The Rajah of Dah | Page 6

two brown-looking knobs. What
is it? Part of a tree. Oh! gone. I know now; it was a crocodile."
"No doubt about that, Ned, and I daresay we shall see plenty more."
"Hah!" ejaculated the Malay again; and he pointed this time toward the
right bank of the river, or rather to the fringe of mangroves on that side.
"Yes, I can see that one plain, just those two knobs. Why doesn't it
show more?"
"For the sake of being safe perhaps. There you can see its yes now, just
above the surface."
"But the gun, uncle. Let's shoot one."
"Waste of powder and ball, my boy. It is a great chance if we could hit
a vulnerable part, and I don't like wounding anything unnecessarily."
"Are there many of those things here?" said Ned, after watching the

two prominences just above the water, and vainly trying to make out
the reptile's body.
"Many things?" said the man, evidently puzzled.
"Yes; crocodiles?"
"Hah! Yes, plenty, many; sahib jump in and swim, crocodile--"
He ceased speaking and finished in pantomime, by raising one hand
and rapidly catching the other just at the wrist.
"Snap at me?" said Ned.
"Yes, sahib. Catch, take under water. Eat."
"I say, though, is he stuffing me? Do they really seize people, or is it a
traveller's tale?" said Ned, appealing to his uncle; but the Malay, who
had been engaged from his knowledge of English to act as interpreter
up the river, caught at the boy's words, though he did not quite grasp
his meaning.
"No, no, sahib; not stuff you. Crocodile stuff, fill himself much as he
can eat."
Then he turned sharply and said a few words to his companions in the
Malay tongue, and they replied eagerly in chorus.
"There's no doubt about it, Ned," said his uncle. "They are loathsome
beasts, and will drag anything under water that they can get hold of."
"Then we ought to kill it," said Ned excitedly. "Let's shoot it, at once."
"Where is it?"
"That one's gone too," said Ned, with a disappointed air.
"Plenty more chances, my boy; but if you do try your skill with a gun,
wait till we see one of the reptiles on the bank."

"But there is no bank."
"Wait a bit, and you'll see sand-banks and mud-banks in plenty. But the
appearance of those creatures answers one of your questions. There
must be plenty of fish in the river, for that forms their principal food."
Just then their attention was taken up by one of the Malay boatmen
drawing in his oar, and then taking out a small bag from which he
extracted a piece of broken betel-nut and a half-dried leaf. Then from
the same bag he took a small brass box carefully hammered to form a
pattern, and upon opening this a thick white paste became visible.
"What's that?" whispered Ned.
"Lime made from coral and mixed into a paste with water."
"But what is he going to do?"
"Watch him."
Ned was already watching, and saw the man take a little of the wet lime
paste from the box with his finger, and smear it over the leaf. Then the
box was put away, and the scrap of nut carefully rolled up in the leaf
and placed in the man's mouth, when he went on contentedly chewing
as he resumed his oar and pulled steadily on.
"I never saw them get their betel ready to chew before, uncle,"
whispered Ned. "I say, what leaf is that?"
"Sirih, a little climbing kind of pepper."
"Well," continued Ned with a laugh; "I don't know whether that's a bad
habit, but it looks a very nasty one. What savages!"
"They might say the same about our Jacks with their tobacco," said his
uncle.--"How would you like to live there?"
He pointed to where, in an opening in the mangroves, a tiny village of a
few houses became visible, mere huts, but pretty enough to look at with

their highly-pitched, palm-thatched roofs, showing picturesque gables
and ornamentally woven sides, the whole raised on bamboo piles, so as
to place them six or eight feet above the level of the river. A few
cocoa-nut trees grew close at hand, and a couple of good-sized boats
were drawn up and tied to posts, while a group of the occupants stood
gazing at the passing party.
"No; I don't think I should like to live there," said Ned, as the men
rowed on, and the houses with their cluster of palm-like trees gave
place once more to the monotonous green of the mangroves. And now
the boy altered his tactics. For a time he had scorned the shelter of the
thatched roof which covered the afterpart of the roomy boat, and been
all life and