"in the same humble,
but not necessarily unhappy, position as his own."[703] In Ceylon
there were slave persons of all ranks. Those of royal rank were
princes who were prisoners or criminals. Any one might obtain
slaves by purchase, or accept voluntary slaves who looked to him
for good support.[704] A Malay will buy of a chief a number of
war captives whom he takes to an island. Then he goes to a
Chinaman and tells him that the slaves want to work on that
island, but still owe the speaker the cost of transportation. The
Chinaman pays this and gives to the slaves, on credit, clothes,
etc., including money with which to gamble. Wages are low and
interest high. They never can pay their debts and get their
freedom again. This kind of slave trade has depopulated northern
Nias.[705] On Sumatra, when a debtor is called upon to pay and
cannot, or when he dies and does not leave enough property to pay
his debts, his children fall into semi-slavery. They can perhaps
persuade some one to pay their debts and accept their services.
If their master formally three times demands payment of them
which they cannot give, they fall into full slavery. Slavery
exists in the Malay seaport towns, but not in the rural
districts, where life is too simple.[706] In times of famine and
want parents sell their children into slavery for a little rice.
Children, especially daughters, constitute a large part of the
fortune of a house father.[707]

At Koetei, on the Mahakkam in Borneo, all well-to-do people have
debtors in pawn, whose position is somewhat better than that of
slaves. The debtors seem content and submissive. Captives taken
on head-hunting expeditions are held as slaves until human
sacrifices are wanted.[708] The souls of all those who are put to
death at the death of a Dyak rajah become his servants in the
other world. In this world the killer can command, as his fetich,
the soul of the killed. On the death of a great man his debtor
slaves are bound to the carved village post, which indicates the
glory of head-hunting, and are tortured to death.[709] "Slavery
is greatly practiced" on Timorlaut. A thief, debtor, slanderer,
or defamer may become the slave of the one he has wronged. The
slave trade is also active between the islands.[710] The slaves
of the sea Dyaks adopt their customs and become contented.
Sometimes they win