280 THE GAME FOWL. 



cool, and before they became languid from the heat. More 

 than two were seldom engaged at once, and so soon as one bird 

 avoided the other, he was considered as vi, or beaten. Victory 

 was declared in favour of his opponent, and they were imme- 

 diately parted. This amusement was sometimes continued for 

 several days successively." Ellis' s Polynesian Researches, 

 vol. i. p. 302. 



It would appear from Mr. Ellis, that there are innate ideas 

 in the human understanding, one of which is Cock-fighting. 

 The Tahitians manifest their simplicity in fighting for love, not 

 for money.- Other barbarians show themselves to be more 

 sophisticated. 



" Throughout every rank of the people of Sumatra there 

 prevails a strong spirit of gaming. Cock-fighting they are still 

 more passionately addicted to, and it is indulged to them under 

 certain regulations. Where they are perfectly independent, 

 their propensity to it is so great, than it resembles rather a se- 

 rious occupation than a sport. You seldom meet a man tra- 

 velling in the country, without a Cock under his arm, and some- 

 times fifty in a company, when there is a limbang in one of 

 the neighbouring villages. A countryman coming down, on 

 any occasion, to the qualloe, or mouth of the river, if he boast 

 the least degree of spirit, must not be unprovided with this 

 token of it. They often game high at their meetings ; par- 

 ticularly when a superstitious faith in the invincibility of their 

 bird has been strengthened by past success. An hundred 

 Spanish dollars is "no very uncommon risk, and instances have 

 occurred of a father staking his children or wife, and a son his 

 mother or sisters, on the issue of a battle when a run of ill-luck 

 has stripped them of property, and rendered them desperate. 

 Quarrels, attended with dreadful consequences, have often arisen 

 on these occasions. 



" By their customs, there are four umpires appointed to de- 

 termine on all disputed points in the course of the tattles, and 



