Pagan races of the Malay Peninsula - Sabrizain.org

CHAP. VIII NEGRITOS OF PERAK 383
Substittdes for Pottery.
Perak Semang-.— Of the art of pottery, according
to De Morgan/ the Semang are absolutely ignorant,
the only vessels they use being manufactured
from big stems of bamboo, which they employ for
cooking purposes when green, and use as watervessels
when the sap has dried out of them." Dc
Morgan adds that he only once (at S. Kerbu) saw a
wooden bowl used, this being one which had been
carved out of the root of a tree with a knife.
Raft- viaking.
Perak Semang".— None of the Semang make boats,
but the Semang (of Perak) make rafts by lashing
together twenty or thirty bamboos of big diameter,
and on these they float down the Perak River nearly
as far as Kuala Kangsar, " though even they walk back
agam.
Ironwork.
Perak Semang".—One of the most primitive methods
of forging iron known is recorded of the Perak
Semang by De Morgan.^ It consists simply in
heating the iron till it gets red hot, and then batter-
ing it into the required shape between two stones.
This, according to De Morgan, is the method by
which they manufacture the iron heads of the arrows
that are used with their bow.
It is interesting to read that the Negritos of the
Andaman Islands employed a yet simpler method, as
'
-
De Morgan, vii. 414.
Cp. Swett. p. 22S : "Of ]wttery
-^ De Morgan, vii.
Sakai-Scmang ?]
414 \i.e. among
they [the Negritos] h.ivo no know- ^ Male, p. 286.
ledge." * De Morgan, vii. 415,
^