(254 MALAY SLAVERY LAW. — 
Since they can neither compel them by force to work nor pun-- 
ish them for disobedience or misbehaviour, the mere nominal 
ownership is of limited practical value. It is only in a few cases, 
where family pride and a clinging to old customs prompt some 
of the remaining Rajas and heads of families of Chiefs to retain 
as many personal adherents as they can, that the possession of 
slaves now bears any resemblance to the old state of things. 
In some of these instances, notably in the case of Raja Muda 
Yusur, the present Regent of Perak, there is no doubt that men 
and women have been and perhaps still are detained in the 
condition of slaves without any grounds, which would constitute 
a right, even under Malay customary law. There is, however, 
little harsh treatment and complaints are rare. 
The possession of slaves and debtors is more common in the 
North than in the South of Perak, desertion being difficult in 
the more secluded districts. Most well-to-do men at Kota La- 
ma and Chigar Galah own several. 
Slaves now in Perak may be divided as follows :— 
(1.) ‘Abdi,i.e., Batak, Sakei, and Habshi (Abyssinian) slaves 
and their descendants. 
(2.) Lamba Raja, or royal slaves, who have been seized by 
a Raja or have become hu/ur to the State. 
(3.) Debtors who have themselves contracted the debt for 
which they have forfeited their liberty. 
(4.) Debtors who have become so merely by marrying a fe- 
male debtor and thus becoming lable to her master for her 
dower. 
(5.) Such wives, children and descendants of debtors as are 
lawfully lable for the debt according to Malay custom. 
(6.) Persons who are really neither slaves nor debtors, but 
who are detained or claimed on fictitious or unlawful grounds, 
Slavery in Perak could be stamped out at once by the adoption, 
by the Council, of resolutions founded on sections 2 and 4 of 
the Indian Act V of 1843 and providing first that “no rights 
‘arising out of an alleged property in the person and services 
‘* of another asa slave shal! be enforced” by any authority in 
Perak, and, second, that ‘‘any act which would be penal of- 
“fence if done to a free man shall be equally an offence if 
