92 



BORNEO— THE DTAKS. 



[C!1-IP. Vi. 



stones, to an ele^^ation of a thonsarid feet. Besides th^ 

 she has an hour's work every evening to pound the rice 

 with a heavy wooden stamper, which violently stniinf? 

 every part of the body. She begins this kind of labour 

 when nine or ten years old, and it never ceases but 

 with the extreme decrepitude of age. Surely we need 

 not wonder at the limited number of her progeny, but 

 rather be surprised at the successful efforts of nature to 

 prevent the extermination of the race. 



One of the surest and most beneticial effects of ad- 

 vancing civilization, wiU be the amelioration of the 

 condition of these womeiL The precej/t and example 

 of higher races will make the Dyak ashamed of liis 

 comparatively idle life, while his weaker partner laboui-s 

 like a beast of burthen. As his wants become increased 

 and his tastes refined, the women will have more household 

 iluties to attend to, and will then cease to labour in the 

 field — a change which has already to a great extent taken 

 place in the allied Malay, Javanese, and Bugts tribes. 

 Population will then certainly increase more rapidly, 

 improved systems of agriculture and some division of 

 labour will become necessary in order to provide the 

 means of existence, and a more complicated social state 

 will take the place of the simple conditions of society 

 whicli now obtain among thenL Bat, with the sharper 

 struggle for existence that will then occur, will the hap- 

 piness of the people as a whole be increa-sed or diminished ? 

 Will not evil passions be aroused by the spirit of compe- 

 tition, and crimes and vices, now uidvnown or dormant, 

 be called into active existence ? These are problems that 

 time alone can solve ; but it is to be hoped that education 

 and a high-class Kuropean example may obviate much 

 of the evil that too often arises in analogous cases, and 

 that we may at length be able to point to one instance 

 of an uncivilized people who have not become demoralized 

 and filially exterminated, by contact with European civi- 

 lization. 



A few words in conclusion, about the government of 

 Samivak. Sir James Brooke found the Dyaks oppressed 

 and gi'oiind down by the most crael tyranny. They were 

 cheated by the Malay tmders, Ewid robbed by the Malay 



