A TRIP TO MT. PENRISSEN, SARAWAK. 3 



another is established by logs rounded or slightly flattened, 

 generally as slippery as glass ; in fact within the village itself 

 no one ever walks on the ground. Beneath the houses pigs 

 root and grunt, fowls cackle and boys fight, in a sodden mass 

 of filth, the effluvium from which percolates freely through the 

 open spaces between the floors of bamboo laths. The particular 

 house in which we tempoiarily took up our abode was a 

 well-built plank structure with billian attap roof, two large 

 doors led out on to a sfacious verandah at the back, which 

 again gave on to a large open space surrounded by fowl- 

 houses and sheds, and with ways leading off to other houses. 

 Here and in the verandah much of the daily work is gone 

 through, the house itself being reserved for cooking, eat- 

 ing and sleeping. In the verandah were a couple of large 

 bell-shaped wooden vessels, half-filled with padi, and nearly 

 all day long women were husking this by repeated thumpings 

 blows administered by 3 or 4 foot poles; when husked, the padi 

 is thrown into circular sieves of rotan. and shaken till the husks 

 and broken grain are separated off. The Land Dyak man pre- 

 sents in his dress no particular feature of interest, a blue or red 

 cloth " chawat, " or a pair of Chinese trousers and a head hand- 

 kerchief generally completing his garb. The women however 

 are more picturesque : their sole garment is a short petticoat 

 reaching to the knees, generally of blue cloth with a red bor- 

 der, but their arms from elbow to wrist and- their legs from 

 just below the knee to the ankle are encircled by rows of brass 

 rings; a shell armlet and leglet generally topping each series 

 of rings ; even the little girls are burdened with these orna- 

 ments, though otherwise innocent of clothing, and when a 

 number of girls of different ages are seen together it is 

 quite possible to trace a gradual distortion of the calf of 

 the leg due to the weight of metal borne; generally also 

 several rings of rotan dyed red or black are worn round the 

 waist, and out-of-doors a neat close-fitting cap made of palm 

 leaf. There were few objects of ethnographical interest to be 

 noticed in the house. Unlike the Sea Dyak, these people neither 

 w r eave their cloth, forge their weapons nor make their pottery, 

 but buy such necessaries from Malay and Chinese traders. 

 However, I saw, coveted and subsequently purchased a curious 



