22 IN MALAY FORESTS. 



natural enemy of the earth spirits and the guardian 

 spirits, but declared that he was unable to help 

 us in the quest of the rhinoceros; deer were the 

 animals over which he had power, not rhinoceroses. 



If it had been a deer now 



Pran Ali could help us no further, and thereupon 

 left, and Che Mat was no longer possessed of him. 

 There was another interval of singing and playing 

 by Pa' Senik, who called on various spirits to come 

 to our assistance, and repeated innumerable charms 

 to prevent the rhinoceros from hearing or scenting 

 us as we approached it, to prevent it from charging, 

 or from recovering from any wound that might be 

 inflicted upon it. "If all the dead return to life 

 and walk this world again, then, and not till then, 

 may this animal turn upon us; if the bottommost 

 of the three layers of stone that support the earth 

 reappear upon the surface, then, and not till then, 

 may this animal attack us." But to repeat one-tenth 

 of the incantations and invocations would fill many 

 pages, and would interest but very few. Che Mat 

 stopped the long tale by again evincing signs of 

 another demoniacal possession. Again his attitude of 

 abstraction fell from him, and his weird hair-swing- 

 ing held the room. After the pause that followed 

 his collapse he inquired what we wanted of him, and 

 when Pa' Senik offered him a bowl of parched rice, 

 he at once seized it and swallowed a handful of the 

 contents ; when a plantain was produced, he gulped 

 it, skin and all, and then announced that he was Sang 

 Kala Raja Megang Rimba, one of the guardian spirits. 

 Pa' Senik thereupon humbly inquired whether we 



