'The Mountain System of the Malayan Peninsula'

Source: Nature, July 17, 1884, p. 264

Some new facts with regard to the mountain system of the Malayan peninsula may be of interest to many of your readers. In exploring through the native State of Perak I find that, in addition to the main range, which occupies about the centre of the territory and runs in a north and south direction, there are two other ranges belonging to quite different systems, and, as I think, of different geological age. The first is close to the coast. It is a series of ridges parallel to each other, but detached, having a north-north-east or south-south-west trend. These ridges are of granite, and rise to a considerable height, such as Gunong (Malay for mountain) Inas, over 5000 feet; Titi Wangsu, nearly 7000 feet; Gunong Hijau, 4400 feet; and Gunong Bubu, or Bubor, 5600 feet. The two latter I have ascended.

Though they are detached from each other, they form a watershed between the coast and the inland drainage, and thus the River Perak has to drain an immense valley in a north and south direction until it finds an outlet to the south of the Dindings.

To the east of the Perak there is a small range about twenty-five miles long, perfectly detached from the other systems, and having generally a north and south direction, but sending off spurs a little west of south. This also is granite, but on its lower shoulders has thick deposits of stratified limestone, above and below which tin is worked. To the north this range is bounded by the valley of the River Plus, which here joins the Perak, and to the south by the mouth of the Kinta. The latter river runs in a valley to the east of this range, and where it ceases joins the Perak. To the east of the Kinta again comes the main range with many peaks over 7000 feet high; Gunong Riam probably reaching over 8000 feet.

The first series of ranges have their origin in the State of Kcddah, just where the Malayan peninsula begins to widen out. This widening out is entirely due to this mountain system. The island of Penang is a part of it, and so are the islands called the Dinding Group. Were the coast to subside about 300 feet, we should have a narrow peninsula fronted by a series of large and very elevated granite islands having their longest diameter north-north-east and south-south-west. The second mountain chain has a different direction, and nowhere rises above 3000 feet; but both ranges are rich in tin. The first series has at its base Palaeozoic schists, slates, and clays. The second has limestone. The Palaeozoic rocks are rich in tin at the junction with the granite. The tin in the second range lies above and below the limestone and has been derived from the older formation. The Palaeozoic clays resemble very closely the gold-bearing slates and schists of Australia. To the south they are nearly denuded away, but in Lower Siam, from specimens I have seen, they are full of auriferous quartz reefs.

It is singular that in this mountain system we have the closest resemblance to the tin-bearing districts of north-eastern Australia. When exploring geologically the Wilde River district in 1881 and the Daintree River in 1879, I found that the sources of the tin were in detached granite mountains or groups of mountains – granite islands, so to speak, much higher than the present watershed of the country, but, being detached from each other, allowed the rivers to pass round and between them. I have referred to the same thing in Tasmania in my account of the physical geology of that country. Geologists in England can say if there is any resemblance to this state of things in the tinbearing granites of Cornwall. I am inclined to think that we have in these rocks the remains of a former and very ancient mountain system.

I may add that it is a pity that we still find in recent books...