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In The Court Of Johore
by
The Malays, dressed in gayly colored sarongs and bajus (jackets), with little rimless caps on their heads, squatted on their heels and chewed betel-nut, with eyes half closed and mouths distended.
The Arab traders and shopkeepers were grouped about in little knots, gravely conversing and watching the files of gharries or carriages, and even rickshaws, that were bringing Malay unkus (princes not of the royal blood), patos (peers), holy men, and rich Chinese mandarins to the steps that led up to the plaza before the throne-room.
The palace was two stories high, long and narrow. The interior rooms were separated from the outer walls by wide, airy corridors. The lattice-work windows were without glass and were arranged to admit the breezes from the ocean and ward off the searching rays of the equatorial sun. In these dusky corridors were long rattan chairs, divans, and tables covered with refreshments, and along its walls were arranged weapons of war and chase, Japanese suits of straw armor, Javanese shields, and Malay krises and limbings.
In a little court at the end of our corridor, where a fountain splashed over a clump of lotus flowers and blue water lilies, a long-armed silver wah-wah monkey played with a black Malay cat that had a kink in its tail like the joint in a stovepipe, and chased the clucking little gray lizards up the polished walls.
The gorgeous aide stared in poorly concealed wonderment, when he entered to conduct us to the grand salon, at my plain evening dress suit, destitute of gold lace or decorations, but he was too polite to say anything, and I humbly followed my uniformed colleagues through the long suite of rooms. It would have been useless for me to have tried to explain the great American doctrine of “Jeffersonian simplicity.” He would have shrugged his narrow shoulders, which would have meant, “When you are among Romans, you should do as Romans do.”
In the grand salon, more than in any other part of the palace, one feels that he is in the home of an Oriental prince whose tastes far outrun his own dominions.
Velvet carpets from Holland, divans from Turkey, rugs from Bokhara, tapestries from Persia, and lace from France mingle with embroideries from China, cut glass from England, and rare old Satsuma ware from Japan. On a grand square German piano is a mass of music in which the masterpieces of all countries have equal rights with the national anthem of Johore.
Going directly through a mass of Oriental drapery, we are in the throne-room, where are gathered the nobility of the little Sultanate.
Amid the crash of music and the booming of guns the Sultan took his seat in one of the gilded chairs on the dais, with the English Governor on his left. Ranged about the burnished walls of the great room, several files deep, were the nobility of the kingdom, the ministers of state, and officers of the army and navy, the space back of them being filled with Chinese mandarins and towkoys, and rich native merchants in their picturesque costumes. In front of the nobility, standing in the form of a square, were the sons of the datos each bearing golden, jewel-studded chogans, spears, krises, and maces. Inside the square stood the fifteen consuls. Back of the throne were four young princes, two bearing each the golden bejewelled kris of the Malay, another the golden sword of state, and the fourth the cimeter of the Prophet.
Up to the steps of the throne came the young prince, dressed in the uniform of a lieutenant of artillery, with the royal order of Darjah Krabat ablaze with jewels on his breast. He was slightly taller than his father, the Sultan, straight, graceful, and handsome, with big, brown eyes and strongly marked features. He was nervous and agitated, and his lips trembled as he bent on one knee and kissed his Highness’s hand.
Above our heads in the gilded walls, behind a grated opening, were Inche Kitega, the Sultan’s beautiful Circassian wife, and the women of the court. We could see their black eyes as they peered curiously down. It was only when the Dato Mentri, or Prime Minister, stood up and asked his people if they wished the young Tunku to be their future lord that we could hear their shrill voices mingling with the “Suku, suku” (“We wish it, we wish it”), of the men.