The Dutch, with their much larger possessions, in a similar way have invoked the co-operation of the native chiefs. Their government is also largely paternal, which is the form best suited to the circumstances. The Malay Sultans maintain power under Dutch control and receive their income from the government, which has abolished many abuses. As for the pagan tribes, they are treated with admirable justice.
Well administered by Europeans as Borneo undoubtedly is, the question may well arise as to whether the natives are not becoming sufficiently civilised to render purposeless expeditions to study them. To this may be answered that in a country so vast, where white men are comparatively few in number, the aborigines in the more remote part are still very little affected by outside influence. The geographical features are an important factor here. In the immense extent of forest vegetation which covers the land from the sea to the tops of the mountains, the rivers are the only highways, and in their upper courses, on account of rapids and waterfalls, travel is difficult and often dangerous. Although in the last quarter of a century much has been accomplished by ethnology, still for years to come Borneo, especially the Dutch part of it, will remain a prolific field for research. The tribes are difficult to classify, and in Dutch Borneo undoubtedly additional groups are to be found. The Muruts in the north, who use irrigation in their rice culture and show physical differences from the others, are still little known. Many tribes in Dutch Borneo have never been studied. So recently as 1913 Mr. Harry C. Raven, an American zoological collector, in crossing the peninsula that springs forth on the east coast about 1° N.L., came across natives, of the Basap tribe, who had not before been in contact with whites. The problem of the Indonesians is far from solved, nor is it known who the original inhabitants of Borneo were, Negritos or others, and what role, if any, the ancestors of the Polynesians played remains to be discovered.
The generally accepted idea has been that the Malays inhabit the coasts and the Dayaks the interior. This is not strictly correct because the racial problems of the island are much more complicated. Doctor A.C. Haddon recognises five principal groups of people in Sarawak, Punan, Kenyah-Kayan, Iban or Sea Dayak, Malay, and the remaining tribes he comprehends under the noncommittal name Klemantan. He distinguishes two main races, a dolichocephalic and a brachycephalic, terming the former Indonesian, the latter Proto-Malay.
Doctor A.W. Nieuwenhuis, who about the end of the last century made important researches in the upper parts of the Kapuas and Mahakam Rivers and at Apo Kayan, found the Ot-Danum, Bahau-Kenyah, and Punan to be three distinct groups of that region. Doctor Kohlbrugge and Doctor Haddon consider the Ot-Danums as Indonesians, to whom the former also consigns the Kayans and the Punans. [*] Doctors Hose and McDougall, who in their Pagan Tribes of Borneo have contributed much to the ethnology of the island, have convincingly shown that the Ibans (Sea Dayaks) are recent immigrants, probably of only two hundred years ago, from Sumatra, and are Proto-Malays. They hold the view that the Kayans have imparted to the Kenyahs and other tribes the "principal elements of the peculiar culture which they now have in common."
[Footnote *: Quoted from Pagan Tribes in Borneo, II, p. 316]
The Malays undoubtedly were the first to employ the word Dayak as a designation for the native tribes except the nomadic, and in this they have been followed by both the Dutch and the British. The word, which makes its appearance in the latter part of the eighteenth century, is derived from a Sarawak word, dayah, man, and is therefore, as Ling Roth says, a generic term for man. The tribes do not call themselves Dayaks, and to use the designation as an anthropological descriptive is an inadmissible generalisation. Nevertheless, in the general conception the word has come to mean all the natives of Borneo except the Malays and the nomadic peoples, in the same way as American Indian stands for the multitude of tribes distributed over a continent. In this sense, for the sake of convenience, I shall myself use the word, but to apply it indiscriminately to anthropological matters is as unsatisfactory as if one should describe a certain tribe in the new world merely as American Indian.
CHAPTER III
BANDJERMASIN, THE PRINCIPAL TOWN IN DUTCH BORNEO—NORTHWARD ALONG THE EAST COAST—BALIK PAPAN, AN OIL PRODUCING CENTRE—SAMARINDA—TANDJONG SELOR—THE SULTAN-UP THE KAYAN RIVER
Fifty miles from land the sea assumes a different aspect through the fresh water of the great Barito flowing on the surface. Its red hue is produced by particles of soil brought from the inland of Borneo. In the beginning of December I arrived at Bandjermasin, the principal town in Dutch Borneo, inhabited for the most part by Malays and Chinese. It is the seat of the Resident of the vast South and Eastern Division and has a garrison. The sea loudly announces its presence here, the tide overflowing much of the low ground, hence the Malay name, bandjir = overflow, másin = salt water. Large clumps of a peculiar water-plant float on the river in Bandjermasin in great numbers, passing downward with the current, upward with the tide, producing a singular, but pleasing sight. It is originally a native of America and has attractive light-blue flowers, but multiplies to such an extent that the growth finally may interfere with traffic. In India I saw a lagoon completely choked with it.
There is one hotel where the table is fair and the beds are clean, but blankets are considered unnecessary, and only sheets are provided. The climate was not as hot as I expected, nights and mornings being surprisingly cool. Early in July of the following year the morning temperature was about 73° F. (23° C). Malaria is rare here, but there are frequent indications of beri-beri.