brothers, and to
have been united from time immemorial in a league offensive and
defensive; though it may be presumed that the permanency of this bond of
union is to be attributed rather to considerations of expediency
resulting from their situation than to consanguinity or any formal
compact.

THEIR GOVERNMENT.

The inhabitants live in villages, called dusun, each under the government
of a headman or magistrate, styled dupati, whose dependants are termed
his ana-buah, and in number seldom exceed one hundred. The dupatis
belonging to each river (for here, the villages being almost always
situated by the waterside, the names we are used to apply to countries or
districts are properly those of the rivers) meet in a judicial capacity
at the kwalo, where the European factory is established, and are then
distinguished by the name of proattin.

PANGERAN.

The pangeran (a Javanese title), or feudal chief of the country, presides
over the whole. It is not an easy matter to describe in what consists the
fealty of a dupati to his pangeran, or of his ana-buah to himself, so
very little in either case is practically observed. Almost without arts,
and with but little industry, the state of property is nearly equal among
all the inhabitants, and the chiefs scarcely differ but in title from the
bulk of the people.

HIS AUTHORITY.

Their authority is no more than nominal, being without that coercive
power necessary to make themselves feared and implicitly obeyed. This is
the natural result of poverty among nations habituated to peace; where
the two great political engines of interest and military force are
wanting. Their government is founded in opinion, and the submission of
the people is voluntary. The domestic rule of a private family beyond a
doubt suggested first the idea of government in society, and, this people
having made but small advances in civil policy, theirs continues to
retain a strong resemblance of its original. It is connected also with
the principle of the feudal system, into which it would probably settle
should it attain to a greater degree of refinement. All the other
governments throughout the island are likewise a mixture of the
patriarchal and feudal; and it may be observed that, where a spirit of
conquest has reduced the inhabitants under the subjection of another
power, or has added foreign districts to their dominion, there the feudal
maxims prevail: where the natives, from situation or disposition,