Tide Marks by H.M. Tomlinson — Read

Our sailors are Malays. My first impression of them was that they were languid and ladylike seamen. No doubt the captain had been unable to get white men for the voyage. He was forced to do what was possible with mariners whose headdress is neat and pleasing millinery, and who sometimes wear attractive lace bodices. One man I saw hauling on a rope, whose jowl itself was as threatening as a bare knife, wore a blouse with an elegant design in birds and flowers. His trousers, which were more or less white, had lavender stripes. But make no mistake about it. There would be fewer lives lost when a ship comes to trouble if white seamen knew how to lower boats and get them away as expeditiously as our Malays. When we see a grove of cocoanuts we stand in. I hear no orders. Our men appear to be loafing. The master is on the bridge. The chief mate is on the forecastle head. The leadsman is in the chains. The leadsman chants, and the bright apple-green water of a reef with its fringe of snow insensibly approaches. And I am still listening to the echoes from the hills of our roaring cable when, as if our boats were sentient and behaved like retriever dogs, they are already away and making for the beach. For our men get plenty of practice. In the Gulf of Tomino alone we called at about fifteen little places in one day, anchored, and got the boats out.

It would be useless to name these beaches. They are known only to the Dutchmen of the K. P. M. (It is easier to write those letters than to say Koninklijke Paketvaart Maatshappij.) These steamers serve all the Malay Islands. They touch at places where there is nothing to mark land but a tree or two upright on universal glass, lost under vast and radiant clouds. What is the use of naming such spots? One sunrise our siren blared when we were idling along Celebes. Another anchorage! I was going to the upper deck and overtook the captain. Where were we? At Paleleh!