XIV
BĔR-HANTU
Striving to reach the mystic source
of things, the secrets of the earth
and sea and air
L. MORRIS
WE could all see the tunggul mêrah, the crimson streak which boded the death of the King. Looking from the top of our green-terraced hill across the clear wide river late one afternoon, this curious phenomenon appeared in the sky, above the last spur of a picturesque range of mountains which separates the valleys of two considerable streams whose united waters flow into the Straits of Malacca.
Standing on the right bank of the river, a stretch of level land lies between the opposite bank and the foot of this range, and the wealth of foliage hides from view the houses, orchards, and ricefields which cover that fertile plain. But the Sultan's house, a palm-thatched wooden structure, three houses on
147
