220 PAGAN TRIBES OF BORNEO chap. 



variety of accounts of the incident, he find himself 

 in a position to construct, by a process of moral 

 triangulation, an approximately correct picture ; 

 this he now lays before the party immediately 

 concerned, who, seeing that the game is up, fill in 

 the details and supply minor corrections. Through- 

 out this process the tactful Penghulu never shuts 

 the door upon his informants or tries to pin them 

 down to their words, or make them take them back ; 

 rather he keeps the whole story fluid and shifting, so 

 that, when the true account has been constructed, the 

 witnesses are not made to feel that they have lost 

 their self-respect. 



It seems worth while to describe here one of a 

 large class of incidents which illustrate at the same 

 time the workings of the native mind and the way 

 in which an understanding of such workings may be 

 applied by the administrator. The Resident of the 

 Baram having heard of the presence in the central 

 no-man's land of a considerable population of 

 Kenyahs under a strong chief, Tama Kuling, sent 

 friendly messages to the latter. He responded by 

 sending a lump of white clay, which meant that he 

 and his people recognised that they were of the 

 same country as the people of the Baram and that 

 their feelings were friendly ; and with it came an 

 elaborately decorated brass hook (PI. 184), which 

 was to serve as a complimentary and symbolical 

 acknowledgment of the white man's power of bind- 

 ing the tribes together in friendship. He sent also 

 a verbal message acknowledging his kinship with 

 the Kenyahs of the Baram ; but he added that 

 he and his people were in the dark and needed a 

 torch (i.e. they wanted more explicit information 

 about the conditions obtaining in the Baram). In 

 reply to these representations, the Resident 

 despatched trusty messengers to Tama Kuling 

 bearing the following articles : a large hurricane 



