THEIR WEAPONS. 163 



these latter people ; the steel is better tempered, and 

 being heavy and two-edged, they are used to cut as 

 well as thrust. Bucklers made of a round form, small, 

 and of rattans firmly plaited, which are serviceable to 

 resist the stroke of a sword or the thrust of a spear, 

 are in general use among them. The bow and arrow, 

 if they ever used these weapons, have now entirely given 

 way to the musket, which is in such general repute 

 among the nations of the Archipelago as to be an 

 article of greater traffic that almost any other com- 

 modity of European manufacture. It is by the dread 

 the natives of the interior have of fire-arms that the 

 Malays are suffered to occupy the coasts, and thus 

 tyrannize over the people of the interior. The Dyaks 

 of Sakarran and Sarebas have often told me, that were 

 it not for the noise of two or three old muskets which 

 they possess, they should never be able to stand 

 against the Kyans, whom they own to be a more 

 brave and dangerous enemy than any of the others 

 they have to encounter. 



At the marriages and other festivals, music is in 

 high repute, but generally of the coarsest and most 

 noisy description. Until the recent introduction of 

 some of the Javanese musical instruments, those of 

 the Sarawak people consisted only of the gongs of 

 different descriptions, and the tom-toms, or drums, 

 similar to those used by the natives of India. At 

 these feasts dancing girls are never introduced, they 

 not being known in the settlement, except to such as 

 have seen them in Pontianak, Singapore, or Java. 



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