DRESS OF MALAY WOMEN. 143 



difficult to be procured, except by purchase, when they 

 are very expensive. A garden or two at Sarawak, for 

 the purpose of supplying the Malays with sweet-scented 

 and other flowers, would pay well if the Chinamen 

 could be induced to undertake it, and so refined a taste 

 amongst these people it would be well to encourage. 

 At present the families of the chiefs are supplied with 

 flowers from the bushes and trees in the garden of 

 their rajah, the liberty of taking which they value 

 highly. The Malay women are also, like their sex in 

 general, fond of fine clothes and jewellery, and their 

 extravagance is the frequent cause of unpleasantness 

 between them and their husbands. Their dress is 

 simple, and consists of the kain tape, or cloth, which 

 has been described as a wide sack open at both ends ; 

 this extends from below the breast to the ground. It 

 is fastened by being merely folded and tucked in ; it 

 is of silk or satin amongst the higher orders, and of 

 cotton cloth of their own, or European manufacture, 

 amongst the poorer classes. The jacket is the next part 

 of their dress ; this also is of dark-coloured satin, and 

 made to fit close at the neck when fastened, and with 

 tight sleeves for the arms ; it reaches to the waist, so 

 as to cover the folds of the tape : it is buttoned at the 

 wrist with nine large gold buttons, which extend up 

 each sleeve towards the elbow, and is fastened at the 

 neck with a large gold clasp. The front, which covers 

 the breast, is also adorned with a profusion of gold 

 plates of various shapes and patterns, so as with rich 

 people entirely to conceal the jacket, or badju, as it is 



