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specific instructions as to the course of action the Governor would desire me to take when cases relating to debt-slavery come to my knowledge.

2. Debt-slavery has always existed in some form or other in all the Malayan States, but I believe that the system, as practised in Perak at the present time, involves evils and cruelties which are unknown to any but to those who have actually lived in these States.

3. From the moment a man or woman becomes a debtor, he or she, if unable to pay, is liable to be taken up by the creditor (not by any process of law, hut mero motu), treated as a slave, and made to work in any way that the creditor chooses; the debtor's earnings go for nothing, but are the property of the creditor, who gives no wages for the work done and allows no credit towards the reduction of the debt.

4. Nor has the debtor under this system any means of becoming free, unless some relative or friend comes forward to pay for him; and, even in this case, the creditor might, if he so willed-and if he were a Rajah in all probability would-under some pretext, refuse the offer of payment.

A debtor may,

however, sometimes better himself by getting some person to pay the debt, and becoming that person's slave.

5. This system, in its primitive state, has always existed in Perak, and I believe in almost all the Malayan States; but a far worse' phase is now in force throughout Perak: here the contraction of a debt by a married man binds the wife and children then exist- ing, or who may hereafter be born, and this goes on for generations, as these children in their turn marry and have offspring.

If the debt is contracted by an unmarried man or woman, and he or she subsequently marry, the

person so taken in marriage and all the offspring are equally bound.

6. In this case the wife and all the children, male and female, are treated as slaves, and bound to work for their creditor as master. This work, as a rule, consists in every species of household drudgery; in clearing ground, and in raising paddy or other articles of food. At the same time the children are constantly beaten and ill-used for alleged neglect of their allotted work, and the smallest attempt at escape is visited with severe punishment, such as working in future for a certain term in irons, and sometimes, I have been told, even by death.

7. As I have mentioned in the third paragraph, no allowance is made for debtor's service, nor can the debt of a family ever become reduced by their services. On the contrary, the debt is frequently increased by fines imposed for alleged misconduct, for losses of the master's property, or for breakages, and each member of the family is held to be liable for the whole debt, which can only become extinct under the circumstances stated in paragraph 4.

8. Several instances have come before me of young girls desiring to sell themselves, and I will here ask reference to an extract from my journal of 4th February last, where a girl named Anjang made the following statement before me :—

"

Batarabit, 4th February 1875. Here a girl came off to the steamer, brought by a friend of hers, and offered to sell herself. I made her sit down, and got her story out of her. She was about 20 years old. Her father and mother live with one Che Amin here. She saya she was asked for three years ago by Che Amin, and her parents gave ber. She does not know if they sold her. She got her food for some time, but at last was told to go out and prostitute herself, and clothe herself out of the proceeds. After a time-she is a good looking girl-they ordered her out more regularly, and then desired her, whenever she got money, to provide curry for the whole house next day, and then they ordered fowls, fish, &c. At last, she says, it is more than she can bear. She bas to draw water and cut firewood, and get lots of beating, and she wants the 80 dollars paid, and she will stay with anyone who will get her free. As far as her own account goes she has never received a penny. Che Amin's nephew, who is a boatman of mine, says her parents sold her for 60 dollars. I promised another time to talk to Che Amin and see if I could get her warried. This is, I believe, a mild specimen of the woman slavery in Perak."

9. Some days ago this same girl Anjang, and another named Manis, living in the same house, ran away from their master Che Amin, and placed themselves, as they supposed, under the protection of our flug, by fleeing to the nearest police station. Che Amin, who is one of the pet advisers of the present Sultan, came in my absence to the Residency, and in the Sultan's Dame demanded the girls, when they were unfortunately given up. They were carried off, and I have credible information that they were beaten, put in irons, and for a time removed to a remote place. There is a rumour at this moment that Manis has been sold to a trader for 100 dollars, but I have been unable to trace it to my

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satisfaction, or I should have taken upon myself at once to act in the matter; my detectives have now orders to find out where she is staying. Anjang still desires to sell herself for anything, but the owner, Che Amin, demands the whole debt, which he alleges to be due by the parents, viz., 70 dollars.

10. Two of my boatmen have applied to me for advances to buy wives, both orphan girls, and both held as debtor-slaves for debts alleged to be due by their deceased parents.

Indut, a boatman, desires to marry one Segora of Batarabit, for whom the sum of 70 dollars is demanded; and Unus, another boatman, wishes in the same way to buy and to marry one Sakumbung, of the same place, for whom the modest sum of 60 dollare is asked. Both these men are constantly entreating me to advance them these sums, to enable them to free these girls, to whom they have taken fancy. The former man is a native of Perak and the latter an immigrant from Battu Barra in Sumatra.

11.

Two other instances have come before me within the last few days.

1st. A mother came to me at Kotastia, and alleged that she had been married to a Chief of Salangor, and borue him a daughter. She lost her first husband, and during the Salangor disturbances married a second husband in Perak, who also has a family, but who is a debtor to a Perak man on the other side of the river. Her husband has been allowed to come over, and work with Messrs. Cheng, Tee, and Co., in order to try and redeem his debt, and she has followed her husband, but the creditor detains the daughter by the former marriage.

On requesting the creditor to come and see me with the girl, he produced a paper showing that the whole family became slaves at once for a debt of 90 dollars, and that one of the daughters was bound to live with the creditor. The paper further he also possesses other debt-slaves.

proves that

2nd. A woman, originally the offspring of Sakkai parents, and who has very indistinct notions of how she became a slave, came before me here. Her parents are dead. A year ago, in the house of her present master, she was allowed to marry a Madras man, who consequently also became a slave. Previous to this marriage she procured clothes by prostituting herself for 10 c. à day. When the husband came over the river to be employed under me as a coolie, the master detained this girl, but she fled some few days ago to the nearest police station. Her mistress, in the absence of the master, caine and claimed her, but gave also a very lame account, or no account at all, of how they obtained the girl, except that she was given to them by the son of the Laxamana (a plea which may or may not be true).

12. It is my duty to state that I believe the statement made by Anjang in paragraph 8 to be literally true as regards the position of most of the girls thus situated, whose parents, if alive, are debtors, or who as orphans are the children of parents who were debt-slaves.

Prostitution is, I believe, as a general rule, forced upon them, but in every case is encouraged by the creditor or master, and in the generality of cases half the earnings are taken by the wives and concubines of the creditor.

13. The numerous female nurses and servants in the Sultan's house are as much slaves as these debt-slaves, though acquired generally by force, for the Sultan has only to send his sword, sundong or kris, to any house where there exists a girl to whom he or any of his household have taken a fancy, and the parents are bound to give her up.

In this way have most of the women in the Sultan's establishment been acquired. Each is treated as a slave, and dare not attempt to escape, while, if she marries, her husband and children will be slaves likewise. The nurses are fed, but get no clothes; the rest get neither food nor clothes. The whole of them, I believe, without any exception, are prostitutes, and support themselves, while it is rumoured that the Sultan's concubines often receive a portion of their earnings.

14. I would call attention to another practice by which men and women of the country of the sakkais or wild people of the interior are captured after being hunted down, and are then sold and made slaves. These poor people, from what I have seen, are worse treated than any other sleges. This must be called a species of debt-slavery, as it is generally alleged that some money has been expended on thera in food, and in the scanty clothes they wear. They are, however, as a rule badly fed, badly clothed, and made to work hard. They have little or no chance of escape, and they know well that the Malay would be sure to ill-treat them if caught, and would not hesitate for a moment to kill them, while not the smallest notice would be taken of bis doing so.

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15. The relations between ryot and Raja have certainly to some extent been amelio- rated by the presence of a Resident at Perak. This is mainly due to the fact that, by

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