mark of the Company.  There is some appearance of the date 1100.  The informant (named Raja Intan), who had repeatedly seen and examined it, added that M. Palm, governor of Padang, once sent Malays with paper and paint to endeavour to take off the inscription, but they did not succeed; and the Dutch, whose arms never penetrated to that part of the country, are ignorant of its meaning.  It is noticed in the Malayan map.  Should it prove to be a Hindu monument it will be thought curious.

CHAPTER 19.

KINGDOMS OF INDRAPURA, ANAK-SUNGEI, PASSAMMAN, SIAK.

INDRAPURA.

Among the earliest dismemberments of the Menangkabau empire was the establishment of Indrapura as an independent kingdom.  Though now in its turn reduced to a state of little importance, it was formerly powerful in comparison with its neighbours, and of considerable magnitude, including Anak-Sungei and extending as far as Kattaun.  Some idea of its antiquity may be formed from a historical account given by the Sultan of Bantam to the intelligent traveller Corneille le Brun, in which it is related that the son of the Arabian prince who first converted the Javans to the religion of the Prophet, about the year 1400, having obtained for himself the sovereignty of Bantam, under the title of pangeran, married the daughter of the raja of Indrapura, and received as her portion the country of the Sillabares, a people of Banca-houlou.

CLAIMS OF THE SULTAN OF BANTAM.

Upon this cession appears to be grounded the modern claim of the sultan to this part of the coast, which, previously to the treaty of Paris in 1763, was often urged by his sovereigns, the Dutch East India Company.  His dominion is said indeed to have extended from the southward as far as Urei river, and at an early period to Betta or Ayer Etam, between Ipu and Moco-moco, but that the intermediate space was ceded by him to the raja of Indrapura, in satisfaction for the murder of a prince, and that a small annual tax was laid by the latter on the Anak-sungei people on account of the same murder (being the fourth part of a dollar, a bamboo of rice, and a fowl, from each village), which is now paid to the sultan of Moco-moco.  In the year 1682 the district of Ayer Aji threw off its dependence on Indrapura.  In 1696 Raja Pasisir Barat, under the influence of the Dutch, was placed on the throne, at the age of six years, and his grandfather appointed guardian; but in 1701, in consequence of a quarrel with his protectors, the European settlers were massacred.

WAR WITH THE DUTCH.

This was the occasion of a destructive war, in the event of which the raja and his mantris were obliged to fly, and the country was nearly depopulated.  In 1705 he was reinstated, and reigned till about 1732.

DECLINE OF THE KINGDOM.