Page:Journal of the Straits Branch of the Royal Asiatic Society (IA journalofstrait121878roya).pdf/148

 MISCELLANEOUS NOTICES.

THE WILD TRIBES OF THE MALAY PENINSULA AND ARCHIPELAGO.

The Council of the Royal Asiatic Society of the Straits Branch have resolved to invite the assistance of persons residing or travelling in the Peninsula, in Sumatra, or in the adjacent countries, with a view to the collection of fuller and more varied information than has been hitherto obtained in regard to the wild tribes of these regions.

The interest such investigations possess for Ethnology, Philology &c., and the importance of prosecuting them without delay, are sufficiently obvious. The following passage from Mr. Logan's writings (I. A. Journal 1850 vol. IV p. 261-5) will instruct those to whom the subject is new as to the precise objects to be aimed at, and the best methods of enquiry to be followed. "For the Ethnology, of any given region the first requirement is a full and accurate description of each tribe in it, and in the adjacent and connected regions, as it exists at present and has existed in recent or historical times. This embraces the geographical limits and the numbers of the tribe, the Physical Geography of its locations, and its relations of all kinds to intermixed, surrounding, and more distant tribes. The environments of the race thus ascertained, the individual man must be described in his Physiological and Mental Characteristics and in his language. The Family in all its peculiarities of formation and preservation, the relative position of its members, its labours and its amusements, must next be studied. The agglomeration of families into communities, united socially but not politically, is also to be considered. Lastly, the Clan, Society, Tribe or Nation as a political unity, either isolated, confederate, or subordinate, must be investigated in all its institutions, customs and relations ... ... ...

"When we attempt to enquire into the canse or origin of any of the facts presented by our ethnic Monograph of the kind we have indicated, we find that very little light is to be obtained in the history of the particular tribe. It suggests numerous enquiries, but can answer only a few. If we confine our attention to it, the great mass of its characteristics are soon lost in a dark and seemingly impenetrable antiquity. But although each race, when thus taken by itself, vanishes