The speech was greeted with a shout as triumphant as if they saw the backs of their enemy disappearing before them; they sprang to their feet, and spears, shields, and parangs clattered, and plumes waved, and so clearly were they victors, that, in imagination, each warrior had a foeman’s head dangling at his belt.
One and all turned to retrace their steps. Where but an hour before, in strained silence, we had crept stealthily, now, that all danger of a lurking foe was dispelled, we scrambled along, laughing, shouting, clattering iron-shod spears on the stones, and hurrying to be first at the boats. Abun, Madong, and Batu did not share in this exultant mood; they alone seemed down-hearted; they and their household must continue to endure the burdensome restrictions of mourning.
It was during this straggling march that the ‘fencing-master,’ who was, it appears, a Past-Master in knowledge of all rites and usages of war, and his word law, announced that in a case like the present, where a war-party had failed to bring home a head because the enemy had scattered, it was quite in accordance with time-honoured, head-hunting custom to borrow a head; the benign influence, from a relic thus rejuvenated by posing as a head freshly taken, would then be diffused in its adopted home. This announcement amazingly heartened the young brothers.
We now shot in a few hours through rapids and over rocks, where, on our way up, we had toiled almost all day long. As the sun slowly declined, the faster we raced, helter-skelter; spray was flying, paddles thumping, the canoes, creaking and grinding over the rocks, dashed together in a mad race to be the first to reach Juman’s house and proclaim the glorious news that we had put the enemy to flight. The canoe wherein I sat, was one of the earliest to reach Bowang Takun, and I could, therefore, count the canoes as they came darting through the dense leafy arch where the smaller stream entered the Baram. There were in all sixty by the count. No sooner were they drawn up on the sloping bank, than their occupants, numbering at least six hundred, were one and all, dashing and splashing in the water. [Indeed, it might be almost asserted that the Kayans and Kenyahs live as much in the water as out of it. Although they may have been wading alongside of their canoes all day, yet there is never a halt of even a few minutes that they do not divest themselves of their one garment and at least extend themselves in the water, if it is not deep enough for swimming. It would be as monstrous for a Kayan boy not to know how to swim as for a white boy not to know how to run.]
A STEALTHY APPROACH TO THE HOUSE OF AN ENEMY.
After the restful bath and the cooking of the evening meal, on the bank,—this time we were not Juman’s guests,—the expedition began to disband. Those who lived only a short distance up or down the river heaped their cumbersome accoutrements in their canoes and glided off into the darkness.
Abun’s party had a pious duty to perform; accordingly, we spent the night at Bowang Takun, where Abun was going to borrow the head. The loan was transacted with minutest care; the head was reverently lifted from its resting-place by a very old man, whose remnant of days on earth was nearly spent, and who, therefore, shrank less, than a younger man would shrink, from a touch which is sure to be followed by speedy death. From the moment that the skull was touched a deep solemnity fell on all. No laugh, no jest, no light word broke the reverence of what all felt to be a holy act. The skull was carefully swathed in palm leaves and tied under the bow of Abun’s boat, so that it just grazed the water.
Early on the following morning we all set out for Long Lama, Abun’s boat in the lead, and without stopping all that day we drifted silently down with the slow current under a scorching sun. Abun’s canoe and one or two others pushed on a little faster than the rest, and when at about five o’clock in the afternoon we were distant from Long Lama only one turn of the river, we found that they had there disembarked, and had already prepared a wonderfully decorated and elaborate camp; there the whole party must remain for the night, and not be even seen by any member of Abun’s household till dawn of the next day. All around the tent-like shelter of palm leaves were horizontal poles resting on forked sticks, whereon were hung the war-coats and caps, and the almost solid wall, thereby made, was completed by the shields, which were leaned against it to fill in any gaps. Spear-points glittered everywhere, and in front of this hut, or shelter, there was reared an archway of sticks, whereof the bark had been cut up in curled frills along the whole length.[9] Down near the edge of the water was a pile of green bamboo joints decorated with bands of plaited palm leaf; in these the rice must be cooked, and not in earthen pots,—possibly an instance of the tendency in all ceremonial rites to return to the most primitive methods.[10]
[In the accompanying photograph, Madong, the second son, is the well-built young fellow in the foreground; next to him is a young warrior whose name, I think, is Jok; then comes Abun, the Chief, with one hand resting on his shield; immediately on his left is Batu, the youngest son; and in front of him the elderly man, with close-cropped hair and upturned face, is the ‘fencing-master.’ At his feet is the pile of bamboo joints, and near them several hampers containing rolls of palm-leaf matting, whereon the natives sleep. In the background are the rows of war-coats and shields. I was at a disadvantage in taking this photograph; the light from the last rays of the setting sun was poor, and the support for my camera was an unstable sand-bank.]