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Updated: June 25, 2025
My own opinion is that, though prestige and vanity and superstition all contribute to the prevalence of head-hunting, in the inherent savagery of the Dyak is found the true explanation of the custom. I have already made passing mention of that characteristic weapon of the Dyaks, the sumpitan, or, as it is called by foreigners, the blow-gun.
Presently I could see the lattice move noiselessly, and a white face appeared with a boy's blow-gun of pierced bore-tree at its lips. "Alas!" said I to myself, "that I had had these soldiers' skill of the knife throwing. I would have marked that gentleman." But I had not even a bow only my sword and dagger. I resolved to begin to learn the practice of pistol and cross-bow on the morrow. "Plap!
There was one weapon and a very efficient one too which he knew how both to make and use. That weapon was a "gravatána," or blow-gun, sometimes called "pocuna." He had had an eye to this weapon all along, and had already provided the materials necessary for making it. These materials were of a varied character, and had cost him some trouble in getting them together.
The arrows were now ready, with the exception of the poison for their tips; and this was the most important of all, for without it both blow-gun and arrows would have been useless weapons, indeed.
These creatures, although they can swim well enough, would only be found upon the banks of the river, when it returned within its proper channel. Now and then Guapo brought down a parrot, a macaw, or an aracari, with his blow-gun; but these were only temporary supplies.
Behind its broad back I had eaten forbidden apples, I had aimed and discharged the blow-gun, I had reveled in blood-and-thunder tales that made the drowsy schoolroom fade before the vast wilderness, the scene of breathless struggles between Indian and settler, or open into the high seas where pirate, or worse-than-pirate Britisher, struck flag to American privateer or man-o'-war.
Arrows were to be made, and a quiver in which to carry them, and poison to dip their points in for the arrows of the blow-gun do not kill by the wound they inflict, but by the poison with which they are charged. The next thing, then, to which Guapo turned his attention was the manufacture of the arrows.
The arrows were now ready, with the exception of the poison for their tips; and this was the most important of all, for without it both blow-gun and arrows would have been useless weapons, indeed.
In Borneo the use of the blow-gun is not confined to the Dyaks. They are also used by fish! That is to say, by a certain species of fish. But it is unique among the finny tribe in possessing the curious power, on corning to the surface, of being able to squirt from its mouth a tiny jet of water.
He was in fine condition fat as a pig. The fruit of the murumuru had agreed with him. He was just in the condition in which an Indian thinks a horse "good for killing," and Guapo killed him! Yes, Guapo killed him! It is true it was a sort of a Virginius tragedy, and Guapo had great difficulty in nerving himself for the task. But the blow-gun was at length levelled, and the curare did its work.
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