331 A TRANSLATION OF THE KEDDAH ANNALS. 
a vagabond, and Iietam 13 “ black’’ in allusion to his body having 
been tatooed. This was doubtless one of the inroads made by the 
Peguers during the period when the Siamese contended with them 
for the supremacy over the Tenasserim coast, for Kaiana Hetam 
insinuates in one of his speeches that this was not the first time 
that he had encouutered Kalahom. 
The jumble of titles which our author gives to his heroes cannot 
he reduced to our regular standard. Bali, Persian, Malayan, 
Siamese, perhaps also Javanese, and one of those belonging appa¬ 
rently to jungle tribes, are all here put into requisition. 
The hill tribes, if we are to credit this narrative, were much more 
numerous and warlike than they now are. Indeed they have 
dwindled down into a few roving parties or families, whose num¬ 
bers seldom at the utmost exceed a few hundreds. But the allusion 
to them evinces the belief as an early period that these tribes had 
long settled in the northern p ris of the Peninsula and in Pegu, 
and they were subjects of Siam. The strength of the contending 
armies on this occasion was exaggerated we can easily believe — 
yet it is well known that the Peguers, first aud then the Burmans 
and Rimese, could bring considerable armies into the held. 
The marshalling by our auihor of the hostile line is in accor¬ 
dance with the system adopted by the Siamese of the present day 
and of which I have already given some description [a]. Like 
the Burmese and Siamese and Malays too of the present time the 
force we have been following had 00 tents. They erect huts of 
branches and leaves, of which they generally find abundance 
every where; and they entrench themselves wherever they halt, even 
for a night* 
Like the Chinese armies', those of Kaiana and Kalahom seemed 
to strive which should frighten the other by the loudest noises. 
I once in 1831 visited the Raja of Ligor when encamped with 
about seven thousand men. The greatest order prevailed and there 
was no din. The ouly noise at night was that of a gong at the re¬ 
lieving of the sentinels, and guards. To be sure there were no 
enemies at the gate, for these had first been subdued, the Malays 
I mean. 
Our author’s poetical description of sun rise is of Persian origin* 
The Biyang is a small cicada which is found in ail the jungles of 
the Peninsula, Its creaking sound may he heard at the distance 
of a quar'er of a mile. According to the Malayan annals the Siam¬ 
ese and Malays fought in A.D. 1201 with bows and arrows. And 
the Javanese and the Macassars when they attacked Malacca in 
1440 A.D. They used poisoned arrows, propelled through blow 
pipes, weapons which the Malacca men were then unacquainted 
with, which appears strange for the wild tribes of the Peninsula use 
^hem [ 1 ]• These aborigines of the Peninsula probably had the 
[ a ] Trans. B. A. S. 
[ T ] Mai. An. No. I. 
