Creation of Man out of Clay 157 



Adam and the woman Ewa 1 ." In this narrative the names of the man 

 and woman betray European influence, but the rest of the story may 

 be aboriginal. The Dyaks of Sakarran in British Borneo say that 

 the first man was made by two large birds. At first they tried to 

 make men out of trees, but in vain. Then they hewed them out 

 of rocks, but the figures could not speak. Then they moulded a man 

 out of damp earth and infused into his veins the red gum of the 

 kumpang-tree. After that they called to him and he answered ; they 

 cut him and blood flowed from his wounds 2 . 



The Kumis of South-Eastern India related to Captain Lewin, the 

 Deputy Commissioner of Hill Tracts, the following tradition of the 

 creation of man. a God made the world and the trees and the creeping 

 things first, and after that he set to work to make one man and one 

 woman, forming their bodies of clay ; but each night, on the com- 

 pletion of his work, there came a great snake, which, while God was 

 sleeping, devoured the two images. This happened twice or thrice, 

 and God was at his wit's end, for he had to work all day, and could 

 not finish the pair in less than twelve hours ; besides, if he did not 

 sleep, he would be no good," said Captain Lewin's informant. "If 

 he were not obliged to sleep, there would be no death, nor would 

 mankind be afflicted with illness. It is when he rests that the snake 

 carries us off to this day. Well, he was at his wit's end, so at last he 

 got up early one morning and first made a dog and put life into it, 

 and that night, when he had finished the images, he set the dog to 

 watch them, and when the snake came, the dog barked and frightened 

 it away. This is the reason at this day that when a man is dying the 

 dogs begin to howl ; but I suppose God sleeps heavily now-a-days, or 

 the snake is bolder, for men die all the same 3 ." The Khasis of Assam 

 tell a similar tale 4 . 



The Ewe-speaking tribes of Togo-land, in West Africa, think that 

 God still makes men out of clay. When a little of the water with 

 which he moistens the clay remains over, he pours it on the ground 

 and out of that he makes the bad and disobedient people. When he 

 wishes to make a good man he makes him out of good clay ; but 

 when he wishes to make a bad man, he employs only bad clay for the 

 purpose. In the beginning God fashioned a man and set him on the 

 earth; after that he fashioned a woman. The two looked at each 



1 N. Graafland, De Minahassa (Rotterdam, 1869), i. pp. 96 sq. 



2 Horsburgb, quoted by H. Ling Roth, The Natives of Sarawak and of British North 

 Borneo (London, 1896), i. pp. 299 sq. Compare The Lord Bishop of Labuan, "On the Wild 

 Tribes of the North- West Coast of Borneo," Transactions of the Ethnological Society of 

 London, New Series, n. (1863), p. 27. 



3 Capt. T. H. Lewin, Wild Races of South-Eastern India (London, 1870), pp. 224— 26. 



4 A. Bastian, Volkerstamme am Brahmaputra und verwandtschaftliche Nachbarn (Berlin, 

 1883), p. 8 ; Major P. R. T. Gurdon, The Khasis (London, 1907), p. 106. 



