they are not, as
others suppose, occasioned by the falls of heavy rains that deluge the
country for one half of the year; which is likewise to be inferred from
many of them having no apparent outlet and commencing where no torrent
could be conceived to operate. The most summary way of accounting for
this extraordinary unevenness of surface were to conclude that, in the
original construction of our globe, Sumatra was thus formed by the same
hand which spread out the sandy plains of Arabia, and raised up the alps
and Andes beyond the region of the clouds. But this is a mode of solution
which, if generally adopted, would become an insuperable bar to all
progress in natural knowledge by damping curiosity and restraining
research. Nature, we know from sufficient experience, is not only turned
from her original course by the industry of man, but also sometimes
checks and crosses her own career. What has happened in some instances it
is not unfair to suppose may happen in others; nor is it presumption to
trace the intermediate causes of events which are themselves derived from
one first, universal, and eternal principle.
CAUSES OF THIS INEQUALITY.
To me it would seem that the springs of water with which these parts of
the island abound in an uncommon degree operate directly, though
obscurely, to the producing this irregularity of the surface of the
earth. They derive their number and an extraordinary portion of activity
from the loftiness of the ranges of mountains that occupy the interior
country, and intercept and collect the floating vapours. Precipitated
into rain at such a hight, the water acquires in its descent through the
fissures or pores of these mountains a considerable force which exerts
itself in every direction, lateral and perpendicular, to procure a vent.
The existence of these copious springs is proved in the facility with
which wells are everywhere sunk; requiring no choice of ground but as it
may respect the convenience of the proprietor; all situations, whether
high or low, being prodigal of this valuable element. Where the
approaches of the sea have rendered the cliffs abrupt, innumerable rills,
or rather a continued moisture, is seen to ooze through and trickle down
the steep. Where on the contrary the sea has retired and thrown up banks
of sand in its retreat I have remarked the streams of water, at a certain
level and commonly between the boundaries of the tide, effecting their
passage through the loose and feeble barrier opposed to them. In short,
every part of the low country is pregnant with springs that labour for
the birth; and these continual struggles, this violent activity of
subterraneous waters, must gradually undermine the plains above. The
earth is imperceptibly excavated, the surface settles in, and hence the
inequalities we speak of. The operation is slow but unremitting, and, I
conceive, fully capable of the effect.
MINERAL PRODUCTIONS.
The earth of Sumatra is rich in minerals and other fossil productions.
GOLD.
No country has been more famous in all ages for gold, and, though the
sources from whence it is drawn may be supposed in some measure exhausted
by the avarice and industry of ages, yet at this day the quantity
procured is very considerable, and doubtless might be much increased were
the simple labour of the gatherer assisted by a knowledge of the arts of
mineralogy.
COPPER, IRON, TIN, SULPHUR.
There are also mines of copper, iron, and tin. Sulphur is gathered in
large quantities about the numerous volcanoes.
SALTPETRE.
Saltpetre the natives procure by a process of their own from the earth
which is found impregnated with it; chiefly in extensive caves that have
been, from the beginning of time, the haunt of a certain species of
birds, of whose dung the soil is formed.
COAL.
Coal, mostly washed down by the floods, is collected in several parts,
particularly at Kataun, Ayer-rammi, and Bencoolen. It is light and not
esteemed very good; but I am informed that this is the case with all coal
found near the surface of the earth, and, as the veins are observed to
run in an inclined direction until the pits have some depth, the fossil
must be of an indifferent quality. The little island of Pisang, near the
foot of Mount Pugong, was supposed to be chiefly a bed of rock crystal,
but upon examination of specimens taken from thence they proved to be
calcareous spar.
HOT SPRINGS.
Mineral and hot springs have been discovered in many districts. In taste
the waters mostly resemble those of Harrowgate, being nauseous to the
palate.
EARTH OIL.
The oleum terrae, or earth oil, used chiefly as a preservative against
the destructive ravages of the white-ants, is collected at Ipu and
elsewhere.*
(*Footnote. The fountain of Naphtha or liquid balsam found at Pedir, so
much celebrated by the Portuguese writers, is doubtless this oleum
terrae, or meniak tanah, as it is called by the Malays.)
SOFT ROCK.
There is scarcely any species of hard rock to be met with in the low
parts of the island near the seashore. Besides the ledges of coral, which
are covered by the tide, that which generally prevails is the napal, as
it is called by the inhabitants, forming the basis of the red cliffs, and
not infrequently the beds of the rivers. Though this napal has the
appearance of rock it possesses in fact so little solidity that it is
difficult to pronounce whether it be a soft stone or only an indurated
clay. The surface of it becomes smooth and glossy by a slight attrition,
and to the touch resembles soap, which is its most striking
characteristic; but it is not soluble in water and makes no effervescence
with acids. Its colour is either grey, brown, or red, according to the
nature of the earth that prevails in its composition. The red napal has
by much the smallest proportion of sand, and seems to possess all the
qualities of the steatite or soap-earth found in Cornwall and other
countries. The specimens of stone which I brought from the hills in the
neighbourhood of Bencoolen were pronounced by some mineralogists, to whom
I showed them at the time, to be granite; but upon more particular
examination they appear to be a species of trap, consisting principally
of feldspar and hornblende, of a greyish colour and nearly similar to the
mountain stone of North Wales.
PETRIFACTION.
Where the encroachments of the sea have undermined the land the cliffs
are left abrupt and naked, in some places to a very considerable height.
In these many curious fossils are discovered, such as petrified wood, and
seashells of various sorts. Hypotheses on this subject have been so ably
supported and so powerfully attacked that I shall not presume to intrude
myself in the lists. I shall only observe that, being so near the sea,
many would hesitate to allow such discoveries to be of any weight in
proving a violent alteration to have taken place in the surface of the
terraqueous globe; whilst, on the other hand, it is unaccountable how, in
the common course of natural events, such extraneous matter should come
to be lodged in strata at the height perhaps of fifty feet above the
level of the water, and as many below the surface of the land.
COLOURED EARTHS.
Here are likewise found various species of earths which might be applied
to valuable purposes, as painters' colours, and otherwise. The most
common are the yellow and red, probably ochres, and the white, which
answers the description of the milenum of the ancients.
VOLCANOES.
There are a number of volcano mountains in this, as in almost all the
other islands of the eastern Archipelago. They are called in the Malay
language gunong-api, or more correctly, gunong ber-api. Lava has been
seen to flow from a considerable one near Priamang; but I have never
heard of its causing any other damage than the burning of woods. This
however may be owing to the thinness of population, which does not render
it necessary for the inhabitants to settle in a situation that exposes
them to danger of this kind. The only volcano I had an opportunity of
observing opened in the side of a mountain, about twenty miles inland of
Bencoolen, one-fourth way from its top, as nearly as I can judge. It
scarcely ever failed to emit smoke; but the column was only visible for
two or three hours in the morning, seldom rising and preserving its form,
above the upper edge of the hill, which is not of a conical shape but
extending with a gradual slope.
EARTHQUAKES.
The high trees with which the country thereabout is covered, prevent the
crater from being discernible at a distance; and this proves that the
spot is not considerably raised or otherwise affected by the earthquakes
which are very frequently felt there. Sometimes it has emitted smoke upon
these occasions, and in other instances not. Yet during a smart
earthquake which happened a few years before my arrival it was remarked
to send forth flame, which it is rarely known to do.* The apprehension of
the European inhabitants however is rather more excited when it continues
any length of time without a tendency to an eruption, as they conceive it
to be the vent by which the inflammable matter escapes that would
otherwise produce these commotions of the earth. Comparatively with the
descriptions I have read of earthquakes in South America, Calabria, and
other countries, those which happen in Sumatra are generally very slight;
and the usual manner of building renders them but little formidable to
the natives.
(*Footnote. Some gentlemen who deny the fact of its having at any time
emitted flame, conjecture that what exhibits the appearance of smoke is
more probably vapour arising from a considerable hot spring. The natives
speak of it as a volcano.)
REMARKABLE EFFECTS OF AN EARTHQUAKE.
The most severe that I have known was chiefly experienced in the district
of Manna in the year 1770. A village was destroyed by the houses falling
down and taking fire, and several lives were lost.* The ground was in one
place rent a quarter of a mile, the width of two fathoms, and depth of
four or five. A bituminous matter is described to have swelled over the
sides of the cavity, and the earth for a long time after the shocks was
observed to contract and dilate alternately. Many parts of the hills far
inland could be distinguished to have given way, and a consequence of
this was that during three weeks Manna River was so much impregnated with
particles of clay that the natives could not bathe in it. At this time
was formed near to the mouth of Padang Guchi, a neighbouring river south
of the former, a large plain, seven miles long and half a mile broad;
where there had been before only a narrow beach. The quantity of earth
brought down on this occasion was so considerable that the hill upon
which the English resident's house stands appears, from indubitable
marks, less elevated by fifteen feet than it was before the event.
(*Footnote. I am informed that in 1763 an entire village was swallowed up
by an earthquake in Pulo Nias, one of the islands which lie off the
western coast of Sumatra. In July or August of the same year a severe one
was felt in Bengal.)
Earthquakes have been remarked by some to happen usually upon sudden
changes of weather, and particularly after violent heats; but I do not
vouch this upon my own experience, which has been pretty ample. They are
preceded by a low rumbling noise like distant thunder. The domestic
cattle and fowls are sensible of the preternatural motion, and seem much
alarmed; the latter making the cry they are wont to do on the approach of
birds of prey. Houses situated on a low sandy soil are least affected,
and those which stand on distinct hills suffer most from the shocks
because the further removed from the centre of motion the greater the
agitation; and the loose contexture of the one foundation, making less
resistance than the solidity of the other, subjects the building to less
violence. Ships at anchor in the road, though several miles distant from
the shore, are strongly sensible of the concussion.
NEW LAND FORMED.
Besides the new land formed by the convulsions above described, the sea
by a gradual recess in some parts produces the same effect. Many
instances of this kind, of no considerable extent however have been
observed within the memory of persons now living. But it would seem to me
that that large tract of land called Pulo Point, forming the bay of the
name, near to Silebar, with much of the adjacent country has thus been
left by the withdrawing or thrown up by the motion of the sea. Perhaps
the point may have been at first an island (from whence its appellation
of Pulo) and the parts more inland gradually united to it.* Various
circumstances tend to corroborate such an opinion, and to evince the
probability that this was not an original portion of the main but new,
half-formed land. All the swamps and marshy grounds that lie within the
beach, and near the extremity there are little else, are known, in
consequence of repeated surveys, to be lower than the level of
high-water; the bank of sand alone preventing an inundation. The country
is not only quite free from hills or inequalities of any kind, but has
scarcely a visible slope. Silebar River, which empties itself into Pulo
Bay, is totally unlike those in other parts of the island. The motion of
its stream is hardly perceptible; it is never affected by floods; its
course is marked out, not by banks covered with ancient and venerable
woods but by rows of mangroves and other aquatics springing from the
ooze, and perfectly regular. Some miles from the mouth it opens into a
beautiful and extensive lake, diversified with small islands, flat, and
verdant with rushes only. The point of Pulo is covered with the arau tree
(casuarina) or bastard-pine, as some have called it, which never grows
but in the seasand and rises fast.
(*Footnote. Since I formed this conjecture I have been told that such a
tradition of no very ancient date prevails amongst the inhabitants.)
ENCROACHMENT OF THE SEA.
None such are found toward Sungei-Lamo and the rest of the shore
northward of Marlborough Point, where, on the contrary, you perceive the
effects of continual depredations by the ocean. The old forest trees are
there yearly undermined and, falling, obstruct the traveller; whilst
about Pulo the arau-trees are continually springing up faster than they
can be cut down or otherwise destroyed. Nature will not readily be forced
from her course. The last time I visited that part there was a beautiful
rising grove of these trees, establishing a possession in their proper
soil. The country, as well immediately here about as to a considerable
distance inland, is an entire bed of sand without any mixture of clay or
mould, which I know to have been in vain sought for many miles up the
neighbouring rivers. To the northward of Padang there is a plain which
has evidently been, in former times, a bay. Traces of a shelving beach
are there distinguishable at the distance of one hundred and fifty yards
from the present boundary of the sea.
But upon what hypothesis can it be accounted for that the sea should
commit depredations on the northern coast, of which there are the most
evident tokens as high up at least as Ipu, and probably to Indrapura,
where the shelter of the neighbouring islands may put a stop to them, and
that it should restore the land to the southward in the manner I have
described? I am aware that according to the general motion of the tides
from east to west this coast ought to receive a continual accession
proportioned to the loss which others, exposed to the direction of this
motion, must and do sustain; and it is likely that it does gain upon the
whole. But the nature of my work obliges me to be more attentive to
effects than causes, and to record facts though they should clash with
systems the most just in theory, and most respectable in point of
authority.
ISLANDS NEAR THE WEST COAST.
The chain of islands which lie parallel with the west coast of Sumatra
may probably have once formed a part of the main and been separated from
it, either by some violent effort of nature, or the gradual attrition of
the sea. I should scarcely introduce the mention of this apparently vague
surmise but that a circumstance presents itself on the coast which
affords some stronger colour of proof than can be usually obtained in
such instances. In many places, and particularly about Pally, we observe
detached pieces of land standing singly, as islands, at the distance of
one or two hundred yards from the shore, which were headlands of points
running out into the sea within the remembrance of the inhabitants. The
tops continue covered with trees or shrubs; but the sides are bare,
abrupt, and perpendicular. The progress of insulation here is obvious and
incontrovertible, and why may not larger islands, at a greater distance,
have been formed in the revolution of ages by the same accidents? The
probability is heightened by the direction of the islands Nias, Batu,
Mantawei, Pagi, Mego, etc., the similarity of the rock, soil, and
productions, and the regularity of soundings between them and the main,
whilst without them the depth is unfathomable.
CORAL ROCKS.
Where the shore is flat or shelving the coast of Sumatra, as of all other
tropical islands, is defended from the attacks of the sea by a reef or
ledge of coral rock on which the surfs exert their violence without
further effect than that of keeping its surface even, and reducing to
powder those beautiful excrescences and ramifications which have been so
much the object of the naturalist's curiosity, and which some ingenious
men who have analysed them contend to be the work of insects. The coral
powder is in particular places accumulated on the shore in great
quantities, and appears, when not closely inspected, like a fine white
sand.
SURF.
The surf (a word not to be found, I believe, in our dictionaries) is used
in India, and by navigators in general, to express a peculiar swell and
breaking of the sea upon the shore; the phenomena of which not having
been hitherto much adverted to by writers I shall be the more
circumstantial in my description of them.
The surf forms sometimes but a single range along the shore. At other
times there is a succession of two, three, four, or more, behind each
other, extending perhaps half a mile out to sea. The number of ranges is
generally in proportion to the height and violence of the surf.
The surf begins to assume its form at some distance from the place where
it breaks, gradually accumulating as it moves forward till it gains a
height, in common, of fifteen to twenty feet,* when it overhangs at top
and falls like a cascade, nearly perpendicular, involving itself as it
descends. The noise made by the fall is prodigious, and during the
stillness of the night may be heard many miles up the country.
(*Footnote. It may be presumed that in this estimation of its height I
was considerably deceived.)
Though in the rising and formation of the surf the water seems to have a
quick progressive motion towards the land, yet a light body on the
surface is not carried forward, but, on the contrary, if the tide is
ebbing, will recede from the shore; from which it would follow that the
motion is only propagated in the water, like sound in air, and not the
mass of water protruded. A similar species of motion is observed on
shaking at one end a long cord held moderately slack, which is expressed
by the word undulation. I have sometimes remarked however that a body
which sinks deep and takes hold of the water appears to move towards
shore with the course of the surf, as is perceptible in a boat landing
which seems to shoot swiftly forward on the top of the swell; though
probably it is only after having reached the summit, and may owe its
velocity to its own weight in the descent.
Countries where the surfs prevail require boats of a peculiar
construction, and the art of managing them demands the experience of a
man's life. All European boats are more or less unfit, and seldom fail to
occasion the sacrifice of the people on board them, in the imprudent
attempts that are sometimes made to land with them on the open coast. The
natives of Coromandel are remarkably expert in the management of their
craft; but it is to be observed that the intervals between the breaking
of the surfs are usually on that coast much longer than on the coast of
Sumatra.
The force of the surf is extremely great. I have known it to overset a
country vessel in such a manner that the top of the mast has stuck in the
sand, and the lower end made its appearance through her bottom. Pieces of
cloth have been taken up from a wreck, twisted and rent by its involved
motion. In some places the surfs are usually greater at high, and in
others at low, water; but I believe they are uniformly more violent
during the spring-tides.
CONSIDERATIONS RESPECTING THE CAUSE OF THE SURF.
I shall proceed to inquire into the efficient cause of the surfs. The
winds have doubtless a strong relation to them. If the air was in all
places of equal density, and not liable to any motion, I suppose the
water would also remain perfectly at rest and its surface even;
abstracting from the general course of the tides and the partial
irregularities occasioned by the influx of rivers. The current of the air
impels the water and causes a swell, which is the regular rising and
subsiding of the waves. This rise and fall is similar to the vibrations
of a pendulum and subject to like laws. When a wave is at its height it
descends by the force of gravity, and the momentum acquired in descending
impels the neighbouring particles, which in their turn rise and impel
others, and thus form a succession of waves. This is the case in the open
sea; but when the swell approaches the shore and the depth of water is
not in proportion to the size of the swell the subsiding wave, instead of
pressing on a body of water, which might rise in equal quantity, presses
on the ground, whose reaction causes it to rush on in that manner which
we call a surf. Some think that the peculiar form of it may be plainly
accounted for from the shallowness and shelving of the beach. When a
swell draws near to such a beach the lower parts of the water, meeting
first with obstruction from the bottom, stand still, whilst the higher
parts respectively move onward, by which a rolling and involved motion is
produced that is augmented by the return of the preceding swell. I object
that this solution is founded on the supposition of an actual progressive
motion of the body of water in forming a surf; and, that certainly not
being the fact, it seems deficient. The only real progression of the
water is occasioned by the perpendicular fall, after the breaking of the
surf, when from its weight it foams on to a greater or less distance in
proportion to the height from which it fell and the slope of the shore.
That the surfs are not, like common waves, the immediate effect of the
wind, is evident from this, that the highest and most violent often
happen when there is the least wind and vice versa. And sometimes the
surfs will continue with an equal degree of violence during a variety of
weather. On the west coast of Sumatra the highest are experienced during
the south-east monsoon, which is never attended with such gales of wind
as the north-west. The motion of the surf is not observed to follow the
course of the wind, but often the contrary; and when it blows hard from
the land the spray of the sea may be seen to fly in a direction opposite
to the body of it, though the wind has been for many hours in the same
point.
Are the surfs the effect of gales of wind at sea, which do not happen to
extend to the shore but cause a violent agitation throughout a
considerable tract of the waters, which motion, communicating with less
distant parts, and meeting at length with resistance from the shore,
occasions the sea to swell and break in the manner described? To this I
object that there seems no regular correspondence between their magnitude
and the apparent agitation of the water without them: that gales of wind,
except at particular periods, are very unfrequent in the Indian seas,
where the navigation is well known to be remarkably safe, whilst the
surfs are almost continual; and that gales are not found to produce this
effect in other extensive oceans. The west coast of Ireland borders a sea
nearly as extensive and much more wild than the coast of Sumatra, and yet
there, though when it blows hard the swell on the shore is high and
dangerous, is there nothing that resembles the surfs of India.
PROBABLE CAUSE OF THE SURF.
These, so general in the tropical latitudes, are, upon the most probable
hypothesis I have been able to form, after long observation and much
thought and inquiry, the consequence of the trade or perpetual winds
which prevail at a distance from shore between the parallels of thirty
degrees north and south, whose uniform and invariable action causes a
long and constant swell, that exists even in the calmest weather, about
the line, towards which its direction tends from either side. This swell
or libration of the sea is so prodigiously long, and the sensible effect
of its height, of course, so much diminished, that it is not often
attended to; the gradual slope engrossing almost the whole horizon when
the eye is not very much elevated above its surface: but persons who have
sailed in those parts may recollect that, even when the sea is apparently
the most still and level, a boat or other object at a distance from the
ship will be hidden from the sight of one looking towards it from the
lower deck for the space of minutes together. This swell, when a squall
happens or the wind freshens up, will for a time have other subsidiary
waves on the extent of its surface, breaking often in a direction
contrary to it, and which will again subside as a calm returns without
having produced on it any perceptible effect. Sumatra, though not
continually exposed to the south-east trade-wind, is not so distant but
that its influence may be presumed to extend to it, and accordingly at
Pulo Pisang, near the southern extremity of the island, a constant
southerly sea is observed even after a hard north-west wind. This
incessant and powerful swell rolling in from an ocean, open even to the
pole, seems an agent adequate to the prodigious effects produced on the
coast; whilst its very size contributes to its being overlooked. It
reconciles almost all the difficulties which the phenomena seem to
present, and in particular it accounts for the decrease of the surf
during the north-west monsoon, the local wind then counteracting the
operation of the general one; and it is corroborated by an observation I
have made that the surfs on the Sumatran coast ever begin to break at
their southern extreme, the motion of the swell not being perpendicular
to the direction of the shore. This manner of explaining their origin
seems to carry much reason with it; but there occurs to me one objection
which I cannot get over, and which a regard to truth obliges me to state.
The trade-winds are remarkably steady and uniform, and the swell
generated by them is the same. The surfs are much the reverse, seldom
persevering for two days in the same degree of violence; often mountains
high in the morning and nearly subsided by night. How comes a uniform
cause to produce effects so unsteady, unless by the intervention of
secondary causes, whose nature and operation we are unacquainted with?
It is clear to me that the surfs as above described are peculiar to those
climates which lie within the remoter limits of the trade-winds, though
in higher latitudes large swells and irregular breakings of the sea are
to be met with after boisterous weather. Possibly the following causes
may be judged to conspire, with that I have already specified, towards
occasioning this distinction. The former region being exposed to the
immediate influence of the two great luminaries, the water, from their
direct impulse, is liable to more violent agitation than nearer the poles
where their power is felt only by indirect communication. The equatorial
parts of the earth performing their diurnal revolution with greater
velocity than the rest, a larger circle being described in the same time,
the waters thereabout, from the stronger centrifugal force, may be
supposed to feel less restraint from the sluggish principle of matter; to
have less gravity; and therefore to be more obedient to external impulses
of every kind, whether from the winds or any other cause.
TIDES.
The spring-tides on the west coast of Sumatra are estimated to rise in
general no more than four feet, owing to its open, unconfined situation,
which prevents any accumulation of the tide, as is the case in narrow
seas. It is always high-water there when the moon is in the horizon, and
consequently at six o'clock nearly, on the days of conjunction and
opposition throughout the year, in parts not far remote from the
equator.* This, according to Newton's theory, is about three hours later
than the uninterrupted course of nature, owing to the obvious impediment
the waters meet with in revolving from the eastward.
(*Footnote. Owing to this uniformity it becomes an easy matter for the
natives to ascertain the height of the tide at any hour that the moon is
visible. Whilst she appears to ascend the water falls and vice versa; the
lowest of the ebb happening when she is in her meridian. The vulgar rule
for calculating the tides is rendered also to Europeans more simple and
practical from the same cause. There only needs to add together the
epact, number of the month, and day of the month; the sum of which, if
under thirty, gives the moon's age--the excess, if over. Allow
forty-eight minutes for each day or, which is the same, take four-fifths
of the age, and it will give you the number of hours after six o'clock at
which high-water happens. A readiness at this calculation is particularly
useful in a country where the sea-beach is the general road for
travelling.)