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scientific method and in 1919 the Annual Report on 
the then still existing Malacca College records : 
“ No student now believes that the Malay classical 
history of the XVIIth century, the Sejarah Melayu, 
was written by its modern European editor! Nor 
would any of the teaching staff now require a class 
to memorize the number of times a day a certain 
chief of old Malacca administered gruel to his Sultan 
during an attack of dysentery, though a few years 
ago that was a question actually set by a native 
examiner.” 
The Sultan Idris College at Tanjong Malim is the 
distributing centre of knowledge in the Peninsula 
for those Malays whose education is confined to 
the vernacular. There will always be a large number 
of Malay children with no aptitude for languages 
or literary pursuits, whose mental and moral deve- 
lopment will depend mainly on the discipline of the 
village school with the opportunity if provides for 
studying the “ three Rs,” benefiting by physical 
and manual training, and acquiring such rudiments 
of simple agriculture as will fit them for the free 
life of that country-side, where the happiness and 
economic interests of their race have lain for cen- 
turies. From the College trained teachers go out 
to the village schools to influence the physical mental, 
moral and economic welfare of the coming genera- 
tion. That they may not stagnate in their rural 
surroundings, they will be summoned periodically 
to vacation classes at their old College. Besides a 
staff of picked Malay teachers, the College has a 
staff of European masters including an Agricultural 
Instructor. 
With the expansion of all branches of the Education 
Department's activities it was recognized that the 
j *** 
