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 Each member of the family knows how to cook—father, mother, and children—for there are few dishes to prepare, and the preparation of these is an art soon acquired. Two meals only are taken each day—one in the morning and another in the early evening. Between whiles tea is drunk, tobacco is smoked, and betel-nut is chewed. The hours for meals are rather irregular, and often the hungry members do not wait for those whose appetites are less keen, but begin as soon as ever the rice is boiled. Amongst the rich the men eat first and by themselves. What they leave serves for their wives and children, and the last remnants of all are thrown to the dogs.

As dessert there are many kinds of fruit, some of which are unknown in this country. Amongst the most popular fruits are young coco-nuts; the ripest of bananas; mangoes, that taste at first like a mixture of turpentine and carrots, but which, after a few efforts, are found to be as pleasant to the palate as the apple or the pear; mangosteens—little sweet snow-white balls set in crimson caskets; durians, that smell like bad drains, but taste, when one is used to them, like a mixture of strawberries, ices, honey, and all other things that are pleasant to eat.

When the meal is over, each person washes his own rice-bowl, and turns it upside down in a basket in the corner of the room to drip and dry till it is needed again.

Dress is a very simple matter. There are no such things as fashions. The smallest children wear no clothing at all, except, perhaps, a necklace of coral or