ABORIGINAL TRIBES: DIVISIONS OF RACE. 
35 
to liye in. I asked for details of ita pleasantness but covvld get none 
wliatever. To reach heaven the spirit baa to pass through hell, 
and is accompanied on the way by a cat and a dog, the cat ^oing 
first and the dog last. On reaching hell the cat sprinkles water 
on the pathway and cools the atmosphere, while the dog performs 
the Siime duty l>ebind the spirit. Where the water comes from 
I did not find ont, nor what finally Tjecomes of cat and dog. The 
flames burn underneath. The patli to heayen lies throuffh the centre 
of hell. 
All this wealth of detail quite foreign to Central Sakai 
belief. 
If this account of the Krau Sakai was true of all 
tliese little mongrel communities it might be possible t'o 
analyse their customs and beliefs and to show their exact 
relationship to the purer tribes. Unfortunately, they 
differ among tliemselyes. Let us leave the Krao Sakai 
and consider Mr, Stiirrock's account of the Bra Sakai, 
who live much closer to the Jakun and Besisi border : 
The Bra Siikai, like the Krau Sakai, leave utensils on the grave— 
jjaniely, a cup, a plate, a water-Teasel, and a block of wood to mark the 
grave. Regarding the utensils my informant was unsatisfactory. He 
said, and repeated, that they were left to mark the grave and with no 
other end in view ; a statement which the nature of the articles appears 
to contradict. When I put it to him that they, were there for the 
benefit of the deceased or his spirit, the Sakai denied it. After death, 
he says, there is nothing ; all is finished. Then, however, when I asked 
him where the deceased went after death, he said he did not know; 
perhaps to another clearing and another house ; but he did not know, 
he said ; and he repeated that there was nothing after death. And 
probably to the present generation that is so. . . . There is no 
idea of a heaven and hell among the Bra men. 
Here wo have the Central Sakai utensils and the 
Jakun tmgga semangat or memorial board , combined 
with the purest Besisi agnosticism, Whatever the 
Besisi may believe, they assert persistently that they 
know of no life after death. 
