The Animal Is Not Easily Killed.

The Dayaks always remove it with the sword edge and immediately cut it in two.

On our return to our old lodging-house near Kaburau I spent a week making ethnological collections from the Kayan, who brought me a surprising number, keeping me busy from early until late. Before continuing my journey up the river I decided to go down to Tandjong Selor in order to buy necessary provisions and safely dispose of my collections. The Kayans were glad to provide prahus, the keelless boats which are used by both Dayak and Malay. The prahu, even the largest size, is formed from a dugout, and to the edge on either side are lashed two boards, one above and overlapping the other. This is accomplished by threading rattan through numerous small holes. As these are not completely filled by the rattan, they are plugged with fibre and calked with damar to prevent leakage.

In order to travel more comfortably we lashed a prahu at either side of mine, while many of the natives who took advantage of the occasion to visit the shops in town, tied theirs at the rear of ours. It was a gay flotilla that proceeded down the river, the Dayaks singing most of the time, especially the women who accompanied their husbands, a number of them sitting in my large but crowded prahu. The women never seemed to grow tired of the Mae Lu Long, a jolly song which I had several times heard them singing when returning from the fields in the evening.

Enter page number Go  Previous Next
Page 54 of 489
Words from 14489 to 14751 of 132281