343 
SUMATRA. 
We have hitherto refrained from inserting any papers on 
Sumatra, because Mr Marsden’s admirable work has long 
made the English reader familiar with one section of that great 
island Although it comprises but an inconsiderable por¬ 
tion of the whole*, anti the countries and races with which 
he was not personally acquainted and of which his notices are 
often extremely meagre, are in some respects more interest¬ 
ing than those with which tflie English settlements on the 
S. W. coast were connected, we considered it proper to turn 
our attention in the first place to those portions of the Archi¬ 
pelago which have hitherto not been so fortunate in securing 
English historians as Sumatra and Java. We now intend 
to give to Sumatra that place m this Journal to which it is 
on many accounts entitled. Next to the Malay Peninsula 
it has perhaps the greatest claims to the interest of resi¬ 
dents in the Straits Settlements ; while as the original seat 
of the Malays and their language, it demands the attention 
of all who are desirous of exploring the history of the 
Archipelago. It is by comparing the language and customs 
* A glance at the table of contents would have shewn this, but unfortu¬ 
nately it has none. The more correct tide of the work would have been 
“An Account of the Rejarigs, wish noiices of the other races of Sumatra.'' The 
territory of the Rejangs is about 4,500 sq m or 2 ^h of the island, but they 
receive far more upace in the History of Sumatra than all the rest of it together, 
ltejmgs .... ...... •. 251 pages, 
Iiorinchi . ...... 21 
Menaogkabau .. . . 28 
Indrapu’a, &c... . ...... 12 
The Batla countries . ...... 30 
Achtn .... „—.. . 69 
The Webern Islands . .. 15 175 
General .. . .. ..44 
We do not point out this disproportion to detract from the merits of this most 
able and delightful work, but to disabuse our readers of any impression that 
Sumatra has been fully described, and to warn them that Mr Marsdetds 
whole woik is somewhat coloured by h‘s too often confounding the Llejangs 
with the Sumatrans generally. In spite of his genuine truthfulness and great 
sense, the reader rises from the perusal of the work with a very erioneous and 
imperfect notion of Sumatra as a whole. Some of the historians of India 
have ranked it as one pf their advantages over their more travelled rivals, 
that they knew nothing of the country save frum books, and the example of 
Mr Marsden seems to give some countenance to the notion. We believe 
however that Mr Marsden's was a mind capable of overcoming the tendency 
to exaggerate the importance, and be blinded by the I ia*, of what was most 
familiar to it, and that it was the sheer lack of materials for a general history 
of the island that made him give Rejang 250, instead of 1(? pages, which 
would have been its just proportion. 
