The Walloon gave a sigh of relief.
“But Wienersdorf will have to be careful of that bottle of nasty smelling liquid,” Johannes continued, “he has done wonders with it indeed.”
“Dalim swears that his salt saved La Cueille.”
“Not a bit of it,” Johannes replied. “I have watched the Colonel at Kwala Kapoeas in his experiments with arrow poisons on dogs, monkeys and fowls. The salt antidote always failed; the poor animals invariably died after it, while those treated by the application of the foul smelling liquid were all cured.”
Wienersdorf was sitting, lost in thought, supporting his head with his hand. “It is still a riddle to me,” he said at last, “how those men came to leave a head behind them on the ground. I always thought that the head-hunter seized his victim by the hair before giving the fatal blow.”
“That is what I also cannot make out,” the Dayak assured him. “As a rule the grasping of the hair and the blow itself take place so rapidly that the victim has no time to utter a cry. Some instances of rapidity have been recorded where the victims actually make a few steps onward waving their arms about after decapitation. The Dayak boys of the upper regions regularly cultivate head-hunting as a fine art. They first place a cocoanut [[106]]on the top of a thin post and practice until they are able to cut the post clean through just under the point where the nut rests upon it without injuring the latter. Later on, as they advance in years and their strength increases, the post is replaced by an effigy of a large boy, the neck of which is made of a piece of soft but elastic wood, and in order to complete the illusion they adorn the nut with a wig formed of the fibres of the arengpalm, which, when properly made, strongly resembles the thin hair of the natives. Hence their great dexterity.”
“To which I can add,” Johannes continued, “that the Dayaks of the lower country are just as great experts in the handling of their mandauws. I have witnessed at Kwala Kapoeas how, in the presence of the Colonel, any Dayak, however weak in appearance, could without visible effort divide in halves at a single blow a ripe green cocoanut, while none of the Europeans could manage to penetrate beyond the fibre.”
“It seems a curious custom to offer one’s lady-love these human heads,” Schlickeisen continued.
“Quite so; but yet it has a meaning,” Johannes answered. “Formerly it must have been a proof of his valor given by the bridegroom to his bride, to demonstrate that he was capable of protecting his wife and children. What better guarantee than the head of one of his enemies killed by his own hand could be offered by a primitive community? This custom afterwards became degraded by turning skulls into an article of luxury or of established traffic. Thus an institution originating in the best intentions became the curse of the whole population.” [[107]]
“But these atrocities cannot be practiced in the lower country, can they?” Wienersdorf asked of Dalim.