The Jersey City news. (Jersey City [N.J.]) 1889-1906, 1889-11-29
UGLY ABOVE ALL.
QUEER FL cTS ABOUTTHE BATAKS
OF SUMATRA.

The Times of the Year When Love Ripehs
to Marriage-sitka's Queer Customs
Busters of Bric-a-Brac.
The population of Serapit turned out to
see us. The women were a strange con.
trast to the men in appearance. While
theslatter were as lean as whipping-posts,
Il uglier than most monkeys, the former
at least those under twenty or severe
plump, solidly built, full-bosomed crea.
lures, and there were at least half a dozen
in the crowd before us who might fairly
be termed good looking.
Blu the Older members of the commun-
ity, the women especially, almost pass my
powers OF description to give an idea OF
their weird ugliness. X. tersely summed
them up as baked monkey" but a
monkey would at least have had a cover
ing of hair, whereas these dreadful per-
sons had nothing but their very scanty
clothing to conceal any part OF the
leathery ~integument that was so tightly
shrunken over their skeleton bodies, and
looked so hard and dry that you expected
to hear them crackle when they moved.
Their faces seemed to consist solely of
skin drawn over a skull without a parti-
Gle of flesh, and looked precisely as If
some had tried to make a mask out
VI ~ ICaOlCI3 bUO lulj1llS Ad0 bAlIONA 4 Y
down in disgust and stamped on it. Yet
they seemed neither decrepit nor idiotic.
Ihe men carried their complement of
arms; one old fellow had girded on the
longest and crUokedest sword there. He
looked like Death with his scythe. A
woman, who Tesembled one of the dried
mummies OF blacks found in North
Queensland terminated, was pounding
paddy in a wooden mortar, SO concluded
that appearances were deceptive and
that they were not nearly so old as
they looked. Indeed, the Malayan races
are not long-lived, and really old people
are very scarce-Sllch an instance as the
late Sultan of Brunei, who lived to nearly
100, being almost unheard of.
And here is the appropriate place to
speak of the strange II unnatural prac-
tice universally aseribed to the Bataks
and confirmed by Dutch travellers,
though l do not understand that any
European has actually witnessed the
ceremony. When the elder members Of
a family have reached the stage of de-
crepitude n uSeleSSneSS tand what their
appearance must be one shudders to con-
template) a general meeting of relations
is held and the senile one is invited to as
cend a small tree, which the affectionate
relative then shake with all their might,
chanting songs expressive of hunger the
while. 1t he can succeed in holding on
until the shakers are tired out he is re-
prieved, but if, as is most likely, he
tumbies off, he is promptly despatched.
A Dutch author. Junghuhus, L think,
grimly remarks that this ceremony
usually takes place at the time of year
when lines are ripe, this fruit being very
plentiful and forming a large ingredient
in the cuisine of both Malays and Bataks.
But if the natives of the interior resemble
those whom / am describing, the meal
must be a mere form. | have forgotten
to state that the Bataks file or grind all
their incisor teeth down to the level of
the gums, and only the jaws of a hyena
could have disposed of one of the elders
of Serapit. AS to their c~annibalism there
cnn he no don bit EiRLn