CHINESE IMMIGRANTS IN THE MALAY PENINSULA.
[To THE EDITOR OF THE "SPECTATOR."] Sin,--4 wonder whether you will allow one who has some personal experience of the Malay Peninsula to make a few comments on your reviewer's treatment of Mr. Hugh Clif- ford's works in an article entitled "Students of Asia in the Spectator of October 26th. Mr. Clifford is not without honour in the country which he has made peculiarly his own, and those who know his work as an administrator are at one with the Spectator in admiring him as a man of letters. But your reviewer was unaware when he wrote of the "Malay Peninsula" generally that Mr. Clifford's experience, as I once remember hearing him admit, is practically confined to one State, that of Pahang, where his whole service has been spent. Now Pabang is undoubtedly the most backward and least satisfactory of all the States in the Federation, and the resources which have enabled Mr. Clifford to do the work he has done there have been almost entirely drawn from the surplus revenues of the other States, especially Perak and Selangor. And whatever may be the case in Pahang, it is quite misleading to suggest of the peninsula as a whole that the Malay or any one else regards the Chinese immigrants as "beasts of the field," or would desire to treat them as such. Kwala Lumpur, the capital of Selangor, which we have made the capital of the entire Federation, owes its existence to the late Captain China Yap Ah Loy, who was commonly stated to have thrice entirely rebuilt the town after it had been burnt down. He had also made roads and organised police, and was, in fact, when the English came to the State, quite as important and powerful a person as the Sultan at Kiang. The gigantic results achieved throughout the whole peninsula by Sir F. A. Swettenlam and his colleagues, of whom Mr. Clifford is one, which, I believe, constitute, without excepting what has been done in Egypt, the best example extant of British administrative capacity, would have been quite impossible without the energy, industry, and intelligence of the Chinese immigrant. And the latter is quite prepared to acknowledge what he on his part owes to British administration, or, as you prefer to put it, to the "white man's justice." For example, Cheang Ah. Kwi, the present Captain China of Perak, in making a donation of £1,000 to the Mansion House Fund in connection with the war expressly said he was glad of an opportunity of showing his gratitude to the Imperial Government, and his example was largely followed. No Malay, and no Englishman either, would wish to treat this gentleman or his son, who is one of the members of the State Council, otherwise than with courtesy and respect. Besides, you should remember that the term "Chinese immigrants" may naturally be understood to include those persons of Chinese nationality who have been born in the States ; that they are all capable of reading English newspapers, and that many of them do so, and are likely to come across your article either in the columns of the Spectator itself or reproduced in the local Press; and that the apparent want of knowledge it displays may cause a good deal of justifiable irritation, which I am sure you would be
the last to desire.—I ate, Sir, &o., X. Y. Z.
[We gave the view of the Chinese not as ours, but as that of Mr. Clifford in the case in question. We were, of course, well aware of the existence and patriotic feeling toward the Empire of the higher class of Chinese inhabitants in the British settlements in the Malay Peninsula.—ED. Spectator.]
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