TOPOGRAPHY OF SUMATRA. 



Ill 



local saying, " Benkulen is a small place with big houses, where small people bear 

 big titles." From the end of the seventeenth century till 1824, it belonged to the 

 East India Compan}^, which had made it the capital of its Indonesian possessions. 

 But the harbour has gradually silted up, and the local trade has withdrawn a few 

 miles farther south, to the more convenient Silebar Bay. The town is unhealthy, 

 and in 1714 the English had already removed their residence to Fort Marlborough^ 

 some miles farther north. The houses, injured by earthquakes, are often left 

 unrepaired, and the neglected appearance of the place is increased by the general 



Fig. 42. — Palembang. 

 Scale 1 : 75,000. 



10 4" 47 



3,300 Yards. 



poverty of its Malay and Chinese inhabitants. The surrounding district is not 

 very fertile, and the neighbouring coffee plantations have been abandoned. 



Despite the excellent commercial position of the ports, lying in deep inlets at 

 the southern extremity of the island, the local trade chiefly in pepper, and dammar 

 resin, has been little developed. Even before the Krakatau eruption, which spread 

 havoc along the seaboard, the region of the Lampongs, or "Lowlands," did not 

 contain a single important town. At present the chief centre of population is 

 Telokh-Batong, a group of eight villages skirling Larapong Bay and a neigh- 



