1. BIRTH-SPIRITS

We now come to the spirits which are believed to attack both women and children at childbirth. These are four in number: the Bajang, which generally takes the form of a pole-cat (musang) and disturbs the household by mewing like a great cat; the Langsuir, which takes the form of an owl with long claws, which sits and hoots upon the roof-tree; the Pontianak or Mati-anak, which, as will be seen presently, is also a night-owl, and is supposed to be a child of the Langsuir, and the Penanggalan, which is believed to resemble a trunkless human head with the sac of the stomach attached to it, and which flies about seeking for an opportunity of sucking the blood of infants. With the above are often associated the Polong, which is described as a diminutive but malicious species of bottle-imp, and the Pelesit, which is the name given to a kind of grasshopper (or cricket?), but these latter, though often associated with the regular birth-spirits, partake also of the character of familiar spirits [537] or bottle-imps, and are usually private property. I will now take these spirits in the above order. The Bajang, as I have said, is generally described as taking the form of a pole-cat (musang), but it appears to be occasionally confused with the Pelesit. Thus a Malay magician once told me that the Bajang took the form of a house-cricket, and that when thus embodied it may be kept by a man, as the Pelesit may be kept by a woman. This statement, however, must not be accepted without due reserve, and it may be taken as a certainty that the usual conception of the Bajang's embodiment is a pole-cat. [538] I need hardly say that it is considered very dangerous to children, who are sometimes provided with a sort of armlet of black silk threads, called a "bajang bracelet" (g'lang bajang), which, it is supposed, will protect them against it. On the opposite page will be seen a remarkable drawing [539] (of which a facsimile is here given), which appears to represent the outline of a Bajang, "scripturally" modified to serve as a counter-charm against the Bajang itself. [540] The following account of the Bajang is by Sir Frank Swettenham:-- "Some one in the village falls ill of a complaint the symptoms of which are unusual; there may be convulsions, unconsciousness, or delirium, possibly for some days together or with intervals between the attacks. The relatives will call in a native doctor, and at her (she is usually an ancient female) suggestion, or without it, an impression will arise that the patient is the victim of a bâjang. Such an impression quickly develops into certainty, and any trifle will suggest the owner of the evil spirit. One method of verifying this suspicion is to wait till the patient is in a state of delirium, and then to question him or her as to who is the author of the trouble. This should be done by some independent person of authority, who is supposed to be able to ascertain the truth. "A further and convincing proof is then to call in a 'Pawang' skilled in dealing with wizards (in Malay countries they are usually men), and if he knows his business his power is such that he will place the sorcerer in one room, and, while he in another scrapes an iron vessel with a razor, the culprit's hair will fall off as though the razor had been applied to his head instead of to the vessel! That is supposing he is the culprit; if not, of course he will pass through the ordeal without damage. "I have been assured that the shaving process is so efficacious that, as the vessel represents the head of the person standing his trial, wherever it is scraped the wizard's hair will fall off in a corresponding spot. It might be supposed that under these circumstances the accused is reasonably safe, but this test of guilt is not always employed. What more commonly happens is that when several cases of unexplained sickness have occurred in a village, with possibly one or two deaths, the people of the place lodge a formal complaint against the supposed author of these ills, and desire that he be punished. "Before the advent of British influence it was the practice to kill the wizard or witch whose guilt had been established to Malay satisfaction, and such executions were carried out not many years ago. "I remember a case in Perak less than ten years ago, when the people of an up-river village accused a man of keeping a bâjang, and the present Sultan, who was then the principal Malay judge in the State, told them he would severely punish the bâjang if they would produce it. They went away hardly satisfied, and shortly after made a united representation to the effect that if the person suspected were allowed to remain in their midst they would kill him. Before anything could be done they put him, his family, and effects on a raft and started them down the river. On their arrival at Kuala Kangsar the man was given an isolated hut to live in, but not long afterwards he disappeared. "The hereditary bâjang comes like other evils, the unsought heritage of a dissolute ancestry, but the acquired bâjang is usually obtained from the newly-buried body of a stillborn child, which is supposed to be the abiding-place of a familiar spirit until lured therefrom by the solicitations of some one who, at dead of night, stands over the grave and by potent incantations persuades the bâjang to come forth." [541] "It is all very well for the Kedah ladies to sacrifice their shadows to obtain possession of a pelsit, leaders of society must be in the fashion at any cost; but there are plenty of people living in Perak who have seen more than one ancient Malay dame taken out into the river and, despite her protestations, her tears, and entreaties, have watched her, with hands and feet tied, put into the water and slowly pushed down out of sight by means of a long pole with a fork at one end which fitted on her neck. Those who have witnessed these executions have no doubt of the justice of the punishment, and not uncommonly add that after two or three examples had been made there would always ensue a period of rest from the torments of the bâjang. I have also been assured that the bâjang, in the shape of a lizard, has been seen to issue from the drowning person's nose. That statement no doubt is made on the authority of those who condemned and executed the victim." [542] The popular superstition about the Langsuir is thus described by Sir William Maxwell:-- "If a woman dies in childbirth, either before delivery or after the birth of a child, and before the forty days of uncleanness have expired, she is popularly supposed to become a langsuyar, a flying demon of the nature of the 'white lady' or 'banshee.' To prevent this a quantity of glass beads are put in the mouth of the corpse, a hen's egg is put under each arm-pit, and needles are placed in the palms of the hands. It is believed that if this is done the dead woman cannot become a langsuyar, as she cannot open her mouth to shriek (ngilai) or wave her arms as wings, or open and shut her hands to assist her flight." [543] The superstitions about the Langsuir, however, do not end here, for with regard to its origin the Selangor Malays tell the following story:-- The original Langsuir (whose embodiment is supposed to be a kind of night-owl) is described as being a woman of dazzling beauty, who died from the shock of hearing that her child was stillborn, and had taken the shape of the Pontianak. [544] On hearing this terrible news, she "clapped her hands," and without further warning "flew whinnying away to a tree, upon which she perched." She may be known by her robe of green, by her tapering nails of extraordinary length (a mark of beauty), and by the long jet black tresses which she allows to fall down to her ankles--only, alas! (for the truth must be told) in order to conceal the hole in the back of her neck through which she sucks the blood of children! These vampire-like proclivities of hers may, however, be successfully combated if the right means are adopted, for if you are able to catch her, cut short her nails and luxuriant tresses, and stuff them into the hole in her neck, she will become tame and indistinguishable from an ordinary woman, remaining so for years. Cases have been known, indeed, in which she has become a wife and a mother, until she was allowed to dance at a village merry-making, when she at once reverted to her ghostly form, and flew off into the dark and gloomy forest from whence she came. In their wild state, a Malay once informed me, these woman-vampires are exceedingly fond of fish, and once and again may be seen "sitting in crowds on the fishing-stakes at the river mouth awaiting an opportunity to steal the fish." However that may be, it seems curiously in keeping with the following charm for "laying" a Langsuir:-- "O ye mosquito-fry at the river's mouth When yet a great way off, ye are sharp of eye, When near, ye are hard of heart. When the rock in the ground opens of itself Then (and then only) be emboldened the hearts of my foes and opponents! When the corpse in the ground opens of itself Then (and then only) be emboldened the hearts of my foes and opponents! May your heart be softened when you behold me, By grace of this prayer that I use, called Silam Bayu." The "mosquito-fry at the river's mouth" in the first line is no doubt intended as an allusion to the Langsuir who frequent the fishing-stakes. The Pontianak (or Mati-anak), as has already been said, is the stillborn child of the Langsuir, and its embodiment is like that of its mother, a kind of night-owl. [545] Curiously enough, it appears to be the only one of these spirits which rises to the dignity of being addressed as a "Jin" or "Genie," as appears from the charms which are used for laying it. Thus we find in a common charm:-- "O Pontianak the Stillborn, May you be struck dead by the soil from the grave-mound. Thus (we) cut the bamboo-joints, the long and the short, To cook therein the liver of the Jin (Demon) Pontianak. By the grace of 'There is no god but God,'" etc. To prevent a stillborn child from becoming a Pontianak the corpse is treated in the same way as that of the mother, i.e. a hen's egg is put under each armpit, a needle in the palm of each hand, and (probably) glass beads or some simple equivalent in its mouth. The charm which is used on this occasion will be found in the Appendix. The Peenanggalan is a sort of monstrous vampire which delights in sucking the blood of children. The story goes that once upon a time a woman was sitting, to perform a religious penance (dudok bertapa), in one of the large wooden vats which are used by the Malays for holding the vinegar made by drawing off the sap of the thatch-palm (menyadap nipah). Quite unexpectedly a man came in, and finding her sitting in the vat, asked her, "What are you doing there?" To this the woman replied, "What business have you to ask?" but being very much startled she attempted to escape, and in the excitement of the moment, kicked her own chin with such force that the skin split round her neck, and her head (with the sac of the stomach depending from it) actually became separated from the trunk, and flew off to perch upon the nearest tree. Ever since then she has existed as a spirit of evil, sitting on the roof-tree whinnying (mengilai) whenever a child is born in the house, or trying to force her way up through the floor on which the child lies, in order to drink its blood. [546] The only two spirits of this class which now remain are the Polong and the Pelesit, and these, as I have said, partake to a great extent of the character of familiar spirits or bottle imps, and are by no means confined to a single "rôle" as the preceding ones have been. The Polong resembles an exceedingly diminutive female figure or mannikin, being in point of size about as big as the top joint of the little finger. It will fly through the air to wherever it is told to go, but is always preceded by its pet or plaything (pemainan), the Pelesit, which, as has already been said, appears to be a species of house-cricket. Whenever the Polong wishes to enter (di-rasoki) a new victim, it sends the Pelesit on before it, and as soon as the latter, "flying in a headlong fashion (menelentang menjerongkong)," has entered its victim's body, which it usually does tail-foremost, and begins to chirp, the Polong follows. It is generally hidden away outside the house by its owner (Jinjangan), and fed with blood pricked from the finger. The description usually given of a Polong tallies curiously with the Malay definition of the soul. [547] The last of these spirits, the Pelesit (or house-cricket?), which is the Polong's "plaything" or pet, flies to and fro (rasok sini, rasok sana) till it finds the body which its mistress has ordered it to enter, harm only being done when it enters tail-foremost, as it generally does. It is occasionally caught and kept in a bottle by Malay women, who feed it either on parched or saffron-stained rice, or on blood drawn from the tip of the fourth finger which they prick for the purpose, and who, when they wish to get rid of it, bury it in the ground. When a sick person is affected by a Pelesit (one of the signs of which is to rave about cats) [548] the medicine-man comes and addresses the Pelesit (or Polong?), which has taken up its residence in the patient's body, with the words: "Who is your mother?" To this question the Pelesit replies, speaking with the patient's voice, but in a high falsetto key, and giving the name of the person who sent it, whereupon prompt measures are taken to compel the owner to recall it. It now only remains to describe the means employed by the Malays to secure one of these familiar spirits, which can be guaranteed to cause the greatest possible annoyance to your enemy, with the least possible trouble on your own part. Receipt for securing a Pelesit "Go to the graveyard at night and dig up the body of a first-born child whose mother was also first-born, and which has been dead less than forty days. On digging it up, carry it out to an ant-hill in the open ground, and there dandle it (di-timang). After a little while, when the child shrieks and lolls its tongue out (terjelir lidah-nya), bite off its tongue and carry it home. Then obtain a cocoa-nut shell from a solitary 'green' cocoa-nut palm (niyor hijau), and carry it to a place where Three Roads Meet, light a fire and heat the shell till oil exudes, dip the child's tongue in the oil, and bury it in the heart of the three cross roads (hati sempang tiga). Leave it untouched for three nights, then dig it up and you will find that it has turned into a Pelesit." [549]