British Malaya; An Account of the Origin and Progress of British Influence in Malaya (Paperback)

This historic book may have numerous typos and missing text. Purchasers can usually download a free scanned copy of the original book (without typos) from the publisher. Not indexed. Not illustrated. 1907 edition. Excerpt: ... chapter vii the malay: his customs, prejudices, arts, language, and literature it will probably be most convenient to the reader if I now tell him something of the people whose country I have tried in general terms to describe. The Malay of Malacca, Pinang, and Singapore is'a different being to the Malay of the Peninsula, of Perak, or Pahang, or any of the States that were independent in 1873, and it is to the latter that I propose to refer. When Sir Harry Ord left the Straits to make way for his successor, Sir Andrew Clarke, there was not in existence, so far as I am aware, any published account of the people of the Peninsula; certainly no one in the neighbourhood was then in a position to give one, and what follows is the result of years of observation, made under circumstances of close intimacy with every class of Malay society. To acquire this information at first hand, it is necessary to speak, read, and write the language, to sympathize with the people--for without sympathy you cannot win the confidence of a shy and reserved race--to live in their houses, join in their festivities, be allowed to listen to their prayers, to attend the rites of marriage and of burial. The searcher after knowledge must journey with them by land, and river, and sea; he must take the field with them, join in their sports, listen to their gossip, their complaints, their stories, tend them in sickness, help them when in difficulty, share their sorrows and their joys, 133 respect their prejudices, be kind to their superstitions, and always treat them with consideration. If he does this, and exercises a great patience, he will gain his end, and the end is worth the effort. Only