to appear, and since it was partly on his account that the trouble
between the people of the two rivers had arisen, the Peace-making
would be incomplete without him. In Borneo, after past wrongs, peace
and good-fellowship cannot be gained by simple asseverations; there
must be always a palpable exchange of beads, highly prized jars, brass
gongs, etc., as an indemnity. The perpetrator of the wrong, or one of
his descendants, must be present with his adherents to join in the sham
fight, known as the ‘Jawa.’ The canoes of the peace-party were laden
accordingly with articles for exchange, and with the paraphernalia of the
men who were to engage in the sham fight.
At an early hour on the morning after the feast, we started up-river in
the Government’s steam launch, for which the river is navigable for at
least sixty miles above the Fort; behind us trailed the long line of
canoes with the peace-makers,—a pretty woe-begone, head-achey looking
lot, after the Chinese arrack of the night before. As the day wore on and
we steamed slowly up against the strong current, dodging the ponderous
logs that swept past, one by one the Chiefs climbed up from their canoes
and sat limp and taciturn around us on the small deck of the steamer.
Still no sign of Juman and his party. We had expected to meet him before
we turned off into the Tinjar River. So necessary a personage could not
be left behind; therefore, a letter was left for him at the mouth of the
Tinjar. On a large sheet of paper, we painted a picture of a steam boat
heading up-stream with inky volumes of smoke issuing from the funnel and
a long line of canoes in tow; underneath was a gigantic hand pointing
up-stream. This letter was fastened in a cleft pole stuck up on the bank;
then we steamed at full speed up the large tributary.
[Illustration: A CHARM AGAINST FEVER.
THE BARRIER AND CHARMS DEVISED BY THE DAYONG TO WARD OFF EVIL SPIRITS
FROM THE HOUSE OF THE LELAK CLAN, AND TO DRIVE AWAY THE DEMONS WHO WERE
ALREADY AFFLICTING THE HEAD-MAN OF THE HOUSE WITH FEVER AND TRYING TO
LURE THE SOUL OUT OF HIS BODY.]
A lovely feature peculiar to the Tinjar River is the hills cultivated
with rice. On the lower reaches of the Baram, the flat, swampy ground
extends for a mile or more from the river on both sides. Here, clearings
extend over low undulating hills, and at this season of the year the rice
was already six inches tall, and its tender emerald green was unspeakably
refreshing after the dark foliage of the jungle. Twice we passed groups
of men and women busily weeding the fields; but, poor wretches, as
if their toil were not enough, they must all needs be clad in heavy
war-cloaks; they had heard, so they said, that there was an enormous
head-hunting army on the way from the Baram, and they were in hourly
terror of being attacked and killed. We allayed their fears, and were
delighted to learn that the fame of our War Expedition had travelled so
bravely and had lost nothing in transmission.
Early in the afternoon we reached the household of the Lelaks, and halted
for the night, to allow Juman to catch up with us. The old man of the
house, whose adherents were not numerous enough to entitle him to the
rank of a ‘Penghulu,’ and whose wealth was insufficient for the title of
‘Orang Kaya’ (_Rich Man_), merely presided over his household by reason
of his age, and was known simply as the ‘Orang Tuah’ (_Old Man_). On our
arrival, we were told that he was almost at death’s door from an attack
of fever, and that every resource known to Dayong art had been tried in
vain; evidently, the evil Spirits had resolved to entice his soul away,
in spite of the elaborate barrier which the Dayongs had professionally
erected in front of his house.
This barrier consisted of a circle of stakes cut, at intervals down their
sides, into curled shavings; in the centre of the circle stood a high,
squared pole painted with stripes of red and black; at about four feet
from the ground, and again near its top, were cross-bars piercing it from
front to back and from side to side. At its base stood an earthen jar
filled with water, and round about outside the circle was a bristling
thicket or sort of _chevaux de frise_ of posts and stakes cut into
manifold fringes of shavings, and several cleft sticks about three feet
high, holding in the cleft an egg. To the Dayongs, these curled shavings
and cleft sticks have a profound meaning which they either did not know
or did not wish to divulge. All these prophylactics were, however, in
vain; the evil Spirits obstinately and perversely refused to depart from
the old man. Not being an angel, I pressed fearlessly within this charmed
ground, and even took photographs there in spite of Tama Bulan’s solemn
warning. He would not go near the barrier, and in awed tones warned me
that just as sure as I touched any of those stakes I would have horrid
dreams and most assuredly be clutched by a ghost and hideously scarred
for life; should the ghost chance to clutch me by the throat, I would
choke to death and never wake.[12]
After I had taken the photograph, we paid a visit to the old man as he
lay feverishly tossing and turning on his hard board bed. I administered
to him a placebo in the form of an assurance that I had skilfully caught
and imprisoned the evil Spirits in my ‘box-with-an-eye’ (_my camera_),
and they would trouble him no more; then, abandoning the ‘faith cure,’ I
administered a generous dose of quinine.
The Lelaks are an unusually industrious household; they cultivate an
abundance of rice and keep it stored for rainy days, in granaries which,
although they are far away from their dwellings and hidden in the jungle,
they decorate with graceful designs in black paint upon a white ground.
In their houses, also, almost every beam-end is carved into barbaric
figures of men or of monkeys in twisted positions with arms and legs
interlacing; also many of the upright posts supporting the roof have
carved in them deep niches to serve as seats.
In the evening, under the benign effects of a hearty meal of rice and
fish and of numerous cigarettes, Tama Bulan became jovial, and his broad,
genial smile beamed to right and left on all as he sat with his back
against one of the carved house-posts, and proposed that we the guests
should be entertained with some of the dances for which the Lelak women
are famous. Of course, the women were coquettishly shy at first and
scurried off to their rooms. Tama Bulan was not, however, to be thus put
off or put down, but appealed to the Orang Tuah to send searching parties
for the best dancers. Then he turned to Dr. Hose, and, in a metaphor of
which he was fond, said, chuckling, ‘Tuan, this fishing doesn’t seem to
be very successful; all the good, plump fish have gone up-stream, and
left us nothing but these bony ones;’ here he nodded toward some old
and thin beldames, calling them by the names of the poorer kinds of
fish which generally are thrown away; but when, a few moments later,
three young girls, dressed in their best skirts and with bright-coloured
fillets round their heads, shuffled coyly out from their rooms ready for
the dance, he lit a fresh cigarette and settled back comfortably in his
seat, saying, ‘Aha! Here are plump fish worth looking at.’
[Illustration: DECORATED STORE HOUSE FOR RICE.
THE PLANT GROWING DENSELY AROUND IT, IS WILD TAPIOCA.]
The dance was like that of almost all of the Malay and allied races, more
waving of the arms and swaying of the body than movements of the feet.
It was exceedingly like the dances of the Javanese, wherein movements
of hands and wrists are the chief features. It appeared to be a solemn
performance; instead of the fixed, mechanical smile of our ballet
dancers, there was a stare of constrained solemnity verging on a scowl.
The effect on the dancers themselves was marked; demure as were their
motions, their excitement was great. One of them suddenly ceased and,
leaning against the wall, declared that she was exhausted with the
strain. Although the movements of the dance had been slow and gentle, she
was undeniably almost in an ecstatic trance, with eyes half closed and
breathing labored.
Very different were the Kayan dances which followed; the men vied with
each other in wild leaps and shouts, springing high in the air and coming
down on their knees, all the while battling with imaginary foes; slashing
with their parang and waving their shield in rhythmical time to the drone
of the kaluri.
Our hand-clapping by way of applause caused great laughter and
astonishment, and the ever-present small boys imitated it in high glee.
Their only fashion of showing approval or wonder is by a loud cluck
with the tongue. Once on a time, when we happened to stop at a house
which, during the selection of a rice-field, was under a ‘lali’ or
_restriction_, (no stranger may then enter and no inmate leave it,) Dr.
Hiller and myself were urgently requested to pace up and down in front
of the house, after we had stripped ourselves to the waist, so that the
inmates might have the privilege of seeing our Japanese tattooing. They
had all gathered in a row behind the railing of the veranda, and as we
passed along below, the succession of explosive clucks of unbounded
admiration sounded like musketry in the distance. Eagerness to see
our tattooing broke down for us many a barrier. Although the Borneans
themselves are masters in the art, nevertheless they use but one colour,
and could not believe that the variegated Japanese designs were not
painted, instead of pricked in. Many a time this incredulity proved a
sore trial, by subjecting us to vigorous attempts at rubbing off the
colour with a dirty thumb, well moistened on the tongue. Here also at the
Lelak house, at Tama Bulan’s urgent request, I stripped to the waist,
and the sight of Hori Chiyo’s best handiwork on my back so inspired one
elderly woman, that, after the chorus of clucks had subsided, she burst
into song, which, being in the Lelak dialect, I was unable to understand,
but was assured it was extremely complimentary.
The guest chambers in a Lelak house are boxes about five feet square,
suspended from the roof, and to which access can be gained only by a
ladder. Possibly, this is for the comfort of the guest; possibly, it is
in order that he may not have too much liberty. We preferred, however,
the floor of the veranda, but before morning I realized the error; three
times was I awakened by an incubus of a dog curling himself up for sleep
on my chest.
Late in the night, the whole house was aroused by the arrival of Juman
and his adherents; he had read our letter and made the best time he could
against the strong current. The expedition was now complete, and the
following morning we abandoned the steamer and started off in canoes.
The Orang Tuah of the Lelaks maintained that my box-with-one-eye was
better than all the Dayongs, and that of a surety I had effectively
captured the evil Spirits; he was so much better that he insisted on
going along with us. I must acknowledge I was none too well pleased with
his determination; he was exceedingly feeble, and should he die the blame
would be surely imputed to me.
Continuously along our route the numbers of the peace-makers were
augmented by boat-loads from the houses that we passed, all anxious to
join in the feasting which took place wherever we halted, and all wanted
to be present at the final grand ratification in the house of Tama Aping
Buling at the head-waters, where Kilup and Juman, bitter enemies, were
to meet, and be reconciled.
Late in the afternoon during a terrific thunder-storm, we arrived at Tama
Liri’s house, and although he is a Penghulu of importance, his house is
a disgrace and he himself a troublesome thorn to the Sarawak Government.
In the first place, there was no notched log whereby to cross the wide
stretch of muddy bank; to get to the house we should have been compelled
to wade through mud knee-deep, had not the Kayans and Kenyahs in our
party devoted themselves energetically to showing the Berawans what
could be done in the way of rapid work. In pelting sheets of rain and
deafening peals of thunder they dragged forth a great fallen tree-trunk
and cut notches in it. The Chief and his people, meanwhile, who ought
to have been helping, sat at their ease up in the house and looked down
unconcernedly. In the second place, Tama Liri’s house is built upon
such ramshackle poles that they could not support the weight of boards,
and, consequently, the flooring is of bamboo strips, and in places so
weak that all were afraid that the whole flimsy structure would tumble
about their ears. The Baram folk were by no means in a good temper when
at last they gained the shelter of Tama Liri’s veranda. In the evening
all the Chiefs took a malicious pleasure in telling their host what a
miserable shanty he had instead of a house, and expressing the hope that
by the time they revisited him he would have built a new one. In the
midst of these vivacious observations, which did not seem, in the least,
to disturb our stolid host, Tama Usong begged me to lend him my box of
matches; on receiving it he passed it over to Tama Liri with the suave
remark, ‘Here, Blood-brother, are some posts for your house; they are
better than those you have, and you can buy more in the Bazaar, very
cheap.’ All the Baram people, and even some of Tama Liri’s own followers,
snorted and laughed at this stroke of wit, but the host adroitly diverted
their thoughts by instantly expatiating on the pig, six spans long! which
Aban Liah (not he himself, but his neighbor Aban Liah) was going to kill
for the feast when we arrived at his house. Tama Liri added that it would
have been better, of course, if it were eight spans long; this would have
been the kind _he_ would kill were _he_ giving a feast. Tama Bulan was
not in as good spirits as on the preceding evening. He was depressed by
the illness of his nephew, Wan, who had been ailing ever since reaching
the Baram Fort, and now, from exposure in the heavy rain during an attack
of fever, was in the first stage of pneumonia and verging on delirium.
Tama Bulan begged me to give him some medicine; but remembering the
disagreeable time that I had in his own house, in consequence of the
death of an inmate, I demurred, preferring to shift the responsibility on
the Dayongs and the livers of pigs and entrails of chickens.
Tama Bulan assured me, however, that he had absolute confidence in my
medicine, and always had, even at the time of Lueng’s death, when her
brother, who thought we had poisoned her, wanted to kill Dr. Hiller and
myself. ‘Besides,’ he added, ‘it will be so inconvenient to have Wan
die in the house of Tama Liri; of all men, he will be the very one to
demand immense compensation for the ill-luck brought on his miserable
old house.’ Thereupon, I did all in my power for the boy; but in the
morning, when the time came to leave, he was only a very little better,
and it would have been highly dangerous to move him down to the boats.
With great regret we were obliged to leave behind the dear old Kenyah
Chief to take care of his good-for-nothing nephew. We had depended upon
Tama Bulan to make the peace-ceremonies go off smoothly, and in strict
adherence to Borneo customs. Wan’s father, a half-brother of Tama Bulan,
was continually making trouble between the Kenyahs and the Sarawak
Government, until Dr. Hose one day obtained possession of an invaluable
charm of his, consisting of a small misshapen hen’s egg, whereon he based
all his good luck. Only by the ever-present threat that his egg would be
broken by Dr. Hose at the least sign of treason on his part, can he be
controlled and kept peaceable, even, I believe, to this hour. Owing to
the sins of the father, I was not quite so compassionate as I might have
been, for this handsome but arrogant youth, who was now the cause of our
losing the assistance of Tama Bulan. I left my watch with the dutiful
old uncle, and exact diagrams of the positions of its hands when the
medicines were to be given. Our next stage was to be but a short one: if
Wan were better on the following day, Tama Bulan could catch up with us;
if he were worse, my advice was that he should be moved to the boats
carefully and an attempt made to get him home. Tama Bulan said he would
much rather have him die in the canoe than in Tama Liri’s house. Judging
by the general lack of recuperative power in the Borneo people when they
are seriously ill, and by the small probability that my instructions
would be strictly obeyed, I thought Wan was doomed, and so expressed
myself to Tama Bulan, with the hope, at the same time, that the medicine
would be efficacious.
[Illustration: RIVER BANK IN FRONT OF A LONG-HOUSE.]
Joined by Tama Liri and a number of his adherents, we set out for
the house of Aban Avit; Tama Bulan dolefully and regretfully bade us
good-bye, wishing us ‘Salamat jalan’—_a lucky journey_.
Aban Avit, also a Berawan, proved to be as much a credit to the tribe as
Tama Liri is a disgrace; his house is strongly built, well floored, well
roofed with iron-wood shingles, decorated here and there with carvings,
and, around doors and along partition walls, ornamented with borders of
loops and circles and dots painted in black and white by the Chief’s own
hand. (Elsewhere I have described the house with some minuteness.)
No longer under Tama Bulan’s influence, the other Kayan Chiefs began to
behave in a foolish and stubborn manner.
Tama Usong flatly refused to come up to the house because he disliked
Aban Avit, and sulked in his boat on the other side of the river,
preferring to endure torrents of rain at night rather than forget old
scores until the very hour of the grand ratification of peace and amity
at Tama Aping Buling’s. His absence, however, was not felt; the house
was full of strangers; an old, sad-faced Chief, named Laki Jok Orong,
had arrived only the day before, from the Rejang, and was on his way to
the Baram, whither he was escorting a middle-aged woman who three years
previously had been abducted from her home, and ever since held captive
in a Rejang River house. Curiously enough, Dr. Kükenthal, on a visit
to the lower Baram, had happened to photograph this very woman before
her abduction,[13] and had sent a copy of the portrait to her family.
Having discovered the house wherein the woman was detained, some of her
friends set out to obtain her release. By means of this photograph,
which they took with them, they were enabled to establish her identity
beyond dispute, and brought her away. The features in the photograph
were still recognisable, even under a thick coating of finger-marks. The
woman herself now had possession of it, and, proudly unwrapping it from
its many coverings of dirty cotton cloth and dried palm leaves, passed it
round the circle.
Laki Jok Orong had a sad tale to tell of the oppression of his people
by one Owang Taha, a half-breed Malay, and a sub-Resident for the
Government, in the upper Rejang River. When he once got fairly started,
he kept up the screed in a whining, lugubrious monotone that droned on
and on till his audience, by desertions and by new arrivals, was changed
several times, and at last engaged in general conversation; but none
the less, the droning plaint of the Rejang Chief still went on and on.
The seven or eight long, straggling hairs which he suffered to grow on
his lip, above the right corner of his mouth waggled and waved, and in
his ears the ornaments, carved out of a horn-bill’s crest to represent
tiger-cat’s teeth, alternately pointed up and down as he dolefully shook
his head over the never-ending rehearsal of his wrongs. I retired to my
dark-tent, developed a dozen or more negatives, packed away all my trays
and chemicals, and then when I rejoined the circle around the fire in the
veranda, still from the outer edge of darkness quavered Jok Orong’s voice
as persistent as ever,—and as unheeded.
[Illustration: SOME CANOES OF THE PEACE-PARTY IN A QUIET REACH BETWEEN
RAPIDS.]
Early in the next forenoon, Tama Bulan and six of his best paddlers came
swiftly up-stream to tell us that Wan was much better, but that they
had decided to take him home with all speed. Of course, that Tama Bulan
should turn round and immediately go back to Tama Liri’s was not for a
moment to be thought of, and, although it was early in the day, jars of
arrack were brought out, and the sullen Tama Usong and Juman, persuaded
thereto by Tama Bulan, joined us in the veranda, and the unwearied Laki
Jok Orong seized a fresh opportunity to indulge in the luxury of woe, and
to begin, and continue the recital of innumerable wrongs. The etiquette
in drinking toasts is the reverse of ours; with us, he who is toasted
remains seated, generally with a sickly, self-conscious smile, while
all the others rise and drink to him. In Borneo, however, the toast is
the only one who rises and is the only one to drink, and he must leave
no heel-taps; it is the company who remain seated, and break into a
deafening humming and _oo-oo_-ing, which are kept up until the last drop
is drained. Possibly, the custom arises from the fact that there are
rarely cups enough to go round, and one sticky, begrimed, glass tumbler,
or else a carved bamboo cup, (rarely used now-a-days,) must perforce pass
from lip to lip. That there had been such things as bamboo drinking-cups,
we discovered by mere accident from a song, commonly sung at these
feasts, which runs:—‘I offer to you the glittering cup, I offer to you
the bamboo cup.’ The words have a jingling rhythm:—
Akui mejee tebok klingee
Ara wi wi ará
Aku meju tebok bulu
Ara wi wi ará.
[Illustration: ‘Tebok Bulu,’—Bamboo Drinking-cup.]
Never having seen in use, as cups, aught else but pressed-glass tumblers
or cocoanut shells, we asked what was meant by ‘tebok bulu’ and, by way
of answer, a rummage began among the old mats and baskets piled on the
rafters; whereupon, several bamboo cups were found, coated with dust and
soot. They were carved into a sort of lip like a pitcher on the upper
edge, and on the sides were decorated with engraved scrolls, bands, and
circles. Tama Bulan was delighted to see them, and said he remembered
well when there was no other kind of cup than the tebok bulu. He insisted
that one should be washed out immediately and put to use, inasmuch as
arrack always tasted far better from the bamboo. To Jok Orong, being
a guest from afar, was accorded the honor of the first drink, and the
_oo-oo_-ing was so thunderous that in his nervousness most of the arrack
trickled down where his shirt front might have been. Then came Tama
Bulan’s turn, and without the wink of an eyelid he drained the cup, and
then gave a cleanly wipe round his mouth with the long, dangling end of
his waist-cloth. So the flowing bowl passed round; one after another the
Chiefs were toasted and _oo-oo_-ed, and Jok Orong’s perpetual-motion
tongue was again set free, but instead of recapitulating his endless
wrongs, he now divulged, for the first time, the true object of his
visit. Having first privately conferred with Tama Bulan and obtained the
latter’s hearty approval of his purpose, he formally announced to the
whole company that he was on his way to the Baram Fort to convey to Dr.
Hose, whom he now unexpectedly met on the road, the earnest wishes of the
people of the Batang Kayan River, in Dutch Borneo, to emigrate to the
Baram district, and place themselves under the protecting Government of
Rajah Brooke. It was the very thing that Dr. Hose had been hoping to hear
for some time past. It was especially fortunate that Tama Bulan happened
to be on hand, and could give his weighty assurances that the immigrants
would meet with cordial welcome. As a tangible proof of the friendship
of the Kayans and Kenyahs of the Baram, a large bundle of presents was
made up for Jok Orong to carry back with him. Tama Bulan purchased at
once from Aban Avit two large brass gongs as his contribution, (a really
lavish present;) Aban Avit sent a highly prized clay jar; Tama Usong
and Juman contributed parangs and spear-heads, and Dr. Hose sent a bolt
of white cotton cloth, three bolts of Turkey red, a bottle of Scotch
whiskey, and, with his usual happy tact, a bundle of candles; these, he
explained to Jok Orong, were to light the footsteps of the new comers and
guide them to a land of ease and plenty,—a gift and a message exactly in
accord with their own sentimental symbolism; and six months later, when
a large number of these Batang Kayan people did move over to the Baram,
the Chiefs all came to Dr. Hose and laid these candles before him in the
court-room of the Fort.
[Illustration: RIVER SCENE IN THE HEART OF BORNEO.]