THEIR BELIEF IN A FUTURE STATE. 263 



smoke, are carefully watched by their assistant relations, 

 who draw from its perpendicular direction, an augury 

 favourable and satisfactory to them. Should, however, 

 the smoke ascend, from wind or other causes, in a 

 slanting manner, they depart, assured that the Antu, 

 or spirit, is not yet satisfied ; and that soon, one or 

 another of them will become his prey. This, however, 

 gives them but little uneasiness; as death, to their 

 ignorant and unenlightened minds, displays no terror; and 

 though they shun it with that instinctive fear which is 

 common both to animals and men, they have by no 

 means the dread of the King of Terror common to more 

 enlightened nations. 



Though a knowledge of a future state has evidently 

 been, at some time, prevalent amongst these people, 

 many of them, at the present time, have no idea of 

 the immortality of the soul ; though some have a 

 slight and confused conception of it. These say 

 that the spirit of a deceased person haunts the house 

 and village it had formerly inhabited during the twelve 

 days of the Pamali ; but the Dyaks of the western 

 branch of the Sarawak, who do not practice the Pamali 

 so rigorously as those of the southern river, say that it 

 departs, at the burying of the body, to the woods or 

 mountains, or goes they know not where. One in- 

 stance came to my knowledge inferring a partial belief 

 in the transmigration of the soul ; but as it is a solitary 

 example, I merely give the anecdote without any com- 

 ment. 



It occurred in October, last year, as I was on the 

 road to the Gunong Pennerissen, which I intended to 



