The Malay Archipelago Author:Alfred R. Wallace But the difficulty was how to get this census. He could not go himself into every village and every house, and count all the people; and if he ordered it to be done by the regular officers they would quickly understand what it was for, and the census would be sure to agree exactly with the quantity of rice he got last year. It was evident theref... more »ore that to answer his purpose no one must suspect why the census was taken; and to make sure of this, no one must know that there was any census taken at all.« less