on arrival, and whatever the cause may have been, it is a fact that Mohit’s
mother died a day or two after the conclusion of the wedding ceremonies, and
that Mohit himself was taken ill almost immediately and died only about a
fortnight later.
The only person who, in former days, was not in the least affected by the royal
taboos which protected the regalia from the common touch was the (now I
believe extinct) official who held the post of Court Physician (Maharaja Lela).
He, and he alone, might go freely in the royal apartments wherever he chose, and
the immunity and freedom which he enjoyed in this respect passed into a
proverb, the expression “to act the Court Physician” (buat Maharaja Lela) being
used to describe an altogether unwarrantable familiarity or impertinence.
The following story (though I tell it against myself) is perhaps the best
illustration I can give of the great danger supposed to be incurred by those who
meddle with the paraphernalia of royalty. Among the late Sultan’s insignia of
royalty (in 1897) were a couple of drums (gĕndang) and the long silver trumpet
which I have already described. Such trumpets are found among the kabĕsaran
or regalia of most Malay States, and are always, I believe, called lĕmpiri or
nĕmpiri (Pers. nafiri). They are considered so sacred that they can only be
handled or sounded, it is believed, by a tribe of Malays called “Orang Kalau,” or
the “Kalau men,”^53 as any one else who attempted to sound them would be
struck dead. Even the “Orang Kalau,” moreover, can only sound this instrument
at the proper time and season (e.g. at the proclamation of a new sovereign), for if
they were to sound it at any other time its noise would slay all who heard it,
since it is the chosen habitation of the “Jin Karaja’an” or State Demon,^54 whose
delight it would be, if wrongfully disturbed, to slay and spare not.^55