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his relation with sickness. The existence of an opinion so contradictory to human reason, and which seemd totaly unconnected with religion, was with me long a subject of doubt, but the universal testimony of every Indian I ever heard speak of it was not to be withstood. It seems to have taken its rise in the Island of Celebes and Bouton, very many of the inhabitants of which have crocodiles in their families; from thence it has spread itself all over the Eastern Islands, even to Timor and Ceram, and west again as far as Java and Sumatra, on which Islands however such instances are very scarce among the natives. To shew how firmly this prejudice has layd hold of the minds of these ignorant people, I shall repeat one story out of the multitude I have heard confirming it from ocular demonstration.
A Slave girl who was born and bred up among the En[g]lish at Bencoulen on the Island of Sumatra, by which means she had learnt a little English, told me that her father when on his Death bed told her that he had a Crocodile for his sudara, and chargd her to give him meat &c. after he was gone, telling her in what part of the river he was to be found. She went she said constantly, and calling him by his name Radja pouti (white king), he came out
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Voyaging Accounts |  |
© Derived from State Library of NSW Transcription of Banks's Journal page (vol. 2) 499, February 2004
Published by kind permission of the Library
To cite this page use: https://paulturnbull.org/project/southseas/journals/-banks_remarks-425.html