ABORIGINAL TRIBES: THE CENTRAL SAKAI. 
43 
learu, tbe sun does not interfere in the affairs of men 
beyond providing life, lieat and light. Was he all- 
A^irtuous ? *' No, he conld hardly be called that/* said my 
informant, *'foi' be ate his own ebildren." This 
'Uhyestean repast seems to have had it8 justification — 
for *' if one sun is so hot how could mankind have borne 
the heat of many?'* — but my Sakai had his doubts' 
about the abstract nioralitv of the sun*s conduct. 80 
too had tbe moon, for " she fled from the in ordey 
to save the lives of her OAvn children, the stars. That is 
-why tlie sun and moon aj-e never seen in company : that 
also is why the sun lives alone whilo the moon is 
surrounded b}" numberless cliiklren.'* 
Inferior though they are to the sun in their dignity 
and power, tlie great spirits of disease are of more 
importance to the Sakai because of their pernicious 
interest in his private life. Chief among them is the 
spirit of small-pox or Ntf*tni Tot — but his true name 
must not be uttereds he is "tlio stranger, the new 
aiTivah'* ' He is a demon of appaling terror to these 
timid peoples of tlie hills, and he appears to them in 
dreams, wearing the guise of a great Malay Raja with a 
whole train of attendant ghosts. He has many rivals in 
wickedness. There is the Ntjani Lfuhuc who comes in 
the semblance of a Mountain Sakai wealing a pendent 
loin-clotli and carrying the deadly blow-pipe tVom which 
he shoots the invisible darts that cause racking pains in 
the jointSj in the waist and in the bones. If he elects to 
use his worst weapons he kills instantaneously, but 
usually he desires the misery and not the death of his 
yictim, He haunts bare rocks and the stony beds of 
streams; doubtless he is responsible for Mr. Cerruti's 
