Through Central Borneo An Account Of Two Years' Travel In The Land Of The Head-Hunters Between The Years 1913 And 1917 By Carl Lumholtz
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"I Cannot Endure This Any Longer, I
Would Rather Die."
After he had cooked the meal and they had eaten he said:
"Take the two
children and go with me to the river." All four of them went into a prahu
which he paddled down stream until they came to a large rock in the middle
of the river, where he stopped it. They all climbed on the rock, and the
prahu he allowed to drift away. He then said to his wife: "You and I will
drown ourselves." "I cannot," she said, "because I have a small child to
suckle." He then tore the child from the mother's breast and placed it on
the rock. The two children and the mother wept, and he caught hold of one
of her hands, dragged her with him into the water, and they were both
drowned.
The two children remained on the rock all day. After sunset Deer (rusa)
arrived. The older child called out; "Take me from here." And Deer came to
the stone and placed Aneitjing on his back, and behind her Inu, and
carried them ashore. Deer then made a clearing in the utan and built a hut
for them. He then went to the ladang to look for food, but before starting
he said to the children: "I am going to the ladang. Maybe I shall be
killed by the dogs. In that case you must take my right arm and my right
eye and bring them here."
Deer went away and was attacked by dogs. The two children heard the
barking, and when they arrived the dogs were gone and Deer was found dead.
The children took the right arm and the right eye and went home, made a
clearing and dug a hole, where the arm and the eye were placed, and they
covered the hole with earth. They often went to look at that place. After
twenty days they saw a sprout coming up, and in twenty years this had
grown into a big tree which bore all sorts of fruit and other good things.
From the tree fell durian, nangka, and many other kinds of delicious
fruit, as well as clothing, spears, sumpitans, gongs, and wang (money).
Rumour of this spread to the kampong, and two men arrived, Tuliparon, who
was chief, and his brother Semoring. They had heard of the two young
women, and they made a hut for themselves near by, but did not speak to
the girls. They went to sleep and slept day after day, a whole year, and
grass grew over them. Inu, the younger, who was the brighter of the two,
said to Aneitjing: "Go and wake these men. They have been sleeping a long
time. If they have wives and children in the kampong this will make much
trouble for all of them." Aneitjing then asked Tipang Tingai for heavy
rain. It came in the evening and flooded the land, waking the two men who
found themselves lying in the water.
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