In common with the Sumatrans, and other inhabitants of the Archipelago and southern part of the peninsula, both sexes of all ranks have the custom of filing and blackening the teeth, it being considered as disgraceful to allow them to remain "white like a dog's." The operation is performed when the children are about eight or nine years of age, and is a very painful one. The object is to make the front teeth concave, and by filing away the enamel, to render them better adapted for receiving the black dye. This extraordinary and barbarous custom tends to destroy the teeth at an early age, and with the use of tobacco, _síri_, and lime, which are continually chewed, generally greatly disfigures the mouth. The Javans, however, do not file away the teeth so much as is usual with some of the other islanders; nor do they set them in gold, as is the case with the Sumatrans. Neither do they distend the lobe of the ear, to that enormous extent practised on _Báli_ and elsewhere, and which is observed in the representations of _Búdh_. This has been discontinued since the introduction of Mahomedanism. Compared with the western Asiatics, the Javans have but few prejudices regarding food. They are Mahomedans, and consequently abstain rigidly from swine's flesh, and commonly from inebriating liquors; and some few families, from the remains of a superstition which has descended to them from their Hindu ancestors, will not eat of the flesh of the bull or cow; but with these exceptions, there are few articles which come amiss to them. They live principally upon vegetable food, and rice is on Java, what it is throughout Asia, the chief article of subsistence; but fish, flesh, and fowl are likewise daily served up at their meals, according to the circumstances of the parties. With fish they are abundantly supplied; and what cannot be consumed while fresh, is salted, or dried, and conveyed into the inland provinces. They do not eat of the turtle or other amphibious animals, but none of the fish known to Europeans are objected to by them. The flesh of the buffalo, the ox, the deer, the goat, and various kinds of poultry, are daily exposed for sale in their markets, and are of very general consumption. The flesh of the horse is also highly esteemed by the common people; but the killing of horses for food is generally prohibited, except when maimed or diseased. The hide of the buffalo is cut into slices, soaked, and fried as a favourite dish. The flesh of the deer, dried and smoked, is well known throughout the Malayan Archipelago, under the term _dinding_, and is an article in high request on Java.