1844.] APATHY OF DISPOSITION. 89 



tually succeeded in pressing them to accept of cloth and 

 flannel in return for the supplies with which they had 

 liberally furnished us during our journey round the 

 island. 



" It would be an easy task to designate this people as 

 a set of tea-drinking old women, imbecile and apathetic ; 

 void of energy and enterprise, living in contentment 

 on a group of islands the value and facilities of which 

 they are almost entirely ignorant, and of whose posi- 

 tion and resources they are unable to take advantage. 

 But on contrasting them with the insidious, fawning, and 

 deceitful Chinese ; or the savage and vindictive,, blood- 

 thirsty Malays, I cannot but fancy their character amiable, 

 and their condition one to be envied. 



" Their food is extremely simple, consisting chiefly 

 of the Batata, Rice, and other vegetables, varied with 

 the produce of the deep, including molluscous animals, 

 such as the Cuttle Fish (Sepia), the large Clam (Tridaona 

 gig as) and others. In their adaptation of the shells, 

 which abound in this region, for various household and 

 other uses, they display considerable ingenuity ; two in- 

 stances in particular excited my attention, and are worthy 

 of notice. The first was in the use of a valve of the large 

 Clam shell just spoken of, for the purpose of swinging the 

 gates to their inclosures ; they place it under the heel of the 

 the main post, in the middle of which it revolves upon its 

 point with ease, and its upper end being confined to the 

 standard by a neat ring or grommet of rattan, serves for 

 the hinge ; it works very smoothly. The second instance 

 was the construction of a tea-kettle out of the well-known 

 Trumpet shell, Triton varicyatus, the operculum forming 



