196 
COMPENDIUM OF GEOGEAPHY AND TEAVEL 
attendant ceremonies. Here before a crowded audience 
they are invested with their equivalent knighthoods and 
peerages ; and here, in many villages, they are at last laid 
out, and pass from it to the grave. Around the Balai, there¬ 
fore, centres as it were the whole life of a Lampong village.” 
In brief, then, we may describe the inhabitants of 
Sumatra as consisting of various nations of either pure 
Malayan or sub-Malayan stock, those in the north being 
the most hybrid. The majority follow Islamism with more 
or less laxity, but the centre of the island is occupied by 
tribes of pure pagans, such as the Battaks, Ulus, Lubus, 
Kubus, and others. Of these, the Battaks are con¬ 
spicuous as affording the only known instance of lettered 
cannibalism. These pagans, chiefly on account of the in¬ 
accessibility of their country, have come very little under 
Dutch influence. The Ache people have resisted it to the 
death for the past twenty years, but it has spread steadily 
though slowly in the north-east, near Dili; in the 
Palembang, Lampong, and Benkulen Besidencies; and, 
more especially around Padang and the upland districts 
behind it. In the south there are abundant evidences of 
a large Javanese immigration having occurred at some 
past epoch, while scattered ruins and sculptures in various 
parts of the island testify to the probability of the exist¬ 
ence of some Hindu influence at a remoter period, which 
influence, however, can never have in any way approached 
that which held sway in Java. Throughout a large 
portion of the island we find a communal system obtain¬ 
ing, upon which the Dutch attempt to graft their own 
administration. Lastly, the languages, which are all 
either pure Malay or sub-Malayan, are remarkable in 
certain instances (Battak, Korinchi, Eejang, Lampong) as. 
being written in a peculiar character. 
