The History of Sumatra Part 16

Dragons-blood, Sanguis draconis, or jaranang, is a drug obtained from a large species of rattan, called rotan jaranang, growing abundantly in the countries of Palembang and Jambi, where it is manufactured and exported, in the first instance to Batavia, and from thence to China, where it is held in much estimation; but whether it be precisely the drug of our shops, so named, I cannot take upon me to determine. I am informed that it is prepared in the following manner: the stamina and other parts of fructification of this plant, covered with the farina, are mixed with a certain proportion of white dammar, and boiled in water until the whole is well incorporated, and the water evaporated; by which time the composition has acquired a red colour, and, when rubbed between the fingers, comes off in a dry powder. Whilst soft, it is usually poured into joints of small bamboo, and shipped in that state. According to this account, which I received from my friend Mr. Philip Braham, who had an opportunity of acquiring a knowledge of the process, the resinous quality of the drug belongs only to the dammar, and not to the rotan.

GAMBIR.

Gambir, or gatah gambir, is a juice extracted from the leaves of a plant of that name, insp.i.s.sated by decoction, strained, suffered to cool and harden, and then cut into cakes of different shapes, or formed into b.a.l.l.s. It is very generally eaten by the natives with their sirih or betel, and is supposed to have the property of cleansing and sweetening the mouth; for which reason it is also rubbed to the gums of infants. For a minute detail of the culture and manufacture of this article at Malacca see the Batavian Transactions Volume 2 page 356, where the plant is cla.s.sed between the portlandia and roella of L. In other places it is obtained from a climbing or trailing plant, evidently the Funis uncatus of Rumphius.* See also Observations on the Nauclea Gambir, by Mr. W.

Hunter, in the Linnean Transactions Volume 9 page 218. At Siak, Kampar, and Indragiri, on the eastern side of Sumatra, it is an important article of commerce.

(*Footnote. Hoc unum adhuc addendum est, in Sumatra nempe ac forte in Java aliam quoque esse plantam repentem gatta gambir akar dictam, qum forte unae eaedemque erunt plantae; ac verb.u.m akar Malaiensibus denotat non tantum radicem, sed repentem quoque fruticem. Volume 5 page 64.)

LIGNUM ALOES.

The agallochin, agila-wood, or lignum aloes, called by the natives kalambak and kayu gahru, is highly prized in all parts of the East, for the fragrant scent it emits in burning. I find these two names used indiscriminately in Malayan writings, and sometimes coupled together; but Valentyn p.r.o.nounces the gahru to be an inferior species, and the Batavian Catalogue describes it as the heart of the rasamala, and different from the genuine kalambak. This unctuous substance, which burns like a resin, is understood to be the decayed, and probably disordered, part of the tree. It is described by Kaempfer (Amaenit page 903) under the Chinese name of sinkoo, and by Dr. Roxburgh under that of Aquillaria agallocha.

TIMBER.

The forests contain an inexhaustible store and endless variety of timber trees, many sorts of which are highly valuable and capable of being applied to ship-building and other important purposes. On the western coast the general want of navigable rivers has materially hindered both the export and the employment of timber; but those on the eastern side, particularly Siak, have heretofore supplied the city of Batavia with great abundance, and latterly the naval a.r.s.enal at Pulo Pinang with what is required for the construction of ships of war.

TEAK.

The teak however, the pride of Indian forests, called by the Malays jati (Tectona grandis, L.), does not appear to be indigenous to this island, although flourishing to the northward and southward of it, in Pegu and Java; and I believe it is equally a stranger to the Malayan peninsula.

Attempts have been made by the servants of the Company to promote its cultivation. Mr. Robert Hay had a plantation near Bencoolen, but the situation seemed unfavourable. Mr. John Marsden, when resident of Laye in the year 1776, sowed some seeds of it, and distributed a quant.i.ty amongst the inhabitants of his district. The former, at least, throve exceedingly, as if in their natural soil. The appearance of the tree is stately, the leaves are broad and large, and they yield, when squeezed, a red juice. The wood is well known to be, in many respects, preferable to oak, working more kindly, surpa.s.sing it in durability, and having the peculiar property of preserving the iron bolts driven into it from rust; a property that may be ascribed to the essential oil or tar contained in it, and which has lately been procured from it in large quant.i.ties by distillation at Bombay. Many ships built at that place have continued to swim so long that none could recollect the period at which they were launched.

POON, ETC.

For masts and yards the wood preferred is the red bintangur (a species of uvaria), which in all the maritime parts of India has obtained the name of poon or puhn, from the Malayan word signifying tree in general; as puhn upas, the poison-tree, puhn kayu, a timber-tree, etc.

The camphor-wood, so useful for carpenters' purposes, has been already mentioned.

Kayu pindis or kapini (species of metrosideros), is named also kayu besi, or iron-wood, on account of its extraordinary hardness, which turns the edge of common tools.

Marbau (Metrosideros amboinensis, R.) grows to a large size, and is used for beams both in ship and housebuilding, as well as for other purposes to which oak is applied in Europe. Pinaga is valuable as crooked timber, and used for frames and knees of ships, being also very durable. It frequently grows in the wash of the sea.

Juar, ebony, called in the Batavian Catalogue kayu arang, or charcoal-wood, is found here in great plenty.

Kayu gadis, a wood possessing the flavour and qualities of the sa.s.safras, and used for the same purposes in medicine, but in the growth of the tree resembling rather our elm than the laurus (to which latter tribe the American sa.s.safras belongs), is very common in the plains near Bencoolen.

Kayu arau (Casuarina littorea) is often termed a b.a.s.t.a.r.d-pine, and as such gave name to the Isle of Pines discovered by Captain Cook. By the Malays it is usually called kayu chamara, from the resemblance of its branches to the ornamental cowtails of Upper India. It has been already remarked of this tree, whose wood is not particularly useful, that it delights in a low sandy soil, and is ever the first that springs up from land relinquished by the sea.

The rangas or rungi, commonly supposed to be the manchineel of the West Indies, but perhaps only from the noxious quality of its juices, is the Arbor vernicis of Rumphius, and particularly described in the Batavian Transactions Volume 5 under the name of Manga deleteria sylvestris, fructu parvo cordiformi. In a list of plants in the same volume, by F.

Norona, it is termed Anacardium encardium. The wood has some resemblance to mahogany, is worked up into articles of furniture, and resists the destructive ravages of the white ant, but its hardness and acrid sap, which blisters the hands of those employed about it, are objections to its general use. I am not aware of the natives procuring a varnish from this tree.

Of the various sorts of tree producing dammar, some are said to be valuable as timber, particularly the species called dammar laut, not mentioned by Rumphius, which is employed at Pulo Pinang for frame timbers of ships, beams, and knees.

Kamuning (camunium, R. chalcas paniculata, Lour.) is a light-coloured wood, close, and finely grained, takes an exquisite polish, and is used for the sheaths of krises. There is also a red-grained sort, in less estimation. The appearance of the tree is very beautiful, resembling in its leaves the larger myrtle, with a white flower.

The langsani likewise is a wood handsomely veined, and is employed for cabinet and carved work.

Beside these the kinds of wood most in use are the madang, ballam, maranti, laban, and marakuli. The variety is much greater, but many, from their porous nature and p.r.o.neness to decay, are of very little value, and scarcely admit of seasoning before they become rotten.

I cannot quit the vegetable kingdom without noticing a tree which, although of no use in manufacture or commerce, not peculiar to the island, and has been often described, merits yet, for its extreme singularity, that it should not be pa.s.sed over in silence. This is the jawi-jawi and ulang-ulang of the Malays, the banyan tree of the continent, the Grossularia domestica of Rumphius, and the Ficus indica or Ficus racemosa of Linnaeus. It possesses the uncommon property of dropping roots or fibres from certain parts of its boughs, which, when they touch the earth, become new stems, and go on increasing to such an extent that some have measured, in circ.u.mference of the branches, upwards of a thousand feet, and have been said to afford shelter to a troop of horse.* These fibres, that look like ropes attached to the branches, when they meet with any obstruction in their descent conform themselves to the shape of the resisting body, and thus occasion many curious metamorphoses. I recollect seeing them stand in the perfect shape of a gate long after the original posts and cross piece had decayed and disappeared; and I have been told of their lining the internal circ.u.mference of a large bricked well, like the worm in a distiller's tub; there exhibiting the view of a tree turned inside out, the branches pointing to the centre, instead of growing from it. It is not more extraordinary in its manner of growth than whimsical and fantastic in its choice of situations. From the side of a wall or the top of a house it seems to spring spontaneously. Even from the smooth surface of a wooden pillar, turned and painted, I have seen it shoot forth, as if the vegetative juices of the seasoned timber had renewed their circulation and begun to produce leaves afresh. I have seen it flourish in the centre of a hollow tree of a very different species, which however still retained its verdure, its branches encompa.s.sing those of the advent.i.tious plant whilst its decayed trunk enclosed the stem, which was visible, at interstices, from nearly the level of the plain on which they grew. This in truth appeared so striking a curiosity that I have often repaired to the spot to contemplate the singularity of it. How the seed from which it is produced happens to occupy stations seemingly so unnatural is not easily determined. Some have imagined the berries carried thither by the wind, and others, with more appearance of truth, by the birds; which, cleansing their bills where they light, or attempt to light, leave, in those places, the seeds adhering by the viscous matter which surrounds them. However this be, the jawi-jawi, growing on buildings without earth or water, and deriving from the genial atmosphere its principle of nourishment, proves in its increasing growth highly destructive to the fabric where it is harboured; for the fibrous roots, which are at first extremely fine, penetrate common cements, and, overcoming as their size enlarges the most powerful resistance, split, with the force of the mechanic wedge, the most substantial brickwork. When the consistence is such as not to admit the insinuation of the fibres the root extends itself along the outside, and to an extraordinary length, bearing not unfrequently to the stem the proportion of eight to one when young. I have measured the former sixty inches, when the latter, to the extremity of the leaf, which took up a third part, was no more than eight inches. I have also seen it wave its boughs at the apparent height of two hundred feet, of which the roots, if we may term them such, occupied at least one hundred; forming by their close combination the appearance of a venerable gothic pillar. It stood near the plains of Krakap, but, like other monuments of antiquity, it had its period of existence, and is now no more.

(*Footnote. The following is an account of the dimensions of a remarkable banyan or burr tree, near Manjee, twenty miles west of Patna in Bengal.

Diameter 363 to 375 feet. Circ.u.mference of shadow at noon 1116 feet.

Circ.u.mference of the several stems, in number fifty or sixty, 921 feet.

Under this tree sat a naked Fakir, who had occupied that situation for twenty-five years; but he did not continue there the whole year through, for his vow obliged him to lie, during the four cold months, up to his neck in the waters of the river Ganges.)

(PLATE 18. ENTRANCE OF PADANG RIVER.

With Buffaloes.)

(PLATE 18A. VIEW OF PADANG HILL.

Published by W. Marsden, 1810.)

CHAPTER 8.

GOLD, TIN, AND OTHER METALS.

BEESWAX.

IVORY.

BIRDS-NEST, ETC.

IMPORT-TRADE.

GOLD.

Beside those articles of trade afforded by the vegetable kingdom Sumatra produces many others, the chief of which is gold. This valuable metal is found mostly in the central parts of the island; none (or with few exceptions) being observed to the southward of Limun, a branch of Jambi River, nor to the northward of Nalabu, from which port Achin is princ.i.p.ally supplied. Menangkabau has always been esteemed the richest seat of it; and this consideration probably induced the Dutch to establish their head factory at Padang, in the immediate neighbourhood of that kingdom. Colonies of Malays from thence have settled themselves in almost all the districts where gold is procured, and appear to be the only persons who dig for it in mines, or collect it in streams; the proper inhabitants or villagers confining their attention to the raising of provisions, with which they supply those who search for the metal.

Such at least appears to be the case in Limun, Batang Asei, and Pakalang jambu, where a considerable gold trade is carried on.

It has been generally understood at the English settlements that earth taken up from the beds of rivers, or loosened from the adjacent banks, and washed by means of rivulets diverted towards the newly-opened ground, furnishes the greater proportion of the gold found in the island, and that the natives are not accustomed to venture upon any excavation that deserves the name of mining; but our possession, during the present war, of the settlements that belonged to the Dutch, has enabled us to form juster notions on the subject, and the following account, obtained from well-informed persons on the spot, will show the methods pursued in both processes, and the degree of enterprise and skill employed by the workmen.

In the districts situated inland of Padang, which is the princ.i.p.al mart for this article, little is collected otherwise than from mines (tambang) by people whose profession it is to work them, and who are known by the appellation of orang gulla. The metal brought down for sale is for the most part of two sorts, distinguished by the terms amas supayang and amas sungei-abu, from the names of places where they are respectively procured. The former is what we usually call rock-gold, consisting of pieces of quartz more or less intermixed with veins of gold, generally of fine quality, running through it in all directions, and forming beautiful ma.s.ses, which, being admired by Europeans, are sometimes sold by weight as if the whole were solid metal. The mines yielding this sort are commonly situated at the foot of a mountain, and the shafts are driven horizontally to the extent of from eight to twenty fathoms. The gold to which sungei-abu gives name is on the contrary found in the state of smooth solid lumps, in shape like gravel, and of various sizes, the largest lump that I have seen weighing nine ounces fifteen grains, and one in my possession (for which I am indebted to Mr. Charles Holloway) weighing eight grains less than nine ounces. This sort is also termed amas lichin or smooth gold, and appears to owe that quality to its having been exposed, in some prior state of the soil or conformation of the earth, to the action of running water, and deprived of its sharp and rough edges by attrition. This form of gravel is the most common in which gold is discovered. Gold-dust or amas urei is collected either in the channels of brooks running over ground rich in the metal, in standing pools of water occasioned by heavy rains, or in a number of holes dug in a situation to which a small rapid stream can be directed.

The tools employed in working the mines are an iron crow three feet in length, called tabah, a shovel called changkul, and a heavy iron mallet or hammer, the head of which is eighteen inches in length and as thick as a man's leg, with a handle in the middle. With this they beat the lumps of rock till they are reduced to powder, and the pounded ma.s.s is then put into a sledge or tray five or six feet long and one and a half broad, in the form of a boat, and thence named bidu. To this vessel a rope of iju is attached, by which they draw it when loaded out of the horizontal mine to the nearest place where they can meet with a supply of water, which alone is employed to separate the gold from the pulverized quartz.

In the perpendicular mines the smooth or gravel-gold is often found near the surface, but in small quant.i.ties, improving as the workmen advance, and again often vanishing suddenly. This they say is most likely to be the case when after pursuing a poor vein they suddenly come to large lumps. When they have dug to the depth of four, six, or sometimes eight fathoms (which they do at a venture, the surface not affording any indications on which they can depend), they work horizontally, supporting the shaft with timbers; but to persons acquainted with the berg-werken of Germany or Hungary, these pits would hardly appear to merit the appellation of mines.* In Siberia however, as in Sumatra, the hills yield their gold by slightly working them. Sand is commonly met with at the depth of three or four fathoms, and beneath this a stratum of napal or steat.i.te, which is considered as a sign that the metal is near; but the least fallible mark is a red stone, called batu kawi, lying in detached pieces. It is mostly found in red and white clay, and often adhering to small stones, as well as in h.o.m.ogeneous lumps. The gold is separated from the clay by means of water poured on a hollow board, in the management of which the persons employed are remarkably expert.

(*Footnote. It has been observed to me that it is not so much the want of windla.s.ses or machines (subst.i.tutes for which they are ready enough at contriving) that prevents excavation to a great depth as the apprehension of earthquakes, the effect of which has frequently been to overwhelm them before they could escape even from their shallow mines.)

In these perpendicular mines the water is drawn off by hand in pails or buckets. In the horizontal they make two shafts or entries in a direction parallel to each other, as far as they mean to extend the work, and there connect them by a cross trench. One of these, by a difference in their respective levels, serves as a drain to carry off the water, whilst the other is kept dry. They work in parties of from four or five to forty or fifty in number; the proprietor of the ground receiving one half of the produce and the undertakers the other; and it does not appear that the prince receives any established royalty. The hill people affect a kind of independence or equality which they express by the term of sama rata.

It may well be imagined that mines of this description are very numerous, and in the common estimation of the natives they amount to no fewer than twelve hundred in the dominions of Menangkabau. A considerable proportion of their produce (perhaps one half) never comes into the hands of Europeans but is conveyed to the eastern side of the island, and yet I have been a.s.sured on good authority that from ten to twelve thousand ounces have annually been received, on public and private account, at Padang alone; at Nalabu about two thousand, Natal eight hundred, and Moco-moco six hundred. The quality of the gold collected in the Padang districts is inferior to that purchased at Natal and Moco-moco, in consequence of the practice of blending together the unequal produce of such a variety of mines which in other parts it is customary to keep distinct. The gold from the former is of the fineness of from nineteen to twenty-one, and from the latter places is generally of from twenty-two to twenty-three carats. The finest that has pa.s.sed through my hands was twenty-three carats, one grain and a half, a.s.sayed at the Tower of London. Gold of an inferior touch, called amas muda from the paleness of its colour, is found in the same countries where the other is produced. I had some a.s.sayed which was two carats three grains worse than standard, and contained an alloy of silver, but not in a proportion to be affected by the acids. I have seen gold brought from Mampawah in Borneo which was in the state of a fine uniform powder, high-coloured, and its degree of fineness not exceeding fifteen or sixteen carats. The natives suppose these differences to proceed from an original essential inferiority of the metal, not possessing the art of separating it from the silver or copper. In this island it is never found in the state of ore, but is always completely metallic. A very little pale gold is now and then found in the Lampong country.

Of those who dig for it the most intelligent, distinguished by the name of sudagar or merchants, are intrusted by the rest with their collections, who carry the gold to the places of trade on the great eastern rivers, or to the settlements on the west coast, where they barter it for iron (of which large quant.i.ties are consumed in tools for working the mines), opium, and the fine piece-goods of Madras and Bengal with which they return heavily loaded to their country. In some parts of the journey they have the convenience of water-carriage on lakes and rivers; but in others they carry on their backs a weight of about eighty pounds through woods, over streams, and across mountains, in parties generally of one hundred or more, who have frequent occasion to defend their property against the spirit of plunder and extortion which prevails among the poorer nations through whose districts they are obliged to pa.s.s. Upon the proposal of striking out any new road the question always asked by these intermediate people is, apa ontong kami, what is to be our advantage?

PRICE.

When brought to our settlements it was formerly purchased at the rate of eighteen Spanish dollars the tail, or about three pounds five shillings the ounce, but in later times it has risen to twenty-one dollars, or to three pounds eighteen shillings the ounce. Upon exportation to Europe therefore it scarcely affords a profit to the original buyer, and others who employ it as a remittance incur a loss when insurance and other incidental charges are deducted. A duty of five per cent which it had been customary to charge at the East India-house was, about twenty years ago, most liberally remitted by the Company upon a representation made by me to the Directors of the hardship sustained in this respect by its servants at Fort Marlborough, and the public benefit that would accrue from giving encouragement to the importation of bullion. The long continuance of war and peculiar risk of Indian navigation resulting from it may probably have operated to counteract these good effects.

It has generally been thought surprising that the European Companies who have so long had establishments in Sumatra should not have considered it an object to work these mines upon a regular system, with proper machinery, and under competent inspection; but the attempt has in fact been made, and experience and calculation may have taught them that it is not a scheme likely to be attended with success, owing among other causes to the dearness of labour, and the necessity it would occasion for keeping up a force in distant parts of the country for the protection of the persons engaged and the property collected. Europeans cannot be employed upon such work in that climate, and the natives are unfit for (nor would they submit to) the laborious exertion required to render the undertaking profitable. A detailed and in many respects interesting account of the working a gold mine at Sileda, with a plate representing a section of the mine, is given by Elias Hesse,* who in the year 1682 accompanied the Bergh-Hoofdman, Benj. Olitzsch, and a party of miners from Saxony, sent out by the Dutch East India Company for that purpose.