IIIF Color HighRes
National Institute of Informatics - Digital Silk Road Project
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| IIIF Color HighRes |
| The Book of Ser Marco Polo : vol.1 |
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Citation Information
AGE, 32-33. IN ARACAN-DEFENCES OF SINGAPORE
II
some died and others had to be sent back, food supplies
failed, and the route through those dense forests was uncertain ;
yet under all difficulties he seems never to have grumbled or
lost heart. And when things were nearly at the worst, Yule
restored the spirits of his local escort by improvising a
wappenshaw, with a Sheffield gardener's knife, which he happened
to have with him, for prize ! When at last Yule emerged
from the wilds and on 25th March marched into Prome, he
was taken for his own ghost ! " Found Fraser (of the Engineers)
in a rambling phoongyee house, just under the great gilt pagoda.
I went up to him-announcing myself, and his astonishment was
so great that he would scarcely shake hands ! " It was on this
occasion at Prome that Yule first met his future chief Captain
Phayre—" a very young-looking man very cordial," a descrip-
tion no less applicable to General Sir Arthur Phayre at the age
of seventy !
After some further wanderings, Yule embarked at Sandong,
and returned by water, touching at Kyook Phyoo and Akyab, to
Calcutta, which he reached on ist May his birthday.
The next four months were spent in hard work at Calcutta.
In August, Yule received orders to proceed to Singapore, and
embarked on the 29th. His duty was to report on the defences
of the Straits Settlements, with a view to their improvement.
Yule's recommendations were sanctioned by Government, but
his journal bears witness to the prevalence then, as since, of the
penny-wise-pound-foolish system in our administration. On all
sides he -vas met by difficulties in obtaining sites for batteries,
etc., for which heavy compensation was demanded, when by the
exercise of reasonable foresight, the same might have been
secured earlier at a nominal price.
Yule's journal contains a very bright and pleasing picture of
Singapore, where he found that the majority of the European
population " were evidently, from their tongues, from benorth
the Tweed, a circumstance which seems to be true of four-fifths
of the Singaporeans. Indeed, if I taught geography, I should
be inclined to class Edinburgh, Glasgow, Dundee, and Singapore
together as the four chief towns of Scotland."
Work on the defences kept Yule in Singapore and its
neighbourhood until the end of November, when he embarked
for Bengal. On his return to Calcutta, Yule was appointed
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