“One can scarcely meet with a middle-aged Dayak who has not had two, and often three or more wives.  I have heard of a girl of seventeen or eighteen years who had already had three husbands.  Repudiation, which is generally done by the man or woman running away to the house of a near relation, takes place for the slightest cause—­personal dislike or disappointments, a sudden quarrel, bad dreams, discontent with their partners’ powers of labor or their industry, or, in fact, any excuse which will help to give force to the expression, ‘I do not want to live with him, or her, any longer.’”

     “Many men and women have married seven or eight times
     before they find the partner with whom they desire to
     spend the rest of their lives.”

“When a couple are newly-married, if a deer or a gazelle, or a moose-deer utters a cry at night near the house in which the pair are living, it is an omen of ill—­they must separate, or the death of one would ensue.  This might be a great trial to an European lover; the Dayaks, however, take the matter very philosophically.”

“Mr. Chalmers mentions to me the case of a young Penin-jau man who was divorced from his wife on the third day after marriage.  The previous night a deer had uttered its warning cry, and separate they must.  The morning of the divorce he chanced to go into the ’Head House’ and there sat the bridegroom contentedly at work.”

     “‘Why are you here?’ he was asked, as the ‘Head House’
     is frequented by bachelors and boys only; ’What news of
     your new wife?’”

     “’I have no wife, we were separated this morning
     because the deer cried last night.’”

     “‘Are you sorry?’”

     “‘Very sorry.’”

     “‘What are you doing with that brass wire?’”

     “’Making perik’—­the brass chain work which the women
     wear round their waists—­’for a young woman whom I want
     to get for my new wife,’” (I., 165-67; 55.)

Such is the love of Dyaks.  Marriage among them, says the same keen observer, “is a business of partnership for the purpose of having children, dividing labor, and, by means of their offspring, providing for their old age;” and Brooke Low remarks that “intercourse before marriage is strictly to ascertain that the marriage will be fruitful, as the Dyaks want children,” In other words, apart from sensual purposes, the women are not desired and cherished for their own sakes, but only for utilitarian reasons, as a means to an end.  Whence we conclude that, high as the Dyaks stand above Australians and many Africans, they are still far from the goal of genuine affection.  Their feelings are only skin deep.

DYAK LOVE-SONGS

Dyaks are not without their love-songs.