MasNES I: Ghosts of Empires - Preview Thread

No European should remain in the Indies for longer than longer than four years otherwise the stress will tell. Normally, even though fairs are expensive and the journey long, all staff of the Régie Autonome are sent home for a year at the end of each three year spell. Those who remain longer risk getting into a groove and if one spends too long "mental sloth" a most peculiar disease of the East which saps the will and weakens one's moral fiber.

There are only seven hundred and fifty Europeans in the Régie Autonome with perhaps two hundred and fifty employed by the Company with most being district officers and the balance comprised of planters and merchants. There are a small number of professionals and fewer than one European women for every five European men. It is a scandalous truth that many planters and servants of the Company keep native women and sometimes Chinese women as housekeepers for want of a decent European women to marry.

It is hard to get good help, and once found, should be paid well. An ordinary household consists of one cook, one or two houseboys, a water carrier and a gardener. Chinese make good cooks and gardeners when old. Javanese should be employed as houseboys and water carriers. Malays should not be employed for the house but are serviceable for outdoors work, especially those involving water, and the maintenance of horses. It is advised that young female servants not be hired because of the risk they pose to European morals and those of the staff. Older women make fine cooks and may be trusted to take care of European children.

House are usually raised, and have wooden shingles for roofing. In fact the whole house is constructed of wood save the ground floor which is of beaten earth or in better appointed houses laid stone. The ground floor contains the kitchen although this may be housed in a separate building to reduce the smells and other emanations. The house usually has two or three bedrooms set around a central living area with wide balconies, and large open louvered windows, to let in the breeze. Bathrooms are attached to each bedroom although ones bath usually involves pouring a dipper over oneself. Servant quarter are usually in a separate complex detached from the main house.

It is recommended that Europeans purchase a new wardrobe in the Indies or Ceylon. Tweed is not recommended but thin flannel and serge is suitable. These are only worn for parties. A white drill suit is used for office work and a khaki suit is the usual rig for work outdoors. A pith hat, a soft felt cap and a straw hat are a must. Leather boots get 'tropical rot' and must be replaced regularly.

If care is taken tropical diseases can be managed. Malarial fever is normal and should be expected. For most, it takes a mild form and is amenable to treatment. Typhoid fever occurs sometimes and is of a serious nature. Cholera occurs but usually kills the Chinese who live closely together. Dysentery and diarrhea are common and should be expected. Diet and exercise are powerful correctives to all of these issues.

Where one finds a few Britons together sport and gaming are the usual outcomes. The island is no different. Cricket is played regularly and football is universally played by Europeans of all nationalities. The Eurasian community small though it is plays football in its own clubs separate from the European ones. Tennis is popular and so is hunting. Birds are the usual quarry although some elephants, deer, pigs and rather a lot of crocodiles are shot.

There are clubs in all the settlements situated near the sports grounds. They are patronised by both sexes and are closed to non-Europeans. Eurasians have their own clubs and natives do not appreciate civilisation although that may change in time. Billiard and bridge are also common games. Dances, concerts and plays are also common being usually held on a monthly basis.

The origin of the Malays probably lies somewhere in China, but it can be safely affirmed that they are colonists of longstanding, who settled across the coast and rivers the Malay Archipelago in antiquity.

They are indolent, contented, thriftless, unambitious, polite and pacific race, mainly the reverse of the sullen, revengeful, silent and bloodthirsty Malay commonly portrayed in books of travel. That there are bad characters among them is not to be doubted, but that they are more frequent among Malays than other nations is certainly not a fact.

It seems to be doubtful as to whether the Malays as a race are capable of improving their material station on their own. Certain it is, that they have not much learned in agricultural skills or commercial skills from the European or Chinese. The lower classes it seems are content with a bare subsistence, while the gentle-born Malay is too proud (and often too lazy to work). He has not the commercial blood of the Chinaman or the physicality of the Javanese but prefers to live by the rents of his serfs while despising the work that gives him sustenance.

The Malay village is usually built on the banks of a river some distance from the mouth which is usually choked with mangroves and impenetrable jungle. The first thing one notices about these villages is the number of boats of all kinds. From sea worthy prau which link villages across the island to the outriggers which supply the village with fish to the canoes which act as a kind of taxi service during the rainy season when formerly dry land floods.

The second thing one notices is the quaint nature of the buildings which are constructed exclusively of wood and palm leaves and sit upon piles which raise them above the mosquitoes and provides a space for the animals and kitchen below. The floors in the top level are of woven flax and the bottom is of beaten earth. The roof leaks without care and it should be inspected prior to accepting lodgings.

The largest building in the village will be the madrasa where the natives are educated in the ways of Mohammed which involves a great deal of recitation and memorisaiton of Arabic which few of the natives understand at all. There is a little teaching in the vernacular but that involves recitation of Malay epics and stories of the local Saints and no more. It has been argued that this form of education does more harm to the students than good. But seeing as how the natives value it so much there has been no attempt to change things. The madrasa usually doubles as the local prayer hall and often the cemetery adjoins it. In larger settlements a mosque of the kind familiar to those who have traveled in Malaya will often have pride of place in the town.

Dedicated markets and shops are rare. Most sales are done in the early morning in a central place perhaps in front of the madrasa. The goods sold are fruit, some grain, fish, but little meat, no diary and nothing else of note. To purchase things such as needles and fabric the Malays either travel to the market towns or purchase them on credit from the travelling Chinese tinker who carries all manner of useful things.

The usual crop is wet rice although tapioca and sago are also grown though these are usually only consumed during lean times. Coconuts, mangoes, bananas mangosteen and other tropical fruit are also grown but are seasonal. Chili and fish paste are the condiments of choice. Chili is consumed because it fills the stomach. In terms of food, the Malay only purchases coffee and tea as otherwise he is completely self-sufficient.

The Chinese are newcomers to the island whose arrival in these islands is almost wholly due to the discovery of tin in 1874. To begin with, the Chinese community was small but now it numbers perhaps twenty-thousand souls of which the vast majority are men. Women being unwilling to make the trip to the tin fields.

The Chinese comprise two distinct groups. There are those who migrated from the impoverished parts of Southern China and a second group called Straits Chinese who can trace their time in the region to before Sir Stanford Raffles settled Singapore.

The Mainlanders are a course sort, much fond of gaming, opium and whoring, but these defects are more than made up for by their strong physique, their willingness to work for money, and their servility. The strong hand of a Kapitan is doubtless important, for a good Kapitan can make or break a mine, but it must be admitted that the Chinaman is a more useful sort for labor than a Malay.

It is the Kapitans who recruit the indentured labor and guarantee that it remains within the law. It is the Kapitans who operate the tin dredges and it is the Kapitans who run the tongs, own the bars, the brothels and the other 'institutions' of Chinese life. Really, the Kapitan functions as judge, jury, execution, barkeep, brothel owner, boss and snitch among other things. It is the policy of the Company to remain on good terms where possible with the Kapitans.

As a general rule, the Mainlanders live close to their place of employ in shacks of whatever materials they have to hand. These places are ruder than the meanest Malay shack and account for the great number of Chinese deaths from diseases such as cholera which are uncommon among the other races. The European is well advised not to venture into these places less for reasons of personal safety, because the Company's reaction to such assaults upon Europeans are swift, and for rather more practical reasons such as the cesspits that are Chinese 'streets'.

There is a middle sort of Mainlander who has moved his way up in the world by ruthless exploitation of his fellows. It is often this sort who owns the small shops and market stalls and it this sort for which the greatest loathing should be reserved. The travelling tinker though should be spared from this hatred because he has a useful social function and brings the benefits of civilization to the Malays in areas where the Company's writ runs thin. By far the most favorable of this sort of Chinaman is the market gardener who with deft hand and great care can coax the most beautiful fruit and vegetables from the most barren of soils. It must be said that these sort of Chinaman often turn out to be of a wholly different racial makeup from their national compatriots being rather less Mongoloid and rather more Semetic in type. Although it must be said with the acquisitive nature of the latter which is most fortunate. These sort are honest, thrift, industrious and make very good servants if one can procure them.

The Straits Chinese are a fine sort, and can be almost European in their sensibilities, and tend to be merchants in their own rights and agents for the mercantile concerns of Singapore from which they originate. It is Strait Chinese money that funds the Chinese tin dredges and it is they who hold the opium and tobacco farms and the pawn and gaming licenses. It has been credibly been argued that it is Straits Chinese money which underpins the greater part of the economic activity of the island. While the Straits Chinese are not European, it has long been Company policy to treat them as such for the purposes of commercial contracts with all the rights and duties that implies.

It is often said that in the mixing of blood the best characteristics of the parties come together in the final product. With the Eurasian this is not the case and while the form and features of these people can be European, it must be admitted that the thought and feeling are wholly Asiatic.

This should be unsurprising given that the Eurasian is the product of miscegenation between an Asiatic women and a European man in-thrall to the basest of passions. European man and an Asiatic women. Sometimes the reverse has occurred but this is always the result of rape.

The basic rule when dealing with Eurasians is to never treat them like Europeans because in short they are not nor indeed should one treat them as half-Europeans because that presupposes that at half their makeup is like ours. This is not the case. Rather, the appropriate response when dealing with a Eurasian is to treat them like Eurasians a bastard people.

In occupation the Eurasian is limited to the role of junior clerk, work-boss, assistant in the hospital, assistant to the surveyor &etc. Like Asiatics the Eurasian should never be trusted with money or placed in a position of independence because of their innate laziness. The man who forgets this rule will pay in due time.

The Javanese are rather like the Malays in all things save their attitude towards work. In this the Javanese are much superior especially in the working of plantations.

In organisation, the Javanese are rather different form the Chinese in that they are willing to accept as a work-boss the guiding hand of a European. This stems from the Javanese belief in a rigid hierarchy with Europeans at the top and their unwillingness to let one of their own be placed above them. Generally speaking, this important work is delegated to the Eurasian, but it is an important consideration and one that should be born in mind.

In religion the Javanese are Mohammedans, but they are of a different sort to the Malays and a very different sort to the Arabs. On occasion these differences have caused trouble when Arabs and Malay youth have called the Javanese kuffir which is a Musulman word meaning unbeliever. Perhaps this is due to the Javanese affection for alcohol and whoring though this should not necessarily be held against them owing to the good work they otherwise perform.

As a people the Javanese are quite clean and appreciate good quarters which they are more than capable of constructing in a short time. These quarters can be made with the minimum of materials such as wood and palm leaves. In such mean circumstances the Javanese is quite an able craftsmen even if they lack the concentration to turn their hands to finer work. Really, on the whole the Javanese are superlative plantation workers in a way that the other races are not.

There are a small number of Japanese who live on the island as small shopkeepers. For the most part these people sell cheap fabrics, shoes, crockery &etc to the natives. The Japanese are accorded a middle status between Europeans and Natives, much like Eurasians, in recognition of their adoption of Western norms and practices. This appropriation should not be given too much weight however owing to the essential 'Oriental' character of the Japanese. But it should be noted that they are on the whole more rational than the Chinese.

The Arabs are mostly from Hadramaut and use this appellation to claim a specious relationship to Muhammad. They are fanatical Mohammedans and if left to their own devices are ore than capable of whipping the natives into a dangerous frenzy. It is for this reason that the Arabs are watched more closely than most groups.

The Francophone club is a bastion of conservatism on the island being the chief meeting place for the Belgians. It has an elegant club house which has a fine bar and a good tennis court. It adjoins the King Leopold II field where football is played on Saturday. It bars all non-Europeans from entrance.

The Victoria is the club of the English community and is famous for its fine parties which it holds on Friday nights. It has a well appointed bar and has as a bartender an Indian who makes a fine gin and tonic. Non-Europeans are not permitted entrance. However, an exception is made for the Eurasian wives of senior officers and important planters. The Francophone Club has objected to what it calls an 'invitation to miscegenation'.

l'Asie is the sole locally produced newspaper and caters mostly to the Belgian population. The Company owns the press and Company officers write the articles. The society page is considered required reading but otherwise it is very staid. The English community in particular objects to it being only printed in French. This tells rather a great deal about their social graces and general lack of gentility.

The Chairman is conservative in taste, dress and thought. Before his appointment he never some much as left Belgium. This was a cause for concern among the shareholders. But having been appointed he has been a deft hand at the helm.

All manual labour is performed by Asiatics. The nationalities so employed are Malays, Chinese and Javanese.

The Malays of the island do not figure prominently among the labouring classes. He undertakes little work for hire beyond the felling of jungle and the management of boats. He is mostly concerned about his own affairs and does not enter into competition with the immigrant labouring classes. A small number of Malays live a nomadic life on the sea and are usually called Sea Gypsies. There are also some Pagan Malays who live in the interior although they are little documented.

Chinese are the most numerous and the most important class of labourers. They will undertake almost any class of work, from the high grade-handiwork of the skilled artisan in wood and metal to the drudgery of the most menial offices. The labour of the mines in the island is almost wholly composed of Chinese, but they seldom work as agricultural labourers, except on their own account as vegetable gardeners, or for employers of their own nationality. When engaged on road and railway work, the arrangement is usually made with the headman on behalf of his gang of coolies, and not with the men individually. Chinese labour is more satisfactorily utilised on piece-work or contract than on daily wages. Except in the case of domestic servants, it is usually difficult to persuade them to accept work otherwise than on those terms.

The Javanese are not numerous in comparison with the Chinese or Malays. They are fairly reliable labourers and are more amenable to European control than the Chinese, and therefore, form the bulk of the labour force employed by the Government and by planters and contractors. Their remuneration generally takes the form of daily wages payable monthly. They are the best coolies for road and estate work.

A small number of Arabs live in the island mostly as merchants and to a lesser extent as Mohammedan holy men. These are dangerous men for they excite the natives to great fevers of religion which have upon occasion harmed the prestige of the Company.

Eurasians are small in number and so faculty as clerks, policemen and as work gang bosses. Eurasians should not be promoted to positions of managerial authority or be placed in charge of large sums of monies. They are best paid on a monthly basis.

Europeans naturally hold the positions of authority and importance.

Pulau Emas offers the planter the following natural advantages: -

(i.) A fertile soil, varying in composition according to locality, but almost uniformly possessed of the substances necessary to ensure a strong and rapid growth.
(ii.) A moist, forcing heat, varying but little throughout the year.
(iii.) An abundant and regular rainfall.
(iv.) An immense acreage of virgin soil, hitherto untouched, available for planting at any elevation up to four thousand feet.

The following products can be cultivated with success: -

Coffee, tea, sugar, pepper, sago, rice, rubber, coconuts, bananas, tapioca and various kinds of native fruits.

Mining for alluvial tin ore is the principal industry carried on in much of the country. As already stated, Chinese labour is almost universally employed in this work.

The normal method of tin mining is more profitably pursued by Chinese than Europeans and involves manual dredging the tin laden earth before separating it via panning and other laborious processes.

Mining for tin by hydraulic power has been introduced by Europeans and is very successful, but requires a large outlay of capital. The water is carried for some miles through iron pipes of about nine inches in diameter, and is force against the hillside, washing the mud down the hill and leaving the ore behind with a minimum of labour.

Some gold has been discovered in alluvial deposits although this not found in sufficient quantities to be profitably extracted by Europeans.

The fakirs are a common sight on the island but are seldom remarked upon. These ascetics are in supremely ignorant but have the ear of the natives. While never dangerous, the fakir can if treated improperly can cause problems among the plantation workforce and among the neighboring natives. The smart plantation owner therefore does his best to ensure the good treatment of visiting fakirs.

These religious 'schools' are common in the larger towns and villages. In some cases the leaders of them are intelligent men although in most cases they are fools and charlatans who know little with that little being actively harmful. For example a popular prescription for diarrhea involves the ingestion of goat dung, abstention from liquids and the recitation of a special Arabic prayer by the affiliated. This obviously results in a poor medical outcome but no amount of argument can persuade the natives that this is the case.

The Roman Catholics have one priest, a Frenchman, who resides on this island. His chief concern is ministering to the European flock, although there are a great many more native Catholics than there are Europeans. Upon occasion, this priest ministers to the natives in their open-air churches but for the most part this is left to Malay deacons who are from the Moluccas.

The main Church is obviously not open to natives who stand on the road or sit on the gravestones of the adjoining graveyard nor is the Church open to the Eurasian Catholics who are made to sit on the lawn. The exclusion of the Eurasians is much remarked upon seeing as how the Church of England permits them to sit or stand at the back and is a source of bitter dispute between the Eurasians and the European Catholics.

The true reasons for this ban are not well known but involves the scandalous conduct of some Eurasian women who used the Church as a place to advertise their feminine whiles to European men in the hopes of securing husbands. Scandalously, this stratagem proved so successful that a European man was found in flagrante in the confessional after the service with a Eurasian women. It was this that caused the father to ban Eurasians from the Church proper. Although, this has not stopped the Eurasian women from attempting to ensnare European men.

The precise number of Catholics is impossible to know given the disorderly nature of the native component. But it is known that there are few local natives who are members of the Church. Most are Javanese or from the Moluccas. It is known that there are perhaps four-hundred European Catholics. About half of whom do not attend Church because of their distance from the capital. There are perhaps two-hundred Eurasian Catholics the greater part of whom are women.

There have been attempts to spread the doctrines of the Pope to the natives but the missionaries who carried out these measures did not survive the climate.

The Church of England has fewer European members than the Roman Catholics. But it does have a large number of Eurasian members who are rather more European in their morals than the Catholic Eurasians. The cause of this difference is not well known. There are few native members although some Protestants of the Dutch kind from the Moluccas have joined the Church of England. These members are most welcome and have a native deacon and are allowed to fully participate in the service. It has been remarked that these fellows are despite their race fine fellows. There is one vicar on the island and two missionaries who are working with two native villages which has caused some friction between the Church of England and the Sultan. The Church of England operates a smaller Sunday school which is open to its native members. At present there are ten students who study under a native deacon most Sundays.

The Germans have their own Lutheran Church but the pastor is known to live with a native openly which has seen the congregation attempt on two occasions to seek a replacement. This has proved ineffective owing to a lack of candidates willing to work on the island. Given the parsimonious and frankly Teutonic nature of the offer this is unsurprising.

The Dutch have a small Church but lack a Minister owing to their small size.

A small number of Eurasians have become Muslims. While the government does not have an official position on the validity of these conversions, it is widely agreed by all Europeans that they risk weakening white prestige and should not therefore be as a general rule be permitted and where possible should be frustrated through the use of the law.

Most of the Chinese Christians are members of the Church of England or are Catholics. In the case of the Catholic Chinese they are treated the same as the natives which has elicited some protest from them owing to their exposure to more lax regimes in other parts of Asia. In the case of the Church of England, the Chinese are fewer in number but richer and with sound ties to Singapore. They are therefore accorded more respect.

In 1875 the Sultan signed a treaty handing administrative powers over to the Board of the Régie Autonome who are allowed to make binding decisions upon all residents of the islands, save in matters which touch upon the native's customs or religions matters which are properly vested with the Sultan.

The system works as such: the Chairman is the highest authority in the Régie Autonome who is vested with the direction of affairs in all of the island and who is answerable only to the board which is based in Belgium.

He is assisted by a staff of Company Officers resident on the islands to whose hands is entrusted supervision of the principal departments of the states being Finance, Lands, Mines, Public Works, Railways, Police and Native Affairs.

The staff also includes the Judicial Officer who is the highest legal authority, the Commander of the Malay Native Rifles, the Protector of Eurasians, the Protector of Chinese, the Chief Medical Officer. Other such staff are also recruited as required.

The Sultan also retains a small staff which while inferior persons are accorded some respect. These include a Mufti who is the chief Mohammedan religious official and usually an Arab, sometimes versed in the Arab script, a sort of Majordomo who manages the royal finances, lands and household and a Native Minister who administers the native law and ensures that the Sultan is given the respect due to him.

The military of the island consists of a company of native rifles which are also the police and a squadron of horse which function as equerries to His Majesty the Sultan.

The total revenue of the island in the year 1899 was $3,533,100 which were collected from customs, excise (inclusive of the opium farm) and land revenue.

The total expenses was $3,321,977 which was spent primarily on wages, roads and the railroad.

It was estimated in 1899 that imports were $9,754,073 and exports $12,844,129 with the main items of imports being manufactures, food and alcohol while the main exports were tin, timber, sugar and rubber.