Page:Christiaan Snouck Hurgronje - The Achehnese - tr. Arthur Warren Swete O'Sullivan (1906).djvu/220

 In view of existing circumstances his father had deemed it wiser to train him up as a soldier than as a pandit, for which latter career he possessed little capacity or inclination. He mastered however as much religious learning as every person of ordinary piety requires to know, and was always distinguished by the title teungku as being the son of the great ulama. As a matter of fact, however, he was a guerilla chief and nothing else, and borrowed from the great authority which his father's name everywhere inspired an influence which raised him to the position of chief panglima.

In this capacity he and his bands proved a great burden to the people, and his life was in other respects also far from harmonizing with the teaching of his father. The story goes that during the last years of the latter's life Mat Amin lived openly with another man's wife, and that Teungku Tirò, to give him a severe lesson, forbade him access to his presence. This appears to have so enraged the young man, that he brooded over some device to rid him of this tiresome father. When Teungku Tirò, while still in the full vigour of life, suddenly fell ill, he is said to have expressed the conviction that poison had been administered to him by some agent of his son.

Notwithstanding this he had Mat Amin summoned to his bedside when dying, and solemnly warned him to go to the devout ulamas for advice, and to forsake his evil ways. He seemed however to realize how little chance there was of his son’s ever proving his true successor in any respect.

The latter was not wont to hearken to advice. In his dress he assumed the character of an ulèëbalang, and while his father, in receiving distinguished guests, always rose to meet them, the young man would remain sitting until they came up to him. Even the Achehnese consider Mat Amin proud, ignorant and headstrong, and when after his father's death he gave the rein more than ever to his evil passions, the great body of the adherents of Teungku Tirò at once melted away.