I could not think of violating the laws of hospitality by having
him seized and drenched with an emetic, and thus frightening him into a
notion that we were going to sacrifice him to some English idol. No:
there was clearly no help for it. He took his leave, and for some days I
felt anxious, but as I never heard of any Malay being found dead, I
became convinced that he was used {17} to opium; and that I must have
done him the service I designed by giving him one night of respite from
the pains of wandering.
This incident I have digressed to mention, because this Malay (partly
from the picturesque exhibition he assisted to frame, partly from the
anxiety I connected with his image for some days) fastened afterwards
upon my dreams, and brought other Malays with him, worse than himself,
that ran "a-muck" {18} at me, and led me into a world of troubles. But
to quit this episode, and to return to my intercalary year of happiness.
I have said already, that on a subject so important to us all as
happiness, we should listen with pleasure to any man's experience or
experiments, even though he were but a plough-boy, who cannot be supposed
to have ploughed very deep into such an intractable soil as that of human
pains and pleasures, or to have conducted his researches upon any very
enlightened principles.
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