[^] In the history of Sumatra, there is a description of two races of wild people on that island, called Orang Kubu and Orang Gugu; the latter of whom seems to correspond with the description of the Bilian of the peninsula. “In the course of my inquiries among the natives,” observes Mr. Marsden, “concerning the Aborigines of the island, I have been informed of two different species of people, dispersed in the woods, and avoiding all communication with other inhabitants. These they call Orang Kubu and Orang Gugu. The former are said to be pretty numerous, especially in that part of the country which lies between Palembang and Jambi. Some have, at times, been caught, and kept as slaves, in Labun; and a man of that place is now married to a tolerably Kubu girl, who was carried off by a party that discovered their huts. They have a language quite peculiar to themselves, and they eat promiscuously whatever the woods afford, as deer, elephants, wild hogs, snakes, or monkeys. The Gugu are much scarcer than these, differing in little, but the use of speech, from the Orang Utau of Borneo, their bodies being covered with long hair. There have not been above two or three instances of their being met with by people of Labun, (from whom any information is derived,) and one of these was entrapped many years ago, in much the same manner as the carpenter, in Pelpay’s fables, caught the monkey. He had children by a Labun woman, which also were more hairy than the common race, but the third generation are not to be distinguished from others. The reader will bestow what measure of faith he thinks due to this relation, the veracity of which I do not pretend to vouch for. It has, probably, some foundation in truth, but is exaggerated in the circumstances.”—See History of Sumatra, p. 41.
[^] See History of Sumatra, pp. 332, 333.
[^] Major Milford’s Essay on Asiatic Researches, vol. x., pp. 144, 145, 146, 147.
[^] Forrest alludes to a remarkable mountain in this quarter: “Gunang Jantong, hanging hill, is remarkable, near Laroot river.”
[^] This race of people seem to correspond in their appearance and habits with a tribe called Jokong, which Sir S. Raffles describes as being found near Malacca, (Asiatic Researches, vol. xii., p. 109): “I had an opportunity,” remarks this author, in his paper on the Malay nation, “of seeing two of these people, from a tribe in the neighbourhood of Malacca; it consisted of about sixty people, and the tribe was called Jakoons. These people, from their occasional intercourse with the Malayan villages, dependant on Malacca, speak the language well to be generally understood. They relate, that there are two other tribes, the Orang Benna and the Orang Udai. The former appears to be the most interesting, as composing the majority; the latter is only another name for the Semang or Caffres. They are not circumcised, and they appear to have received some instruction regarding Nabi Isu, or as they pronounce it, Nabi Isher. They, however, have no books, nor any word for God, whom they designate by the Portuguese word Deos. The men are well formed, or rather short, resembling the Malay in countenance, but having a sharper and smaller nose. They marry but one wife, whether rich or poor, and appear to observe no particular ceremony at their nuptials; the consent of the girl and the parents being obtained, the couple are considered as man and wife.”
[^] On the language and literature of the Indu Chinese nations. (As. Res. vol. 10, 202, 203.)
[^] Herodotus, Lib. 3, s. 99.
[^] Dr. Leyden, in his disquisition on the language and literature of the East, makes mention of the negro-tribes as follows: “The Papuas, termed by themselves Inglote, but by the Spaniards of the Philippine islands, ‘Nigritos del Monte,’ from their colour of woolly hair, are the second race of Aborigines in the Eastern isles, in several of which they are still to be found, and in all which they seem to have originally existed. Some of these divisions have formed small savage states, and made some advances towards civilization; but the greater part of them, even with the example of more civilized races before their eyes, have betrayed no symptoms, either of a taste or capacity for improvement, and continue in their primary state of nakedness, sleeping on trees, devoid of houses or clothing, and subsisting on the spontaneous products of the forest, or the precarious success of their hunting and fishing. The Papuas, or Oriental negroes, seem to be all divided into very small states, or rather societies, very little connected with each other. Hence their language is broken into a multitude of dialects, which, in process of time, by separation, accident, and oral corruption, have nearly lost all resemblance. The Malays of the peninsula consider the language of the blacks of the hills as a mere jargon, which can only be compared to the chattering of large birds, and the Papua dialects in many of the Eastern isles, are generally viewed in the same light.” See As. Res. vol. x. p. 218.
[^] “The East Insular Negro,” says Crawford, “is a distinct variety of the human species, and evidently a very inferior one. Their puny stature and feeble frames cannot be ascribed to the poverty of their food, or the hardships of their condition, for the lank-haired races, living under circumstances equally precarious, have vigorous constitutions. Some islands they enjoy almost exclusively to themselves, yet they have in no instance ever risen above the most abject state of barbarism. Wherever they are encountered by the fair races, they are hunted down like wild animals of the forest, and driven to the mountains and fastnesses, incapable of resistance.” (Crawford’s Archipelago, vol., i. p. 26.) Sir Everard Home gives the following description of a Papua negro, carried to England by Sir S. Raffles, Hist. of Java, vol. ii., Appendix, p. 235: “The Papua differs from the African negro in the following particulars: his skin is of a lighter colour, the woolly hair grows in small tufts, and each hair has a spiral twist. The forehead is higher, and the hind head is not so much cut off. The nose projects more from the face, the upper lip is longer and more prominent, the lower lip projects forward from the lower jaw to such an extent that the chin forms no part of the face, the lower part of which is formed by the mouth; the buttocks are so much lower than the negro as to form a striking mark of distinction, but the calf of the leg is as high as in the negro.”
[^] The Company’s agents, in Canton, do not give the number of chests in their returns of teas shipped.