Discoveries in Australia, Volume 2: Discoveries in Australia; with an Account of the Coasts and Rivers; Explored and Surveyed During the Voyage of H.M.S. Beagle, in The; Years 1837-38-39-40-41-42-43. By Command of the Lords Commissioners; Of the Admiralty. Also a Narrative of Captain Owen Stanley's Visits; To the Islands in the Arafura SeaStokes, John Lort
History
Discoveries in Australia, Volume 2: Discoveries in Australia; with an Account of the Coasts and Rivers; Explored and Surveyed During the Voyage of H.M.S. Beagle, in The; Years 1837-38-39-40-41-42-43. By Command of the Lords Commissioners; Of the Admiralty. Also a Narrative of Captain Owen Stanley's Visits; To the Islands in the Arafura Sea
Stokes, John Lort
Australia -- Description and travel; Australia -- Discovery and exploration; Natural history -- Australia
Among the fresh information gained from Mr. Gronovius during this visit,
was an account of the natives of Timor called Timorees. They are very
superstitious, and when a person of consequence dies, a number of
karabows (buffaloes) pigs, and ponies are killed and placed over his
grave, as an offering to the evil spirit. Some, in case of sickness,
imagine, that by eating a whole buffalo, even the horns and hoofs, by
degrees, they can appease the anger of the demon to whom they attribute
all their misfortunes.
Many of the Timorees have really handsome features, strikingly different
from the Malays. Their hair, which is neither woolly nor straight, but
crisp, and full of small waves, is worn long behind, and kept together by
a curiously formed comb. There is altogether a degree of wildness in
their appearance that ill accords with their situation; for nearly all
the Timorees in Coepang are slaves sold by the Rajahs of the different
districts, the value of a young man being fifty pounds.
A powerful Rajah, commonly called the Emperor of Timor, visited Coepang
during our stay there. Unfortunately we all missed seeing him. He was
attended by a large and well-armed guard, and appeared to be on very good
terms with the merchants of the place, who made him several presents, no
doubt through interested motives; probably he supplies them with slaves.
His character is notoriously bad; it was only the other day that he had
one of his wives cut to pieces, for some very trifling offence.
A SHOOTING EXCURSION.
On taking my leave of the Resident, I fixed the day for our shooting
excursion. We were to go to a place called Pritie, on the northern shore
of Babao Bay, and distant some fifteen miles from the ship, which
rendered it necessary therefore to make an early start.
Daylight on Monday morning accordingly found us on the northern shore of
the bay, but we soon ascertained that our guide knew very little about
the matter; and what was still worse, there was no getting near the
shore, a bank of soft mud fronting it for some distance, at this time of
tide, and particularly in the vague direction our guide gave us of
Pritie. The day was fast advancing; so we made our way back to a cliffy
projection we had passed before light, where, after some difficulty, we
got on shore. Whilst the breakfast was cooking, I made a sketch of the
bay, and took a round of angles, all the charts and plans I had seen
being very erroneous.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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