s with oil and pigments, which gives them the appearance
of being tattooed. Whether this is intended to defend them against the
bites of insects, to operate as a cure or prevention of this epidemic,
or to adorn their persons, I cannot take upon me to decide. They
believe, it is said, in a Supreme Being, and offer sacrifices of
gratitude to a beneficent Deity. Polygamy is not allowed among them;
no man has more than one wife; they burn their dead. They are said
to shoot poisoned balls or arrows through hollow tubes; and whenever
they kill a man, they preserve the skull to exhibit as a trophy to
commemorate the achievement of their arms. They are said to have
no mode of communicating their ideas by characters or writing, like
the Battas. Driven from the sea-coast of Borneo into the mountains
and fastnesses in the interior, they are more occupied in the chase
and the pursuits of husbandry than in commerce. They, however, barter
their inland produce of camphor, gold, diamonds, birds'-nests, wax, and
cattle, for salt (which they hold in the highest degree of estimation,
eating it with as much _gout_ as we do sugar), china, porcelain,
brass and iron cooking utensils, brass bracelets, coarse blue and
white cloth, Java tobacco, arrack (which they also like), parangs,
hardware, beads, &c. Some tribes of them are said to pull out their
front teeth and substitute others of gold, and others adorn themselves
with tigers' teeth. The greatest numbers and most considerable bodies
of these men are found near Kiney Balu and about Borneo Proper.

The Malays represent them as the most savage and ferocious of men;
but to be more savage or ferocious than a Malay is a thing utterly
impossible. Their representations may be accounted for. These
aborigines have always evinced a strong disposition and predilection
for liberty and freedom; they have either resisted the yoke of the
Malay, or have retired to their mountains to enjoy this greatest of
all human blessings. The Malay, unable to conquer them, lays plans
for kidnapping as many as he can fall in with. Every Dyak so taken is
made a slave of, his children sold, and his women violated. The Malay,
hence, is justly considered by them as the violator of every law,
human and divine; and whenever any of these people meet with one,
they satiate their vengeance, and destroy him as the enemy of their
race, and as a monster of the human kind. The Portuguese missionaries
found these people very tractab