extremities, in order that they may the better receive and
retain the jetty blackness with which they almost universally adorn them.
The black used on these occasions is the empyreumatic oil of the
coconut-shell. When this is not applied the filing does not, by
destroying what we term the enamel, diminish the whiteness of the teeth;
but the use of betel renders them black if pains be not taken to prevent
it. The great men sometimes set theirs in gold, by casing, with a plate
of that metal, the under row; and this ornament, contrasted with the
black dye, has by lamp or candlelight a very splendid effect. It is
sometimes indented to the shape of the teeth, but more usually quite
plain. They do not remove it either to eat or sleep.

At the age of about eight or nine they bore the ears and file the teeth
of the female children; which are ceremonies that must necessarily
precede their marriage. The former they call betende, and the latter
bedabong; and these operations are regarded in the family as the occasion
of a festival. They do not here, as in some of the adjacent islands (of
Nias in particular), increase the aperture of the ear to a monstrous
size, so as in many instances to be large enough to admit the hand, the
lower parts being stretched till they touch the shoulders. Their earrings
are mostly of gold filigree, and fastened not with a clasp, but in the
manner of a rivet or nut screwed to the inner part.

CHAPTER 3.

VILLAGES.
BUILDINGS.
DOMESTIC UTENSILS.
FOOD.

I shall now attempt a description of the villages and buildings of the
Sumatrans, and proceed to their domestic habits of economy, and those
simple arts on which the procuring of their food and other necessaries
depends. These are not among the least interesting objects of
philosophical speculation. In proportion as the arts in use with any
people are connected with the primary demands of nature, they carry the
greater likelihood of originality, because those demands must have been
administered to from a period coeval with the existence of the people
themselves. Or if complete originality be regarded as a visionary idea,
engendered from ignorance and the obscurity of remote events, such arts
must be allowed to have the fairest claim to antiquity at least. Arts of
accommodation, and more especially of luxury, are commonly the effect of
imitation, and suggested by the improvements of other nations which have
made greater advances towards civilisation.