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THE NALAWAN SOCIETY 407
invocation marks an emotional crisis in the ceremonial. A feeling
of awe seems to enter with the ï¬Årst longedrawn-out cry “ Litamat
-a—¢—¢i As the voice draws nearer the sound name» is
blown on the lemes naainggol inside the amel, Every time that
these tomes cry out, the call "lilamatz â€ù goes up. Then the
crying of the temes ceases, only to begin afresh a few minutes
later and be answered once more by the invocation to be at
peace. This continues until the caller oornes into sight, He is
an old man of very high Nalawau rank; his face, body, and
legs are painted white all over with lime, and on his head he
wears the Nalau/an mask tame: napal. As he approaches the
mrwl, from which the voices of the temes are coming, he calls
out to them: " Walzmg me I " (" Depart now! ") and they reply
as before. He then takes a stick of the nettleit beside the gongs, and addresses the temes once more, saying:
" Aavu, uto mIm' um‘ I " (“ Grandfather, abide thou long here ! â€ù).
This is spoken not in the dialect of Seniang, nor of any of the
neighbouring districts, but in that of some unidentiï¬Åed region
to the south called M al'or. The names now reply with the slow
mournful alternation of two notes which is known as mmm
singgew, and at last become silent.
N imbatin N a’amel
There is no complete record of the rites of the grade Nimbatin
Naamel. It is during his entry into this, his fourth grade, that
the candidate performs the ceremony of "cutting the sacred
yam If this were not the iourth time that the man had
oelcbrated his entrance to a Nalawrm then this episode would
be Omitted, for it is associated with the number of Nalawan
which he has entered rather than with any special one.
For "cutting the sacred yarn " (silt mbrlai limbu) a yarn
is painted red, and held by a man, of probably higher Nalawan
rank than the candidate. The latter then takes a knife, and
the two men dance round the gongs in opposite directions. As
they pass each other the candidate slashes once at the yam,
cutting oï¬Å the top. When this has been done they both move
away from the gangs to opposite sides of the dancing ground.
Then they race backwards and forwards across it, passing one
another as though they were making runs in cricket. Suddenly,