PAKT L 



THE MALAY PENINSULA. 



CHAPTER I. 



GKNKIML SURVEY— PHYSICAL FEATTJ RES— MOrrKTAli* AND RIVER 

 SYSTEMS— SB ADOARO— ISLANDS — THE ISTHMUS OF It HA. 



Position— Extent,— T] to Malay Peninsula, tlio Tdnak MaMt/ts, 

 or 11 Moloy Land * of the native*, forms the Bouthemriwust extension 

 of tfic great peninsular region of Indo-Chiua, with which it in con- 

 nected by the Isthmus of Km (Kmw). At tlie narrowest point of 

 Ibis istliums il jo river Pakshan marks the natural and political bound- 

 ary towards British Burma on the west side; but on the cast the 

 frontier towards Siarn is indicated by no physical or conventional line. 

 South of Kra the Peninsula projects for about GOO miles first south, 

 lin n Kuiiik-Msl niMtly imrnlli-l wilh Siiui:i:r«, i.-rmii ating at " a|m 

 Tmijong P.ulua in 1° 10 J 12" N. latitude. Here is the southernmost 

 extremity o£ the Asiatic continent, which,, however, is geologically 

 continued to the island of Billiton (Bilitong), ami includes the 

 neighbouring archipelagoes of Ben tan, Liugga, and Bauku, nil now 

 severed from the mainland. The Piminsida, which in washed by the 

 Bay of Bengal and Strait of Malacca on the west, by the Gulf of 

 Sum :n.i3 China Sea on the cast, gradually widens from about -10 

 miles at Kra to about 200 miles between the. Dimliugx and Trhig- 

 giinn, again contracting further south to n mean breadth of under 

 100 tulles iti Johor. The total aTea is somewhat over 75,000 stnjsn 

 miles, with an estimated population of at least 1,200,000, or about 

 15 inhabitants to the square mih\ 



Mountain Systems.— M alay land forms geologically a southern 

 extension ok" 1 1n- mountain system, which separates the Sal win and 

 llsmun river basins. It consists mainly of c otitinuous ranges running 



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