162 MAN: PAST AND PRESENT. [CHAP. 



fully developed, so much so as to interfere with each other's gram- 

 matical functions 1 ." The result often is certain sesquipedalia 

 verba comparable in length to those of the American polysynthetic 

 languages. A savage people, who can hardly count beyond two, 

 possessed of about the most intricate language spoken by man, is 

 a pyschological puzzle which I cannot profess to fathom. 



In the Malay Peninsula the indigenous element is certainly 

 the Negrito, who, known by many names Semang, 



The Semangs. / . J J 



Sakai, Dma, Liar, Senoi, Mantra, Jakun forms 

 a single ethnical group presenting some striking analogies with 

 the Andamanese. But, surrounded from time out of mind by 

 Malay peoples, some semi-civilised, some nearly as wild as 

 themselves, but all alike slowly crowding them out of the land, 

 these aborigines have developed defensive qualities unneeded by 

 the more favoured insular Negritoes, while their natural develop- 

 ment has been arrested at perhaps a somewhat lower plane of 

 culture. In fact, doomed to extinction before their time came, 

 they never have had a chance in the race, as Mr Hugh Clifford 

 sings in The Song of the Last Semangs : 



"The paths are rough, the trails are blind 



The Jungle People tread ; 

 The yams are scarce and hard to find 



With which our folk are fed. 

 We suffer yet a little space 



Until we pass away, 

 The relics of an ancient race 



That ne'er has had its day." 



These particular Semangs, who have hitherto succeeded in 



maintaining their independence, have a weird legend 



of a mysterious nation of great Amazons destined 



one day to come and smite the faithless Sakai people, who have 



gone over to the enemy's camp, and now join with them in 



tracking and hunting down their own kinsfolk. These female 



warriors who dwell in the depths of the dark woodlands beyond 



the Gunong Korbu heights, and are stronger, taller, bolder, and of 



paler colour than any men have even been seen, and their bows 



and blow-pipes also, larger and truer and better carved than any 



1 Lieut. R. C. Temple, quoted by Mr Man, Anthrop. Jour. 1882, p. 123. 



