IV. NOTES ON THE SAKA1 OF THE ULU 

 KAMPAR. (Plates I— V). 



By Ivor H. N. Evans, B.A., Assistant ( urator and Ethno- 

 graphical Assistant, F.M.S. Museums. 



l'he toll.. wing notes are the results of rather over a 

 month's work among the Sakai of the Kampar River, above 

 Gopeng, in the Kinta district of Penik ; my visit to these 

 people having been made during the months of May and June, 

 rgi5. Starting from Gopeng on May 29th, a three miles walk, 

 chiefly through old and new tin workings, took me to 

 " Kampong Ulu Pipe," a Malay settlement, about three miles 

 distant from Gopeng, which is close to Messrs. Osborne & 

 Chappel's new pip -li ie. On the hills near this village can be 

 seen several Sak li clearings, so, with ihe idea of getting into 

 touch with their inhabitants and of learning something of the 

 ali irigines living round tin.; headwaters of the Kinta River, 

 I made a few days stay in this locality. With regard to 

 my second intention, I met with very small success. The 

 Malays of the settlement are all foreigners, Sumatra men, who 

 have come into the country within the last twenty years or so, 

 and know practically nothing of the district with the exception 

 of their own village and the road to Gopeng. I could not 

 even obtain from them the name of a conspicuous mountain, 

 which was clearly to be seen from the village. The informa- 

 tion I got from the local Sakai was almost as unsatisfactory 

 as that from th>' Malays, since they also seemed to move only 

 within a small radius in the region of the foot-hills. The 

 country of the Fahang border was to them unexplored 

 territory, and they seemed to have no intercourse with the 

 aborigines of that district. These tame Sakai inhabit the Kinta 

 Valley from about Gopeng to localities some little w#y above 

 the dam on the big pipe-line, and also those of the Guroh and 

 Geruntum (Kuntun on the map) Rivers, tributaries of the 

 Kinta, while they have some intercourse with the people 

 of Sungei Raia, who are said to differ slightly from them in 

 dialect. This particular section of the Sakai, which cannot 

 well be called a tribe, falls within the large division of the 

 Central Sakai. The aborigines who live near Gopeng have 

 adopted Malay fashions in dress, and the blow-pipe seems to 

 be falling into disuse among them, as do also their ancient 

 customs and beliefs. 



Finding these people, therefore, too sophisticated to be 

 likely to afford me much of interest, I moved to a Sakai 

 settlement on the Kinta River, some two and a half miles 

 above the dam on the larire pipe-line, and some ten miles from 

 Gopeng. Here I staved for about a fortnight. Though the 

 inhabitants of this settlement had been to a considerable 

 August, 1916. 4 



