THE BATTAS OP MANDHEL1NG AND PERTJBT. 376 
the chastity of the young women ; let it ever be remembered, 
that in those parts of our father land, where courtship above 
the blanket is maintained the longest, the manners are the most 
innocent. There are few or no exceptions to the chastity of 
the married women. Further the Batta’ knows neither im¬ 
modest dancesor songs, nor immodest assemblies of men and 
women, and prostitution, beyond our capitals, is an unknown 
thing to him. Protected likewise, in and out of marriage, 
against the temptations which elsewhere excite to voluptuous¬ 
ness or inflame jealousy, desire but seldom leads the Batta 
to the crimes or numerous follies by which others embitter 
the best half of their lives.* His tranquillity is as little 
troubled by ambition. His birth has placed him in a social po¬ 
sition, in which he can raise himself very little, and which he 
cannot surmount without a revolution. He loves the palm wine, 
so generously granted to him by nature, but even in his feast 
days he makes little use of it, and daily drunkards are nowhere 
to be found. He knows other liquids as little as the use of 
opium. Although free from high placed ambition, be posses- 
sess the feeling of honor ; his humility towards superiors is 
friendly and becoming but never slavish, he will not suffer de¬ 
famation or insult, but washes them out by the lawful means 
which his country’s institutions assure to him. 
However saving in disposition, he is hospitable to travel¬ 
lers, and benevolent towards relatives or the indigent of his 
own tribe. 
In his social relations he manifests great honesty, and in ge¬ 
neral also uprightness and love of truth, although it is his 
birthright prudently to answer one question by another. 
All his family relations are marked by great amenity and 
purity of manners ; honor and respect from the younger to 
the older, tender care from the older to the younger, love and 
mutual accommodation from man to woman, (however little 
that might otherwise seem to agree with her hard labour), 
liberality towards slaves,—are so many bonds which in most 
families secure daily happiness. 
In his public life he shows a true patriotism \ neither the 
chiefs nor their followers divide their interests from the gene¬ 
ral welfare. He is truly attached to his native soil; only 
great misfortunes, slavery or want, can bring him to say fare¬ 
well to it, and banishment is nearly assimilated to a sentence 
of death He is equally attached to the institutions of his 
forefathers, and it is sufficient for him that the sentence by 
* The Malay races of Ulu cannot make the least claim to this chastity; 
the funeral ceremonies there can testify the licentiousness of the young who 
at night come ostensibly to bewail the dead, 
