CANNIBALISM AS A CUSTOM. 209 



says : " In Brass (or the Mimbe country) cannibalism often occurs. 

 Even within the last year a chief of that district, named Imamy, killed 

 two of the Acreeka people before mentioned, who were sacrificed to 

 the manes of his father. In Brass, as in Bonny, they eat all enemies 

 taken in war ; and they put forth, as a justification for this, that de- 

 vouring the flesh of their enemies makes them brave." The account 

 given by the same writer of the killing of a native for the purposes of 

 cannibalism, of which he was an eye-witness, is most admirably graphic 

 and striking, but it is, unfortunately, too long, if not too terrible, to 

 quote in these pages. 



Nor is cannibalism confined to the Ethiopian and Polynesian races 

 alone ; it is prevalent to an astonishing extent among the inhabitants 

 of the Malayan Islands, Java, Sumatra, and Borneo. Some of the 

 earliest voyagers to the Eastern seas came back with stories of how the 

 people of those parts were man-eaters ; but, however much credence 

 their tales may have received at the time, they have been greatly 

 doubted since. But Marsden and other writers prove that the state- 

 ments of those early pioneers of travel and observation were entirely 

 correct. Marsden, in his account of Sumatra, says that, although he 

 had heard reports of the cannibal habits of some of the tribes, he had 

 always discredited them until the truth of the statement was made 

 entirely clear to him. He says that the Battas, one of the peoples of 

 Sumatra, eat human flesh regularly, not to satisfy the cravings of hun- 

 ger, but as a sort of ceremony to show their detestation of certain 

 crimes by this most ignominious punishment, and as a savage display 

 of revenge and insult to their unfortunate enemies. People killed or 

 badly wounded by them in war are eaten, and the captured sold as 

 slaves. These same Battas show a certain amount of culinary art in 

 the preparation of this food, for they broil the flesh over a brisk fire, 

 and flavor it with salt, lemon, and red pepper. 



A friend of the writer's, who for more than forty years has been in 

 the employment of the Dutch Government, bears personal witness to 

 the prevalence of the custom in Sumatra up till recent times. He was 

 once making scientific investigations in the interior of that island, and 

 was being entertained in the most hospitable manner by the native 

 rajah, or chief, of the place he was then in. A feast had been made 

 to which he was bidden, and to which he went, taking his own native 

 servant with him. The banquet had proceeded for some time without 

 interruption, when at last, as crown of the feast, a beautiful brown 

 roast joint was brought from the back of the house to the open, airy 

 place where the repast was being held. This was cut up without re- 

 mark and handed round, and the Dutch gentleman was on the point of 

 eating his portion, having raised part of it to his lips, when his ser- 

 vant rushed forward and stopped him, saying, " Master, master, do not 

 eat ; it is a boy ! " The chief, on being questioned, admitted, with no 

 small pride at the extent of his hospitality, that, hearing that the white 



TOL. XXTI. — 14 



