60 IN MALAY FORESTS. 



upon the sidins with shouts and yells. When the 

 pawang hits upon the fresh deer tracks, he lets loose 

 the dogs that have hitherto been in leash, muttering 

 as he slips them 



"Go, my dogs ! Si Panji Lela! Si Panji Ladang ! 

 Go hunt ye the raiats of Nabi Sleman, 

 Who trample the earth, who pass like lightning-flash, 

 Wearing earrings of gold and waistlets of gold, 

 Who wait outside the fold of Nabi Sleman." 



When the dogs give tongue, the owner shouts a long 

 tu-u-u-u to encourage them, adding under his breath 

 the mystic words 



Telekul lam tdekul, 



This is in the hands of Raja Una. 



(Raja Una is the Nimrod of Malay mythology.) Soon 

 the dogs are in full cry, and after a few minutes of 

 tremendous excitement, during which the deer at- 

 tempts to break out, but is judiciously turned by 

 one of the stops, the hunted animal, with the dogs 

 close upon its heels, dashes into one of the nooses. 

 The sidin for some yards at either side is torn from 

 the slender saplings that support it, and gives to the 

 impetus until the strain is felt at the two extremities 

 where it is tied to the trees. It then suddenly 

 tautens and throws the deer down. The nearest of 

 the ambushed watchers runs out, hamstrings the deer, 

 and, if he happens to be a haji, cuts its throat, 

 repeating as he does so a verse of the Koran ; but if 

 not, with that callous indifference to pain in animals 

 so marked in all Asiatics, he allows the animal to 

 live until a haji comes up. But in the meanwhile he 



