ch. iv.] Head-hunting. 63 



tension it can be hurled right through the body of any- 

 passing animal, which unconsciously disengages the ap- 

 paratus by pressing against or treading on a branch 

 across its track. These pig-sticking contrivances are very 

 dangerous to strangers, and even the Muruts themselves 

 are sometimes injured by them. 



One of the Lawas Muruts showed me where the 

 bamboo spear belonging to one of these pig or deer-traps 

 had been driven right through his leg near the knee. 

 His bronzed features underwent the most extraordinary 

 and suggestive of contortions as he explained how it had 

 taken the strength of five or six men to hold him against 

 a tree while others tugged at the bamboo shaft until they 

 succeeded in withdrawing it from the injured limb. In 

 some districts these pig-traps are very numerous, and 

 one has to be continually on the look-out for them. I 

 visited the Lawas district several times, and had good 

 opportunities of seeing the Muruts, and noting many of 

 their peculiarities. Their houses are similar to those of 

 the Dusun, but instead of living in separate houses, one 

 enormous house is built sufficiently large to accommodate 

 from twenty to fifty families. These houses vary from 

 thirty to one hundred yards in length, and, like those of 

 the Kadyans, are built on piles. As the different tribes 

 are continually at variance with each other, and knowing 

 each other's affection for crania, they congregate in one 

 large dwelling so as to be better prepared for resistance 

 in case of a sudden attack. These people, and the 

 Kayans who live in the vicinity of the Baram river, and 

 one or two other tribes of the aboriginal Borneans, still 

 continue the practice of head-hunting, although the 

 custom is now fast dying out here, as it has in the case 

 of the Dyaks of Sarawak, and other places further south. 

 Only a few years back a youth was not allowed to marry 



