RETURN ON BOARD. 393 



bazaar trade appears for the most part also to 

 be monopolized by them ; the Malays seem tlie 

 tillers of the soil, or subordinates, in other re- 

 spects. The Hindostanee natives, or their de- 

 scendants, are evidently the conquerors of the 

 coast, and of course the heads of government 

 are of that race! The rajah made Mr. Fearon 

 a present of a small bullock, cocoa-nuts, plan- 

 tains, sugar-canes, &c., and accepted an invita- 

 tion to visit the ship the day following, when it 

 would be requisite, from their professing the 

 Mahometan creed, that " all pigs should be 

 kept from grunting,'' or getting an afternoon's 

 liberty.* About noon, taking leave of the rajah 

 and his party, we returned on board. 



At this place no canoes came off to the ship 

 with fish, fowls, fruit, &c., for sale ; none but 

 those on business came to the ship, and Mr. 

 Fearon was advised by the rajah not to allow 

 any to do so. This appeared strange, as off the 

 other villages to the eastward of Pedir, goats, 

 fruit, fowls, yams, &c., were brought off for 

 sale ; but we afterwards had good reason for 

 suspecting that some of the rajah's followers were 



* A " flock of the swinish breed " would prove efficacious 

 in clearing the decks of a ship of the Mahometan Malays, 

 who have a religious abhorrence of the pollution occasioned 

 by such company. 



