DYAK WOMEN. 199 



seed, and weeding the plants after they have sprung 

 up, and in collecting the harvest when the crop is 

 ripe ; this, as the padi seldom all ripens together, 

 is a tedious and laborious occupation, as they have to 

 cut off each ear, or head of the padi, separately. They 

 generally return to their houses half an hour before 

 the men, who arrive at dark, so that they may have 

 their plain and simple food prepared for them ; this 

 seldom consists of any thing but rice and salt, except 

 when their traps are successful in procuring them 

 better fare. Though they have numbers of fowls, 

 pigs, and goats, about their houses, they seldom kill 

 them excepting on occasions of general festivity. 

 When they can afford to purchase salt fish from 

 the Malays, they much prefer it to animal food. 



Nor after the harvest has been gathered, and the la- 

 bours of the farm have for a time ceased, are the women 

 allowed to be idle ; they have constant employment 

 in making cloth of the cotton, as already noticed ; fine 

 mats of rattans worked into pretty patterns ; baskets 

 for the next season, made of split and coloured rat- 

 tans, which they carry on their backs, suspended by a 

 band which crosses the forehead ; clearing padi from 

 the husk, so that it may be brought to market as rice, 

 or preparing it for their own use; these, together 

 with their household duties, attending to their chil- 

 dren, and carrying wood and water for their families, 

 fully occupy their time, and the cheerful alacrity 

 with which these are all undertaken by them, is alike 



