52 
A JOURNEY IN JOHORE. 
obtain some information about the village itself as well as 
respecting the neighbouring places; but upon seeing me the 
inmates of the place fled, and I could scarcely succeed in 
reaching a few of them who appeared so much surprised and 
astonished that I could not obtain from them any satisfactory 
answer. I left the village about an hour after my arrival 
there; I sailed for Johore, where I arrived at four o’clock p.m. 
JoLore,* formerly the chief city of the empire of that name 
and residence of the Sultan, is situated about twenty miles 
up the river. The town was founded in 1511 or 1512 A..D. 
by Sultan Mahomad Shall II of Malacca who, after his ex¬ 
pulsion from that place by the Portuguese, fled to the river 
of Johore. From that time the town of Johore has been the 
capital of the empire which took the name of the empire of 
Johore instead of that of Malacca.t 
The inhabitants of Johore told me that their town was 
formerly a considerable one, that the Sultan who used to 
reside there had a fortified castle, and that the city was 
adorned by several handsome buildings erected chiefly upon 
some elevated ground distant a few hundred steps from the 
last houses of the present village going down the river. I 
visited the place but I could not find any remains of them4 
The town of Johore has undergone the same fate as the 
empire ; it has fallen entirely. It consists of about twenty- 
five or thirty Malay houses§ built on wooden poles, and co¬ 
vered with ataps and chucho leaves ; about the center of the 
village I remarked a Mosque built with planks, but it ap¬ 
peared to be in a miserable state, calling for repairs; the 
place is now of no importance. 
Johore is the residence of a Panghulu who is appointed 
both by the Sultan of Johore and by the Tumungong of Sing¬ 
apore. The present Panghulu, who is called Jawa, after hav¬ 
ing examined the credentials I had from the Sultan, re¬ 
ceived me very kindly. The men I had engaged at Singa¬ 
pore, refusing to go further, returned back with their boat. 
I passed the night in the house of a China man who kept a 
shop. 
The next day, the Panghulu procured me a small boat with 
three men in order to go up the river to the small stream of 
Kamang. At ten o’clock a.m. I left Johore. At about 
twelve o’clock I was near Pulo Kayu Anak Bes&r ; this is 
* The town of Johore L6m£.—E d. 
t The Beat of government was for some time in the Johore Archipelago.— Ed, 
% The remains of an extensive rampart are still visible.—E d. 
§ The housei, like the inhabitants, are not Malay but Bugia.— Ed, 
