Two forms of BAYOH are known to the people of Niah, but it is only

with the BAYOH SADONG that there is any need to deal here. The other

form is used by the Punans, or mixed Punans and Malanaus. If it is

supposed that some illness is due to possession by an evil spirit, it

is decided to call the medicine women and get the unwelcome visitant

to depart, though it is not considered possible in all cases to turn

a demon out of his mortal abode. Offerings of eggs and fowls to the

good spirits having proved fruitless, a day is fixed for the BAYOH,

preferably shortly after a good harvest, and the household begins its

preparations for the occasion. As powerful spirits are to be invited

to the house, the room where they are to appear is decked with a

profusion of ornaments suited to such exalted guests. Great tassels

of white shavings are hung upon the walls, a white cloth adorned with

the blossoms of the areca palm hides the rafters, and these graceful

inflorescences are spread out fanwise over the doors and among the

shavings. In one corner a hollow cone of areca blossoms and shavings

spread over a framework of rattan is suspended from a rafter; and

a model of a ship or raft is placed just outside an open window. As

the function takes place at night, candles of beeswax are set about

to give light. At the appointed time brass dishes are put on the

floor with rice of many colours -- yellow, red, and blue -- spread in

patterns of crocodiles; popcorns of rice and maize, water, and washing

utensils, boxes of betel ready for chewing, tobacco, and cigarettes,

to appease the varied appetites of the spirits invoked. just after

sundown the neighbours troop in and settle themselves round the room,

the ill-mannered pushing themselves in front. Certain of the villagers

agree to form the band. Soon the house is full of people, boys and old

men contentedly chewing and smoking, women retiring to darker parts

of the room to gossip. A person of importance will be received with

some show of civility, but without any definite ceremony. Arabian

incense, KAMANYAN, which is used nowadays because the native GARU

has too high a value for export to be consumed at home, disperses

a not unpleasant smell through the gathering. Then the fun begins,

gongs and drums are struck, and the strains of music sound through

the village. With intervals of a quarter of an hour every two hours,

the monotonous melody proceeds until seven the next morning, to be

resumed, in all probability, the next night for another twelve hours,

and perhaps maintained night after night for a whole week.

The medicine women -- one, two, or three, rarely four in number --

have collected in the middle of the room. Generally experienced by

years of performing, they are often too old to be attractive, despite

the gorgeous raiment with which they conceal their aged frames and

the hawkbells which jingle as they move. At first they collect round

the earthenware censers to warm their hands. They then begin to step

with the music and wave their arms, hissing loudly through their

teeth the while, and occasionally breaking into a whistle. After a

time they sit down and nod this way and that to the music, as though

engaged in training the muscles of the neck. But the drums and gongs go

faster, till the long hair of the woman flies round with her head. The

whistling is varied by a chant, SADONG, in an ancient language now

barely understood.

"Why do you speak? Why do you SADONG? Why are you such a long

time? As long as it takes a pinang (areca) to become old? The fruit

of the cocoanut has had time to reach maturity and drop. Come to this

country below the heavens. What do you wish? What is your desire? I

have come to heal the sick one who lies on the floor, feeble and

unable to rise, thin and shrivelled like a floating log. Have pity

from your heart and prevent my soul from parting from my skin and my

bones from failing away. This sickness is very severe and I am unable

to contend against it."

One of the women goes to the patient, who, clad in black, sits alone

on a mat, and brings her a pinang blossom to hold, covering her head

with a cloth. The unfortunate being is then brought to the hollow cone

of shavings and seated within it; it is then whirled round till the

white shreds rise like a ballet dancer's skirt. Gradually the sick

person is worked up to a frenzy, and, keeping time with the music,

the medicine women sway about and wag their heads. So the proceedings

go on, with weird fantastic dancing, nodding, howling, whistling,

chanting, for all the hours of the tropical night. Then the medicine

women are whirled round in the cone, and one by one they fall into a

faint, to be recovered by fanning with the pinang blossom. They dance

about and brush against the onlookers as though unable to control their

movements, and are only kept at a distance by finding handfuls of rice

flung in their faces. The point of giddiness and hysteria eventually

reached can only be compared with certain stages of drunkenness.

The outsider will find it difficult to detect much method in the

madness, but on more sober occasions the performers can offer

intelligible explanations of their behaviour. The account given

by an old medicine woman at Niah, and confirmed by the man who

conducts the ceremonies at the same village, shows that the part

taken by the spirits is quite as definite as the performance of the

exorcisers. Attracted by the music, the followers of the chief evil

spirits gather round the house when the BAYOH has begun, and hunt

about. These little demons ask the chief medicine woman, "Why have

you called us?" She replies, "Tell your master that I have called you

because there is a person here sick." They then go back and fetch the

more powerful spirit whom they serve. This demon comes up from the

sea to the JONG, a small ship or raft that stands behind the house

(Fig. 84), and finds his way up the rope ladder. He asks the BAYOH

woman, "Why have you called me, mother?" She answers, "I have called

you because there is a sick person here. You can help him! See whether

you can help him or not." If the demon finds the sickness beyond

his power to cure, he says, "I cannot help you; get some one else";

and the next night another one is invoked, until the evil spirit is

cast out of the patient. If for seven nights the attempt is made in

vain, the BAYOH is stopped and medicines are tried again, but with

little hope that they will do much good. One of the BAYOHS I saw at

Niah was on behalf of a slightly mad woman, who became very violent

during the performance. She was said to be mad because she had become a

Mohammedan, and it was explained that the Malanau demons had no power

over the evil spirits of Islam. The poor woman was consequently put

into stocks in her own room, and not long afterwards recovered.

When a big spirit comes into one of the medicine women, as they say,

like a flash she feels its presence, but does not see its form. If

it agrees to help, the woman goes on with the regular BAYOH, and soon

feels confident that she is able to make the patient well. She asks for

rice and other food, and spirit made from fruit, which she eats and

drinks to gratify the demon within her. She calls upon the people to

see that the viands are good, but not from any selfish motive, for it

is said that she is not aware that she is eating at all. The coloured

rice, which has been prepared, is the spirit's share, and eggs are

also given. The demon invoked to help calls out to the evil spirit

in possession of the sick person, "You stay in this craft whilst I

sit here." "If you don't wish to stay here you can go to the woods,

or your former abode." The evil spirit then goes from the patient

into the basket prepared for his reception, and is then induced or

ordered to depart by the demon in the medicine woman. What remains of

the food set apart for the spirit is scattered along the river. The

BAYOH is stopped, and thanksgiving offerings are floated out to sea

that the exertions of the supernatural powers may not have been in

vain, or these gifts may be taken into the jungle, where the hollow

cone and raft are also placed or hung from a tree.

The medicine women work for a fee, and it is likely enough that

the length of the BAYOH is influenced to some extent by their

pay. Sometimes the ceremony is most gorgeous. A rattan swing,

covered with a beautiful cloth, is provided for the women and the

patient to swing in, with a platform near at hand to receive the evil,

spirit. Sometimes Ula Gemilang himself is invoked. On these occasions

the expenditure is profuse. A box is placed in the middle of the room

with a handsome covering. The walk up the floor is covered with cloth

of gold thread. There are seven candles in seven brass sticks, seven

betel stands, and seven men carrying spears. When the god arrives,

seven people carry the umbrella over his head. If every thing is not

perfectly satisfactory in his judgment, he demands through the medicine

woman whose body he has occupied some expensive gift, and if this is

refused she may fall in a dead faint. Rice is thrown on her and she is

fanned with the pinang blossoms, but the women who attend to her only

share her fate and also become senseless. Eventually they recover, but

there is now but little hope for the patient, for Gemilang is angry. In

a despairing mood the BAYOH women then seek help from lesser powers.

Needless to say, the women bear out their part of the pantomime with

great skill, becoming "possessed" at the proper time, snatching at

the sick person's head as though to catch the evil spirit, and so

forth. It is probable that in some cases the ceremony works a cure by

suggestion. In any case the villagers have not too many occasions for

social gatherings and feasts, and since those who hold BAYOHS must

offer a good deal of hospitality to their neighbours, such meetings

in a village are exceedingly popular with all except those who wish

to go to sleep.

CHAPTER 17

Myths, Legends, and Stories

Among all the peoples of Borneo a number of myths are handed on from

generation to generation by word of mouth. These are related again

and again by those who make themselves reputations as story-tellers,

especially the old men and women; and the people are never tired of

hearing them repeated, as they sit in groups about their hearths

between supper and bed-time, and especially when camping in the

jungle. The myths vary considerably in the mouths of different

story-tellers, especially of those that live in widely separated

districts; for the myths commonly have a certain amount of local

colouring. Few or none of the myths are common to all the peoples;

but those of any one people are generally known in more or less

authentic form to their neighbours.

Although many of the myths deal with such subjects as the creation of

the world, of man, of animals and plants, the discovery of fire and

agriculture, subjects of which the mythology has been incorporated

in the religious teachings of the classical and Christian worlds, the

mythology of these peoples has little relation to their religion. The

gods figure but little in the myths, and the myths are related with

little or no religious feeling, no sense of awe, and very little

sense of obligation to hand them on unchanged. They are related

in much the same spirit and on the same occasions as the animal

stories, of which also the people are fond, and they may be said to

be sustained by the purely aesthetic or literary motive, rather than

the religious or scientific motives. In fact it is not possible to

draw any sharp line between myths and fables. If it is asked, Do the

people believe the myths? no clear answer can be given; for few of

the myths have any direct bearing upon practical life, and therefore

belief in them is not brought to the test of action, the only test

that can reveal the reality of belief, or indeed differentiate belief

from merely unreflective acceptance of a story. Where such practical

bearing is not altogether wanting, we commonly see conduct regulated

in conformity with the myth or story, as in the case of the story

of the bat carrying to the creatures in the river the news of the

intention of the people to poison the water.

A certain number of the Bornean myths and legends have been published

in Mr. Ling Roth's book and elsewhere, especially those of the

Ibans. We have chosen for reproduction some representative specimens

that have not hitherto appeared in well-known publications. A few

stories that properly belong to this chapter are scattered in other

parts of this book.

We give first in a condensed form the substance of a long rambling

creation-myth current among all branches of the Kayan people. This

myth is sung in rhymed blank verse, a fact which is partly responsible

for the wealth of names occurring in it.

In the beginning there was a barren rock. On this the rains fell and

gave rise to moss, and the worms, aided by the dung-beetles, made soil

by their castings. Then a sword handle (HAUP MALAT) came down from

the sun[159] and became a large tree. From the moon came a creeper,

which hanging from the tree became mated with it through the action of

the wind.[160] From this union were born KALUBAN GAI and KALUBI ANGAI,

the first human beings, male and female. These were incomplete, lacking

the legs and lower half of their trunks, so that their entrails hung

loose and exposed. Leaves falling from the tree became the various

species of birds and winged insects, and from the fallen fruits sprang

the fourfooted beasts. Resin, oozing from the trunk of the tree, gave

rise to the domestic pig and fowl, two species which are distinguished

by their understanding of matters that remain hidden from all others,

even from human beings. The first incomplete human beings produced

PENGOK NGAI and KATIRA MUREI; the latter bore a son, BATANG UTA TATAI,

who married AJAI AVAI and begot SIJAU LAHO, ODING LAHANG, PABALAN,

PLIBAN, and TOKONG, who became the progenitors of the various existing

peoples. ODING LAKANG is claimed as their ancestor by the Kayans,

and also by the Kenyahs and some of the Klemantan tribes.

TOKONG is claimed as ancestor by the Sebops (a tribe of Klemantans)

and by the Punans. The former attribute to him the introduction of

head hunting. The story goes that once upon a time, when TOKONG and

his people were preparing to attack a village, he was addressed by

the frog, who called out, "WONG KA KOK, TETAK BATOK." This fairly

represents the cry of this species of frog (BUFO); and TETAK BATOK

in the Sebop language means "cut through the neck." At first the

people, who hitherto had taken only the hair of their enemies to

adorn their shields, scoffed at this advice; but the frog assured them

that the taking of heads would bring them prosperity of every kind,

and demonstrated the procedure he advised by decapitating a small

frog. TOKONG therefore determined to follow the frog's advice and

carried away the heads of his enemies; this was followed immediately

by increased prosperity. As the party returned home and passed through

their fields the PADI grew very rapidly. As they entered the fields the

PADI was only up to their knees, but before they had passed through

it was full-grown with full ears. As they approached the house their

relatives came to meet them, rejoicing over various pieces of good

fortune that had befallen them. The words of the frog thus came true,

and Tokong and his people continued to follow the new practice,

and from them it was learned by others.

Although the help of the stars is not needed by the Borneans in

directing their course when travelling, since all but very short

journeys are made on the rivers, most of them are familiar with

the principal constellations, and name them in accordance with the

resemblances they discover to men, animals, and other objects. Some of

the tribes determine the arrival of the season for sowing PADI by the

observation of the stars. Thus the LONG KIPUTS (Klemantans) name the

great square of Pegasus PALAI, the PADI storehouse (these houses are

generally square); the Pleiades they call a well; and the constellation

of which Aldebaran is a member they call a pig's jaw. They measure

the altitude of a star by filling a tall bamboo vessel with water,

inclining it until it points directly to the star, and then setting

it upright again, and measuring the height at which the surface of

the water remaining in the vessel stands above its floor. Orion is

interpreted as the figure of a man, LAFAANG, in much the same way as

by Europeans; but his left arm is thought to be wanting. They tell

the following story about LAFAANG, who of course is regarded as of

their own tribe.

The Story of LAFAANG

The daughter of PALAI (the constellation Pegasus) fell in love with

a Long Kiput youth, LAFAANG by name, and invited him to ascend to

the heavens, warning him at the same time that the customs in her

celestial home were very different from those of earth. The girl

was very beautiful, and LAFAANG was not slow to find his way to her

father's house. PALAI, surprised to see this mortal visitor, enquired

of his daughter, "Who is this man, and why does he come here?" "It

is the man I wish to wed," replied the girl. The kind-hearted father

told her to give her lover food, and consented to the realisation of

her hopes. So LAFAANG took up his abode in the house of PALAI and

was wedded to his daughter. But in spite of repeated instructions,

LAFAANG found it very difficult to conform to the customs of his

adopted country. He put his food into his mouth with his fingers

instead of using a needle for the purpose, and by doing so distressed

his wife, who chid him for his disobedience to her instructions. On

the morrow of his arrival he was invited to clear a patch of jungle

for a PADI field; and his wife told him that, in order to fell a tree,

he was merely to lay the axe she gave him at the foot of the tree,

which would forthwith fall to the ground. But habit was too strong to

be controlled, and, when LAFAANG set his hand to the task, he fell

to chopping at the tree. But though he chopped with might and main

he made no impression, and his gentle spouse was horrified to see

the crudeness of his methods. On the next day he was told to watch

PALAI at work felling the trees. Squatting in the jungle he saw how

the great trees fell when PALAI merely laid the blade of the axe at

the foot of each one. This spectacle filled LAFAANG with terror and he

would have ran away, but that his wife reproached him for cowardice. On

the following day he set to work again; and once more forgetting his

lesson, he began to chop at the stems of the trees. This gross breach

of custom was punished by the fall of a tree from the patch of jungle

hard by that on which PALAI was at work; for the tree in falling cut

off LAFAANG'S left arm. Disgusted by these disagreeable incidents and

by the awkward appearance of his wife, who was now far advanced in

pregnancy, LAFAANG made up his mind to return to his own people. His

wife reproached him for his intention; but, when she could not alter

his determination, she gave him sugar-cane tops and banana roots,

previously unknown to men, and let him down to earth by means of a

long creeper. Before he reached the ground he heard the cry of his

new-born child, and begged to be allowed to go back to see him. But

his entreaties were unavailing, and weeping bitterly, he alighted on

the earth at TIKAN ORUM (a spot in the upper Baram district). Still

his disobedience was not overcome; for, although he had been told to

plant the sugar-cane and banana by merely throwing them on the ground,

he planted them carefully in the soil; and to this day a tall coarse

grass (BRU) grows on the spot. Nevertheless some sugar-cane and banana

plants grew up; but they were of an inferior quality, and such they

have remained wherever they have spread in this world. LAFAANG died

among his own people on earth, but the bright constellation that

bears his name and shape still moves across the heavens, reminding

men of his journey to the world above the sky and of the misfortunes

he suffered there.[161]

The Story of USAI

The following myth, current under several forms among the Klemantans,

accounts for a number of the geographical features of the Baram

district, in which it was told us. The story was evoked from an

old man of the Long Kiputs by a question as to his views about the

nature of the stars. He explained that the stars are holes in the

sky made by the roots of trees in the world above the sky projecting

through the floor of that world. At one time, he explained, the sky

was close to the earth, but one day USAI, a giant, when working sago

with a wooden mallet accidentally struck his mallet against the sky;

since which time the sky has been far up out of the reach of man. Our

informant, warming up with the excitement of the recital, went on to

give us the following history of USAI: --

USAI was the brother of the guardian of the shades of men. His

wife desired to have a large prawn that lived in the Baram river;

so USAI built a dam across the river at LUBOK SUAN (a spot where the

river is about 250 yards in width) and baled out the water below it,

seizing the crocodiles with his fingers and whisking them out on to

the bank. While this operation was in progress, the dam gave way;

and USAI'S wife was drowned in the sudden rush of water. In vain

he sought for his wife, weeping bitterly. Disconsolately he waded

down the river. At the mouth of the PELUTAN he wept anew, throwing

aside the crocodiles as he explored the bed of the river. At LONG

SALAI he found his wife's coat and wept again. At LONG LAMA he found

his wife's waist-cloth and gave up hope, and at TAMALA he clucked

like a hen, so great was his grief. Still he went on wading down

the river. The water, which at LONG PLUSAN was only just above his

ankles, reached his middle at the mouth of the TUTAU, and covered

all his body at the place where the Tinjar (the largest tributary)

flows into the Baram. At the mouth of the ADOI he wailed aloud,

"ADOI, ADOI!" (a sorrowful cry in common use, nearly the equivalent

of our Alas!). He began to shiver with cold, but at the mouth of the

BAKONG he wept again. When he reached LUBOK KAJAMAN he was out of his

depth (this is a part known to be very deep) and colder than ever;

but he kept on, and presently the water reached only to his belly,

and when he reached the sea it came only to his knees. (There is a

shallow bar at the river mouth.) On seeing the boundless ocean, USAI

gave up the search and strode down the coast to Miri, where he lived

on charcoal and ginger. (The belief is widely held that the people of

Miri, formerly ate charcoal in large quantities.) The people of Miri

seemed to him like maggots; and they, taking him to be a great tree,

climbed up on him. When he brushed them off, he killed ten men with

each sweep of his hand. The Miri people set to work to hew down this

great tree, and blood poured from USAI'S foot as they worked. Then

USAI spoke to them, asking them what sort of creatures they might be,

and said, "Listen to my words. I am about to die. My brains are sago,

my liver is tobacco. Where my head falls there the people will have

much knowledge, where my feet lie will be the ignorant ones." Then,

his legs being cut through, he fell with a mighty crash, his head

falling towards the sea, his feet pointing up river. ("This accounts

for the fact that white men and Chinese know so many things, while

the people of Borneo are ignorant" said our informant; but this was

probably his own comment.) The Miris, of whom a thousand were killed

by the fall of USAI, have beautiful hair, because his head fell in

their district; but the other people have only such hair as grew on

USAI'S limbs. The mosquitoes that existed in the time of USAI were

as big as fowls, and their bites were terribly painful. The people

hewed them into small pieces, so that now they are the smallest of

the animals; but their bite is still painful.

The Iban Story of Simpang Impang

The following story, which is an old favourite among the Ibans (Sea

Dayaks) of the Batang Lupar, will serve to illustrate, with its many

heterogeneous features, the myth-making faculty of this imitative

and fun-loving people. It will be noticed that the story combines the

characters of a creation-myth, an animal fable, and a fairy tale: --

Once upon a time some people were looking for edible vegetables in

the jungle, when they came upon a huge python, which they took to

be a log. Sitting upon it to cut up their vegetables, they by chance

wounded it, and caused the python's blood to flow out. Recognising then

the nature of their resting-place, the people cut up the python and

began to cook its flesh. Then heavy rain began to fall, and it rained

like anything for days and days, so that all the land was covered with

water, and only the top of TIANG LAJU (the highest peak of the Batang

Lupar district) stood out above the flood. All the people and animals

were drowned except one woman, a dog, a rat, and a few other small

animals, which climbed to the top of this mountain. The woman, seeking

shelter from the rain, noticed that the dog seemed to have found a

warm place beneath a creeper. The creeper was swaying in the wind

and rubbing against a tree, and thus was warmed by the friction. The

woman, taking the hint, rubbed the creeper hard on a piece of wood,

and so for the first time produced fire. Having no husband the woman

took the creeper for her mate, and soon afterwards gave birth to a

son, who was but one-half of a human being, having one arm, one leg,

one eye, and so on. This child, SIMPANG IMPANG, whose only companions

were the animals, often complained bitterly to his mother of his

incompleteness. One day SIMPANG IMPANG discovered some PADI grain

which the rat had hidden in a hole. He spread it out to dry on a leaf,

which he put on top of a stump. On this the rat demanded the PADI back;

and when SIMPANG IMPANG refused it, he grew very angry, and swore that

he and all his race would always retaliate by taking the PADI of men

whenever they could get at it. While they were disputing, SELULAT

ANTU RIBUT, the wind-spirit, came by and scattered the PADI grains

far and wide in the jungle. SIMPANG IMBANG looked round in anger and

astonishment, and could perceive nothing but the noise of the wind. So

he set out with some of his companions to get back his corn from the

wind-spirit, or know the reason why. After wandering for some days he

came to a tree on which were many birds; they picked off its buds as

fast as the tree could push them out. SIMPANG IMPANG asked the tree to

tell him the way to the house of the wind-spirit; and the tree said,

"Oh, yes, he came this way just now, and his house is far away over

there. When you come to it, please tell him I am tired of putting out

my leaves to have them bitten off by these rascal birds, and that I

want him to come and end my miserable life by blowing me down."

SIMPANG IMPANG went on and came to a lake, which said, "Whither are

you going, friend?" And when he answered that he was going to find

the wind-spirit, the lake complained that its outlet to the river was

blocked with a lump of gold, and told him to get the wind-spirit to

blow away the obstruction. SIMPANG IMPANG promised to put in a word

for the lake, and, passing on, came to a cluster of sugar-canes and

bananas. "Whither are you going, friend?" said they. "I'm going to the

wind-spirit" he answered. "Oh! then, will you please ask him how it is

we have no branches like other trees; we should like to have branches

like them."[162] "Yes, I'll remember it," said SIMPANG IMPANG, and,

passing on, he soon came to the home of the wind-spirit. There he

heard a great noise of wind blowing, and the wind-spirit said, "What

do you want here, SIMPANG IMPANG." He answered angrily that he had

come to demand the PADI that the wind-spirit had carried away. "We'll

settle the dispute by diving" said the wind-spirit,[163] and he dived

into the water; but being only a bubble, he very soon popped up to

the surface. Then SIMPANG IMPANG called on his companion the fish

to dive for him; and when the windspirit saw that he had no chance

of coming out the winner in this ordeal, he said, "No, this is not

fair, we'll settle the matter by jumping," and he leapt right over the

house. SIMPANG IMPANG called on the swift as his substitute, and the

swift, rising from the ground, jumped right out of sight. Still the

wind-spirit would not give in. "We'll have another test; let's see who

can go through this blow-pipe"; and he went whistling through. Then

SIMPANG IMPANG did not know what to do, for none of his companions

seemed able to help him. But he had forgotten the ant, until a little

squeaky voice called out, "I can do it"; and forthwith the ant crawled

through the blow-pipe. Still the wind-spirit would not give in, and

SIMPANG IMPANG was very angry, and seizing his father, the fire-drill,

he set the windspirit's house on fire. Then at last the wind-spirit

called out that he would make compensation for the PADI he had taken

away. "But," said he, "I haven't any gongs or other things to pay

you, so I'll make you a whole man with two arms and two legs and two

eyes." SIMPANG IMPANG accepted the bargain, and was overjoyed to find

himself a whole man. Then he remembered the messages he had brought

from the tree and the lake, and the wind-spirit promised to do as

he was asked. And then SIMPANG IMPANG put to him the question of the

bamboo and of the banana plant; and the wind-spirit said, "They have

no branches because human beings are always offending against custom;

they often utter the names of their father-in-law and mother-in-law,

and sometimes they walk before them in going through the jungle;

that is why the bamboo and the banana have no branches."

Kenyah Fable of the Mouse-deer and the Tortoise

Animal fables are current among all the peoples of Borneo, and

are frequently repeated and listened to with much enjoyment; some

individuals who acquire the reputation of being good story-tellers are

frequently called upon to practise their art. Closely allied with this

enjoyment of fables is the practice of describing incidents of social

or tribal intercourse in fables, parables, or allegories, which are

made to suit the occasions and to point the appropriate moral.

Once upon a time PLANDOK (the tiny mouse-deer) and KELAP (the

water-tortoise) went out together to find fruit. They found a tree

laden with ripe fruit close by a house. "I can't climb up that tree,"

said PLANDOK, "but I'll give you a leg up, and then you can get on to

that branch." So he pushed up KELAP on to the lowermost branch. KELAP

threw down all the fruit, but then didn't know how to get down,

and called to PLANDOK for help. "Oh! get down anyway you like,"

said PLANDOK. "But I can't get down forwards and I can't get down

backwards." "Then throw yourself down," said PLANDOK, and KELAP threw

himself down and came to the ground with a great thud. The people in

the house heard the sound and said," There's a durian falling." Then

PLANDOK began to divide the fruit into heaps. "This is for me and

that's for you," he kept calling out; and every time he put some

more fruit to KELAP'S heap, he shouted louder than before. "Hello,"

said the people in the house, "there's somebody dividing something,"

and they ran out to see what was going on. PLANDOK skipped away with

his share of the fruit, and left KELAP to hide himself as best he

could under the broad leaves of a Caladium plant. The people saw

the tree stripped of its fruit, and KELAP'S tracks on the ground

soon led to the discovery of his hidingplace. "Here's the thief,"

said the people, "let's put him in the fire." "Oh yes," said KELAP,

"please put me in the fire; last time they put me in the fire they

only half did the thing, and left one side quite untouched by the

fire."[164] "0h! that won't do," said the people, "let's squeeze him

in the sugar-cane press." "Oh yes, please squeeze me in the press,"

said KELAP, "last time they put me in the press they only squeezed one

side of me."[165] "Then that won't do either," they cried, "let's throw

him into the river." "Oh! don't throw me into the river," said KELAP,

and began to weep. So they threw him into the river. KELAP swam out to

the middle of the river and, putting up his head above the surface,

called out, "That's alright, this is my home." At this the people

saw that he had got the better of them, and determined to turn the

tables by poisoning the water with TUBA.[166] The bat overheard

what they were saying, and at once flew off to KELAP, and advised

him to get out of the river. "No, I shall stay here," said KELAP,

"this is the safest place for me," and he went and stood quite still

among the big stones in the shallow water.

Presently the people began to beat out the TUBA root on the stones, and

one man, taking KELAP'S back for a stone, began to beat his TUBA upon

it. Then KELAP made his back sink lower little by little, so that the

water began to cover it. "Hello!" said the man, "the water's rising,

it's no good trying to poison the river when the water's rising." So

they went home.

The Kenyah Story of the BELIRA Fish

The BELIRA is a fish that has an extraordinary number of bones. The

following story accounts for this exceptional number of bones and,

in conjunction with the foregoing story, explains why Kenyahs, when

proposing to poison the river with TUBA in order to take the fish,

speak of their intentions only in parables.

The fish began to complain that they were so often caught by men

who poisoned the river. So they decided they must have a DAYONG who

could make rain for them[167] so as to prevent the poisoning of the

water. They asked one fish after another to become a DAYONG; but all

refused until they came to the BELIRA, who said he would do his best

to become a DAYONG and to make rain for them, if each of the other

fishes would give him a bone. They accepted the bargain and each gave

him a bone, and that is why the BELIRA has so many bones.

The Story of the Stupid Boy

The following Klemantan story illustrates the taste of the people

for the comic: --

One day SALEH and his father set out in their boat for their

farm. "Look out for logs" (I.E. floating timber), said SALEH'S

father. They had not gone very far when SALEH sings out, "I see some

timber." ,Where?" says his father. "Why, there on the bank," says

SALEH, pointing to the jungle. "Oh! you silly," says his father, "go

on." So they went on and landed, and the father, leaving SALEH to cook

some rice in the large pot, began to cut down some trees. Presently

he came back and found SALEH with the pot upside down over the fire,

and nothing cooked. "What are you at?" cries the father. "Well,"

says SALEH, "I put the pot over the fire as you told me to do, but

when I poured the water on it, it all ran into the fire and put it

out." "You stupid boy, you should have put the pot on the other way

up." But you didn't tell me so," says SALEH.

The father had chipped his axe, so he sends SALEH home to fetch

another. SALEH sets out gaily singing, the blade of the axe lying

in the bow of the boat. Soon the boat strikes a snag and overboard

goes the axe-blade. "Oh, bother!" says SALEH, "but never mind, I'll

mark the place," and he whips out his knife and cuts a notch in the

gunwale of the boat at the spot where the axe fell in. Arriving at

the landing stage before his father's house, he begins to dive into

the water to find the lost axe-head, and continues vainly seeking it

till his mother comes out to ask what he is doing. "I'm looking for

the axe that fell into the water just at this notch, as I was coming

down river," says SALEH. "Oh! you are a stupid," says his mother, and

fetches him a new axe. SALEH goes back to his father, who has found a

fruit tree. He tells SALEH to gather the fruit in his basket while he

goes on felling trees. Presently the father comes back and finds SALEH

fastened with his back to the tree by the shoulder-basket, which he has

put right round its stem, and his legs going up and down. "Hello! what

ARE you up to now?" says the father. "Why, I'm carrying away the whole

tree to save trouble," says SALEH, "and I'm watching the clouds up

there to see how fast I'm walking with this tree on my back."

A Story with a Moral

We conclude this chapter with an example of a fable which points a

moral. It is told by the Barawans of their neighbours, the Sebops

(both are Klemantan tribes), who, they say, put off every task till

the morrow.

One wet night KRA, the monkey, and RAONG, the toad, sat under a log

complaining of the cold. "KR-R-R-H" went KRA, and "Hoot-toot-toot"

went the toad. They agreed that next day they would cut down a KUMUT

tree and make themselves a coat. of its bark. In the morning the sun

shone bright and warm, and KRA gambolled in the tree-tops, while RAONG

climbed on the log and basked in the sunlight. Presently down comes KRA

and sings out, "Hello, mate! How are you getting on?" "Oh! nicely,"

says RAONG. "Well, how about that coat we were going to make?" says

KRA. "Oh! bother the coat," says RAONG, "we'll make it to-morrow;

I'm jolly warm now." So they enjoyed the sunshine all day long. But,

when night fell, it began to rain again, and again they sat under the

log complaining of the cold. "KR-R-R-H," went KRA, and "Hoot-toot-toot"

went RAONG. And again they agreed that they must cut down the KUMUT

tree and make themselves a coat of its bark. But in the morning the

sun was shining again warm and bright; and again KRA gambolled in the

tree-tops and RAONG sat basking in the sunshine; and again RAONG,

said, "Oh! bother the coat, we'll make it tomorrow." And every day

it was the same, and so to this day KRA and RAONG sit out in the rain

complaining of the cold, and crying "KR-R-R-H" and "Hoot-toot-toot."

CHAPTER 18

Childhood and Youth of a Kayan

From the time that the parents of a Kayan become aware of his existence

they faithfully observe, without intermission until his appearance in

the world, certain tabus. Or, in their own language, they are MALAN

and certain things and acts are LALI for them. The belief that the

child will resemble in some degree the things which arrest the glance

of his mother while she carries him (LEMALI) is unquestioningly held

and acted upon; hence the expectant woman seeks to avoid seeing all

disagreeable and uncanny objects, more especially the Maias and the

long-nosed monkey; she observes also the tabus imposed upon sick

women in general, and besides these a number of other tabus peculiar

to her condition, most of which apply to acts or situations which

may symbolise any difficulty in delivery of the child; for example,

she must not tie knots, she must not thrust her hand into any narrow

hole to pull anything out. The tabus of the latter class are observed

by the husband even more strictly, if possible, than by the wife. The

woman must also avoid certain kinds of flesh and fish. It frequently

happens that the woman begins to crave to eat a peculiar soapy earth

(BATU KRAP), and this is generally supplied to her.

The woman will also take positive measures to ensure the prosperous

course of her pregnancy and delivery. At the quickening she sacrifices

a young pig and charges it to convey her prayer to Doh Tenangan;

and on the occurrence of any untoward incident, such as a fall, the

prayer and sacrifice are repeated. The carcases of the victims are

stuck upon poles before the house near her door, and the inevitable

feathered sticks, smeared with blood, are thrust behind a roof beam

in the gallery opposite her door.

In every Kayan house are certain elderly women (not the DAYONGS)

who have a reputation for special knowledge and skill in all matters

connected with pregnancy and childbirth. One of these is called in

at an early stage; she makes from time to time a careful examination

of the patient's abdomen and professes to secure the best position

of the child.

She has also a number of charms, which she hangs in the woman's room,

and various unguents, which she applies externally. But all these

procedures are surrounded by a veil of secrecy which we have failed

to penetrate. And, in fact, all information in regard to the processes

of childbirth is difficult to obtain, for all Kayans are very reticent

on the matter, even among themselves.

In all other respects the pregnant woman follows her ordinary mode

of life until the pains of labour begin. Then she is attended by the

wise woman and several elderly relatives or friends. She sits in

her room which is LALI to all but her attendants and her husband;

and she is hidden from the latter by a screen of mats. During the

pains she grasps and pulls on a cloth fixed to a rafter above and

before her. The pains seem to be severe, since the woman generally

groans and cries out; but the duration of labour is commonly brief,

perhaps two or three hours only. The attendants' great anxiety is lest

the child should go upward, and to prevent this they tie a cloth very

tightly round the patient about the upper part of her abdomen. During

the pains two of them press down with great force upon the uterus,

one from each side. The wise woman professes to accomplish version

by external manipulation, if she judges that the feet are about to

present. But we do not know whether her claim to so much skill is well

founded. If the after-birth does not follow immediately upon the child,

the attendants become very anxious; two of them lift up the patient,

and, if it does not soon appear, an axe-head is tied to the cord in

order to prevent its return within the body, and possibly that the

weight may hasten its extrusion. We have no reason to suppose that

any internal manipulation is attempted at this or any other stage of

labour or of pregnancy. Immediately after delivery the cord is tied

and cut across with a bamboo knife. If the child does not cry at once,

its nostrils are tickled with a feather.

The after-birth is usually buried or merely thrown away. But if

the child is born enclosed in the membranes (with a caul), they are

dried and preserved by the mother. It is said that, when dried, it

is pounded to a powder and mixed with medicines administered to the

child in later years.

If labour is unusually difficult or prolonged, or if accidents happen,

the news spreads quickly through the house; and, if the attendants

begin to fear a fatal issue, the whole household is thrown into

consternation, for death in childbirth is regarded with peculiar

horror. All the men of the house, including the chief and boys, will

flee from the house, or, if it is night, they will clamber up among

the beams of the roof and there hide in terror; and, if the worst

happens, they remain there until the woman's corpse has been taken

out of the house for burial. In such a case the burial is effected

with the utmost despatch. Old men and women, who are indifferent to

death, will undertake the work, and they expect a large fee.

The body, wrapped in a mat, is buried in a grave dug in the earth

among the tombs, instead of being put in a coffin raised on a tall

post; for the soul of the woman who dies in childbirth goes, with the

souls of those who fall in battle, or die by violence of any kind,

to Bawang Daha (the lake of blood).

If twins are born, one is chosen, generally the boy, if they are

of different sexes. The other is got rid off by exposure in the

jungle. The avowed motive for this practice (which, of course, is

rapidly passing away under the influence of the European governments)

is the desire to preserve the life of the survivor; for they hold

that his chances of life are diminished not only by the necessity of

dividing the mother's care and milk between the twins, if both survive,

but also by the sympathetic bond which they believe to exist between

twins, and which renders each of them liable to all the ills and

misfortunes that befall the other; and to Kayans the loss of a child

of some years of age is a calamity of the first magnitude, whereas

the sacrifice of one of a pair of new-born twins is hardly felt.

At the moment the child is completely born, a TAWAK or a drum

(according as it is male or female) is beaten in the gallery with

a peculiar rhythm. All members of the household (I.E. all whose

rooms are under the roof of the one long house, and who, therefore,

are under the same omens and tabus) who are within the house at this

moment have the right to a handful of salt from the parents of the

child; and all members who are not under the roof at the moment are

expected to make a present of some piece of iron to the child. This

is an ancient custom, which is no longer strictly observed, and which

seems to be undergoing a natural decay.

During the confinement of a woman, Kayans (more especially those

of the upper Rejang) sometimes perform a dance which is supposed to

facilitate delivery. It is commonly performed by a woman, a friend

or relative of the labouring woman, who takes in her arms a bundle

of cloth, which she handles like a baby while she dances, afterwards

putting it into the cradle (HAVAT) in which a child is carried on the

back. An old story relates the origin of this dance as follows. A

widow died in childbirth, and the child was given to a woman who

happened to be dancing at the time of its birth, and who afterwards

became a very influential and prosperous person.

When the delivery has been normally accomplished and all goes well,

the mother at once nurses the child; and a woman of the lower class

may resume her lighter household duties within twenty-four hours. A

woman of the upper class may remain recumbent for the most part of

several days or even weeks. For seventeen days the mother wears

threads tied round the thumbs and big toes, and during this time

she is expected to avoid heavy labour, such as farm-work and the

pounding of hadi. There seems to be no trace of any such custom as

the COUVADE, though the father observes, like the mother, certain

tabus during the early months and years of the child's life, with

diminishing strictness as the child grows older. The child also is

hedged about with tabus. The general aim of all these tabus seems to

be to establish and maintain about the child a certain atmosphere

(or, as they say, a certain odour)[168] in which alone it can

thrive. Neither father nor mother will eat or touch anything whose

properties are thought to be harmful or undesirable for the child,

E.G. such things as the skin of the timid deer (see vol. ii. p. 72),

or that of the tiger-cat; and the child himself is still more strictly

preserved from such contacts. Further, nothing used by or about the

child -- toys, garments, cradle, or beads -- must be lost, lent, sold,

or otherwise allowed to pass out of the possession of the parents;

though, if one child has thriven, its properties are preferred to all

others for the use of a younger brother or sister. It is important

also that no stranger shall handle or gaze too closely upon the child;

and when it is put down to sleep in the parents' room, the mat or

rude wooden cradle on which it lies is generally surrounded by a

rough screen. The more influential the stranger, the more is his

contact to be feared; for any such contact or notice may attract

to the infant the unwelcome and probably injurious attentions of

the TOH. For the same reason it is forbidden, or PARIT, to a child

to lie down on the spot where a chief has been sitting or where he

usually reposes. And it is a grave offence for a child to, jump over

the legs of a reclining chief; but in this case the disrespect shown

is probably the more important ground of the disapprobation incurred.

If any such contact has unwittingly occurred, or if, for example,

a Kayan mother has consented to submit an ailing child to inspection

by a European medical man, the danger incurred may be warded off

by the gift from the stranger to the child of some small article

of value. In a similar way the breach of other tabus, such as the

entering of a room which is LALI, may be rendered innocuous.

The infant is carried by the mother almost continuously during the

waking hours of its first year of life; it is generally suspended in

a sling made of wood or of basket-work, resembling in shape the baby's

swing familiar in our nurseries; the child sits on a semicircular piece

of board, its legs dependent, its knees and belly against the mother's

back, and its own back supported by the two vertical pieces of the

cradle (see Pl. 166). The mother nurses the infant in her arms during

most of her leisure moments, and she hushes it to sleep by crooning

old lullabies as she rocks it in her arms or in a cradle suspended

from a pliable stick.[169] The father hardly handles it during its

first year, but many fathers nurse and dandle the older infants for

hours together in the most affectionate manner; and, if the child's

grandfather is living, he generally becomes its devoted attendant.

About the end of its first year the infant begins to crawl and toddle

about the room and gallery, to sprawl into the hearth and eat charcoal,

and to get into all sorts of mischief in the usual way. During the

first year he lives chiefly on his mother's milk, but takes also

thick rice-water from an early age.

Towards the end of the first year the lobes of the ears are perforated,

and a ring (or, in the case of a girl, several small rings) is inserted

in each. Of childish affections of health, the commonest at this age

is yaws (FRAMBOESIA) about the mouth. Kayan mothers believe that every

child must go through this, and that one attack protects against its

recurrence; and the rareness of the disease in adults seems to bear

out this belief. Most of the children are weaned about the end of

their second year.

During the next years, until the boy is five or six years of age,

he remains always under the care of his mother. He spends the day

running about within and around the house and among the boats at

the landing-place, playing with his fellows, chasing the pigs and

fowls, and bathing in the river. The children are in the main what is

commonly called good, they cry but little, and quarrels and outbreaks

of temper are few. During the boy's third year a hole is punched

in the shell of each ear. A single blow with a bamboo punch takes

out a circular piece; into this a circular plug of wax or wood is

inserted. The girl, on the other hand, has more rings added to the

lobes of her cars, which gradually yield to the weight, and begin to

assume the desired character of slender loops. During these years the

boy normally takes the first step of his initiation as a warrior by

striking a blow at a freshly taken head, or, if need be, at an old one

(see vol. ii. p. 169).

It is at some time in the course of these years, usually not earlier

than the beginning of the child's third year, that he first receives

a name. The occasion of the rite is a general naming of all the

children of the house of suitable age; and the time is determined by

the conclusion of a successful harvest; for a general feast is made

for which much rice and BURAK are required, and these cannot be spared

in a year of poor harvest. For each child who is to be named a small

human image in soft wood is prepared. This is an effigy of Laki Pesong,

the god whose special function it is to care for the welfare of the

children. A small mat is woven and a few strips of rattan provided

for each child. Each child sits with his (or her) mother in the

gallery beside the door of their room, and the parents announce the

name they propose for the child. Then the father, or some other man,

after killing a chick or young pig, lays the image on the mat before

the child, passes one of the rattan strips beneath it, and, holding

the image firmly with a big toe on each end of it, pulls the strip

rapidly to and fro, until it is made hot by its friction against the

image, and smoke begins to rise. While this goes on, the same man,

or another, pours out a stream of words addressed to Laki Pesong,

the sense of which is a supplication for an answer to the question,

"Is this a suitable name? Will he be prosperous under it? Will he

enjoy a long life?" etc. He continues the sawing movement until the

strip breaks in two. The two pieces are then compared; if they are of

unequal length, this result is regarded as expressing the approval of

the proposed name by Laki Pesong; if they are of approximately equal

length, the god is held to have expressed his disapproval, and another

name is proposed and submitted to the same test. If disapproval is

thus expressed several times, the naming of the child is postponed

to another occasion (Pls. 53, 168).

If a name has been approved, the image, together with the knife used

in killing the pig or chicken, is wrapped up in the small mat; the

bundle, which, as well as the ceremony, is called PUSA, is thrust

behind the rafters of the gallery opposite the door of the child's

room, to remain there as a memento of the naming.

When the naming is accomplished a general feast begins, the parents

of the newly named children contributing the chief part of the good

things; and a number of specially invited guests may participate.

The name so given at this ceremony is borne until the child becomes a

parent; when he resigns it in favour of the name given to his child

with the title Taman (= father) prefixed (or Tinan in the case of

a woman).

Among the Kayans of the upper Rejang the naming ceremonies differ

widely from those described above, and are even more elaborate. The

following description was given us by Laki Bo, a Kayan PENGHULU.[170]

A child is named sometime between its third month and the end of

its second year, the date depending partly on the father's capacity

to afford the expenses incidental to the ceremony. The father and

his friends obtain specimens of all the edible animals and fish,

and after drying them over the fire, set them up in his room in

attitudes as lifelike as possible. He procures also the leaves of a

species of banana tree which bears very large horn-like fruit, known

as PUTI ORAN; and having procured the services of a female DAYONG,

who has a reputation for skill in naming, he calls all the friends and

relatives of the family to the feast. The DAYONG enters the room where

the child is, bearing a fowl's egg, while gongs and drums are beaten

and guns discharged. She strokes the child from forehead to navel

with the egg, calling out some name at each stroke, until she feels

that she has found a suitable name. The whole company then pretends

to fall asleep; and presently some go out into the gallery. The

DAYONG then calls upon sixteen of the women to enter the room; they

enter led by a woman who, pretending to be a fowl, clucks and crows,

and says, "Why are you all asleep here? It has been daylight for a

long time. Don't you hear me crowing? Wake up, wake up." The child,

which has been kept in its parents' cubicle during this first part

of the ceremony, is then brought into the large room, and a fowl and

small pig are slaughtered and their entrails examined. If these yield

favourable omens, the DAYONG begins to chant, invoking the protection

of good spirits for the child. Then sixteen men and sixteen women,

whose parents are still living, are sent to fetch water for the use

of the child and its mother. The feasting then begins, some person

eating on behalf of the child, if it is too young to partake of the

feast. Eight days later the DAYONG again invokes the protection of

the beneficent spirits, and the child is taken out into the gallery

and shown to all the household. Some near relative makes a cross upon

its right foot with a piece of charcoal, and the child is taken to the

door of each room to receive some small present from each roomhold. The

child must then return to its parents' room and remain there eight

days. After the next harvest a similar feast of pigs' flesh and dried

animals is made, and the name is confirmed. But if in the meantime

the child has been ill, or any other untoward event has happened,

a new name is given to it. In this case it would be usual to choose

the well-tried name of some prosperous uncle or aunt. Again the child

must be confined to its parents' room for eight days following the

feast; and after that time it is free to go where it will, or rather

wherever children are allowed to go.

From five or six years onwards the boy more and more accompanies

the men in their excursions on the river and in the jungle, and is

taught to make himself useful on these occasions, and also on the PADI

farm, where he helps in scaring pests and in other odd jobs. But he

still has much leisure, which is chiefly devoted to playing with his

fellows. Among the principal boys' games the following deserve mention:

-- Spinning of peg-tops of hard wood, usually thrown overhand, but

sometimes underhand, in a manner very similar to that of English boys,

each boy in turn striving to strike the tops of the others with his

own; this game is played about the time of PADI harvest. Simple kites

are flown. A roughly made bow with unfeathered arrow is a somewhat

rare toy. Most of the out-door games are of the nature of practice

for the chase and war, and of trials of strength and of endurance of

pain. Wrestling is perhaps the most popular sport with the older boys

and with men. Each grips his antagonist's waist-cloth at its lower edge

behind, and strives to lay him on his back (Pl. 169). Throwing mock

spears at the domestic pigs or goats, and thrusting a spear through a

bounding hoop, afford practice for sport and war. Running games like

prisoner's base, and diving and swimming games, are also played. All

these boys' games are but little organised, and the competitive

motive is not very strongly operative; there are few set rules,

and but little scope for, training in leadership and subordination

is afforded by them.

In the house less active games are played. In one of the most popular

of these a number of children squat in a ring upon the floor; one

takes a glowing ember from a hearth, and passes it on to his neighbour,

who in turn passes it on as quickly as possible. In this way it goes

round and round the ring until the last spark of fire goes out. He or

she who holds it at that moment is then dubbed ABAN LALU or BALU DOH

(=widower Lalu or widow Doh).

Pets, in the form of birds and the smaller mammals, especially

hornbills, parrokeets, squirrels, porcupines, are kept in wicker cages.

About the age of ten years the Kayan boy begins to wear a waist-cloth

-- his first garment -- his sister having assumed the apron some two or

three years earlier; we are not aware of any ceremony connected with

this. From this time onward the boy begins to accompany his father on

the longer excursions of the men, especially on the long expeditions

in search of jungle produce; and on these occasions he is expected

to take an active part in the labours of the party. Participation

in such expeditions affords, perhaps, the most important part of his

education. There is little or no attempt made to impart instruction to

the children, whether moral or other, but they fall naturally under the

spell of custom and public opinion; and they absorb the lore, legends,

myths, and traditions of their tribe, while listening to their elders

as they discuss the affairs of the household and of their neighbours

in the long evening talks. They learn also the prohibitions and

tabus by being constantly checked; a sharp word generally suffices to

secure obedience. Punishments are almost unknown, especially physical

punishments; though in extreme cases of disobedience the child's ear

may be tweaked, while it is asked if it is deaf. A sound scolding also

is not infrequent, and an incorrigible offender, especially if his

conduct has been offensive to persons outside his family, may be haled

before the chief, who rates him soundly, and who may, in a more serious

case, award compensation to be paid by the delinquent's father. But in

the main the Spencerian method of training is followed. A parent warns

his child of the ill effects that may be expected from the line of

behaviour he is taking, and when those effects are realised, he says,

"Well, what did I tell you?" and adds a grunt of withering contempt.

The growth of the children in wisdom and morality is aided also by the

hearing from the lips of their elders wise saws and ancient maxims that

embody the experience of their forefathers, many of which are possibly

of Malay origin. A few of these seem worthy of citation here: --

"Never mind a drop or two so long as you don't spill the whole."

"Better white bones than white eyes" (which means -- that death is

preferable to shame).

"If you haven't a rattan do the best you can with a creeper."

It is difficult to say exactly at what age puberty begins with the

youths. The girls mostly begin their courses in the fourteenth or

fifteenth year. By this time the girl of the better class has the lobes

of her ears distended to form loops, which allow her heavy ear-rings

to reach to her collar-bone or even lower, and she is far advanced

towards completion of her tatu on thighs, feet, hands, and forearms

(see Chap. XII.). The process is begun at about the tenth year, and is

continued from time to time, only a small area being covered at each

bout, owing to the pain of the operation and the ensuing inflammation

and discomfort.

The boys begin at about fifteen years, or rather earlier, to assert

their independence, by clubbing together with those of their own

age, and taking up their sleeping quarters with the bachelors in the

gallery. At an earlier age the children have picked up a number of

songs and spontaneously sing them in groups, but now they begin to

develop their powers of musical. expression by practising with the

KELURI, Jew's harp, drum and TAWAK.

Of these instruments the first is the most used, especially by the

youths. It is a rude form of the bagpipes. The KELURI consists of

a dried gourd which has the shape of an oval flask with a long neck

(Fig. 85). The closed ends of a bundle of six narrow bamboo pipes are

inserted in the body of the gourd through a hole cut in its wall,

and are fixed hermetically with wax. Their free ends are open, and

each pipe has a small lateral hole or stop at a carefully determined

distance from the open end. The artist blows through the neck of

the gourd, and the air enters the base of each pipe by an oblong

aperture which is filled by a vibrating tongue or reed; this is

formed by shaving away the wall of the bamboo till it is very thin,

and then cutting through it round three sides of the oblong; it is

weighted with a piece of wax. The holes are stopped by the fingers,

3ach pipe emitting its note only when its hole is stopped. The physical

principles involved are obscure to us. Varieties of this instrument

are made by all the tribes of Borneo as well as by many other peoples

of the far East (Pl. 70).

The bamboo harp is similar to that made and used by the Punans (see

Fig. 86); the SAPEH is a two-stringed instrument of the banjo order;

the strings are thin strips of rattan; the whole stem and body are

carved out of a single block of hard wood (see Pl. 170 and Fig. 20).

Some of the girls learn to execute a solo dance, which consists largely

in slow graceful movements of the arms and hands (Pl. 170). The bigger

boys are taught to take part in the dance in which the return from

the warpath is dramatically represented. This is a musical march

rather than a dance. A party of young men in full war-dress form up

in single line; the leader, and perhaps two or three others, play the

battle march on the KELURI. The line advances slowly up the gallery,

each man turning half about at every third step, the even numbers

turning to the one hand, the odd to the other hand, alternately,

and all stamping together as they complete the turn at each third

step. The turning to right and left symbolises the alert guarding of

the heads which are supposed to be carried by the victorious warriors.

A more violent display of warlike feeling is given in the war-dance

which is executed by one or two warriors only. The youth, in full

panoply of war, and brandishing a PARANG and shield, goes through

the movements of a single combat with some fanciful exaggeration

(Pl. 171). He crouches beneath his shield, and springs violently hither

and thither, emitting piercing yells of defiance and rage, cutting and

striking at his imaginary foe or his partner in the dance. But it is

characteristic of the Kayans that neither in this dance nor in actual

practice in fencing do they attempt to strike one another. The boy,

besides watching these martial displays, is instructed in the arts

of striking, parrying, and shielding by the older men, who strike

at him with a stick but arrest the blow before it goes home. And we

have found it impossible to introduce among them a more realistic

mode of playful fencing. The ground of this reluctance actually to

strike one another in fencing is probably their strong feeling for

symbolism and the prevailing tendency to believe that the symbolical

art brings about that which it symbolises. In part also it is due

to the fact that to draw the blood of any member of the household is

LALI and involves the penalty of a fine.[171]

The youth goes through no elaborate rite of initiation to manhood;

and, to the best of our knowledge, there exists no body of secret

knowledge or of tradition or rites shared in only by the adult men,

to participation in which he might be admitted in the course of such

a rite. The only rite that is required to qualify him for taking

his place as a full-fledged member of the community is the second

occasion on which he strikes at the heads taken in battle. We have

seen that he performs this ceremonial act for the first time when

still of tender age. The age at which he repeats it depends in part

upon the occurrence of an opportunity; it commonly falls between his

eighth and fifteenth year. If in a house there is a number of big

lads who have not performed this rite, owing to no heads having been

taken for some years, a head may be borrowed for the purpose from

a friendly household; and in this case the borrowed head is brought

into the house with all the pomp and ceremony of successful war.

As the returning war-party approaches the village, the boys who are to

take part in the rite are marshalled before the house by a master of

the ceremonies. He kills a fowl and thrusts a sharpened stake right

through it, so that the point projects from its beak, and slashes

the carcase into three pieces, one for the adults of the house, one

for the boys, and one for the infants. He then takes a short bamboo

knife, and a bunch of ISANG leaves, and, after making a short address

to the boys, ties a band of ISANG round the wrist of each of them,

and, diluting the blood of the fowl with water, smears some of the

mixture on each boy's wrist-band. He puts a handful of rice on a

burning log and gives a grain of it to each of the boys to eat.

Some old man of the house goes down to the river to meet the returning

war-party and brings up the head (or one of the heads) and holds

it out, while the master of ceremonies, holding the portion of the

fowl's carcase assigned to the boys, leads up each boy in turn to

strike at the head with a sword. The boys then go down to the river;

and, while they bathe, a bunch of ISANG with which the head has been

decorated is waved over them. During the feasting which follows the

boys may eat only twice a day. No youth may join a war-party until he

has taken part in this rite. The boys are with few or no exceptions

keen to go out to war and therefore they like to go through this

ceremony at the earliest permissible opportunity.

When the youth begins to feel strongly the attraction of the other

sex, he finds opportunities of paying visits, with a few companions,

in friendly houses. It is then said in his own house that he has gone

"to seek tobacco," a phrase which is well understood to mean that he

has gone to seek female companionship.[172]

We must not pass over without mention a peculiar mutilation which

is practised by most of the Kayan youths as they approach manhood,

namely, the transverse perforation of the GLANS PENIS and the insertion

of a short rod of polished bone or hard wood.

A youth of average presentability will usually succeed in becoming the

accepted lover of some girl in his own or another house (cp. Chap. V.);

and though he may engage himself in this way with two or three girls

in turn before deciding to "settle down," he is usually not much over

twenty years of age when he becomes accepted as the future husband

of a girl some years his junior. A Kayan youth who has rendered

pregnant a girl with whom he has kept company can be relied upon

to acknowledge his responsibility and to marry her before her time

comes. In general it may be said that the rite of marriage does not

mark so complete a change in the recognised relations of the young

couple as with ourselves, except perhaps in those parts of this country

where "handfasting" is recognised as customary and regular. A time is

appointed for the wedding, generally shortly after the completion of

the padi-harvest; but this date is liable to be repeatedly postponed

to the following year by the occurrence of various events which are

regarded as of evil omen and as foretelling the early death of one of

the couple if they should persist in going through the ceremony. Such

omens are hardly ever disregarded; not even if the girl is far advanced

in pregnancy.[173] In the latter case the girl does not incur the odium

that attaches to the production of bastard offspring (see Chap. XX.);

she is treated as a married woman would be, and her child is regarded

as legitimate.

We describe in the following paragraphs the wedding of the son of an

influential Kayan chief to the daughter of the chief of another house

of the same village, such as we have had occasion to assist at. The

weddings of couples of less exalted station are correspondingly less

elaborate in all particulars.

When the appointed time draws near, the bridegroom sends a trusted

friend (his "best man") to open negotiations with the bride's

parents. The emissary carries with him a number of presents whose value

accords with the status and wealth of the bridegroom's parents. For

some time the fiction is maintained that the object of his visit is

not even suspected by the family, who make enquiries into the nature

of his business. After some fencing he comes to the point and asks

on behalf of his friend for a definite date at which he may marry the

daughter. The parents raise objections and difficulties of all sorts,

and perhaps nothing is settled until a second or third visit. If the

parents accept the proposal, the best man hands to them five sets

each of sixteen beads, the beads of each set being of uniform shape

and colour, namely (1) small yellow beads (UTEH); (2) black beads

(MEDAK); (3) a set known as HABARANI which may not be worn by the bride

before the naming of her first child; (4) light blue beads (KRUTANG);

(5) dark blue beads (TOBI). Each of these sets of beads is held to

ensure to the bride the enjoyment of some moral good. The girl also

sends a string of beads to her lover by the hand of his best man,

and at last the date is fixed, due regard being paid to the phases

of the moon; new moon is considered the most favourable time of the

month. The importance ascribed to the phase of the moon seems to arise

from the fact that the shape of the half-moon suggests the state of

pregnancy. Tally is kept by both parties of the date agreed upon. On

two long strips of rattan an equal number of knots is tied. Each party

keeps one of these tallies (often it is carried tied below the knee)

and cuts off one knot each morning; when the last knot alone remains,

the appointed day is at hand.

The parties on both sides invite the attendance of their friends

and relatives, who crowd the gallery of the bride's house. Early in

the morning the bridegroom arrives with his best man and a party of

young friends in full war-dress; they land from a boat even though

they have come but a few yards by water. They march up to the house,

some of them carrying large brass gongs; ascending the ladder, they

lay the gongs down the gallery from the head of the ladder towards

the door of the bride's room at such intervals that the bride can

step from one to another. It is understood that these gongs become the

property of the bride and her parents. Others of the bridegroom's band

carry other articles of value, and when the party reaches the door

of the bride's room, they parley with her parents and friends who

are gathered in the room, displaying and offering these objects to

the defenders of the room as inducements to admit them. They strive

also to push open the door. Presently the men of the defending party

make a sortie from the room fully armed, and repel the attackers

with much show of violence, but without bloodshed. After this sham

fight has been repeated, perhaps several times, the bridegroom and

his supporters are at last admitted to the room, and they rush in,

only to find, perhaps, that the coy maiden has slipped away through

the small door which generally gives access to a neighbouring room. The

impatient bridegroom cannot obtain information as to her whereabouts,

and so he and his men sit down in the room and accept the proffered

cigarettes. Presently the bride relents and returns to her parents'

room accompanied by a bevy of her girl friends. But the bridegroom

takes no notice of her entry. The inevitable pig meanwhile has been

laid in the gallery, together with a few gifts for the DAYONG who is

to read its liver. Here the final steps of the bargaining are conducted

by the friends of the bridegroom. (It is impossible to say in each case

how far this bargaining is genuine and how far the terms of the bargain

have been arranged beforehand.) More gongs are added to the row upon

the floor, chiefly by the friends invited by the bridegroom, who thus

make their wedding gifts, perhaps until the row extends to the door of

the bride's room. The pig is then killed and its liver examined; and,

if necessary, this is repeated with another and another pig, until one

whose liver permits of favourable interpretation is found. (A series

of bad livers would lead to postponement.) The DAYONG then sprinkles

pig's blood and water from a gong upon all the assembly, invoking the

blessing of the gods upon the young couple, asking for them long life

and many children. Then the bride and bridegroom walk up and down

the row of gongs eight times, stepping only upon the metal. In some

cases the bridegroom descends to his boat at the landing-stage on

each of these eight excursions, thus showing that he is free to come

and go as he pleases and has no entanglements. In this degenerate

age the ceremony terminates with this act, but for the feasting and

speech-making which fill up the evening hours. But in the old days,

as we are credibly informed by those who have been eye-witnesses,

the bride descended with the groom and his party to his boat and was

then carried off at full speed, pursued by several boat-loads of her

friends. The fleeing party would then check the pursuit by throwing

out on to the bank every article of value still remaining among them;

each article in turn would be snapped up by the pursuers, who then,

having thus resisted to the last and extorted the highest possible

price from the bridegroom, would allow the happy pair to console each

other in peace for the many trials they had had to endure.

It may seem difficult to reconcile the form of the marriage ceremony

(involving as it does a blending of symbolical capture with actual

purchase) with the fact that, in accordance with the custom almost

universally followed among Kayans, the bridegroom becomes a member

of the room of his father-in-law and remains there for some years

before carrying off his wife to his own house. But we think this latter

practice, which in some quarters has been regarded as a survival from a

matriarchal organisation of society, is a recently introduced custom,

which has come rapidly into favour as a means by which the bridegroom

and his friends avoid a part of the expense involved in the older form

of marriage. For the residence for a period of years of the young

couple in the house and room of the wife's parents is made a part

of the marriage contract. If the bride is the only child of a chief,

her husband may remain permanently in her home and succeed her father

as chief. But in most cases the couple migrates to the husband's house

after a few years, generally on the occasion of the building of a new

house or on the death of his father, both of which events afford him

the opportunity of becoming head of a room and thus taking rank as,

and assuming the full responsibilities of, a PATER FAMILIAS.

The marriage ceremonies of the Kenyahs and Klemantans are similar

but less elaborate. But the Sea Dayak ceremony is different. A feast

is made in the house of the girl's parents. The bridegroom makes no

considerable gifts to the parents of the bride, though he is generally

expected to become a member of their household for the first few years

of his married life. The principal feature of the ceremony is the

splitting open of a PINANG (the seed of the areca palm) during the

feast, in the presence of the young couple and their relatives. The

two halves are examined for signs of decay or imperfection; and if

there are none, the marriage is regarded as approved. A live fowl is

waved over the couple by the chief of the house as he says, "Make

them prosperous, make them happy, give them long life, make them

wealthy, etc. etc." The phrases conform to a conventional pattern,

but each orator modifies and adapts them freely. The words seemed to

be addressed to the fowl, and it seems impossible to discover in the

Iban mind any conception of a higher power behind or beyond the fowl,

though we may suspect that in a vague way the live fowl symbolises

or represents Life in general or the power behind Nature (Pl. 173).

Few or no Kayans can state their age without going through some

preliminary calculations, and even then their statements are apt to

be vague and uncertain. A Kayan mother can generally work out the

age of each of her children on request. She puts down in a row bits

of leaf or stick, one for each year, working back from the present,

and recalling each year by the name of the place where the PADI crop

of that year was raised. When she reaches back to, the year of the

birth of any one of her children, she says that the child was born

about or before or soon after this particular harvest, and by counting

the pieces of stuff laid down she then arrives at the child's age.

An elderly man can generally make no more accurate statement regarding

his age than that at the time of the great eclipse he had just

begun to wear a waist-cloth, or that when the great guns were heard

(I.E. the sound of the eruption of Krakatoa) he was just beginning

"to look for tobacco."

We mention here a statement commonly made by Kayans, which, if true,

is of some interest as reporting a curious exception to a world-wide

custom commonly regarded as directly determined by the difference of

nature between the sexes, the report, namely, that among the Kalabits

the initiative in all love-making is taken by the women. We have

no detailed information in regard to their courtship and marriage

procedures.

CHAPTER 19

The Nomad Hunters

In almost all parts of Borneo there are to be found hidden in

the remotest recesses of the jungles small bands of homeless nomad

hunters. All these closely resemble one another in physical characters

and in mode of life; but differences of language mark them as belonging

to several groups, of which the Punans, the Ukits, the Sians, the

Bukitans, the Lugats, and the Lisums are the best known. Hitherto we

have designated all these groups by the name Punan, which properly

belongs to the largest group only. These groups inhabit different

areas, though there is considerable overlapping; and it seems probable

that they are merely local varieties of one stock, and that their

differences are mainly the results of geographical separation and

of intercourse with, and probably some mingling of blood with, the

settled tribes of the regions inhabited by the several groups. For

their languages seem to be closely allied; but in each region the

nomads seem to have adopted many words from their settled neighbours,

with whom they trade; and instances are known to us in which the

men of the settled tribes have married women of the nomads and have

adopted their mode of life, and others in which children of nomad

women, married into Kenyah, Kayan, or other villages, have gone back

to their mothers' people.

The Punans proper are found in the central highlands wandering through

the upper parts of the basins of all the large rivers; here and there

they range into the lowlands, and in rare instances they even reach

the coast. The Ukits, on the other hand, confine themselves to the

interior, and are found chiefly in the upper parts of the basins of the

Kotei, the Rejang, the Kapuas, and Banjermasin rivers. The Bukitans

inhabit chiefly the upper basins of the rivers of Sarawak. Although

these nomads wander perpetually in the forests, moving their camp every

few weeks or months, any one group attaches itself to a particular

area, partly because they become familiar with its natural resources,

partly because they establish friendly relations with the villagers

of the region, with whom they barter jungle-produce to the advantage

of both parties. The settled tribesmen of any region find this trade

so profitable that they regard the harmless nomads with friendly

feelings, learn their language, and avoid and reprobate any harsh

treatment of them that might drive them to leave their district. In

fact they look upon them with a certain sense of proprietorship and

are jealous of their intercourse with other tribes; the nomads, in

fact, rank high among the many natural products of the jungle that

render any particular region attractive to the tribesmen.

Of all these nomad groups the Punans are the most numerous and we have

seen more of them than of any others. We therefore describe their

peculiar mode of life; but it may be understood that what we say of

them holds good in the main of the other groups of nomads with but

little modification.

From the point of view of physical development the Punans are among

the finest of the peoples of Borneo. They resemble the Kenyahs more

closely than any other tribe; that is to say, they are of very pale

yellow colour, of short stature with long body and short legs, but

otherwise well proportioned and very sturdily built with well-rounded

limbs and large muscular development. Their heads are subbrachycephalic

and inclining to be square; their features are more regular than those

of most other tribes; their most distinctive physical characters are

a relatively well-developed nasal bridge, nostrils directed so much

forward that one seems to look right into their heads through them,

and the slight greenish tinge and fine silky texture of their pale

yellow skins. The greenish tinge may be noticed in all nomad Punans,

and it is possible that the ruddier darker tint of the agricultural

peoples is largely or wholly due to their greater exposure to the sun;

for the Punan fears the broad daylight and rarely or never leaves

the deep shade of the jungle.

In fineness of texture of the skin they surpass all the other tribes,

and they seldom or never suffer from the disfiguring scaly affections

of the skin so common among the others.

The Punans are more uniform as regards their physical characters than

the other peoples; there are no distinctions of upper and lower social

strata as among the other tribes, and thus the mixture of blood,

which in the Kayan and Kenyah communities results from the adoption

of war captives into the lower class, does not occur with them;

and they present none of the wide diversities of type such as are

common in the other tribes, especially between the upper and lower

social classes. They correspond, in fact, to the relatively pure bred

upper classes of the other tribes, and present the same high standard

of physical development and vigour. It is not improbable that the

severer conditions of their mode of life contribute to maintain this

high standard.

The facial expression and the bodily attitudes of the Punans are also

characteristic. When gathered in friendly talk with strangers, even

those whom they have every reason to trust, they prefer to remain

squatting on their heels, rather than to sit down on a mat; and the

tension of their muscles, combined with the still alert watchfulness

of their faces, conveys the impression that they are ready to leap

up and flee away or to struggle for their lives at any moment. It

is doubtless this alertness of facial expression and bodily attitude

that gives the Punan something of the air of an untameable wild animal.

In spite of his distrustful expression the Punan is a likeable person,

rich in good qualities and innocent of vices. He never slays or attacks

men of other tribes wantonly; he never seeks or takes a head, for his

customs do not demand it; and he never goes upon the warpath, except

when occasionally he joins a war-party of some other tribe in order to

facilitate the avenging of blood. But he will defend himself and his

family pluckily, if he is attacked and has no choice of flight; and,

if any one has killed one of his relatives, he will seek an opportunity

of planting a poisoned dart in his body. In a case of this kind all

the Punans of a large area will aid one another in obtaining certain

information as to the identity of the offender; and any one of them

will avenge the injury to his people, if the opportunity presents

itself. They do not avenge themselves indiscriminately on all or any

member of the offender's village or family, but they will postpone

their vengeance for years, if the actual offender cannot be reached

more promptly. It seems worth while to recount a particular instance

of Punan vengeance. The Punans of the Tinjar basin were claimed by

a Sebop chief; that is to say, the chief, Jangan by name, regarded

them as under his protection and as therefore under an obligation

to trade with him and his people only. But the Pokun people in the

basin of a neighbouring river, the Balaga, a tributary of the Rejang,

also claimed similar rights over the Punans of the district. One of

these Pokuns, a man of the upper class, being angered by the adhesion

of the Punans to the chief Jangan and by their refusal to trade with

him, cut down one of them during an altercation in the jungle, leaving

him dead on the spot. The companions of the murdered man retired, and

all the Punans deserted the neighbourhood of the Pokuns. Some four

years later the Pokun community migrated to the Tinjar; and shortly

afterwards the murderer, thinking the whole matter was forgotten, set

out through the jungle with a small party to seek to trade with another

group of Punans. While on the march he was struck in the cheek (the

favourite spot for the aim of the Punan marksman) by a poisoned dart

from an unseen assailant and died within ten minutes. His companions,

remembering the incident of four years before, suspected the Punans,

but saw no trace of any.

The Punans confessed the act of vengeance to Jangan, and he

communicated the facts to the Resident of the Baram district (C. H.),

who happened to be in the neighbourhood at the time. The Pokuns

wished to take vengeance on the Punans, and they would undoubtedly

have turned out in force to hunt down and kill all the Punan men

they could find, but that the Resident forbade them to take action,

and enforced his command by threatening to burn down their houses in

their absence. It is only fair to add that the Pokun chief recognised

the justice of this prohibition and showed no resentment.

That the Punans will not allow the slaying of any one of their number

to go unavenged on the person of the slayer is well known to all

the people of the country, and this knowledge does much to give them

immunity from attack.

The Punans cultivate no crops and have no domestic animals. They live

entirely upon the wild produce of the jungle, vegetable and animal. Of

the former, sago and a form of vegetable tallow found in the seed

of a tree (SHOREA) are the most important. Animals of all kinds are

eaten, and are secured principally by the aid of the blow-pipe and

poisoned darts, in the use of which the Punans are very expert. The

Punan dwelling is merely a rude low shelter of palm leaves, supported

on sticks to form a sloping roof which keeps off the rain but very

imperfectly, and leaves the interior open on every side.[174]

A Punan community consists generally of some twenty to thirty adult men

and women, and, about the same number of children. One of the older men

is recognised as the leader or chief. He has little formally defined

authority, but rather the authority only that is naturally accorded to

age and experience and to the fuller knowledge of the tribal history

and traditions that comes with age. His sway is a very mild one; he

dispenses no substantial punishments; public opinion and tradition

seem to be the sole and sufficient sanctions of conduct among these

Arcadian bands of gentle wary wanderers. Decisions as to the movements

of the band are arrived at by open discussion, in which the leader will

exercise an influence proportioned to his reputation for knowledge

and judgment. He is mainly responsible for the reading of the omens,

and has charge of the few and simple household gods -- if that lofty

title may be given to the wooden image of a crocodile and the bundle

of charms attached to it which are always to be seen in a Punan camp.

If, in case of disagreement, one or more of the members of a band

refuses to accept the judgment of the leader and of the majority,

he, or they, will withdraw from the community together with wife and

children, to form a band which, though in the main independent of

the parent group, will usually remain in its near neighbourhood and

maintain some intercourse. Fighting between Punans, whether of the

same or of different communities, is very rare; the only instances

known to us are a few in which Punans have been incited by men of

other tribes to join in an attack on their fellows.

The members of the band are for the most part the near relatives

of the leader, brothers and sons and nephews with their wives and

children. Each man has usually one wife. We know of no instances of

polygyny amongst them; though we know of cases in which a Punan woman

has become the second wife of a man of some other tribe. On the other

hand, polyandry occurs, generally in cases in which a woman married

to an elderly man has no children by him. They desire many children,

and large families are the rule; a family with as many as eight or

nine children is no rarity.

Marriage is for life, though separation by the advice and direction

of the chief, or by desertion of the man to another community,

occurs. Sexual restraint is probably maintained at about the same

level as among the other peoples, the women being more strictly chaste

after than before marriage. The ceremony of marriage is less elaborate

than among the settled tribes. A young man will become the lover of a

girl generally of some other group than his own, and when she becomes

pregnant the marriage is celebrated. There is little or no formal

arrangement of marriages by the elders on behalf of the young people.

The ceremony of marriage consists merely in a feast in which all,

or most of, the members of the two communities take part. Speeches

are made, and the leaders exhort the young couple to industry and

to obedience to themselves, making specific mention of the principal

duties of either sex, such as collecting camphor and procuring animal

food for the man, the preparing of sago, cooking, and tending the

children for the woman.

After the ceremony, the husband joins the wife's community and

generally remains a member of it; unlike the Kayans, among whom a

husband, though he may live for some years with his wife's people,

eventually brings her to his father's village. No definite payment

is made to the parents of the bride, but some small gift, perhaps

two or three pounds of tobacco, is usually presented to them by

the bridegroom.

Adverse omens may cause the postponement of a marriage; but beyond this

there seems to be no regular method of obtaining or seeking divine

sanction for the marriage; an offering of cooked food may be made

to Bali-Penyalong, by placing it on a stake beneath the image of the

crocodile (which seems to serve as an altar) with some dedicatory words

-- for like the other peoples the Punans are voluble in speech, both

in human intercourse and in appealing to the supernatural powers. On

such occasions the words uttered usually take in part the form of a

prayer for protection from danger.

Those who are accustomed to all the complex comforts and resources of

civilisation, and to whom all these resources hardly suffice to make

tolerable the responsibility and labour of the rearing of a family,

can hardly fail to be filled with wonder at the thought of these gentle

savages bearing and rearing large families of healthy well-mannered

children in the damp jungle, without so much as a permanent shelter

above their heads. The rude shelter of boughs and leaves, which is

their only house, is perhaps made a little more private than usual for

the benefit of the labouring woman. The pregnant woman goes on with

her work up to the moment of labour and resumes it almost immediately

afterwards. She at once becomes responsible for the care of the

infant. The only special treatment after childbirth is to sit with the

back close to a fire, so as to heat it as much as can be borne. The

delivery is sometimes aided by tightly binding the body above the

gravid uterus in order, it would seem, to prevent any retrogression of

the process. While the mother goes about her work in camp, the infant

is usually suspended in a sling of bark-cloth from a bent sapling or

branch, an arrangement which enables the mother to rock and so soothe

the child by means of an occasional push. When travelling or working

in the jungle the mother carries the infant slung upon her back,

either in a bark-cloth or a specially constructed cradle of plaited

rattan such as is used by the Kayans. The infant is suckled from one

to two years, and then takes to the ordinary diet of boiled wild sago,

varied with other animal and vegetable products of the jungle.

The children begin to help in the family work at a very early age. They

are disciplined largely by frequent warnings against dangers, actual

and suppositious, of which they remain acutely conscious throughout

life. This discipline no doubt contributes largely to induce the air

and the attitude of timid alertness which are so characteristic of the

Punan. Harmony and mutual help are the rule within the family circle,

as well as throughout the larger community; the men generally treat

their wives and children with all kindness, and the women perform

their duties cheerfully and faithfully.

The religious beliefs and practices of the Punans are similar to

those of the Kayans, but are less elaborated. They observe a simpler

system of omens, of which the behaviour and calls of lizards and

grasshoppers and of the civet cat (ARCTOGALE) are the chief. They

pray to Bali Penyalong, who seems to be the principal object of

their trust. This being is probably conceived anthropomorphically,

but his human qualities are not so clearly marked as in the case of

the gods of the settled tribes. They make no images in human form,

and we do not know that Bali Penyalong is supposed by them to have

a wife. The only image used in rites is the wooden image of the

crocodile, which is carried from place to place with every change of

camp. In communicating with the omen-creatures, fire and the frayed

sticks are used in much the same way as by the Kayans. Their rites

involve no animal sacrifices, and they do not look for guidance or

answer to prayer in the entrails of animals. It seems probable that

the Punans in each region have absorbed some of their religious and

superstitious notions from the settled tribes of the same region;

for in each region the Punan beliefs are different, showing more

or less affinity to those of the settled tribes. It is an obscure

question whether all their religious belief has been thus absorbed

from more cultured neighbours, or whether the Punans represent in this

and other respects the perpetuation (perhaps with some degeneration

or impoverishment) of a more primitive culture once common to the

ancestors of all, or the greater part of, the tribes of Borneo.[175]

The fact that the principal divinity recognised by them bears the same

name (Bali Penyalong) as the chief god of the Kenyahs is compatible

with either view.

Beside Bali Penyalong the Punans are aware of the existence of other

divinities, which, however, are very obscurely conceived and seldom

approached with prayer or rite. As regards the land of shades and

the journey thither, Punan beliefs are closely similar to those of

Kenyahs and some of the Klemantans. Their account of the journey of

the dead includes the passage of a river guarded by a great fish and a

hornbill (see Chap. XIV.). But they practice no burial and no funeral

rites. As soon as a man dies in any camp, the whole community moves

on to a new camp, leaving his body under one of their rude shelters,

covered only with a few leaves and branches.

Their view of the life after death seems to involve no system of

retribution and to be wellnigh devoid of moral significance. Their

religious beliefs probably influence their conduct less strongly than

do those of the Kayans; for among the latter such beliefs certainly

make strongly for social conduct, I.E. for obedience to the chiefs

and for observance of custom and public opinion; but in the Punan

community the conditions of life are so simple and so nearly in harmony

with the impulses of the natural man that temptations to wrong-doing

are few and weak; external sanctions of conduct, therefore, are but

little needed and but little operative.

Danger assails the Punan on every side and at all times, hence

alertness, energy, and courage are the prime virtues; courage

is rated highest, and a woman looks especially for courage in her

husband. But though courageous and active, Punans are not pugnacious;

as was said above, they rarely or never fight against one another,

and the nomadic groups of each region maintain friendly relations

with one another. Within each group harmony and mutual helpfulness

is the rule; each shares with all members of the group whatever

food, whether vegetable or animal, he may procure by skill or good

fortune. On returning to camp with a piece of game, a Punan throws

it down in the midst and it is treated as common property. If he has

slain a large pig or deer, too heavy for him to bring in unaided, he

returns to camp and modestly keeps silence over his achievement until

some question as to his luck is put to him; then he remarks that he

has left some small piece of game in the jungle, a mere trifle. Three

or four men will then set out and, following the path he has marked

by bending down twigs on his way back to camp, will find the game

and bring it in. If a present of tobacco is made to one member of

a group of Punans, the whole mass is divided by one of them into as

many heaps as there are members of the band present; and then each

of them, men and women alike, takes one heap for his or her own use,

the one who divided the mass taking the heap left by the rest.

In spite of their shyness and timidity, they respond readily to

kind treatment. They are never seen on the rivers, as they have

no boats and cannot easily be persuaded to venture a trip in a

boat. It is possible to make many expeditions through the jungle

without getting any glimpse of them. One of us (C. H.) had lived in

the Baram district six years before succeeding in seeing a single

Punan. The history of his first meeting with Punans may serve to

illustrate their timidity, caution, and good feeling. On making a

long hunting trip on the slopes of Mount Dulit, he took with him a

Sebop who was familiar with Punans and their language. For some days

no trace of them was seen; but one morning freshly made footprints

were observed round about the camp. The following night a cleft stick

was set up at some twenty paces from the camp with a large cake of

tobacco in the cleft, and on the stick a mark was carved which would

be understood by the Punans as implying that they were at liberty to

take the tobacco. This is a method of opening communications and trade

with them well known to the Klemantans. In the morning the tobacco had

disappeared, and fresh foot prints showed that its disappearance was

due to human agency. The following night this procedure was repeated,

and in the course of the day Punan shouts were heard, coming from a

distance of some hundreds of yards. The interpreter was sent out with

instructions to parley and, if possible, to persuade the Punans to come

into camp. Presently he returned with two shy but curious strangers,

who squatted at some distance and were gradually encouraged to come to

close quarters. After staying a few minutes and accepting presents of

tobacco and cloth, they made off. On the following day they returned

with eight male companions, bringing a monkey, a hornbill, and a rare

bird, all killed with their poisoned darts; and they enquired how

much rubber they should bring in return for the tobacco. They were

told that no return was expected, but, understanding that animals of

all sorts were being collected, they attached themselves to the party,

lent their unmatched skill to adding to the collections, and brought

in many rare specimens that now repose safely in the Natural History

Museum at South Kensington. They soon gained confidence and took up

their sleeping quarters under the raised floor of the rough hut; and,

when after some weeks the time for parting came, they voluntarily

took a prominent part in carrying down the collections to the boats,

and went away well satisfied with the simple presents they received.

Punans never build boats or travel on the water of their own initiative

and agency. In fact they dislike to come out from the shade of the

forest on to a cleared space or the stony bed of the river. They are

very conservative in spite of their intercourse with more advanced

tribes, and they harbour many irrational prejudices. They entertain

a particular aversion to the crocodile, an aversion strongly tinged

with awe. They will not kill it or any one of their omen-beasts. They

are very shy of whatever is unfamiliar. Many of them will not eat

salt or rice when opportunity offers.

The medicine men or DAYONGS of the Punans are distinguished for

their knowledge and skill, and are in much request among the other

tribes for the catching of souls and the extraction of pains and

disease. They are therefore fairly numerous; but, as among the other

peoples, the calling is a highly specialised one, though not one which

occupies a man's whole time or excuses him from the usual labours of

his community. Their methods do not differ widely from those of the

Kayan and Kenyah DAYONGS.

The Punan has great faith in charms, especially for bringing good luck

in hunting. He usually carries, tied to his quiver, a bundle of small

objects which have forcibly attracted his attention for any reason,

E.G. a large quartz crystal, a strangely shaped tusk or tooth or

pebble, etc., and this bundle of charms is dipped in the blood of

the animals that fall to his blow-pipe.

As regards dress and weapons the Punan differs little from his

neighbours. A scanty waist-cloth of home-made bark-cloth, or equally

scanty skirt for the woman, strings of small beads round wrists or

ankles or both, numbers of slender bands of plaited palm-fibre below

the knees and about the wrists, and sometimes a strip of cloth round

the head, make up his costume for all occasions.

All his belongings are such as can easily be transported. He carries

a sword, a small knife, a blow-pipe with spear-blade attached, and a

small axe with long narrow blade for working camphor out of the heart

of the camphor-tree. Besides these essential tools and weapons, which

he constantly carries, the family possesses sago-mallets and sieves,

dishes and spoons or spatulas of hard wood, and tongs of bamboo for

eating sago,[176] a few iron pots,[177] large baskets for carrying

on the back, a few mats of plaited rattan, and small bamboo boxes.

These are the sum of the worldly goods of a Punan family, and it would,

we suppose, be difficult to find another people who combine so great

a poverty in material possessions with so high a level of contentment

and decent orderly active living.

Although his material possessions are so few, the Punan is not capable

of fashioning all of them by his own independent efforts. All his

metal tools he obtains from the Kayans (or other tribes) who are his

patrons. But everything else he makes with his own hands. The long

blow-pipe of polished hard-wood, which is his favourite weapon, he

makes by the same methods and as well as the Kayans. But the iron rod

which he uses in the process of boring the wood he cannot make. This

illustrates his intimate dependence on other tribes, and seems to

imply that the blow-pipe, at least in the highly finished form in

which it is now used, cannot have been an independent achievement

of the Punans. They are especially skilful in the plaiting of rattan

strips to make baskets, mats, and sieves. They do little wood-carving,

but carve some pretty handles for knives and decorative pieces for

the sword-sheaths from the bones of the gibbon and deer. They are

expert also in making bamboo pipes with which to imitate the calls

of the deer and of some of the birds.

Hunting, tracking, and trapping game are the principal and favourite

pursuits of the men; they display much ingenuity in these pursuits

and attain a wonderful skill in the interpretation of the signs of the

jungle. For example, a Punan is generally able to read from the tracks

left in the jungle by the passage of a party of men, the number of the

party, and much other information about it. They are expert scouts,

and, when their neighbourhood is invaded by any party whose intentions

are not clearly pacific, they will follow them for many days, keeping

them under close observation while remaining completely hidden.

The Punan has few recreations. His highest artistic achievement

is in song. His principal musical instrument is a simple harp made

from a length of thick bamboo (Fig. 86); from the surface of this

six longitudinal strips are detached throughout the length of a

section of twenty inches or more, but retain at both ends their

natural attachments. Each strip is raised from the surface by a pair

of small wooden bridges, and is tuned by adjusting the interval

between these. The only other musical instrument is a very simple

"harmonica." A series of strips of hard-wood, slightly hollowed and

adjusted in length, are laid across the shins of the operator, who

beats upon them with two sticks. But the finest songs are sung without

accompaniment and are of the nature of dramatic recitals in the manner

of a somewhat monotonous and melancholy recitative. To hear a wild

Punan, standing in the midst of a solemn circle lit only by a few

torches which hardly seem to avail to keep back the vast darkness of

the sleeping jungle, recite with dramatic gesture the adventures of

a departing soul on its way to the land of shades, is an experience

which makes a deep impression, one not devoid of aesthetic quality.

In dancing, the Punan attains only a very modest level. The men dance

upon a narrow plank (for the good reason that they have nothing else

to dance upon); and the exhibition is one of skilful balancing on this

restricted base while executing a variety of turning movements and

postures. The women dance in groups with very restricted movements

of the feet, and some monotonous swaying movements of the arms and

body. The men also imitate the movements of monkeys and of the hornbill

and the various strange sounds made by the latter.

The most striking evidence of the low cultural standing of the Punan

is the fact that he cannot count beyond three (the words are JA,

DUA, TELO); all larger numbers are for him merely many (PINA). Yet,

although in culture he stands far below all the settled agricultural

tribes, there is no sufficient reason for assuming him to be innately

inferior to them in any considerable degree, whether morally or

intellectually. Any such assumption is rendered untenable by the fact

that many Punans have quickly assimilated the mode of life and general

culture of the other tribes; and there can be no doubt, we think, that

many of the tribes that we have classed as Klemantan and Kenyah are

very closely related to the Punans, and may properly be regarded as

Punans that have adopted Kayan or Malay culture some generations ago.

CHAPTER 20

Moral and Intellectual Peculiarities

In this chapter we propose to bring together a number of observations

which have found no place in foregoing chapters but which will throw

further light on the moral and intellectual status of the pagan tribes.

We have seen that among the Kayans the immediate sanction of all

actions and of judgments of approval and disapproval is custom, and

that the sanction of custom is generally supported by the fear of

the TOH and of the harm they may inflict upon the whole house. The

principle of collective or communal responsibility of the household,

which is thus recognised in face of the spiritual powers, as well

as in face of other communities, gives every man an interest in

the good behaviour of his fellows, and at the same time develops

in him the sense of obligation towards his community. The small

size of each community, its separation and clear demarcation by its

residence under a single roof, its subordination to a single chief,

and its perpetual conflict and rivalry with other neighbouring

communities of similar constitution, all these circumstances also

make strongly for the development in each of its members of a strong

collective consciousness, that is to say, of a clear consciousness

of the community and of his place within it and a strong sentiment of

attachment to it. The attachment of each individual to his community is

also greatly strengthened by the fact that it is hardly possible for

him to leave it, even if he would. For he could not hope to maintain

himself alone, or as the head of an isolated family, against the

hostile forces, natural and human, that would threaten him; and

it would be very difficult for him to gain admittance to any other

community.

It is only when we consider these facts that we can understand how

smoothly the internal life of the community generally runs, how few

serious offences are committed, how few are the quarrels, and how few

the instances of insubordination towards the chief, and how tact and

good sense can rule the house without inflicting any other punishment

than fines and compensatory payments.

And yet, when all these circumstances have been taken into account,

the orderly behaviour of a Kayan community must be in part regarded as

evidence of the native superiority of character or disposition of the

Kayans. For though the Sea Dayaks, Klemantans, and Muruts, live under

very similar conditions, they do not attain the same high level of

social or moral conduct. Among the Muruts there is much drunkenness

and consequent disorder, and the same is true in a less degree of

the Sea Dayaks; among them and some of the Klemantan tribes quarrels

within the house are of frequent occurrence, generally over disputed

ownership of land, crops, fruit-trees, or other property. And these

quarrels are not easily composed by the chiefs. Such quarrels not

infrequently lead to the splitting of a community, or to the migration

of the whole house with the exception of one troublesome member and

his family, who are left in inglorious isolation in the old house.

But the higher level of conduct of the Kayans is in most respects

rivalled by that of the Kenyahs, and some importance must therefore be

attributed to the one prominent feature of their social organisation

which is peculiar to these two peoples, namely a clearly marked

stratification into three social strata between which but little

intermarriage takes place. This stratification undoubtedly makes

for a higher level of conduct throughout the communities in which it

obtains; for the members of the higher or chiefly class are brought

up with a keen sense of their responsibility towards the community,

and their example and authority do much to maintain the standards of

conduct of the middle and lower classes.

We have said that almost all offences are punished by fines only. Of

the few offences which are felt to require a heavier punishment,

the one most seriously regarded is incest. For this offence, which is

held to bring grave peril to the whole house, especially the danger of

starvation through failure of the PADI crop, two punishments have been

customary. If the guilt of the culprits is perfectly clear, they are

taken to some open spot on the river-bank at some distance from the

house. There they are thrown together upon the ground and a sharpened

bamboo stake is driven through their bodies, so that they remain pinned

to the earth. The bamboo, taking root and growing luxuriantly on this

spot, remains as a warning to all who pass by; and, needless to say,

the spot is looked on with horror and shunned by all men. The other

method of punishment is to shut up the offenders in a strong wicker

cage and to throw them into the river. This method is resorted to as

a substitute for the former one, owing to the difficulty of getting

any one to play the part of executioner and to drive in the stake,

for this involves the shedding of the blood of the community.

The kind of incest most commonly committed is the connection of

a man with an adopted daughter, and (possibly on account of this

frequency) this is the kind which is most strongly reprobated. It

is obvious also that this form of incest requires a specially strong

check in any community in which the adoption of children is a common

practice. For, in the absence of severe penalties for this form of

incest, a man might be tempted to adopt female children in order to

use them as concubines. We find support for this view of the ground of

the especially severe censure on incest of this form in the fact that

intercourse between a youth and his sister-by-adoption (or VICE VERSA)

is not regarded as incest, and the relation is not regarded as any bar

to marriage. We know of at least one instance of marriage between two

young Kenyahs brought up together as adopted brother and sister.[178]

Of other forms of incest the more common (though, it should be said,

incest of any form is very infrequent) are those involving father

and daughter, brother and sister, and brother and half-sister.

The punishment of the incestuous couple does not suffice to ward off

the danger brought by them upon the community. The household must be

purified with the blood of pigs and fowls; the animals used are the

property of the offenders or of their family; and in this way a fine

is imposed.

When any calamity threatens or falls upon a house, especially a great

rising of the river which threatens to sweep away the house or the

tombs of the household, the Kayans are led to suspect that incestuous

intercourse in their own or in neighbouring houses has taken place;

and they look round for evidences of it, and sometimes detect a case

which otherwise would have remained hidden. It seems probable that

there is some intimate relation between this belief and the second

of the two modes of punishment described above; but we have no direct

evidence of such connection.[179]

All the other peoples also, except the Punans, punish incest with

death. Among the Sea Dayaks the most common form of incest is that

between a youth and his aunt, and this is regarded at least as

seriously as any other form. It must be remembered that, owing to

the frequency of divorce and remarriage among the Sea Dayaks, a youth

may find himself in the position of step-son to half a dozen or more

divorced step-mothers, some of them perhaps of his own age, and that

each of them may have several sisters, all of whom are reckoned as

his aunts; therefore he must walk warily in his amorous adventures.

Sexual perversion of any form is, we think, extremely rare among

the pagan tribes of Borneo. We have never heard of any case of

homosexuality on good authority, and we have never heard any reference

made to it; and that constitutes, to our thinking, strong evidence

that vice of that kind is unknown among most of the tribes. It is

not unknown, though not common, among the Malays and Chinese, and,

if cases occur sporadically among the pagans, they are presumably

due to infection from those quarters.

Homicide

Kayans, as we have seen, have no scruple in shedding the blood

of their enemies, but they very seldom or never go to war with

other Kayans; and the shedding of Kayan blood by Kayans is of rare

occurrence. To shed human blood, even that of an enemy, in the house

is against custom. Nevertheless murder of Kayan by Kayan, even by

members of the same house, is not unknown. In a wanton case, where

two or more men have deliberately attacked another and slain him,

or one has killed another by stealth, the culprit (or culprits)

would usually be made to pay very heavy compensation to relatives,

the amount being greater the higher the social status and the greater

the wealth of the culprit; the amount may equal, in fact, the whole

of his property and more besides; and he might, in order to raise the

amount, have to sell himself into slavery to another, slavery being

their only equivalent to imprisonment. The relatives would probably

desire to kill the murderers; but the chief would generally restrain

them and would find his task rendered easier by the fact that, if

they insist on taking the murderer's life, they would forfeit their

right to compensation.[180] The amount of the compensation to be paid

would not depend upon the social standing of the murdered man, but

the fine paid to the house or chief would be heavier in proportion

to his rank. But we have knowledge of cases in which chiefs have,

with the approval of the house, had a murderer put to the sword. The

murderer who has paid compensation has, however, by no means set

himself right with the household; they continue to look askance

at him. Set fights or duels between men of the same house are very

rare. If a Kayan of one house kills one of another, his chief would

see that he paid a proper compensation to the relatives, as well as

a fine to his own house. If a man killed his own slave, he would be

liable to no punishment unless the act were committed in the house;

but public opinion would strongly disapprove.

'Running AMOK' is not unknown among Kayans, though it is very rare. If

a man in this condition of blind fury kills any one, he is cut down and

killed, unless he is in the house; in which case he would be knocked

senseless with clubs, carried out of the house into the jungle,

and there slain.

Drunkenness during an act of criminal violence is regarded as a

mitigating circumstance, and the fines and compensation imposed would

be of smaller amount than in a case of similar crime deliberately

committed.

Suicide is strongly reprobated, and, as we have seen, the shades of

those who die by their own hands are believed to lead a miserable and

lonely existence in a distressful country, Tan Tekkan, in which they

wander picking up mere scraps of food in the jungle. Nevertheless,

suicides occur among Kayans of both sexes. The commonest occasion

is the enforced separation of lovers, rather than the despair of

rejected lovers. We have known of two instances of Kayan youths who,

having formed attachments during a long stay in a distant house and

who then, finding themselves under the necessity of returning home

with their chief and unable to arrange marriage with their fair ones,

have committed suicide. The method most commonly adopted is to go

off alone into the jungle and there to stab a knife into the carotid

artery. The body of a suicide is generally buried without ceremony

on the spot where it is found. Suicides of women are rarer than those

of men; desertion by a lover is the commonest cause.

Dishonesty in the form of pilfering or open robbery by violence

are of very rare occurrence. Yet temptations to both are not

lacking. Fruittrees on the river-bank, even at some distance from

any village, are generally private property, and though they offer a

great temptation to passing crews when their fruit is ripe, the rights

of the proprietor are usually respected or compensation voluntarily

paid. Theft within the house or village is practically unknown. Even

before the European governments were established, Malay and Chinese

traders occasionally penetrated with boat-loads of goods far into

the interior; and now such enterprises are regularly and frequently

undertaken. Occasionally a trader establishes himself in a village

for months together, driving a profitable trade in hardware, cloth,

tobacco, etc. These traders usually travel in a small boat with a

company or crew of only two or three men, and they are practically

defenceless against any small party of the natives who might choose

to rob or murder them. Such traders have now and again been robbed,

and sometimes also murdered, by roving bands of Sea Dayaks, but we

know of no such act committed by Kayans or Kenyahs. The trader puts

himself under the protection of a chief and then feels his life and

property to be safe.

It would not be true to say that the Kayans or any of the other

peoples are always strictly truthful. They are given to exaggeration

in describing any event, and their accounts are apt to be strongly

biassed in their own favour. Nevertheless, deliberate lying is a

thing to be ashamed of, and a man who gets himself a reputation as

a liar is regarded with small favour by his fellows.