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panglimas of the sagis; that the latter had no power without the acquiescence of the seven kawōms (the traditional expression[1] for the Achehnese people); and that the people themselves could only act in accordance with the determination of the ulamas, who derive their knowledge from Allah and his Apostle.
The war-chest.Teungku Tirò knew as well as anyone that money is the life and soul, even of the holy war. He pushed on with the utmost zeal the collections of the haʾ sabi (ḥaqq sabīl) i. e. the portion of the tax callad zakāt set apart for the holy war. He urged all the chiefs at least to give him money contributions towards the good cause, even if they would take no personal part in the conflict. Whoever appeared backward in this duty became exposed to the enmity of the Teungku's followers. When the adat chiefs protested, his answer was that he was desirous of giving full weight to their adat qualifications; but these he never defined, and always submitted any questions that arose to the test of the religious law. He denied that he wished to deprive them of a handsbreadth of their territory, but as the representative of religion he required of their subjects a strict obedience to the law of Allah.
At that particular juncture these subjects cherished especial respect and fear for the ulamas, feelings which were not as at ordinary times counterbalanced by other circumstances. It was thus that the Teungku succeeded without difficulty in obtaining the control of a never-empty coffer for the purposes of the war. No ulèëbalang would have ever so much as conceived the idea of establishing such a treasure-chest, replenished by contributions from the whole of Great Acheh and a great part of the dependencies in the North, East and West Coasts.
Given money, men are not lacking in Acheh. The Teungku's troops, it is true, were formed in part of those very vagrant elements which had formerly supplied Teuku Asan, Teuku Uma etc. with their fighting men, but each recruit was first duly "converted" by the Teungku, strictly drilled and subjected to a better discipline than suited these so-called panglimas. Thus he raised a sort of standing army, and took care at the same time always to have a well-armed reserve of gampōng men.
At the same time he maintained his influence over the people by making constant journeys and holding at his halting-places great kanduris
- ↑ See above p. 52.
