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THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. 



be masks made in part from the heads of the dead. The former are 

 hardly a part of dress ; the latter are. Both kinds will be consid- 

 ered. The Dyaks of Borneo are famous " head-h^^nters/' and 

 often prepare their trophies with great care. Barnard Davis had 

 several specimens in his great collection, and he describes them 

 in his Thesaurus. One was a whole skull ; the lower jaw was 

 stained inside to a deep red ; it was fastened to the cranium by 

 rattan ; light, soft wood was fitted in the places of the teeth, into 

 the nostrils, and into the ear-holes ; other inequalities were filled 

 with red-brown resin. The entire skull was covered with tin-foil ; 

 two cowrie-shells made the eyes ; a small tuft of beard was made 

 of stiff black hair ; on the vertex and sides of the calvarium an 

 ornamental, regular, and symmetrical device was cut through the 

 tin-foil and painted red. These heads vary greatly in pattern and 

 treatment. They were kept in head-houses, and were looked upon 

 as treasures and as sacred objects. In the Solomon Islands, the 

 Marquesas, and New Zealand we find heads preserved for one or 

 another reason. Among the strangest of these most curious relics 



are ihe heads prepared by 

 the Jivaros of South Ameri- 

 ca. These are trophies of 

 war. The heads are cut 

 from \.\\Q bodies of slain ene- 

 mies ; the brain and bones 

 are removed through the 

 neck ; the whole head is then 

 shrunken down. The result 

 is a strange, diminutive,, 

 black head, with abundant 

 and long hair, and with feat- 

 ures all preserved, but so 

 small as to be hardly recog- 

 nizable as those of a human 

 being. In all these Jivaros'' 

 heads the lips are sewed to- 

 gether with cords, and in 

 some cases spiked together in 

 addition. If Bollaert is to be 

 trusted, this is done in order 

 that tlie head may not answer the abuse that is heaped upon it at 

 times ! In the same part of the world, among the Mundurucus, 

 are other interesting preserved heads. These are of full size % 

 they are partly shaved; ornaments of feathers are hung at the 

 ears; the eye-sockets are filled with black gum, into which are 

 inserted bits of shell. These heads are apparently those of friends, 

 not of enemies. In some respects akin to these real preserved 



Fig. 7.— Dance-mask. South Seas. 



