“The Sigos taking the alarm, cut off their retreat and killed two of the Singé Dayaks, and obtained altogether five heads, though they lost two, and those belonging to their principal warriors. This news reaching me, I hurried up to the hill and arrived just after part of the war party had brought the heads. On our ascending the mountain we found the five heads carefully watched about half a mile from the town, in consequence of the non-arrival of some of the war party. They had erected a temporary shed close to the place where these miserable remnants of noisome mortality were deposited, and they were guarded by about thirty young men in their finest dresses, composed principally of scarlet jackets ornamented with shells, turbans of the native bark cloth dyed bright yellow and spread on the head, and decked with an occasional feather, flower, or twig of leaves. Nothing can exceed their partiality for these trophies; and in retiring from the war path, the man who has been so fortunate as to obtain a head, hangs it about his neck, and instantly commences his return to his tribe. If he sleep on the way, the precious burden, though decaying and offensive, is not loosened, but rests in his lap, whilst his head (and nose) reclines on his knees. “On the following morning the heads were brought up to the village, attended by a number of young men, all dressed in their best, and were carried to Parembam’s house, amid the beating of gongs and the firing of one or two guns. They were then disposed of in a conspicuous place in the public hall of Parembam. The music sounded, and the men danced the greater part of the day, and towards evening carried them away in procession through all the campongs except three or four just above me. The women in these processions crowd round the heads as they proceed from house to house, and put sirih and betel-nut in the mouths of the ghastly dead, and welcome them. After this they are carried back in the same triumph, deposited in an airy place, and left to dry. During this process, for seven, eight, and ten days, they are watched by the boys of the age of six to ten years, and during this time they never stir from the public hall: they are not permitted to put their foot out of it whilst engaged in this sacred trust. Thus are the youths initiated.