•TUB BINUA OF JOIIORE. 
269 
kindness and respect. They are less distrustful, less changeful, and 
more robust in their character than the Bermun tribes, who require 
to be humoured like children, and who, if we fail to do so, easily con¬ 
vince themselves that they are wronged, neglected, or treated with a 
want of consideration. Like them they are very susceptible to flat¬ 
tery. 
It is this excessive sensitiveness both to flattery and slight Mvich 
seems to supply that psychological link between the aborigines and 
the Malays which, at the first contemplation of the great difference 
between them, seems to be wanting. Civilization has deprived the 
Malay of the openness and simplicity of the Binua, and hardened him. 
But, although he has substituted for a total want of manner, one of 
the most strongly marked manners possessed by any race, his pris¬ 
tine sensitiveness is covered not conquered. It is indeed the secret of 
much that is peculiar in his social deportment. That art of putting 
every thing in a pleasing point of view, of softening and concealing 
the natural asperities of a subject under discussion, of rendering even 
that which in other hands might wound the self-love of the person 
addressed, the medium of a compliment,—an art in which the well bred 
Malay is unsurpassed and which the combined softness, frankness and 
simple dignity of his manner so well second—is the growth of this 
very sensitiveness. He soothes and flatters others that he may him¬ 
self be soothed and flattered. The command over his own pas¬ 
sions and feelings which he has obtained, renders courtesy and polite¬ 
ness habitual, but habit has veiled not subdued his Binua nature, 
and the sense of wrong, when not relieved by speedy revenge, some¬ 
times preys upon bis mind till he is goaded into fury, and moodi¬ 
ness becomes madness. It is another result of the inherency of the 
Binua disposition that many Malays, who have not the sustained ani¬ 
mal spirits or firmness required by the civilization and position which 
the race have obtained, are disposed to a degree of melancholy which 
sometimes becomes sullenness. Let the Biniri be drawn from his 
seclusion into intercourse with other nations, and his character will 
be emboldened and hardened by the change in his habits, and unless 
a more powerful and spiritual religion than that of the Malays elevates 
him in character as in civilization, we may see him bring the kris to 
the aid of his spells, and substitute the amok for the tujo. As yet 
the race sits happy in the ethnic nursery, unconscious of the pro¬ 
gress of events which must force it from its child like ignorance and 
peace and teach it to know the corruption and the strife which na¬ 
tions of larger growth have found in civilization. May they not be 
