such false testimony. It appears that the General had his own reasons for not allowing this examination to take place. The charge laid against Yang di Pertooan was treated non avenu, and I feel sure that the documents relating to it were never brought under the eyes of the Government at Batavia.
“Shortly after Yang di Pertooan’s return I arrived at Natal to take over the administration of that division. My predecessor told me of course what so recently had happened in Mandhéling, and gave me the necessary information about the political relation between that territory and my division. He was not to be blamed for complaining about the treatment, in his opinion unjust, which had been meted out to his father-in-law, and about the incomprehensible protection Yang di Pertooan appeared to enjoy on the part of the General. Neither he nor I knew at that moment that to send Yang di Pertooan to Batavia would have been a slap in the face to the General, and that the latter—having personally answered for the loyalty of that Chief—had good reason to protect him at any price from a charge of high treason. This was all the more important to the General, as meanwhile the just named Government Commissary himself had become Governor-General, and would therefore most likely have recalled him from his Governorship, naturally angry at the unwarranted confidence reposed in Yang di Pertooan, and at the obstinacy resulting from it, with which the General had opposed the evacuation of the east coast.
“ ‘But,’ said my predecessor, ‘whatever may have induced the General to accept offhand all the charges against my father-in-law, and not even to consider the much more serious accusations against Yang di Pertooan as deserving investigation, the matter is not finished! And if at Padang, as I expect, they have destroyed the recorded testimonies, I have here something else that cannot be destroyed.’
“And he showed me a verdict of the Rappat-Council[1] at Natal,
- ↑ A native council in Sumatra.
