Journal of the Federated Malay States museums - Sabrizain.org

1916.] I. H. N. Evans: Sakai 0/ the L'lu Kampar. 2y
1
I chanced to hear imports ot communal houses. Si Busu knew
almost as little as the other Sakai from whom I made enquiries,
but I arranged with him that he should go up country
and try to bring down some wild people to see me. He lelt
his house 011 May 51 h, and calling in at a relation's dealing, a
little further up the Kampai River, took this man with him,
since he iSi Busu's relation) occasionall} had dealings with
the hill Sakai. On the afternoon oi May 8th Si Busu and his
relation returned, bringing with them twelve wild Sakai, three
men. two boys, and seven women. Ad ot them seemed very
much frightened, the women keeping their e\es fixed on the
ground, and the men beinu obviously extremely nervous.
None of these people -poke Mala}', though 1 believe that one
of the men understood a lew words of that language. On the
day of their arrival I to a; a few photographs and some
measurements of the men, and in the evening 1 got Si Busu to
bring two of them to my tent. One kept his face averted
the whole tunc and the oth spoke in whispers when answering
questions. I took a vocabular] (printed with this paper),
of rather more than thirty words, bill I did not ait. nipt to
carry the matter furthei owing to the Sakai's uneasiness.
fudging from the words obtained, however, their dialect
belongs to the central Sakai gro ps, as does that ot the more
civilized aborigines >~t tin Kampai River. I did my best to
rind out from Si Busu where these people lived, what mountains
their clearings were on. and what was tin nearest riser,
but without much success, bul probably they wore from the
Perak side of the main range. The next morning I was told
that the women-folk being, I supposed, frightened, had tieparted
at daylight. This was particularly annoying as some
of them had tat 11 marks on the face, which I wanted to
sketch. The men left at about 10 a.m. on the same day. I
afterwards found out that Si Busu had got them down on false
pretences, asking them. I believe, :o help him in making his
clearing. This, no doubt, partly accounted for their nervousness,
since, when thev found that I had called them, and that
they hail been told a he. they pr >babl) 'bought that they were
to be kidnapped. I reproached Si Busu f r having told the
Sakai an untruth, but he said that if they had known that a
European wanted to see them the} would have refused to
come and would most likely have desert< d their clearing. The
only other information that I was aide to gain about these
people, partly from Si Busu, partly from themselves with Si
Busu's assistance, was that theii houses were small, but had
several fire-places, and that one family occupied each house.
Each household appear-; to possess two clearings, one planted
with quick-growing crops such as Sengkuai (millet), Indian
corn and gourds, the other with slow -growing vegetables such
as tapioca, keledek (convovulus batanas?) and caladium.
When the quick-growing crops ire exhausted thev subsist on
the produce of their second planting. I gathered that the
Hill-Sakai only moved within a very small radius since they