MALAY LAW IN NEGRI SEMBILAN, 
BY 
Hon. MARTIN LISTER. 
Report on the Negri Sembilan for 1887 entitled 
“srg  ‘ Origin and Constitution.’’* It has been suggested 
Se that what was only avery brief and superficial sketch 
ce might further be enlarged upon. What I wrote was 
explanatory of my Report, was sketchy and in many 
points inaccurate, and it was not written for publication in a 
Journal. This paper, however, was reprinted in the Asiatic 
Society’s Journal, though this had not been my intention 
when I wrote the Report, and it is excusable, I think, to say 
that difficulties have arisen in writing what I had intended 
to write later, viz., afar fuller and more careful paper for 
publication in connection with this very interesting subject. 
Without constant repetition of the previous paper this is im- 
possible. Thus I have decided upon taking the question from 
a different view, and giving some illustrations of cases and 
decisions in Malay custom connected with their origin, such 
custom being of a curiously complicated form and derived from 
a singular origin of Muhammadan Malay occupation and are, 
if not unknown, ignored in other Malay States. 
First and foremost it must be understood that instead of 
Bugis and other Malay pirates occupying a coast line, as in the 
case of Selangor and Perak, driving back and taking as slaves 
the non-Muhammadan aborigines of the Peninsula termed 
“Sakei,” “Jakun,” ““Semang ” and ‘“‘ Waris laut,” the people 
of Menangkabau who penetrated into the Negri Sembilan v74 
ol N 1888, I wrote an appendix to my Administration 
3 
* Vide “‘ The Negri Sembilan, their Origin and Constitution,” 1889. 
