ABORfGINAL TR!HES: DIVISIONS OF EACE, 
15 
tribes that possess a distinctive culture of their own. 
To begin with, tliey live in large substantial communal 
houses like the Djaka of Borneo — not in leaf-shelters 
like the Semang, nor in cranky huts like the Central 
Sakai of Batang Padang. In the second place, they 
are good craftsmen, making excellent blow-pipes, elabo- 
rate quivers, powerful bows, and even iron-tipped 
aiTows. As regards physique they are taller and 
stouter than their aboriginal neighbours; moreover, 
tliey are cleanly in their habits and suffer little fi^om 
skin disease. Although they are migratory they are 
less so than the other wild tribes, and theii' crops take 
longer to mature. For an aboriginal race their standard 
of culture is so high that it entitles them to l)e regarded 
as a distinct tribe or element in the population of 
Malaya. 
But when we come to define their exact relation- 
ship to the other wild tribes we have many difficulties 
to face. These Northern Sakai have no objection 
to intermarriage with other aborigines and show many 
traces of mixed blood. In the extreme north they are 
dark with every sign of Semang affinity; in tlie south 
they show no such sign. Culturally they stand far 
above both the Central Sakai and the Semang. In the 
matter of language they possess words that are trace- 
able neither to Semang nor to Central Sakai. On tlie 
whole, the Northern Sakai may be regarded as a mixed 
tribe containing some peculiar racial element that 
has raised them above their neighbours. What that 
element is we cannot say, but we cannot dismiss the 
tribe as a mere cross between the negritoes of the 
north and the Central Sakai to the south. 
The Northern Sakai may be divided into two or even 
