To achieve
this they take long poles, frayed with many cuts, and set them up on
the river-bank at some distance above and below the scene of the crime
and at the mouths of all the neighbouring creeks and streamlets; and
they kill fowls and pray that the guilty crocodile may be prevented
from passing the spots thus marked. They then search the creeks,
and if they find the criminal with the body of his victim they kill
him, and the feud is at an end. But, if they fail to find him thus,
they go out on the part of the river included between their charmed
poles, and, with their spears tied to long poles, prod all the bed of
this part of the river, and thus generally succeed in killing one or
more crocodiles. They then usually search its entrails for the bones
and hair of the victim so as to make sure that they have caught the
offending beast. But, even if they do not obtain conclusive evidence
of this kind, they seem to feel that justice is satisfied, and that
the beast killed is probably the guilty one.
Except in the meting out of a just vengeance in this way, no Kenyah
will kill a crocodile, and they will not eat its flesh under any
circumstances. But there is no evidence to show that they regard
themselves as related by blood or descent to the crocodiles or that
their ancestors ever did so.
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