They carried only rice as
provisions and told me they intended to be away three months. On the Upper
Kasao there is no more rubber to be found, and, according to them, on the
upper part of Mahakam there is no more rattan.
The Penihings of Long Kai are good-natured and pleasant, and it was
refreshing to be among real, natural people to whom it never occurs that
nudity is cause for shame; whom the teaching of the Mohammedan Malays, of
covering the upper body, has not yet reached. This unconsciousness of evil
made even the old, hard-working women attractive. They were eager to sell
me their wares and implements, and hardly left me time to eat. Their
houses had good galleries and were more spacious than one would suppose
from a casual glance.
One morning I entered the rooms of one of the principal blians, from whom
I wanted to buy his shield, used as a musical instrument to accompany his
song. The shield looks like the ordinary variety used by all the tribes of
the Mahakam and also in Southern Borneo, but has from four to ten rattan
strings tied lengthwise on the back. In singing to call good spirits,
antohs, especially in case somebody is ill, he constantly beats with a
stick on one of the strings in a monotonous way without any change of
time.
