They sit up in state at night on raised cushions, in their best clothes and trinkets.  They are sometimes loaded on the occasion with all the finery of their relations, or even the whole dusun, and carefully eased of it when the ceremony is over.  But this is not the case with the children of persons of rank.  I remember being present at the marriage of a young woman, whose beauty would not have disgraced any country, with a son of Raddin, prince of Madura, to whom the English gave protection from the power of the Dutch after his father had fallen a sacrifice.* She was decked in unborrowed plumes.  Her dress was eminently calculated to do justice to a fine person; her hair, in which consists their chief pride, was disposed with extreme grace; and an uncommon elegance and taste were displayed in the workmanship and adjustment of her ornaments.  It must be confessed however that this taste is by no means general, especially amongst the country people.  Simplicity, so essential to the idea, is the characteristic of a rude and quite uncivilized people, and is again adopted by men in their highest state of refinement.  The Sumatrans stand removed from both these extremes.  Rich and splendid articles of dress and furniture, though not often procured, are the objects of their vanity and ambition.

(Footnote.  The circumstances of this disgraceful affair are preserved in a book entitled A Voyage to the East Indies in 1747 and 1748.  This Raddin Tamanggung, a most intelligent and respectable man, died at Bencoolen in the year 1790.  His sons possess the good qualities of their father, and are employed in the Company’s service.)

The bimbangs are conducted with great decorum and regularity.  The old women are very attentive to the conduct of the girls, and the male relations are highly jealous of any insults that may be shown them.  A lad at one of these entertainments asked another his opinion of a gadis who was then dancing.  “If she was plated with gold,” replied he, “I would not take her for my concubine, much less for my wife.”  A brother of the girl happened to be within hearing, and called him to account for the reflection thrown on his sister.  Krises were drawn but the bystanders prevented mischief.  The brother appeared the next day to take the law of the defamer, but the gentleman, being of the risau description, had absconded, and was not to be found.

NUMBER OF WIVES.

The customs of the Sumatrans permit their having as many wives by jujur as they can compass the purchase of or afford to maintain; but it is extremely rare that an instance occurs of their having more than one, and that only among a few of the chiefs.  This continence they in some measure owe to their poverty.  The dictates of frugality are more powerful with them than the irregular calls of appetite, and make them decline an indulgence that their law does not restrain them from.  In talking of polygamy they allow it to be the privilege of the rich, but regard it as a refinement which the poor Rejangs cannot pretend to.  Some young risaus have been known to take wives in different places, but the father of the first, as soon as he hears of the second marriage, procures a divorce.  A man married by semando cannot take a second wife without repudiating the first for this obvious reason that two or more persons could not be equally entitled to the half of his effects.