Federated Malay States Railways : pamphlet of ... - Sabrizain.org

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Nakajima. Kttata Lumpur.
Para Rubber Drying.
it was effected with terrible bloodshed.'' The name
itself has inspired many and often fantastic attempts
at explanation by philologists, Malay and European.
Nothing seems better than the obvious interpreta-
tion that Singapura is two Sanskrit words, that
Singha is Sanskrit for "lion " and Pura for " city,"
that the word means City of the Lion, and that the
name was magniloquently given to it to bring it
good luck by Sanskrit-using settlers from the
Hindu- Malayan Empire of Java and its dependency
Sumatra. It is believed that its more ancient name
was Tamasek, but that is now utterly lost. How-
ever great be the ancient renown of the City of
Singapore in local tradition, it was so little
accounted of in later times that in 1703 the Raja
of Johore offered it to a Captain Hamilton, who
declined the present, though he remarked that it
was " a proper place to settle a colony in, lying in
the centre of trade and accommodated with good
rivers and a safe harbour, so conveniently situated
that all winds serve shipping both to go out and
come into these rivers." This description of
Singapore has never been bettered, and it agrees
with the remark of an earlier Portuguese writer that
to Singapore " resorted all the navigators of the
Western seas of India, and of the Eastern of Siam,
China, Campa and Cambodia, as well as of
thousands of islands to the eastward." So long as
the Dutch held Malacca, which they did until
1795, there was no object for them in founding
another great city on the Peninsula, though the
anchorages at Singapore were much superior to
those at Malacca, and the size of ships was growing.
But in 18 1 8, threatened by the British with a loss
of their monopoly in the Peninsula, they occupied a
post in Rhio, one of the islands visible from
Singapore to the south. At that time the British
were already in Penang, so the position was that
Penang was British, Malacca Dutch and Rhio
Dutch. Clearly it was expedient for Britain to cut
in between Rhio and Malacca. On the 19th
August, 1 8 18, therefore. Major Farquhar, sub-
ordinate of Sir Thomas Stamford Raffles, made a
treaty providing for mutual liberty of navigation
and commerce in the ports and dominions of
Johore, Pahang, Linggi, and Rhio and other
places subject to the Sultan of Johore, this
including Singapore. Sir Stamford Raffles was at
that time Lieutenant-Governor of Bencoolen
(Sumatra). From there he wrote to the Honour-
able East India Company in Bengal urging the
acquisition not of Singapore but of Bentan
(Bintang), an island opposite. He spoke of a
simple commercial station with a military guard to
force free trade upon the Dutch or to collect the
trade under the British flag. He followed the
letter in person and returned as Agent to the Most
Noble the Governor-General with the States of
Rhio, Lingin and Johore to occupy some central
station in the Archipelago. On February 6th, 18 19,
Raffles signed with Johore plenipotentiaries the
necessary treaty ceding Singapore and hoisted the
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