A grammar of the Malayan language, with an introduction and praxis..

xii INTRODUCTION.
authority of the Company ; who gives assistance to the chiefs
of these leeward countries, and whose fame is celebrated both
beneath the wind and above the wind." And again : " Ada
shekh tlga Jang andak piilang ka arabi maka andak-lah anak
klta tolong tumprwg-kan ka-jmda kapal tajig andak pergi ka-
sablak atas angin suna there are three sheiks who wish to return
to Arabia. Will my son have the goodness to assist them with
a passage by a ship proceeding towards those windward (western)
parts ?" Here at least there can be no ambiguity with respect
to the geographical appropriation of the term.
On the Avestern coast of Sumatra the name of Zrajig atas
angin is commonly applied to the inhabitants of a maritime dis-
trict in the neighbourhood of the country from whence the prin-
cipal quantity of gold is procured, and has been generally un-
derstood to have a reference to the direction of the westerly
monsoon, supposed to vary several points above and below In-
dra-pura. Suspecting however that this might have been an
opinion gratuitously adopted, or an accommodation of the fact
to the etymology, I requested Mr. charles holloway, an in-
telligent gentleman, then chief of Padang, to let me know the
acceptation of the phrase amongst the inhabitants of that place,
situated as it is within the district of which we are speaking.
To this he replied, that " the atas atigin, people were not consi-
dered as drang durat or " natives of the land," like those of
Menaiigkahau, but generally as adventurers, being a mixture of
all nations, residing at the mouths of the rivers and along the
sea-shore, from Ayer Aji as far to the northward as JJdi'u-s,
where the Achlncse territory commences; and that a 3Ienangka-
hau man would feel very indignant at being confounded with
people of this description :" froui whence it is evident that they
have