FASCICULI MALATENSES 
objection to part with these combs in exchange for a little rice. The lobes of 
her ears were pierced and distorted, and she told us that unmarried girls 
wore earrings, which were discarded on marriage. This is also a Malay- 
custom. 
When questioned about the number of children usually born to a Hami 
woman, she volunteered the information that the children of her tribe were 
always born at the same season of the year, that season, according to some 
Malays who were present, which corresponds with the first month of the 
Arabic calendar, as reckoned in the Peninsula, that is to say about March. 
This would be just after the conclusion of the stormy season. The statement 
was confirmed by a Malay woman, who remarked that the Panghans bred like 
beasts ; but Malay evidence is practically worthless regarding these people. 
We were unable to obtain information concerning the number of children 
usually born, owing to our Hami informant’s inability to count ; but she said 
that a child was born regularly every year to women of the proper age. 
For weapons the men carried stout cudgels, one of which was made of a 
sapling covered with particularly stout spines set at right angles to the stem. 
They were not shaped, but merely cut from the tree. The chief of the tribe 
brought us a blowgun as a present. It was made, like all other blowguns we 
saw in the Peninsula, of an outer and an inner tube. The former was composed 
of two lengths of bamboo neatly spliced together, the junction being protected 
with a plaited rattan band ; while the inner tube was fashioned in a similar way, 
except that a piece of the flower-spathe of a palm was gummed over the splice. 
The total length was about seven feet. The ornamentation of the sheath was 
elaborate, and consisted of a series of bands of incised geometrical patterns, 
extending over the whole of the section nearest the mouthpiece. The design 
was composed of dots and transverse and slanting hatchings, mostly arranged in 
lozenges, the longer diameter of which was in the direction of the length. In 
a few cases the pattern had been emphasized by the use of a hot iron. The 
mouthpiece was annular, composed of rather soft wood, and was fixed to the 
tube by resin. The distal end of the blowgun had been closely bound with 
vegetable fibre and coated with resin, to prevent splitting ; the action of fire 
was evident upon this. The quiver was a short length of one of the larger 
bamboos. It was devoid of cover and had not been decorated in any way ; 
but was bound with plaited rattan, and had attached to it by means of a string 
the ulna of a monkey, said to be that of a white gibbon. This was used to twist 
into the girdle of the owner (Plate I, fig. 2), and was also regarded as a charm 
against the effects of ‘ hot rain.’ The darts were split from the stems of a grass 
or sedge, being about ten inches long, with cones of a light, spongy cane at the 
