Seventeen years among the Sea Dyaks of Borneo; a ... - Sabrizain.org

THE FUTURE OF THE SEA DYAK 325
into the rice for their daily food. In addition to all
this, there is the worry and commotion connected with
having
to move the household for some months each
year to the little hut put up in their paddy-farm some
little distance away.
The Sea Dyak has year after year to grow as much
paddy as possible. He rises on work-days early in the
morning, partakes of his frugal meal of rice and salt, or
rice and salt fish, varied, if he be very lucky, by a piece
of wild pig's flesh or venison, which he has received as a
gift or bought from some hunting friend. His wife
bundles up for him his midday meal in the spathe of the
Penang palm, and be goes off to his work, returning home
late in the evening.
There are days when he does not go to work on his
paddy-farm, but spends his time in getting firewood or
mending things in his room, or in sitting about in the
common veranda chatting with his friends.
When the paddy has grown a little, and the time for
weeding draws near, the family remove to the little hut
put up in the paddy-field. In the weeding the Sea
Dyak is helped by his wife, the younger children being
left in charge of the elder for the greater part of the day,
while their parents are at work. When the weeding has
been done, the family return to the long Dyak house for
a month or so ;
then they go back to their hut to watch
the ripening paddy and guard it against attacks of birds
and beasts.
Paddy-planting is the chief occupation of every Sea
Dyak, but he has plenty of time for other things, and his
life is not quite so monotonous as may be supposed. The
actual work of paddy-planting, and things connected with
it, such as the building of farm-huts and the getting