A hurried visit to a tribe, whose language, traditions and customs are unknown, is sometimes deemed sufficient for "smart" remarks as to "ape characters," &c., which are as untrue as irrelevant.

It should not be forgotten how extremely difficult it is to enter into the ideas and feelings of an alien race.

If in the nineteenth century a French theatrical audience can witness with acquiescent approval, as a type of English manners and ideas, the representation of a marquis who sells his wife at Smithfield, &c.

&c., it is surely no wonder if the ideas of a tribe of newly visited savages {199} should be more or less misunderstood.

To enter into such ideas requires long and familiar intimacy, like that experienced by the explorer of the Malay Archipelago.