474 



THE ARU JSLANLS. 



they think they are going to win or lose, hut in a very 

 fiiw minutes it is all over; there is a hurrah from the 

 winners, the owners seize their cocka, the winning bird is 

 caresse<l and admire*!, the loser is generally dead or very 

 badly wounded, and his master may often be seen pluck- 

 ing out his feathers as he walka away, |>rep{iring him for 

 the cooking pot while the poor bird is still alive, 



A game at foot-hall, which f'enerally took place at snn- 

 eet, was, however, much more interesting to nie. The ball 

 used is a rather small one, and is made of rattan, hollow, 

 light, and elastic. The player keeps it dancing a little 

 while on his foot, then occasionally on hia arm or thigh, 

 till suddenly he gives it a good blow with the hollow of 

 the foot, and sends it flying high in the air. Another 

 player runs to meet it, and at its first bound catches it ou 

 his foot and plays in his turn. The ball miist never be 

 touclied w4th the hand ; but the arm, shoulder, knee, or 

 thigh are used at pleasure to rest the foot. Two or three 

 played very skilfully, keeping the ball contiimally flying 

 about, but the place was too confined to show ofif the game 

 to advatitage. One evening a qnan-el arose from some 

 dispute in the game, and there was a gi'eat row, and it 

 wa.s feared there would be a fight about it — not two men 

 only, but a party of a dozen or twenty on each side, a 

 regular battle with knives and krisses ; but after a large 

 amount of talk it passed ofl' quietly, and we heard nothing 

 about it afterwards. 



Most Europeans being gifted by nature with a luxuriant 

 gro^vth of hair upon their faces, think it disfigures them, 

 and keep up a continual struggle against her by mowing 

 down every morning the crop "wluch has sprouted up 

 during the preceding twenty-fom' hours. Now the men of 

 Mongolian race are, naturally, just iis many of us want to 

 be. They mostly pass their lives M'ith faces as smooth and 

 beartUess as an infant's. But sliaviuL?: seems an instinct of 

 the human race ; for many of these iieojile, having no hair 

 to take off their faces, shave their heads. Others, how- 

 ever, set resolutely to work to force nature to give them a 

 beard. One of the chief cock-fighters at Dobbo was a 

 Javanese, a sort of master of the ceremonies of the ring, 

 who tied on the spure and acted as backer-up to one of 



