4 o4 THROUGH CENTRAL BORNEO 



making her very angry, and she asks damages from me." 

 "This case is difficult," the husband answered. "I must 

 think it over." After a while he said: "The best thing 

 to do is to give food to both." Bird was given fruit to 

 eat and Otter fish, and they went home satisfied. All 

 the people of the kampong gathered and rejoiced at 

 the successful head-hunting. They killed pigs and hens, 

 and for seven nights they ate and danced. 



Note. — When an attack on men is decided upon the sumpitan is hidden 

 and left behind after the spear-head has been detached from it and tied to 

 a long stick. This improvised spear is the principal weapon on head-hunt- 

 ing raids, as well as on the chase after big game. The bird, called by the 

 Saputans teong, is common, of medium size, black with yellow beak, and 

 yellow around the eyes, also a little red on the head. It learns easily to 

 talk, and is also common in Java. 



16. LAKI MAE 

 (From the Saputans; kampong Data Laong) 



The wife of Laki Mae was pregnant and wanted to 

 eat meat, so she asked her husband to go out hunting. 

 He brought in a porcupine, wild hens, kidyang, pig, and 

 deer, and he placed all the meat on the tehi, to smoke 

 it over fire, that it should keep. But the right hind leg 

 of the porcupine was hung up by itself unsmoked, to 

 be eaten next day. They had their evening meal and 

 then went to sleep. In the night she bore an infant son, 

 and, therefore, next morning another woman came to 

 do the cooking. She took the hind leg and before pro- 

 ceeding to cook it, washed it. It slipped through a hole 

 in the floor to the ground underneath. Looking through 

 the hole she saw a small male child instead of the leg, 

 and she told Mae of this. 



