The Golden Bough (Third Edition, Vol. 7 of 12) - Mirrors

222 The Golden Bough (Third Edition, Vol. 7 of 12)[187]by the hand. As he strides along, the leader makes a motionwith his crook as if he were hooking something and drawing it tohimself, and the gesture is imitated by all his followers. What heis thus catching are the souls of the rice, which sometimes wanderfar away, and by drawing them home to the village he is believedto ensure that the seed of the rice which is about to be sownwill produce a plentiful harvest. As the spirits are thought not topossess the power of speech, the actors who personate them maynot utter a word, else they would run the risk of falling downdead. The great field of the chief is sown by representativesof all the families, both free and slaves, on the day after themasquerade. On the same day the free families sacrifice on theirfields and begin their sowing on one or other of the followingdays. Every family sets up in its field a sacrificial stage or altar,with which the sowers must remain in connexion during the timeof sowing. Therefore no stranger may pass between them andthe stage; indeed the Kayans are not allowed to have anything todo with strangers in the fields; above all they may not speak withthem. If such a thing should accidentally happen, the sowingmust cease for that day. At the sowing festival, but at no othertime, Kayan men of the Mahakam river, like their brethren of theMendalam river, amuse themselves with spinning tops. For ninedays before the masquerade takes place the people are bound toobserve certain taboos: no stranger may enter the village: novillager may pass the night out of his own house: they maynot hunt, nor pluck fruits, nor fish with the casting-net or thedrag-net. 587 In this tribe the proper day for sowing is officiallydetermined by a priest from an observation of the sun settingbehind the hills in a line with two stones which the priest has setup, one behind the other. However, the official day often does587 A. W. Nieuwenhuis, Quer durch Borneo, i. 322-330. Compare id., InCentraal Borneo, i. 185 sq. As to the masquerades performed and the taboosobserved at the sowing season by the Kayans of the Mendalam river, see above,pp. 94 sqq.