Doubtless Their Low Voices And
Gentle, Supple Movements Never Shock The Timid Sensitiveness Of Brutes.
Besides This, Malay Children Yield A Very Ready Obedience To Their
Elders, And Are Encouraged To Invite The Confidence Of Birds And
Beasts, Rather Than To Torment Them.
They catch birds by means of
bird-lime made of gutta, by horse-hair nooses, and by imitating their
call.
In this small house there were bamboo cages containing twenty
birds, most of them talking minas and green-feathered small pigeons.
They came out of their cages when called, and perched in rows on the
arms of the men. I don't know whether the mina can learn many words,
but it imitates the human voice so wonderfully that in Hawaii when it
spoke English I was quite deceived by it. These minas articulated so
humanly that I did know whether a bird or a Malay spoke. There were
four love-birds in an exquisitely made bamboo cage, lovely little
creatures with red beaks and blue and green plumage. The children catch
small grasshoppers for their birds with a shovel-shaped instrument of
open rattan work. When I add that there were some homely domestic fowls
and a nearly tailless cat, I think I have catalogued the visible
possessions of this family, with the exception of a bamboo cradle with
a small brown inmate hanging from the rafters, and a small shed, used,
I believe, for storing rice.
The open floor, while it gives air and ventilation, has also its
disadvantages, for solid and liquid refuse is thrown through it so
conveniently that the ground under the house is apt to contain stagnant
pools and heaps of decomposing matter, and men lying asleep on mats on
these gridirons have sometimes been stabbed with a kris inserted
between the bars from below by an enemy seeking revenge.
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