Sketches from Formosa.

FAR AFIELD NORTHWARD 63
Next morning, on coming out to reconnoitre, my eye
caught sight of a row of human skulls and heads fastened
up at the end of the Chief's house. They were mostly
cloven in, and some of them were comparatively fresh,
and had a most ghastly look. The greater number
of the other houses or huts were similarly provided.
I counted thirty-nine in one collection, thirty-two in
another, twenty-one in a third, and so on. They were
the terrible outcome of clan-fights among the savages
themselves, and of many a fatal meeting with people
in the west. Those unsubdued tribes have been brought
to bay by the advance of civilization. Their hand is
against every man, and they consider nothing more
praiseworthy than to transfix any straggler who wears
a pig-tail. Not only the Chinese, but the Sek-hwan who
have submitted to Chinese rule, are made to supply the
demand for heads. One of the most active and intelligent
of our Church members informed me that not a year
passes without ten or fifteen cases of successful headhunting
taking place in and around Po-li-sia. In some
years the number is very much larger. This degrading
practice appears to be carried on in much the same way,
and mutatis mutandis for the same general reasons, as
it is in Borneo. It has come to be so largely mixed up
with the beliefs and customs of the eastern tribes that,
apart from all quarrelling, heads must be brought
in to
keep up the traditional stand against Chinese invasion to
show the continued possession of bravery, and to furnish
an occasion for excitement, for jubilation, and for the
consumption of jarfuls of native whisky.
On turning away from these sickening sights and
entering the large cabin again, I felt sad at heart on seeing
further evidences of this awful degradation. A number
of very suspicious-looking implements were lying about,
and there could be no mistake regarding the thick coils