Page:Journal of the Straits Branch of the Royal Asiatic Society (IA journalof404219041905roya).pdf/244

 the wood damp until the leaves fall from the twigs, and then the land is often left untilled, for it is nearly useless. When the fire has passed over the fallen timber, deep layer of ashes and charred trunks is all that is left. The partially burnt wood is heaped round a stump and again ignited, till little save ashes, occasional stumps, and islands of green trees left to preserve valuable fruit, are to be seen in the clearing. The rice is then dropped by the women, a few grains at a time, into holes made by the men with pointed sticks; perhaps cucumber, maize and other sundry plants are sown round stumps or where the ash is especially thick; and the crop is left to the weeding of the people and the fertility of a warm, moist climate and virgin soil.

The Kenyahs and Kayans judge the seasons by the sun, and the method they adopt displays a wonderful knowledge of the precautions necessary to accuracy. The Kenyahs measure the shadow cast at midday with an instrument the Greeks would have called a gnomon. It is a pole set up near the village, guarded by a fence to keep away mischievous children and animals. In height it is more than a fathom by the span of the thumb and first finger. A piece of string weighted at each end and thrown over the top shows when it is perfectly upright. The length of the shadow is measured by a stick called "asu do" which is marked with notches gradually approaching one another more closely as they get further from the pole.

The interval between successive notches represents the change in the length of the shadow in three days. Midday is known to be the time when the shadow cast by the sun is at its shortest, and the Kenyahs are also aware of the fact that the direction of the shadow at noon, though sometimes to the north sometimes to the south, is always in the same straight line. The Kayan method, which differs more in practice than in theory from the Kenyah, is to let in a beam of light through a hole in the roof and measure the distance from the point immediately beneath the hole to the place where the light reaches the floor. Their measure is a plank, made level so that round discs do not roll on it, and fixed in position and direction by chocks placed at the side. This shows that they know the sun to be always due north or due south at noon.