MALAYSIA | AdventAI

Pacific Press Publishing Company · Oakland, California · Jun 3, 1897

FromSigns of the Times, Vol. 23, No. 22.

MALAYSIA.

MALAYSIA includes the Malay Peninsula and the many islands south, southeast, and east of the peninsula, inhabited largely by the Malay race, with a population of about 50,000,000, speaking nearly 100 different languages. The largest islands are Sumatra, Java, Borneo, Celebes, Philippines, and the Moluccas. The islands belonging to New Netherlands have a population of 33,000,000, and the Philippines, belonging to Spain, have a population of 12,000,000. Throughout the islands the Malay is the predominant race. Bishop Thoburn says of the Malay, "He is short of stature, with a reddish-brown complexion, beardless face, straight black hair, and broad and rather flat face."

The Straits Settlements, to which the Methodist Episcopal Mission has to the present been chiefly confined, is a colony of Great Britain, and comprises the island of Singapore, the island of Penang, and Province Wellesley and Malacca on the Malay Peninsula; while all the native States on the peninsula are under British protection. Population, 512,342.

Singapore is 27 miles long, 15 miles wide, and has an area of 224 square miles, with a population in 1891 of 184,554, of whom 121,908 were Chinese, 35,992 Malays, and 16,035 natives of India. Most of these are in the city of Singapore, which is about 1,850 miles from Calcutta.

Penang, 2 miles from the mainland, is 12 miles long, 9 miles wide, and has an area of 107 square miles, and a population, including Province Wellesley, of 235,618, of whom nearly one-half are Chinese, the others being chiefly Malays and Tamils. Georgetown is the principal town, but it generally goes under the name of Penang.

Malacca is a strip of territory on the peninsula 42 miles long and from 8 to 24 miles wide, the chief town being Malacca. It has a population of 93,579.

The Europeans and Americans in Singapore number 5,254; in Penang, 1,201; in Malacca, 134.

The Malaysia Methodist Episcopal Mission was commenced in Singapore in 1885. It was organized as a Mission Conference in 1893. The three principal stations occupied are Singapore, Penang, and Ipoh, in Perak, on the peninsula. There are 15 male missionaries, 8 wives of missionaries, 3 missionaries of the Woman's Foreign Missionary Society, 9 native preachers, 269 members, 161 probationers, and 48 Sunday-schools, with 1,084 scholars. There were 75 conversions, and 41 adults and 17 children baptized in 1896.—Gospel in All Lands.