the rest of his life, and the man who rescued him has got promotion and
a pension. A short time ago a fine young tiger was brought alive to
Captain Shaw, and he ordered a proper cage to be made, in which to send
him to England, telling Babu, the "double Hadji," to put it into the
"godown" in its bamboo cage; but the man put it into the kitchen, and
in the morning the cage was found broken into pieces, the kitchen
shutters torn down, and the tiger gone! There was a complete panic in
Malacca; people kept their houses shut, and did not dare to go out even
on business, and not only was the whole police force turned out in
pursuit, but the English garrison. It was some days before the scare
subsided and the people believed that the beast had escaped to its
natural home in the jungle.

A tropical thunderstorm of the most violent kind occurred yesterday,
when I was quite alone in the Stadthaus. The rain fell in sheets,
deluges, streams, and the lightning flashed perfectly blue through a
"darkness which could be felt." There is a sort of grandeur about this
old Dutch Stadthaus, with its tale of two centuries. Its smooth lawns,
sloping steeply to the sea, are now brilliant with the gaudy
parrot-like blossoms of the "flame of the forest," the gorgeous
Poinciana regia, with which they are studded. Malacca is such a rest
after the crowds of Japan and the noisy hurry of China! Its endless
afternoon remains unbroken except by the dreamy, colored, slow-moving
Malay life which passes below the hill. There is never any hurry or
noise.

So had I written without prescience! The night of the awful silence
which succeeded the thunderstorm was also the eve of the Chinese New
Year, and Captain Shaw gave permission for "fireworks" from 7 P.M. till
midnight. The term "fireworks" received a most liberal construction.