That affair with the leopard would have been more to my taste; though, if I had been in your place, with nothing but your knife and Abdool's, I doubt whether I should have come out of it as well as you did; but the other business was splendid, and those Malays of the rajah's must have fought well, indeed, to beat off a force six times their own strength." "The great point is that I have obtained his ratification of the tumangong's grant, whenever it may be made." "That is satisfactory, of course; but it would not have, to my mind, anything like the importance of your series of adventures, which will be something to think over all your life.

I wish I had been there, with my crew, to have backed you up; though I am afraid that most of them would have shared the fate of your Malay escort, in that sudden attack in the forest." "Yes; with all their pluck, they could scarcely have repulsed such a sudden onslaught though, certainly, the killing would not all have been on one side.

I am glad, indeed, that Abdool also came safely out of it; as I should have missed him, fearfully.
"The interpreter showed himself a good man, and I hope that Lord Mornington will, when I report his conduct, make him a handsome present.

If he had not got away with me, it is hardly likely I should ever have found my way to Johore and, if I had done so, I could not have explained to the rajah that he was going to be attacked, or have got him to erect the stockade that was the main cause of our success.

In fact, he would probably, in his anger at the slaughter of his escort, have ordered me to be executed on the spot.