A TRANSLATION OP THE KEDDAH ANNALS, 
175 
Malays but of the Indo-Chinese in general, once approximated 
much closer to the colour of the Chinese than it now does. 1 
have invariably found that the more secluded any of these tribes 
lived the fairer were their complexions. I observed this particu¬ 
larly amongst the jungle Karians of Martaban province, and one 
of the wild or aboriginal tribes of the Malacca Peninsula in the 
heart of Perak. I except of course the woolly haired races The 
colour of these Perak Samang, as they are called, whom I saw, was 
much fairer than that of the Malays around them, being nearly 
that of the southern Chinese, for those of the north are as fair as 
many Europeans. The partiality of all of the Malayan tribes leans 
strongly towards fairness of skin, whereas the African who never 
perhaps was fairer than he is now, deems blackness, peifection. 
“ White and yellow” mixed is the favorite expression which 
Malayan writers, amongst whom is our author, employ wlieu des¬ 
cribing female beauty. 
Theie is a curious passage in the Sajara Malayu or Malayan An¬ 
nals which might tend to induce a belief that there were tribes 
of the original Malay race on the Malacca coast when the colony 
of, in this case, foreign Malays, reached it, 
“ Sultan Mudhafer Shah, of Malacca, ordered the Bandahara 
«* Paduka Raja to drive the Siamese out cf the country (they had 
“ invaded it) and he directed Sri Vija A1 di Raja with the rest of 
** the hulubalangs and champions to accompany the Bindahara, 
“ This Sri Vija A1 di Raja was a native Malay and named ori* 
“ ginally Tun Humza” [Humza it may be observed is the famous 
sacred goose of India] “ and he derived his origin from the cows 
** vomit.” (*) This last remark has also reference to Hindu super¬ 
stitions, The word in the original work, at least in my copy of it, is 
As!, which means root, origin, source, which are still stronger 
expressions than the one Leyden has here used. But the author 
may have only meant that he was an unconverted Malay. 
It would seem that the Malays at first occupied the East Coast 
of the Peninsula along the gulf of Siam from Sangora or Singhora 
inclusive to Point Romania or Ujong Tannah Malayu, But they 
were overrun by, and their countries were brought from time to 
time, under the sway of the Siamese. When this rule to the south 
of Siam Proper began is not certain, but if any credit be due to 
the Malayan annals, it must have been long before the settlement 
of the antient Singapura. 
( 7 ) Mai, An. Lsyden, C, XIII p. 130, 
