Malay Magic _ Being an introduction to the - Walter William Skeat

sĕlaguri

pulut-

pulut

sapanggil

sapĕnoh

Further inquiry and the collection of additional material will no doubt help to
elucidate the general principles on which such selections are made.

Short rhyming charms are very often used as accompaniments of the rite of rice-
water, but appear to be seldom if ever repeated aloud. The following is a

specimen, and others will be found in the Appendix:^26 —

“Neutralising   Rice-paste, true    Rice-paste,

And,    thirdly,    Rice-paste  of  Kadangsa!

Keep    me  from    sickness,   keep    me  from    death,

Keep    me  from    injury  and ruin.”

Other not less important developments of the idea of lustration by water are to be
found in such ceremonies as the bathing of mother and child after a birth and the
washing of the floor (basoh lantei) upon similar occasions, the bathing of the

sick, of bride and bridegroom at weddings, of corpses (mĕruang),^27 and the
annual bathing expeditions (mandi Safar), which are supposed to purify the
persons of the bathers and to protect them from evil (tolak bala).

Fasting, or the performance of religious penance, which is now but seldom
practised, would appear to have been only undertaken in former days with a
definite object in view, such as the production of the state of mental exaltation
which induces ecstatic visions, the acquisition of supernatural powers (sakti),
and so forth.

The fast always took place, of course, in a solitary spot, and not unfrequently
upon the top of some high and solitary hill such as Mount Ophir (Gunong
Ledang), on the borders of Malacca territory. Frequently, however, much lower