PLAN FOR A VOLUNTEER POLICE iN THE MUDA DISTRICTS, 
PROVINGE WELLESLEY, SUBMITTED TO GOVERNMENT 
_ BY THE LATE d. R. LOGAN IN 1867. 
$= === OUI O000 8s 
€2e4 HE districts of North Province Wellesley lying along the 
(et Muda and the Kreh, comprising the lands held by me 
and the tracts surrounded by or adjacent to those 
held by Malays, are without Police stations, and, for 
the most part, without roads. Overa large portion 
of this area the population is scattered in small 
hamlets far apart from each other. The unreclaimed state of the 
greater part of it affords facilities for gangs of robbers lurking, 
and they can enter it by stealth either from the Muda or from 
the sparsely inhabited country beyond our eastern frontier. 
Crimes are frequently committed within it, and the perpetrators 
are hardly ever brought to punishment. A few years ago one 
of the noted panglima panyamun, or robber captains, of Kédah 
crossed it repeatedly in open day at the head of a gang well armed, 
and the Pénghtlus took care, while affecting pursuit, to keep at a 
safe distance from him. 
Unless Chinese can be induced to settle in these districts, the 
work of reclamation will be exceedingly slow. I give them all 
the encouragement I can, but, in the absence of regular Police, or 
a good system of volunteer police, they have no protection for 
their lives and property, and are constantly exposed to thefts and 
often to robbery and murder. A goldsmith opened a shop on 
the Ikan Mati Road, but was robbed, and the lives of himself and 
his workmen endangered. He drew back and established himself 
close to my house at Permatang Bértam. A shopkeeper settled at 
Paya Kladi, fortified his house by rows of posts all round it, and thick 
‘bars to his door. Within two months he was attacked at night 
by a party of Malays. He and his men defended themselves by 
throwing billets of tire-wood and crockery from an upper window 
