d wife in the presence of all,
for is it not written, "Written deeds may be forged, destroyed, or
altered; but the memory of what is transacted in the presence of a
thousand witnesses must remain sacred? Allah il Allah!" And all the
people answered, "Suka! Suka!" (We wish it! We wish it!)

Then Mamat took his seat on the dais beside the bride, and the punghulo
passed about the betel-box. First, Busuk took out a syrah leaf smeared
with lime and placed in it some broken fragments of the betel-nut,
and chewed it until a bright red liquid oozed from the corners of
her mouth. The others did the same.

Then the women brought garlands of flowers--red allamandas, yellow
convolvulus, and pink hibiscus--and hung them about Busuk and Mamat,
while the musicians outside beat their crocodile-hide drums in
frantic haste.

The great feast began out in the sandy plaza before the houses. There
was cock-fighting and kicking the ragga ball, wrestling and boxing,
and some gambling among the elders.

Toward night Busuk was put in a rattan chair and carried by the
young men, while Mamat and the girls walked by her side, a mile away,
where her husband's big cadjang-covered prau lay moored. It was to
take them to his bungalow at Bander Bahru. The band went, too, and
the boys shot off guns and fire-crackers all the way, until Busuk's
head swam, and she was so happy that the tears came into her eyes
and trickled down through the rouge on her cheeks.

So ended Busuk's childhood. She was not quite fifteen when she became
mistress of her own little palm-thatched home. But it was not play
housekeeping with her; for she must weave the sarongs for Mamat and
herself for clothes and for spreads at night, and the weaving of
each cost her twenty days' hard labor. If she could weave an extra
one from time to time, Mamat would take it up to Singapore and trade
it at the bazaar for a pin for the hair or a sunshade with a white
fringe about it.

Then there were the shell-fish and prawns on the sea-shore to be
found, greens to be sought out in the jungle, and the padi, or rice,
to be weeded. She must keep a plentiful supply of betel-nut and lemon
leaves for Mamat and herself, and one day there was a little boy to
look after and make tiny sarongs for.

So, long before the time that our American girls are out of school, and
about the time they are putting on long dresses, Busuk was a woman. Her
shoulders were bent, her face wrinkled, her teeth decaye