universal sentiment. Fortunately, the Resident was present, and the
supreme head; never for a moment would he allow the possibility of such
an unbridled expedition to have a lodgement in their minds. He turned to
Abun, who had more men under his command than any other Chief, and to him
put the question whether he would be willing to lead an expedition into
the country of the Lerons, and solemnly promise that none but Leron men
should be killed. The young fellow had a hard struggle; ardently as he
longed to approve his lately inherited Chiefship by leading a head-hunt,
and piously as he desired to honour his father’s grave with a fresh
head, he knew the heavy fines the Government would impose on his House
if innocent people were killed, and he distrusted the precipitate temper
of his followers. All eyes were fixed on him as, for several seconds, he
sat silent, gazing intently at a little pile of pebbles he was pushing
up with his widespread toes. Then without lifting his eyes he almost
whispered to the Resident, ‘Tuan, I cannot promise so much for my men.
Every one of them has known me as a mere boy. Although they follow me for
my father’s sake, I cannot promise they will do as I command when we get
in sight of any dweller on the Tinjar, armed or unarmed. No, I cannot
lead the expedition and keep this promise.’
At this reply, a grunt of unmistakable disapproval was emitted by
the whole circle, and, to prevent at once any more insubordinate
offers like Ma Obat’s, Dr. Hose immediately ended all discussion by a
diplomatic speech, delivered after their fashion with great emphasis, and
brought them all round (mere children as they are) to believe that the
expedition had been a brilliant, absolute success. Was it not manifest
that the enemy had scattered, and fled in wild disorder before them?
Had not the real object of the war been gained? Were they not glorious
conquerors, every one of them, since all danger to women and children
had been removed? What hostile Leron would now dare to lurk about the
rice-clearings, after he had noted the traces of this resolute army of
invincible warriors? The only thing to do now was to start an enormous
peace expedition into the Tinjar country, and put an end, once for all,
to the present feuds by the payment and collection of ‘Usut’ [indemnity]
and by the performance of ‘Jawa’ [a sham battle].
The speech was greeted with a shout as triumphant as if they saw the
backs of their enemy disappearing before them; they sprang to their
feet, and spears, shields, and parangs clattered, and plumes waved, and
so clearly were they victors, that, in imagination, each warrior had a
foeman’s head dangling at his belt.
One and all turned to retrace their steps. Where but an hour before,
in strained silence, we had crept stealthily, now, that all danger of
a lurking foe was dispelled, we scrambled along, laughing, shouting,
clattering iron-shod spears on the stones, and hurrying to be first at
the boats. Abun, Madong, and Batu did not share in this exultant mood;
they alone seemed down-hearted; they and their household must continue to
endure the burdensome restrictions of mourning.
It was during this straggling march that the ‘fencing-master,’ who
was, it appears, a Past-Master in knowledge of all rites and usages
of war, and his word law, announced that in a case like the present,
where a war-party had failed to bring home a head because the enemy had
scattered, it was quite in accordance with time-honoured, head-hunting
custom to borrow a head; the benign influence, from a relic thus
rejuvenated by posing as a head freshly taken, would then be diffused
in its adopted home. This announcement amazingly heartened the young
brothers.
We now shot in a few hours through rapids and over rocks, where, on our
way up, we had toiled almost all day long. As the sun slowly declined,
the faster we raced, helter-skelter; spray was flying, paddles thumping,
the canoes, creaking and grinding over the rocks, dashed together in a
mad race to be the first to reach Juman’s house and proclaim the glorious
news that we had put the enemy to flight. The canoe wherein I sat, was
one of the earliest to reach Bowang Takun, and I could, therefore, count
the canoes as they came darting through the dense leafy arch where the
smaller stream entered the Baram. There were in all sixty by the count.
No sooner were they drawn up on the sloping bank, than their occupants,
numbering at least six hundred, were one and all, dashing and splashing
in the water. [Indeed, it might be almost asserted that the Kayans and
Kenyahs live as much in the water as out of it. Although they may have
been wading alongside of their canoes all day, yet there is never a halt
of even a few minutes that they do not divest themselves of their one
garment and at least extend themselves in the water, if it is not deep
enough for swimming. It would be as monstrous for a Kayan boy not to know
how to swim as for a white boy not to know how to run.]
[Illustration: A STEALTHY APPROACH TO THE HOUSE OF AN ENEMY.]
After the restful bath and the cooking of the evening meal, on the
bank,—this time we were not Juman’s guests,—the expedition began to
disband. Those who lived only a short distance up or down the river
heaped their cumbersome accoutrements in their canoes and glided off into
the darkness.
Abun’s party had a pious duty to perform; accordingly, we spent the
night at Bowang Takun, where Abun was going to borrow the head. The loan
was transacted with minutest care; the head was reverently lifted from
its resting-place by a very old man, whose remnant of days on earth was
nearly spent, and who, therefore, shrank less, than a younger man would
shrink, from a touch which is sure to be followed by speedy death. From
the moment that the skull was touched a deep solemnity fell on all. No
laugh, no jest, no light word broke the reverence of what all felt to be
a holy act. The skull was carefully swathed in palm leaves and tied under
the bow of Abun’s boat, so that it just grazed the water.
Early on the following morning we all set out for Long Lama, Abun’s boat
in the lead, and without stopping all that day we drifted silently down
with the slow current under a scorching sun. Abun’s canoe and one or two
others pushed on a little faster than the rest, and when at about five
o’clock in the afternoon we were distant from Long Lama only one turn
of the river, we found that they had there disembarked, and had already
prepared a wonderfully decorated and elaborate camp; there the whole
party must remain for the night, and not be even seen by any member of
Abun’s household till dawn of the next day. All around the tent-like
shelter of palm leaves were horizontal poles resting on forked sticks,
whereon were hung the war-coats and caps, and the almost solid wall,
thereby made, was completed by the shields, which were leaned against
it to fill in any gaps. Spear-points glittered everywhere, and in front
of this hut, or shelter, there was reared an archway of sticks, whereof
the bark had been cut up in curled frills along the whole length.[9] Down
near the edge of the water was a pile of green bamboo joints decorated
with bands of plaited palm leaf; in these the rice must be cooked,
and not in earthen pots,—possibly an instance of the tendency in all
ceremonial rites to return to the most primitive methods.[10]
[In the accompanying photograph, Madong, the second son, is the
well-built young fellow in the foreground; next to him is a young warrior
whose name, I think, is Jok; then comes Abun, the Chief, with one hand
resting on his shield; immediately on his left is Batu, the youngest son;
and in front of him the elderly man, with close-cropped hair and upturned
face, is the ‘fencing-master.’ At his feet is the pile of bamboo joints,
and near them several hampers containing rolls of palm-leaf matting,
whereon the natives sleep. In the background are the rows of war-coats
and shields. I was at a disadvantage in taking this photograph; the light
from the last rays of the setting sun was poor, and the support for my
camera was an unstable sand-bank.]
The taboo against visiting the house did not extend to Dr. Hose and
myself, nor to Dr. Hose’s Iban crew; none of us belonged to the
household; so we left the Kayans at their sacred encampment, and were
soon settled for the night amid all the comforts the house of Abun could
afford.
[Illustration: THE RETURN FROM A HEAD-HUNT.
THE CAMP OF ABUN’S FOLLOWERS ON THE EVENING BEFORE THE RETURN TO THEIR
HOUSE WITH THE BORROWED HEAD, WHICH WAS TO REMOVE THE RESTRICTIONS
IMPOSED BY THE MOURNING FOR A DEAD CHIEF.]
At the very first faint glimmer of dawn I was awakened by an unusual
stir throughout the house. The women and children and the few men who
were so unfortunate as to have been obliged to remain behind, were all
collecting along the edge of the veranda below the eaves, whence they
could get a view of the river. Just at the very instant that the sun
sent its first shaft of level light down the long expanse of river we
heard coming from up-stream, a solemn, low, deep-toned chant, or rather
humming, in harmony. There were no articulate words, only a continuous
sound, in different keys, from treble to bass, of the double vowel _oo_,
as in _boom_. A minute later the long line of canoes, lashed three
abreast, slowly rounded the turn, and drifted toward the house. The
men were all standing erect on the thwarts arrayed in all their many
coloured war-clothes, with bands of plaited palm leaves around their
knees and elbows and also on every spear and paddle. Only a few were
at the paddles, merely enough to steer the procession, while all the
others stood as motionless as statues, holding their spears upright and
the point of their shields resting at their feet. On and on they slowly
glided, propelled, it almost seemed, by this inexpressibly solemn dirge,
which was wafting this sacred skull to a home it must for ever bless. The
brilliant colours of the war-coats flashed brighter every minute as the
sun rose higher, and lit up the framework of the wondrous pageant;—the
cloudless blue sky over-head, the myriad spangled ripples of the
glistening river beneath the dark masses of heavy foliage, suggesting,
yet hiding, the ever-mysterious jungle, the hushed, awe-stricken group
of women and children, awaiting the warriors’ return, and over all, the
silence of earth and sky, broken only by the modulated cadences of that
impressive harmony. On, on, they glided until the three foremost canoes
touched the bank; then Abun alighted and unloosed the skull, still in its
coverings of palm leaves, from the bow of his boat. In order to watch the
ceremony more narrowly, I left the veranda as the boats neared the beach,
and I shall not soon forget Abun’s solemn, absorbed demeanour. I could
not catch his eye, and, unlike his usual self, he took not the smallest
notice of my presence, nor did any of the others. Every face wore the
wrapt expression of a profoundly religious rite. Without intermitting
the chant, Abun, bearing the skull, led the procession in single file to
the up-river end of the house. [The skull was now representing a freshly
taken head, and there was no longer any danger to those who touched
it.] When they were all gathered, still chanting, in a close group, the
old ‘fencing-master’ stepped out to the front with a blow-pipe, and,
looking in the direction of the Tinjar River (still chanting), addressed
a vehement warning to the enemy, and then (still chanting) raised the
blow-pipe to his lips, and blew a dart high in the air to carry the
message to them. The chanting instantly ceased, and all gave a wild,
exultant shout! The skull was placed upon the ground and its wrappings
broken, and on four stakes near by were placed the bleeding fragments of
a chicken which the ‘fencing-master’ had torn apart as if it were a piece
of paper. Each warrior, in turn, then advanced and gravely brandished
his parang over the skull, and, walking past the four stakes, smeared
the blood of the chicken on his knees, and addressed the spirit of the
fowl in a prayer to ‘protect him from all dangers, to impart strength and
courage, and drive out all pains and stiffness from his bones.’ After
they had passed the last stake they gave a loud, shrill shout, leaped
high in the air, and ran quickly up the notched log into the house.
By this ceremony each one cast off the taboo of mourning. When all
those who had actually been on the expedition had performed it, then
followed those who had been obliged to remain at home; and after them,
the small boys, even those who were scarcely able to walk. Everyone,
without exception, must be adorned with bands of palm-leaf strips bound
round their knees and elbows, and must be dressed in war-clothes. The
small boys, however, wore only war-caps, not decorated with horn-bill
feathers, but with the skull of a horn-bill, or the long feathers of the
Argus pheasant. Those who were too tiny to hold a parang were carried by
their fathers, and their little hands were guided while a feeble stroke
was made at the head. Between their little lips several grains of rice,
boiled in a bamboo joint, were then put, to symbolize that they too had
been in a warriors’ camp and partaken of warriors’ fare. Then they were
carried past the stakes, and smeared with the blood, while the father
uttered the prayer for them, and, in place of the leap and manly shout,
gave a bound in the air, and an explosive exclamation, before carrying
them hurriedly up to the veranda.
As soon as every male inmate of the house, from feeble age to toddling
infancy, had performed this rite, in a flash the charm of the taboo
was snapt! In a twinkling, every corner in the house seemed turned
into a barber’s chair. Ever since the death of Oyang Luhat, the late
Chief, no hair had been trimmed, and long locks, so unsightly to Kayan
eyes, had grown on the temples of the exquisite youths and fastidious
loungers, who, before the taboo, figured as the ‘glass of fashion,’
as they certainly are always the ‘mould of form.’ Turn and turn about
they scraped each other, and when the operation was finished, (which,
judging from the character of the knives, must have been a fine lesson
in the endurance of agony,) each one carefully gathered up the hair,
and, rolling it in a ball, spit vigorously on it, and threw it as far as
he could out of the veranda. I imagine this was done with the idea of
preventing any one from collecting the hair, and thereby working a charm
against the owner; or it may be that spitting upon the hair exorcises any
evil Spirit lurking in it. I asked many a one why it was done, but the
only reply was, ‘Adat seja’—_merely custom_.
[Illustration: WAR-CAPS OF RATTAN AND SPLIT BAMBOO.]
[In connection with this instance of a possible survival of primitive
religion, let me mention that in this remote region I found an example
of another well-known ancient custom:—wooden images are fashioned in
the likeness of an enemy, and placed in the jungle; as the wooden
representative decays the original sickens and dies.[11] In ‘The Free
Museum of Science and Art,’ in Philadelphia, two of these images are
preserved. They represent Dr. Hose and Tama Bulan. They were made by
the Lerons after the killing of Tinggi, to be revenged on these two
arch-foes. They were discovered by a friendly native and brought to Dr.
Hose, whose image happily shows as yet no sign of decay; from the last
reports the original also was in excellent health. See next page.]
Of course, it is quite unbefitting for women to go through the rite
of slashing at the head; they never go on war expeditions. Therefore,
they are freed from their mourning by being sprinkled with water dipped
from the river in the palm leaves wherewith the head has been wrapped.
Thereafter they resume their ornaments of bead-work, their ponderous
brass ear-rings, and don fillets of gaily coloured cloth.
When every member of the household has been freed from the taboo by these
rites, a fragment of the skull, wrapped in palm leaves, is attached to
a long rope of bamboo twigs, and solemnly carried to the grave of the
Chief, which, in the present case, was about half a mile down-stream.
In the path which the sons and near relatives have to take to reach the
grave, a living chicken, with its legs tied, is placed, and on it each
one, in passing, must tread, (the poor fowl does not survive more than
two or three footfalls.) The fragment of skull, lifted on the tip of a
long bamboo pole, is hung to the edge of the ornamentation on top of the
grave. When this is finished, all that can be possibly done to honour a
dead Bornean Chief has been performed.
[Illustration: Wooden effigies of Dr. Hose and Tama Bulan, which were
left to decay in the jungle, and thereby accomplish the death of the
originals. One-half natural size.
I think the one on the left is Dr. Hose.]
At night, the men who were away in the rice-fields, when the war-party
returned, attain their freedom by smearing with the blood of fowls
a little piece of wood cut into a brush of fine strips at one end;
this brush they fasten on the side of one of their large basket-work
fish-traps, placed on the floor of the veranda, and against this
ensanguined brush they rub their knees, before uttering their prayer and
giving the shout and the leap which the warriors gave outside the house.
The fish-trap, on this occasion, they call their _Father_; ‘it catches
everything it sees, and is afraid of nothing.’
[Illustration: GRAVE OF OYONG LUHAT, THE FORMER CHIEF AT LONG LAMA.
A PIECE OF THE SKULL BORROWED TO TAKE THE PLACE OF A FRESHLY TAKEN HEAD
HAS BEEN PLACED ON THE FLAT ROOF ABOVE THE COFFIN, AND THE LONG STREAMER
OF SHREDDED PALM LEAVES ATTACHED TO THIS HALLOWED FRAGMENT OF SKULL
STILL HANGS FROM THE TOP OF THE GRAVE. THE BODY OF THE CHIEF RESTS IN A
COFFIN HEWN OUT OF A LOG AND PLACED HORIZONTALLY ACROSS THE TOP OF THE
HIGH COLUMN. OVER THE COFFIN IS FASTENED A LARGE, SQUARE SLAB OF WOOD,
CUT FROM A FLAT BUTTRESS ROOT OF A TAPANG TREE. THE STICKS PROJECTING
FROM THE SQUARE TOP OF THE GRAVE ARE STRUNG WITH CIGARETTES, WHICH CARRY
MESSAGES FROM THOSE WHO MADE THEM TO FRIENDS AND RELATIVES IN THE NEXT
WORLD.]
All hours of the next day are devoted to a promiscuous slaughter of
pigs and chickens, and to the preparation of a great feast; every one
contributes a pig or a fowl, according to his means; and on every pig’s
liver the fateful omens must be deciphered. At intervals, along the
whole length of the interminable veranda, are little enclosures wherein
sit the shrewd old Dayongs, whose exhortations, before the slaughter,
are potent with the pigs to have nice, lucky livers. As each pig, with
its legs tied, is brought and laid before the Dayong to be exhorted
and then killed, the owner pays the Dayong a small fee of a few beads,
a strip of cloth, or the blade of a parang; after this preliminary
fee-giving (a custom, not unknown elsewhere), the owner enters the little
enclosure, and, seating himself beside a large gong, proceeds to bang
it with a stick, and make as much din as possible; all the while the
Dayong lectures and exhorts the wretched pig. The owner while beating
the gong pays absolutely no attention to the Dayong’s words, which may
be possibly etiquette, but is certainly not surprising,—not a syllable
could be audible above the deafening squealing, clattering, banging
resounding on all sides. Very likely the Dayong desires to have his
platitudes overheard by no one except by the pig, whose attention to duty
is every now and then enforced by a vigorous thump in the side from the
fist, or a dig in the ribs from the thumb of his ghostly exhorter. When
the Dayong thinks the auspicious moment has arrived, and that the swine
has caught the drift of the exhortation, and has obligingly modified
the streakings of his liver, he plunges a knife in the animal’s throat,
catches the spouting blood in a bowl, and, before life is extinct, rips
open the paunch, and extracts the dripping liver, whereon, in characters
legible only to the Dayong, the pig had inscribed an assured knowledge
of the future. Now and then, an avaricious Dayong will persist in
reading dreadful portents on the liver; of course, a second pig must be
brought, and a second fee paid; and so on until the Dayong is satisfied,
then at once the signs become good. On the present occasion eighty-five
pigs and sixty fowls were sacrificed. The young boys who have been on
the expedition are made to feel that they are to be numbered among the
warriors, by being compelled, on that first evening after their return
from the head-hunt, to cook their own supper of pork and rice, and to
sleep in the veranda among the grown-up men.
The pork is cut into small cubes and boiled in bamboo joints; a very
pleasant flavor is thereby imparted to the meat, if you can shut your
eyes very tight to the fingers that prepare it.
After the feast was cooked and served in wooden trays and bowls, we
all squatted here and there about the veranda, and helped ourselves
to the toothsome delicacies of parboiled pork and chicken, excellent
boiled rice, pulverized salted fish, and bananas. Then dusty and musty
cords were cut on many a jar of ‘Borak,’ or sweetened rice beer, and
the festive cup, either half a cocoanut or blue pressed-glass tumbler,
was passed from lip to lip. Speeches were made, in which the invincible
bravery of every warrior was proclaimed, and frightful threats were
hinted as to the fate of the Lerons, had they not fled like the cowards
that they are. Festival songs and war-dances, with kaluri accompaniment,
followed. When the jars of Borak were drained to the dregs, one by one
the exhausted warriors crept to bed, saturated with the serene joy of
duty done, glory gained, and honour paid to their departed Chief.
Even after all these ceremonies and the feast, the house is not utterly
free from taboo: for ten days no work may be done in the clearings, nor
may the men go for rattans or any jungle product. There is always a
foundation of wisdom for these taboos. Thus, to keep the men collected in
or near the house for a number of days, after a head-hunting raid, is a
wise provision: the house cannot be surprised unawares by a retaliating
force.
Thus ended this memorable War Expedition of the Kayans and Kenyahs of the
Baram against the Lerons of the Tinjar, to vindicate Juman for the legal
killing of Tinggi and drive the Lerons back to their own district,—a
typical expedition, save alone that the Omen Birds were not consulted,
and that it did not end in a wild and wanton raid on innocent people.
[Illustration: WAR-COAT AND CAP MADE OF THE SKIN OF A MANIS.]
_‘JAWA’ OR PEACE-MAKING_
During the rainy months, when all work in the fields is suspended, and
Nature herself attends to the rice, every path in the jungle leads idle
feet to mischief, and, if war be forbidden by the Prenta, pent-up energy
may find a wild outlet in boisterous protestations of peace, provided
only that these protestations have at least a suggestion of war.
After our war expedition up the Baram just narrated, barely a fortnight
elapsed before we were organizing a great Peace-making with those very
people of the Tinjar who had been our foes. Tama Bulan, Tama Usong, Aban
Deng, and Juman, the chiefest Chiefs of the Kayans and Kenyahs, with all
their numerous warriors, were eager to join in the Peace-making, and
pledge themselves to the Tinjar people for the friendliness of all the
dwellers on the Baram and its tributaries.
Accordingly, the Baram Chiefs were summoned to the Fort, and the day
before this great army of peace-makers set out, Dr. Hose invited these
Chiefs and their adherents to a lavish feast at his house. The viands
were prepared according to the taste of the guests, and, to make all
feel perfectly at home, served on the floor of the veranda; the arrack,
however, was of extra Chinese brew, and, of course, superior and very
much stronger than the diluted, home-brewed liquor to which they were
accustomed. Consequently, the hilarity and fluency of song and speech,
upon a liberal and well-laid foundation of boiled pork, chicken, rice,
and salted fish, was exuberant, but never boisterous. Perhaps the
presence of so many powerful Chiefs, above all, that of the all-powerful
Resident, had a restraining influence. We all sat down (should I not say,
squatted?) at about four in the afternoon, and the last of the guests
departed to their quarters in the Bazaar at about eleven o’clock at
night. About fifteen pounds of tobacco were consumed, three good-sized
pigs were stowed away, and the Chinese shop-keepers alone know how many
jars of arrack were unsealed. Tama Bulan and Tama Usong were the last
to leave the scene of revelry, and we watched (I must admit with great
relief) their dusky figures disappear down the path, as, linked arm in
arm, they meandered off in the broad moonlight toward the Bazaar.