Manchester Memoirs, Vol. lx\ (1916), No. 13. 51 



Among the Dyaks of Borneo it is the custom to place 

 the small white money-cowries in the eye-sockets of the 

 skulls of enemies, which they keep. 149 The baskets of the 

 Dyak head-hunter are also decorated with the same 

 cowries. 1 - Specimens in the Leiden Museum show C. 

 annulus as decoration for sword-hangings from West 

 Borneo, and C. moneta as decoration for a betel-pouch 

 from South-east Borneo. 151 



In certain parts of Malaysia, cowries are attached to 

 the fishing-nets, not as "net-sinkers" as recorded by 

 several ethnologists, 15 ' 2 but in order to ensure success in 

 fishing or to ward off evil influences. In Nias. an island 

 off the west coast of Sumatra, Cyprcea vitellus is so used ; 

 in Engano, an island in the same neighbourhood, the 

 species is C. ventricnlus ; in Timor, C. arabica ; while off 

 N.VV. New Guinea the shells employed are C. moneta, 

 C. caput-serpentis, C. erosa, C. lynx, C. tigris and C. vitellus}™ 



According to Von Martens, the Berlin Museum con- 

 tains specimens of clothing ornamented with cowries, from 

 Bali, near Java. 154 In Timorlaut the natives adorn cloth- 

 girdles with cowries, and in the same island, four species 

 of cowries, C. annulus, C. Isabella, C. erosa, and C. helvola, 

 are employed as neck-ornaments. 155 



Van der Sande, 156 describes and figures several neck- 

 ornaments from Dutch New Guinea, on which specimens 



149 Stearns, op. cit., p. 302 ; Ratzel, op. cit., i., p. 135 (fig.). 

 ]5 ° Ratzel, op. cit., vol. i., p. 448 (fig.) 



151 Schmeltz, " Schnecken und Muscheln in leben der volker Indo- 

 nesians und Oceaniens," Leiden, 1894. 



152 The slight weight of these shells would render them valueless as 

 sinkers. 



1 5 3 Schmeltz, op. cit. , 



154 Schneider, op. cit., p. 118. 



155 Ibid., and Schmeltz, o/>. cit. 



i5c y an d er Sande, "Nova Guinea," iii , 1907, pp. S^, 117-8, pl.xiii., 

 f. 4. 



