( 17 ) 
or you to them. A catechism as to where you come 
from, what your business is in that locality, where 
you ordinarily live, what your work is, whether you 
are married or single and if the former, whether 
you have any children, and even how much you 
earn a month, will have to be answered or warded 
off. Naturally the replies given will furnish a topic 
of conversation in the village for several days to 
come. 
As compared with those of other races — of the 
Chinese, for instance — Malay children are singularly 
orderly, quiet and self-possessed, and a little Malay 
boy of five years old will be seen strutting along 
the road with a comical little man-of-the-world air, 
while Chinese children are brawling and dirtying 
themselves in the gutter, or occupied in playing some 
noisy game. It must be added, moreover, that 
children are seldom beaten or harshly reproved and 
that if a child says that it does not want to do 
something which has been ordered, very often no 
effort is made to enforce obedience. 
Malays are inclined to be credulous and tales 
of the marvellous are readily received if presented 
in an “ appetizing ” form. They are a good deal 
played upon by their “ medicine-men,” though these 
professors of the arts of healing by the aid of spirits 
should not be resorted to by orthodox Mohammedans, 
such as they are in name. 
The Malay has a great respect for his own 
personal dignity and is extremely resentful of rough 
usage or of rough methods of address. He cannot 
bear nagging, or to be made to appear ridiculous 
before others. At the same time he has a very 
lively sense of humour and is inclined to indulge in 
wise saws and terse sayings, to the latter of which 
his language particularly lends itself. 
62 
