144 THE TROTTING RHINO 



driver to the Malay who on horse and by canoe had 

 brought me finally to the kampong. In a general 

 way the kampong knew what I wanted, but it 

 was not easy to organize a party for the trip I 

 wished to make toward the eastern coast, as the 

 Malays care little for hunting and rarely go of 

 their own volition, except where a tiger has per- 

 haps become a menace to a settlement, in which 

 case they set up a spring gun or wait for him at his 

 drinking hole or set boys up the trees to drop 

 spears on him. Yet this spirit of indifference is 

 a question of distaste for vigorous bodily effort 

 and not one of cowardice, for really the Malay 

 regards life lightly, as his history proves. But he 

 does not care for sport that requires hard work, 

 though he is very fond of horse racing and occa- 

 sionally organizes animal fights. He does a little 

 fencing with that favorite and somewhat famous 

 weapon of his, the kris, though it was always a 

 crude art and rarely is seen nowadays. There was 

 also another fencing game in which the tumbuk 

 lada— the Malayan dagger, with narrow eight-inch 

 blade and much decorated handle— plays a part; 

 but neither showed much skill and the fencers * 

 energy was spent chiefly in jumping about and in 

 posturing. Nothing of this kind of play would be 

 relied upon, I fancy, for serious work with either 

 weapon. The Malay also does little canoe racing. 



