176 IN THE SWAMPS 



blades attained to wide celebrity; now he is pass- 

 ing, almost passed indeed, and his art, like all the 

 splendid native arts the world over, is being re- 

 placed by unpleasing, if practical, articles of civili- 

 zation—civilization, destroyer of the picturesque 

 and of the natural art instinct in the individual. 



When Din learned that the real object of my 

 coming into his country was to hunt wild pig, all 

 his good humor vanished, for, to the Mohammedan, 

 pig is an animal abhorrent. We had already made 

 several successful deer hunts, for which purpose 

 he kept an assortment of dogs and enjoyed quite 

 a local reputation; but he would have nothing 

 whatever to do with my proposed hunt for boar; 

 he would not even hire me his dogs. At least such 

 was his attitude at first, but after a day or so his 

 natural good humor and the lessons of Singapore 

 asserted themselves, and he showed a more recep- 

 tive mind to my proposition. At just this psycho- 

 logical moment word came from a neighboring 

 kampong of crocodiles terrorizing the people ; and 

 it was not very long before I had closed a bargain 

 with Aboo Din that, if I would go with him into 

 the swamps and help slaughter crocodiles for his 

 people, he, in return, would organize my pig hunt. 

 So with that mutual understanding we started off 

 next morning with twenty men and a dozen dogs. 



Curiously, the Malay is no hunter of the croco- 



