Page:The further side of silence (IA furthersideofsil00clifiala).pdf/346

 the reputation for lying which rightly belongs to them. Here, however, alone among the Malayan states, a great name was to be won, not by prowess as a warrior, but by renown as a saint, a sage, or a successful man of business. Every man bore arms, as a matter of course, for that was the Malayan custom; but very few ever found occasion to use them, and one and all had a natural horror of battle in any shape or form. It is necessary to realize this, for it is probable that in no other state in the Penin- sula could the ámol which the Dato' Kaya Biji Děrja ran in the streets of Kuâla Trengganu have met with such inefficient opposition.

When Baginda Umar, who conquered the country carly one morning after landing at the head of some fifty warriors, ruled in Trengganu, there was a chief named Dato' Bentara Haji, who was one of the king's adopted sons, and early in the reign of the present Sultan the title of Dato' Kaya Biji Děrja was con- ferred upon this man's eldest son. The public mind was much exercised at this, for the title was not one which it was usual to bestow upon a commoner, and Jusup, the youth now selected to bear it. was un proven and was possessed of little personality. He was of no particular birth, his father having been merely a king's favourite; he had little reputation as a scholar, such as the Trengganu people revere; and he was not even skilled in the warriors lore which of old was so dear to the ruder natives of Pahang.