There are many prohibitions which, if disregarded by the parents, would result in some harm to the child. They must not pour out oil, lest the child should suffer from inflammation of the ears; or fix the sword (_duku_) in its hilt, lest the child be deaf; or break an egg, lest the child be blind; or plant a banana-tree, lest the head of the child should be abnormally large; or kill any animal, lest the child be deformed or its nose bleed; or scrape the shell of a cocoanut, lest the child’s hair should not grow. It is also forbidden to eat anything in a mosquito curtain, lest the child should be still-born; to carry stones, lest the child should be paralyzed; to bend into a circle any piece of wood, lest the child should not prosper. There are a great many other matters of a similar sort forbidden, but in the case of nearly all their restrictions, there are ways by which they can be circumvented, and no evil effects follow. For instance, the mother may do basket-work and make mats, provided some other woman begin the work for her, and the man may dig trenches or erect a hut provided the hands of others are first laid to it. A man may not kill an animal yet, if he does kill anything, and runs away and then returns a few minutes afterwards, and makes some remark like this aloud, “I wonder who killed this animal?” he has nothing to fear. These curious restrictions are more or less similar among the different tribes. It is probable that they are founded on some theory of sympathy. Man, woman, and unborn or newborn babe are all linked together by some unseen bond, and, accordingly, the wrong action of one may result in harm to the others. The whole period of a woman’s pregnancy is passed in fear lest the spirits (_antu_) should do harm to her or her unborn babe. If the mother has a bad dream or hears a bird of ill omen, at once a fowl is sacrificed to propitiate the spirits. Should the husband wilfully violate any of the restrictions, the wife’s relations immediately bring him to justice, and, according to Dyak law, he has to pay a fine.