XX 



PECULIARITIES 207 



lower down river and to prevent any one coming 

 up river contributes to their immunity. With this 

 object the people of a tributary stream will fell trees 

 across its mouth or lower reaches so as to block it 

 completely to the passage of boats, or, as a less drastic 

 measure, will stretch a rope of rattan from bank to 

 bank as a sign that no one may enter (PI. 183). 

 Such a sign is generally respected by the inhabit- 

 ants of other parts of the river-basin. They are 

 aware also of the risk of infection that attends the 

 handling of a corpse of one who has died of epidemic 

 disease, and they attempt to minimise it by throw- 

 ing a rope around it and dragging it to the grave- 

 yard, and there burying it in a shallow grave in the 

 earth, without touching it with the hands.^ 



The Kayans have some slight knowledge of the 

 medicinal properties of some herbs, and make general 

 use of them. They administer as an aperient a 

 decoction of the leaves of a certain plant, called 

 Orobongy which they cultivate for the purpose on 

 their farms. The root of the ginger plant is used 

 both internally and for external application. A 

 variety of vegetable products are used in preparing 

 liniments ; the basis most in request for these is the 

 fat of the python and of other snakes, but wild pig's 

 fat is used as a more easily obtainable substitute. 



There is a small common squirrel (Sciurus exilis), 

 the testicles of which are strikingly large in pro- 

 portion to his body. These organs are dried and 



^ The desire of the people inhabiting a branch of the river to shut them- 

 selves off from all intercourse with the areas in which an epidemic disease is 

 raging, is sometimes disregarded by Malay or Chinese traders ; such disregard 

 has sometimes led to trouble. 



This desire for seclusion as a safeguard against epidemics is by no means 

 peculiar to the tribes of the interior of Borneo, but seems to be shared by many 

 savage and barbarous peoples. It is one that ought to be strictly respected by 

 all travellers ; and we have no doubt that the disregard of this desire by European 

 explorers, ignorant, no doubt, of its existence or of the practical and rational 

 grounds on which it is based, has been the cause in many cases of their hostile 

 reception by native tribes and potentates, and has led to bloodshed and 

 punitive expeditions which might have been wholly avoided if the explorers 

 had been equipped with some general knowledge of, and some respect for, the 

 principles of conduct of savage peoples. 



