Note 1 — Chapter XI · THE SULTAN’S ISTANA AND THE “HILL OF TEARS.”

We descended to the village, leaving the men to bring on the horses and gear, and here “Gelah” procured us some hot water, and we sat down under the shady trees and enjoyed our lunch of chocolate and biscuit. “Gelah” told us he did not care for chocolate and asked for some brandy. I gave him half a tumblerful, which he drank and became very communicative. He lighted one of the cigars he had appropriated last night—indeed he had been smoking them all the morning—and then he told us that many of the Sulus were bad men and great thieves, adding that he was a good man himself, and that was why the Sultan liked him. He then helped himself to more brandy, tossing it off undiluted as before. He then launched out into a long story of a pirate fleet having left Tawi-Tawi about a year before, and remarked that they had but just returned with a good deal of plunder. Wallace mentions1 that these Sulu pirates sometimes visit the Aru islands near New Guinea and Ceram on their predatory expeditions. They only attack small trading prahus now, but in former times even large sailing vessels were not safe from their attacks.