Travel Reference
In-Depth Information
whose sinuous movements were quite unlike anything he had seen
before:
Their feet and legs are but little employed, except sometimes to
turn round very gently. But their hands, arms, head and body are in
continued motion, especially their arms which they turn and twist so
strangely, that you would think them to be made without bones
.
17
Dampier was the first Englishman to describe this art form
which is now more associated with Bali and other parts of Indonesia.
On another occasion, he described with fascinated attention to detail
the ceremonies accompanying the Muslim circumcision rite:
. . . most of the men, both in city and country being in arms before
the house, begin to act as if they were engaged with an enemy, hav-
ing such arms as I described. Only one acts at a time, the rest make
a great ring of 200 or 300 yards round about him. He that is to exer-
cise comes into the ring with a great shriek or two, and a horrid look;
then he fetches two or three large stately strides, and falls to work. He
holds his broad sword in one hand, and his lance in the other, and tra-
verses his ground, leaping from one side of the ring to the other; and
in a menacing posture and look, bids defiance to the enemy, whom his
fancy frames to him; for there is nothing but air to oppose him. Then he
stamps and shakes his head, and grinning with his teeth makes many
rueful faces. Then he throws his lance, and nimbly snatches out his
cresset [i.e. creese, a dagger], with which he hacks and hews the air like
a madman, often shrieking. At last, being almost tired with motion, he
flies to the middle of the ring, where he seems to have his enemy at his
mercy, and with two or three blows cuts on the ground as if he was
cutting off his enemy's head. By this time he is all of a sweat, and with-
draws triumphantly out of the ring, and presently another enters with
