While they were all busy looking at the advancing object and speculating upon its nature, there suddenly arose from behind the kotta a cry of alarm, immediately followed by several rifle shots. Profiting by the general darkness the Colonel had succeeded in advancing with his Dayaks close to the palisades, and while the whole attention of the garrison was directed to the river an escalade was attempted and nearly met with success. One of the women, however, saw a figure leap from the ramparts into the darkness below. She had a hatchet in her hand and was busily cutting wood. Before the intruder could recover from the effects of his leap, she dealt him some violent blows on his head and arms, which soon laid him defenceless and weltering in his blood. Some of the garrison approached on hearing the cries of the woman just in time to receive the assailants who now appeared above the palisades. They were soon made acquainted with the Poenan mandauws and fell heavily wounded on the sharp landjoes planted at the foot of the parapet. The two Swiss and La Cueille, accompanied by the Poenans, now appeared on the ramparts and at once opened a heavy fire, although they could discover nothing in the darkness which reigned around. They kept up their fire for some time, until the yells and cries becoming lost in the distance led them to conclude that all immediate danger was past. Proceeding to the spot where the escalade had been attempted they found one dead body inside and four severely wounded outside the fortification. It was impossible to prevent the Poenans from beheading these unfortunates. In fact, during the prevailing darkness and general confusion the Europeans gave no thought to Poenan barbarities. When, however, in the succeeding calm they saw a fire lighted in the square of the kotta, they knew what it portended, and as soon as the flames shot up, they observed these wild men dancing with the captured heads in their hands and besplashing everything round them with the still oozing blood. Harimaoung Boekit in particular seemed delighted; he had been amongst the first to sally from the fort in order to dispatch the wounded. He now skipped about like a madman, crying his “lēēēēh, lèlèlèlè ouiiit,” and held a captured head to his mouth again and again, that the warm blood might run down his throat. “They have not got the head-hunter yet!” he cried victoriously. In a very short time the whole garrison of kotta Djangkan joined in the really diabolical dance, and the heads were passed from hand to hand in order to afford them all an opportunity of swallowing a few drops of the delicious red fluid. After the blood had ceased to flow they applied their lips to the bleeding necks and sucked them.