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BORNEO BLOOD-BROTHERHOOD.

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to the community, and beneficial to the individuals by whom the compact was formed."

Yet again, this covenant of blood-friendship is found in different parts of Borneo. In the days of Mr. Ellis, the Rev. W. Medhurst, a missionary of the London Missionary Society, in Java, described it, in reporting a visit made to the Dayaks of Borneo, by one of his assistants, together with a missionary of the Rhenish Missionary Society.1

Telling of the kindly greeting given to these visitors at a place called Golong, he says that the natives wished "to establish a fraternal agreement with the missionaries, on condition that the latter should teach them the ways of God. The travelers replied, that if the Dayaks became the disciples of Christ, they would be constituted the brethren of Christ without any formal compact. The Dayaks, however, insisted that the travelers should enter into a compact [with them], according to the custom of the country, by means of blood. The missionaries were startled at this, thinking that the Dayaks meant to murder them, and committed themselves to their Heavenly Father, praying that, whether living or dying, they might lie at the feet of their Saviour. It appears, however, that it is the custom of the Dayaks, when they enter into a covenant, to draw a little blood from the arms of the

1 Cited in Ellis's Hist. of Mad., I., 191, note.

covenanting parties, and, having mixed it with water, each to drink, in this way, the blood of the other.

"Mr. Barenstein [one of the missionaries] having consented [for both] to the ceremony, they all took off their coats, and two officers came forward with small knives, to take a little blood out of the arm of each of them [the two missionaries and two Dayak chiefs]. This being mixed together in four glasses of water, they drank, severally, each from the glass of the other; after which they joined hands and kissed. The people then came forward, and made obeisance to the missionaries, as the friends of the Dayak King, crying out with loud voices, 'Let us be friends and brethren forever; and may God help the Dayaks to obtain the knowledge of God from the missionaries!' The two chiefs then said, ' Brethren, be not afraid to dwell with us; for we will do you no harm; and if others wish to hurt you, we will defend you with our life's blood, and die ourselves ere you be slain. God be witness, and this whole assembly be witness, that this is true.' Whereupon the whole company shouted, Balaak! or 'Good,'' Be it so.'"

Yet another method of observing this rite, is reported from among the Kayans of Borneo-quite a different people from the Dayaks. Its description is from the narrative of Mr. Spenser St. John, as follows: "Singauding [a Kayan chief] sent on board to request

THE CIGARETTE OF PEACE.

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me to become his brother, by going through the sacred custom of imbibing each other's blood. I say imbibing, because it is either mixed with water and drunk, or else is placed within a native cigar, and drawn in with the smoke. I agreed to do so, and the following day was fixed for the ceremony. It is called Berbiang by the Kayans; Bersabibah, by the Borneans [the Dayaks]. I landed with our party of Malays, and after a preliminary talk, to allow the population to assemble, the affair commenced. Stripping my left arm, Kum Lia took a small piece of wood, shaped like a knife-blade, and, slightly piercing the skin, brought blood to the surface; this he carefully scraped off. Then one of my Malays drew blood in the same way from Singauding; and, a small cigarette being produced, the blood on the wooden blade was spread on the tobacco. A chief then arose, and, walking to an open place, looked forth upon the river, and invoked their god and all the spirits of good and evil to be witness of this tie of brotherhood. The cigarette [blood-stained] was then lighted, and each of us took several puffs [receiving each other's blood by inhalation], and the ceremony was over." This is a new method of smoking the "pipe of peace"-or, the cigarette of interunion! Borneo, indeed, furnishes many illustrations of primitive customs, both social and religious.

1 St. John's Life in the Forests of the Far East, I., 116 f.

One of the latest and most venturesome explorers of North Borneo was the gallant and lamented Frank Hatton, a son of the widely known international journalist, Joseph Hatton. In a sketch of his son's lifework, the father says1: "His was the first white foot in many of the hitherto unknown villages of Borneo; in him many of the wild tribes saw the first white man. Speaking the language of the natives, and possessing that special faculty of kindly firmness so necessary to the efficient control of uncivilized peoples, he journeyed through the strange land not only unmolested, but frequently carrying away tokens of native affection. Several powerful chiefs made him their 'bloodbrother'; and here and there the tribes prayed to him as if he were a god." It would seem from the description of Mr. Hatton, that, in some instances, in Borneo, the blood-covenanting is by the substitute blood of a fowl held by the two parties to the covenant, while its head is cut off by a third person-without any drinking of each other's blood by those who enter into the covenant. Yet, however this may be, the other method still prevails there.

Another recent traveler in the Malay Archipelago, who, also, is a trained and careful observer, tells of this rite, as he found it in Timor, and other islands of that region, among a people who represent the Malays, 1 In "The Century Magazine" for July, 1885, p. 437.

THE TREE OF THE COVENANT.

the Papuan, and the Polynesian races.

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His descrip

tion is: "The ceremony of blood-brotherhood, . . . or the swearing of eternal friendship, is of an interesting nature, and is celebrated often by fearful orgies [excesses of the communion idea], especially when friendship is being made between families, or tribes, or kingdoms. The ceremony is the same in substance whether between two individuals, or [between] large companies. The contracting parties slash their arms, and collect the blood into a bamboo, into which kanipa (coarse gin) or laru (palm wine) is poured. Having provided themselves with a small fig-tree (halik) they adjourn to some retired spot, taking with them the sword and spear from the Luli chamber [the sacred room] of their own houses if between private individuals, or from the Uma-Luli of their suku [the sacred building of their village] if between large companies. Planting there the fig-tree, flanked by the sacred sword and spear, they hang on it a bamboo-receptacle, into which—after pledging each other in a portion of the mixed blood and gin—the remainder [of that mixture] is poured. Then each swears, 'If I be false, and be not a true friend, may my blood issue from my mouth, ears, nose, as it does from this bamboo!'-the bottom of the receptacle being pricked at the same moment, to allow the blood and gin to escape. The [blood-stained] tree remains and grows as a witness of their contract.”

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