MISCELLANEOUS NOTES. 159 



" to the summit o£ some o£ their highest mountains, ou account of 

 " the tigers which still, they say, lurk in the deepest recesses of the 

 " forest." Afterwards he again met with the same tradition among 

 the Linbang Muruts, but in a different locality, where two rocks 

 about thirty feet apart were known among the people as the 

 -" Tiger's Leap." St. Johx says that he had heard of the existence 

 of tigers on the North-East Coast also, but gives no reference. 



In the year 1869, I happened to be staying at the village of 

 the SiSggi Dyaks in Sarawak, and there I lit upon a veritable tiger's 

 skull preserved in one of the head-houses (pahggah). It was kept 

 with other skulls of tree-tiger, bear, muntjac-deer, &c, in certain 

 very ancient sacred dishes placed among the beams of the roof and 

 just over the fire-place. It was so browned and discoloured by soot 

 and dirt, and the Dyaks were so averse to my touching it, that I 

 was unable to decide whether it was a fossil or a recent skull. All 

 inquiries as to when it had been obtained met with the discouraging 

 response : " It came to us in a dream," — and they had possessed 

 it so long that the people could not recall the time when it first 

 came into the hands of the tribe. The dish on which it lay was of 

 a boat-like form, and was of camphor- wood and quite rotten. The 

 skull was 13^ inches long by 9i inches in breadth, measured across 

 the jugal arches. The lower jaw and all the teeth were wanting. The 

 large sockets for the teeth, the strong bony occipital crest, and the 

 widely-arched sygomatic bones indicated that the animal, to which 

 the skull belonged, had been one of mature growth. On a second visit 

 I made an attempt to purchase it, but the people were so horrified at 

 the idea of its removal, that I reluctantly desisted. The chief of 

 the village declared that, in consequence of my having moved the 

 skull on my last visit, the Dyaks had been afflicted by heavy rains, 

 which had damaged their farms ; that once, when a Dyak accidentally 

 broke a piece of the bone, he had been at once struck dead with 

 lightning ; that its removal would bring about the death of all the 

 Singghi Dyaks, and so forth. Afterwards the Hajah of Sarawak 

 kindly endeavoured to persuade the Dyaks to part with it to him ; 



