Page 141 - Malay sketches

THE PASSING OF PENGLIMA PRANG SEMAUN

It did not take long to collect from the neigh-
bouring village of Lambor enough men to fill two
boats, and, as that was all the Penglima wanted for
his purpose, the party had started" for Batak Rabit
Musah's before the down-stream
(Haji village)
people had the smallest inkling of their intention.
The time was specially well chosen from the fact
that the Shabandar was absent in a remote district.
"
In Japan they say, If you have not seen Nikko
you cannot say gekko" and if there is anyone who
knows the Malay Peninsula and yet has never
watched the sun set across the rice-fields, when
the ripe grain hangs heavily in the ear, his know-
of the beauties of in-
ledge Malay scenery is very
complete.
A wide, flat plain covered by the golden harvest,
the rice- stalks standing five or six feet above the
ground from which they have sucked all the water
which nourished them in the earlier stages o/
growth. One yellow sea of yellow ears, the green
stalks only discernible in the near foreground.
This sea is broken by islands of palms and fruit-
trees in which nestle the picturesque brown huts of
cottagers, houses of wood, built on wooden piles
with palm-thatched roofs and mat walls.
The setting sun strikes in great beams of saffron
"5