2o6 PAGAN TRIBES OF BORNEO chap. 



Laki Avit, had earned a high reputation for such 

 statesmanship before the district was incorporated 

 in the Raj of Sarawak. His policy was to bring 

 about intermarriages between the families of the 

 chiefs and upper-class people of the various tribes. 

 Tama Bulan (see PI. 27), the leading Kenyah chief 

 of the same district at a later time, spared no efforts 

 to bring about friendly meetings between chiefs of 

 different tribes, for the purpose of making peace 

 and of promoting intercourse and mutual under- 

 standing.^ It should be added that these peace- 

 making ceremonies are generally of lasting effect ; 

 the oaths then taken are respected even by succeed- 

 ing generations. Tama Ruling, who a decade ago 

 was the most influential of the Batang Kayan chiefs, 

 had also spontaneously pursued a similar policy.^ 



It has been said of many savage peoples that they 

 recognise no natural death, but believe that all 

 deaths not due to violence are due to black magic. 

 No such statement can be made of the Kayans ; few, 

 if any, deaths are ascribed by them to the efforts of 

 sorcerers. Natural death is recognised as inevitable 

 in old age, and disease is vaguely conceived as the 

 effect of natural causes ; though as to what those 

 natural causes are they have no definite ideas. This 

 attitude is shown by their readiness to make use of 

 European drugs and of remedies for external applica- 

 tion. Quinine for fever, and sulphate of copper for 

 the treatment of yaws, are most in demand. Cholera 

 and smallpox are the great epidemic diseases which 

 have ravaged large areas of Borneo from time to 

 time. The Kayans recognise that both these 

 diseases spread up river from village to village, and 

 that to abstain from intercourse with all villages 



^ See vol. ii. p. 296 for a striking example of self-control displayed by this 

 great man under most trying circumstances. 



^ Only one evil effect of the success of these efforts for the spread of peace 

 has come under our notice, namely, a tendency in some communities to 

 economise labour by building flimsy houses in place of the massive and roomy 

 structures which were fortresses as well as dwelling-places. 



