ABSTRACT
In the Malay sketches contained in this and a previous volume, I have endeavoured to portray, as exactly as I could, the Malay as he is in his own country, against his own most picturesque and fascinating background. I will not here make further reference to him, beyond saying, broadly, that he deeply resented our first coming, and has lived to change his mind. His conversion has been slow, as might be expected with one so constituted and with such traditions, but still it is so genuine that he will candidly confess both the original feeling and the present recantation. The position he occupies in the body politic is that of the heir to the inheritance. The land is Malaya, and he is the Malay. Let the infidel Chinese and the evil-smelling Hindu from Southern India toil, but of their work let some share of profit come to him. They are strangers and unbelievers; and while he is quite willing to tolerate them, and to be amused, rather than angered, by their strange forms of idolatry, their vulgar speech in harsh tongues, and their repulsive customs, he thinks it only fitting that they should contribute to his comfort and be ready to answer to his behests. The Malay hates labour, and contributes very little to the revenues in the way of taxation. He cultivates his rice-fields, when he is made to do so by stern necessity, or the bidding of his headmen, and he is a skilful fisherman, because that is in the nature of sport. He plays at trade sometimes, but almost invariably fails to make a living out of it; because, having once invested his capital in a stock, he spends all the money he receives for sales, and then finds he has no means to continue his business. And yet, he is a delightful companion, a polite and often an interesting acquaintance, and an enemy who is not to be despised. He has aspirations. He loves power and place, and his soul hankers after titles of honour. In all these desires his women-folk are keenly interested. They apply the spur, and will readily consent to become the man’s mouthpiece, when they think the good things of this world can be got by judicious flattery or tearful pleading.
