Indo-China and its primitive people

by Henry Baudesson

[ Children scrambling over the Remains of the Wedding Feast. ]

We encouraged this artist with an offer of some cigarettes, and presently he began to play for a dance, of which the principal movements seemed to be raising the feet in turn, and striking the ground with the heels or a stick. These operations became more rapid and ended with a tremendous contortion of the whole body. It reminded me forcibly of the well-known "bear dance," and is not peculiar to the Moï, being also popular in Thibet.

Both the musician and the dancer were rewarded with the most unstinted applause and invited to take a well-earned rest in view of the orgy which now followed. On such an occasion the Moï regard sobriety as an insult to the host, and indeed the charge could not have been levelled at any of the guests then assembled. The last stage of the proceedings was the distribution of presents, for interest can always seal the bonds of friendship. At a given signal the husband flung lemons, mangoes, areca nuts and other fruits among the crowd, who scrambled for them without the least regard for order or good manners. For some moments a free fight seemed imminent, but good humour finally prevailed and the combatants dispersed chewing the inevitable betel and bidding each other an inebriated farewell.

Among the Moï, as everywhere else, the birth of a child is an occasion for rejoicing both to the family and the village. Such is the fear that malevolent spirits will assail the mother during the critical period that a special hut is made for her accommodation and all strangers are forbidden to enter the village itself. This prohibition, or "taboo," is known as "Dieng" in some regions and as "Calam" in others. The experienced traveller will never dream of attempting to evade it and expose himself to a summary vengeance at the hands of the inhabitants, who are under orders to see it enforced. Foreigners stand in no privileged position and we ourselves had frequent occasion to bewail this absurd regulation. Imagine our rage after a hard day's march under a tropical sun or soaked by torrential rains when we found ourselves condemned to spend the night perched in trees for fear of tigers, with the fires of a tabooed village burning almost under our noses! The punishment of Tantalus was nothing to this, and little consolation is to be derived from inveighing against the ignorance which is the offspring of such blind superstition.

The house in which the mother-to-be is lodged is distinguished from the others by a tuft of pompelmoose and a piece of charcoal suspended from the roof. About the time when the happy event is to take place all the inhabitants forgather in a special place to await the good news.

Even to-day in certain European countries custom forbids the husband and family to be present during labour.

If the group is not altogether destitute, sacrifices must be offered to conciliate the Spirits, especially if it seems likely that complications are threatening. Of course, the villagers offer no more than they can help. The bidding, so to speak, for divine favour generally starts with an egg and rises if the complications continue. The egg will be followed by a chicken, then a goat, then a pig, and finally an ox in cases of extreme necessity.

Only the woman's nearest relations are allowed to be present at the accouchement, for which she assumes a sitting position. As soon as labour begins they rub her stomach from top to bottom with tiger's gut and make her lean against the knees of a female nurse. This is not a universal practice, for in the North, among the Tho, for example, the woman stands supported by two cords passed under her armpits. Immediately after the birth the child is washed and anointed with cocoa-nut oil. The navel-string is then cut with a sharpened bamboo and the severed end tied up with a cotton thread or a blade of long grass. The placenta is buried either in the house itself or in some place adjacent.

It is interesting to compare these rites with those which accompany the same event among certain African races. Among the Bushongo of the Belgian Congo the woman adopts a sitting position and is supported by the knees of a midwife. The placenta is likewise buried and also, at a later stage, the foreskin of the child, if male. In Mandeling (on the western frontier of Sumatra) the child is first washed and then kept in confinement in the house, the natives claiming that this procedure secures the child against evil influences.