Malays Being Mussulmen, Are Mostly Tried By The "Divine Law" Of The
Koran, And Chinamen Are Dealt With "In Equity.
" The question to be
arrived at simply is, "Did the prisoner commit this crime or did he
not?" If he
Did he is punished, and if he did not he is acquitted.
There are no legal technicalities by which trial can be delayed or the
ends of justice frustrated. Theft is the most common crime. One hundred
and fourteen persons were convicted last year, which does not seem a
large proportion (being less than one per cent.) out of an unsettled
mining population of twelve thousand. Mr. Hayward, through whose hands
the crime of Singapore and Malacca has filtered for twenty years, was
very critical on the rough and ready method of proceeding here, and
constantly interjected suggestions, such as "You don't ask them
questions before you swear them," etc. Informal as its administration
is, I have no doubt that justice is substantially done, for the
Resident is conscientious and truly honorable. He is very lovable, and
is evidently much beloved, and is able to go about in unguarded
security.
It is not far from the Court House to the prison, a wholesomely
situated building on a hill, made of concrete, with an attap roof. The
whole building is one hundred feet long by thirty feet broad. There are
six cells for solitary confinement. A jailer, turnkey, and eight
warders constitute the prison staff. The able-bodied prisoners are
employed on the roads and other public works, and attend upon the
scavengers' cart, which outcome of civilization goes round every
morning! The diet, which costs fourpence a day for each prisoner,
consists of rice and salt fish, but those who work get two-pence
halfpenny a day in addition, with which they can either buy luxuries or
accumulate a small sum against the time when their sentences expire.
Old and weakly people do light work about the prison. One man was
executed for murder last year under a sentence signed by the Datu
Klana. I have not been in a prison since I was in that den of horrors,
the prison of the Naam-Hoi magistrate at Canton, and I felt a little
satisfaction in the contrast.
The same afternoon we all made a very pleasant expedition to the
Sanitarium, a cabin which the Resident has built on a hill three miles
from here. A chair with four Chinese bearers carried Miss Shaw up, her
sister and the two gentlemen walked, and I rode a Sumatra pony, on an
Australian stock-man's saddle, not only up the steep jungle path, but
up a staircase of two hundred steps in which it terminates, the
sagacious animal going up quite cunningly. One charm of a tropical
jungle is that every few yards you come upon something new, and every
hundred feet of ascent makes a decided difference in the vegetation.
This is a very grand forest, with its straight, smooth stems running up
over one hundred feet before branching, and the branches are loaded
with orchids and trailers.
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