268 THE DUTCH IN PERAK. 
‘ selves.on the island of Pangkor off the mouth of the Perak river, 
‘ but were unsuccessful. They were equally so in their endeavour 
" to control Salangor.”’ * 
No vestiges now remain of the brick buildings of the Dutch factory 
at Tanjong Putus. The materials have long since been removed by 
the Malays for their own use. The site, which was pointed out to 
me some years ago, was then covered with low jungle, and I never 
carried out the intention which I then entertained of having it 
cleared and the foundations, if possible, traced. The long inter- 
course of the Dutch with the Perak Malays has not, however, been 
forgotten by the latter. The repeated demands of the Europeans 
for permission to settle and for sites for establishments have 
passed into a proverb, and importunity is often laughingly derided 
in the phrase, Ai ka-lagi-lagi saperti blanda minta tanah! “OQ! 
more, more! like the Dutchmen asking for land.” + Fruits and 
vegetables of foreign importation are also called blanda or wolanda 
(Hollander), which really meant formerly “ European,’ the natives 
having been quite unable to distinguish different nationalities 
among white men. When our recent intercourse with Perak be- 
gan, in 1874, small Dutch silver coins were still current in the 
State, and 1 was able, when I first went to Perak, to collect a good 
many. They are now difficult to obtain, and the old Perak eur- 
rency —lumps of tin, weighing 24 katé each, called bidor, (mentioned 
in the Dutch treaties quoted in this paper)—-have altogother dis- 
appeared. 
Trading monopolies have, happily, long been things of the past, 
and our allies and neighbours in Netherlands India have, in some 
places at least, recognised, like ourselves, the advantage of free 
trade. But whatever we may think of the object of the Dutch 
settlement in Perak in former days, there can be but one opinion ~ 
as to the courage and tenacity with which they held their own 
in that little-known kingdom during various periods embraced 
between the years 1650 and 1795, nearly 150 years. 
W. EB. MAXWELL. 
* Journ. Ind. Arch., IV., 21. 
7 Journ. Straits Branch, R. A. S., IT, 20, 45. 
