On tlie Malay Peninsula. 



63 



Without going far from the same neighborhood we visit a different race, and the 

 bark-cloth is made much the same way. Quoting from the Saraivak Gazette^ 1894, 

 p. 121, — "There is the tree Ktilit Takdlong^ which the Dyaks pound until it becomes 

 soft in texture and then manufacture into the bajus (jackets) and chaivats^ and very 

 pleasing to the e3'e too are these garments, in hue reminding one of the colour of a 

 new saddle whilst in length of time may wear quite as well, if not better than a gar- 

 ment of 'bazaar cloth'." Mr. Burbridge {The Gardens of /he Snn, 1S80, p. 175) sa3'S 

 that among the Muruts the Chawats are made of the bark of Artocarpus elastica. 

 " The bark is pulled off a tree in broad strips and is very united and flexible; it is then 

 hammered all over with a heavy wooden instrument, which has a flat surface on one 



VVvl 



D 



n 



FIG. 24. DESIGNS ON NEW HEBRIDES TAP.\. 



side cut in deep cross lines like a file; this breaks up the harder tissues of the bark 

 and reduces it to a very pliant, though b}^ no means united, tissue. The bark being 

 full of rents and holes this difficulty is overcome by transverse darning: one of these 

 coats now before me has no fewer than 270 transverse strings on the back alone, each 

 thread penetrating the outer surfaee only, and assists to work out a cross pattern for 

 ornamentation. The size of a strip of bark for a bajn is about 5 ft. x 18 in." " 



When I turn to the Malay Peninsula I find not only the Malay race, but a far 

 more primitive one, still in the exercise of pre-Malay customs, and about these still 

 pagan races Messrs. Skeat and Blagden" have given us much information. I shall 

 quote them as follows : — 



" The girdle of bark-cloth is so well-known and so widely spread throughout S. E. 

 Asia, the Malay Archipelago, and the Pacific Islands, that a ver}^ few words about it 

 should here suffice. The finest and best known variety of this cloth is the 'tapa' cloth 



'Exploration of Mount Kina Balu, North Borneo, by John Whitehead, 1893, p. 75. 

 'Pagan Races of the Malay Peninsula, by W. W. Skeat and C. O. Blagden. London, 1906. 



