Earth which has been
washed down from the hills becomes fertile, and farther inland the
plains are so broken up by natural sand ridges which lighten the soil,
that it is very suitable for rice culture.
Tin is the most abundant of the mineral products of Perak, and, as in
the other States, the supply is apparently inexhaustible. So far it is
obtained in "stream works" only. The export of this metal has risen
from 144,000 pounds in 1876 to 436,000 pounds in 1881. Tin-mining
continues to attract a steady stream of Chinese immigration, and the
Resident believes that the number of Chinamen has increased from twenty
thousand in 1879 to forty thousand in 1881. Wealth is reckoned in slabs
of tin, and lately for an act of piracy a Rajah was fined so many slabs
of tin, instead of so many hogsheads of oil, as he would have been on
the West African coast.
Gold is found in tolerable quantities, even by the Malay easy-going
manner of searching for it, and diamonds and garnets are tolerably
abundant. Gold can be washed with little difficulty from most of the
river beds, and from various alluvial deposits. The metal thus found is
pure, but "rough and shotty." The nearer the mountains the larger the
find. It is of a rich, red color. Iron ore is abundant; but though coal
has been found, it is not of any commercial value.
