ANIMISTIC BELIEFS 83 



The Orang Kaya Tumonggong tells us that in 

 the olden times the crocodiles used to speak to 

 his people, warning them of danger, but that now 

 they never speak, and he supposes that their 

 silence is due to the fact that his people have 

 intermarried with other tribes. The Long Patas 

 frequently carve a crocodile's head as the figure- 

 head for a war-canoe. 



The Batu Blah people (Klemantans) on return- 

 ing from the war-path make a huge effigy of a 

 crocodile with cooked rice, and they put fowl's eggs 

 in its head for eyes and bananas for teeth, and 

 cover it with scales made from the stem of the 

 banana plant. When all is ready it is transfixed 

 with a wooden spear, and the chief cuts off its head 

 with a wooden sword. Then pigs and fowls are 

 slaughtered and cooked, and eaten with the rice 

 from the rice-crocodile, the chiefs eating the head 

 and the common people the body. The chief of 

 these people could give us no explanation of the 

 meaning of this ceremony ; he merely says they do 

 it because it is custom. 



One community of Klemantans, the Lelak people, 

 lived recently on the banks of a lake much infested 

 with crocodiles. Their chief had the reputation of 

 being able to induce them to leave the lake. To 

 achieve this he would stand in his boat waving a 

 bundle of charms, which included among other 

 things teeth of the real tiger and boars' tusks, and 

 then address the crocodiles politely in their own 

 language. He would then allow his boat to float 

 out of the lake into the river, and the crocodiles 

 would follow him and pass on down the river. 



Many, probably all, Klemantans put up wooden 

 images of the crocodile before their houses, and 

 many of them carve the prow of their war-canoes 

 into the form of a crocodile's head with gaping 

 jaw. 



