where there is a plenty of meat, do they eat much of anything but rice.  Their hospitality is extreme, and bounded by their ability alone.  Their manners are simple; they are generally, except among the chiefs, devoid of the Malay cunning and chicane; yet endued with a quickness of apprehension, and on many occasions discovering a considerable degree of penetration and sagacity.  In respect to women they are remarkably continent, without any share of insensibility.  They are modest; particularly guarded in their expressions; courteous in their behaviour; grave in their deportment, being seldom or never excited to laughter; and patient to a great degree.  On the other hand, they are litigious; indolent; addicted to gaming; dishonest in their dealings with strangers, which they esteem no moral defect; suspicious; regardless of truth; mean in their transactions; servile; though cleanly in their persons, dirty in their apparel, which they never wash.  They are careless and improvident of the future, because their wants are few, for though poor they are not necessitous; nature supplying, with extraordinary facility, whatever she has made requisite for their existence.  Science and the arts have not, by extending their views, contributed to enlarge the circle of their desires; and the various refinements of luxury, which in polished societies become necessaries of life, are totally unknown to them.  The Makassar and Bugis people, who come annually in their praws from Celebes to trade at Sumatra, are looked up to by the inhabitants as their superiors in manners.  The Malays affect to copy their style of dress, and frequent allusions to the feats and achievements of these people are made in their songs.  Their reputation for courage, which certainly surpasses that of all other people in the eastern seas, acquires them this flattering distinction.  They also derive part of the respect paid them from the richness of the cargoes they import, and the spirit with which they spend the produce in gaming, cock-fighting, and opium-smoking.

GOVERNMENT.

Having endeavoured to trace the character of these people with as much fidelity and accuracy as possible, I shall now proceed to give an account of their government, laws, customs, and manners; and, in order to convey to the reader the clearest ideas in my power, I shall develop the various circumstances in such order and connection as shall appear best to answer this intent, without confining myself, in every instance, to a rigid and scrupulous arrangement under distinct heads.

REJANGS DIVIDED INTO TRIBES.

The Rejang people, whom, for reasons before assigned, I have fixed upon for a standard of description, but which apply generally to the orang ulu, or inhabitants of the inland country, are distinguished into tribes, the descendants of different ancestors.  Of these there are four principal, who are said to trace their origin to four brothers, and to have been united from time immemorial in a league offensive and defensive; though it may be presumed that the permanency of this bond of union is to be attributed rather to considerations of expediency resulting from their situation than to consanguinity or any formal compact.