SINGAPORE ISLAND, at the southern ex tremity of the Malay Peninsula, in lat. 1° 17' N., and long. 103° 50' E., is separated from the con tinent by a narrow strait, in some places less than a mile in width. Singapore was first settled in A.D. 1160 by Sri Sura Bawana, and from an inscription, now destroyed, on a sandstone rock on a narrow point to the left of the entrance of the Singapore river, it would appear that raja Saran of Amdan Nagara, after conquering the state of Johore with his Kling troops, proceeded to Tamask about A.D. 1201, returned to Kling, and left this stone monument. • The island consists of a numbcr of low hills and ridges, with narrow and rather swampy flats inter vening. In several places the sea-face is elevated, but the greater portion of the circumference is fringed by a pretty deep belt of inangrove forest. Bukit Timall is a granitic hill about 530 feet high, but the rest of the island is composed of sedi mentary rocks, amongst which sandstone occupies a prominent place. GoVernment Hill is about 160 feet high. The Bukit Timalt is in the centre of the island.
During the administration of Sir Stamford Raffles, on the 6th February 1819, for a sum of 60,000 dollars, and a yearly stipend of 24,000 dollars for life, the sultan of Johore made over the island of Singapore to the British, and it was finally ceded by treaty on 2d August 1824 to the British by the sultan.
The island is 25 miles in length, and about a third of that distance in breadth, has an area of 206 square miles (1,423,000 acres), and a popu lation (at the census 3d April 1882) of 139,208.
The total imports and exports (in dollais) during the last decade were as follows :— imports. Ex ports. Imports. Exphrts.
1870, 39,058,564 31,731,022 1876, 45,466,070 40,614,783 1871, 36,766,530 32,003,807 1877, 49,327,317 41,428,407 1872, 43,415,383 39,020,121 1878, 47,250,337 39,421,921 1873, 47,880,090 41,752,145 1879, 56,278,292 49,250,238 1874, 46,887,070 41,508,798 1880, 60,675,733 54,578,931 1875, 43,766,201 41,619,519 1881, 70,699,682 58,001,188 In Singapore free port, the only charges are the Straits light dues, which are 1 anna or 2i cents per registered ton on merchant vessels. All national ships are free of this also. In Singa pore, measures of capacity are rarely used, and these only with certain articles, such as tobacco, etc.
16 tael make 1 catty= 1 lb. 5 oz. 5i grs., or 11 lb. avoirdupois.
100 catties make 1 (Chinese) pikul 133i lbs. avoir dupois.
40 (Chinese) pikuls make 1 royan.
2 (Malay) pikuls make 1 char.
The Malay catty weighs 24 Spanish dolltus. The Chinese catty weighs 22f Spanish dollars. Rice is sold by the royan of 40 pikuls. The native merchants buy imported produce from the islands by the Malay pikul, but sell it by the Chinese pikul. Singapore timber is conveyed in huge rafts, 500 or 600 feet long and 60 or 70 feet broad, with atap-leaved houses on the top ; each raft containing about 2000 logs, bound together by rattan rope.