304 HEAD-TAKING. 



hung up in the Pangah, which Capt. Keppel facetiously 

 calls the " skullery," and are often painted with lines 

 of white or red all over them, they are occasionally 

 blackened with antimony, and have cowrie shells placed 

 in the apertures of the eyes, with the flat, or 

 white side outwards ; which, in some measure, resem- 

 bles the closed eye, the little furrows appearing like 

 eyelashes. 



To have been on a war-party, is necessary before boys 

 can be initiated into the privileges of manhood ; but at 

 none of their ceremonies is the shedding of human 

 blood practised, and such a thing would be thought of 

 amongst them with horror and disgust. So much 

 have these people been maligned, when called cannibals, 

 that if told such a race of people do exist, they cannot 

 credit it, and do not believe such enormities possible. 

 When two or more tribes of Land Dyaks combine to 

 attack another tribe, and one head only is obtained, 

 it is divided, so that each may have a part ; in honour 

 of this moiety, all the same ceremonies are observed, as 

 if they had a whole head. I notice in Forrest's Voyages, 

 and other works, that amongst the people of New 

 Guinea, and other of the eastern islands, the bachelors 

 of the tribes sleep apart, in houses appropriated to 

 their use ; but as no particular description is given 

 of them, it is presumed that they do not differ in 

 their construction, from the ordinary dwellings of the 

 villagers. 



The diseases which are most common among 

 them are those incident to their exposed manner of 

 life. Agues and diarrhoeas are the most prevalent, 



