FUNERAL CEREMONIES.

When a raja or person of consequence dies the funeral usually occupies several months; that is, the corpse is kept unburied until the neighbouring and distant chiefs, or, in common cases, the relations and creditors of the deceased, can be convened in order to celebrate the rites with becoming dignity and respect.  Perhaps the season of planting or of harvest intervenes, and these necessary avocations must be attended to before the funeral ceremonies can be concluded.  The body however is in the meantime deposited in a kind of coffin.  To provide this they fell a large tree (the anau in preference, because of the softness of the central part, whilst the outer coat is hard), and, having cut a portion of the stem of sufficient length, they split it in two parts, hollow each part so as to form a receptacle for the body, and then fit them exactly together.  The workmen take care to sprinkle the wood with the blood of a young hog, whose flesh is given to them as a treat.  The coffin being thus prepared and brought into the house the body is placed in it, with a mat beneath, and a cloth laid over it.  Where the family can afford the expense it is strewed over with camphor.  Having now placed the two parts in close contact they bind them together with rattans, and cover the whole with a thick coating of dammar or resin.  In some instances they take the precaution of inserting a bamboo-tube into the lower part, which, passing thence through the raised floor into the ground, serves to carry off the offensive matter; so that in fact little more than the bones remain.

When the relations and friends are assembled, each of whom brings with him a buffalo, hog, goat, dog, fowl, or other article of provision, according to his ability, and the women baskets of rice, which are presented and placed in order, the feasting begins and continues for nine days and nights, or so long as the provisions hold out.  On the last of these days the coffin is carried out and set in an open space, where it is surrounded by the female mourners, on their knees, with their heads covered, and howling (ululantes) in dismal concert, whilst the younger persons of the family are dancing near it, in solemn movement, to the sound of gongs, kalintangs, and a kind of flageolet; at night it is returned to the house, where the dancing and music continues, with frequent firing of guns, and on the tenth day the body is carried to the grave, preceded by the guru or priest, whose limbs are tattooed in the shape of birds and beasts, and painted of different colours,* with a large wooden mask on his face.

(Footnote.  It is remarkable that in the Bisayan language of the Philippines the term for people so marked, whom the Spaniards call pintados, is batuc.  This practice is common in the islands near the coast of Sumatra, as will hereafter be noticed.  It seems to have prevailed in many parts of the farther East, as Siam, Laos, and several of the islands.)