(*Footnote. At the period when the above was written I was little aware of the intimate connexion now well understood to have anciently subsisted between the Hindus and the various nations beyond the Ganges. The most evident proofs appear of the extensive dissemination both of their language and mythology throughout Sumatra, Java, Balli (where at this day they are best preserved), and the other eastern islands. To the Sanskrit words dewa and dewata, signifying divinities in that great mother-tongue, we are therefore to look for the source of the terms, more or less corrupted, that have been mentioned in the text. See Asiatic Researches Volume 4 page 223.) VENERATION FOR THE MANES AND TOMBS OF THEIR ANCESTORS. The superstition which has the strongest influence on the minds of the Sumatrans, and which approaches the nearest to a species of religion, is that which leads them to venerate, almost to the point of worshipping, the tombs and manes of their deceased ancestors (nenek puyang). These they are attached to as strongly as to life itself, and to oblige them to remove from the neighbourhood of their krammat is like tearing up a tree by the roots; these the more genuine country people regard chiefly, when they take a solemn oath, and to these they apostrophise in instances of sudden calamity. Had they the art of making images or other representations of them they would be perfect lares, penates, or household gods. It has been asserted to me by the natives (conformably to what we are told by some of the early travellers) that in very ancient times the Sumatrans made a practice of burning the bodies of their dead, but I could never find any traces of the custom, or any circumstances that corroborated it. METEMPSYCHOSIS.