490 
FIVE DAYS IN NANING. 
the Besisi women. Making every allowance for the intermix¬ 
ture that has taken place from the Sumatran emigrants marry¬ 
ing Binua women,—that is discarding the peculiarities of the 
Naning or Menangkabite Malays,—there remained abundant 
traits to compare them with the Malay race generally, and to 
justify the conclusion that they are uudoubtedly the original 
or uncivilized, perhaps we might say with truth, the unadul¬ 
terated Malays. _ . ' 
The mode of marriage was described as follows. All the 
relatives and friends of the bride and bridegroom having 
assembled at the hut of the lady’s parents, the bridegroom 
first presents siri (betel leaf) to liis future f: ther in law and 
then to all the bride’s relatives. The bride’s male relations 
then present it to those of the bridegroomjlastly the bridegroom 
offers siri to the bride, and the marriage ceremony is coni' 
plete. A feast follows. There is no fixed age for marriage, 
and the bride is sometimes married when a little child. The 
husband in such cases carries her to his house and brings her 
up. When she arrives at the age of puberty a feast is some¬ 
times given, but neither a feast, nor any other ceremony or 
intimation is essential. . . . 
Their favorite food is the wild hog. The domestic ptg, 
fowls &c are considered insipid. They eat tlm salted fish 
which I procured for them at the Chinese shops with a hearty 
relish after very slightly broiling it. 
In the fruit season they make great feasts. All the families 
of one kampong provide a plentiful supply of wild hogs and 
other food with arrak tampui, and invite the inhabitants of 
another kampong to feast with them- They eat and drink till 
they become jolly, and then they dance and sing, the men and 
women mingling in the dance The former ply the latter with 
arrack till they are in a kindly humour, when they place them 
on their knees and pass the rest of the day in drinking and 
singing. The men and women sing to each other alternately. 
Such is their own account. 
They described five races of men as inhabiting the moun¬ 
tains of the interior, and all differing in some degree in lang¬ 
uage. The Mawas are naked savages who run away when 
they meet Binua * The latter in their own mountains wear 
terap bark round their loins. 
In the morning while the Besisi were breakfasting I examin¬ 
ed the immediate neighbourhood of Ayer Panas. The hill 
on which the bungalow stands lias a surface of a light brown 
* As the Johore Binua describe similar wild men (orang utan) I cannot 
help thinking that the Peninsular jungles must have some large species of 
orang similar to the Bornean. 
