No. I
From H.B.M.'s Resident, Perak, to Colonial Secretary, Straits
Settlements Residency, Kwala Kansa, December 14, 1878.
Sir - In reference to your letter of the 28th June last, directing, by
command of His Excellency the Governor, my particular attention to the
plan adopted in Selangor for the extinction of the claims against
slave-debtors, by a valuation of their services to their creditors
according to a fixed scale, and directing me to consider to His
Excellency with a view to its being afterward submitted for the
consideration of the Council of State:
1. I have the honor to state in reply that a copy of that letter and
its inclosure was supplied to the Assistant Resident of Perak, and its
contents communicated to the other magistrates, with instructions on
all occasions in which such cases should be brought before them, to
endeavor, with the consent of the creditors, to come to a settlement on
such a basis.
2. The Toh Puan Halimah, daughter of the exiled Laxamana of Perak, and
chief wife of the banished Mentri of the State, had invested most of
her private money in advances of this description, which, up to the
time of British interference, was the favorite form of security, and
she is now the largest claimant in the country for the repayment of her
money. Another, Wan Teh Sapiah, has also claims of a like nature on
several families, and both these ladies willingly undertook to accept
of liquidation by such an arrangement.
