There are many kinds of sacred jars. The best known are the Gusi, the Rusa, and the Naga, all most probably of Chinese origin. The Gusi, the most valuable of the three, is of a green colour, about eighteen inches high, and is, from its medicinal properties, exceedingly sought after. One fetched at Tawaran the price of four hundred pounds sterling to be paid in produce; the vendor has for the last ten years been receiving the price, which, according to his own account, has not yet been paid, though probably he has received fifty per cent. over the amount agreed on from his ignorant customer. They are most numerous in the south of Borneo. The Naga is a jar two feet in height, and ornamented with Chinese figures of dragons; they are not worth above seven or eight pounds. While the Rusa is covered with what the native artist considers a representation of some kind of deer, it is worth from fifteen to sixteen pounds. An attempt was made to manufacture an imitation in China, but the Dayaks immediately discovered the counterfeit.
We pulled up the Sakarang river to visit Gasing in his farmhouse, which was large, neat, and comfortable; in form and general appearance like their usual village houses. These Sea Dayaks are a very improvable people. I have mentioned the tender point of their character as displayed in Mr. Gomez’s school at Lundu, and another is their love of imitation. A Sakarang chief noticed a path that was cut and properly ditched near the fort, and found that in all weathers it was dry, so he instantly made a similar path from the landing place on the river to his house, and I was surprised on entering it to see coloured representations of horses, knights in full armour, and ships drawn vigorously, but very inartistically, on the plank walls. I found, on inquiry, he had been given some copies of the Illustrated London News, and had endeavoured to imitate the engravings. He used charcoal, lime, red ochre, and yellow earth as his materials.
The Sakarang women are, I think, the handsomest among the Dayaks of Borneo; they have good figures, light and elastic; with well-formed busts and very interesting, even pretty faces; with skin of so light a brown as almost to be yellow, yet a very healthy-looking yellow, with bright dark eyes, and long glistening black hair. The girls are very fond of using an oil made from the Katioh fruit, which has the scent of almonds. Their dress is not unbecoming, petticoats reaching from below the waist to the knees, and jackets ornamented with fringe. All their clothes are made from native cloth of native yarn, spun from cotton grown in the country. These girls are generally thought to be lively in conversation and quick in repartee.
The Sakarang men are clean built, upright in their gait, and of a very independent bearing. They are well behaved and gentle in their manners: and, on their own ground, superior to all others in activity. Their national dress is a chawat or waistcloth, and in warlike expeditions they are partial to bright red cloth jackets, so that when assembled at a distance, they look like a party of English soldiers. The Sakarang and Seribas men have the peculiar practice of wearing rings all along the edge of their ears, sometimes as many as a dozen. I thought this custom confined to them, but I find the Muruts of Padas, opposite Labuan, also practise it.
Their strength and activity are remarkable. I have seen a Dayak carry a heavy Englishman down the steepest hills; and when one of their companions is severely wounded they bear him home, whatever may be the distance. They exercise a great deal from boyhood in wrestling, swimming, running, and sham-fighting, and are excellent jumpers. When a little more civilized they would make good soldiers, being brave by nature. They are, however, short—a man five feet five inches high would be considered tall, the average is perhaps five feet three inches.
We did not visit the interior of the Batang Lupar, but it is reported to be very populous, and the Chinese are now working gold there. I have penetrated to the very sources of the Sakarang, and found it, after a couple of days’ pull, much encumbered by drift-wood and rocks, with shallow rapids over pebbly beds. This interior is very populous, and from a view we had on a hill over the upper part of the Seribas River, as far as the hills in which the Kanowit rises, we could perceive but little old forest.
I may mention that the crime of poisoning is almost unknown on the north-west coast, but it is very generally believed the people of the interior of the Kapuas, a few days’ walk from the Batang Lupar, are much given to the practice. Sherif Sahib, and many others who visited that country, died suddenly, and the Malays assert it was from poison; but of this I have no proof.
Near the very sources of the Kapuas live the Malau Dayaks, who are workers in gold and brass, and it is very singular that members of this tribe can wander safely through the villages of the head-hunting Seribas and Sakarang, and are never molested,—on the contrary, they are eagerly welcomed by the female portion of the population, and the young men are not indifferent to their arrival; but the specimens of their work that I have seen do not show much advance in civilization. The Malau districts produce gold, and it is said very fine diamonds.
I will insert here an anecdote of the public executioner of Sakarang. Last year, a native was tried and condemned to death for a barbarous murder, and according to the custom in Malay countries, the next day was fixed for carrying out the sentence. A Chinese Christian lad, who was standing near the executioner, said to him earnestly, “What! no time given him for repentance?” “Repentance!” cried the executioner, contemptuously. “Repentance! he is not a British subject.” A curious confusion of ideas. Both were speaking in English, and very good English.
I tasted here, for the first time, the rambi fruit, that looks something like a large grape, growing in bunches, pleasantly sweet, yet with a slight acidity, yellow skin, with the interior divided into two fleshy pulps.