4 HISTORY OF SANTUBONG, SARAWAK. 
pacification of the spirit. However the religious ceremonies 
connected with the healing of sick people in Santubong are 
not really typical of those in vogue amongst Milanos in their 
own country, and we think it best to give no details concern- 
ing them. We may mention however that they hold the 
‘“ Bayoh”’ ceremony (cf. Ling Roth) and occasionally they 
make images of the antus though the material (pith of the sago 
palm) from which such images are ordinarily made is scarce 
in this neighbourhood. 
All these people, Milanos as well as Malays, have em- 
braced Islamism and hence are not so rabid in their notions 
of demonology as are the unconverted Milanos of Matu or 
Mukah; however the new religion has by no means entirely 
or even largely displaced the old. 
As Mohammedans, the Santubong people prefer to be 
called Malays and are wont to conceal their Milano origin ; and 
indeed it generally happens that when a native in Sarawak 
becomes a Mohammedan he immediately feels justified in 
calling himself a Malay—the Malays claiming to be the highest 
type of native in Borneo. Thus it comes that Sarawak Malays 
are a very complicated mixture of entirely different types of 
people and in Sarawak there is no such thing as a Malay race. 
A very odd superstition is that known as © Pajong.”’ 
It is the common notion that there is in the body a spirit 
(Pajong) or quality which may be exhaled and do harm quite 
unintentionally and that if one passes immediately behind a 
person who is in heavy perspiration the former person will 
soon have stomach-ache, and this indeed may have some 
foundation in fact: however to obtain relief it is necessary to 
implore the perspiring person to restrain his issuing spirit. 
It is quite the usual thing fora Milano when hot and perspir- 
ing to lean close to a wall lest any friend passing behind him 
should suffer the ~ Pajong.”’ 
An equally funny notion— this of Malayan origin—is the 
story of the “ Polong.’’ Certain unscrupulous persons in 
some way or other become masters of an evil spirit which 
punishes other people according to the will of its master. 
This familiar spirit embodies himself in a grasshopper which 
Jour. Straits Braneh 
