Note 12 — Chapter VI · Magic Rites as affecting the Life of Man

The Polong resembles an exceedingly diminutive female figure or mannikin, being in point of size about as big as the top joint of the little finger. It will fly through the air to wherever it is told to go, but is always preceded by its pet or plaything (pĕmainan), the Pĕlĕsit, which, as has already been said, appears to be a species of house-cricket. Whenever the Polong wishes to enter (di-rasoki) a new victim, it sends the Pĕlĕsit on before it, and as soon as the latter, “flying in a headlong fashion (mĕnĕlĕntang mĕnjĕrongkong),” has entered its victim’s body, which it usually does tail-foremost, and begins to chirp, the Polong follows. It is generally hidden away outside the house by its owner (Jinjangan), and fed with blood pricked from the finger. The description usually given of a Polong tallies curiously with the Malay definition of the soul.12