Page 128 - Malay sketches

XIII

THE PASSING OF PENGLIMA PRANG
SEMAUN

Oh vengeance ! thou art sweet
LEWIS MORRIS

the Perak River, about fifty miles from its
ON
mouth, and just above the tidal influence,
where the water is clear and shallow and the banks
are lined with palm groves and orchards, there is a
large Malay village called Bandar.
More than twenty years ago there dwelt in this
a man named married to a
village Megat Raja, par-
ticularly well-favoured girl named Meriam. The
fact of her marriage drew her into some sort of
and her attractions were soon the
notoriety,
of the The of Ban-
gossip place. gilded youths
dar were fired by the description of Meriam's
charms, and one of them, a boy of good family,
of and fell in love
position, and means, got sight
with her.
112