CAVE DWELLEES OF PERAK. 17 



time elapsed between their formation and ^occupation by human 

 beings. In the case of the caves at Ipoh, the human deposits 

 rest on a bed of coarse river sand, and there does not appear to 

 be any earth in between the two deposits. A fact to be taken 

 into account is that the caves could not have been occupied for 

 long at a time, for the supply of food would soon run short, 

 and the people would have to shift to another cave, and leave 

 that again as soon as the supply of food became exhausted in 

 its vicinity. Thus the occupation must have been only inter- 

 mittent with, often, comparatively long intervals intervening. 



Of the habits and customs of the cave dwellers not much 

 can be gleaned, but some idea of them can be formed. From 

 the extraordinary quantity of shells in these caves it is evident 

 that fresh water and land mollusc must have been their staple 

 food, supplemented by such animals as they could snare or kill 

 with their rude weapons, the fish they could catch, and the fruits 

 leaves and roots of the jimgle. The absence of any implements 

 except those already mentioned indicates an extremely low state 

 of intelligence, though it is quite j)ossible that they may have 

 been able to fashion weapons out of bamboo, with knives made 

 of the same material hardened by the application of fire, and 

 probably supplemented by the use of sharp fragments of stone. 

 In this way it would be quite possible to make bamboo pointed 

 spears, blow pipes, darts, and bows and arrows. With these and 

 the knowledge of the means of extracting the poison from some 

 of the plants of the jungle, they would be able to kill the 

 animals whose bones are so plentiful in the caves. That they 

 used fire is abundantly evident, and this in the hands of some 

 savages is made into a most effective means of shaping wooden 

 objects. The use of fire in cooking was probably confined to 

 roasting their food, for without tools it is, in a country like 

 Perak, impossible for any cultivation of grain to be carried on, 

 and therefore the necessity for boiling would not have arisen. 

 The presence of pig bones shews that the cave dwellers were 

 not Muhammadans. The nature of their food and the indi- 

 cation of a custom of leaving their dead would shew that they 

 were continuosly shifting from cave to cave, and the presence 

 of sea shells far inland, that they may at times have extended 

 their wanderings as far as the sea coast in search of a change 

 of diet. 



This is about all the evidence we have of their habits and 

 customs. It is meagre, though apparently sufiicient to enable 

 an idea to be formed of who these cave dwellers w^ere. In the 

 southern part of the Malayan Peninsula tliero are three races 

 of people without counting the Chinese and other modern intro- 



