As far as can be ascertained from the slight intercourse which has been held with these tribes, there is no regular form of government, the elders deciding disputes, and their decisions being respected. They are an honest set of people, paying the greatest regard to the rights of property; and being so scrupulous in this respect, that if any one should even enter the house of an absent man he is called to account, and made to pay a fine to the owner of the house. A similar law exists with regard to the women. If a man should even touch, though accidentally, the wife of another, he makes himself liable to a fine. A curious example of this regulation is mentioned by Lieutenant Kolff. A man set out in his canoe to fish, intending to return in a week; but being caught by contrary winds, he was driven away from his own part of the coast, and was detained two months. Unfortunately he had only left at home provisions for a week, and his wife, finding herself without food, asked a neighbor to provide it for her. This he did, and as, day after day, nothing was heard of the husband, the woman transferred her affections and herself to the neighbor who had assisted her, and the pair went off to another island. After two months had elapsed the husband came back, and, not finding his wife, demanded her from her brothers, who were then bound to produce her. They set off in search of the guilty couple, discovered them, and brought them back, when the injured husband demanded an enormous sum by way of fine. The man said that he could not possibly pay such a sum if he were to work for the rest of his lifetime. The affair was eventually brought before the elders, who decided that the husband had done wrong in leaving his wife so ill provided for, and that if he had supplied her with a sufficiency of provisions the acquaintance between herself and her paramour would probably have been avoided. So they decreed that the man should pay a small fine, and advised the husband to leave plenty of provisions at home when he next went out fishing. The principal object for which the natives make these expeditions is the trepang, or sea-slug (_Holothuria_), which is in great demand in China, and is purchased by traders from the natives for the Chinese market. It is chiefly by means of the trepang that a man procures a wife. As is the case among many savage tribes, a wife can only be obtained by purchase, so that daughters are quite as valuable to their parents as sons. With the Alfoërs, the marriage present must always consist of foreign valuables, such as elephants’ tusks, gongs, China dishes, cloth, and similar objects. These are obtained by exchanging trepang with the traders.