Through Central Borneo Part 21

At its deepest part the lake measures about seven metres. From May to August, when the Pembuang River is small and the lake is low, the depth is reduced to a metre. People then must walk far out to get water. Every afternoon we had gales accompanied by heavy rain from the northeast, although once it came from the southwest, and the _Selatan_ had to put out another anchor. I was told that similar storms are usual every afternoon at that season (April), during which prahus do not venture out; apparently they also occur around Sampit and arc followed by calm nights.

Eighteen Dayaks were brought here from Bangkal. Of these, nine were Tamoan, the tribe of the region, eight Katingan, and one Teroian (or Balok) from Upper Pembuang. They were measured, photographed, and interviewed. One man looked astonis.h.i.+ngly like a j.a.panese. The name of the tribe, Tamoan, also p.r.o.nounced Samoan, means to wash. The tatu marks are the same as those of the Katingans. At present these natives have only six kampongs, three of them above Sampit. Cultivating rice was very difficult, they complained, on account of the poor soil and wet weather. The lake has few fish and they cannot be caught except when the water is low. There are no large serpents here, and neither snakes, dogs, nor crocodiles are eaten; but the rusa is accepted as food. Fruits, as the durian and langsat, are rather scarce.

Fire is made by twirling, and these natives use the sumpitan. They know how to make tuak, crus.h.i.+ng the rice, boiling it, and then pouring it into a guts.h.i.+ until the vessel is half full, the remaining s.p.a.ce being filled with water. In three days the product may be drunk, but sometimes it is allowed to stand a month, which makes it much stronger. If there is no tuak there can be no dancing, they said. Many remarked upon the expense of obtaining a wife, the cost sometimes amounting to several hundred florins, all of which must be earned by gathering rubber. The tiwah feast is observed, but as to legends there are none, and their language and customs are disappearing.

These Tamoans are disintegrating chiefly on account of the ravages of cholera. About forty years previously an epidemic nearly extinguished Bangkal, and there was another in 1914. The result is that the population has changed, people from other kampongs, at times from other tribes, taking the places of the dead. At the kampong Sembulo there appear to be no Tamoans remaining, the Malays having easily superseded them.

Although my journey to the lake yielded no evidence to substantiate the legend connected with it, because I found no Dayaks left "to tell the tale," still, satisfaction is derived even from a negative result. Having accomplished what was possible I returned to Sampit, arriving almost at the same time a sailing s.h.i.+p came in from Madura, the island close to northeastern Java. It was of the usual solid type, painted white, red, and green, and loaded with obi, a root resembling sweet potatoes, which on the fourth day had all been sold at retail. A cargo of terasi, the well-known spicy relish made from crawfish and a great favourite with Malays and Javanese, was then taken on board.

In the small prison of Sampit, which is built of iron-wood, the mortality from beri-beri among the inmates was appalling. Nine men, implicated in the murder of two Chinese traders, in the course of eight months while the case was being tried, all died except a Chinaman who was taken to Bandjermasin. I understood a new prison was about to be erected. It seems improbable that ironwood has any connection with this disorder, but Mr.

Berger, manager of the nearby rubber plantation, told me the following facts, which may be worth recording: Six of his coolies slept in a room with ironwood floor, and after a while their legs became swollen in the manner which indicates beri-beri. He moved them to another room, gave them katjang idju, the popular vegetable food, and they soon recovered. He then replaced the ironwood floor with other material, and after that n.o.body who slept in the room was affected in a similar way.

I met in Sampit three Dayaks from the upper country of the Katingan on whom the operation of incision had been performed. According to reliable reports this custom extends over a wide area of the inland, from the upper regions of the Kapuas, Kahayan, and Barito Rivers in the east, stretching westward as far as and including the tribes of the Kotawaringin. Also, in the Western Division on the Upper Kapuas and Melawi Rivers, the same usage obtains. In Bandjermasin prominent Mohammedans, one of them a Malay Hadji, told me that the Malays also practise incision instead of circ.u.mcision.

The Malays, moreover, perform an operation on small girls, which the Dayaks do not.

The controleur invited me to take part in a banquet which he gave to celebrate the completion of a road. There were present Malay officials, also Chinamen, and one j.a.panese. The latter, who arrived at Sampit one and a half years before with forty florins, had since increased his capital to a thousand through the sale of medicines to natives whom he reached by going up the rivers. We were seated at three tables, twenty-eight guests.

The natives were given viands in addition to the menu provided, because they must have rice. Their women had helped to cook--no small undertaking for so many in an out-of-the-way place like Sampit. It was an excellent dinner; such tender, well-prepared beef I had not enjoyed for a long time.

Claret, apollinaris, and beer were offered, the latter appearing to be the favourite. Women were served in another room after the men had dined.

FOLKLORE OF SOME OF THE TRIBES IN DUTCH BORNEO VISITED BY THE AUTHOR

1. THE MOTHERLESS BOY

(From the Penyahbongs, kampong Tamaloe)

Ulung Tiung was left at home by his father who went out hunting. Borro, the cocoanut-monkey, came and asked for food, but when Ulung gave him a little he refused to eat it and demanded more. The boy, who was afraid of him, then gave more, and Borro ate until very little remained in the house. The monkey then said, "I am afraid of your father, and want to go home." "Go," replied the boy, "but return again." When the father came home in the evening he was angry that the food had been taken.

The following day when the father went out hunting, Borro again came asking for food. The boy, at first unwilling, finally yielded; the monkey ate with much gusto and as before wanted to go home. "Do not go," said the boy, "my father is far away." "I smell that he is near," said Borro, and went.

When the father returned in the evening and saw that the food again had been eaten he was very angry with the boy, who replied: "Borro ate it--I did not take any." Whereupon the father said: "We will be cunning; next time he comes tell him I have gone far away. Make a swing for him near your mat, and when he is in it tie rattan around him and swing him."

The father went away and the monkey came again and asked for food, and got it. When he had eaten the boy said: "You had better get into the swing near my mat." Borro liked to do that and seated himself in it, while the boy tied rattan around him and swung him. After a little while the monkey, fearing that the father might come back, said he wanted to get out, but the boy replied, "Father is not coming before the evening," at the same time tying more rattan around him, and strongly, too.

The father came home and fiercely said: "You have been eating my food for two days." Thereupon he cut off Borro's head, and ordered his son to take him to the river, clean him, and prepare the flesh to be cooked. The boy took Borro's body to the river, opened it and began to clean it, but all the small fish came and said: "Go away! What you put into the water will kill us." The boy then took the monkey some distance off and the big fish came and said: "Come nearer, we want to help you eat him."

The sisters of Borro now arrived, and his brothers, father, children, and all his other relatives, and they said to Ulung Tiung: "This is probably Borro." "No," he said, "this is a different animal." Then the monkeys, believing what he said, went away to look for Borro, except one of the monkey children, who remained behind, and asked: "What are you doing here?" "What a question!" the boy answered; "I am cutting up this animal, Borro."

The child then called all the monkeys to return, and they captured Ulung Tiung and carried him to their house and wanted to kill him. "Don't kill me," he said, "I can find fruit in the utan." The monkeys permitted him to do that, and told him to return in the evening, but the boy said that first he would have to dream.

In the morning the monkeys asked him what he had dreamed. "There is plenty of fruit in the mountain far away," he answered, pointing afar, and all the monkeys went out to the mountain leaving their wives and children behind. When they were all gone Ulung Tiung killed the women and children with a stick, and went home to his father. "I killed the women and children," he declared, "but the men had not come back." "We will watch for them with sumpitan," said his father, and when the monkeys returned and found that all who had remained at home were dead, they began to look for Ulung Tiung, but he and his father killed half of them with sumpitan and the rest ran away.

NOTE.--Ulung Tiung is the name for a boy whose mother is dead, but whose father is alive. For the sake of convenience I have maintained the Malay name "borro" for the cocoanut-monkey.

2. THE FATHERLESS BOY

(From the Penyahbongs; kampong Tamaloe)

Ulung Ela made a fish-trap and when he returned next morning he found it full of fish. He put them in his rattan bag, which he slung on his back and started for home. As he walked, he heard an antoh, Aaton Kohang, singing, and he saw many men and women, to whom he called out: "It is much better you come to my place and sing there." Aaton Kohang said: "Very well, we will go there." The boy continued his march, and when he came home he gave one fish to his mother to roast, which she wrapped in leaves and put on the live coals. He also prepared fish for himself, ate quickly, and begged his mother to do the same. The mother asked: "Why do you hurry so?" The boy, who did not want to tell her that he had called an antoh, then said that it was not necessary to hurry.

After they had finished eating, in the evening Aaton Kohang arrived with many men and many women. They tickled the mother and her boy under the arms until they could not talk any more and were half dead, took what remained of the fish, and went away. The two fell asleep, but ants bit them in the feet and they woke up and saw that all the fish were gone.

"Ha!" they said: "Aaton Kohang did this," and they ran away.

NOTE.--Ulung Ela is the name for a boy whose father is dead, but whose mother is alive.

3. THE TWO ORPHANS

(From the Penyahbongs; kampong Tamaloe)

Two small sisters, whose father and mother had died, went with the women to look for sago. The tree was cut and the sago, after having been beaten, was put into the large rattan bag. The younger child, who was sitting close to the bag, dropped asleep and fell into it. The other girl came to look for her sister but could not find her. She had disappeared, and when the women saw that the bag was already full they all went home. On returning next day they found plenty of sago inside of the tree, and had no difficulty in filling their bags.

NOTE.--Ulung Ania is the name for the elder of the two girl orphans. Ulung Kabongon is the name for the younger. When her elder sister died the latter became obon, and her name became Obon Kabongon.

4. THE TREE OF WHICH ANTOH IS AFRAID

(From the Penyahbongs; kampong Tamaloe)

Tabedjeh wanted to go to the place where a girl, Inyah, was living. On the way he met an antoh in the shape of a man with whom he began talking.

Antoh said: "I am going to catch Inyah and eat her." Tabedjeh then drew his parang and cut off his head. But a new head grew, and many more, so that Tabedjeh became afraid and fled, with antoh running after him. He lost his parang, then, after a while, he stopped and took sticks to strike antoh with, but every time he struck the stick was wrested from him, and he had to take flight again.

He ran up on a mountain and antoh, in close pursuit, caught up with him sitting on a fallen tree. Tabedjeh was tired and short of breath, but when antoh saw what kind of a tree he was sitting on he said: "You may remain there. I cannot eat you now because I am afraid of that tree." Tabedjeh took a piece of the wood of the tree, which is called klamonang, and he went to the house of Inyah to show her the tree of which antoh is afraid, and they had their wedding at once.

5. LEAVES THAT BAFFLED ANTOH

(From the Penyahbongs; kampong Tamaloe)

Two brothers were walking in the utan, with sumpitans, when they met a pig which one of them speared. The quarry became furious and attacked the other one, but they helped each other and killed the pig, ate what they wanted, and continued their hunting.

Next they met a rhino which they killed. As they began to take off the hide, cutting into his chest, the rhino became alive again, and the hide turned out to be the bark of a tree. The two ran home, but the rhino came after them, so they again had to flee, pursued by him, until they came across a small tree called mora, of which antoh is afraid. They gathered some of the leaves, and as soon as the rhino saw that he ran away.

6. PENGANUN, THE HUGE SERPENT

(From the Penyahbongs; kampong Tamaloe)

The mother of Daring's wife ordered him to go out and hunt for animals to eat, but said they would have to be without bones. He searched for a month, and all that he got had bones. Finally he brought back a leech, which she ate. Then she said: "Go and look for penganun," the huge serpent with the golden horn. He met the monster and used all his poisoned darts before it succ.u.mbed. He left it there and went home. "Have you got the big serpent?" she asked him. "Yes!" he answered. She then went out to bring it in, but she cut off only a little of the flesh, which she brought back. It was cooked in bamboo, and the people in the house ate it, but before they had finished the meal they became crazy--fifteen of them. The affected ones, as well as the bamboo in which the cooking had been done, turned into stone, but the meat disappeared. Daring and his wife, who had not partaken of the meal, escaped.

NOTE.--There exists in Borneo a huge python, in Malay called sahua, which is the basis for a superst.i.tious belief in a monster serpent, called penganun, the forehead of which is provided with a straight horn of pure gold. The tale is possibly influenced by Malay ideas. The Penyahbongs have a name for gold, bo-an, but do not know how to utilise the metal.

7. HOW THE PENGANUN WAS CAUGHT ALIVE