Page 231 - Malay sketches

WITH A CASTING-NET

bugler sits on the extreme end of the prow, and
from time to time blows a call on the antique silver
trumpet of the regalia. Flags are flown, other boats
carry gongs and drums, and altogether the pleasure-
fleet makes a brave show and a considerable noise,
attracting the attention of all the dwellers on the
riverine.
The journey from the Sultan's palace at Kuala
Kangsar occupies two days, and on the morning of
the third all the ladies of the party, with all their
attendants and children (a good many still in arms),
disembark for the ceremony of digging out the,
turtle-eggs.
The ladies are in their smartest garments
and wear their costliest jewels. It is a blaze of
brilliant-coloured silks, of painted sarongs, cloth-of-
gold scarves, and embroidered gauze veils ; of bright
sunshades, gold bracelets, necklaces, and bangles ;
of curious jewelled brooches, massive hair-pins, and
rings flashing with the light of diamonds and
rubies.
The men appear in jackets, trousers, and sarongs
of hardly less striking hues ; but the horror of
Western dyes and Western schemes of colour has
demoralised the innate sense of
not yet Malay's
beauty and fitness, and nothing offends the eye as
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