the Eldest Magician.

'Yes,' said the Man. 'But now we must go back to Perak, and that is a
weary way to paddle. If we had waited till Pau Amma had gone out of
Pusat Tasek and come home, the water would have carried us there by
itself.'

'You are lazy,' said the Eldest Magician. 'So your children shall be
lazy. They shall be the laziest people in the world. They shall be
called the Malazy--the lazy people;' and he held up his finger to the
Moon and said, 'O Fisherman, here is the Man too lazy to row home. Pull
his canoe home with your line, Fisherman.'

'No,' said the Man. 'If I am to be lazy all my days, let the Sea work
for me twice a day for ever. That will save paddling.'

And the Eldest Magician laughed and said,

'_Payah kun_' (That is right).

And the Rat of the Moon stopped biting the line; and the Fisherman let
his line down till it touched the Sea, and he pulled the whole deep Sea
along, past the Island of Bintang, past Singapore, past Malacca, past
Selangor, till the canoe whirled into the mouth of the Perak River
again.

'_Kun?_' said the Fisherman of the Moon.

'_Payah kun_,' said the Eldest Magician. 'See now that you pull the Sea
twice a day and twice a night for ever, so that the Malazy fishermen may
be saved paddling. But be careful not to do it too hard, or I shall make
a magic on you as I did to Pau Amma.'

Then they all went up the Perak River and went to bed, Best Beloved.

Now listen and attend!

From that day to this the Moon has always pulled the sea up and down and
made what we call the tides. Sometimes the Fisher of the Sea pulls a
little too hard, and then we get spring-tides; and sometimes he pulls a
little too softly, and then we get what are called neap-tides; but
nearly always he is careful, because of the Eldest Magician.

And Pau Amma? You can see when you go to the beach, how all Pau Amma's
babies make little Pusat Taseks for themselves under every stone and
bunch of weed on the sands; you can see them waving their little
scissors; and in some parts of the world they truly live on the dry land
and run up the palm trees and eat cocoa-nuts, exactly as the
girl-daughter promised. But once a year all Pau Ammas must shake off
their hard armour and be soft--to remind them of what the Eldest
Magician could do. And so it isn't fair to kill or hunt Pau Amma's
babies just because old Pau Amma was stupidly rude a very long time ago.

Oh yes! And Pau Amma's babies hate being taken o