Page:Malay Sketches.pdf/144

 light across this wide expanse of grain bounded by distant ranges of soft blue hills. How greedily one drinks it all in! and, as the Eye of Day droops lower, there shoot from between its closing lids rays of fire which tinge the glistening palms with a rosy effulgence, followed all too soon by the pale opalescent shades which proclaim the approach of the fast-driving chariot of night,

A grey haze rises from the damp earth, spreads in thin wreaths across the darkening plain, thickens to a heavy dead-white yapour, and as the silver sickle rises over the distant hills it shines upon clustered plumes of dark fronds mysteriously poised above a motionless drift of snow-like cloud.

On the edge of such a field was the home ot Haji Masah. Behind stretched the rich plain, in front a great river, both wide and deep, its banks lined by groves of coco-nuts in the neighbourhood of villages, but elsewhere covered by forest and the nipah palm.

The dwelling stood a few feet back from the river, and, as its owner was a man of means, the structure was of some size, the floor and walls of stout planks and a strong palisade enclosed the surrounding yard, The house was, as usual, on wooden piles, and the kitchen, also on piles but