THE BINUA OP JOHORE. 
279 
forced out of its position. Imlumut, seeing his mistake, stepped 
in with his huge body between them, and has ever since kept them 
separate. 
Although the Binuas have a conception of the spirit of man as dis¬ 
tinct from the body,—and the belief that the spirit of the Poyang is 
carried in music to heaven, while his animate body remains beside 
them, even shews a high degree of immateriality in their idea of its 
nature,—they appear to he without any glimmering of faith or hope 
in its permanent indestructibility, or rather in its retention of indi¬ 
viduality. It is fashioned by Pirm&n of air, and when the Jin Bumf 
is commissioned to dissolve its union with the body, it relapses into 
airy nothing.* All my endeavours to detect the existence, in some 
shape, of a recognition of a future life were fruitless ; and yet I can 
hardly bring myself to believe that it is entirely wanting, seeing that 
their religious notions have evidently been derived from other nations 
who believe in the translation of the soul to another world or its 
transmigration in the present. It might have been anticipated too, 
that the respect in which parents are held would have been accom¬ 
panied by the same reverence for ancestors, which is so common 
amongst the nations of the Archipelago, and which often displays it¬ 
self in modes indicative of a belief in their continued existence and 
endowment with supernatural powers. While in the seaward or 
Malayan part of the country, I encountered repeated obstructions in 
examining rocks, for almost every one that was in any way remarka¬ 
ble for size, form, or position, was either the kramat of some ancient 
• worthy, or was indued with the power of working evil. To break off 
a fragment was impiety in the one case and madness in the other, and 
a stranger must respect the feelings of those to whose good will and 
assistance he is indebted. On reaching the Binua boundary all dif¬ 
ficulties of the kind ceased. 
Ihe history of the race is involved in darkness. The tradition of 
the Binuas is certainly sufficiently definite with respect to their ori¬ 
gin in the country where they are found, and confirms the conclu¬ 
sion, derived from other considerations, that they immigrated to Jo- 
hore in very ancient times. It is on their language almost exclusively 
that any conjecture as to their derivation must be founded. There 
is no doubt that when the Malays first entered the rivers of the Pe¬ 
ninsula (about 600 years ago according to their own histories) they 
found the country occupied by the Binua. The descendents of the 
ancient line of kings are still living on the Indau. Their origin 
* A similar belief is entertained by wine of the Dyak tribes* 
