They were brother and sister, and though very much alike, the family
resemblance was lost in the more general traits common to the whole
race.

They were natives of Wajo and it is a common saying amongst the Malay
race that to be a successful traveller and trader a man must have some
Wajo blood in his veins. And with those people trading, which means also
travelling afar, is a romantic and an honourable occupation. The trader
must possess an adventurous spirit and a keen understanding; he should
have the fearlessness of youth and the sagacity of age; he should be
diplomatic and courageous, so as to secure the favour of the great and
inspire fear in evil-doers.

These qualities naturally are not expected in a shopkeeper or a Chinaman
pedlar; they are considered indispensable only for a man who, of noble
birth and perhaps related to the ruler of his own country, wanders over
the seas in a craft of his own and with many followers; carries from
island to island important news as well as merchandise; who may be
trusted with secret messages and valuable goods; a man who, in short,
is as ready to intrigue and fight as to buy and sell. Such is the ideal
trader of Wajo.

Trading, thus understood, was the occupation of ambitious men who played
an occult but important part in all those national risings, religious
disturbances, and also in the organized piratical movements on a large
scale which, during the first half of the last century, affected the
fate of more than one native dynasty and, for a few years at least,
seriously endangered the Dutch rule in the East. When, at the cost of
much blood and gold, a comparative peace had been imposed on the
islands the same occupation, though shorn of its glorious possibilities,