252 



POLICE — rOPT'LATlON'. 



lunteersj have, on several occasions materially aided 

 in driving off marauding bands from the boundary, 

 ami who are ready enough to act when called upon on 

 oilier emergeneies. 13 tit the St rails police — at least (he 

 provincial part of it — labours under the disadvantage 

 of hot being supplied readily with inklliutm and 

 trustworthy night constables, the disposition of the 

 very best of them being liable to lie corrupted even by 

 the very small portion of power entrusted to them. 



The salliant population of Province Wellesle) — or 

 those who could be easily spared for a while from their 

 families — amounts to not less than five thousand men, 

 who have all, more or less, been used to the musket 

 or the spear, the parang and kris. The able-bodied 

 men of all Jhis population has never yet been called 

 out en masse, but it is believed that the number just 

 speci6ed could be assembled for defence in the course 

 of six hours, and probably eight thousand within two 

 days. The stake which the Mala \ an population now 

 baa in the soil, the hopelessness of its being ever able 

 to regain Keddah from the Siamese, and the length 

 of time which has elapsed since a large portion of it 

 was driven from that country — during which a new 

 generation has sprung up, having local attach, 

 ments — and also its hatred and fear combined of the 

 Siamese sway, are circumstances which, it may be sup- 

 posed, Mould make its members no lukewarm or 

 nerveless resisters of aggression from without. 



The Chinese and Chuliahs have been excluded 

 from the above statement. The former will only 

 take up arms when the danger presses close upon 

 them, but the latter are, in the Straits at least, prover- 

 bially cowards, and are not ashamed to confess their 

 weakness and to palliate it by asking why they should 

 possess emirate «hen none of their ancestors ever 

 had any, or would Venture to fire a musket ! The 



