From the window of my head-house I could see all the way down the village. I noticed the houses were built in blocks, placed here and there, some ten or twelve in a row, in the inequalities of the soil by the side of the stream. The houses were, of course, propped up by poles of different heights, and there were platforms made of split bamboos lashed together by rattans running down the fronts of these houses, behind which were covered verandahs. I was told that there was a fireplace in each house, with shelves above it, where water, oil, salt fish, jars, potted durians, etc., were stored. A raised platform was invariably erected at the end of each room, used as a place to sit on when receiving one’s friends, also as a sleeping-place when strangers came to the village. The women looked picturesque with their white shell armlets, brass rings, and silver girdles shining against the dark background of the houses. I noticed that most of them parted their hair, and that the children’s heads were not shaved. At sunset in the wooden verandahs the girls of the village prepared food for their pigs, made of paddy husks mixed with water. A special brew was poured into smaller basins and kept for little pigs, which the girls caught from under the houses and threw here and there on to the verandahs. The girls then pushed the little pigs’ snouts into the food, whilst with long poles they beat off the cocks and hens anxious to join in the feast. In the evening the elders of the tribe rested under the shade of a banyan tree conversing with one another, whilst pigs grunted under the houses, cocks and hens strutted about the roofs, and dogs ran in and out of doorways--a tiny speck of human and animal life surrounded by gigantic backgrounds of mysterious and unexplored forests and mountains. These Land Dyaks are very hospitable, and, barring the time of my afternoon siestas or when I retired for the night, my room in the head-house was filled at all times of the day with the élite of the Dyak tribe. Whenever the elders were seated on the wooden divan in front of me, I was struck anew with the unlikeness of these people to the rest of our Sarawak tribes. I could not help thinking they resembled the Cingalese, for they had the same dreamy, soft, and effeminate look.