W. J. Perry

“ To make even this diluted evidence available, Mr. Perry has had to make a number of assumptions. There are a few, and only a few, places in the world where mankind has not passed through, or is still in, the stone-age. Mr. Perry practically admits this. "At every stage in the presentment of the evidence," he says, "customs and beliefs will be revealed in Indonesia for which more or less close parallels are found widespread throughout the world. ”

“ As the aim of this book is to set forth the Indonesian evidence impartially and to extract the story it reveals, the wider issues have been deliberately suppressed for the present." In the face of this he assumes that everywhere in Indonesia the use of so universal and ready a material as stone was unknown to the primitive inhabitants, and that it was introduced from elsewhere by a mysterious band of immigrants (not necessarily in every case the same band) , who added to their favours by becoming missionaries bringing the new cult of the sun. ”

“ At Weedon I was told that a wicked old gamekeeper died, and his ghost used to appear, exactly at twelve every night, within an old oak tree opposite to the park lodge gate. Many people used to go there at night and wait until twelve o'clock to see him. One night a parson went there and, the ghost not appearing, the parson called to him. Thereupon the ghost appeared, and said : " If you dig beneath this tree you'll find a lot of money." The next day a search was made in accordance with the ghost's directions, and a leather bag filled with sovereigns was dug out of the ground. ”

“ The same mysterious immigrants brought the cult of the dead. They are responsible for all sacred stones, whether small or large, and for the awe of, and observances at, natural rocks. Stories of petrifaction, so common all over the world, are referred to the same people. Traditions relating to beings from the sky are assumed to mean "the stone-using immigrants." ”

“ The position with regard to tree-disposal may be put in this way — that, wherever a myth of origin exists which states that the first men came from trees or bamboos, then it will generally be found that the dead are placed in trees, or disposed of in a way derived from tree disposal. ”

“ That of Bonfire Night at Lewes in 1899, where he tells us he saw men running through the flames, is especially worthy of note. The first-hand character of the evidence, and the early date of some of the records, give a value of its own to the little collection, begun before any Society existed to encourage the work, and patiently gathered together through so many years. ”

“ Indonesia, he tells us, "occupies a position of peculiar importance in relation to the main argument as to the origin and nature of megalithic monuments, for it forms the sieve through which any extensive migration from the west to Oceania must pass. Any migration into the Pacific of sun-worshipping megalith-builders should have left traces of their passage in Indonesia." But these hypothetical sun-worshipping, megalith-building immigrants have proved a somewhat elusive people. It is true that Mr. Perry's investigations, as they proceeded, showed plenty of megaliths ”

“ In the case of tree disposal, inter- ment and " stone graves," the dead are certainly being " put back whence they came," and in some cases, as has been seen, this is recognised by those who carry out the practices, but it does not follow that this was the aim which first prompted the disposal in any case. It may have been only the result of reasoning about the mode of disposal. Once such an idea be present, however, it may quite possibly play an important part in the formation of new myths of origin and modes of disposal. ”

“ And with regard to the sun-cult "the difficulty of deciding which facts to retain for examination, and which to reject, was avoided by including in the survey all practices, beliefs and tales concerning the sun that it was possible to collect." ”

“ Stone disposal. — In some parts of Indonesia there is the custom of using stone in the construction of graves ; in one case indeed the dead are put in stone urns. The Kabui Naga have already been mentioned as placing their dead in a cave hollowed out of the side of a hill. ”

“ An examination of the beliefs of the peoples inhabiting Indonesia regarding death, reveals the fact that the ghosts of the dead are sometimes supposed to go to a land of the dead situated somewhere on this earth. For example, Myths of Origin. ”

“ In Watubela the ghosts of warriors as a class do not go to the moon : what Riedel, whom he cites, says is that those who fall in war go immediately to the moon and seldom return like the ghosts of other people to the earth. ”

“ Lydia Milton, a native of Devonshire, told me in April, 1893, that in her native place it is said to be lucky for a woman if, in putting on her dress, the end of it turns up ; she should not smooth it out, but let it fall of its own accord, as it is a sign that she is going to receive a present. ”

“ On Friday Hill, between Chingford and Woodford, old men have often seen a spirit of a woman dressed in white; others have seen spirits in long white dresses flying about in the air. The latter have also been seen in Chingford old churchyard. ”

“ The sacred part of this house is the north chief pile, to which is hung a bunch of palm leaves in which the ghosts of the dead come occasionally to live. The land of the dead is situated in the north. ”

“ Say the stone-using immigrants created Indonesian civihzation to exhibit Mr. Perry's amazing audacity of assumption, his in- genuity, and the tenuity of his proofs." The truth is that he has taken too large an order, and he has not set about the right way to execute it. It may be quite correct that a civilization marked by megalithic monuments has penetrated the great archipelago. ”

“ The Olo Ot, Punan and Manketan of Borneo make a hole in the trunk of an iron-wood tree and place the body in it, the liole being afterwards so carefully closed up that it is not possible to tell that the tree has been interfered with.^-
The Bahau of Koetei practise tree-disposal, and they would seem to have definite ideas concerning the relation- ship of men and trees. They hold that " men came from trees and to trees they shall return. ”

“ Perry misses, which indeed does not fit in with his theory, is that the worship of these islands is not, and probably never was, a sun-cult exclusively, but a worship of the heavens and the earth, the two powers male and female on whom jointly the population acknowledges con- stant dependence. ”

“ King Arthur fought a battle on the hills near Friston House.
At Alfriston " people say " that King Arthur fought there- abouts.
A ploughman between Berwick and West Firle said " there can be no doubt that a war or two was fought hereabouts in the olden time." (1891-)
I again heard that King Arthur had fought battles in this neighbourhood, but again was unable to obtain any particulars. A shepherd told me that King Arthur had fought a great battle amongst the barrows on the hill-top east of the Long Man. ”

“ About ten o'clock a lighted tar-barrel was thrown into the Ouse. A few minutes before midnight a procession came up from Schoolhill, and, forming four abreast, danced round the bonfire in front of the Town Hall many times; presently one man broke from the ranks and ran through the flames; after a while others did the same. This continued until the town clock struck twelve, when fire-men with a hand-engine came up and totally extinguished the bonfire. ”

“ Then we'll say old Pope is dead. (1899.)
The Bonfire Boys of Lewes are selected by the Bonfire Societies of the town ; some of the boys are workmen, some tradesmen's sons, and some gentlemen ; all join as equals to do the work. ”

“ Delavant's comet, recently discovered, keeps up the tradition. — The Morning Post, 5th September, 19 14.
^ " Like a comet burn'd That fires the length of Ophiuchus huge In the Arctic sky, and from his horrid hair Shakes pestilence and war." — Milton, Paradise Lost, ii., 708.
" There with long bloudy haire, a Blazing Star Threatens the World with Famin, Plague & War : To Princes, death : to Kingdoms, many crosses : To all Estates, inevitable Losses :
To Heard-men, Rot : to Plough-men, hap-lesse Seasons : To Saylers, Storms : to Cities, civill Treasons." ”

“ A solitary barn in a hollow of the hills near Ivinghoe, Bucking- hamshire, is called Waterloo Barn, and is believed by some of the people of the neighbourhood to be the site of the Battle of Waterloo. (February, 191 2.)
[Cf. Oxfordshire, Icknield Way.]
Derbyshire. — In the churchyard at Hatnersage is Little John's grave ; a little stone marks the place of the head, and another little stone marks the place of the feet. A thigh-bone 32 inches long was dug up in the church, "so that proved that he must Collectanea.
155
have been a very big man ”

“ The dead go there to join their ancestors, and in turn are joined by their descendants."*^ In south-west Timor, where the dead are interred, earth- quakes are supposed to be due to the efforts of the dead imprisoned beneath to break out from their underground land.^- The practice of cremation is a late importation among the Karen. ”

“ Here the priest, 1 70 Collectanea.
in surplice and stole, headed the procession, reading the opening sentences of the burial service. The body was then taken into the church, and the service proceeded with until the end of the verses from i Corinthians xv. Then the choristers sang some- thing to a very sad air. After this, very many of the congregation went up to a table which was in front of the altar-rails, and deposited thereon offerings of money (these, I was informed, were offerings for the clergyman) . ”

“ Globus, Ixxix., 1901, p. 3.
36 C. V. Hoevell, op. cit., p. 207.
^ Riedel, Slnik- en hroeshaarige rassen, p. 275. the Home of the Dead m Indonesia. 147 of origin and place of disposal, and this fact is of importance. In many cases the myth of origin states that men first came out of a bamboo, and the fact that two of the three definite cases that we possess are of this kind is of peculiar interest. ”

“ The belief that the dead go to a mountain after death is not without a corresponding practice. The Karen believe themselves to have originated from a mountain called Thaw-thi-kwo.^" They usually cremate
^* Kruijt, AniDiisme, p. 373.
^^Gryzen, " Mededeelingen omtrent Eeloe of ^Midden-Timor," Verh. Bat. Gen. , liv. , p. 26 et seq.
Ling Roth, The Natives of Sarawak and British North Borneo, 1896, p. 220. ”

“ E. L. M. Kuhr, " Schetsen uit Borneo's Westerafdeeling," Tijd. iaal land. en volk., Ser. 6, iii., 1897, p. 74.
^W. M. Donselaar, " Aanteekeningen over het eiland Savoe," vT/^^/. Ned. Zend. Gen., xvi., 1872, p. 309.
"Kruijt, op. lit., p. 373 ; V. Ende, op. cit., p. 11.
'Riedel, op. cit., p. 334. ^Kuhr, op. cit., p. 74.
M. Teffer, " Naamlijsten van al hetgeen den Savoenees tot onderhoud en verangenaaming der levens wordt geschonken," Tijd. iaal land- en volk., xxiii., 1876, p. 351.
'*"The Orientation of the dead in Indonesia," y ”