1781.
The Annals report his death to have happened on the 2nd of June 1781, and observe that from the commencement to the close of his reign the country never enjoyed repose. His brother, named Ala-eddin (or Uleddin, as commonly pronounced, and which seems to have been a favourite title with the Achinese princes), was in exile at Madras during a considerable period, and resided also for some time at Bencoolen.
The eldest son of the deceased king, then about eighteen years of age, succeeded him on the 16th of the same month, by the title of Ala-eddin Mahmud shah Juhan, in spite of an opposition attempted to be raised by the partisans of another son by a favourite wife. Weapons had been drawn in the court before the palace, when the tuanku agung or high priest, a person of great respectability and influence, by whom the former had been educated, came amidst the crowd, bareheaded and without attendance, leading his pupil by the hand. Having placed himself between the contending factions, he addressed them to the following effect: that the prince who stood before them had a natural right and legal claim to the throne of his father; that he had been educated with a view to it, and was qualified to adorn it by his disposition and talents; that he wished however to found his pretensions neither upon his birthright nor the strength of the party attached to him, but upon the general voice of his subjects calling him to the sovereignty; that if such was their sentiment he was ready to undertake the arduous duties of the station, in which he himself would assist him with the fruits of his experience; that if on the contrary they felt a predilection for his rival, no blood should be shed on his account, the prince and his tutor being resolved in that case to yield the point without a struggle, and retire to some distant island. This impressive appeal had the desired effect, and the young prince was invited by unanimous acclamation to assume the reins of government.*
(*Footnote. Mr. Philip Braham, late chief of the East India Company's settlement of Fort Marlborough, by whom the circumstances of this event were related to me, arrived at Achin in July 1781, about a fortnight after the transaction. He thus described his audience. The king was seated in a gallery (to which there were no visible steps), at the extremity of a spacious hall or court, and a curtain which hung before him was drawn aside when it was his pleasure to appear. In this court were great numbers of female attendants, but not armed, as they have been described. Mr. Braham was introduced through a long file of guards armed with blunderbusses, and then seated on a carpet in front of the gallery. When a conversation had been carried on for some time through the Shabandar, who communicated his answers to an interpreter, by whom they were reported to the king, the latter perceiving that he spoke the Malayan language addressed him directly, and asked several questions respecting England; what number of wives and children our sovereign had; how many ships of war the English kept in India; what was the French force, and others of that nature. He expressed himself in friendly terms with regard to our nation, and said he should always be happy to countenance our traders in his ports. Even at this early period of his reign he had abolished some vexatious imposts. Mr. Braham had an opportunity of learning the great degree of power and control possessed by certain of the orang kayas, who held their respective districts in actual sovereignty, and kept the city in awe by stopping, when it suited their purpose, the supplies of provisions. Captain Forrest, who once more visited Achin in 1784 and was treated with much distinction (see his Voyage to the Mergui Archipelago page 51), says he appeared to be twenty-five years of age; but this was a misconception. Mr. Kenneth Mackenzie, who saw him in 1782, judged him to have been at that time no more than nineteen or twenty, which corresponds with Mr. Braham's statement.)
Little is known of the transactions of his reign, but that little is in favour of his personal character. The Annals (not always unexceptionable evidence when speaking of the living monarch) describe him as being endowed with every princely virtue, exercising the functions of government with vigour and rectitude, of undaunted courage, attentive to the protection of the ministers of religion, munificent to the descendants of the prophet (seiyid, but commonly pronounced sidi) and to men of learning, prompt at all times to administer justice, and consequently revered and beloved by his people. I have not been enabled to ascertain the year in which he died.
1791.
It appears by a Malayan letter from Achin that in 1791 the peace of the capital was much disturbed, and the state of the government as well as of private property (which induced the writer to reship his goods) precarious.
1805.
In 1805 his son, then aged twenty-one, was on the throne, and had a contention with his paternal uncle, and at the same time his father-in-law, named Tuanku Raja, by whom he had been compelled to fly (but only for a short time) to Pidir, the usual asylum of the Achinese monarchs. Their quarrel appears to have been rather of a family than of a political nature, and to have proceeded from the irregular conduct of the queen-mother. The low state of this young king's finances, impoverished by a fruitless struggle to enforce, by means of an expensive marine establishment, his right to an exclusive trade, had induced him to make proposals, for mutual accommodation, to the English government of Pulo Pinang.*
(*Footnote. Since the foregoing was printed the following information respecting the manners of the Batta people, obtained by Mr. Charles Holloway from Mr. W.H. Hayes, has reached my hands. "In the month of July 1805 an expedition consisting of Sepoys, Malays, and Battas was sent from Tapanuli against a chief named Punei Manungum, residing at Negatimbul, about thirty miles inland from Old Tapanuli, in consequence of his having attacked a kampong under the protection of the company, murdered several of the inhabitants, and carried others into captivity. After a siege of three days, terms of accommodation being proposed, a cessation of hostilities took place, when the people of each party having laid aside their arms intermixed with the utmost confidence, and conversed together as if in a state of perfect amity. The terms however not proving satisfactory, each again retired to his arms and renewed the contest with their former inveteracy. On the second day the place was evacuated, and upon our people entering it Mr. Hayes found the bodies of one man and two women, whom the enemy had put to death before their departure (being the last remaining of sixteen prisoners whom they had originally carried off), and from whose legs large pieces had been cut out, evidently for the purpose of being eaten. During the progress of this expedition a small party had been sent to hold in check the chiefs of Labusukum and Singapollum (inland of Sibogah), who were confederates of Punei Manungum. These however proved stronger than was expected, and, making a sally from their kampongs, attacked the sergeant's party and killed a sepoy, whom he was obliged to abandon. Mr. Hayes, on his way from Negatimbul, was ordered to march to the support of the retreating party; but these having taken a different route he remained ignorant of the particulars of their loss. The village of Singapollam being immediately carried by storm, and the enemy retreating by one gate, as our people entered at the opposite, the accoutrements of the sepoy who had been killed the day before were seen hanging as trophies in the front of the houses, and in the town hall, Mr. Hayes saw the head entirely scalped, and one of the fingers fixed upon a fork or skewer, still warm from the fire. On proceeding to the village of Labusucom, situated little more than two hundred yards from the former, he found a large plantain leaf full of human flesh, mixed with lime-juice and chili-pepper, from which he inferred that they had been surprised in the very act of feasting on the sepoy, whose body had been divided between the two kampongs. Upon differences being settled with the chiefs they acknowledged with perfect sangfroid that such had been the case, saying at the same time, "you know it is our custom; why should we conceal it?")