MALAY PROVERBS. 



HEJN" commencing the publication of a collection of 

 Malay proverbs in the first number of this Journal in 

 1878. I took occasion to explain that the specimens then 

 printed were exclusive of a large number which might 

 be consulted by the curious in the pages of the Malay- 

 French Dictionary of the Abbe Favre and the work of M. 

 Klinkert. # In order to make sure that I was not reprinting pro- 

 verbs already published with explanations in French or Dutch by 

 those authors, it was necessary to go carefully througli their collec- 

 tions, many of the proverbs in which I had myself collected inde- 

 pendently before those works came to my knowledge. In the course 

 of this occupation, all the examples given by M. Favee were copied 

 and translated. The publication of the collection of proverbs which 

 appeared in the first three numbers of the Journal of this Society 

 having, I have reason to believe, created some interest in the 

 subject, I venture to offer to the Society this earlier collection, 

 many of the examples in which are, perhaps, in more general use 

 than most of those formerly published, though they are not easily 

 accessible to Malay students who may happen to be ignorant of 

 French or Dutch. 



All the proverbs now published are to be found in the works 

 of Fayre and Klinkert, but I have departed, in many instances, 

 from the explanations given by those commentators, and am res- 

 ponsible for all that is here printed in small type. Some examples 

 given by Fayre as proverbs, but which are obviously merely 

 rhetorical expressions or idiomatic phrases, are omitted. 



The proverbs from the collection of Klinkert are distin- 

 guished by the sign Kl. and reference numbers. The letter If. 

 followed by a numeral indicates a reference to my own collection 

 of Malay proverbs published in this Journal in 1878-9. Hk. Ah. 

 signifies '' Hikayat Abdullah " — a work by Abdullah bin Abdul 

 Kadir, Munshi, from which many of these proverbs are taken. 



The order adopted is alphabetical. 



' W. E. MAXWELL. 



* " Eenige Maleische Spreekwoorden en Spreekwijzen, Verzameld, Ver- 

 taald en Opgehelderd " door H. C. Klinkekt. 



