olently
increased operate to prevent it; but it must be considered that moisture
also is requisite to the former effect, and this is absorbed in thin
substances by the sun's rays before it can contribute to the production
of maggots.

Blachang, a preservation, if it may be so termed, of an opposite kind, is
esteemed a great delicacy among the Malays, and is by them exported to
the west of India. The country Sumatrans seldom procure it. It is a
species of caviar, and is extremely offensive and disgusting to persons
who are not accustomed to it, particularly the black kind, which is the
most common. The best sort, or the red blachang, is made of the spawn of
shrimps, or of the shrimps themselves, which they take about the mouths
of rivers. They are, after boiling, exposed to the sun to dry, then
pounded in a mortar with salt, moistened with a little water and formed
into cakes, which is all the process. The black sort, used by the lower
class, is made of small fish, prepared in the same manner. On some parts
of the east coast of the island they salt the roes of a large fish of the
shad kind, and preserve them perfectly dry and well flavoured. These are
called trobo.

When the natives kill a buffalo, which is always done at their public
meetings, they do not cut it up into joints as we do an ox, but into
small pieces of flesh, or steaks, which they call bantei. The hide of the
buffalo is sometimes scalded, scraped, and hung up to dry in their houses
where it shrivels and becomes perfectly hard. When wanted for use a piece
is chopped off and, being stewed down for a great number of hours in a
small quantity of water, forms a rich jelly which, properly seasoned, is
esteemed a very delicate dish.

The sago (sagu), though common on Sumatra and used occasionally by the
natives, is not an article of food of such general use among them as with
the inhabitants of many other eastern islands, where it is employed as a
substitute for rice. Millet (randa jawa) is also cultivated for food, but
not in any considerable quantity.

When these several articles of subsistence fail the Sumatran has recourse
to those wild roots, herbs, and leaves of trees which the woods
abundantly afford in every season without culture, and which the habitual
simplicity of his diet teaches him to consider as no very extraordinary
circumstance of hardship. Hence it is that famines in this island or,
more properly speaking, failures of crops of grain, are n