Little is known of the transactions of his reign, but that little is in favour of his personal character.  The Annals (not always unexceptionable evidence when speaking of the living monarch) describe him as being endowed with every princely virtue, exercising the functions of government with vigour and rectitude, of undaunted courage, attentive to the protection of the ministers of religion, munificent to the descendants of the prophet (seiyid, but commonly pronounced sidi) and to men of learning, prompt at all times to administer justice, and consequently revered and beloved by his people.  I have not been enabled to ascertain the year in which he died.

1791.

It appears by a Malayan letter from Achin that in 1791 the peace of the capital was much disturbed, and the state of the government as well as of private property (which induced the writer to reship his goods) precarious.

1805.

In 1805 his son, then aged twenty-one, was on the throne, and had a contention with his paternal uncle, and at the same time his father-in-law, named Tuanku Raja, by whom he had been compelled to fly (but only for a short time) to Pidir, the usual asylum of the Achinese monarchs.  Their quarrel appears to have been rather of a family than of a political nature, and to have proceeded from the irregular conduct of the queen-mother.  The low state of this young king’s finances, impoverished by a fruitless struggle to enforce, by means of an expensive marine establishment, his right to an exclusive trade, had induced him to make proposals, for mutual accommodation, to the English government of Pulo Pinang.*

(Footnote.  Since the foregoing was printed the following information respecting the manners of the Batta people, obtained by Mr. Charles Holloway from Mr. W.H.  Hayes, has reached my hands.  “In the month of July 1805 an expedition consisting of Sepoys, Malays, and Battas was sent from Tapanuli against a chief named Punei Manungum, residing at Nega-timbul, about thirty miles inland from Old Tapanuli, in consequence of his having attacked a kampong under the protection of the company, murdered several of the inhabitants, and carried others into captivity.  After a siege of three days, terms of accommodation being proposed, a cessation of hostilities took place, when the people of each party having laid aside their arms intermixed with the utmost confidence, and conversed together as if in a state of perfect amity.  The terms however not proving satisfactory, each again retired to his arms and renewed the contest with their former inveteracy.  On the second day the place was evacuated, and upon our people entering it Mr. Hayes found the bodies of one man and two women, whom the enemy had put to death before their departure (being the last remaining of sixteen prisoners whom they had originally carried off), and from whose legs large pieces had been cut out, evidently for the purpose of being eaten.  During the progress of this expedition a small party