it was an original Sumatran empire, antecedent to the introduction of the Arabian faith; instructed, but by no means conquered, as some had imagined, by people from the peninsula.  So memorable an event as the elevation of a Xerif to the throne would have been long preserved by annals or tradition, and the sultan in the list of his titles would not fail to boast of this sacred extraction from the prophet, to which however he does not at all allude; and to this we may add that the superstitious veneration attached to the family extends itself not only where Mahometanism has made a progress, but also among the Battas and other people still unconverted to that faith, with whom it would not be the case if the claim to such respect was grounded on the introduction of a foreign religion which they have refused to accept.

Perhaps it is less surprising that this one kingdom should have been completely converted than that so many districts of the island should remain to this day without any religion whatever.  It is observable that a person of this latter description, coming to reside among the Malays, soon assimilates to them in manners, and conforms to their religious practices.  The love of novelty, the vanity of learning, the fascination of ceremony, the contagion of example, veneration for what appears above his immediate comprehension, and the innate activity of man’s intellectual faculties, which, spurred by curiosity, prompts him to the acquisition of knowledge, whether true or false—­all conspire to make him embrace a system of belief and scheme of instruction in which there is nothing that militates against prejudices already imbibed.  He relinquishes no favourite ancient worship to adopt a new, and is manifestly a gainer by the exchange, when he barters, for a paradise and eternal pleasures, so small a consideration as the flesh of his foreskin.

TOLERANT PRINCIPLES.

The Malays, as far as my observation went, did not appear to possess much of the bigotry so commonly found amongst the western Mahometans, or to show antipathy to or contempt for unbelievers.  To this indifference is to be attributed my not having positively ascertained whether they are followers of the sunni or the shiah sect, although from their tolerant principles and frequent passages in their writings in praise of Ali I conclude them to be the latter.  Even in regard to the practice of ceremonies they do not imitate the punctuality of the Arabs and others of the mussulman faith.  Excepting such as were in the orders of the priesthood I rarely noticed persons in the act of making their prostrations.  Men of rank I am told have their religious periods, during which they scrupulously attend to their duties and refrain from gratifications of the appetite, together with gambling and cockfighting; but these are not long nor very frequent.  Even their great Fast or puasa (the ramadan of the Turks) is only partially observed.  All those who have a regard for character fast more or less according to the degree of their zeal or strength of their constitutions; some for a week, others for a fortnight; but to abstain from food and betel whilst the sun is above the horizon during the whole of a lunar month is a very rare instance of devotion.