The Lee County journal. (Leesburg, Ga.) 1904-19??, 1909-08-06

i LOCKER eurn cold ana SICK at the dis
play of cruelty which is carried on
with a systematic aplomb which leaves
no room for mercy or relenting.
i A dance serious, touched with dig
nified gravity, takes place about the
dying man. Each native keeps time To
the dirge. 1t is all very intense and
| hating, as though the vengeance OF
the gods worked like their mills
slowly, The dancers move automati-
cally, as If drunk with some opiate!
The consciousness of what the poor,
spiked wretch must be enduring, set
in the ring of naked, revolving bodies.
| fills the onlooked with a horror that
can scarcely refrain from shrieking
aloud But there is no redress, for the
| mind of the savage has tribunals and
iuries, and forgotten primitive laws
deduced from premises to which We
have lost the key. We and our JUS
| tees, our pities, are strangers to them,
as they and their cruelties are to us.
The chant Of Eindictive hate drones
on for an eternity, 1t would seem, and,
/
abruptness. Lapsing into fanatical
abandon, with screams and cries and
a beating of tom-tUms, the Igorpotes
execute dance which degenerates in
to an orgy, and. with glistening, fame
swept bodies, with flying elflocks and
heather amulets on wrists and ankles,
they seem nothing more than liberated
| denizens of the neither World-demons
| Of evil and fire.
| Demoniacal, they cease to be human
beings, and no one could look into
these distorted faces, with the foam
fiecked lips, and expect mercy. When
they are exhausted, the chief, whose
part has been more or less passive,
selects one of the strongest natives and
hands him shield. The final execu-
tor embraces the chief, puts his arms
on the leaders shoulders, and, bowling
to his comrades, strides over to the
prisoner He tips up the dropping
head and slips the neck into the open
ing fitted for such an object. There
is solemn pause, and then one of
|
the victim is swiftly decapitated. The
feast is now served, and consists in
the case of the Bontoc Igorrote, OF
stewed dog meat and a species Of veni-
son, the deer being not much bigger
than a shepherd dog, while the lion
gotes deyour such delicacies as bugs,
4 worms and slugs.
The head of the murdered man is
sometimes dried and kept as mascot;
sometimes it adorns the pole of the
chiefs hut or becomes an incense
! bowl; it all depends upon the import
ance of the one captured.
To DR.. G. A. Dorsey of the Field Co
/ lumbar Museum, came tidings the
i other day of the murder of a colleague,
one DR.. William Jones, by the spear
and axe of the head hunters. He was
taking extensive notes on the tribal
differences and had just written long
4 letter to his friend. Scientific research
/ had led him afar afield and the forfeit
was life in an alien land and at the
hands of savages whom, in some man
ner, he had offended.
When a white man falls by the fury
of the head hunter the head is never
seen again; its fate is unknown. The
Bontoc Igorrote does not kill for the
lust of killing; some deadly feud must
be wiped out by life-taldng and his
revenge never takes the form of mas
sacre and carnage. Nnlike the Moro
chief of the Southern island, unlike our
own Indians, he does not seek and
collect either skull or scalp as a
trophy with which to show his Prov
ess He wants justice in his dim ele-
mental perception of that attribute.
and, If left unmolested, If his domain
is recognized as a territory to which
no one may enter without his permits
sion, will harm no man white or
brown. Once anger him and there is
little hope Of succor unless surrounded
by the strong arm Of Uncle Sam.
On several occasions when privates
have fallen on some lonely trail; whom
our soldier boys have stumbled over
the headless thing lying in the path. a
thing uniformed In the familiar khaki,
the little brown savage has fed in ter
ror to his mountain fastness, fed be-
fore the wrath Of white furies sweep
ing on through jungle growths and up
steep ravines where unexpected alti-
tudes make blood hum in the ears and
wet the lips Of undaunted white men
When such hostilities occur there is
no beat of the tom-tom; the forests
primeval are unlighted by inspiring
fires and the savage, like the retreat.
ing reptile, crawls noiselessly on his
belly nor is there desire ON his part
to strike at those terrible gods of ven.