Page:Journal of the Straits Branch of the Royal Asiatic Society (IA journalofstrait121878roya).pdf/153

 Sakei to become civilized, even so much as the Malay of the interior; he is never happy except while roaming in his native forest, and, although he will eat rice and smoke tobacco, which he can only get from the Malays, he rushes off after satisfying his craving for the weed (of which he is inordinately fond) and does not appear again for months.

"The second occasion of meeting these people was at the head of the Baling river, a branch of the Muda, uear Patani, where I had the good fortune to come across a tribe under the protection of the Raja of Kedah, by whose orders they roamed uumolested through his country. I received a visit from the chief and a party of his people, men, women, and children numbering in all a dozen, and for a week had daily intercourse with them. The members of this tribe differed greatly from those near the Selama river, for they were of the Semang race for the most part. The chief bimself, who had received the title of "datu" or chief from the raja was a man of no common intelligence; besides his own language, which is different from any I have ever read of, he spoke Malay and Siamese. Dressed in the sarong of the Malays, at a distance it was impossible to detect that he was not of that race; but on close inspection be bore all the evidences of his extraction, and especially that restlessness of the eye which, as I said before, is so sure a sign of the denizen of the forest. Amongst his followers were two Brothers, named Gading (or Joory) and Buloo (Bamboo) whose appearance struck me very much. About twenty-three and twenty-five years of age respectively, these men were perfect specimens of manhood. Five feet ten or eleven in height, their limbs were symmetrical to a degree; their features, finely cut and intelligent, were positively good; their bodies, perfectly formed, rendered their movements particularly graceful, and I must admit to being envious of their fine proportions and " [sic]general air of robust health. They were a kind of body guard of their Datu, and he was evidently proud of them, and justly so."

Some interesting particulars, though with fewer details, have also been published in the Official Reports of Mr. Swettenham (April 1875), who encountered some tribes of the Sakei in Ulu Slim; Mr. Daly who came across them in the upper part of the Ulu Perak (June 1875); and Captain Speedy who encountered other tribes shortly afterwards in the Bidor district, nearly 100 miles off.