XX 
FASCICULI MALATENSES 
time. The headman, in whose house I stayed, told me that his people had 
come from a place called Kampong Lalang, the ruins of which J I passed the 
next day a few miles to the north-west. It was interesting to notice that the 
crow (Corvus erica (?) ), which in the Malay Peninsula is rarely found at any 
distance from human dwellings, still haunted the site of this and other 
deserted villages that I passed in this tract of country. 
Ban Maiwas . A small Siamese village near the point where the Mai was 
River enters the Patani. Judging from the curly hair and dark complexions 
of many of the people, they have absorbed a considerable proportion of Semang 
blood, and they call the Semang tribe of the neighbouring jungle 4 Sakai 
Perak/saying that the jungle men have only recently come from over the 
border. It is probable, from the age of the fruit trees and from what we 
know of the Siamese invasions of this part of the Malay Peninsula, that the 
inhabitants of Ban Maiwas represent a comparatively recent Siamese settle¬ 
ment, which has intermarried to a great extent with the aboriginal inhabitants 
of the country, and, therefore, it is worthy to note, that while a large propor¬ 
tion of the population approximate to the aboriginal type, a minority appear 
to have the characters usually associated with purer Siamese blood than that 
habitually found in the Patani States, having clear yellow skins, straight hair, 
and somewhat Mongoloid features. 
From a zoological point of view, Ban Maiwas is interesting, as being the 
village furthest west in this latitude in which I found the common village 
squirrel to belong to the Sciurus Con color type. The fauna in the neighbour¬ 
ing jungle seemed to be very rich, and at one point I found the cast pupal 
skins of Flata limbata , the Chinese wax insect, or an allied species, covering 
the leaves of a shrub in enormous numbers, while the moth-like adults of the 
same species clung to tree trunks in the vicinity, having much the appearance 
of a fungus that grows in the same situation. 
The journey from Betong to Ban Maiwas took me three days, though 
the distance is short in a straight line. Several steep spurs had to be sur¬ 
mounted, and the track crossed and re-crossed the Patani River m such a way 
that the stream had to be forded fourteen times in the course of one morning ; 
though the water was low, 1 had to swim at one ford. At Maiwas, owing to 
the kindness of the district magistrate at Betong, a well educated Bangkok Malay, 
who entertained me most hospitably, rafts were waiting to take me to Bendang 
Stall, another journey of three days, and from there to Patani, three days 
more. On the way I was able to obtain some interesting information regarding 
the popular religion of the people of the district from my raftsmen, especially 
about the cult, common to Mahommedans and Buddhists, of 1 Job Ni’ a late 
raja of Rhaman. 
NELSON ANNANDALE 
