Muhammadans from India or Persia introduced their own method of writing among the Malays. They wrote Malay in their own character (to the gradual supersession of any native alphabet that may have previously existed), and this became the alphabet of the Malays.
It is now our turn to write Malay in our character. Is it sufficient to do this in our own way, as those did who introduced the Perso-Arabic alphabet, or must we also have regard to the mode of spelling adopted by the latter?
In an elementary work like the present, it does not seem to be necessary to burden the student with a system of transliteration. The native character is not employed in this manual, and there is, therefore, all the less occasion for using special means for denoting peculiar native letters. It will be found that the mode of spelling Malay words adopted by Marsden has been followed in the main.[53] In this Introduction the long vowels (that is, the vowels which are written in full in the native character) are marked with a circumflex accent, but it has not been thought necessary to adopt this system in the body of the work.
Sometimes vowels will be found marked with the short sign, ˘. This is only for the purpose of assisting the student in pronunciation, and does not represent any peculiarity in the native character.
The vowels are to be sounded in general as in the languages of the Continent of Europe. Final k is mute.
The correct pronunciation of Arabic words is aimed at by Malays of education, and the European student should get the right sounds of the vowel ain and of the more peculiar Arabic consonants explained to him.
Introduction: Footnotes
[1.] Calendar of State Papers, Colonial Series, East Indies, p. 272.
[2.] Journ. Ind. Arch., iv. 311.