Fresh vegetables are brought in from the fields and a big hole is dug in the ground for an oven. So that the prisoner shall not escape, they then break his legs with a blow of the club, bind him to a tree, and adorn him with shells and feathers in preparation for the forthcoming orgy. When a party of warriors takes an enemy prisoner, either in combat or by abduction, they tie the captive to a thin tree-trunk and bring him horizontally back to the village. That incident enabled me to appreciate the reports of the reconnaissance patrols, and to believe what Jack had told me of the barbarous habits of the Kukukukus.
He kept on till the blood spurted out the children and women, who had gathered round him, screamed with delight. He was normally a calm, peaceable fellow, not without a certain natural dignity but when he set about killing the pig with his club, the joy of slaughter shone in his eyes and he battered the club again and again upon the head of the beast, although it had been killed by the first blow. I had bought one of their tame pigs, and asked the headman of the village, a young warrior by the name of Momakowa, to kill it for me. It was difficult to imagine that these people were cannibals but one day I was given a sudden revelation of their blood-lust. The boys roared with laughter at my unskilful efforts to compete with them with bow and arrow. The children would come to clutch my arm if they wanted to show me something. They had an attractive, spontaneous sense of humour, and there was something very touching in the pleasure they evidently felt at meeting strangers who manifestly intended them no mischief. I gave them various presents in exchange for the specimens I gathered for the National Museum of Denmark I joked with them, showed them photographs of other natives and let them listen to the tape recorder. They maintained a constant distrust of their neighbours but towards us, who were complete strangers, their attitude was different. They were always ready either for defence or attack.
Whenever the men left the huts, either to go hunting or to go to the fields, they always took their weapons with them.
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