ANIMISTIC BELIEFS 71 



does not obey. They display little affection for 

 their dogs, and they do not like children to touch 

 or play with the dogs, but of course cannot alto- 

 gether prevent them. 



One young Kenyah chief, on being questioned, 

 said that the reason they will not kill dogs is that 

 they are like children, and eat and sleep together 

 with men in the same house ; and he added that, 

 if a man should kill a dog, he would go mad. 



If a dog dies in the house, the men push the 

 carcase out of the house and into the river with 

 long poles, and will on no account touch it with 

 their hands. The spot on the floor on which the 

 dog died is fenced round with mats for some few 

 days in order to prevent the children walking 

 over it. 



It is usual for the Kenyah men to have one 

 or more designs tatued on their forearms and 

 shoulders. Among the commonest of these designs 

 are those known as the prawn and the dog (see 

 Chap. XII.). They seem to be conventionalised 

 derivatives from these animal forms. It is said 

 that the dog's head design was formerly much more 

 in fashion than it is at the present time. 



Deer and Cattle 



Very few Kenyahs of the upper class will kill or 

 eat deer and wild cattle. They believe that if they 

 should eat their flesh they would vomit violently 

 and spit out blood. They have no domestic cattle, 

 and the buffalo does not occur in their districts. 

 Lower-class Kenyahs and slaves, taken as war- 

 captives from other tribes, may eat deer and horned 

 cattle, but they must take the flesh some little 

 distance from the house when they cook it. A 

 woman who is pregnant, or for any other reason is 

 in the hands of a physician, has to observe the 



VOL. II F 



