A chief, for example, who prides himself on his strong head, will sit before a huge jar of tuak, and pledge every one around. For every one whom he serves he drinks one cup himself, and it is his ambition to keep his seat after all his companions are insensible. Of course, it is impossible that any man can drink an equal amount with ten or twelve others, and it is most likely that he forces the tuak on them so fast that they are soon rendered incapable of seeing whether their host drinks or not. They are very proud of being fresh on the following morning, and boast that although their guests, who belonged to another tribe, had severe headaches, they themselves suffered nothing at all.
It is partly by means of appealing to this pride that the girls are able to make the men drink to the extent which has been mentioned, and they derive so much amusement from exercising their power that they lose no opportunity that falls in their way, and essay their blandishments even when there is no definite feast.
Once, when Mr. St. John had travelled from the Sibuyan Dyaks to the Bukars, he and his guides were received, as usual, in the head house. While the English guests were making their toilet, two young Dyak girls came very gently up the ladder and slipped into the chamber. Now the head house is, as the reader may remember, the bachelors’ hall, and consequently the girls had no business there. So, pretending not to see them, the white men proceeded with their toilets, and quietly watched their proceedings.
The two girls, after glancing cautiously at the strangers, and thinking themselves unobserved, made their way to the Dyak guides, each having in her hands a vast bowl of fresh tuak, which they offered to the visitors. The young men, knowing their object, declined to drink, and thereby drew on themselves a battery of mixed blandishments and reproaches. Above all, they were entreated not to inflict on the girls the shame of refusing their gift, and making them take it back, to be laughed at by all their friends.
Cajolery, honied words, and caresses having been resisted, they tried the effect of ridicule, and their taunts succeeded where their coaxings failed. “What!” said they, “are the Sibuyans so weak-headed as to be afraid of drinking Bukar tuak?” This touched the visitors on a very tender point. The Sibuyans specially pride themselves on the strength of their heads and of their tuak, and a refusal to drink was thus made tantamount to a confession of inferiority in both respects. So they raised the huge bowls to their lips, and were allowed no peace until they had drained the last drops, when their tempters ran away laughing, knowing that in a very short time their two victims would be senseless.
It is a most extraordinary thing that the Dyak women, most of whom do not drink at all, and very few drink even moderately, take such a delight in forcing the men into intoxication. The young girls are the most successful temptresses. They take advantage of their youth and beauty, and employ all their fascinations to inveigle the men into drinking. No man is safe from them.
Their brothers, friends, and even their betrothed, fall, as we have seen, victims to their blandishments. They will make up to perfect strangers, get up a flirtation, and lavish all their enchantments upon them like Circe of old, until they have reduced their helpless admirers to a state little better than that of the mythological swine. Even after the men have sunk on the ground, and are incapable of raising the cup to their lips, the women think their task not quite completed, and pour the tuak down the throats of the helpless men. In the “[Dyak Feast],” which the artist has so finely drawn on the opposite page, the appeal and dresses of these Eastern syrens are illustrated.
Yet, although on such occasions they give themselves over to utter drunkenness, the Dyaks are a sober race, and except at these feasts, or when beset by women, they are singularly temperate, the betel-nut supplying the place of all intoxicating liquor.
