Everything being now ready, Bilal Umat carried a smoking censer thrice round
the row of trays (walking always towards the left), and then lighting the five wax
tapers of the left-hand tray, directed two of his men to take down this tray and
sling it on a pole between them. This they did, and we set off in procession along
the sandy foreshore at the back of the building until we came to a halt at a spot
about fifty yards off, where Bilal Umat suspended the tray from the branch of a
mangrove-tree about five feet from the ground. This done, he faced round
towards the land, and breaking off a branch of the tree, gave utterance to three
stentorian cooees, which he afterwards informed me were intended to notify the
Land Spirits (Orang darat, lit. “Land Folk”) of the fact that offerings were
awaiting their acceptance. Returning to the house, he manufactured one of the
leaf-brushes^318 which the Malays always used for the “Neutralising Rice-paste”
(tĕpong tawar) rite, and we then started in a couple of boats for the fishing-
stakes, taking with us the two remaining trays.
Of these two trays, one was suspended by Bilal Umat from a high wooden tripod
which had been erected for the purpose, the site selected being the centre of a
shoal about half-way between the fishing-stakes and the house. The third tray,
which contained the head of the goat (kapala kambing dĕngan buah-nya), was
then taken on to the fishing-stakes, Bilal Umat disposing of a large quantity of
miscellaneous offerings which he had brought with him in a basket by strewing
them upon the surface of the sea as we went along.^319
On reaching the stakes, the Pawang (Bilal Umat) suspended the tray from a
projecting pole at the seaward end of the fishing-stakes,^320 and then seating
himself upon one of the timbers almost directly underneath it, scattered handfuls
of saffron-stained rice, “washed” rice, and native cigarettes upon the water, just
outside the two seaward posts at the end of the stakes, and emptied out the
remainder of the parched rice upon the water just inside the “head” of the stakes.
Then he recited a charm, stirred the bowl of neutralising rice-paste (tĕpong
tawar) with the brush of leaves, and taking the latter out of the bowl, sprinkled,
or rather daubed it first upon the two “tide-braces” of the stakes (first upon the
left “tide-brace,” and then upon the right), then upon the heads of the two upright
posts next to the tide-braces, and then delegated the brush to two assistants. One
of these sprinkled the heads of all the (remaining) upright posts in the seaward
compartment of the stakes, while the other boarded the big boat belonging to the
stakes, and sprinkled the boat and all its gear from stem to stern (commencing on