Page:Malay Sketches.pdf/93

 having attracted the attention of either, if you said, "Kâsim, go and hit that man," he would invariably repeat what was said, word for word, including his own name, while he carried out the order. When the person hit turned on him. Kâsim would say, "It was not I who hit you, but that man who ordered me."

I have seen Kâsim the younger, when the man influencing him put his own finger in his mouth and pretended to bite it, imitate the action but really bite his finger and bite it hard. Similarly I have seen him, in imitation and without a word being said, take a lighted brand from the fire, and he would have put it in his mouth if the experiment had been carried so far. Some one told him one day to jump into the river, and he did not get out again till he had swum nearly two hundred yards, for the stream was both broad and deep, with a terrible current, and infested by crocodiles. If at any moment you called out "Tôlong Kâsim" ("help! Kâsim"), the instant he heard it he would jump up and crying "Tôlong Kâsim," dash straight to you, over all obstacles. If then you had put a weapon in his hand and told him to slay any one within reach I have not the slightest doubt he would have done it without hesitation.