166 
VOYAGE OF THE POTOMAC, 
[February, 
the family, he shall be held, responsible for whatever may be lost 
dming the night : but if he commit any thing in keeping to the 
care of his host, then, if his effects be lost, he must be made good. 
When the owner and his guest both lose property, then they shall 
make oath to each other of their mutual innocence. As stated be- 
fore, where the Mahometan religion prevails, the Koran is used 
for administering oaths. 
Among the Rejangs, murder, the greatest of all crimes, may 
be expiated by the payment of a fine ; the amount is not propor- 
tioned in any case to the rank and condition of the murderer, but 
according to the importance of the person whose life has been 
sacrificed. The value of mens' lives, therefore, is not esteemed 
equal. If a murderer have not property sufiicient to pay the fine 
imposed on him by the authorities, then his nearest family rela- 
tions are held responsible, and even the village where he lives, or 
he may be sold as a slave. 
In this, as in many other respects, there is a striking resemblance 
between their customs and those of the Araucanian Indians of 
South America. We once travelled twenty leagues in company 
with a cacique, or chief, who was on his journey to receive a 
number of horses and cattle from a distant settlement, where one 
of his relatives had been murdered; and the atonement, in this 
instance, had been assumed by the family of the murderer, who 
was himself too poor to pay. It does not appear, therefore, from 
the spirit of their customs, that fines are imposed so much for the 
punishment of the guilty, as for an atonement or compensation to 
the family of the deceased. This is confirmed by the fact, that 
they make no distinction between wilful murder and manslaugh- 
ter : the loss to the living being the same, the fines are equal. 
This custom comes down by tradition from a remote period, 
beyond the introduction of Mahometanism upon the island. 
Among our Saxon ancestors, and northern nations, a compensa- 
tion was admitted for murder : it is the " eric of Ireland, and the 
aponai of the Greeks." Among the Rejangs, corporeal punish- 
ments are rare, and confinement in chains unknown ; the danger- 
ous persons are sometimes enclosed in small houses prepared for 
the purpose, or, in their own significant language, " We pen him 
up as we would a bear." The right of holding persons in slavery 
