Ceramese, and
half-caste Javanese, with a sprinkling of half-wild Papuans from Timor,
Babber, and other islands, yet all goes on as yet very quietly. This
motley, ignorant, bloodthirsty, thievish population live here without
the shadow of a government, with no police, no courts, and no lawyers;
yet they do not cut each other's throats, do not plunder each other day
and night, do not fall into the anarchy such a state of things might be
supposed to lead to. It is very extraordinary! It puts strange thoughts
into one's head about the mountain-load of government under which people
exist in Europe, and suggests the idea that we may be over-governed.
Think of the hundred Acts of Parliament annually enacted to prevent us,
the people of England, from cutting each other's throats, or from doing
to our neighbour as we would not be done by. Think of the thousands of
lawyers and barristers whose whole lives are spent in telling us what
the hundred Acts of Parliament mean, and one would be led to infer that
if Dobbo has too little law England has too much.

Here we may behold in its simplest form the genius of Commerce at the
work of Civilization. Trade is the magic that keeps all at peace, and
unites these discordant elements into a well-behaved community. All
are traders, and know that peace and order are essential to successful
trade, and thus a public opinion is created which puts down all
lawlessness. Often in former year, when strolling along the Campong Glam
in Singapore, I have thought how wild and ferocious the Bugis sailors
looked, and how little should like to trust myself among them. But now I
find them to be very decent, well-behaved fellows; I walk daily unarmed
in the jungle, where I meet them continually; I sleep in a palm-leaf
hut, which any one may enter, with as little fear and as little
danger of thieves or murder as if I were under the protection of the
Metropolitan police. It is true the Dutch influence is felt here. The
islands are nominally under the government of the Moluccas, which the
native chiefs acknowledge; and in most years a commissioner arrives from
Amboyna, who makes the tour of the islands, hears complaints, settle
disputes, and carries away prisoner any heinous offender. This year he
is not expected to come, as no orders have yet been received to prepare
for him; so the people of Dobbo will probably be left to their own
devices. One day a man was caught in the act of stealing a piece of
iron fro