My Malay Boy Ali Was Affected With The
Same Illness, And As He Was My Chief Bird-Skinner I Got On But
Slowly With My Collections.
The occupations and mode of life of the villagers differed but
little from those of all other Malay races.
The time of the women
was almost wholly occupied in pounding and cleaning rice for
daily use, in bringing home firewood and water, and in cleaning,
dyeing, spinning, and weaving the native cotton into sarongs. The
weaving is done in the simplest kind of frame stretched on the
floor; and is a very slow and tedious process. To form the
checked pattern in common use, each patch of coloured threads has
to be pulled up separately by hand and the shuttle passed between
them; so that about an inch a day is the usual progress in stuff
a yard and a half wide. The men cultivate a little sirih (the
pungent pepper leaf used for chewing with betel-nut) and a few
vegetables; and once a year rudely plough a small patch of ground
with their buffaloes and plant rice, which then requires little
attention until harvest time. Now and then they have to see to the
repairs of their houses, and make mats, baskets, or other
domestic utensils, but a large part of their time is passed in
idleness.
Not a single person in the village could speak more than a few
words of Malay, and hardly any of the people appeared to have
seen a European before.
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