14 MEMOIR OF CAPTAIN LIGHT. 



This destpatch gives no mean tribute to Captain Light's 

 work ; and it deserves to be quoted at some length, for 

 it explains with curious minuteness the policy of the East 

 India Company during the first nineteen years of Penang 

 history. It testifies that " from the spirit of British rule, 

 " even when imperfectly administered, industry, enterprise 

 '^ and improvement have appeared to a considerable extent on 

 " the island, and its population, produce and commerce are 

 "already very respectable/' As regards the future, it 

 adds : " The position of this island, its climate, its fertility, its 

 " harbour, its produce of large timber, its contiguity to Pegu 

 " which contains the most abundant of teak forests in Asia, 

 "have long pointed it out as an acquisition of very great im- 

 " portance in a commercial and political view, being situated 

 "in a most favourable situation for an emporium of commerce 

 " in the Eastern seas." 



This important document, of 14 closely printed pages and 

 74 paragraphs, must have been framed in the latter part of 

 1804, just ten years after Captain LiGHT's death. It is diffi- 

 cult to conceive a better testimony to his work and to the 

 merits of his young Settlement. Among other things, it 

 describes minutely how " no Import and Export duties were 

 " imposed up to the time of the 2 per cent, ad valorem duty 

 "levied in 1801, on the importation of tin, pepper and betel- 

 " nut, which in that year produced $13,076" ; and also how 



" upon our first taking possession of the island 



" ground was said to be of such little value that to ask was 

 "to have, or to appropriate was equivalent to legal right." 



To check this some instructions had been invited and a 

 Regulation had been passed on August ist, 1794, "respecting 

 grants of land for the period of 5 years " ; and resolving 

 that for the future " no grant of land be made to Europeans 

 " exceeding in quantity 300 orlongs, preferring to encourage 

 " the clearing and cultivation of the island by making small 

 " grants of land to the industrious Chinese." 



Unfortunately for this policy, the Chinese would not look at 

 such short leases. The emergency thus created at the close of 



