The house built by Tama Aping Buling stands on the north bank of the river, just opposite to the mouth of the Dapoi, a large tributary. It is about two hundred feet from the river, on a high bank which slopes gradually to a wide pebbly beach. The house was only recently finished at that time, and had cost interminable labor; many of the piles whereon it was built were at least twenty inches in diameter, and supported the floor fully fifteen feet from the ground. The veranda was broad and well floored with wide, hewn planks, and roofed with shingles of billian wood, not nailed to the rafters, but tied on with strips of rattan. One end of the house was not yet quite finished, and shingles only partially covered it. This incomplete state was not, however, without its uses; it supplied Tama Aping Buling, while showing his house to us, with a chance to make a remark, which, hackneyed and threadbare as it is among them, is always uttered apparently in the belief that it will be received with all the applause of a novel and brilliant idea. With a wave of his hand toward the roofless rafters, Tama Aping explained, ‘This end of the house is occupied by Laki Langit and his children,’ which, interpreted, means, ‘Grandfather Sky and his children—the stars!’ We had heard the witticism so often that it was hard to force a smile,—but we did. Let him among us, who, in describing ‘full dress,’ has never called it ‘war-paint’ or ‘best bib and tucker,’ cast the first reproach at the unsophisticated Borneans.
Early on the following morning the wee pig was sacrificed on the beach and there left in its gore. Such a sacrifice, when made in ratification of a compact, renders the flesh inedible to all participants in the ceremony; hence the diminutive size of the pig. On the present occasion Aban Liah’s enforced pig was so extremely small, that I saw a lean and hungry dog seize it by the head after the sacrifice was over, and, slinging the body over his back, make off toward some tall grass, where he probably devoured the whole carcass at one meal,—possibly, at one gulp.
The sacrifice of the pig was certainly a beginning, but it did not seem to expedite the other ceremonies to be performed in the veranda of the house. The Kayans, never enthusiastic over this Peace-making, (which is not a fraternisation, but only an agreement not to kill each other on unprovoked raids,) were sulking in their huts on the karangans, under the pretext of drying themselves. All the while Tama Aping Buling and his clan, and the other Tinjar Chiefs and their clans, sat wearily waiting in the veranda for the Kayans to appear. There were several false reports that they were coming, and each time the host, Tama Aping, invariably alleged that most important matters needed attention in his private room, and as invariably had to be dragged, trembling, from his little dark sleeping-box, where he was crouching, to attend to the reception of his guests. One cause of Tama Aping’s conduct was dread lest it should leak out that he had been largely instrumental in giving the Government the information which eventually led to the detection of Tinggi and his brother, Sidup, both of whom had been, in point of fact, at one time inmates of his house; should this treachery become known, his own people, even, would turn against him, and his life would not be worth a black bead.
TAMA APING BULING’S HOUSE ON THE TINJAR.
THE SCENE OF THE NOTABLE PEACE-MAKING.
The forenoon passed; the day wore on to afternoon,—still no Kayans; we began to fear that they had turned back and had given up all idea of peace-making.
Jamma of the flabby, unhealthy lips, talked interminably, and his goggles seemed to grow bigger and his jockey cap dirtier every minute. Tama Talip silently munched betel nut, and squirted the blood-red juice incessantly through a crack in the floor. Aban Liah was depressed in spirit, and sat sullenly twisting an extinguished cigarette between his fingers. We became thoroughly wearied of the whole assemblage, and, unattended, paddled across the river to a grassy point where we could watch for the coming of the Kayans, and, at least for awhile, get rid of the natives. Even this watching became intolerable, and finally we decided to go up the clear Dapoi River a short distance and take a swim. Of course, this was the very time through the perversity of luck, that the Kayans decided to go up to the house, and we, unfortunately, were not on hand. Kilup, one of Tinggi’s brothers, took it upon himself to be the leader of a small Jawa party, and did not even wait for Juman to disembark from his canoe, but ran full speed down to the beach, and with his parang drawn,—a violation of propriety absolutely forbidden in every well-conducted Jawa—actually chopped at Juman’s boat and slashed the palm-leaf covering. They told us afterward that Juman behaved bravely, and sat unmoved in his boat,—his serenity was possibly due to the knowledge that the ‘snappang,’ albeit with the ‘fever-stricken engine,’ was at his side, and that, if necessity arose, its discharge would prove fatal to some one, either to himself or to Kilup. By the time we returned from our bath the excitement had subsided, but none the less, Tama Aping Buling remained secluded in the depths of his private apartments. Dr. Hose at once summoned Kilup before him, and incontinently imposed on him a fine of one tawak,—equivalent to thirty dollars, a really heavy fine. Kilup sat unmoved during his sentence, and then arose slowly and swaggered off to his room, where he was told to remain until sent for, under penalty of another fine, or, possibly, imprisonment in the Baram Fort.
The Kayans were very naturally greatly incensed at such treatment; certainly they had a right to expect a little more hospitality after their dolorous night in the soaking rain.