498 Messrs. Burton and Ward's Journey into the BataJc Country. 



Food. 

 Rice and sweet potatoes, with an iinnsual proportion of salt, form the 

 principal food of the Bataks : it is only on particular occasions they indulge 

 themselves with animal food. In their choice of animals, or even reptiles, 

 however, they are by no means delicate : horses, buffaloes, cows, pigs, 

 fowls and goats are esteemed the best ; but they do not scruple to eat dogs, 

 cats, snakes, monkies, bats, &c., nor does it make any particular differ- 

 ence, in their estimation, whether tlie animal has died a natural death 

 or been killed in good health ; whether recently dead or bordering on 

 putridity. When an animal is killed for food, they save tlie blood, and use 

 it as sauce, pouring it over the meat when cooked, and cliopped into 

 pieces of about an ounce weight each. As tlie art of cookery has made 

 little progress, they arc frequently obliged to gratify the taste with simple 

 salt, in cases where the Malay would have recourse to curries or sambals. 

 This may have given rise to the idea of an extraordinary consumption 

 of salt amongst the Bataks, which may not be destitute of foundation. 



General Character. 



Nothing can be more erroneous than the opinions commonly entertained 

 by the Malays, in tlieir neighbourhood as well as by Europeans, with regard 

 to the general character and disposition of the Bataks. The well-established 

 fact of their cannibalism has, perhaps, naturally led to the conclusion, that 

 they were a remarkably ferocious and daring people. So strongly, indeed, 

 had this imjjression taken hold of our minds, that although a residence 

 of two years on the border of their country had furnished nothing to 

 confirm the opinion, we still expected to find proofs of it in the interior. 

 So far from this, however, whatever may be the fact with respect to other 

 districts, the jjcoplc of Silindung, in quietness and timidity, are apparently 

 not surpassed even by the Hindus. Misunderstandings between individuals 

 of the same village seldom go beyond words, or a complaint to the chief; and 

 their wars are little more than nominal. These will often continue for five 

 or six years, without proving fatal to more than two or three persons of each 

 side. Tiie hostile parties commit no depredations on each othei^'s crops or 

 cattle ; and an instance occurred, during our stay in Silindung, of two men 

 coming upon private business to the village where we resided, from one with 

 which our host was at war, when he hospitably entertained them, and suffered 

 them to depart in peace. We mean not to say, however, that the Batali-s 



