ABSTRACT
For a half century before 1874, the British Malay possessions were limited to the three ports of Penang, Singapore, and Malacca. Throughout the half century from 1824, the British policy was to avoid intervention in the Malay states and extension of political control over them. Tin was indeed the most precious asset of nineteenth-century Malaya. Custom and tradition, however, played a greater role in the society and government of the Malays than in those of their white "advisers." The resident system in Malaya was, like the chartered company rule, a device of indirect rule—a substitute for annexation and formal rule—and a means of power in the guise of protection to the sultans. The second phase of British expansion in Malaya was initiated by Sir Frederick Weld, governor of the Straits Settlements from 1880 to 1887. In 1895, with the creation of the federation, Sir Frank Swettenham became the first resident-general of the Federated Malay States.
