The Berawans believe that shortly after death the spirits of the dead return from Bulun Matai, to see that their relatives and friends are displaying the due amount of grief by performing the proper ceremonies. Should a spirit find that it has been neglected and forgotten, it curses the culprits, and they become blind, deaf, or lame. If all has been done to show befitting grief and respect,—if the mourners have been on a raid and secured a nice head wherewith to decorate the grave or the household hearth,—then the spirit retires to the nether world, never again to return.
In former days, on the death of any influential Chief, if his people were either too lazy or too cowardly to go head-hunting, a male or female slave was purchased and sacrificed in honor of the dead. From near and far, friends were invited to take part in the high ceremony. When the poor wretch of a slave was thrust into a cage of bamboo and rattan, he knew perfectly well the death by torture to which he was destined. In this cage he was confined for a week or more, until all the guests had assembled and a feast was prepared. On the appointed day, after every one had feasted and a blood-thirsty instinct had been stimulated to a high pitch by arrack, each one in turn thrust a spear into the slave. No one was allowed to give a fatal thrust until every one to the last man had felt the delight of drawing blood from living, human flesh. We were told by the Berawans that the slaves often survived six or seven hundred wounds, until death from loss of blood set them free. The corpse of the victim was then taken to the grave of the Chief, and the head cut off and placed on a pole overhanging the grave. Frequently, some of the guests worked themselves into such a blood-thirsty frenzy that they bit pieces from the body, and were vehemently applauded when they swallowed the raw morsel at a gulp.
It is, probably, in conformity with the same idea of a head-hunt in honor of the memory of the deceased, that the tribe of Malanaus, on their return from a burial, engage in a mock battle with those who remained behind to guard the house, and throw at them mud and imitation javelins made of light pith.
The body of Aban Liah, although a Berawan, was not placed in a jar, but, as I have said, in a coffin, and would be kept in the house, so they told us, for three months, until the end of the harvest. The people darkly hinted at the absolute necessity of their obtaining, at that time, a fresh human head. But Dr. Hose warned them of the sure consequences following every violation of the solemn compact and rites of peace which they had just concluded.
We left them in their grief, and set out on our trip to the summit of Mt. Dulit, one of the lofty range that forms the watershed between the Rejang and the Baram Rivers. When we turned into the little stream that flows down the side of the mountain, we noticed lying on one of the banks the huge, stately Durian tree, (worth a livelihood to a whole household on account of its much-prized fruit,) which had been already cut down just to make a monumental support for the coffin of the good-for-nothing old Aban Liah. The giant pole was to be elaborately carved and painted, and, when the Chief’s body was ready to be placed in position, this huge trunk would be erected near the bank of the river, a little below his house.
Whatever might have been its origin, it is not now easy to determine what emotion it is which prompts the Borneans to decorate elaborately the depositories of their dead; at first glance, it seems as if it must be affectionate remembrance and a devotion to the habitation of the soul even after the soul has left it. But, certainly among the Borneans, demonstrative affection is, I should say, an exceedingly rare trait; their lives are almost as purely individual and selfish as are the examples Nature sets before them at every turn in the jungle. During the time that a child is still nursing at the mother’s breast, there is that instinctive, protective parental affection observable in all mating animals; but after the child is weaned and is able to toddle, it is allowed to ramble pretty much where it will, and to take its educational bumps and tumbles without parental worry. Mother Nature provides the only clothes it wears, and, after her own healing, scarifying fashion, darns and patches the rents and tears that they may receive. Among the young boys and girls there is a sort of playmate affection, whenever self-sacrifice is not necessary, and where the one who plans the game or sport always expects to be and is the principal player. Between adults, be they the nearest of kin or be they even lovers, I think I am safe in saying that there is no such thing as unselfish love; a youth would never think of resigning a comfortable place in a boat to his father, or to his mother, or to his sister, or even to his sweetheart. When a man comes back from a long, and perhaps dangerous, expedition, he does not fall into the arms of his family amid tears of joy and welcome; but he walks up the notched log and stalks along the public veranda, looking neither to the right nor to the left until he deposits his burden opposite his own door, and there he sits down, lights a cigarette, and tries to act and look as if he had just come in from the rice-field after a day’s work.[14] There is not a greeting of any kind whatsoever exchanged on either side; but after a while, and little by little, an admiring group of men and boys gather round, and slowly he unbends, telling scraps of news about friends or foes in the country whence he is come, until at last he is haranguing the people and acting ‘Sir Oracle’ in the centre of a circle of gaping mouths and unwinking eyes. It is the same were he about to start off on an expedition; no kerchiefs are waved to him nor do eyes stream with tears as his canoe pushes off from the shore; he goes down to the boat with his parcels in just the same matter-of-fact manner as if he were only going to cross the river for fire-wood. I have seen Bornean mothers, fathers, and sweethearts, part from those who ought to have been dear to them, and who were about to set out on distant expeditions of a peaceful nature, or on long war expeditions of a dangerous nature, but I remember only one solitary instance where there were any tears or the slightest show of reluctance at parting; that one instance was the parting of a sister from a brother who had come over on a visit to the house into which she had married quite recently. The woman in this case did really show a downright love for her snaggle-toothed and hideous brother; she hung upon his neck, sobbing and wailing, trying her best to hold him back, and pleading with him not to go; he patted her on the shoulder, seemed very self-conscious and exceedingly bored; finally, extricating himself rather rudely from her arms, he stalked toward the notched log and descended, looking straight in front of him. Possibly it was, on the woman’s part, more homesickness than love for her brother. From the Arctics to the Tropics, be it ever so humdrum, there’s no place like home.
GRAVE OF THE WIFE OF ORANG KAYA TEMANGANG LAWI.
THE CORPSE WAS PLACED IN A SQUATTING POSITION IN A DEEP PIT, HOLLOWED OUT AT THE UPPER END OF THE COLUMN AND COVERED OVER WITH A LARGE TRIANGULAR SLAB OF WOOD, CUT FROM THE ROOT OF A BUTTRESS TREE. THE ORNAMENTATION IS COMPOSED OF WHITE CHINA BOWLS AND PLATES, FASTENED ON WITH GUTTA-PERCHA
Among certain tribes, the body of a Chief swathed in cloths is placed within the upper end of a tree trunk hollowed out for the purpose, and a large slab of wood cut from a ‘buttress tree’ is fastened on top. The photograph, on the opposite page, is that of the grave of a Chief’s wife, and I am sure that in its erection and ornamentation no jot of affection was felt by the husband, Temangang Lawi, than whom no more heartless old head-hunter, and slayer of women and children, exists in Borneo. His only idea in spending so much time and money on the grave of his wife was his own glorification. The white spots on the column are china bowls and saucers stuck on with damar gum; the flags and streamers on top are strips of white and red cloth, possibly to keep off birds of prey; possibly a remnant of the Mongolian idea that anything moving and fluttering in the wind attracts or distracts the attention of the Spirits.