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Updated: June 16, 2025
I soon climbed up and joined her; and there I beheld what was indeed sufficient to make my heart beat quick with hope. About a mile off, having just rounded a headland, appeared my own schooner, the Fraulein. The rocks before had concealed her from our sight. Kalong and Hassan immediately recognised her, and so, they declared, did Ungka, who seemed to share our agitation and excitement.
We told Kalong that they must not fail to hint that we were well-armed and able to defend ourselves, but at the same time that we were peaceably disposed. Observing a rock a short distance off, partly covered with trees, from which we could command a view of the country around us, we climbed to the top of it to wait there in the shade until the return of the two Papuans.
"Those not good people," he said, looking very grave. "Too fond of taking heads; always taking heads. Kalong not bad; but still he like heads now and then." The truth is, that a great number of the Dyaks are as much addicted to piracy as the Malays, and are in some respects even more cruel.
He answered that it was on the shores of a large island a very large one, I should think, and away somewhere to the eastward, for he pointed in that direction, though I could not make out exactly how far off it was." I was deeply interested, and told him that he ought to have brought the man on board that we might have examined him more particularly with the aid of Bell and Kalong.
We feared, from the long discussion held by the natives, that we should find a difficulty in obtaining guides, none of them being willing to encounter the dangers they expected to meet with. We told Kalong to offer a handsome payment to each man who would accompany us, and at length two fine young fellows stepped forward and agreed to go.
Kalong and Ned at once entered into conversation with them, as they seemed perfectly to understand each other. No information, however, could be obtained about the white men of whom we had heard. Without hesitation they came down to the boats, bringing some mats and other articles which we purchased at a very moderate rate.
We asked the young fisherman his name; and he made us understand that it was Kalong. His eyes sparkled with animation whenever any one addressed him; and with wonderful rapidity he seemed to comprehend our signs, and was never at a loss to answer us.
Several shots were fired at him, but the balls glanced off harmlessly from his scaly sides. I afterwards saw some captured by a very simple method. The breeze freshened, and we ran rapidly on, carefully, of course, sounding all the time. Kalong, our pilot, was in great delight, till he saw one of the officers going to fire at a crocodile, when he rushed up to him, and entreated him not to do so.
Close to it, also, Kalong found a tree, which he and Hassan pronounced well adapted to serve as the foundation of a canoe. It must be remembered that we had no tools of any sort, except some clasp-knives, and some boarding-spikes found in the junk; but they proposed forming their hatchets and all their instruments out of flint stones and shells.
Before night we hauled up the canoe on deck, and endeavoured rather better to fit her for sea, by heightening and strengthening her sides, and by nailing matting over the bow and stern. The main cabin was devoted to Eva and Nutmeg. Blount and I took up our berths in the two little cabins on the highest part of the poop, and Hassan and Kalong went forward. We divided ourselves into four watches.
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