PROPITIATION OF THEIR DEITIES. 255 



case for the first, but I gave them a grass-cloth hand- 

 kerchief, which very much delighted them : the old chief 

 brought out his wife to receive it, and the lady told 

 me that it was to be hung up in the house as a memo- 

 rial of my visit, and to preserve the village from evil 

 influence. 



When the feast was about to begin or rather the 

 preparations for it I was desired by the Orang Kaya 

 to accompany him to the stage before the verandah, which 

 is used by the Dyaks for drying their Padi (Indian-corn), 

 Jagong (maize), &c. Having determined, for the purpose 

 of seeing the ceremony, to be quite passive in their hands, 

 I accordingly rose, and went with him. The old man 

 held in his left hand a small saucer, filled with rice, 

 which had been made yellow by a mixture with 

 Kunyit, or Turmeric, and other herbs. He then 

 uttered a prayer in Malay, which he had previously 

 requested me to repeat after him. It was addressed 

 to Tuppa, the sun and moon, and the Rajah of 

 Sarawak, to request that the next Padi harvest might 

 be abundant, that their families might be increased 

 with male children, and that their pigs and fowls might 

 be very prolific : it was, in fact, a prayer for general 

 prosperity to the country and tribe. During its con- 

 tinuance, we threw towards heaven small portions 

 of the rice from the saucer at frequent intervals, and 

 at the commencement of every fresh paragraph of the 

 supplicatory address. After this had been finished, 

 the chief repeated the prayer in the Dyak language 

 by himself, throwing the rice towards the sky, as 



