93 



to suHjuafate that state whose independence could 

 have been preserved l>y the mere utterance of a 

 British veto; and in* September 1818 Perak was 

 prostrate at the feet of it» compulsory enemy. 

 It \vm, howeverj subsequently wrestecl from 

 Siamese domination by the Kajah of Salangor, 

 who, pttrsuinga less timorous and more manly poli- 

 cy, restored ii by force of arms to its original sove- 

 reign in 1 822, The first king of Perak, as far as 

 any records now extant throw light upon the 

 subject, was Sulihauu MuEaffer Sbah, fatlier of the 

 famous Suitbaun Man-sur Shah, kmg of Aehin, 

 whose unwearied attacks upon Malacc i have been 

 already recorded at page 46. The present chief. 

 Suhbaun Taj-a-diot who a^icend'id the throne in 

 1818, is the son of Sulthaun Manzur *Sbah the 

 second, who died io IS 1 9, and vvho:Je father was 

 Sulthaun Mahomed Taz Udeen, who died in 1^01." 



The Dutch had a factory here at one period tor 

 the purpose of procuring the tin, of which ihey 

 received abuut five thousand piculs anuuaUy at 

 the rate of about 10 dollars per pieuL After 

 their expulsion by the British in 1795, and at the 

 commencement of the nineteenth century^ the 

 exports rose to 9000 piculs annually ; and, when 

 we consider how harassed the country has been 

 for a long succession of years by different nations, 

 European and Asiatic, it is not hazarding too 

 much to assert that half the resources of this fine 

 territory are not yet developed. In European 

 countries, wherever there is a rich vein of ore, 

 the soil is generally, i beUeve, proporliooabiy 

 barren, but the prodigality of nature ha« not 

 been thus restrained in the Malayan Penia- 



