The Pagan Races of the Malay 

 Peninsula. 



By W. W. Skeat and 0. Blagden. 



(A Review). By H. N. Ridley. 



As the work of civilization progresses and the forests fall 

 before the axe of the planter, the more primitive tribes of 

 jungle folk disappear, to be replaced by the imported and more 

 civilized labourer from other countries ; and should these 

 old world folk themselves not actually disappear, they amal- 

 gamate with the later arrivals, and adopting their ideas and 

 customs, they become so changed that all that is interesting 

 about th^rn is lost. Many tribes of the human race have thus 

 passed away, leaving few or no relics of their ever having exist- 

 ed. One such race, indeed the makers and users of the stone 

 implements known here as Batu Lintar, has vanished from 

 the peninsula; but we have still with us that simple people 

 commonly known as S'akais, whose manners, customs, tradi- 

 tions and language, have been long the study of Messrs. Skeat 

 and Blagden, who together have published a most excellent 

 record of the vanishing tribes of the jungle folk of the Malay 

 Peninsula. The work in two volumes excellently illustrated 

 by photographs and woodcuts is perhaps one of the most 

 important of ethnological works that has appeared for some 

 time. No trouble has been spared by the authors, both well 

 known officials here some years ago, to collect all possible 

 evidence on all ethnological and anthropological questions con- 

 cerning these races, and the extensive list of the Bibliography 

 of the subject shows how thorough their work has been. 



The Bibliography dates from 1800, or thereabouts, and is 

 divided up into three periods. The first two from 1800 to 1850, 

 and thence to 1890, though giving a good many amateur's notes 

 and some amount of research work, supplied little more than 

 enough knowledge to stimulate research into these interesting 



Jour. Straits Branch R. A. Soc, No. 49, 1907. 



