FASCICULI MALATENSES 
49 
spirit-ships, using segments of cocoanut husks. When an audience-hall is made 
instead of a ship it is built m some waste place, generally by the side of the river, 
and is furnished as a real house would be, except that all the furniture consists 
of roughly made models in miniature. It has a ladder by means of which the 
spirit may mount into it, and is itself a small copy of the large audience-chamber 
attached to every raja’s house, but constructed of paper and other flimsy materials; 
I have never seen one more than two or three feet square. Models of fruit, 
birds, fish, and prawns, ingeniously plaited out of strips of palm leaf, are 
often suspended within to give the hall a festive appearance, similar objects 
being frequently hung up in a room in which spirits are being conjured, in 
order to make them think that they are summoned to a pleasure garden.' 
just as spirits may be deceived by sham offerings, and seemingly nourished 
by them, so they can be prevented from entering places where they are not 
wanted by the use of sham traps in which they might be caught. For this 
purpose the stems of creepers that have naturally tied themselves into a knot 
are suspended over the doors of houses, while the roots of trees that have 
bifurcated and then anastomosed are sometimes placed in the same position, both 
among the Samsams of Trangand the Malays and Siamese of the Patani States. 
At Ban Kassot we obtained part of a liana stem (Bauhinea anguind) that had 
had a similar employment, being naturally pitted with deep depressions and 
raised into corresponding elevations alternating along each side, the elevations 
being co-extensive with the depressions opposite. The spirits which encountered 
a creeper of the kind would get lost among the pits, and so would be prevented 
from entering the house it protected. The talons of the serpent eagle (Spiiomis) 
are also hung over house doors and over hearths to frighten spirits away, and 
although their use for this purpose is said to be due to the fact that all spirits 
fear the cry of this bird, yet it is probable that they too have something of the 
trap in their theory. All such objects are called tangkal ruwab> and many 
peculiarly shaped twigs and roots, the theory of which is not so comprehensible 
as that of those described, are also included in the term, while certain very 
complicated specimens have also the reputation of being powerful tonics, or 
perhaps rather aphrodisiacs, if powdered and swallowed with water ; their 
excellence consisting in their form and not in the species of the tree or creeper 
from which they are derived. 
The practices already described in this section are considered legitimate ; 
for no man’s soul is always strong, and every man must protect himself and 
his possessions against the entry of spirits; but, as was noted in the introduc¬ 
tion to the paper, they are not regarded as quite consistent with Mahommedan 
H 
i. Cf. Anita, part I, p. 
Ah 
