He had lived with the people whose house I had occupied, and it is a proof of their goodness, if fairly treated, that although he took with him a quantity of silver dollars to pay for the birds they caught, no attempt was made to rob him, which might have been done with the most perfect impunity.
He was kindly treated when ill, and was brought back to me with the balance of the dollars he had not spent.
The Wanumbai people, like almost all the inhabitants of the Aru Islands, are perfect savages, and I saw no signs of any religion.

There are, however, three or four villages on the coast where schoolmasters from Amboyna reside, and the people are nominally Christians, and are to some extent educated and civilized.

I could not get much real knowledge of the customs of the Aru people during the short time I was among them, but they have evidently been considerably influenced by their long association with Mahometan traders.

They often bury their dead, although the national custom is to expose the body an a raised stage till it decomposes.

Though there is no limit to the number of wives a man may have, they seldom exceed one or two.