TWO YEARS IN THE JUNGLE 
 
 THE EXPERIENCES OF A HUNTER 
 AND NATURALIST 
 
 IN INDIA, CEYLON, THE MALAY PENINSULA AND BOENEO 
 
 WILLIAM T. HOENADAY 
 
 CHIEF TAXIDEBMIST, V. 8. NATIONAL MUSEUM 
 LATE OOLLECTOB FOB WARD'S NATURAL SCIENCE ESTABLISHMENT 
 
 WITH MAPS AND ILLUSTRATIONS 
 
 ' There Is a pleasure In the pathless woods, 
 There is a rapture In the lonely shore."— ^yron 
 
 NINTH EDITION 
 
 KEW TOEK: 
 
 CHARLES SCRIBNER'S SONS, 
 1910 
 

 H 
 
 oh 
 
 ^% 
 
 Copyright, 1885, by 
 
 CHARLES SCRIBNER'S SONS 
 
 By trsnsfer 
 
 IJ« Si Soldlei^ Tione Lib. 
 
 8.0V 5 1941 
 
MY GOOD WIFE 
 JOSEPHINE 
 
 WHOSB PRESENCE BOTH WHEN SEEN AND UNSEB* 
 
 HAS EVER BEEN THE SUNSHINE OP MY LIPB 
 
 THIS BOOK 
 
 IS AFFECTIONATELY DEDICATED 
 
 3516 
 
Digitized by tine Internet Arciiive 
 in 2010 witii funding from 
 Ti^e Library of Congress 
 
 littp://www.arcliive.org/details/twoyearsinjungleOOIiorn 
 
PREFACE. 
 
 As a matter of simple justice to myself, I must inform the reader 
 that the journey of which this book is a record was one of action 
 rather than observation, and opportunities for study were few and 
 far between. Omng to the cu-cumstances under which the trip 
 was carried out, all my waking houi's were occupied in a ceaseless 
 warfare for specimens, and my only regi*et comes when I think 
 what ** it might have been," for me at least, had I not been obhged 
 to shoot, preserve, cai'e for and pack up nearly every specimen with 
 my o^^^l hands. From first to last I had no other assistance than 
 such as could be rendered by ignorant and maladroit native ser- 
 rants. Even in the preparation of these pages the demon of Work 
 has still pursued me, and the task has been accomplished only by 
 the aid of *' midnight oil," when wearied by the laboi*s of the day. 
 
 What follows is offered merely as a faithful pen-picture of what 
 may be seen and done by almost any healthy young man in two 
 yeai'9 of ups and downs in the East Indies. 
 
 He, at least, who loves the gi-een woods and rippling waters, and 
 has felt the mystic spell of life in " a vast wilderness," will appre- 
 ciate the record of my experiences. I love natui-e and all her works, 
 but one day in an East Indian jungle, among strange men and 
 beasts, is worth more to me than a year among dry and musty 
 " study specimens." The green forest, the aiiy mountain, the plain, 
 the river, and the sea-shore ai-e to me a perpetual delight, and the 
 pursuit, for a good purpose, of the li^dng creatures that inhabit them 
 adds an element of buoyant excitement to the enjoyment of natural 
 scenery, which at best can be but feebly porti-ayed in words. 
 
Tl PREFACE. 
 
 In the belief that the average reader is more interested in facta 
 of a general nature than in minutiae, I have avoided going into nat- 
 ural history details, but have endeavored instead to indicate the 
 most striking features of the countries visited, and the more note- 
 worthy animals and men encountered in their homes. 
 
 As the pages which follow will presently reveal, this is in every 
 sense a personal — I might even say a first-personal — narrative, in 
 which the reader is taken as a friend into the author's confidence 
 while they make the trip together. The writer addresses, not the 
 public, in general, but The Eeader, individually. To him I would 
 say, confidentially of course, that as a duty to him, in the prepara- 
 tion of these pages I have labored earnestly to avoid all forms of 
 exaggeration, and to represent everything with photographic accu- 
 racy as to facts and figures. It is easy to overestimate and color 
 too highly, and I have fought hard to keep out of my story every 
 elephant and monkey who had no right to a place in it. 
 
 I consider it the highest duty of a traveller to avoid carelessness 
 in the statement of facts. A narrative of a journey is not a novel, 
 in which the writer may put down as seen any thing that " might 
 have been seen." ., 
 
 To a great many kind friends in the East Indies my thanks are 
 due for aid, comfort, and advice ; but I will not consign their names 
 and the acknowledgment of my gratitude to the obscurity of a 
 preface, and each will be found in its own place in the story. But 
 for the friends I made as I went along, and the kindly interest they 
 manifested in my welfare and happiness, I would have felt like a 
 rogue elephant — solitary, un cared for, and even spurned by the 
 other members of the social herd. 
 
 Curiously enough, nearly all my East Indian friends were Eng- 
 lish, and to my American reader I would say, when you meet an 
 English traveller treat him kindly for my sake. 
 
 W. T. H. 
 
 Washington, D. C. 
 
CONTENTS. 
 
 PART I. 
 INDIA. 
 
 CHAPTEK I. 
 
 THE JOURNEY TO INDIA. 
 
 vAoa 
 
 Objects of the Trip. — Boycotted in Ireland. — The Challenger Colleo- 
 tions. — The Liverpool Museum. — The British Museum. — From 
 Paris to Rome.— Art versus Nature. — Collecting at Naples. — The 
 Zoological Station. — Alexandria. — The Nile Delta. — Cairo. — A 
 Picnic to the Petrified Forest — The Author rides a Camel. — Egyp- 
 tian Fossils. — Through the Suez Canal. — A Day at Jeddah. — Pil- 
 grims and Strangers. — The Tomb of Eve. — The Red Sea. — A 
 Pleasant Voyage. — Bombay 1-20 
 
 CHAPTEE II. 
 
 BOMBAY. 
 
 Duty on Outfit.— A Model (!) Consul.— The Servant Question.— The 
 Grand Market. — Flowers. — Fruit. — Fish. — Live Birds. — The 
 First Specimen. — Street Cars. — An Interesting Crowd. — Vehicles. 
 — The Bullock Hackery. — The Homeliest Animal Alive. — The 
 Victoria and Albert Museum. — Soft-hearted Hindoos. — The Hos- 
 pital for Animals. — A Strange Sight. — A Good Servant. — Depart- 
 ure for Allahabad 21-29 
 
 CHAPTEE III. 
 
 FROM BOMBAY TO ETAWAH. 
 
 Physical Aspect of the Country. — Scarcity of Animal Life. — A Barren 
 Region. — Major Ross. — A Boat Trip up the Jumna. — A Mile of 
 
Vm CONTENTS. 
 
 PAGI 
 
 Bathers.— Dead Hindoo. — Plenty of Birds but no Gavials. — Re- 
 turn and go to Etawah. — The Dak Bungalow. — Two Specimens 
 the First Day. — My Boat and Crew. — A Day in the Bazaar. — An 
 Instance of Caste 30-38 
 
 CHAPTER IV. 
 
 GAVIAL SHOOTING ON THE JUMNA. 
 
 Afloat on the Jiimna. — Character of the Eiver. — Difficulties of Croco 
 dile Shooting. — The Fatal Spot— Prospects.— The Fun Begins.— 
 Defeat through Poor Shooting and Native Timidity. — An Ha- 
 rangue. — Swimming after a Wounded Gavial. — Death of " Num- 
 ber One." — Another still Larger. — How to Skeletonize a Gavial. — 
 Mode of Skinning Described. — Birds of Prey. — Crowds of Spec- 
 tators. — Gavial Eggs. — A Model Crew. — Plucky Encounter with 
 a Wounded Gavial. — A Struggle at Close Quarters. — Our Plan of 
 Operations.— A Good Eifle. — Killing Gavials at Long Range 39-49 
 
 CHAPTER V. 
 
 THE GANGETIC CROCODILE. 
 
 AJoUyLife.— Native Tenderness for the Gavial, — Eating the Flesh. — 
 The Jumna swarming with Gavials. — A " Mass Meeting." — Loss 
 of an Enormous Specimen. — Maximum size Attained. — ^The 
 Gavial's Place in Nature. — Habits and Characters of the Species. 
 — General Observations on the Crocodilians. — Number of Eggs 
 Deposited. — The Gavial not a Man-eater. — A Ticklish Reptile. 
 — Vocal Powers 50-57 
 
 CHAPTER YI. 
 
 ANIMAL LIFE ALONG THE JUMNA. 
 
 Boating on the Jumna. — A Long Prayer. — The Saras Crane. — Queer 
 Antics. — The Jabiru. — Nests of the Scavenger Vulture. — Pea- 
 cocks. — A Jungle Cat Surprised. — The Jackals' Serenade. — Tur- 
 tles. — The Gangetic Porpoise. — Native Villages. — The People. — 
 Female Ugliness. — Friends and Foes. — A Native Funeral. — Cre- 
 mation a mere Form. — An Adjutant Shot. —Goodbye to the River. 58-68 
 
 CHAPTER YII. 
 
 RAVINE DEER AND BLACK BUCK HUNTING. 
 
 An Invitation. — Aspect of the Country. — Major Ross's Camp. — A Lux- 
 urious Establishment. — The Jumna Ravines. — The ' ' Ravine 
 
CONTENTS. IX 
 
 FAOS 
 
 Deer." — A Day's Sport — Fifteen Gazelles and a Nil-6ai. — The 
 Sasiu Antelope or " Black Buck." — Animal Pests — Another Hunt 
 with Major Ross. — Interesting Sport. — A Narrow Escape. — A 
 Stern Chase at Mid-day. — Eight Antelopes Gathered in. — A Holi- 
 day at Agra. — The Taj Mehal, of course. — Taj-struck Travellers. — 
 The Trees of the North- West Provinces 69-88 
 
 CHAPTEK VIII. 
 
 BENARES, CALCUTTA, AND MADRAS. 
 
 The Monkey Temple.— Sacred Animals.— The Fakir.— The Hindoos 
 as Beast Worshippers. — A Beastial Religion. — From Benares to 
 Calcutta.— The Hot Season.— " Punkahs and Tatties. "—Depart- 
 ure for Madras. — The Hoogly River. — Sailor Anatomists. — The 
 Hoogly Channel. — Madras. — A Seaport without a Harbor. — Two 
 Years of Drought. — A Famine-stricken City. — A Paternal Govern- 
 ment. — The Madras Museum. — Another Language and another 
 Servant 83-03 
 
 CHAPTER IX. 
 
 THE NEILGHERRY HILLS. 
 
 The "Blue Mountains." — A Natural Eden.— Physical Aspect.— The 
 Coonoor Pass. —Beauty and Grandeur. — Climbing up to Paradise. 
 — Ootacamund. — Products of the Hills. — The Worst Hotel in 
 India. — A Hunt in the "Delectable Mountains." — Above the 
 Clouds.— The Todas. — A Remarkable People. —Their Negative 
 Qualities. — Phenomenal Laziness. — The "Paulaul" and the 
 "Paulchi." — Physique of the Todas. —Dress. — Polyandry, or 
 Plurality of Husbands. — Betrothal, Marriage, and Divorce. — In- 
 fanticide.— The Toda Hut.— The Mund.— The Toda Buffalo.— 
 Little Game but Splendid Scenery. — A Cloud Scene. — An Empty 
 Bag, but no Regrets 93-104 
 
 CHAPTER X. 
 
 THE WAINAAD FOREST. 
 
 A Hunting Trip to Mudumallay. — Monkey Shooting. — The Karkhana. 
 — The Meanest Natives in India. — Obstacles. — An Old Hypocrite. 
 — Record of One Day's Hunting. — Expert Trackers. — Bison. — A 
 Long Chase.— Death of a Sambur Stag.— A Herd of Wild Ele- 
 phants. — An Attack by an Amateur, on Foot and Alone. — Close 
 Quarters. — Failure. — Lost in the Jungle. — A Sambur Killed by a 
 
X CONTENTS. 
 
 Tiger. — A Bad Predicament. — Deliverance by a Lucky Guess. — 
 The Author's Status as a Shikaree. — Death of a Bull Bison. — 
 Skinning Under Difficulties. — Instinct of Self-preservation in 
 Monkeys. — Jungle Fever. — Native Cussedness again. — Return to 
 Ooty. — A Good Samaritan. — A Model (!) Physician. — Mr. and 
 Mrs. Dawson. — Departure 105-118 
 
 CHAPTER XL 
 
 THE ANIMALLAI HILLS. 
 
 A Hunter's Paradise. — Getting there. — The Bullock Bandy and its 
 Driver. — His Discourse. — Physical Aspect of the Animallais. — 
 Toonacadavoo. — A Glorious Prcspect. — Mr. Theobald.— An Effi- 
 cient Officer and Faithful Friend. — Character of the Forest. — Sea- 
 sons. — Protection of the Elephants. — A Permit Obtained. — My 
 Mulcer Hunting Gang. — The Karders. — More Ornamental than 
 Useful 119-139 
 
 CHAPTER XTI. 
 
 ELEPHANT HUNTING. 
 
 **A Lodge in a Vast Wilderness." — Hut-building with Bamboos. — 
 Elysian at Laftt.— Character of Elephant Hunting. — Grand but 
 Dangerous Sport. — Indian versus African Methods. — The Skull. 
 — Difficulty of Hitting the Brain. — Cranial Fracture Impossible. 
 — The Fatal Shots. — Physique of the Elephant. — Tracking up a 
 Herd. — Welcome Sounds. — Surrounded by Giants. — The Attack. 
 — Stampede and Flight of the Herd. — Great Abundance of Large 
 Game. — The Charge of a Dangerous Animal. — Fooling around a 
 Baby Elephant. — Charge of an Infuriated Female. — A Grand but 
 " Scarey " Sight.— Repelling the Charge 130-141 
 
 CHAPTER Xm. 
 
 MONKEYS, BEARS, AND ELEPHANTS. 
 
 The Black Langur. — Monkey Shooting. — A Startling Cry. — Absurd 
 Encounter with Three Bears. — A Stern Chase. — Death of Num- 
 ber Two. — A Woful *' Slip 'twixt cup and lip. " — Surprise Number 
 Two.— The Old Bear Dies.— Habits of the Species.— A Typical 
 Elephant Hunt. — Hunters Hunted. — Wonderful Manoeuvring of 
 the Elephants. — A Stealthy Retreat. — A Double-barrelled Attack. 
 — " Shavoogan ! " — Panic-stricken Hunters. — Failures, Fever, 
 and Scarcity of Food 142-151 
 
CONTENTS. XI 
 
 CHAPTER XIV. 
 
 A TIGER HUNT. 
 
 pxos 
 
 Vi^rs. — The Game-killer. — The Cattle-lifter, — The Man-eater. — 
 Reign of Terror. — Eight Hundred Victims Annually. —Modes of 
 Tiger-hunting. — Howdah Shooting. — Machan Shooting. — Shoot- 
 ing on Foot. — An Impromptu Tiger-hunt. — The Trail. — A Light 
 "Battery."— The Game Overhauled.— A Good Shot.— Death of 
 a Superb "Game-killer." — Dimensions and Weight. — A Proud 
 Moment. — Struggle to Preserve the Skin 153-160 
 
 CHAPTER XV. 
 
 SKELETONIZING AN ELEPHANT. 
 
 Mijthievous Elephants. — Chase of a Large Herd. — Death of a Tusker. 
 — Forbidden Ground. — A Secret. — The Mulcer's Oath. — A Change 
 of Base. — Skeletonizing an Elephant in Sixteen Hours. — Cacheing 
 the Bones. — The Traces of our Guilt. — Moral Aspect of the Affair. 
 — The Spotted Deer. — A Pretty Picture. — The Indian Elk or Sam- 
 bur. — Bad Case of Protective Coloring. — Serenaded by Sambur. — 
 The "Brain-fever bird." — Tree Rats. — The Muntjac. — Delicious 
 Venison.-— The Neilgherry Goat.— Wild Hogs 161-173 
 
 CHAPTER XVI. 
 
 THE SECOND YEAR OF THE MADRAS FAMINE. 
 
 Sickness in the Jungle. — Temporary Absence from the Hills. — A 
 Starving Waif.— The Spectre of Famine. — Famine-stricken Na- 
 tives. — Cause and Effects of the Famine. — The Relief Camp at 
 Animallai. — A Review of the Hungry. — The Government and the 
 Famine. — " Money Doles." — Mortality. — " Be ye Warmed and 
 Fed ! "—End of the Drought 174-181 
 
 CHAPTER XVII. 
 
 THE POETRY OF FOREST LIFE.— BISON SHOOTING. 
 
 Return to the Hills.— Benighted in the Jungle. — Native Meanness. — 
 Doraysawmy, the " Gentleman's God."— A Jewel of a Servant- 
 Prospects.— Fever again. — Bass' Pale Ale.— Glorious Weather. 
 —Fine Forest.— The Poetry of Life in the Forest.— Our Mode of 
 Hunting.— A Bison Hunt.— Death of a Solitary Bull.— A Noble 
 Animal.— Characters and Habits of the Species. — Another Hunt. 
 
XU CONTENTS. 
 
 PAGS 
 
 — Four Bison in Five Shots. — The Bison as an Antagonist. — Mr. 
 Morgan's Encounter with a Wounded Bull.— A Close Shave. — A 
 Typical English Sportsman and his Battery. — How to Preserve a 
 Bison-skin for Mounting , 183-193 
 
 CHAPTER XVin. 
 
 A MEMORABLE ELEPHANT HUNT. 
 
 A Run of 111 luck. — The Climax. — Strained Relation with an Official. 
 — The Turn of the Tide.— My Last Card.— An Official Favor. — 
 Permission to Kill a Tusker. — Move to Sungam. — A Memorable 
 Elephant Hunt. — A Bad Shot. — Dangerous Ground. — A Bold Ad- 
 vance and a Disorderly Retreat. — Mulcer Philosophy. — A Long 
 and Tiresome Chase. — Desperate Character of the Jungle. — Luck 
 at Last. — The Attack. — An Anxious Moment. — Victory. — The 
 Dead Tusker. — A Sell on the Mulcers. — Skinning a Nine-and- 
 a-half Foot Elephant. — The Modus Operandi. — Camp on the Field 
 of Battle. — Surrounded by Wild Beasts. — Getting up a Scare. — 
 Burning Bamboo. — A Tiger about. — An Accident. — Back to Sun- 
 gam. — A Mulcer Row. — Fever again. — Mutiny in Camp 194-207 
 
 CHAPTER XIX. 
 
 END OF THE ANIMALLAI CAMPAIGN. 
 
 Balky Mulcers. — Work on the Elephant again. — Wild Beast versus 
 Tramp and Burglar. — My Mulcers go on a Strike. — Playing a 
 Lone Hand. — Bringing the Men to Terms. — A Bloodless but Com- 
 plete Victory. — Another Tiger about. — Treatment of the Elephant 
 Skin. — The March out to Sungam. — The Season. — The Last of 
 my Hunting Gang. — Descent from the Hills in a Storm. — Paradise 
 Lost. — Fever Again. — Good-by to the Animallais.-^My Collection 
 of Mammals 308-217 
 
 CHAPTER XX. 
 
 THE INDIAN ELEPHANT. 
 
 Geographical Distribution. — Indian and African Species Compared.— 
 The Ceylon Elephant. —The Capture of Wild Elephants.— Breed- 
 ing in Captivity. — Gestation of the Elephant. — Duration of Life. 
 —Growth and Height.— Size of Tusks. — Classes of Elephants. — 
 Uses. — Table of Values. — Intellectual Capacity and Temper. — 
 Elephants at Work in a Timber Forest. — Feeding Elephants. — Cost 
 of Keeping. — "Must," or Temporary Insanity — "Rogue" Ele- 
 phants. — How an Elephant Kills a Man. — Swimming Power of 
 Elephants 318-234 
 
CONTENTS. Xm 
 
 PART 11. 
 CEYLON. 
 
 CHAPTEK XXL 
 
 COLOMBO. 
 
 FAQB 
 
 Madras to Colombo.— Farewell to Jungle Fever. — The Queen of the 
 Tropics. — The Singhalese. — The Native Shops. — Exorbitant 
 Duty on Methylated Spirits. — An Appeal, and its Result. — Public 
 Opinion. — A Protest. — Legislation for the "Odd Man." — The 
 Sea View Hotel. — Natives as Collectors. — A Morning's Work. — 
 How to Clean and Preserve Echini. — The Gatherings of one Day, 
 — The Fish Market.— The Colombo Museum and its Director. — 
 Native Taxidermists. — Need of European Preparateurs in the 
 East Indies,— An Obliging Firm 235-250 
 
 CHAPTER XXII. 
 
 THE NORTHERN PROVINCE. 
 
 Trip to Jaffna. — The Paumben Passage. — Jaffna. — Coral Gathering. — 
 The Beauties of Living Coral.— Shallow Waters. — A Harvest of 
 Cartilaginous Fishes. — Rldnobati. — Large Rays. — A Handsome 
 Shark. — A Rare and Curious Fish. — Bhamphobatis ancylostomus 
 Described. — Sea Turtles. — Questionable Value of Native Help. — 
 Start for Mullaitivu. —Jaffna to Point Pedro. —The most Northern 
 Point of Ceylon. — Native Cussedness again. — The Slowest Sailing- 
 Craft on Record 251-263 
 
 CHAPTER XXm. 
 
 MULLAITIVU. 
 
 An Unwholesome Village Site. — Dirt and Discomfort. — Crocodile 
 Hunting. — Cannibalism and Leprosy among Crocodiles. — Flying 
 Foxes. — A Big Haul. — A Heronry. — Hot Jungle. — Death of Mr. 
 Leys by Sunstroke. — Mammals. — A Live Manis and its Doings. — 
 On Short Rations. — Exasperating Failure to Receive Supplies. — 
 Tropical Hunger. — A Gloomy Proposition Strangely Refuted. — A 
 Delicious Beverage. — Journal of a Trip into the Interior. — Mon- 
 key-shooting. — Character of the Jungle. — Joseph Emerson. — 
 Elephant Skeletons. — Self -buried Frogs. — Two Hundred Mon- 
 keys in Four Hours. — Their Fleetness in the Tree-tops. — Deer. — 
 Overland Journey to Jaffna. — Elephant Pass. — Return to Co- 
 lombo 263-280 
 
XIV CONTENTS. 
 
 CHAPTER XXrV. 
 
 KANDY AND POINT DE GALLE. 
 
 The Interior of Ceylon. — A Run up to Kandy. — Native Plows and 
 Plowing. — The Mountains. —Kandy. — An Overpraised Town. — 
 Summary of Ceylon Collections. — The Royal Mail Coach. — Gov- 
 ernmental Eccentricities. —The Ride to Galle.— Charming Coast 
 Scenery. — A Church Episode. — Bentotte. — Point de Galle Nep- 
 tune's Garden. — Ceylon Gems. — Classification of Dealers. — Study 
 of a Scoundrel, in Black and White. — Diamond cut Diamond. — 
 Farewell to Ceylon , 381-390 
 
 PART III. 
 THE MALAY PENINSULA. 
 
 CHAPTER XXV. 
 
 SINGAPORE. 
 
 New Harbor. — A Back-door Entrance. — Mangrove Swamps and Malay 
 Houses. — StreSt Scenes. — The Sailors' Quarter. — Well-planned 
 City. — Chinese Shops and Houses. — Populace. — Social Life. — 
 The Curse of the East Indies. — The American Consul. — Two 
 American Travellers. — A Model Millionaire. — The Climate of 
 Singapore. — Market for Live Animals. — A Visit to Mr. Whampoa's 
 Villa. — Curios. — A Tigerish Orang-Utan. — Curiosities in Garden- 
 ing .. . 391-300 
 
 CHAPTER XXVL 
 
 ON THE SELANGORE SEA-COAST. 
 
 Malacca. — Selangore. — Klang River and Town. — A Kindred Spirit- 
 Visit to Jerom on the Sea-coast to Collect, — Bamboo Creek. — A 
 Filthy Chinese Village.— A Foul Stream.— Crocodiles.— Catching 
 a Twelve-foot Crocodile with Hook and Line.— The "Alir." — A 
 Harvest of Saurians again. — Crocodiles in the Sea. — Birds. — 
 Shrimp- eating Monkeys. — An Iguana, — The Slowest Race on 
 Record. — Remarkable Fishes. — Catching Periophthalmi. — An Ad- 
 venture in Mud. — Various Vertebrates. — Centipedes and their 
 Doings. — Doctoring a Ray-stung Fisherman. — Malay Character. 
 —Return to Klang 301-313 
 
CONTENTS. XV 
 
 CHAPTEB XXVII. 
 
 HUNTING IN THE INTERIOR OF SELANGORE. 
 
 PAGE 
 
 A Trip to the Interior. — Road to Kwala Lumpor. — The Town. — 
 "The Captain Cheena." — A Bonanza in Champagne. — Sungei 
 Batu. — A Foolish Feat.— Our House. — Feasting on Durians. — A 
 Jacoon House and Family. — Resemblance to the Dyaks. — An 
 Impromptu Elephant Hunt. — Attack in a Swamp. — Death of a 
 Young Tusker.— Plague of Flies. — Another Elephant Hunt. — A 
 Close Shave and a Ludicrous Performance. — Discovery and Ex- 
 ploration of Three Fine Caves. — Cathedral Cave. — Mammals. — 
 Visit to a, Tin Mine. — Chinese versus Malays. — Political Condi- 
 tion of Selangore. — Statistics. — Snakes. — Good-by to Klang. — Mr. 
 Robert Campbell, my Good Genius 314-333 
 
 PART IV. 
 
 BOENEO. 
 
 CHAPTER XXVm. 
 
 SARAWAK, PAST AND PRESENT. 
 
 Geographical Position and Area of Borneo. — Explorations. — From 
 Singapore to Sarawak. — The Finest City in Borneo. — Historical 
 Sketch of Sarawak Territory. — Sir James Brooke. — Anarchy and 
 Oppression. — Cession of the Territory. — Order out of Chaos. — 
 Evolution of a Model Government. — A Wise and Good Rajah. — 
 Justice in Sarawak and the United States. — Present Prosperity. — 
 A Lesson for Political Economists 333-346 
 
 CHAPTEE XXIX. 
 
 FROM SARAWAK TO THE SADONG. 
 
 Hunting near Kuching. — Crocodiles in the Sarawak. — A Dangerous 
 Pest. — War of Extermination. — From Sarawak to the Sadong. — 
 The Simujan Village. — A Hunt for an Orang-utan. — In the 
 Swamp.— On the Mountain.— Valuable Information at Last... . 347-353 
 
XVI CONTENTS. 
 
 CHAPTER XXX. 
 
 AMONG THE ORANG-UTANS. 
 
 Pies 
 
 Start up the Simujan. — Boat-roofs. — Among the Head-hnnters. — A 
 Djftk Long-house. — Monkejs. — Fire-flies. — A Night on a Tropical 
 River. — Mias' Nests. — " Mias, Tuau." — Death of the First Mias. 
 — Another Killed. — Screw Pines. — " Three Mias in one Day I " — 
 
 ' Laborious Work. — Swamp Wading. — Padang Lake. — Cordial Re- 
 ception at a Dyak House 354-365 
 
 CHAPTER XXXI. 
 
 DOINGS IN THE ORANG-UTAN COUNTRY. 
 
 Preparation of Orang Skins and Skeletons. — Return down the Simu- 
 jan. — Three Orangs Killed. — A T-oublesome Infant. — Accessions 
 from Native Hunters. — Seven Orangs in One Day. — Miscellaneous 
 Gatherings. — A Battle-scarred Hero. — The Bore in the Sadong. — 
 Another Trip up the Simujan. — Doctoring an Injured Hunter. — 
 The Dyak at his Worst.— Death of a Huge Orang, " the Rajali." 
 —Dimensions. — A Rival Specimen. — Two Captives 866-377 
 
 CHAPTER XXXII. 
 
 COLLECTING AROUND SIMUJAN. 
 
 Native Hunters. — Two Orangs Killed at Simujan. — Nest-making by 
 an Orang. — A Harvest of Mammals. — A Deputation of Dyaks 
 from the Sibuyau. — An Inviting Invitation. — The Rise and 
 Progress of the Baby Orang. — An Interesting Pet. — Humanlike 
 Habits and Emotions. — A Tuba-fishing Picnic. — Third Journey 
 up the Simujan. — Snake Curry. — A Voyage in the Dark 878-889 
 
 CHAPTER XXXni. 
 
 COLLECTING AT PADANG LAKE. 
 
 A Hunt on Gunong Popook. — A Lost Hunter. — A Handsome Dyak. — 
 A Reception by Torchlight. — More Onang-utans. — How an Orang 
 Sleeps. — Proboscis Monkeys.— Living versus Stuffed Specimens.^ 
 A Remarkable Nose. — LucklessGibbon-hunting.— Luckless Wild- 
 hog Hunting.— Mud and Thorns. — Picturesque Vegetation. — 
 Fresh-water Turtles wid Fishes, — Return to the Sadong 390-897 
 
CONTENTS. 3CVU 
 
 CHAPTER XXXIV. 
 
 PACTS ABOUT THE ORANG-UTAN. 
 
 picn 
 Distribution of the Orang-utan. — ItsAffinitiea. — External Appearanc*. 
 —Remarkable Facial Ornament (?).— Color of Skin.— Hair.— 
 Eyes.— Mode of Fighting. — Pugnacity.— Food. — Unsocial Habits. 
 — Young at Birth. — Nesting Habits. — Locomotive Powers. — In- 
 ability to Walk or Stand Erect.— Height of Adults.— General 
 Measurements. — Two Species Recognized. — Characters of Simia, 
 Wurmbii and Satprui. — Individual PecnliariticB 398-408 
 
 CHAPTER XXXV. 
 
 A MONTH WITH THE DYAKS. 
 
 Journey to the Sibuyau. — The River. — A Malodorous Village.— - 
 Barriers. — Proboscis Monkeys and Flying Lemurs. — Head of 
 Canoe Navigation. — Swamp-wading. — Our Journey's End. — A 
 Lodge in a Vast Wilderness. — Fine Hunting-grounds. — Soiarce of 
 the River. — Hunting Gibbons. — Lively Sport. — Gibbons' Re- 
 markable Mode of Progress — A Mias. — A Successful Hunt. — 
 Affection and Courage of a Male Gibbon. — Helplessness of the 
 Baby Orang in Water. — A Live Tarsier. — More Gibbons Shot. 
 — Argus Pheasants. — Dyak Mode of Snaring. — A Deadly Pig- 
 trap. — A Shiftless Village. — A Magnificent Bird. — Curious Rodent. 
 — Visit to Lanchang. — A Village of Head-hunters. — Trophies of 
 the Chase.— A Fine Dyak Specimen 409-425 
 
 CHAPTER XXXVI. 
 
 A MONTH WITH THE T>YAKS— Concluded. 
 
 Leeches. — Model Making. — Poor Shooting-Boots. — Bad Ammunition. 
 — A Big Buttress. — Wild Honey. — Human-like Emotions of the 
 Baby Orang. — My Guides go on a Strike. — Flying Gibbons. — Boils 
 and Butterflies. —Bear and Muntjac. — Delicious Venison, — Lee 
 Tiao's Omen Bird. — Dyak Shiftlessness in Trade. — Gathering 
 Gutta. — Lee Tiac Climbs a Tapong Tree. — A Perilous Feat. — Ah 
 Kee gets Lost. — A Torch-light Search in the Swamp. — Another 
 Bear. — Return to the Sadong. — Tlie Last Orang. — The Nipa 
 Palm. — A dangerous Squall. — Nesting Habits of the Crocodile. — 
 Farewell to the Sadong 436-443 
 
XVUl CONTENTS. 
 
 CHAPTER XXXVII. 
 
 THE ABORIGINES OF BORNEO. 
 
 Fxax 
 Civilization an Exterminator of Savage Races — Stability of the Dyaks. 
 — The Survival of the Fittest.— The Typical Dyak. — Four Great 
 Tribes. — I'he Kyam. — Their Strength and Distribution. — Tribe 
 Misnamed Milanau. — General Characteristics. — Mechanical Skill. 
 —Modes of Wiwfare. — Aggressiveness. — Cannibalism of certain 
 Sub-tribes. — Tattooing. — Ideas of a Future State. — Human 
 Sacrifices. — Houses. — The llill Dyaks. — Distribution. — Takers of 
 Head Trophies. — Fighting Qualities. — Physique. — Dress and 
 Ornaments. — A Curious Corset. — Weapons. — Houses. — The Pan- 
 gah. — Social Life. — Strict Morality without Religion. — Prohibi- 
 tion of Consanguineous Marriages. — Marriage Ceremony. — Hon- 
 esty. — Disposal of the Dead. — A Relic of Hindooism. — Ideas of a 
 Supreme Being and Future State. — The Mongol Di/aks. — Remains 
 of Former Chinese Influence. — An Advanced Tribe. — Position. — 
 Physique. — Dress. — Houses. — Skill in Agriculture. — Implements 
 of Husbandry. — Independent but Peaceful. — The Muruts. — Dress 
 and Ornaments. — Houses. — The Kadyans. — Comparative Estimate 
 of the Four Great Dyak Tribes 443-458 
 
 » CHAPTER XXXVm. 
 
 THE SEA DYAKS. 
 
 Habitat. — Number. — Sub-tribes. — Their Physique, — Sea Dyak 
 Women. — Their Dress and Ornaments. — The Men. — Their 
 Weapons. — War Boats. — Fighting Qualities. — Head-taking and 
 Head-h\anting. — A Mania for Murder. — Houses and House-life 
 of the Sea Dyaks. — Communal Harmony. — Daily Occupations. — 
 Amusements. — Music-making. — Feasts. — Gentlemanly Drunken- 
 ness. — High Social Position of Women. — The Doctrine of Fair 
 Play. — Strict Observance of the Rights of Property. — A Race of 
 Debt-Payers. — Morality without Religion. — Infreqxiency of Crime. 
 — Dyak Diseases. — Mode of Burial. — The Future of the Race. — 
 Can Christianity Benefit the Dyaks ? 459-475 
 
 CHAPTER XXXIX. 
 
 A PLEASURE TRIP UP THE SARAWAK, 
 
 The Firefly.— Mr. A. H. Everett.— The Chinese Gold-washings at 
 Ban. — Caves and Crevices near Paku. — Walk to Tegora. — The 
 Cinnabar Mines of the Borneo Company. — Romantic Boat Ride 
 
CONTENTS. Xix 
 
 PAQK 
 
 down the Staat. — Trip to Serambo Mountain. — Dyak Bridges. — 
 Village of Peninjau. — The Rajah's Cottage. — Magnificent View. — 
 Raturn to Kuching. — Fare well to Borneo. — Singapore once more. 
 — End of the Expedition. — Retrospect. — Conclusion 476-489 
 
 APPENDIX. 
 
 Outfit for a Collector 491 
 
 Recipe for Making Arsenical Soap 492 
 
 How to Skin a Quadruped, and Prepare the Skin for Mounting 493 
 
 Loss of Life in British India by Wild Beasts and Serpents 493 
 
 Statistical Tables of Human Lives, Cattle, and Dangerous Animals 
 
 Destroyed 494 
 
 Measurements of some Indian Mammals 495 
 
 Indox 
 
THE MANIS, UOLLKD UP. 
 
LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONh 
 
 The End op our Tiger Hunt Frontispiece. 
 
 The Manis, rolled up, To face page xxi 
 
 Among the Gavla.ls, " 44 
 
 Bird-nesting on the Jumna, " 61 
 
 The Neilgherries, and a Part op Ootacamund, , " 96 
 
 A TODA MUND, « 102 
 
 Ground-plan op a Toda Hut, " 103 
 
 Mr, Theobald and his Forest Bungalow, , . *' 133 
 
 Pera Vera, " 127 
 
 My Camp at Tellicul, " 131 
 
 Section op an Elephant's Skull, etc., . , • " 135 
 
 Charge op a Female Elephant, " 141 
 
 Tiger-hunting on Elephant-back, . ' . . . " 154 
 
 Death op a Tusker, " 163 
 
 Herd op Axis Deer in Bamboo Forest, ..." 167 
 
 The Neilgherry Goat, and the Muntjac, . , " 173 
 
 The Indian Bison, or Gaur, " 188 
 
 Skinning an Elephant, " 303 
 
 A KooMERiAH Elephant, and a Meerga, ..." 336 
 
 Colombo from the Clock Tower, looking Southwest, . " 338 
 
 Ji?iampJiobatis ancylostomus, " 357 
 
 Good Collecting Ground, Mullaitivu, . . . " 367 
 
 Catching a Crocodile with Hook and Line, . , " 306 
 
 The Jumping Fish. — {Periophthalmus ScTdosserii), . . " 309 
 
 A Jacoon House, " 319 
 
 Vertical Section op a Cave in Selangore, . • " 327 
 
 Malay Houses on the Sarawak River, ..." 338 
 
 Plan op a Dyak Long-house, " 356 
 
XXll 
 
 LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS. 
 
 Exterior op a Sea Dyak Long-house, 
 
 Interior of a Sea Dyak Long-house, 
 
 Wading after a wounded Orang-utan, 
 
 Female Orang-utan, Infant and Nest, 
 
 A Fight in the Tree-tops, 
 
 Head of Cynogale Bennettii, 
 
 Embryo op GrocodUxu poroaua. 
 
 The "Old Man," . 
 
 The Thread Fish, . 
 
 Stegostoma tigrinum, 
 
 Liiciocephahta pulc7i&r, 
 
 The Gourami, . 
 
 Portrait of a Proboscis Monkey, 
 
 The Gibbon's Modes op Progression, 
 
 The Tarsier. — {Tar sius spectrum), 
 
 Buttresses op a Tapang Tree, 
 
 Dyak Weapons, Utensils, etc., 
 
 Kyan Warrior, 
 
 Group op Sea Dyaks, . 
 
 A Sea Dyak, (Seribas Clan), 
 
 A Sea Dyak Belle, 
 
 Dyak Harp 
 
 Dyaks using the Biliong, or Axe-adz, 
 
 To face page 
 
 356 
 
 
 357 
 
 
 361 
 
 
 368 
 
 
 375 
 
 
 380 
 
 
 380 
 
 
 381 
 
 
 386 
 
 
 387 
 
 
 387 
 
 
 389 
 
 
 395 
 
 
 415 
 
 
 430 
 
 
 428 
 
 
 443 
 
 
 447 
 
 
 459 
 
 
 460 
 
 
 461 
 
 
 469 
 
 
 484 
 
 MAPS. 
 
 British India, 
 
 Borneo, Ethnographic and General, 
 
 At end of volume. 
 Ojipoaite page ddd 
 
TWO YEARS IN THE JUNGLE 
 
 WITH RIFLE AND KNIFE. 
 
 PART I.— INDIA. 
 
 CHAPTER I. 
 
 THE JOURNEY TO INDIA. 
 
 Objects of the Trip. — Boycotted in Ireland.— The Challenger Colleciions. — The 
 Liverpool Museum. — The British Museum. — From Paris to Rome. — Art 
 versus Nature. — Collecting at Naples. — The Zoological Station. — Alexan- 
 dria — The Nile Delta. — Cairo. — A Picnic to the Petrified Forest. — The 
 Author rides a Camel — Egyptian Fossils. — Through the Suez Canal. — A 
 Dayat Jeddah. — Pilgrims and Strangers. — The Tomb of Eve. — The Red 
 Sea. — A Pleasant Voyage. — Bombay. 
 
 SHALL always believe I was bom under a lucky star as a com- 
 pensation for not having been born rich. My greatest piece of 
 good luck came to me in 1876, when I was equipped for field work 
 in natural history and sent to the East Indies on a two years' hunt- 
 ing and collecting tour. True, I had spent two years in Professor 
 Ward's famous establishment at Rochester, hard at work learning 
 the art of taxidermy, and all the methods employed in zoological 
 collecting. I had also made two trial trips as a collector in tropi- 
 cal America, so that taking aU together, I had served a regular ap- 
 prenticeship under skilled instructors. 
 
 Of course my trial trips were considered successful, else would 
 1 have been elected thereafter to remain at home in quiet comfort. 
 h& it was, fortune smiled upon me, very broadly I thought, and in 
 1 
 
2 TWO YEARS IN THE JUNGLE. 
 
 October, just two months after the plan was first proposed, I start- 
 ed eastward to India. 
 
 Was it by some institution of learning or scientific society that 
 I was sent out ? No, indeed ; there is not one in this country or 
 any other that ever had the enterprise to set on foot such an un- 
 dertaking and back it up to the bitter end with the necessary hard 
 cash. A private individual then, was it ? It was, and who else than 
 Henry A, Ward would have had the pluck to send a collector on a 
 tour around the world, to furnish him ample funds for expenses 
 during nearly three years' work, and pay him a good salary besides ? 
 
 Yet this lavish expenditure proved a good investment, and 
 yielded more museum materiae, in a better state of preservation, 
 than could be purchased with three times the amount of money 
 expended on the trip. This novel expedition was rendered neces- 
 sary by the demands of various scientific museums upon Professor 
 Ward's establishment, for East Indian forms which were not to be 
 obtained without sending a collector to gather them in the field. 
 
 Behold me, then, on board the steamship Bolivia, steaming 
 swiftly, but not too swiftly, I confess, across the Atlantic, in com- 
 pany with Professor Ward himself, whose companionship I was to 
 enjoy as far as the Eed Sea. My outfit of fire-arms and ammuni- 
 tion, knives, tools, preservatives, collecting cases, and camp equi- 
 page was both complete and compact, and I considered it very 
 nearly perfect. My instructions were anything but rigid, and I 
 had really a roving commission to visit India, Ceylon, the Malay 
 Peninsula, and Borneo, in quest of mammals in particular, and ver- 
 tebrates of all kinds in general. It was particularly to my liking 
 that quadrupeds of all species, from the elephant downward, were 
 needed most of all, and that my natural preference for the chase 
 and study of mammals in their haunts was to be indulged almost 
 without limit. I was directed especially to secure skins and skel- 
 etons of elephants, Indian bison and elk, orang-utans, gibbons, 
 monkeys of all species, two or three tigers if practicable, and 
 every species of crocodile procurable. The avifauna of that region 
 was then being very thoroughly studied by A. O. Hume, Esq., 
 and his co-laborers, and I could well afford to leave the birds to 
 him and his army of collectors. 
 
 In due time we landed at Londonderry, and to me was assigned 
 the pleasant task of visiting the Giant's Causeway, near Port Rush, 
 to procure several of its basalt columns for Professor Ward's cabi- 
 net This great geological wonder is the most interesting feature 
 
THE JOURNEY TO INDIA. 3 
 
 of the picturesque north coast of Ireland, and to my mind it really 
 is, as the local guides assure the visitor again and again, " wan uv 
 the foremust sights uv the known wurruld." After securing and 
 sjhipping five large columns, I went to Belfast, and from thence 
 about twenty miles farther, to the head of Loch Neagh, where I 
 skeletonized four old donkeys, and very nearly had my scalp taken 
 by a mob of wild L'ishmen, who came at me with long-handled 
 spades. They objected to the proceedings on the ground that 
 the " pore bastes had been jist murthered fur me, so they had," 
 and in the tenderness of their hearts they wei-e spoiling for an ex- 
 cuse to pound me and my two butcher boys to a jelly. I was boy- 
 cotted for an entire day in a cabin, by a mob of neai'ly a hundred 
 men, women, females, and children, who like 
 
 *' A legion of foul fiends 
 Environed me, and howl'd in mine ears," 
 
 while I exercised all the arts of diplomacy I knew to keep the 
 crowd on a peace footing until the arrival of British reinforcements 
 from a police station. I wish I could narrate the whole episode, to 
 show what the festive Home Ruler is capable of on his native bog ; 
 but it is too long a stor-y, and a rehearsal of what I endm*ed fi'om 
 those howUng bog-trotters would make me lose my temper en- 
 tirely. I am happy to say I came off with whole bones — mine, I 
 mean, not the donkeys' — for they were a complete wreck — after an 
 adventure ten times more dangerous than any I experienced with 
 the head-hunters of Borneo, or any other East Indian natives. 
 
 After joining Professor Ward at Glasgow we went to Edinburgh, 
 where we visited the collections of the Challenger expedition, or 
 as much of them as were stored at No. 1 Park Place, Aside 
 from the marine invertebrates, the amount collected seems small 
 almost to insignificance, in comparison with the cost, the equip- 
 ment and personnel of the expedition, and the distance it traversed. 
 The higher forms of animal life received but scant attention, and 
 the results obtained are interesting to a few scientific specialists 
 only. Aside from the deep-sea sounding and dredging, I, for one, 
 am puzzled to know how such an expedition could go so far and 
 accompHsh so little. The collections of vertebrates would be no 
 great credit, even if shown as the work of a private individual, to 
 say nothing of such an expedition sent out by a great nation. 
 
 At Manchester we visited the Owens College Museum, whence I 
 went on to Sheffield and had made to order, after my own patterns, 
 
4 TWO YEARS IN THE JUNGLE. 
 
 two dozen skinning knives of various sizes. Tliey were made of the 
 best shear steel by E. Blaydes & Co., and proved a valuable invest' 
 ment. 
 
 At Liverpool we visited the Derby Museum, which is my ideal 
 of what a public museum ought to be. It is readily seen that no 
 effort has been spared to make it perfect in quality of both speci- 
 mens and fixtures, and one only regrets that Dr. Moore has not 
 unlimited funds at his disposal for the indefinite increase of the 
 quantity. The methods of installation happily combine attractive- 
 ness of display with economy of space. 
 
 After that came London and its museums of all kinds. The city 
 is but a vast, inhospitable wilderness of brick, gloomy but not 
 grand, ancient but not attractive, redeemed from utter loneliness 
 only by its wonderful museums and galleries of art, and its gardens 
 of zoology and botany. Not even in the jungles of India, with only 
 half a dozen native followers, did I feel so utterly lonely as in the 
 heart of London's immensity, surrounded by nearly four million 
 human beings speaking my own language. 
 
 The British Museum is undoubtedly the most complete of any 
 of its kind in existence, and always will be. It outranks all other 
 museums just as the Great Eastern surpasses in size and carrying 
 capacity all other ships. There is not now, and there never will be, 
 even in boastful, progressive America, another museum which can 
 even be compared with it as to size and scientific completeness. 
 Englishmen have a pride in this institution which reaches to the 
 bottom of their pockets, and this, with the dispersal of Enghshmen 
 all over the world, has made it what it is. British consuls are 
 paid good salaries, from which they can and do afford to gather 
 valuable collections in foreign lands for the British Museum, So 
 long as our consuls are limited to the paltry salaries they now re- 
 ceive, for a year at a time, by the gi'ace of Congress, they would be 
 very foolish to spend a dollar for the benefit of any American mu- 
 seum ; though they might, at a trifling expense, send collections to 
 the Smithsonian Institution which would make a magnificent mu- 
 seum in a year. More than this, the British Museum is allowed to 
 buy what it wants and cannot get by presentation, but the wisdom 
 of our Congress fails to provide for the purchase of a single speci- 
 men by the National Museum. What a glorious scheme for build- 
 ing up a national institution ! 
 
 To a stranger, the extent and completeness of the British Mu- 
 seum's scientific collections are truly astonishing. Unless he is a 
 
THE JOURNEY TO INDIA. 5 
 
 scientific sharp, the chances are he cannot name a living species of 
 any except the lowest forms of animal life which cannot be found 
 represented there in some form. It may be a skin, a mounted 
 specimen, a skeleton, a skull, a preparation in alcohol, or perhaps 
 only a pair of horns ; anyhow, it wOl be there, somewhere, although 
 it may not be on exhibition by any means. Of many species there 
 are dozens of specimens of various ages, from various localities, all 
 valuable as showing the variations in size, color, and texture of cov- 
 ering. The best of it all is, that this wonderful storehouse of 
 science is open on equal terms to all, and, be you ever so humble a 
 student, an assistant is always at your service to hunt up and show 
 you at once the specimens you desii-e to examine. Even before I 
 had intimated a desire for a closer examination of the tortoises on 
 exhibition, a vigilant attendant noticed my interest in the group 
 and immediately came forward, with an offer to unlock the cases 
 and take out any specimens I wished to examine closely. When I 
 protested that I did not wish to give him so much trouble, he re- 
 plied that he was there for that very purpose. No introduction, 
 no unwinding of red tape was necessary ; that I had been found 
 studying those specimens as well as I could through the glass was 
 enough. Again, when I wished to see a particular crocodile skull 
 described by Gray as Molinia Amencana, Dr, Gunther immediately 
 sent an assistant with me, who went into the basement with a lan- 
 tern and found it directly. "When I wished to see Seba's figure 
 and description of " the American crocodile," pubHshed so many 
 years ago, the distinguished keeper of zoology sent another assist- 
 ant to the library, who found the volume and the plate for me at 
 once. This, and much more, was done to assist the inquiries of a 
 mere nobody. 
 
 It is in this great institution that the naturalist will find the type 
 specimens of so many thousand species, and the array of objects 
 from which those extremely valuable but far too costly contribu- 
 tions to science, known as the British Museum Catalogues, have 
 been made up. Each catalogue is in reaHty a handbook of classi- 
 fication, but the trouble is, the volumes are so expensive as to be 
 beyond the reach of the average impecunious student who would 
 gladly inform himself from them. What a boon to poor naturahsts 
 it would be if these catalogues and monographs were published 
 and issued upon the same generous plan as that pursued by the 
 Government of the United States in the issue of similar works. 
 We have not as yet a British Museum, but we have a Government 
 
6 TWO YEAES m THE JUNGLE. 
 
 which bountifully provides for the publication and free distribution 
 of complete and systematic information bearing upon all branches 
 of American natural history. The reports of the Geological Survey, 
 the Bureau of Ethnology, the Miscellaneous Publications, the re- 
 ports of the Commissioner of Fish and Fisheries, the Bulletins of 
 the National Museum, and nearly all the publications of the Smith- 
 sonian Institution are all sent free as air and postage paid to deserv- 
 ing applicants. This liberality on the part of the Government, 
 unparalleled in the history of nations, has given to science in 
 America such an impetus as could not have been acquired in less 
 than a century by any other means. 
 
 After six weeks of London, Paris came and went like a beautiful 
 dream, leaving confused memories of clean buildings, pretty parks 
 and gardens full of nude marble figures, monumental columns and 
 arches ; acres of fine paintings by masters old and new ; gorgeously 
 gilded and frescoed ceilings ; rooms full of artistically mounted 
 bones, " stuffed animals," and beautiful birds ; long rows of human 
 skeletons ; naked Hottentots in wax ; and museums of everything 
 under the sun. 
 
 On Christmas day we crossed the Alps into " sunny Italy," and 
 landed in the lap of winter at Turin. " Sunny Italy " indeed, with 
 a foot of snow on the ground ! Together, Pi'ofessor Ward and I did 
 the natural history museums of Turin, Milan, Florence, Pisa, and 
 Rome, and, surreptitiously, I did the art galleries alone. 
 
 Rome is a paradise for art, but a desert for natural history. The 
 Eternal City turns out paintings by the square mile, and regiments 
 of women and men in marble, but she cannot stuff an animal so 
 that it is fit to be seen. She has the Vatican and St. Peter's, but 
 she has not the least idea about cleaning and mounting skeletons 
 properly. There is one scientific man in Rome, the professor of 
 natural history who has charge of the University Museum ; but I 
 am sure he must feel very lonesome there. The naturalist is too 
 heavily handicapped in Rome. It requires the untrammelled genius 
 of the western world to produce a real mermaid, a Cardiff giant, 
 gorillas eight feet high, made of buffalo skins, and a forty-foot 
 whale made of bull hides sewn together. Rome ought certainly to 
 produce the most ai'tistic taxidermists in the world, considering 
 how much artistic talent there is running to seed all over Italy ; 
 but Rome does not care a whit for nature unless it is reproduced 
 in paint or marble. 
 
 At Naples we spent eight delightful days, in spite of beggars 
 
THE JOURNEY TO INDIA. 7 
 
 and bad smells, in the course of which we made two excursions to 
 Vesuvius and collected a ton of lava specimens, and also visited 
 Pompeii to see the place, and scoop up a bagful of the fine pumice- 
 stone which still covers a large portion of the city. Men are just 
 as great fools as other animals. There are half a dozen populous 
 villages nearer to the treacherous old volcano than this which was 
 buried out of sight, and human memory too, in a few hours' time ; 
 and the vineyards reach as far up the mountain as the lava will al- 
 low. Famiharity has bred contempt, and the people take it for 
 granted that the great ash-pile will never again get up such high 
 jinks with pumice-stone, sand, ashes, and hot water, as broke up 
 the cu'cus that fine day in Pompeii, in the year 79. 
 
 "While in Naples we spent several days among the oyster-stalls on 
 the quay, buying quantities of shells, star-fishes, and echinoderms 
 of many species from the Mediterranean. It really seems as if the 
 Italians eat every living animal they can catch in the sea excepting 
 the corals and sponges. In addition to the common edible fishes, 
 the poor people devour sharks, rays, octopods, echinoderms, squids, 
 crustaceans, and shell-fish of all sorts. By way of experiment, we 
 tried a few of the outre dishes which are daily cooked and served up 
 in the oyster-stalls. Fried shark was very good, and so was shell- 
 fish soup, but the festive echinoderm was rather tasteless and de- 
 lusive. We tried to eat some stewed octopus, but it was tough as 
 india-rubber and salt as the ocean, and after five minutes' steady 
 chewing we gave it back to the caterer to be sold again for the 
 benefit of the poor. 
 
 Naples has no public market, but there is a certain wide street 
 in which, as in Albany, fish, flesh, and fowl are gathered together 
 every morning, and every man with aught to sell stands up and 
 howls at the top of his voice until whatever he has is sold. The 
 infernal din, the dirt and bad smells, were enough to appall sensi- 
 tive nerves ; but every morning we used to go in and take our 
 chances amid the motley rabble of buyers and beggars. In this 
 way we secured many fine specimens of Octopus vulgaris, and vari- 
 ous cuttle-fishes, mursenas, lobsters, crabs, shell-fish, etc., which we 
 preserved in spirits. 
 
 Of course we visited the famous zoological station, founded and 
 conducted by Dr. Dohm, for the systematic study of marine in- 
 vertebrate life under the best possible advantages. The basement 
 story of the pretty building, which stands at one end of a grassy 
 esplanade, close to the shore, is devoted to an aquarium for the 
 
8 TWO YEARS IX THE JUNGLE. 
 
 benefit of tlie general public, and is bountifully filled with interest* 
 ing marine animals of many kinds, such as cephalopods, medusae 
 in all their delicate and fihny beauty, live corals, sponges, sharks, 
 rays, crabs, lobsters, fishes, and turtles in great variety and pro- 
 fusion. A walk through the aquarium is like taking a stroll 
 under the sea and becoming personally acquainted with its inhab- 
 itants. The water supply comes directly from the bay, and the 
 denizens of the commodious tanks seem quite at home in the pretty 
 bits of sea-bottom that have been transferred hither for them. 
 
 The upper story of the station is, to the gaping crowd, a sealed 
 book, and " shall fools rush in where angels fear to tread ? " By 
 no means ; hence I did not attempt to penetrate the inner temple 
 where Dr. Dohrn and his investigators have their "tables," and 
 prosecute their divings after the unfathomable, and graspings for 
 the unknowable. 
 
 But all too soon the time came for us to move on ; and, in 
 obedience to the summons, we shipped home sixteen cases of speci- 
 mens and sailed for Egj^pt. 
 
 At sunrise of the fifth day out, a long, low stretch of barren 
 sand all along the south betokened our approach to the land of 
 deserts. At eight o'clock Pompey's pillar loomed up from its hill- 
 top behind the city, graceful, prominent, and shai-ply outlined 
 against the clear eastern sky, and we steamed around the end of 
 the breakwater into the hai'bor of Alexandria. This city is the 
 gateway to all Egj'pt, and we found its harbor filled with the ships 
 of many nations, among which we counted nineteen large steamers. 
 
 To my mind, there is absolutely nothing attractive about Alex- 
 andria, and but for the European quarter, the Place des Consuls, 
 the city would be intolerable, even for a day. The only good 
 things that can be said about it are, that the city is of great com- 
 mercial importance to Egypt, and is the starting-point for Cairo. 
 We visited Pompey's pillar and the Khedive's gardens, but to reach 
 them we had to drive through such filthy streets, and past so many 
 dens of wretchedness, that the charm of sight-seeing was utterly 
 lost. We saw sights we had in no Avise bargained for. It seems to < 
 me that Alexandria is the dirtiest city I ever saw, and it certainly 
 smells worse than Naples. No wonder that fevers are prevalent, or 
 that the plague always breaks out here prior to its appearance in 
 any other part of Egypt, 
 
 The ride from Alexandria to Cairo, one hundred and thirty-one 
 miles by rail, is fuU of interest. Lea\dng behind us the slums of 
 
THE JOURNEY TO INDIA. 9 
 
 the city, we sped quietly along the eastern shore of Lake Mareotis 
 for several miles, then tiu'ned off to cross the flat and fertile delta 
 of the Nile. Although it was mid-winter, the fields were green 
 with young crops of wheat, save those which had been newly 
 ploughed ; and for a great part of the journey, the landscapes re- 
 minded me strongly of the level green prairies of Northern Hhnois 
 near the southern shore of Lake Michigan. 
 
 For a number of miles the railway runs along the bank of an 
 irrigation canal, the space between the two being used as a public 
 highway. As the railway traveller flies along, he is treated to an 
 endless moving panorama of turbaned men, women, and childi'en, 
 riding donkeys or plodding along on foot ; groups of laborers, 
 idlers, beggars, and strings of laden camels. And so we rattled on, 
 past the green fields ; across muddy canals ; across the iron viaduct 
 over the Rosetta branch of the Nile ; past mud villages, with their 
 miserable peasant inhabitants squatting on the sunny side of their 
 huts, fighting the flies ; past ruined villages — mere round hillocks 
 of mud — across the splendid iron tubular bridge at Benha, over 
 the Damietta branch of the Nile ; across bits of desert, wider or 
 narrower ; in sight of the Pyramids ; in sight of Cako ; through 
 clouds of sand and dust, and at last into the grand old 6ity itself. 
 
 We took up quarters at the Grand New Hotel, and immediately 
 began to gather in specimens. But it wouldn't do, and we might 
 have known it before going there. The high-toned guests of the 
 hotel wondered too much and looked too much scandalized when we 
 began to buy ibex skulls, stuffed mastigures, polypterus, and other 
 queer animals, and carry them upstairs to our rooms. A naturalist 
 who intends to accomplish any tiling has no business to stop at a 
 grand hotel, where he must stand upon ceremony and do nothing 
 remarkable. He must put up at the small hotels, where, being a 
 guest who pays cash for everything, the landlord will be his warm- 
 est friend and abettor in whatever he undertakes, will give him 
 every accommodation the house affords, and allow him to turn its 
 best room into a taxidermist's shop if necessary. Being compelled 
 to realize this, we moved to the Hotel de I'Europe, where the land- 
 lord gave us all the rooms on the lower floor, and in those we bar- 
 gained with natives, sorted and packed specimens, sawed and ham- 
 mered at our boxes, and were happy. 
 
 In this day of modern improvements and European innovations 
 upon the ways and means of the oriental races, there are two Cairos, 
 the old and the new. The latter is the foreign — or, more properly. 
 
10 TWO YEAliH JN '111 K .limOLE. 
 
 European — quarter, and in characterized by Inroad Hireots, fine, airy 
 l)uildiugH, parkH and gardens, grand liotclH and a theatre, Htylish 
 oarriaj^eH and gaH-lampH, in all of which it in eminently PariHian. 
 All thiw JH agreeal>le, but uninteresting, and we turn l)aclc to the 
 wouderH and delights of the old city. Here, at least, the nineteenth 
 <;r;ntury has wrought no change, and we take pleasure in thinking 
 that Ihe city is to-day very like what it was when the Pyramids 
 wer(! new, wh(!n l<]ngland was inhabited by savages, and America 
 was unknown. It may not be so, but still we like to believe that 
 these are the same cramped and crooked streets, the same latticed 
 windows and overhanging upper stories, the same bazaars and 
 work-H[ioj)S and wcMh that w(!re hero when the ]>rethren of .Joseph 
 came down, as envoys (sxtraordinary, to practise the arts of di- 
 plomacy in the court of I'haraoh. 
 
 Of course we saw the sights as we went along, the beautiful 
 moH(|ue of Mehemct Ah, built of orifsntal alabaster -the prettiest 
 building mat(!rial in the world ; th(! mostpje of Hultan Jtassan ; the 
 citadel, and the place where the Mamaluke leaped his horse over 
 the wall ; Joseph's wcill, cut 200 feet dciop through solid ro(;k — 
 whi(;h is much better for the jjosterily of "Joseph" (the Sultan 
 Haladin !) than a bronze equestrian statue or a monujiient could 
 p(^HHibly be. The Turkish bazaar is vary like a church fair, inas- 
 mucli as you gefe less there for your money than anywhere else, 
 l>ut it is worth a visit all the same. The Museum of Egyptian An- 
 tiquities at lioulac was full of interest and mummies, but 1 fear 
 the Egyptian collection in the British Museum surpasses it. The 
 Khedive has lately put a stop to Ibe exportation of anti(|uities from 
 J^jgypt, and now not a single article <!an be shipped without an 
 order from him. 
 
 Our pleasantest excursicni from Cairo was to the Petrified For- 
 est, south of the city, for specimens of petrified wood and other 
 fossilH. C'ook does not take his tourists out that way, and for once 
 we were jiot harassed l>y crowds of beggars for " backsheesh," or 
 sellers of Brummagem anticpaities. 
 
 Having ma<le all preparations the previous day, wo mounted 
 our donkeys very early one morning and set out. Our cavalcade 
 consisted of ProfoHSor Ward, Mr. l*'arman, the U. H. Consul Gene- 
 ral, mys(ilf, our dragoman, Mr. Farman's chuprassie, all upon 
 donkeys, and three brown-skinned, barefooted little Arabs, clad in 
 long })lue drilling sliifts, to whij) up. The sun was just rising as 
 we rode out at the famous Bab-el-Masr gate, and there, near the 
 
TlIK .lOUKNKY TO INDIA. U 
 
 l«>iitrt of ilio Bodonins, waa an old Arab with a cajuol wiiHinj;- fo join 
 us. Wo li!ul »>nga|:;0(l ilioin iho day brforo. but wovo uovo^i.ll(^l(^^^H 
 surpriHod iii fnuliug ilioni both t1u>ro and n>ady to utavt. Tho plan 
 waa for mo to ride tho camel o\it to the Forest, whw'o we would 
 load it Avith spooimonfl of potrtdod wood fo bo brouf^fht back ; so I 
 disniounlcd from my donkey siud j>ropa,rod to tnnbark upon tlio 
 shij) of Iho doHoH. 
 
 Th(^ Bo«li>uin niado him kuool, which ho di<l uuiUm- proti^st, with 
 much {guttural awoarinfj^, not loud but deep ; biit when T prepared 
 io mouni, ho bawUxl aloud in fcmonstranco a-i^ainst a " Olirislian 
 iiifuUil doj^" " j^oitin^ upon his back, which was sa<M-cd to ilio follow- 
 (M-sof tho Pi'ophot. But hia objoclions wcr(^ overruled by the (^>urt; 
 the siirni])-slraps were adjusted over the front horn of tlie saw- 
 bui'k I was io v\do upon, and 1 mount(u1. 
 
 " Mow look out," said Mr. l*\'irman. 
 
 ]nuneiliat(>ly tlio camel bofjfan io heavo up Ix^hind and sink 
 earthward in front, jviat like an Arab when ho prostrates himself and 
 touches tilit^ {ground witb his fon^head while sayin;:^ his pray«\rs. It 
 seenuul as thouj^h my c^anu'l was jj^oiii}^ t.o stand on his h(>ad, and 
 but, for tho timely M'arnint? I ahould have pitched graoofully over 
 his bows int(> tlu^ sand. But! clun<^ to th<^ rack, an»l ])resently tho 
 ship bt\';an to rij^ht itsc^lf. The m^xt thin-;- I Knew, the alTair was 
 liij;li in tlu^ air, with its le<:^-j<»ints ])artially strai'i;lit«iiied out. ; the 
 Bedouin took hold of the halt.er and we wovo oil". 
 
 How atranjj^e and romantic- the aceiit*. How soft and pure and 
 ba,lmy tlie fresh mornin^jj air. How phnisin;;- th(> landscape ; and 
 y(^t how barrt^n. Not a. siuf^le j^ret^n tliin;^' in sij^ht. yet somtihow 
 itaGoraamore like a freshly plou>:fhed ti(<ld than ad(^s»Mt. ller(Muid 
 there are the same und>r(^lla-like Bedouin t,«Mits thai \ve havt^ st^»nl 
 j)ict,ur(Hl in the {jjtH^fijraphy on the i)a.};'e opposite the map of Africa, 
 ev(ir sin«-e we bej>a,n to r«'in<Mub(>r, a,nd <'los(^ to each ticnt is tlui very 
 name camel. The wanderinj^ Arabs pitch tlieir tents just outsid(\ 
 t.lu^ <j;ato8 of tho city, and feel quite at homo, for tho d(^stM-t, conu^s 
 (|uite up to tlie walls. 
 
 Over to tlio left thero stand a number of low, dome-like stiiict- 
 urea, and we do not need to bo told that thoy are tho tond)s 
 of tho calipha who have - morcy ! A trottin-i; carnel is (Mioufjh 
 to stamiMMle the n^tlections of a mirror. The donk<^yK walk 
 faster than our (^amol, ho we have f/dlen bt^hind, and nuist trot 
 io catch up. While wo walked, caniol-ridinj:^ went well enou«j[h, 
 for the old follow went very easily and softly forward, .and it is not 
 
12 TWO YEARS IN THE JUNGLE. 
 
 SO very disagreeable to be heaved forwai-d with a jerk, stopped 
 suddenly, and thus bent nearly double at every step. One's 
 stomach soon learns to accommodate itself to the circumstances, 
 and after half an hour or so one's lumbar vertebrie get into 
 pretty good working order. But when we fall far behind, which 
 we do quite often, then the Arab begins to run, the camel starts 
 to trot, and I drop all side issues to devote all my energies to the 
 task of holdhig myself together. 
 
 We passed the limestone cliffs and quiu-ries of the Mokattem 
 Hills, wound along up a little valley for several miles, and finally 
 turned off eastward into the desert. The svu-face was very uneven, 
 and thickly strewn with black and porous fragmentai-y limestone, 
 which very closely resembled the pieces of lava we collected upon 
 tlie sides of Vesuvius. About ten o'clock we reached the Petrified 
 Forest — a hilly, sandy desert, strewn with petrified tree-trunks 
 and countless fragments of wood. In many places we foimd trunks 
 twenty, thirt}', and even forty feet in length, and often a foot and 
 a half in diameter. The large trunks were always broken in a 
 nunaber of places, squarely, as if they had been sawn. A few 
 stood perpendicularly in the sand, with only their upper ends visi- 
 ble. Fragments of all sizes lay scattered thickly all about, show- 
 ing petrified kii4>ts, btu-k, decayed places, small branches, and 
 roots. 
 
 What a grand picnic that was ! We gathered up peti-ified 
 wood, found a great number of fossil oyster-shells, similai* to Os- 
 trca deUoidea, wandered about, and enjoyed ourselves generally. 
 It was a glorious day, and for once in Egj^pt we enjoyed peace, 
 balmy peace. It was free and roomy and quiet out there, for we 
 had a whole desert all to oiu-selves. At noon we sat down upon a 
 little sand hill, just at the edge of a great sandy basin that was 
 once a lake, to rest and enjoy our Imicheon. A cloth was spread 
 upon the clean brown sand, and from the lunch-basket Mahomet 
 produced two bottles of claret and one of water, oranges, dates, 
 sandwiches, and other substantials. 
 
 Why do not more ai"tists paint such glorious pictures as the 
 one that lay before us then, instead of the tame and hackneyed 
 scenes of lakelet, meadow, hill and dale so univei-sally depicted? 
 On either hand the view was bounded by lofty sand ridges, or 
 limestone cliffs, but before us stretched the warm brown desert in 
 gently rolling hills of sand, sloping gradually down toward the 
 Kilo. Cairo lav half hidden behind the Mokattem Hills, its grace- 
 
THE JOURXEY TO IN HI A. 13 
 
 ful miunrets and mosque-domes shining brightly in the morning 
 smi. Above the city, where there were no hills to hide it from our 
 view, we could see the sluggish Nile, and trace its winding course 
 through the ntu-row, level valley of fertile fields that stretched 
 like a ribbon of green velvet between the two great deserts. 
 Beyond C:uro, at the edge of the green valley, the Pyramids loomed 
 up far above the horizon, mysterious and majestic mountains of 
 etone, while fiu- beyond them stretched a vast but hfeless ocean — 
 A sea of desolate sand, reaching from the Nile to the far-off shore of 
 the Atlantic. 
 
 On our way home from the Petrified Forest with a camel-load 
 of specimens, we stopped at the limestone quarry a mile fi'om the 
 city, to look for fossils in the piles of rock that had recently been 
 quai'ried from the cliff. In a couple of hours' vigorous scrambhng 
 and hammering, we secured a fine assortment of fossils, including 
 about thirty good specimens of a pretty little fossil crab, bearing, 
 as none but a stone crab could, the appdling name of Lobocarcimis 
 I\iuIo-Wi(rte>nburgt')ms, a number of Itu-ge Xaufili, and several 
 species of Valuta, TuniteUa and Ccrithium. The most interesting 
 find was a rib of a Siren iau. 
 
 Eg}-pt is one of the grandest countiies in the world for an anti- 
 quiu-iim, but one of the poorest for a naturjilist. The Polt/pferus 
 (A ganoid fish valuable to science because of its close resemblance 
 to Osteolcpis, a fossil fish of the Devoniim) is found in the Nile, 
 but it is exceedingly rai'e. Crocodiles (C. vulgaris) are also found 
 in the Nile, but so fai- above Cairo that we decided not to hiint 
 them, A trip up the Nile by rail, four hundred and fifty-seven 
 miles to the mummy pits at Manfalout, revealed the fact that the 
 pits had been fairly gleaned of the mummied crocodiles, ibises, 
 cats, and human beings they once contained. The result of this 
 tedious three days' trip w;\s but two mummied crocodiles, a skull, 
 and an ai-mful of mummied arms, legs, and heads of ancient Egyp- 
 tians. 
 
 An Aitib brought us an earthen jar. said to contain a mummied 
 ibis, for which he asked the modest sum of .£1. The mouth of the ' 
 jiir was tightly closed with cement, and the Ai-ab would not allow us 
 to open it, so Professor WiU'd, who had seen Arabs before, declined 
 it with thanks. We met an old Bedouin who had just come across 
 the desert from the peninsula of Sinai, iiud had carried on one of 
 his camels, all that weaiy distance, seven heads of Egyptiiin ibex 
 (Copra Nubiana), all of which were quickly added to our coUection 
 
14 TWO YEARS IN THE JUNGLE. 
 
 at a price highly satisfactory to both parties. The skin remained 
 upon each skull, dry and hard, and had perfectly protected all 
 parts of the bony structure from injury. Not a bad idea for the 
 preparation of small skulls that are destined to be banged about 
 on camel- back. 
 
 We procured specimens of the polypterus (P. hichir), the spiny- 
 tailed mastigure of the desert ( Uromastix spinipes), one specimen 
 of the Egyptian wild-cat {Felis chaus), and about three camel-loads 
 of petrified wood, fossils of many kinds, blocks of Egyptian granite 
 and oriental alabaster to be sawed up into cabinet specimens. 
 Near the beautiful mosque of Mehemet Ali lay a number of blocks 
 of alabaster like those of which the mosque has been built, " stones 
 which the builders rejected." After the exercise of considerable 
 diplomacy. General Stone, the Khedive's Chief-of-Staff, to whom 
 Prof. Ward had letters, obtained the vice-regal permission for us 
 to cart through the gates of the citadel one slab of alabaster for 
 ourselves, and another which he consigned to the care of Prof. 
 Ward for the Smithsonian Institution. General Stone also ob- 
 tained the Khedive's permission for our two mummy coffins and 
 their contents to be exported from the country without let or hin- 
 drance. 
 
 Even at the Pyramids, last of all suitable places for a naturalist, 
 we found specimeiis valuable to science. The Pyramids are built 
 entirely of nummulitic limestone blocks, and the passages are lined 
 with limestone brought from the Mokattem Hills east of Cairo, 
 eight miles away. This limestone is full of nummulites, little flat 
 echinoderms, which, as the blocks upon the surface slowly disinte- 
 grate through exposure, are set free and roll down to the base of 
 the Pyramids, where they are picked up by the Arabs and sold to 
 travellers. 
 
 Another interesting fossil which we also obtained at the Pyra- 
 mids was a larger echinoderm, Glypeaster Ghizaensis, from the 
 limestone (a lower strata than the nummulitic), which is the foun- 
 dation upon which the Pyramids rest. The Arabs dig these fossils 
 out of deep holes in the sand. 
 
 As a sort of penance for two delightful weeks in Cairo and vi- 
 cinity, I was exiled to Port Said for a few days to look after our 
 heavy luggage, which had been shipped there, and to watch for an 
 outward steamer. 
 
 Port Said (pronounced Side), named after Said Pasha, undei 
 whose patronage the Suez Canal was commenced in 1859, is the 
 
THE JOURlSrEY TO INDIA. 15 
 
 port at the Mediterranean entrance of the canal, a very important, 
 but very dreary, dirty, and uninviting modern town, built upon the 
 sand and infested by Arabs and fleas. But deliverance came at 
 last, I embarked one night upon the Austrian-Lloyd steamer 
 Memfi, and when I awoke at sunrise the next morning. Port Said 
 lay far behind us and we were steaming slowly through the great 
 canal. Some one had told me that this passage was an " uninter- 
 esting and monotonous voyage through a big ditch," but I do not 
 believe he ever saw the canal. After leaving Port Said, the channel 
 is cut through Lake Menzaleh, a vast but shallow lagoon, swarming 
 with wild fowl. From that, a cutting through a low, sandy plain 
 leads into another lagoon, called Ballah Lake, which is also tra- 
 versed by the canal. From Ballah Lake to Lake Timsah the canal 
 is cut through the plateau of El Guisr, the highest ground on the 
 route. The banks grow higher and higher, and the channel nar- 
 rower, until we suddenly emerge upon Lake Timsah (Crocodile 
 Lake), nearly midway between the two seas. On the western bank 
 of the lake stands Ismailia, a pretty little town, a garden in the 
 desert, with substantial houses, fine streets, shady avenues, green 
 gardens, and all the institutions of business and religion pertaining 
 to a modem town. 
 
 Crossing the lake, we entered another cutting several miles in 
 length, full of curves and gares, or sidings where ships can meet 
 and pass each other. After steaming slowly all the afternoon 
 through the desert, we anchored just before sunset in the deepest 
 part of the Great Bitter Lake. What an odd sensation it is to 
 cross a desert in a steamship ! Never have I seen water look so 
 smiling and delicious as do these clear blue lakes in the midst of a 
 scorching and lifeless expanse of brown sand. As the sun set, the 
 full moon rose, lighting up a broad, golden track across the glassy 
 surface of the lake, the stars came out until we had one shining 
 firmament above and another in the lake below, the evening air 
 was balmy and pure, and, as if to crown aU these delights, the bell 
 rang for supper. 
 
 The Suez Canal is 86 miles in entire length, 21 of which are 
 through the three larger lakes. It is 26 feet deep in mid-channel, 
 and the bed is 72 feet wide. At the surface, the width varies from 
 350 to 196 feet, according to the books, but in the narrowest cut- 
 tings, the surface width looked more like 96 than 196 feet. Vessels 
 are not to steam faster than five and one-third miles per hour in the 
 canal. The toll charged by the company is thirteen francs per foot 
 
16 TWO YEARS IN THE JUNGLE. 
 
 of draught for laden vessels, ten francs per foot when in ballast. 
 V The total cost of the canal was eighteen and a quarter million 
 pounds sterling, to say nothing of the millions of pounds worth of 
 "forced labor" — or, in plain English, slave labor of the most deadly 
 sort — supplied by Ismail Pasha. 
 
 The next morning we ran the gauntlet of buoys and beacons 
 which mark the channel across the Bitter Lakes, and continued our 
 winding course through the desert. The canal makes a great 
 many very sharp curves, and it is a delicate task to take a large 
 steamer through without a mistake. About noon, we saw, across 
 the desert, a number of ships ; the desert gradually sank away into 
 the sea, and at one o'clock p.m., just thirty-one hours from Port 
 Said, we anchored in the harbor of Suez. Professor Ward came on 
 board directly, with nearly a bushel of fresh echinoderms, and 
 after a stay of two hours, we weighed anchor and started down the 
 Gulf of Suez. 
 
 Half way down the Eed Sea, on the Arabian shore, lies Jeddah, 
 the nearest port to Mecca, and therefore the landing place for the 
 throng of Mohammedan pilgrims constantly coming from all parts 
 of Northern Africa and Southern Asia to visit the tomb of the 
 Prophet. We were to call there for a deck-load of returning pil- 
 grims bound to Bombay, and just forty-eight hours from Suez, the 
 town lay before u^, compact, angular and gi'ay, bounded on three 
 sides by the desolate baiTenness characteristic of the Arabian pen- 
 insula. Taking a position with as much precision as a man going 
 to leap over a bar, we slowly and cautiously threaded our way- 
 through a break in the coral barrier reef which forms the harbor. 
 
 It was close nipping sometimes, and once or twice we had to 
 stop and go astern before we could pass the end of a reef ; but the 
 swarthy Arab pilot we had brought from Suez took our ship 
 through without accident. How large saihng ships manage to get 
 through is more than a landsman can see, but they do it somehow, 
 for we saw several riding at anchor inside the reefs, which is the 
 only harbor there is at Jeddah. There were in port a dozen or 
 more large steamers like our own, and a whole fleet of sailing ves- 
 sels, most of which had come laden with pilgrims, and were wait- 
 ing to bear back their living freight. 
 
 We had a day to spend on shore, and made the most of it. 
 Upon landing we found that the substantial portion of the town 
 is built of fossil coral and coralHne limestone. Great masses of 
 brain coral, Meandrince and Astreoporce, have been quarried from the 
 
THE JOURISrEY TO INDIA. 17 
 
 raised beaches, trimmed uj) as ordinary building stone, and used 
 in the construction of houses. Blocks of limestone full of very 
 perfect Madreporoe were common, and sometimes we found four 
 or five species of coral in a single wall. Owing to the jDurely cor- 
 alline natm*e of the building material, the houses of Jeddali are of 
 dazzling whiteness when fairly viewed. In the suburbs, the houses 
 are mere huts of reeds and brushwood. 
 
 Taken altogether, Jeddah is a fine little city. The houses are 
 built quite solidly, in a peculiar style of architecture, half Moor- 
 ish, half Saracenic, which is both unique and beautiful. Each 
 upper window is a square latticed casement of brown wood, pro- 
 jecting from one to two feet beyond the wall. The city is entirely 
 surrounded, on the landward side, by a high wall, and, owing to its 
 close proximity to Mecca, and the presence of so many pilgrims, it 
 is a perfect little hot-bed of fanaticism, ready for a religious (!) dis- 
 turbance upon very short notice. One occurred in 1858, dui'ing 
 which the meek and lowly followers of the Prophet massacred all 
 the white Christians in the place, including the British and French 
 consuls. In retiu-n for this, the British Government, with its 
 usual promptness, taught them the gospel of peace by bombard- 
 ing the place. That lesson has had its effect, and until it is for- 
 gotten, every white man in Jeddah will be safe. And yet I fancy 
 it must be very much like living in a powder magazine to hold a 
 consulship there. 
 
 In the cemetery, a quarter of a mile northeast of the city, is 
 the celebrated tomb of Eve. Whether the dust of the great moth- 
 er of mankind really reposes there or not, no man can say : but 
 all true Mohammedans believe that such is the case, and reverence 
 the spot accordingly. In fact, they hold it as very sacred indeed, 
 but the guardian angels of the tomb are not proof against the se- 
 ductive power of backsheesh, and for about fifteen piastres each, we 
 were cheerfully admitted to all the rights and privileges of the place. 
 
 If Eve was, when living, as long as this tomb, then she was in- 
 deed a woman fit to start a world with. Her tomb is about two 
 hundred and twenty feet long, but very narrow, enclosed by a white- 
 washed stone wall. Across the centre stands a small building, in 
 which is a shrine, and under this is supposed to lie the dust of 
 Adam's wife, the first woman, who came direct from the hand of the 
 Creator. It gives one's head a turn to think of it. 
 
 There is one thing about the tomb, which is both strange and 
 pitiful. At the southern end of the enclosure is a sort of tower, 
 2 
 
18 TWO YKAKS TN PTIK -irXGLK. 
 
 low and square, in each side of wliicli is a large "s^indow. To the 
 iron bars of these windows were tied hundreds, perhaps even thou- 
 sands, of small strips of cotton cloth, one upon another, so that not 
 !Ui atom of iron was visible in either of the three windows. 
 
 Each of those little ragged strips, — none of them large enough 
 to tie up a cut finger, — had been tied there by some barren Mo- 
 hammedtm womsui who had made a pilgrimage to the shrine, and 
 performed this act of faith, praying and belieN-ing- that the great 
 tirst ^lother would have pity for hor distress, and render her fruit- 
 ful. Think of the yetu-s of wretched longing for maternity that 
 were represented by those fluttering bits of cloth. 
 
 Jeddah has only three gates, except those facing the sea, and 
 having gone out at the northern gate to reach the cemetery, we 
 concluded to keep on ai-ound the wall, and so m:ike a complete 
 circuit of the city. 
 
 At the eastern side of the town we came to the famous Mecca 
 gate, through which one hundred and twenty thousand pilgrims 
 pass every year on their way to IMecca, the Mohammedan Jerusa- 
 lem, sixty-two miles inland. It used to be death for a Clu'istian 
 to pass through this gate, just as it would even now be death 
 for a Christian to attempt to enter Mecca. Only two English- 
 men have ever been inside the walls of that city. Captain Burton 
 was the fii-st, and he went with a large party of pilgrims, so thor- 
 oughly disguised in feature, speech !iud habit, that his true chai'- 
 acter was not suspected. The other was Hadji Brown, of Bom- 
 bay, who professed full conversion to the IMohamniedan faith, 
 and made the pilgrimage in 187r>. In my opinion, getting into 
 IMecca and safely out again is a mere question of backsheesh. The 
 man who bids high enough will be granted the freedom of the city, 
 and it is a wonder that Cook is not even now paying an annual 
 subsidy to the Pasha, and taking his tourists there. The ]Mecca gate 
 (at Jeddah). is open to all comers now, and we passed inside just 
 for the sake of enjoying what used to be a forbidden privilege. 
 
 Professor Ward had arranged to stop at Jedd;ih, and did so, 
 having in early life formed the habit of doing what he sets out to 
 do. He spent a few days there, then took the Egyptian steamer to 
 Suakin and ]Massowah. busily collecting at every opportunity, and 
 shortly returned to Europe luid home to America with a goodly 
 lot of Red Sea invertebrates and fishes. And so I was left to go 
 on iilone to the East Indies, and work out my own salviition with 
 feiu- tuid trembling. The Jlt-mti took aboard one hundred and 
 
THE JOURNEY TO INDIA. 19 
 
 eleven pilgrims — Hadjis — as deck pasaengei's for Bombay, and the 
 next morning we continued our course down the Red Sea. 
 
 There were onl}' three saloon passengers besides myself, an 
 officer of the Indian army with his wife and child, retui-ning from 
 fiu-lough to tlieii' station at Kohat, in the Punjab, close to the 
 Kbyber Pass. In Colonel — then Captain — Ross of the 1st Sikh In- 
 fantry, I met a man whose mind was a store-house, full of valuable 
 information, who patientl}' endured a tedious amount of question- 
 ing, and whose friendship and advice afterward proved of great 
 service to me. He entered heartily into the details of my plans for 
 India, and even condescended to teach me enough Hindostanee to 
 enable me to inquire whether there were " any large gavials near 
 here ? " — " how far away ? " — " who can take me in a boat ? " — and 
 so on. My meeting with Colonel Ross was indeed most fortunate, as 
 events proved, and as I look back upon it, I do not see how I could 
 possibly have accomplished what I did, without his assistance. 
 
 In the course of many delightful conversations with Mrs. Ross, 
 each of which was to me a mental treat, she rendered me an im- 
 portant and lasting service. She diagnosed so cleverly a malady 
 which had often attacked me — " the blues " — and prescribed a 
 remedy so skilfullj' that I never have suffered from it since that day. 
 For the benefit of fellow-sufferers I will state both. Diagnosis : — 
 " The blues " are caused by envy and selfishness. Remedy : — 
 ^^^len attacked, go to work vigorously to promote the happiness of 
 those around you, and thereby forget yourself. 
 
 The thu'd day after leaving Jeddah we passed through the 
 strait of Bab -el-Man deb, which is the Arabic for " gate of teai's," a 
 name applied to these straits on account of the many wrecks that 
 have occm-red here of vessels trying to get in or out of the Red 
 Sea. At the point where the strait is nai'rowest the island of Perim 
 stands mifl-way between Ai-abia and Africa, a sentry-box with a 
 British soldier in it. Of course England occupies Perim and holds 
 the key to the Red Sea, just as she holds the keys to all the impor- 
 tant points between Downing Street and Canton. This little bit of 
 barrenness was made, like Gibraltai-, Aden, and Hong Kong, espe- 
 cially for England. At the narrowest point, the sti-ait of Bab-el- 
 Mandeb is but fifteen miles wide, and the navigable channel on 
 either side of Perim is near the island and very nai'row. The 
 Arabian coast, which is in sight all day, is mountainous, rocky, and 
 entirely barren, save for an occasional palm-ti*ee along the shore. 
 
 After getting thi'ough the strait, we called at Aden. The 
 
'>0 TWO YKAUS IN" TllK .U'XO.LE, 
 
 Moliammedsms believe that, (his Inirnt-up place was ouee the Gai'- 
 deu of Edeu, but we know that it is about sixty degrees F. from 
 that now. It has been very truly spoken of as a cinder, for it is 
 composed of rugged black mouutaius of lava, piled high up, with- 
 out a single tree, bush, or blade of grass visible to the n:iked eye. 
 It was once a cluster of volcanoes that poured lava down their 
 steep sides into the sea, but now they are extinct, and the town of 
 Aden is located in the crater of the lai'gest. It is surrounded 
 by high wtills and ridges of lava, and has but two outlets, the road 
 to the west, and a tunnel, a mile and a quarter long, to the uortli. 
 Aden is said to be the hottest place in the world, and yet it boasts 
 21,500 inhabitants. 
 
 The lirst Piu'see (iire-worshipper) I ever saw was a wealthy and 
 apparently respectable merchant, but when the chtmce offered he 
 could not resist the temptation to tell me a lie and cheat me out of 
 a rupee, just as a hackman Avould do. At Steamer Point I stepped 
 into the store of IMessrs. Swindlejee »!t Co., and after making a lit- 
 tle purchase, handed a sovereign in payment. I asked how much a 
 sovereign was worth in rupees, and he assiu-ed me only ten. Trust- 
 ing to his honor as a respectable merchant I made no further in- 
 quiry, and he gave me my change on the basis of ten rupees. As 
 soon as I left the^ place I was fairly beset by a mob of ragged little 
 Ai'ab money changers who had got wind of the transaction and 
 w-auted to give me ten and a half rupees for all the sovereigns I 
 had. During the day I had occasion to change severtd, for each of 
 which I received eleven rupees without any trouble. I shall never 
 forget my introduction to the Pai-sees. 
 
 I obtained a fine lot of ostrich eggs, and a few fine feathei's also 
 which had been brought across the Gulf of Aden from the African 
 coast, but, finding nothing else there worth taking, the Mcmji 
 weighed anchor and proceeded on her course across the Arabian Sea. 
 
 Taken altogether, I think that voyage from Port Said to Bom- 
 bay was the most agreeable I ever made. It was the poetry of life 
 at sea, a sort of lotus-eatei's' voyage. The sea was smooth, tlie 
 weatlier was cleai* and balmy, the officers were as kind and court- 
 eous as officers could possibly be, and my fellow-passengei*s in tlie 
 cabin seemed to have been selected especitdly for me. The ship was 
 clean, roomy, and comfortable, luid the devotions of the deck-load 
 of Hadjis afforded a pleasing diversion. But it had to end at last. 
 
 We sighted the Bombay light just before midnight of Jauiiai'y 
 16th, and three houi'S after w^ere at anchor in the hiu-bor. 
 
CHAPTER II. 
 
 BOMBAY. 
 
 Duty on Outfit. — A Model (!) Consul. — The Servant Question. — The Grand 
 Market.— Flowers. — Fruit. — Fish. — Live Birds. — The First Specimen. — 
 Street Cars. — An Interesting Crowd. — Vehicles. — The Bullock Hackery. 
 — The Homeliest Animal Alive. — The Victoria and Albert Museum. — Soft- 
 hearted Hindoos. — The Hospital for Animals. — A Strange Sight. — A Good 
 Servant. — Departure for Allahabad. 
 
 And now we have come to India, the land of princes and paupers, 
 of creeds and castes, of savage men and still more savage beasts. 
 The sun rose upon what was, to me, a new world, full of strange 
 sights, and sounds, and people. We were at anchor in the middle 
 of a bay several miles long, on one side of which lay the flat city, 
 stretching far along the shore ; in the distant east the sun was just 
 rising above the high brown hills of the Western Ghauts, while to 
 the south lay a perfect archipelago of mountainous islands, large 
 and small. A single look over the ship's side into the murky water, 
 told me that I need not expect to find any shells, corals, or star- 
 fishes at Bombay, for they do not live upon a muddy bottom. 
 
 The bay was fairly alive with small native boats, in one of which 
 I immediately went ashore to look for suitable lodgings. Almost in 
 the shadow of Watson's Hotel, a splendid iron structure of five 
 stories, the finest hotel between Cairo and San Francisco, I found 
 Doughtey's Hotel, a little nest of a place that would hardly have 
 made a kitchen for Watson's ; but I found in it what no one can in 
 a big, stylish hotel — freedom, the privilege of taking " mine ease in 
 mine inn." 
 
 When I went to the steamer to bring away my baggage, I found 
 that the custom-house officers had swooped down upon us and 
 that ten per cent, duty was demanded on most of my outfit. Feel- 
 ing that I was, in every sense, a traveller, merely passing through 
 India with all my personal effects, and that my belongings were 
 designed for scientific work, I thought that a proper representa- 
 
22 TWO YEARS IN THE JUNGLE. 
 
 tion to the collector of customs would secure the passage of my 
 outfit free of duty. A naturalist, unless he is a millionaire or has 
 one at his back, cannot afford to look lightly upon a matter involv- 
 ing forty to fifty mpees. So I went to the United States Consul, 
 and asked that he make a statement of the facts in the case to the 
 collector of customs. Mr. Farnham may be of more use to the 
 United States than a wooden man would be, but he certainly wasn't 
 to me. He simply declined to trouble himself about the matter in 
 the least and, with not more than a dozen words, went back to his 
 " long-sleeved " chair and his newspaper. I was so completely 
 snubbed that I determined to give our consuls a wide berth there- 
 after, and meekly paid the duty demanded.* 
 
 In the yard of the custom-house I saw about three hundred 
 elephant tusks lying in a pile, awaiting shipment to England. I 
 Avas greatly surprised at the shortness of them all. 
 
 Knowing that I could remain but a comparatively short time in 
 India, I realized that I could not afford to spend time in learning 
 the languages of the different Presidencies. I resolved therefore 
 to depend entirely upon interpreters ; and my first care was to 
 find a servant who could speak a little English. I wanted some one 
 who would act as my shadow every time I went out, and who could 
 also assist me at whatever work I should undertake. The Hindoo 
 servant is a nuisance, for he can only eat in a certain way, at a certain 
 time, and do but one kind of work ; and the Mohammedan is not 
 easily induced to travel. I wanted a man who would be willing to 
 do any kind of work that I myself would do, and I found a httle 
 fellow from Goa who proved to be the very man. He was a native 
 Christian, and therefore not hampered by caste prejudice ; he 
 dressed neatly in European style, wore a nobby, high black hat, a 
 moustache and side whiskers, and was as black as night. He did 
 not know more than fifty words of English, but he was quick to 
 understand and prompt to execute my wishes. I took him at first 
 on trial, with the understanding that if we suited each other, I 
 would take him to Northern India with me. 
 
 "With my new servant, Carlo, at my heels, I started out to visit 
 the market, which is always good collecting ground in a new locality. 
 Bombay is the only city in the East Indies blessed with street cars, 
 and being well managed and liberally patronized by all classes, they 
 
 * In justice to the service I should add that I soon reconsidered this de- 
 termination, for I found our consuls at Calcutta, Columbo, and Singapore, ex- 
 tremely obliging and serviceable. 
 
BOMBAY. 23 
 
 are a complete success. The distances would seem very great 
 without them. Taking a car at Watson's Hotel, we rolled smoothly 
 along a broad, shady street at the side of a spacious esplanade, at 
 the farther end of which stand the splendid new buildings of the 
 University, High Court, Secretariat, and Post Office. A ride of 
 about a mile and a half brought us to the Grand Market, which 
 was to me the most interesting sight of the city. Standing so as 
 to form a triangle, are three buildings, long and wide, with roofs 
 of corrugated iron supported upon iron pillars, and in the centre 
 of the triangle is a fine fountain with flowering shrubs and trees. 
 The best American housewife cannot show a pantry cleaner or 
 more perfectly arranged than this vast market. Fifty-six thousand 
 square feet of space are divided into sections for the sale of flowers, 
 fruits, vegetables, grains, spices, fish, and meats, and these are sub- 
 divided into hundreds of stalls where native men and women squat 
 upon the sloping platform and serve the passers-by. 
 
 In the flower market was a scene that would have made the 
 reputation of any artist who could fairly depict it. Seated upon 
 the raised platform, and surrounded by great heaps of fresh-blown 
 roses, marigolds, jessamines, and brilliant tropical flowers of many 
 kinds, was a group of dark-skinned Hindoo men and women tying 
 the blossoms up into bouquets and long garlands while they laughed 
 and chatted. The huge, snow-white turbans and loose jackets of 
 the men, the raven-black hair of the women, the massive silver 
 ornaments around their arms, ankles, and toes, and their gaudily 
 colored robes in the midst of such brilliant flowers, made up a pict- 
 ure which, if seen once, could never be forgotten. The air was 
 heavy with sweet perfume. 
 
 The vast space occupied by the fruits and vegetables seemed 
 more like the display at an agricultural fair than a simple market 
 for the sale of daily food. There were piles of oranges, bananas, 
 grapes — both purple and white — pomegranates, pummeloes, and 
 many other kinds entirely new to me. 
 
 But what interested me most was the fish market. Besides a 
 fine assortment of common edible species, such as are most abundant 
 in the Arabian Sea, there were a number of sharks, shark-rays (Rhino- 
 ball), and skates, which were of special interest. My first visit oc- 
 curred so late in the morning that the kinds I wanted had all been 
 chopped up, and I found that, in order to catch large rays or rhyno- 
 bates before they were cut up, I would have to be on hand before 
 daybreak. 
 
34 TWO YEAES IK THE JUNGLE. 
 
 To a Hindoo, beef is an abomination, and the ever-patient au- 
 thorities have located the beef market in a building off at one side, 
 the doors of which are shut by screens, so that good Brahmins may 
 not be offended by eyen the sight of holy heifers which have been 
 sacrificed to the waiits of EngHshmen and Mohammedans. In the 
 garden adjoining the market are men who have live birds for sale — 
 cranes, quails, pheasants, mainahs, jays, doves, etc. 
 
 Eager to secure at least one valuable specimen the first day, 
 " for luck," I found that the crane-seller had a dead saras {G7'us 
 antigone) in his possession, and upon finding it to be a specimen 
 both large and old, I bought it of him, after a good deal of hag- 
 gling, for two rupees. Its plumage was soiled and ragged, but it 
 made a fine skeleton. 
 
 How strange it seems to ride upon a modern street-car as it 
 rolls on its way through the narrow, crooked, and crowded streets 
 of the native bazaar. It seems like the true car of Progi*ess, pushing 
 its way through the thi'ong of caste prejudices, ancient customs, 
 and silly traditions, inviting all to meet upon a common level. 
 This nineteenth century street-car looks as strangely out of place 
 here in the narrow streets of the native town as would a train of 
 camels plodding along Broadway. The driver whistles and shouts 
 and the crowd quickly opens a passage for us. 
 
 And what a siCrauge, fantastic crowd it is, to be sure ! Most no- 
 ticeable of all are the Parsees (from Persia), tall, lank, and intel- 
 lectual in appearance, clad in long black satin ulsters and oil-skin 
 hats that always remind one of the cone and crater of Vesuvius. 
 I am sure I never saw a Parsee on the street who did not carry from 
 one to half a dozen books. There were Portuguese half-castes 
 neatly dressed in white ; long-bearded Jews in red fezzes and long 
 robes ; Catholic priests ; Arabs ; tall Mohammedans imder huge 
 turbans of white or green ; fierce-looking Mahrattas in turbans of 
 red ; and Hindoos of a hundred types and castes with shaven heads 
 and caste-marks on their foreheads. The low-caste Hindoo women 
 are gorgeously attii'ed in short jackets and mysterious winding- 
 sheets of red, white, black, green, and yellow ; while nearly every 
 shining black arm and ankle boasts from one to half a dozen silver 
 bangles or bracelets. There are rings and rivets of gold, brass, 
 or silver through their noses and ears, huge silver rings upon their 
 toes, and betel-nut in every mouth. There are children in the 
 crowd, too, mostly Parsee boys, cunningly bedecked in Kttle jack- 
 ets, trowsers, and caps of silk and satin of the most gorgeous 
 
BOMBAY. 25 
 
 colors, and glistening with gold and silver embroidery. Each gaudy 
 little chap carries himself with the air of a peacock or a prince, and 
 were we small boys once more, we should turn green with envy of 
 their splendid clothes. 
 
 In the broader streets, vehicles of various kinds go rattling by 
 us, carrying passengers usually, for the coolies carry most of the 
 freight. Here we meet for the first time the gharry, which prevails 
 throughout all the large cities of the East Indies. This necessaiy 
 evil consists of a small, closed carriage with shutters in the sides, 
 a double roof, four wheels — no two of which are of the same dia- 
 meter, a miserable pony, and a most rascally driver. There 
 must be something pernicious in the society of a horse and a four- 
 wheeled carriage. Either gharry-driving will corrupt the morals of 
 the best native, or else none but the most rascally take to it, for 
 they are all as grasping and unscrupulous as the hackmen of New 
 York City, or Niagara Falls. There seems to be a sort of free- 
 masonry of meanness among all the hack-drivers in the world, for, 
 as a class, I do not know of any other public servants who are such 
 extortionate liars and professional bullies. If the gharry- wallah of 
 India only had the pluck to be a bully, he would be ten times 
 worse than he is, and life would indeed be a burden to a stranger 
 in India. 
 
 But the oddest vehicle is the bullock-hackery. This is a light 
 cart, or rather a high platform, enclosed at the back and sides, 
 with a roof so low that it can only accommodate a man sitting 
 cross-legged, like a Turk. Four big, fat, and sleek Hindoo mer- 
 chants will crowd into this go-cart, the semi-naked driver doubles 
 himself up on the tongue in front, the little bullocks strike into a 
 sharp trot or gallop which they can keep up comfortably for a mile 
 or two, and away they go. The way they get over the ground is 
 surprising, not in the least resembhng the slow, creeping gait of 
 our ponderous American oxen, one of which could easily drag off 
 hackery, bullocks and all. These bullocks, which are used thi-ough- 
 out India and Ceylon instead of draught-horses, are the sacred cat- 
 tle of India, the zebus {Bos Indicus), with straight horns, humped 
 shoulders, and almost invariably either wholly white or black. 
 They are light, fleet, and hardy, and easily perform work which in 
 this Indian climate would quickly kill the best horses in the world. 
 
 The Indian buffalo {Bos bubalus) is also used in Northern India 
 for heavy work, and in my opinion it is the homehest quadruped 
 that ever breathed. It is simply a huge skeleton covered with a 
 
26 TWO TEAKS IN THE JUNGLE. 
 
 bluish-black, and almost hairless india-rubber-like skin ; the hip* 
 bones stand up high and sharp Hke obelisks, and the feet are huge, 
 clumsy, and wide-spreading. The buffalo loves mud and moist 
 grovmd, and nature has provided these broad splay feet to prevent 
 the animal from sinking too deeply in the mire. He carries his 
 head precisely Hke a camel, low down, with nose thrust far for- 
 ward ; and his horns, which join his skull exactly on a level with 
 his eye, sweep downward and backward as they diverge, until they 
 reach back to the shoulders and beyond. The horns are broad, 
 flat, ^vrinkled, and jet black, and to look at the whole head one 
 would say that the beast was created with especial reference to 
 running rapidly through very thick brush. This animal so inter- 
 ested me that I went to the market at four o'clock in the morning, 
 just when the butcher-train came in from Bandora, bought five 
 large heads, and after breakfast, Carlo and I cleaned them with our 
 knives in the back-yard of the hotel. Two of them afterward went 
 to EngUsh museums — like coals carried to Newcastle. 
 
 I visited the Victoria and Albert Museum, in the Victoria Gar- 
 dens, expecting to find there a collection illustrating the fauna of 
 the Bombay Presidency, from which I could learn where to go or 
 send for certain animals which I desired to obtain. The Museum 
 consists of a very Sne building containing an admirable statue of 
 the Prince Consoi"t and another of the Queen, two stuffed animals, 
 half a dozen skulls, some minerals and seeds, and that is about all. 
 The Museum seems to have been built for the statues, rather than 
 the statues for the Museum. I had been joyfully anticipating the 
 sight of the splendid tigers I would find there in various shapes, 
 but I was not prepared for the sight which really awaited me. It 
 was a huge tiger made of papier-mache and gorgeously painted, in 
 the act of rending a native to death. The man lay imder the tiger 
 holding a long knife in the brute's stomach, perfectly unconcerned, 
 while his eyes were fixed upon the visitor with a reaUy joUy "what 
 do-you-think-of-that ?" expression. 
 
 Why Bombay, the largest city in India, should take so much less 
 interest in scientific matters than cities in the other Presidencies, 
 I do not know, unless it is that she is whoUy absorbed in cotton. 
 It is certainly a poor place for a naturaHst, and all the time I felt 
 lonesome and out of place. 
 
 At the hotel I met one day an educated native who spoke Eng- 
 lish perfectly, and whom I immediately proceeded to question 
 about the localities where I might find certain animals, particularly 
 
BOMBAY. 27 
 
 crocodiles, since he was acquainted ■with Kurrachee and the sacred 
 crocodiles of Mugger Peer. He was talking at a great rate, and I 
 was busily jotting down notes, when he suddenly stopped and 
 asked, "Sii*, why do you require to know about these animals? " 
 " Why, I wish to find them." " Why do you require to find them ? 
 Do you wish to shoot them, to kill them?" "Exactly, for their 
 skins and skeletons." "Ah," said he, dropping my map, "then I 
 cannot inform you where any animals are ; I do not wish any thing 
 to be killed, and if I tell you where you can find any animals I shall 
 do a great wrong." 
 
 " Did you never kill an animal ? " said I. 
 
 " Never sir, never ; not purposely, it would be a great sin for 
 me. 
 
 He then went on to teU me of a certain caste of Hindoos, the 
 members of which are so conscientious about taking the life of any 
 living thing that they always eat before sunset to avoid making a 
 light which might be the death of some moth or gnat. They do 
 not kill even mosquitoes, fleas, or Hce, and if a man finds a louse 
 upon himself, he either allows it to feed comfortably, or else he 
 puts it carefuUy upon his next neighbor. What a paradise for in- 
 sects theu* homes must be ! 
 
 , This morbid Hindoo prejudice against taking life has developed 
 in the Jain sect into an institution which is perhaps the only one 
 of its kind in existence. I refer to the hospital for animals, not far 
 from the Mombadevi Temple. In a spacious enclosure, divided 
 into yards, sheds, stables, kennels, cages, etc., are gathered to- 
 gether hundreds of diseased, worn out or starving horses, bullocks, 
 cows, sheep, cats, and monkeys ; cranes, crows, chickens, ducks, 
 and parrots — in short, a perfect zoological garden of the most woe- 
 begone description. Domestic animals that have been t/irned out 
 by heartless owners to perish miserably of starvation and disease ; 
 vrild birds whose wings or legs have been broken by sportsmen ; 
 kittens, "left in the road," to die of stai-vation, just as tender- 
 hearted Christian people serve them in America, are all gathered 
 up by the agents of this Jain institution, and cared for in every 
 possible way. Many animals, whose festering sores, broken legs, 
 and incurable diseases make life a burden to them, need far more 
 to have their miseries ended by a speedy, painless death, than to 
 have their sufferings prolonged a single day, even with the best 
 intentions. As I looked at some of those miserable animals which 
 were slowly dying by inches and suffering intensely, I thought oi 
 
28 TWO TEAKS IN THE JUNGLE. 
 
 the railway engineer I once saw, who, caught and crushed beneath 
 his wrecked locomotive, with the scalding water pouring in a 
 stream over his wretched body, screamed in agony and implored 
 his friends to shoot him through the head. But no ; spades were 
 procured, he was dug out, lingered for houi-s, and the papers 
 calmly stated that he died in great agony ! Alas ! humanity has 
 not yet been educated up to the point which teaches that it is as 
 great an act of duty and kindness to end the miseries of a hopeless- 
 ly burned, boiled, or mangled man by a speedy and painless death, 
 as it is to mercifully put an end to the suiferings of a dumb brute. 
 Were my best friend to implore me to end his hopeless sufferings, 
 
 1 would do it and take the consequences. And I beheve the time 
 wiU come when mankind, as a class, will be as merciful to man as 
 the more humane of us are to lower animals. 
 
 There are few marine animals to be found in the vicinity of 
 Bombay, except the fishes in the Grand Market, and thither I made 
 a pilgrimage every morning. The most interesting specimen I 
 procured there was a large blue ray {Trygon sephen), weighing 80 
 pounds, with a body measuring 2 feet 8 inches in length, by 4 feet 
 
 2 inches in width, of which I prepared the skeleton. Ehinohati are 
 common, but it is a difficult matter to secure one entire, for the 
 moment one of these, or a shark, is landed in a market-stall, its fins 
 and tail are cut oflt' to be dried and shipped to China, where the 
 Chinese eat them in soups and consider them a great dehcacy. By 
 dint of perseverance I secured one fine specimen {R. djeddensis), 5 
 feet 6 inches in length, the skin of which I preserved dry with salt. 
 
 By the end of a week I had proved to my satisfaction that Bom- 
 bay was no place for me, and determined to go to Allahabad for 
 gavials and other things. My new servant was in doubt about the 
 advisabihty of going so far away, imtil one day he caught sight 
 of my guns, ammimition, and camp-outfit, when he suddenly 
 announced, "I no care, sir, I go Allahabad. I like see new 
 country, I like go shoot. I no cai-e how I come back Bombay." 
 I had told him that I could not pay his way back to Bombay after 
 only two months on the Jumna, biit that I would take him to Cal- 
 cutta with me if he would go. He suddenly became possessed of 
 a desire for travel and adventure (it overcomes the best of men 
 sometimes), and we quickly concluded a bargain. I agreed to pay 
 his expenses and give him 15 rupees per month, for which he was 
 to interpret, cook, skin crocodiles, and do anything that might need 
 to be done. I had found in the bazaai's that he was as shi'ewd as 
 
BOMBAY. • ^29 
 
 any native at a bargain, and had not the least modesty to hamper him 
 when dealing with a tricky or exorbitant huckster. Natives usu- 
 ally make it a rule to charge a white man from fifty to a hundred 
 per cent, more than any one else, and but for vigorous bullying on 
 the part of Carlo, I could seldom have got an article at its proper 
 price. Luckily for me. Carlo, being a native Christian, felt no 
 sympathy whatever with Hindoos or Mohammedans, and I very 
 often had hard work to repress my laughter when he would start 
 in to brow-beat a bazaar man and bring down his prices to what 
 they ought to be. 
 
 I trusted Carlo with an advance of 9 rupees for his outfit, in 
 spite of advice to the contrary from the very man who recom- 
 mended him to me, who feared he would "jump the bounty;" but 
 the little fellow was honest, and very grateful to me for trusting 
 him against advice. He afterward repaid me for it in many ways. 
 
 Before I left Bombay, Colonel Ross very kindly gave me two 
 letters of introduction, one to a brother, a barrister, in Allahabad, 
 and the other to another brother. Major* J. C. Ross, of the Royal 
 Engineers, quartered at Etawah, in an excellent hunting district. 
 These letters proved to be of the greatest service to me, although 
 I have since wondered how Colonel Ross dared give them to a 
 stranger. Excepting those two letters, I landed in India without a 
 single scrap of introductory paper to anybody, save a letter of credit, 
 and I prided myself upon my independence. I said I had money, 
 and would not need any letters of introduction. Before long I 
 found that every such letter is worth a thousand times its weight in 
 gold. 
 
 After a week in Bombay we shipped a large case of specimens 
 to Calcutta, and bought our tickets for Allahabad. By going third 
 class I did what an independent white man rarely does in India, 
 and astonished both Europeans and natives. I am not sure that J 
 would do it again, but for once the experience was worth the dis- 
 comfort. The charges upon excess baggage are very high, and 
 mine cost 44 rupees. Two Englishmen, travelling by the same 
 train toward Lahore, paid 128 rupees for excess luggage. But 
 think of riding from Bombay to Allahabad, 845 miles, for 16 rupees 
 13 annas, or about $7.50 ! 
 
 * Then Captain, 
 
CHAPTEE III. 
 
 FROM BOMBAY TO ETAWAH. 
 
 Physical Aspect of the Country. — Scarcity of Animal Life. — A Barren Eegion. 
 — Major Ross. — A Boat Trip up the Jumna. — A Mile of Bathers. — Dead 
 Hindoo. — Plenty of Birds, but no Gavials. — Return and go to Etawah. — 
 The Dak Bungalow. — Two Specimens the First Day. — My Boat and Crew. 
 — A Day in the Bazaar. — An Instance of Caste. 
 
 The sun was just setting as our long train crossed the bridge from 
 Bombay island to the mainland, and began toiling up the Western 
 Ghauts. These are the Andes of India, and extend close along the 
 coast from Cape Comorin to Bombay and vanish in the Central 
 Desert. We crossed that chain during the night, the next day we 
 crept over the Satpura Range at a snail's pace, and were then fairly 
 upon the great Indian plateau which extends north to the Eajpoo- 
 tana desert and t^st to Calcutta. But where are the luxuriant 
 tropical forests, the waving palms, and the crowds of people one 
 naturally expects to see ? Not here, certainly. Where the covmtry 
 is not cut up by ravines, it stretches out on every side, level as a 
 billiard-table, dry, parched, and thirsty-looking, and, except in the 
 %'icinity of Kundwah, utterly destitute of any thing like forests or 
 jimgle. There the dry, hot plains ai*e covered with a scattering 
 growth of scrubby trees, and it was quite a sui-prise to learn that 
 this brushy tract is dignified by the title of forest and duly ofl&cered 
 by the Government. North of this are the famous tiger districts of 
 Indore, Bhopal, and Gwalior. 
 
 There are no fences, no houses, nor villages worth mentioning, 
 no swamps, lagoons, nor ponds in this region, and the only living 
 objects are a few herds of buffalo and zebu. Except for the scat- 
 tered fields of young wheat and a few straggling trees, the land- 
 scape is gray and monotonous in the extreme. But it is the dry 
 season now, there are no rains, and we see the country at its worst. 
 With the bm'st of the southwest monsoon in May, these parched 
 and baiTen plains will blossom like a garden, and the intense dry 
 
FKO^r r.OMP.AT TO ETA W AH. 31 
 
 lieat will be replaced by the Turkish-bath atmosphere of the wet 
 season. 
 
 During the first day's ride we saw not a single wild animal, nor 
 even a bird of any size, but in one district we saw many " machans " 
 — platforms of poles erected in the fields, upon which the owners 
 sit to scare away the deer and wild pigs which come to feed upon 
 the growing crops. 
 
 In the same compartment of the railway carriage as myself were 
 three old Hindoo merchants, gray-bearded, dignified, and respect- 
 able, who evidently were natives of the better sort. Breakfast time 
 came, we were still many hot and dusty miles from a refreshment sta- 
 tion, and from the depths of some of their bundles, the old gentle- 
 men, who had evidently travelled before, evolved a supply of cooked 
 food. It consisted simply of a large bowl of " dal," like stiff pea- 
 soup, and a pile of " chapatties," small, leathery, unleavened pan- 
 cakes, made of flour. With my usual indifference as to the wants of 
 my inner man, I had neglected to provide myself with a luncheon 
 to fall back upon, and while I was busily thinking of the nice warm 
 breakfast I should have in two or three hours more, one of the old 
 native gentlemen suddenly thrust his fingers into the bowl of 
 cooked " dal " (they had no spoons, forks, or knives), scooped up a 
 good, generous handful, plastered it over a little pile of " chapat- 
 ties," and, with a benevolent beam over his spectacles, handed it 
 to me. I was completely taken aback for an instant, for the old 
 gentleman's hands were as grimy as my own, but I accepted the 
 food with my politest bow and ate it down with every appearance 
 of gratitude. I would have eaten it had it been ten times as dirty 
 as it undoubtedly was. It was an act as friendly as any man could 
 perform, and I was pleased to find such a feeling of pure charity 
 and benevolence in a native. 
 
 About noon we stopped at Khundwa for breakfast. There was 
 a clean and commodious wash-room, a table well filled with choice 
 eatables, ice-water in abundance, and plenty of time. What a 
 comfort a sharp appetite is upon such an occasion ! 
 
 Nearly every station upon the line of the G. I. P. Kailway has its 
 beds of flowers, and vines running up its walls, and occasionally a 
 smtch-tender has trained flowering vines over his little house until 
 it has become a perfect bower, fit for a fairy queen. 
 
 As we approach the Ganges the plain becomes green and fertile 
 and dotted over with trees and villages. There are ponds and pools 
 of water along the railway, in which herons, storks, and ibises are 
 
39 TWO YEARS IX THE JUNGLE. 
 
 cautiously wadiug, and the earth no longer has that di-y and 
 parched appearance observed from Bombay to near Jubbulpore. 
 After riding through two cold nights and one hot and dusty day, 
 the morning of the second day finds us crossing the great iron via- 
 duct over the Jumna into Allahabad. This is a grand structure, 
 2,870 feet long, with the bottoms of its piers sixty feet below the 
 bottom of the river. English, every inch of it, or, in other words, 
 built to stand forever. 
 
 Allahabad, the "city of God," also called by the irreverent, 
 " Fakirabad," or " city of beggai's," stands at the confluence of the 
 Ganges and the Jumna, both of which rivers rise in the Himalayas 
 in the same latitude and flow southeastwai'd, almost parallel to each 
 other, to their point of meeting here. The gavial, or Gangetic 
 crocodile {Gaiialis Gangcticus), inhabits both these rivei-s and their 
 tributai'ies, and my task was to find where they were most plentiful 
 and grew to the lai'gest size. Pi'ofessor Wai'd had tried in vain to 
 buy skins and skeletons of this crocodile, had made most tempting 
 oflers to Indian naturahsts without success, and at last decided that 
 I should go to the Ganges, spend about six weeks time, and get 
 about twenty-five specimens. At last, after a joui-ney of 10,500 
 miles, neai-ly half-way round the world, I found myself in the gav- 
 ial region, and ready to begin collecting in earnest. Sight-seeing 
 was at an end, and what remained was hai-d work. 
 
 Upon presenting my letter to ]Mi'. Eoss, I was fortunate enough 
 to meet Major Eoss also, who had come down from Eta<vah for a 
 few days, both of whom received me with the utmost cordiality, 
 and we three sat down directly to a council of war in reference to 
 my movements. It was decided that the Jumna was a better river 
 for ga%-ials than the Ganges, and that I shoiild tiy in the former 
 above the city. If that ventm-e failed me, i.e., if I found no lai-ge 
 ga-vials, which was all I asked, then I should pack up and go on to 
 Etawah, a civil and miHtiuy station 20G miles up the Jumna, near 
 which Major Eoss had for some time been engaged in siu've^ing 
 upon the Ganges Canal and its branches. 
 
 When a natm-alist goes hunting for any pai'ticular and impor- 
 tant auimtvl. he is quite in the hands of those who imdertake to give 
 him reliable information. A long series of disappointments grow- 
 ing out of exaggenited information, has taught me how to gauge 
 the value of a friend's advice as accurately as a hydi'ometer mai-ks 
 the strength of alcohol. The imivei-sal tendency of people in the 
 game districts of both North and South America is to esaggei-ate 
 
FROM BOMBAY TO ETAWAII. 33 
 
 fearfully. One man told me, " If you go to New River, you will 
 get any quantity of birds, a whole boat-load of birds' heggs, and 
 'gators (alligators) by the million ! " I went, and found a great 
 many alligators, that was all. In Trinidad, a wealthy and respect- 
 able English merchant soberly informed me that " at Punta Pied- 
 ra, twenty miles above Bolivar, in the Orinoco, you will find manatee 
 in millions, su* ; get all you want in one day ! " "Lord, how this 
 world is given to lying " about wild animals. As a rule, game 
 grows plentiful directly as the distance from it increases, and vice 
 versa. A collector in search of a certain animal must be guided by 
 the information that is given him, and it was a blessed relief to 
 find a man who gave as careful estimates and opinions as Major 
 Eoss. I felt from the first that he never exaggerated or overesti- 
 mated in the least, that his information was always strictly accur- 
 ate, and there was an abundance of it. He informed me that 
 large gavials were numerous immediately below Etawah, that ravine 
 deer were plentiful in the ravines, and black buck upon the up- 
 lands, and that, if I shot reasonably well, I could probably kill every 
 day one or two specimens of either species I chose to follow up. 
 
 Keeping this fine prospect in reserve, I engaged a small boat 
 and three boatmen, laid in a stock of provisions, and the next 
 morning we were off. Starting from the railway bridge, the boat- 
 men poled our little craft along the shore, which was crowded 
 with natives, in the water and out, busily bathing or washing their 
 clothes — a whole mile of bathers. Cleanliness, or rather, bathing, 
 is the only feature of a Hindoo's religion which is not objection- 
 able. It makes an excellent plank in any religious platform, espe- 
 cially in a hot climate, and I have often wished that the negroes of 
 the West Indies, who have enough of religion and to spare, had 
 made the bathing obligation an article in their creed. Just think 
 what a grand thing it would be for white folks if a Barbadoes or 
 Demerara negro's religion could beguile him into washing himself 
 once a day. 
 
 We passed a number of clumsy river boats moored to the shore, 
 and one man in the water, who was neither washing himself nor his 
 clothes. He was dead. He floated there upon the water, naked, 
 bloated, and hideous, with only a few patches of his brown Hindoo 
 epidermis remaining upon his body, which was otherwise perfectly 
 white. Men and women were bathing within ten yards of this dis- 
 gusting object, perfectly indifferent, and one man was actually 
 fishing within two yards of it, I asked one of the boatmen ; 
 3 
 
34 TWO YEARS IN^ THE JUNGLE. 
 
 " Is tliis water good to drink ? " 
 
 He replied : 
 
 " Yes, sir ; see, the people drink it," and lie pointed to a woman 
 "wlio was filling an eai'tben jar. Perched upon the edge of the high 
 bank was a huge vulture {Otogyps calvus), with his eyes fixed upon 
 the corpse in the water, but the bathers were so near it he did not 
 venture fai'ther just then. "When I first saw the bii-d from below, 
 I decided to have him for a specimen, but when I found what he 
 had been feeding upon, and was waitmg to feed upon again, I con- 
 cluded my collection would be complete without him. 
 
 After getting clear of the bathers and the boats, two long and 
 light grass Unes were made fast to the top of oui- stumpy little 
 mast, and two of the boatmen went ahead along the bank, towing 
 us canal-boat fashion, while the thii-d man steered. The boat was 
 short, but broad, heavy, and clumsy, and could not be rowed 
 against a strong cui'rent. It had a roomy deck, with a thatch roof 
 over it, and was altogether a very comfortable little craft. As the 
 men slowly towed the boat along, we cooked, ate, skinned birds, 
 and loaded cai-tridges imder the avsTiing, while the boatmen kept a 
 shai"p lookout ahead for any thing which needed to be shot. 
 
 This little trip was full of interest and enjoyment, but so far as 
 gavials were concerned it was a failure. We went five days' jom- 
 ney up the river,^ found no gavials at all, save very small ones, not 
 worth the trouble of shooting, and when the natives told us there 
 were no gavials " two miles fai'ther up," we knew the case was 
 hopeless. We collected a number of large birds, however, among 
 which were specimens of the black vulture {Otogyps calvus), brown 
 vulture {Gyps Bengalcnsis), the sea eagle {Ilalicetiis albiciUa), the 
 black-backed goose {Sartidioniis melanonotus), bai'-headed goose 
 {Ansej' Indicus), the Casarca ridila, and several fine specimens 
 of the cuiious Indian skimmer {Bhynchops albicoIUs). At ovir 
 farthest point, where the river is full of huge boulders, I shot an 
 otter that was resting upon the top of a large rock out in the 
 stream. The animal rolled off the rock into the water, was quickly 
 borne away by the swift current, and before we could get near it 
 had sunk out of sight. By digging lifle-pits in the sand, and lying 
 in them until I was almost roasted, I managed to kill two small 
 gavials ; but it was improfitable work, and after having given the 
 place a fau- trial, we retui-ned to Allahabad. 
 
 Leaving all our specimens and a portion of our heavy luggage 
 at the hotel, we lost no tinie in starting for Etawah. It is the rule 
 
FROM BOMBAY TO ]i:TAWAlT. 35 
 
 iu India to make all railway journeys in the night, if possible, to 
 avoid the oppressive heat of the day. Leaving Allahabad at 11 p.m., 
 we rolled up in our double blanket and slept comfortably until we 
 reached Cawnpore, at 5 a.m. 
 
 As we neared our destination, we watched the landscape with 
 greedy interest, and the prospect was perfectly satisfactory. The 
 country was a dead level, dry and baked hard, covered with Helds 
 of wheat, barley, and dal, with here and there thorny acacias, and 
 little mud villages nestling in clumps of green and shady mango 
 or banjan trees. We saw eight pairs of saras cranes stalking ma- 
 jestically over the open fields, large numbers of ibises, small cranes, 
 herons, and plovers wading in the pools of water along the railway, 
 and a small fox {Vulpes Bengalends) , standing a hundred yards 
 away, looking at the rushing train with a stare of curiosity. 
 
 At half-past eight we reached Etawah, an insignificant civil 
 station, with a population of twenty-seven thousand natives (a 
 town of that size is nothing in India), and eight Europeans, the 
 headquarters of the Lower Ganges Canal Department, containing, 
 besides a dak bungalow, a church, school, jail, and a court j)resided 
 over by a single assistant magistrate, who is the sole representa- 
 tive of English power that is allotted to this host of natives. Major 
 Ross and his wife were then twenty miles east of Etawah, tenting 
 and surveying the line of a new irrigation canal, so I took up quar- 
 ters at the dak bungalow, until I could get a boat ready u^son the 
 river. 
 
 The dak bungalow is a government institution, common through- 
 out India and Ceylon, which is simply indispensable to the very 
 existence of European travellers. In Southei-n India it is called a 
 traveller's bungalow, and in Ceylon it becomes a rest house, but 
 its plans and purposes are just the same. A traveller in India 
 cannot start out boldly across the country as we do in America, 
 travel until nightfall, and then demand shelter, food, and fire for a 
 consideration at any farm-house or settler's cabin he may happen 
 upon. Ninety-nine out of a hundred Indian natives would see a 
 white man perish by the roadside before they would take him 
 into any of their houses, even for a night, simply because he has 
 no caste, and therefore is not quite so good as a dog. The travel- 
 ler across country, in India, must reach a dak bungalow or camp 
 in the open fields, for only the largest cities have hotels. 
 
 The dak bungalow is a house built and kept in repair by the 
 Government, usually containing two suites of rooms — dining, bed, 
 
36 TWO YEARi5 TX THE JUNGLE. 
 
 and bath-room — fm'uislied with floor matting', plain Imt substantial 
 chaii-s and tables, and a bedstead upon which the traveller spreads 
 his bed, for every one in India cai-ries with him his thick cotton 
 rizai, or comforter, blankets, and pillow. Attached to every dak 
 bimgalow upon the important lines of travel, is a cook-house, a 
 complete set of table fm-niture, and an old gray-beai'ded !Moham- 
 medau, who has chai'ge of the whole estabUshment, and who vnll 
 supply the traveller with meals, if requii-ed. Each traveller pays 
 one rupee per day for occupying the bimgalow, and "the old man" 
 will supply the provender by private contract at from two to three 
 rupees per day. The rule is that any Eiu'opean ti-aveller is enti- 
 tled to shelter in the dak bungalow for at least twenty -four houi'S, 
 and if no other ti-aveller demands his place, he is at liberty to re- 
 main three days. The Etawah bvmgalow is clean, aiiy, and cool, 
 standing in a thick grove of mangos, a perfect haven of rest for a 
 dusty, heated, and himgi-y wayfai-er. 
 
 I had barely finished bathing Jind breakfasting, when !Mr. 
 Fi*aser, the assistant magistrate, dropped in to help me get ac- 
 quainted with the place and to ofler whatever assist:mce I might 
 requii'e. In the afternoon I went over to his bimgalow, where we 
 sat on the verandah and shot small birds in the trees near by, until 
 the midday heat was over, when we took a rifle and stai-ted down 
 to the Jumna prospecting. The river is two miles from the 
 European cantonment, but a fine metalled road winds down from 
 the level plateau into the rarines, and through them to the bridge 
 of boats. Neju" the river I had a snap shot at a jackal, but missed 
 him. Just opposite the point where we fii-st reached the river 
 bank were two saras cranes, stalking along the river mai'gin, at the 
 farther side of a sand-bar one huudi-ed and fifty y:u-ds in width. 
 ^Ii". Eraser knelt down in the wheat and knocked one of them over 
 very neatly, with a bullet through its breast. It proved to be the 
 male bird and a very fine specimen. Farther up we saw three 
 lai'ge gavials l^'ing on a sand-bar in the middle of the river, but 
 could not succeed in getting a shot at them. Above the bridge of 
 boats we found a five-foot gavial lying upon another sand-bai", which 
 Mr. Finiser shot through the shouldei*s and killed instantly. This 
 made two valuable specimens for the first day, which was enough 
 to bring good luck. A pai-ty of native boys cai'ried the crane and 
 the gavial up to the dak bimgalow. and I skinned them both the 
 next morning. 
 
 I saw that I had found erood collecting gi*ound at last and lost 
 
FEOM BOMBAY TO ETAWAH. 37 
 
 not a moment in getting ready for a long cruise on the river. 
 Boats were exceedingly scarce, and but for my friends I shotdd have 
 had serious trouble in hii-ing a suitable craft. Major Ross very 
 kindly relieved me of all trouble on that score by obtaining for my 
 use, as long as I should want it, and free of charge, a large boat be- 
 longing to a wealthy old native gentleman, Mumtaz Ali Khan, who 
 had the government contract for the bridges of boats in that dis- 
 trict. It was a very large and unwieldly craft, flat-bottomed and 
 square-ended, sloping far up from the water, 35 feet long, 12 wide, 
 and 2 deep, a perfect model of the old-fashioned ferry-boats to be 
 seen upon many of our Western rivers. We built a deck across 
 amidships, and erected an awning of grass thatch over a portion of 
 this to protect us from the rays of the sun, for there was not a drop 
 of rain to fear. Our craft was provided with a mast, a sail, Knes to 
 tow it, poles to push it, oars to row it, and five able-bodied men to 
 work all these appliances. We tried hard to hire a small and light 
 row-boat to take along, but without success, for there was not one 
 available on the river. Should I go there again to collect, I would 
 take with me a small boat of some kind. 
 
 Two days after we reached Etawah (March 13th), our boat was 
 ready. We loaded our traps into a buflfalo cart and drove through 
 the bazaar to lay in a stock of provisions sufficient for three weeks. 
 We bought rice, bread, flour, sugar, onions, butter, and ghee, in 
 the purchase of which last an amusing incident occurred. 
 
 The sun was pouring down upon us at high noon and I became 
 very thirsty. Carlo bought a clean new chattie, an earthen pot, 
 worth about one cent, and when we came to a well where people 
 were drawing water he had it filled for me. I took a long draught 
 and handed the chattie back to Carlo, who threw the water out, 
 wiped it dry, and, going to a ghee-seller close by, asked to have it 
 filled with that immortal stuff. Ghee is clarified butter, and is 
 used in India instead of lard, ordinary butter, and other animal 
 fats. To our amazement the ghee-seller flatly refused to sell us 
 any, for the reason, as Carlo explained, that the gentle Hindoo had 
 seen me put the chattie to my mouth, which defiled it to such an 
 extent that he could not take it into his hands. I was strongly 
 tempted to knock his ghee-pots about his ears, take thirty rupees 
 worth of satisfaction out of his royal highness, and then go up to 
 court and pay my fine. But Carlo was equal to the occasion ; he 
 raised his voice to its regular commanding pitch, bullied the man of 
 caste, and threatened him with arrest, until he gave in and pro« 
 
38 TWO YEARS IN THE JUNGLE. 
 
 ceeded to sell us the gliee. But he would not touch that chattie 
 with his hands ! Not he. He handled it with two sticks as though 
 it were the dead carcass of some foul animal ; and all because I drank 
 water from it once. 
 
 After three hours' work in the crowded, hot, and dusty bazaar, 
 we drove down to where the boat lay at the bathing ghaut, the 
 boatmen quickly carried our cargo aboard, and with a feeling of 
 profound relief we let go our moorings and drifted down the 
 stream. 
 
CHAPTER lY. 
 
 GAVIAL SHOOTING ON THE JUMNA. 
 
 Afloat ontlie Jumna. — Character of th.e Eiver. — Difficulties of Crocodile Shoot- 
 ing. — The Fatal Spot. — Prospects.— The Fun Begins. — Defeat through 
 Poor Shooting and Native Timidity. — An Harangue. — Swimming after a 
 Wounded Gavial. — Death of " Number One." — Another still Larger. — How- 
 to Skeletonize a Gavial. — Mode of Skinning Described. — Birds of Prey. — 
 Crowds of Spectators. — Gavial Eggs. — A Model Crew. — Plucky Encounter 
 with a Wounded Gavial. — A Struggle at Close Quarters. — Our Plan of 
 Operations. — A Good Bifle. — Killing Gavials at Long Range. 
 
 As we floated down the river, I began to realize that the task 
 which lay before me, to be accompHshed regardless of circumstances, 
 was no light one. The Jumna is a very crooked, muddy, swift, and 
 deep river, full of treacherous eddies and under-currents, but for- 
 tunately only about two hundred yards in average vddth at that 
 season. Usually the banks are low and covered vdth fields of wheat 
 and grain, to which every foot of fertile land is devoted, but in 
 many places the stream is hemmed in by perpendicular cliffs of 
 hard clay, behind which are barren and rugged ravines. At each 
 bend in the river there' was a wide sand-bar, often many acres in 
 extent. 
 
 Previous experience had taught me the uselessness of shooting 
 crocodiles in the water, for a dead crocodile or alligator sinks to 
 the bottom like a stone, and is lost in a moment. If the water is 
 stUl, your victim will be found floating belly up at the end of two 
 days, but the skin will be a total loss, for the scales wiU slip off in 
 spite of all that can be done. In rivers that are swift, deep, and 
 very muddy, like the Jumna at that season, it is simply impossible 
 to shoot crocodiles and get them unless they are lying out upon 
 the banks. Even then they must be hit hard in a vital spot, and 
 either killed stone-dead upon the instant, or stunned so effectu- 
 ally that they wiU not be able to recover and crawl into the water 
 before the hunter or an attendant has time to rush forward and 
 
40 TWO YEARS IN THE JUNGLE. 
 
 seize them by the tail When a crocodile leaves the water to take 
 his daily sun-bath upon the bank, he does not go rambling about 
 over the country, to be suddenly set upon and killed by almost any 
 one before he has time to reach the water. Far from it. He cau- 
 tiously lays himself down to sleep within a yard of the water's edge, 
 head toward the stream, ready to plunge forward out of sight at 
 the slightest alarm. He usually sleeps with one eye open, too, and 
 however fast asleep he may appear to be, you have only to show 
 yourself within easy rifle shot, and adios ! he is off to the bottom 
 of the river. 
 
 I have found by a long series of experiments, that the only sure 
 way to stop a large crocodile or alligator is to shoot him in the neck 
 or a:t the shoulders, so as to strike the vertebral column. It is easy 
 enough to kUl small specimens by shooting them in the head, but 
 a crocodile with the top of its head blown off is useless either for 
 its skin or skeleton, while one shot through the heart or lungs will 
 get into the water much faster than one not shot at all. The brain 
 of a twelve-foot gavial is so small that it would hardly fill an egg- 
 cup, and it is surrounded by such a huge mass of solid bone that 
 it offers no mark at all to fire at. The sides of the neck and the 
 shoulders, however, are wholly unprotected by bony plates, and 
 when a bullet strikes the vertebi'al column, the whole nervous sys- 
 tem receives such' a terrible shock that the animal is instantly paral- 
 yzed, at least for a time, and rendered powerless to move a single 
 yard. When the spinal column is struck by a bullet, the crocodile's 
 jaws fly wide open, as if the bullet had touched a spring, the legs 
 draw up and quiver convulsively, and the reptile Hes still for further 
 treatment. 
 
 I soon found that if we captured any gavials, I should have to 
 shoot them at long range and do much better shooting than I had 
 ever done before. At first I feared that my Httle rifle and I had 
 undertaken more than we could accomplish under so many disad- 
 vantages. The river was very swift owing to the recent freshets in 
 the lower Himalayas, and our boat was so much Hke an old clumsy 
 raft that shooting from it was simply out of the question. The 
 cover along the banks was so pitifully thin, and the sand-banks 
 were so wide I saw I should often have to shoot across the river, or 
 else just as far across the sand-banks, in order to kill a gavial at all. 
 
 Just below Etawah we stopped at a wide sand-bar and I spent 
 some time in fii-ing at targets from one himdred to three hundred 
 yards, until I got the peep-sight of my Maynard rifle graduated 
 
GAVIAL SHOOTING ON THE JUMNA. 41 
 
 very carefully. I also spent some time in learning to estimate dis- 
 tances accurately, wliich now became a matter of tlie first impor- 
 tance. 
 
 The next day the fun began. As we rounded a bend in the 
 river, we saw far down the stream seven gavials, large and small, 
 lying at the lower end of a long, narrow sand-bar, which joined the 
 shore by a narrow strip at the upper end. "We brought the boat 
 to the shore and moored it, then made a detour into the wheat 
 field to avoid being seen by our game. Just at the upper end of 
 the sand-bar I posted Carlo and three of the boatmen, telling them 
 that when I fired they were to run down the peninsula, seize by 
 the tail the ' ghariyal ' I would shoot, and prevent it from getting 
 into the water. I told them that if they could catch the tail and 
 hang on, the reptile could not bite them and I would soon come up 
 and finish it. They promised to obey, but I saw they were ner- 
 vous, and I had my doubts as to the result. I went down through 
 the wheat field, keeping well out of sight until I arrived opposite the 
 largest gavial, and then crept softly up to the top of the bank. The 
 largest gavial was about ten feet in length, lying at the water's edge 
 broadside on, a beautiful specimen. Aiming to hit the vertebral 
 column I fired at the neck, but the gavial plunged into the river 
 and I gave it up for lost. I signalled the men to stay where they 
 were, and waited for the gavials to come out again. And then 
 happened the strangest thing I ever saw in crocodile hunting. The 
 large gavial I fired at suddenly appeared at the top of the water 
 and actually rushed out upon the bank. He clanked his bony jaws 
 together and flung his head from side to side as if in great agony. 
 "When he reached the bank I fired a second time, and again he took 
 to the water, but soon appeared with his head held high up, snap- 
 ping and struggling as though in the agonies of death. He pushed 
 up into the shallow water and groaned three or four times, like a 
 strong man in distress. It was the first time I ever heard such a 
 pure vocal tone from a crocodile. I fired a third shot, which seemed 
 to strike the right spot, for the gavial's jaws flew open and it lay 
 quite still. The men now came running down, but before they 
 reached the scene of action the crocodile began to slowly drag it- 
 self into the shallow water. They arrived in ample time to stop it, 
 but they stood in a shrinking group within three feet of the huge 
 reptile's tail, cowering back and afraid to touch it. As the gavial 
 slowly crept away I shouted to the men to encourage them, offering 
 a reward of two rupees if they would stop it, and I fairly stormed 
 
42 TWO TEAKS IN THE JUNGLE. 
 
 at them as the animal reached the water. Twice they plucked up 
 the courage to take hold of the long, scaly tail, but as it gave a slight 
 twitch they dropped it. I fired another shot, but my rifle seemed 
 quite bewitched, and that splendid reptile crawled slowly away be- 
 fore my eyes, in spite of all I could do or say. One man could easily 
 have stopped it, but I did not care to swim across the strip of 
 water that lay between the end of the sand-bar and the bank. As 
 the gavial reached deeper water it turned belly up, kicked its legs 
 feebly in the air, and slowly diifted doAvn to where no one dared 
 follow. The water was so murky we could not see an object three 
 inches below the surface. 
 
 And so we lost that fine ten-foot gavial. I was disgusted with 
 myself for my miserably poor shooting, and vexed with the men for 
 their timidity, which lost the game. In a few words I shamed them 
 for their cowardice, and pointed out how the reptile was too nearly 
 dead to bite any one. I told them that if any one of them should ever 
 be bitten by a gavial, I would send him to the hospital and pay him 
 double wages until he should get well, and that if any one should 
 be drowned while trying to catch one for me, I would give his 
 widow a hundred rupees. This harangue had a wonderful effect 
 upon them. 
 
 The next morning we all began to do better work. We found 
 a large gavial Ijkxg upon an isolated sand-bar out almost in the 
 middle of the river, and from the top of the bank I put a bullet 
 into its back-bone just at the shoulders. Its jaws flew wide open 
 and its legs drew up, but otherwise it lay perfectly stilL To my 
 great surprise three of the boatmen immediately sprang into the 
 water and stai*ted to swim across to the sand-bar. There was no 
 telling how many gavials lay right under them, but I quickly made 
 up my mind I could risk it as well as they, and taking only my hunt- 
 ing knife in my belt, swam after them. 
 
 The gavial was powerless to move, but as we approached, it 
 snapped viciously from side to side in a maimer which warned us 
 to be carefuL We immediately seized it by the tail, and reaching 
 fi'om behind I stabbed it to the heart with my hunting-knife, which 
 soon ended its struggles. This specimen measured exactly eleven 
 feet The boat was brought down, and we hauled aboard the car- 
 cass of " Number One." 
 
 We had still better luck that day. A mile below our first cap- 
 ture we found seven fine gavials lying at the edge of a broad 
 sand-bank, which extended along the shore. I posted the men 
 
GAVIAL SHOOTING ON THE JUMNA. 43 
 
 as near as it was prudent to go, then crept along the bank through 
 a field of dal, until I arrived opposite the group. The distance 
 was only about ninety yards, for a wonder, and my first shot 
 stopped the largest reptile. In a moment the men rushed across 
 the sand and seized him. He kicked and struggled and snapped 
 vigorously, but the men held him fast until I ran down and broke 
 his neck with another bullet, which killed him instantly. This 
 one measured eleven feet eight inches, and having two large 
 specimens, we decided to stop and dissect them without delay. 
 The boat was brought down to where our last victim lay, moored 
 to the bank, and dragging our specimens out upon the level sand- 
 bar, Carlo and I rolled up our sleeves, sharpened our knives and be- 
 gan work. 
 
 We prepared the skeleton of the first gavial, an operation which 
 was accomplished as follows : After having measured the animal, 
 the skin was slit open along the under side, from the throat to the 
 tip of the tail, and removed from the body in the most expeditious 
 manner. The forelegs were detached from the body at the shoul- 
 ders, the hind legs at the hips, and the flesh carefully cut off the 
 bones of each leg and foot. The head was detached from the body 
 at the first cervical vertebra and the tail cut off close up to the pel- 
 vis. Thus the animal was divided into seven parts. From each of 
 these all the flesh was cut away piece by piece until only the bones 
 remained, which were always left united by their Hgaments. The 
 vital organs were removed from the trunk, the flesh carefully cut 
 from between the ribs, from the pelvis, from the vertebrse of the 
 tail, and from the head. After the flesh had been carefully cut 
 away so that only small fragments remained, each part of the en- 
 tire skeleton was rubbed thoroughly with strong arsenical soap * 
 to preserve all the remaining flesh and the ligaments from decay, 
 and protect the bones from being attacked by rats and Dermestes. 
 When the bones were thoroughly anointed, the skull, the tail, and 
 the legs were carefully packed into the cavity of the thorax and the 
 bundle tightly bound up with strong twine. In a few days the 
 skeleton becomes perfectly dry and hard, is free from all bad odors, 
 and can be packed without loss of space. Such is the character of 
 a "rough skeleton." It is about five hours' work for one man who 
 understands the process to prepare the skeleton of a ten-foot gavial 
 in this manner. 
 
 * See Appendix. 
 
44 T^VO YIOAKS IN THE JUNGLE. 
 
 It i$ quite a task to skin a ton-foot saurian properly, and to pre- 
 Bcrve iho skin so successfuUy that none of the scales will slip ofi 
 when the time comes for the skin to be softened and stuffed. My 
 method, which I have practised successfully with the skins of eleven 
 species of crocodiles and alhgators, is as follows : For the sake 
 of science in general suid the taxidermist in particulai-, measiu-e the 
 crocodile carefully and record the dimensions. Divide the skin 
 along the xnulcr side, following the median line from the throat to 
 the tip of the tail, in one long straight cut. Beginning at the end 
 of each middle toe, divide the skin jilong the bottom of the foot and 
 tlie under side of the leg up to the point where the leg joins tlie 
 body, but no farther. Then begin at the edges of the first cut, and 
 hIuu as far down the sides of the body as possible. WTieu tlie legs 
 ni-e reached, detach tJiem from the body at hip and shoulder with- 
 out cutting the skin, and continue on around the body until the 
 back-bone is reached and the skin entirely detached. Sever tlie 
 head from the neck at the first cer-vical vertebra ■\^-ithout cutting 
 the skin. Skin out the tongue jmd remove the flesh from the pala- 
 tal apertures and ^-arious cavities of the head. Skin each leg by 
 turning the skin MTong side out until the toes ai-e reached. Leave 
 all the bones of each log attached to each other and to the skin it- 
 self at the toes, but cut away the flesh ctxi-efully, the same as in skele- 
 tonizing. Remove fi'om the skin as much as possible of tlie flesh 
 which will be fomid adhering to it. "When the skin is thoroughly 
 clean, immerse it in a strong bath of s;vlt and water and allow it to 
 remain twenty-four to thirty hours. Then take it out, rub the in- 
 side tmd the leg-bones thoroughly with strong arsenical soap, after 
 which apply powdered alum liberally over the inner s\u"face. so that 
 not a single spot is missed. Then luing the skin up by the head 
 ^^no danger of stretching in this easel, and allow it to dry in the 
 wind and ^hadc. "When almost htu-d and stiff take it do^^^l j\nd fold 
 it up as carofuUy as if it were a Sunday coat, so that it can be packed 
 in a box of ordinary dimensions. 
 
 "When Carlo and I began oiu- work upon the dead gaviiils. the 
 birds of prey beg"au to g^ather round us from all dii*ections. Doz- 
 ens of huge, ungainly vultures [Otogijps colvus), came tmd settled 
 down upon the s;uid within twenty yiu'ds of us, looking on with 
 givedy eyes. A httle farther away a huge flock of crows kept up an 
 incessiUit cawing as they watched their opportunity. A piiir of white 
 scavenger vultuivs {^Xeophron ^>eivnopterus). stood off' some distance, 
 while a score of hawks and kites swooped and ciicled above us. 
 
GAVIAL SHOOTING ON THE JUMNA. 45 
 
 We had fine sport in feeding the birds. We threw large pieces 
 of meat toward the vultures, upon which eight or ten of the fore- 
 most would rush forward, seize it with their beaks, and then such a 
 tumult ! Each one would try to swallow the meat before the others, 
 and their huge, horny beaks actually clanked together as they strug- 
 gled for the coveted flesh. Wings, legs, beaks, and talons were all 
 brought into use, and such flopping, pulling, and hauHng I never 
 saw before. Once a large old vulture seized a long piece of meat 
 dad started oS, swallowing as he ran. Half a dozen others imme- 
 diately gave chase, overhauled him when the meat was three-fourths 
 swallowed, and, fastening their beaks into the end which was ex- 
 posed, they pulled and hauled at it until they yanked the precious 
 morsel out of that poor vulture's throat and greedily devoured it 
 themselves, I never saw a more disgusted looking bird, and he 
 seemed utterly discouraged, too, for he gave his feathers a con- 
 temptuous shake and walked off by himself. 
 
 The crows would caw and peck at the meat thrown to them 
 until a party of greedy vultures would gallop over and gobble up 
 everything. We tossed small pieces of meat high up in the air, and 
 every time a hawk would come swooping down and clutch it with 
 a " spat " in his talons. They never missed their aim nor allowed 
 a piece of meat to descend to the earth again. Once a vulture 
 started to fly away with a piece of meat in his beak, but a hawk 
 was down upon him in an instant. They flew nearly a hundred 
 yards, fighting in mid-air, and at last both fell upon the sand strug- 
 gling fiercely and losing many feathers. The hawk whipped the 
 vulture, but by the time he had accomplished it the vulture had 
 swallowed the meat, leaving to his conqueror only the empty honor 
 of victory. 
 
 While we were at work, dozens of natives came to watch us, 
 and at one time there were about forty brown men and boys, naked 
 except their loin cloths, sitting upon their heels in a close group 
 near us, solemnly looking on. They talked very little and scarcely 
 asked us a question, which was a blessed relief. They did not ask 
 all about my private affairs, nor did they get up afterwards and 
 mob us, as that crowd of Irish yahoos did at the south end of Loch 
 Neagh when we were skeletonizing donkeys. 
 
 Both of our gavials were females. From the ovary of one we 
 took forty-one eggs, and forty-four from the other, which were so 
 fully developed that I blew them out successfully. In the stomach 
 of one we found three half-digested fishes of very good size, in the 
 
46 TWO YEARS IN THE JUNGLE. 
 
 other two, and four small, flat bits of broken earthen-ware. Even 
 as we worked there, several gavials came out upon a sand-bank not 
 more than a hundred and fifty jai'ds below us. 
 
 From that time forward we followed up very systematically the 
 plan of hunting we had inaugurated so successfully on the second 
 day among the gavials. My boatmen proved to be capital fellows 
 every way. They belonged to a hereditary boatman caste, and 
 knew all about na^-igatiug the Jumna. They were, without excep- 
 tion, the best watermen I ever had, always wilhug to do precisely as 
 they were asked, without any questioning or advice, and they never 
 tiied to thwart my plans, as most boatmen are prone to do. They 
 were always ready to " go on," "go back,"' or " go across," without 
 a word, and I beheve they would have scuttled the old craft and 
 sent her to the bottom if I had du'ected them to do so. They soon 
 found that there was no great danger in seizing a wounded gavial 
 by the tail, and by a judicious bestowal of praises and rewards I 
 managed to infuse into them a real espiit de corps, which increased 
 up to the last. In hunting gavials they ceased to be " gentle Hin- 
 doos," and became active, plucky men, as the following incident will 
 show : 
 
 We came one day to an isolated sand-bar out in the middle of 
 the river, near which there was absolutely no cover on either bank, 
 only wide sand-banks. But this isolated bai- was fi'equented by 
 two or three lai'ge gavials, and in order to get a shot, I dug a rifle- 
 pit and threw up a little embankment at the nearest point on the 
 shore. The men were posted as near as possible, while I took up 
 my position in the lifle pit and waited. It was about mid-day, just 
 when the sun was hottest Its rays beat fiercely down upon me as 
 I lay there in the hot sand, and soon heated my rifle barrel so that 
 I could not hold it unless I filled my hand with freshly dug sand. 
 I wore a solai- topee given me by Major Eoss, of which the pith was 
 a good inch in thickness, and which extended fai' down my back. 
 Without its protection I would probably have received a sunstroke 
 in less than an hour. 
 
 But, fortimately, we ai'e not condemned to endui'e that baking 
 process more than an hoiu". At last we see a black line, with an 
 eye at one end of it, lying upon the water out in the middle of the 
 stream. The eye looks about for a moment, and the black line 
 quietly sinks out of sight. Fifteen minutes later the same black 
 line comes up close to the sand-bai-, and we see that it is the upper 
 surface of a gavial's head. The old fellow looks about a moment^ 
 
GAVIAL SHOOTING ON THE JUMNA. 47 
 
 gathers confidence, and allows his body to float up to the top of the 
 water. His back and tail are now visible, and we carefully esti- 
 mate his length to within six inches. While we are thinking 
 about it, he gives a gentle sweep sidewise with his tail, and floats 
 forward till his snout touches the sand. Slowly and deliberately 
 he puts his best foot forward, raises the end of his snout, and lazily 
 slides up the sand until he is fairly out of the water, then he sHdes 
 slowly round to the left until he hes broadside to us. If he is a 
 httle suspicious, he turns \intil his head is toward the water again 
 and only a yard from it. He does not stand up on his feet and 
 walk ; he simply sHdes along in the laziest possible way. As he 
 settles down, he gives his tail a flirt to one side, draws his feet close 
 up to his body, and is soon sound asleep, though in appearance 
 only, and dreaming of young calves, big fish, and dead Hindoos. 
 
 Just as my intended victim cleared the water and showed me 
 his side, my rifle spoke, and his jaws flew open. Instantly four of 
 the boatmen rushed across the sand, jumped into the river, and 
 started to swim to the sand-bar. The gavial saw them coming, 
 mustered up his strength, and began to struggle toward the water. 
 I fired at him again but missed the vital spot, and the gavial re- 
 doubled his eflbrts to reach the water. I shouted to the men and 
 promised them four annas each (twelve cents, or two days' wages), 
 if they stopped that "ghariyal." They struggled through the 
 water faster than ever, but just as they touched bottom the gavial 
 reached the water. As he slid out of sight I yelled to the men that 
 I would give "eight annas ! " They rushed across the sand-bar, and 
 reached the further side just as the end of the gavial's tail disap- 
 peared, and I gave it up for lost. But they were not to be beaten 
 so easily. Two men jumped into the water above then- knees, 
 made a grab for the gavial's tail, caught it and held on, and in a 
 twinkling they dragged the huge reptile out of his native element 
 and to the middle of the sand-bar. The gavial was now fairly re- 
 covered and thoroughly roused, and I never saw a crocodile try so 
 viciously to bite his assailants. He was a large one too (measur- 
 ing 11 feet 6 inches), and the men had a fierce struggle to hold 
 him, and to keep from being bitten. I cheered them lustily, but 
 could do no more, for my last cartridge had been expended. Fort- 
 unately, one of the men had carried over with him a rope, and an- 
 other had taken a stout little bamboo, for just such an emergency. 
 At last the rope was slipped round one of the gavial's hind legs and 
 made fast to the bamboo, which was stuck in the sand, and the 
 
48 TWO YEARS IN THE JUNGLE. 
 
 C[uestion was settled. As soon as possible the boat was brought 
 down to ferry me across, and a pistol shot in the neck ended the 
 troublesome reptile. 
 
 But for the almost perfect accuracy of my little Maynard rifle 
 up to three hundred yards, my gavial hunt would have been almost 
 a total failure, for in only two or three instances did I succeed in get- 
 ting a shot at a less distance than one hundred yards. I loaded my 
 cartridges with the most scrupulous care, kept my rifle thoroughly 
 clean, and did my shooting as if I were firing at a target for a 
 prize. It often happened that my only chance to kill a gavial was 
 to fire across the river, from the high bank to the opposite sand- 
 bar. Under such circumstances I would leave three men on the 
 same side as the crocodile, and from my post on the oppo- 
 site side direct them by various signals where to take up a position. 
 Then at the signal they would sit down upon the hot sand and 
 wait patiently, hours if necessary, for further developments. I 
 would then take up my position, and with my field-glass carefully 
 examine the position of the crocodiles, and decide upon the exact 
 spot to fire at. After carefully estimating the distance, the di- 
 rection of the wind, and the amount of " windage " to allow the 
 bullet, I would adjust my peep-sight, lie flat upon the ground, and 
 rest my rifle upon the leather-case of my field-glass, or the top of my 
 solar topee. It was firing to hit a gray, horizontal line, the actual 
 mai'k to be struck being smaller than a man's arm. A long, care- 
 ful aim, a holding of the breath, a firm grip, a steady pull and a 
 sharp " bang," would be the climax of perhaps two or three hours 
 manoeuvring in the scorching sun. If all the gavials upon the op- 
 posite shore skurried into the river and plunged out of sight in a 
 twinkling, I made no further demonstration ; but if the jaws of the 
 lai'gest one flew wide open, I would spring to my feet, wave my 
 solar topee in a circle, and the men would jump up and rush across 
 the sand-bar to our victim. On one occasion I killed a gavial, measur- 
 ing 11 feet 6 inches, a large specimen, with my peep-sight elevated 
 for 225 yards, and the largest one I secured during my hunt on the 
 Jumna measured just 12 feet, and was killed at 200 yards, across the 
 river. From first to last I killed eight gavials by fii-ing across the 
 river at long range and hitting their spinal column. Once I was so 
 far from my game that when I fii'ed and overshot the mark the 
 gavials did not even take the water. I fii'ed again, and undershot, 
 and still they did not take alarm, but having now got the exact 
 range, a third shot struck one of the gavials and cut its spinal cord 
 
GAVIAL SHOOTING ON THE JUMNA. 49 
 
 squarely in two. That was the best shooting I have ever done with 
 a rifle, and it was a surprise even to myself. My success was due 
 mainly to the admirable qualities of my Maynard rifle, which was 
 always to be depended upon in time of greatest need. 
 
 The air was perfectly clear, for one thing, the light was usually 
 good, and my nerves were reasonably steady. 
 4 
 
CHAPTER y. 
 
 THE GANGETIC CROCODILE. 
 
 A Jolly Life. — Native Tenderness for the Gavial. — Eating the Flesh. — The Jum- 
 na swarming with Gavials. — A " Mass Meeting." — Loss of an Enormous 
 Specimen. — Maximum size Attained. — The Gavial's Place in Nature. — 
 Hahits and Characters of the Species. — General Observations on the Croco- 
 dilians. — Number of Eggs Deposited. — The Gavial not a Man-eater. — A 
 Ticklish Reptile. — Vocal Powers. 
 
 As I look back upon it thi-ougli the rose-tinted vista of memory, 
 it really seems that I never in my life spent another month of such 
 unalloyed happiness as that upon the Jumna. I was steadily gath- 
 ering in a bountiful harvest of ga"\dals, bii'ds, and mammals ; I had 
 glorious sport witlj both rifle and fowling-piece upon new and in- 
 teresting animals, and my surroundings were strange, romantic, 
 and agreeable. The weather was perfect. The nights were breezy 
 and cool, so that we needed to wrap up in our blankets as we slept 
 soundly under the awning of our boat, and there was not a single 
 mosquito, gnat, or sand-fly to annoy us. The mornings were soft 
 and balmy, the days were cloudless and hot, and there was not a 
 drop of rain to feai*. Although my boat was the clumsiest I ever 
 had, it was also the most comfortable and convenient. Under the 
 awning we had our boxes of provisions, preservatives, and tools, 
 ammunition, clothes, etc., all conveniently ai'ranged, while along 
 one side hung the fire-arms, always loaded, and the indispensable 
 field-glass ready at hand. Under one side of the awning we piled 
 up gaA^ial skeletons and skins, tied into compact bundles, and hung 
 up rough skeletons of birds. Down in the forward part of the 
 boat stood a large barrel of brine in which we soaked gavial skins, 
 and beside it was the Httle mud fire-place, where Carlo did a very 
 moderate amount of cooking for himself and me. He was fond 
 of shooting, and neai'ly every day would take one of my shot-guns 
 and wander off along the banks until he succeeded in shooting two 
 
THE GANGETIC CROCODILE. 61 
 
 or three doves or partridges for my dinner. I had roast dove or 
 partridge on toast nearly every day, and we had no other meat 
 during the trip than such as we shot. We killed geese, ducks, 
 and peacocks, which made excellent roasts and curries, and once I 
 shot a gazelle ("ravine deer"), upon a brushy sand-flat, the flesh 
 of which was very acceptable to us all. 
 
 There was ample room on the deck of the boat for us to work 
 at our specimens, and we skinned and skeletonized many a gavial 
 and large bird as we floated quietly along. "We could not hang our 
 crocodile skins under any shade, and so we tried hanging them on 
 the mast. By taking the skins down during the hottest part of the 
 day we managed to dry them very successfully, and as soon as they 
 were dry we folded them up. One day as we went floating down 
 the river with an eleven foot gavial skin suspended by the head 
 from the top of the mast, its legs held straight out by sticks, and 
 the jaws gaping wide open to allow a free circulation of air, we 
 saw some distance ahead of us three large gavials lying upon the 
 bank. Just beyond them were some natives washing at the river- 
 side. We began to lay our plans for making a kill, but suddenly 
 two of the natives caught sight of us, and guessing our purpose 
 from the emblem at the mast-head, they ran toward the gavials and 
 drove them into the water. We shouted angrily at them, and by 
 way of reply they threw stones at the gavials until their heads en- 
 tirely disappeared under the water, and were thus beyond our 
 reach. This was the only time I ever saw the natives show any 
 sympathy for the crocodiles. In some portions of India, however, 
 crocodiles are held sacred, and it would be safer to shoot a native 
 than one of those scaly reptiles. At Mugger Peer, eight miles 
 from Kurrachee, there is a large tank full of huge and ugly mug- 
 gers (Crocodilus bombifrons), which are regularly fed by priests 
 and held sacred. 
 
 Twice while we were on the Jumna, low-caste natives came to us 
 for the flesh of young gavials, which they declared they wanted to 
 eat. I have eaten roast crocodile in South America, where they 
 feed only upon fish, and the flesh was white, tender, free from 
 all disagreeable musky odors, and toothsome as the nicest roast 
 veal. 
 
 For about fifteen miles below Etawah the Jumna fairly swarms 
 with gavials, many of which are of monstrous size. Unlike all the 
 other saurians I ever hunted, they come out upon the sand-bars 
 very early in the morning, and are to be found there at aU hours 
 
52 TWO Y"FA"RS IX THE JrXGLT.. 
 
 of tlie day until almost sunset.* Indmdnals have their favorite 
 haunts, and unless disturbed the sjime crocodile ^vill return day 
 after day to the same sand-bank, as I have plainly seen by obser\'ing 
 those ^vhich were peculiarly marked. Several times I have seen 
 gavials swimming leisurely up and down the river over the same 
 com-se for an hoiu' at a time, appiu-eutly enjo^-ing a promenade. 
 GenersUly we found them upon the shore in groups of foiu" to six, 
 but of course many solitary individuals were seen. As a rule tJiey 
 were very shy, but several times after missing a certain animal of a 
 group, I have seen it take to the water at the sound of the ritie, but 
 almost immediately come oiit again, if we remained quietly hidden. 
 As an instance of their great numbers, I iind it recorded in my 
 note-book that in six hours we once counted twenty-four gavials 
 lying upon the siuid-banks. Once, while hidden behind a small 
 bush at the base of a clay clifl', \\'ith my rifle tmd field-glass in my 
 hand, I saw twelve gavials (not one of which was under ten feet in 
 length) ci-;xwl slowly out of the water, one after another, upon a 
 little isolated sand-bar which was no Lrrger thi\u a good-sized ero- 
 qxiet-gromid. Such a mass-meeting of saimans I never saw before 
 nor since. But here let me caution the next hiuiter, or naturalist, 
 who may \isit this locality, that in a few years' time conditions may 
 become so changed that not a dozen ga\'ials will be found in that 
 paxticular spot, wBere in March, 1S77, they existed iu scores. And 
 furthermore, during the wet season when the river is high and wide, 
 it may be dmost impossible to find gavials upon the banks in such 
 situations that they c;\ii be secm-ed.f 
 
 Although the hu'gest of the twenty-six gavials I shot and secured 
 measured only twelve feet, we Sixw three or fom- individuals which 
 
 * I attribute this to the ooUiness of the water, whioh is due to its sno\r}' 
 sources, and also to its swiftness and strong imderonrrents, which combine to 
 render life beneath its surface not entirely .sgreeable to a huy, heat-loving 
 aniuiiU. 
 
 f In order to give an idea of the seasons in which gavials may be succes;*- 
 fuUy hunted on the Ganges and Jumna, the following facts concerning the 
 rise and fsvll of the river may be useful. About May 1st, the snow water be- 
 gins to swell the river. The volume of this gradually increases until June 
 15th, when most of the sand-banks are covered. From the latter date until 
 October 1st, the river is frequently in high tlood, shooting is practically im- 
 possible, and navigation is diuigeroua. After this the water falls steadily until 
 Januiwy 1st, and from this date until May, there is a minimum of water in the 
 river, except during slight freshets caused by light rains in the lower Himalayas;. 
 From April 15th to October 1st the heat is dangervius to European constitutions 
 
THE GAISTGETIC CROCODILE. 63 
 
 must have been from fifteen to eighteen feet in length, or even 
 more. To my chagrin and disappointment I found after two or 
 three trials that a single bullet from my little Maynard rifle (cali- 
 bre .40, lai'ger calibres are made now), had not weight and force 
 enough to shatter the spinal-column of a seventeen-foot crocodile 
 at one hundred and fifty yards. Had I possessed a heavy rifle of 
 the same accuracy as my Maynard, we should have accounted for 
 two or three of them at least. 
 
 Once I found an old monster, beside which a ten-foot gavial 
 seemed entirely insignificant, sunning himself upon an isolated bar 
 in the middle of the river. I offered my men a nipee each if we 
 secured him, and fired at his neck. At the first shot his jaws flew 
 open, he lay quite still, and my men instantly plunged into the 
 river. I quickly reloaded and fired two more shots to make mat- 
 ters more sure, but in my eagerness and haste they must have 
 missed the vital spot, for when the old monster saw my boatmen 
 surging madly tlu-ough the water straight toward him, he put forth 
 all his strength, slid slowly down the sand into the river and disap- 
 peared. It was a bitter disappointment to us all, for we knew we 
 should never see him again. Although during that trip we shot a 
 number of gavials which must have died in the water, not one of 
 them ever came to the surface afterward. One small one, however, 
 did deliberately come out upon a bank and die there, the only in- 
 stance of the kind I ever saw. 
 
 Pliny states that if turmeric be fired into a crocodile's body he 
 AviU come out upon the sand to die, so Major Eoss sent me his 
 express rifle, and some turmeric, for me to make the experiment. 
 I filled some explosive bullets with it instead of detonating powder 
 and fired them at g•a^dals, but none of them ever came out of the 
 water after they had once got into it. I have heard of parties of 
 mighty hunters shooting " one hundred and twenty-eight alligators 
 a week in the St. Johns," and even of a hundred " shot " in a day ; 
 but be it remembered that these alligators were only shot at. 
 There is a world of difference between shooting (at) a crocodile 
 and securing it, and when your mighty hunter boasts of the great 
 number he " shot," ask him how many he got. 
 
 In the museum at Allahabad is a fine skeleton of a male gavial 
 which measures 17 feet in length as it stands. If we allow for the 
 shortening of the skeleton which has undoubtedly taken place in 
 mounting and drying, I think we may safely say that the ani- 
 mal when alive was 17 feet, 8 inches in length. In the Jardin 
 
54 T^VO YEARS IN THE JUNGLE. 
 
 des Plantes, Pai-is, there is a stuffed Gavialis Gangeficus, 20 feet, T 
 inches long, but that animal when ahve was appaa'ently an excep> 
 tionally slender one. The largest specimen in the British Miiseum 
 measiu'es only 1-4 feet, 9 inches. 
 
 My chief disappointment at faihng to secure one of the three 
 monster ga^ials that we saw, was owing to the fact that these 
 individuals were the only ones that possessed the sti-ange bony 
 knob at the end of the snout, which is peculiar to the lai'gest speci- 
 mens of this species. I particulai-ly desired to examine it upon a 
 living specimen, for the manner of its grovrth, and its uses, are as 
 yet a puzzle to naturalists. It is the development of the inner edge 
 of the premasillary bones into a lofty double knob of smooth bone, 
 nearly surrounding the external nostril. For my part, I believe it 
 to be a purely sexual characteristic, possessed only by those males 
 which have attained theu- full groT\-th, and reached an advanced 
 age. In my collection of twenty-six gavials, there were both males 
 and females of various sizes up to twelve feet, not one of which 
 showed the least sign of any unusual development of the premaxil- 
 laries. A skull which was kindly presented me by Mr. Palmer, of 
 Etawah, and which according to my calculations, belonged to an 
 animal thirteen feet in length, also showed no signs of the "boss" 
 upon the snout. 
 
 The gavial, or«" ghariyal " of the Hindoos {Gavialis Gangeticus, 
 Geoff.), stands at the head of the order Saui'ia (Crocodihans), which 
 includes the gavials of India and Borneo, the crocodiles of both the 
 old world and the new, the alHgators and caimans of America only. 
 Generally speaking, the main points of difference between crocodiles 
 and alligators are as follows : a crocodile (of any species) is distin- 
 guished by a triangular head, of which the snout is the apex, a nar- 
 row muzzle, and canine teeth in the lower jaw which pass freely up- 
 ward in the notches in the side of the upper ; whereas an aUigator 
 (;ilso caiman or jacai-e) has a broad fiat muzzle, and the canine teeth 
 of the lower jaw tit into sockets in the under siu'face of the upper jaw. 
 
 The gavial has very slender and elongated jaws, with an ex- 
 panded end, quite like the handle of a fi-ying-pan, smooth and com- 
 pact, set with twenty-seven teeth in each side of the upper jaw and 
 twenty-five in the lower. The lower large front teeth pass upwai-d 
 entirely thi'ough two holes at the extremity of the snout, but all the 
 remaining teeth are wholly free upon the sides, slanting well out- 
 wai-d, and in young specimens they are so prominent and sharp that 
 it is unpleasant to gi-asp the muzzle in the naked hand. 
 
THE GANGETIC CEOCODILE. 55 
 
 From the gavial, which has the narrowest muzzle of all the 
 crocodilians, all .the known species of crocodiles, caimans, and 
 jacares, can be arranged in a regular series according to the width 
 of their muzzles, leading by regular gradations down to the alH- 
 gator, which has the broadest muzzle of all, inasmuch as the sides 
 are nearly parallel from the angle of the jaw to the canine teeth. 
 
 The Indian gavial inhabits all the large rivers of Northern India, 
 the Ganges up to Hurdwar, nine hundred and eighty-three feet 
 above the sea, the Jumna, Sard ah, Indus, Brahmapootra and their 
 tributaries, but does not occur anywhere in Southern India, nor 
 Burmah. Another species of gavial, called by Dr. Gray, Tomistoma 
 schlegellii, is found in Borneo, but nowhere else so far as we know at 
 present. The mugger ( Crocodilus hombifrons), inhabits all India 
 from the foot of the Himalayas where the water is often frozen,* 
 almost to Cape Comorin. I saw only one small specimen of this 
 species in the Jumna, and as it lay upon a sand-bar close beside 
 some gavials, the points of difference between the two were very 
 striking. I observed it long and carefully with a powerful field- 
 glass, and fully satisfied myself as to its identity. The gavial looked 
 smooth and yellow, whereas the little mugger had a very rugose 
 appearance, and in color was of a dirty gray. When he left the 
 water he deliberately walked out upon the sand, and when I finally 
 fired at him he sprang up on his feet, and ran across the bar into 
 the water, in doing which he more nearly resembled a huge iguana 
 than a crocodile. I examined the spot directly afterward, and be- 
 sides the tracks left by his feet there was only a broken mark where 
 the tip of his tail had touched the sand as he ran. Out of perhaps 
 four hundred and fifty to five hundred gavials, crocodiles, and alli- 
 gators which I have watched getting from the land into the water, 
 only four have stood up on their legs and run. This mugger was 
 one, and another was a Mississippi alligator, which I afterward 
 killed, and found to be in a very emaciated condition, owing to the 
 fact that nearly half of its upper jaw had been bitten off, and it had 
 apparently experienced great difficulty in capturing its prey. 
 
 Gavials are the smoothest of all the large crocodilians it has 
 been my privilege to handle as Hving specimens, i.e., aU the Ameri- 
 can species save one, and three in the East Indies. They are also 
 the brightest in color. Lying upon the sand at a distance of two 
 hundred yards, their bodies often seem to be of a uniform dull 
 
 * Gray. 
 
56 TWO YEARS IN THE JUNGLE. 
 
 chrome yellow, but in reality the entire upper surface of the animal, 
 from snout to tail, is of a uniform olive green, mottled with the 
 former color. Of course the older individuals lose the original 
 brightness of their coloring with advancing age. The under sur- 
 faces ai-e aU pale yellow, the iris is green frosted with black, while 
 the pupil is a very narrow, perpendicular black line. 
 
 It would appear probable from the examination of some of our 
 specimens, that the number of eggs deposited by a female gavial 
 depends upon her size. One of our specimens, 9 feet in length, 
 contained 15 eggs almost ready to be deposited, another measiu'ing 
 10 feet contained 30 eggs, while two measuring between 11 and 12 
 feet contained 41 and 44 eggs respectively. As nearly as I could 
 estimate, all these eggs would have been ready for the sand by 
 about April 1st. As with the eggs of all saurians, these were sub- 
 cylindrical, and pure white. 
 
 E^'idently gavials are not man-eaters, or rather man-catchers, 
 else they would certainly have cai'iied off some of my boatmen. 
 Upon many occasions they swam the river as feaiiessly as though 
 not a saui-ian existed in it, whereas they actually swarmed there. 
 The natives who live along the river also assm-ed me the ghai'iyals 
 never caught men. The stomachs of all those I dissected contained 
 only the remains of fishes, and I looked in vain for pieces of dead 
 Hindoos. StiU, it l^s not improbable that gavials devour the bodies 
 of defunct natives who are thi-own into the river after undergoing 
 a mock cremation, such as I shall describe further on. 
 
 Although the skin of a lai-ge gavial is veiy thick, and the entire 
 back is covered with bony plates neai-ly a quarter of an inch thick, 
 it is still as sensitive to touch as the bottom of a man's foot. Often 
 when watching gavials that lay apparently sound asleep upon the 
 sand, I have seen them suddenly reach a leg backward or forward 
 to kick off a fly that had alighted upon them. A 9-foot female 
 which I captured was exceedingly ticklish upon the back and sides. 
 Although my shot had broken her neck and she lay apparently 
 dead, the hghtest scratch with the finger-nail upon her sides or 
 dorsal scales caused her to flinch and squirm violently. Even the 
 tip of a crow's feather drawn lightly along between the rows of 
 doi-sal scales, or across the thin skin of the flanks was attended with 
 the same result. 
 
 Wounded gavials oft^n bawl aloud like calves, when seized by 
 their captors, a thing I have never known any other crocodiles to 
 do. One of oui" largest specimens, a female 11 feet 6 inches long, 
 
THE GANGETIC CROCODILE. 57 
 
 made the most determined resistance of any, and bawled aloud 
 more than a dozen times while struggling with her assailants. It 
 has been asserted that crocodiles are voiceless, but this is certainly 
 not the case with Gavialis Gangeticus. Nor is it true of the Orinoco 
 crocodUe {Crocodilus intermedius), as I know by a personal en- 
 counter with an old male nearly 12 feet in length, who turned 
 upon me with a deep guttural snarl like a dog as I attempted to 
 seize him by the taiL 
 
CHAPTER VI. 
 
 ANIMAL LIFE ALONG THE JUMNA. 
 
 Boating on tlie Jumna. — A Long Prayer. — Tlie Saras Crane. — Queer Antics. — 
 The Jabiru. — Nests of the Scavenger Vulture. — Peacocks. — A Jungle Cat 
 Surprised. — The Jackals' Serenade. — Turtles. — The Gangetic Porpoise. — 
 Native Villages. — The People. — Female Ugliness. — Friends and Foes. — A 
 Native Funeral. — Cremation a mere Form, — An Adjutant Shot. — Goodbye 
 to the River. 
 
 "We worked on down the Jumna until we readied the mouth of 
 the river Chumbul, which flows into it from the south. Here the 
 banks began to grow muddy, and almost destitute of both gavials 
 and birds, so we decided to work back up towai'd Etawah. Com- 
 ing do^^^l the river is a very easy matter, for it is only necessaiy to 
 steer the boats, but going up, the boatmen have to tow them 
 against a current running from two to three miles per horn*. We 
 often mot large boats laden with wheat floating rapidly do^v^Ti, 
 steered mth long sweeps, hke lumber rafts. Many others passed 
 up the river empty, some of which requu-ed ten to twenty men to 
 tow them. It was a sti'ange sight to see one of those huge, clumsy 
 crafts coming round a bend in the river mth fifteen to twenty long, 
 slender grass lines radiating from the top of the mast, like a beam 
 of Hght faUing fai- ahead upon a long line of nearly naked Hindoos 
 toiling slowly along the bank. 
 
 One night we tied up to the shore near one of these grain-boats, 
 anti in the still small hours of the morning, we heai-d a Hindoo 
 say his prayers. It was one of the boatmen, lying comfortably 
 stretched out on the bags of the wheat, who was pei-haps wake- 
 ful towai'd morning and took occasion to indulge in a season of 
 prayer. Shortly after three o'clock we were awakened from a 
 sound sleep by this boatman's singing out " /S'ite-Ram-a-<S'ifa-Eam-a- 
 ;Si^rt-Hiim-a-(S'jto-Eam-a-(S'ito-Eam," which was kept up with shght 
 variations imtil morning. There was a kind of sameness to this 
 
ANIMAL LIFE ALONG THE JUMNA. 59 
 
 however, so at the end of about every fifteen minutes he would dash 
 off into a variation of " Ram -Eam-Bam-Kam-Eam," which always 
 afforded us quite a rest, prior to the next instalment of ^' Sila- 
 Eam." Sleep was out of the question so long as that perform- 
 ance continued. I could not count the fellow's prayers, but I 
 timed him and ciphered out the number in that way. He began 
 to pray at twenty minutes past three o'clock and kept it up until 
 ten minutes to five ; and during that time he uttered the name of 
 Rama and his consort at least once every second, which made sixty 
 prayers to the minute, or altogether about five thousand four hun- 
 dred prayers that morning before breakfast. All very well in its 
 way ; but after that we took care not to tie up near any other boat, 
 lest another boatman should be taken with Sita-Ram in the middle 
 of the night. 
 
 On the way up the river we devoted much of our time to col- 
 lecting large birds, which frequented the river in greater variety 
 and greater numbers than I ever saw in any one locality. 
 
 Saras cranes fed in pairs in the fields, along the banks, or stalked 
 majestically over the sand-bars in flocks of six to thirty. Except- 
 ing the large snow-white whooping crane of America (Grus Araeri- 
 canua) the saras crane [Grus antigone) is the largest and hand- 
 somest of the genus. The saras stands over four feet high, and 
 is of a pale bluish color, except the head and nape, which are al- 
 most bare and of a dark crimson tinge. On the uplands they 
 nearly always go in pairs, and although their cry sounds at first like 
 the note of one bird, it is in reality a double cry made up of a low 
 short note from the female, immediately taken up and improved 
 upon by the male. The second cry always follows the first in- 
 stantly, and it requires sharp Avatching for a stranger to detect the 
 true manner in which it is made. It is, as a whole, very loud and 
 clear, and would be noted musically about as follows : 
 
 ^m 
 
 with the interval of the fifth much slurred. 
 
 These cranes sometimes cut some of the queerest antics ever 
 indulged in by sober and dignified birds. Several times I have 
 seen a whole flock indulge in a regular dance upon a level sand- 
 bank. While the birds are idly stepping about, one suddenly 
 flaps his long wings several times in succession, another jumps 
 straight into the air, and, with one accord, they throw ofl' their dig- 
 
CO TWO YEARS IN THE JUNGLE. 
 
 iiity for tlio time being aud the fun begins. Some stand still and 
 flap their wings, others jnmp straight up and down — one jump 
 after another — as high as they ctui go, often springing three feet 
 from the ground ; others run about, bowing and bobbing to each 
 other, courtesying with half-opened wings, their breasts low down 
 and tails high in the air, cutting the most ridiculous figures imagin- 
 able. 
 
 The saras, like most of the large cranes and herons, fights des- 
 perately when wounded, and is not to be approached with impu- 
 nity. I once winged a large male bird, aud when my boatmen ran 
 forwiU'd to seize him he struck out so dangerously with his long, 
 shai'p bill and unwounded wing that ho actually kept the men at 
 bay, until Iran up from behind, seized him by the head, and quickly 
 thrust a slender knife-blade through the occiput into the brain, 
 which instantly ended the life of the noble bird. Usuall}^ I was 
 obliged to shoot the sai-as at one hundred yards, with my rifle, but 
 upon finding that they suftered the natives to approach them much 
 nearer than me, I killed several with my shot-gun by getting be- 
 hind the boatmen as tliey went slowly forward along the bank in 
 towing the boat. Once or twice we found the sai-as and the small 
 common crtuie {Grus nnerea) flocking sociably together. 
 
 We saw two pairs of jabiru {Jfyctena Au.^frolis), but they were 
 exceedingly wju-y" at this season, never alighting near the slightest 
 cover of any kind, and never allowing me to approach within less 
 than two hundred yards. One of these birds sm-prised us one day 
 by deliberately sitting do^\^l upon his tju'si to tiike a rest. I tried 
 to bring one down with the rifle, but failed. We foimd the black 
 ibis {Genviticus popillosus), probing in the sand along the water s 
 edge, also an occasional stork ( Ciconia alha), and lai'ge egret {Hei'o- 
 dius alba). 
 
 Birds of prey were abundant, among which was the white scav- 
 enger vulture {Neophron percnopterus). This bii'd happened to 
 be nesting at that time (April 10th), and although Jerdon informs 
 us it usually builds in trees, we here found its nests in the most 
 inaccessible places it could possibly select, Invai-iably, indeed, 
 we foimd its nest placed upon a naiTow ledge against the side of a 
 perpendicular bluft', iisually just about midway from top to bottom, 
 and not to be reached at all vrithout the aid of a rope. As was the 
 case Avith seizing the wounded gix%'iiU by the tixil, my boatmen 
 needed first to be shown how to reach a nest by means of a 
 rope. 
 

 ^ f , h 
 
 m^^i»i.v :.is 
 
 I'teW 
 
 BIRD-NESTING- ON THE JUMNA. 
 
 (From a sketch by the Author, , 
 
ANIMAL LIFE ALONG THE JUMNA. 61 
 
 We found the first nest against the side of a cHff, about forty 
 feet from the ground and thirty from the top, killed the old bird 
 upon the nest, and then we wanted the eggs. As I expected, ray 
 men were each afraid to be let down from above, so I went myself. 
 When I had put one leg through a loop tied firmly at the end of 
 our strongest rope, four of my men lowered me over the top of the 
 bank and slowly paid out the rope, until I reached the nest and 
 stood safely on the narrow ledge, upon which it was built. It con- 
 tained two eggs of a dirty gray color, minutely dotted over with 
 dull brownish red. One of them measured 2.65 inches by 1.90. 
 
 The nest was a remarkable conglomeration of materials. The 
 groimdwork was an armful of twigs from the thorny acacia, some 
 of great size considering the smallness of the bird, and upon this 
 was laid a bunch of long, black Hindoo hair (cut from the head of 
 some man going into mourning), a square foot of dried goat-skin, a 
 human humerus, buffalo and goat's hair, cotton in small quanti- 
 ties, a dorsal plate, two metacarpal bones, and eight inches of cau- 
 dal vertebras from some of our gavials, the back of a sheep's skull, 
 an assorted lot of rope fragments, and rags of every color and de- 
 gree of dirtiness. No wonder the builder of such a nest is called 
 the scavenger vultvu'e. 
 
 The next time we found a nest, the boatmen let down the rope 
 from the top of the chff to the bottom, and one who was drawn 
 from below up to the nest, put the eggs into the empty case belong- 
 ing to my field-glass, and lowered them down safely. This stout 
 leathern case made an excellent receptacle for bird's eggs when 
 hung over the shoulders of a man hanging against the face of the 
 cliff. 
 
 A few yards from the vultui'e's nest, stuck against the cliff like 
 a huge honey-comb of mud, was a cluster of about thirty nests of 
 the Indian cliff swallow {Lagenoplastes fiumcola). The proprietors 
 of the place were at home, and in their breeding season. By the 
 aid of the rope we soon reached the colony of retort-shaped, tube- 
 mouthed nests, and secured a goodly number of eggs. The num- 
 ber of eggs in a nest was usually three, although four were found 
 together more than once, aU pure white. 
 
 Wherever the deep and barren ravines came down to the river, 
 peacocks were numerous, and we often heard their piercing cry of 
 " pee-goo-ee " ringing from the tops of the barren ridges. Late in 
 the evening they would appear upon the tops of the cHffs, poise 
 upon the edge, and launching off one by one, fly across the river 
 
62 TWO TEAKS IX THE JUKGLE. 
 
 into the low wheat fields upon the opposite side to feed unmolested 
 until morning. At sunrise they would fly back again and disappear 
 in the ravines. We shot several for their skeletons and two splen- 
 did males for their- skins, expecting trouble with the natives almost 
 any day on this account, for the peacock is a sacred bird among 
 the Hindoos, It is not worshipped as a god, but it serves as a 
 thi'oue for the god Eama, and is thus held sacred. 
 
 The peacock is a bone of contention between the English soldiers 
 in the Xorth-TVest Province and the Hindoos. The soldiers go out 
 hunting and shoot peacocks, for which the natives attempt to mob 
 them, and it is said that they seldom go out shooting without get^ 
 ting into a row and perhaps shootiag a native. Carlo found where 
 a flock of peacocks roosted in a large banyan tree, and killed sev- 
 erd. At Last the natives came down to us and humbly begged, as 
 a personal favor to themselves, that we would not kill ''' any more of 
 those poor fellows that never did anything bad, but only ate a httle 
 wheat ; " and so we promised to desist. 
 
 One day we found a pair of rose-winged paroquets [Palceornis 
 iorquafus), which occupied a hole in a bank similar to the nest 
 of a kingfisher. One bii-d came out of the biuTOw and ahghted 
 upon a small bush near the mouth beside its mate. "We shot both 
 of them for speicmens and then chmbed up to look for eggs. The 
 hole extended horizontally into the bank in neai'ly a sti-aight line, 
 two inches in diameter, and we thi'ust in a stout stick eight feet 
 long without reaching the end. This was the longest stick we 
 could procure, and we decided not to attempt to follow up the 
 buiTOW by digging. Up to that time, I never heard of this bird 
 bun-owing in a bank like a king-fisher, for they almost iuvaiiably 
 nest in holes in ti-ees. 
 
 Besides twenty-eight impoi-tant species of birds, we also found 
 some small mammals along the banks of the Jumna. As I sat under 
 the awning, skinning a saras crane while the boatmen towed us up 
 stream. Carlo pointed out a small vdld animal ti-otting along the 
 opposite bank of the river. I could not make out what it was 
 without the gLass, but determined to take a shot at it for luck. 
 Putting my peep-*ight up to one hundred and seventy -five yards, 
 I got down in the bottom of the boat, rested my lifle firmly upon 
 the edge, and without stopping the boat, blazed away. To the as- 
 tonishment of us all, especially myself, the httle beast on the oppo- 
 site side fell down, rolling over and over, kicking and growling 
 furiouslv. A native on the other bank ran to seize it and held it 
 
ANIMAL LIFE ALONG THE JUMNA. 63 
 
 cautiously until we crossed over. It proved to be a jungle cat 
 {Felis chaus). Height at shoulders 14 inches, length of head and 
 body 26 inches, tail 9 inches. 
 
 Jackals [Canis aureus), were numerous in the ravines along the 
 river, and some of the night concerts with which they favored us 
 were highly entertaining, to say the least. Twice in particular, I 
 remember that as the sun went down, and darkness closed in rapid- 
 ly, the jackals all around us broke out into a perfect concert of 
 agonized yelping and yaw-yawing, so ludicrous that we all laughed 
 outright. The cry of a jackal is an abominable chopped-up yell, 
 haK howl, half bark. 
 
 Upon opening my eyes one morning I saw a saucy and inquisi- 
 tive jackal sitting coolly upon the top of the bank, looking down 
 into our boat, apparently studying the internal economy of our old 
 floating slaughter-house. As I reached for my rifle he gracefully 
 retu-ed, and I stole quickly but quietly up the bank. Reaching 
 the top I failed to see him, and sat down to pull various thorns out 
 of the bottoms of my feet. While thus engaged I espied a dark 
 gray object across a little ravine, sitting quietly upon a little mound, 
 watching me with the greatest curiosity. It was my morning 
 caller. It was hardly light enough to see my sight, but I fired at 
 him from where I sat. He fell down, but jumped up with a pro- 
 fane growl, remarking that that was a pretty way to treat a visitor, 
 and disappeared in the ravines. An hour later one of my men 
 found him lying dead under a bush, shot through the liver. Carlo 
 watched one night near the carcass of a gavial, and killed another 
 specimen with my No. 10 shotgun. 
 
 Two species of turtle, Batagur thurgii and Trionyx Gangeticus, 
 were abundant in the river, especially the latter. Above Allahabad 
 we saw this large, soft-shelled variety in great numbers, and of very 
 large size, lying upon the sand at the water's edge, with their long, 
 skinny necks stretched high in air. Below Etawah, also, we saw 
 them frequently, and several times I tried to break their necks with 
 a buUet, but without success. A good net would have been more 
 useful than fire-arms. One day we were fortunate enough to find 
 a large female Batagur thurgii out in the middle of a sand-bar, 
 whither she had crawled to deposit her eggs. We cut off her re- 
 treat toward the water and she fell an easy prey. She weighed 
 thirty-two pounds, and from her ovary we took twenty-five fully de- 
 veloped eggs. 
 
 There was another animal in the river which I desired above 
 
64 TWO YEARS IN THE JUNGLE. 
 
 everything else, but of Avhicli I was unable to obtain a single speci* 
 men. It was the Platanista Gangetica, or fresh-water porpoise, nu- 
 merous in the Ganges, Jumna, Gogra, and Brahmapootra, but ex- 
 ceedingly rare in museums on account of the difficulty of capturing 
 it. Professor Ward wished me to capture specimens, if it could 
 possibly be accomplished during the time we had allotted to that 
 region, but without a long net and a light boat it was impossible. 
 Had I but known the situation, I would have brought a stout net a 
 hundred and fifty feet long, and ropes and hai'poons in plenty, by 
 the aid of which we could have captured Flafanista enough for 
 all the great museums of America and Europe, As matters stand 
 at present, the scientists of Calcutta vainly oifer the fishermen of 
 the Ganges £5 each for specimens. "We saw dozens of them in 
 the Jumna below Etawah, passing up and down, appearing at the 
 surface every forty or fifty yards as they swam along, rising for a 
 second only to instantly disappear. It would have been folly to 
 fire at them, for after a long series of trials on the coast of Florida 
 and in the Orinoco I am convinced that porpoise shooting is a delu- 
 sion and a snare. No animal that I ever hunted has baffled me 
 like the fresh-water porpoise {Inia) of the Orinoco, and the Platanis- 
 ta. With experienced Venezuelan fishermen to help me, I have 
 tried time after time to harpoon and to shoot Inia, but without 
 success. They do not stupidly play around the bows of one's boat 
 as marine porpoises do, inviting hai-poons into their vitals ; they 
 simply rise for a moment, now here, now yonder, anywhere except 
 just where you expect them. When I go to the Jumna again I will 
 take a net, stretch it across the river according to a certain plan, 
 and then have my revenge. 
 
 Villages were numerous along the river, and, in the coiu'se of 
 oui' bird-hunting, we had occasion to visit or pass through a num- 
 ber of them, usually to procure a di'ink of water. We were always 
 received very civilly by the natives, and some one would be deputed 
 to bring us a clean bi-ass chat tie full of fresh water. 
 
 But woe unto us had we had the ignorance or the audacity to 
 put one of their vessels to oiu- lips. It would have been worse de- 
 filed than if a hog had stuck his snout into it, and no matter 
 whether the vessel were of cheap earthenware or brass of high 
 value, it would have to have been broken in pieces, thrown into the 
 river, or melted down. Ordinarily the Christian traveller bends 
 down, puts both hands to his mouth so as to form a trough into 
 which the water is pom*ed from the chattie held aloft, and so the 
 
ANIMAL LIFE ALONG THE JUMNA. 65 
 
 stream is conducted into the mouth. I always kept a clean com- 
 partment in my leather cartridge-bag which, when filled with water, 
 served me as well as a drinking-cup. 
 
 The villages were built of mud and thatched with straw, the 
 houses huddled closely together in a higgledy-piggledy waj, win- 
 dowless, often doorless, and with mother earth for a floor. At 
 midday they are hot as ovens. How wretchedly filthy they must 
 be during the rainy season, when all this dust is turned into liquid 
 mud, and rain drips through every roof. 
 
 In one of these river villages, at the foot of a tree which seemed 
 to be used as a shrine, I came suddenly upon a sculptured stone 
 image which almost took my breath away. Like Mark Twain in 
 the Jardin Mabille, I covered my face with my hands — but I looked 
 between my fingers. It was about two feet long, very neatly 
 scidptured, but the subject was the most obscene that could be 
 imagined. And this emblem of purity (?) the villagers reverence, 
 I suppose. Verily the Hindoos have queer tastes. 
 
 The native men were, as a rule, very good looking, and their 
 features were as regular, symmetrical, and finely cut as those of 
 Europeans. If they were white they would mako handsome Ital- 
 ians. Physically they are, as a rule, lean, lank, and poorly mus- 
 cled, which is due to their living a Hfe of perpetual hunger. No 
 wonder they are naturally timid and cowardly, or that one vigo- 
 rous, beef-eating white man can overawe a multitude. In civil life 
 this is actually the case, for we behold 130,886 English men and 
 women occupying the country and ruling 191,307,070 natives — 
 only one white person to every 1,461 natives, every one of whom 
 would gladly see the English thrust out of India, but they do not 
 dare say so. The natives have a saying that if every native in India 
 would throw only a handful of dust upon the nearest Englishman, 
 every one of them would be buried. 
 
 "Whenever I chanced to meet a woman in any of those villages, 
 she invariably pulled a corner of her mantle across her face and 
 turned her head aside, as if she were ashamed for such ugliness to 
 be seen. It was certainly very considerate of them, for they were 
 almost as homely as buffaloes. Somehow it seemed that all the 
 women were old, wrinkled, and skinny, and all the females who 
 were not, were the little girls. 
 
 The natives were kind to us, after a fashion, in occasionally 
 bringing us milk, for which they refused all pay. I would gladly 
 believe they did this out of pure friendUness, but we must give 
 5 
 
66 TWO YEARS IN THE JUNGLE. 
 
 the devil his due. Those who brought us milk were herdsmen, 
 Brahmins who worship kine, and they believe that by making gifts 
 of milk (with a deposit of black dirt at the bottom) to strangers, 
 they will call down blessings upon their flocks and herds. Major 
 Eoss had so little faith in the dealings of the natives with a stranger 
 unused to their ways and unsupported by any shadow of authority, 
 that he sent one of his private peons to keep me company on the 
 river, remarking that a brass plate with the Government stamp 
 upon it often possessed great virtue in bringing surly natives to 
 terms. He referred to the badge worn by all Government peons 
 (messengers or guards), a brass plate engraved with the name of 
 the department and worn upon the front of a colored sash. We 
 were not long in finding out the vii'tues of the brass plate. I sent 
 Carlo and Wazir, the peon, up to a village bazaar one day to buy 
 some flour. They found where it was for sale and asked for a 
 certain quantity, but with an earthen pot full of flour standing in 
 plain view, the gentle Hindoo stoutly declared he had none to sell 
 at any price. My men pointed to the flour and said they had just 
 seen him sell some of it to a woman and take the money, but he 
 sulkily refused to sell any to them. He had probably heard of 
 my shooting peacocks and saras cranes (also sacred to the Hindoos), 
 and he thought ho have a little revenge. But the brass plate 
 brought him around very soon. We always procured our drinking 
 water from the village wells, and Wazir always accompanied the 
 water jar* to make sui'e of getting it filled. Once the villagers de- 
 manded pay for the water, a most unheard of proceeding, but the 
 peon caused them to withdraw their claim almost as soon as it was 
 made. 
 
 We noticed several human skulls bleaching upon the sand-bars 
 in the river, and just below Etawah we witnessed a Hindoo fu- 
 neral. The procession came filing along the bank, about twenty 
 low-caste men, four of whom bore the coi'pse on a litter on their 
 shoulders. They wore their ordinary business suits, simple waist- 
 cloths only, some carried straw, one carried an armful of wood, 
 and all chanted a monotonous dirge. They reached a spot close 
 to a ruined temple where the bank almost overhung the water, and 
 the current was both deep and swift. There were bai-e, black spots 
 upon the edge of the bank, as if the same ceremony for which 
 they had come had often been performed there before. 
 
 A bed of sti-aw was spread close to the edge of the bank and 
 the corpse laid upon it. The body was wi'apped fi'om head to foot 
 
ANIMAL LIFE ALONG THE JUMNA, 67 
 
 in a red cotton cloth. Then more straw was piled upon the body 
 and a very little wood upon that, after which one of the rela- 
 tives touched a lighted match to the straw. The mourners sat 
 down upon their heels in a group to windward of the pile, and 
 chatted sociably while they watched it burn. The wind was 
 strong and it burned fiercely for about three minutes, then very 
 moderately for about ten more, by the end of which time the fuel 
 was all consumed. Then the mom^ners arose, dipped water from 
 the river and drowned out the fire ; the corpse lay there almost 
 intact, and we all saw that it was a woman. The limbs were 
 drawn up and the face contorted, the hair was burned away, and 
 the entire remains were black and hideous, yet only the skin and 
 hair were burned. Presently one mourner put a stout stick 
 under the neck, another put another stick under the hips, and at 
 the word the carcass was tumbled over the edge of the bank and 
 fell into the water with a loud splash. A few yards further down 
 it reappeared at the surface for a moment ; upon which one of the 
 cremators reached out with his stick and pushed it under, after 
 which we saw it no more. Not more than ten yards below that 
 we saw the heads of two large gavials that floated at the surface, 
 watching the proceedings with evident interest 
 
 AU the ashes and bits of wood were thrown into the river and 
 the spot washed clean, after which the mourners took their depart- 
 ure. The Jumna never seemed so filthy and repulsive as at that 
 moment, and I was glad I never drank from it. 
 
 That body-burning was a mere shallow pretence, and might 
 just as well have been dispensed with, for all it amounted to in 
 reality. But religion is religion, and the form, at least, must be, 
 carried out.* 
 
 In some portions of India, where fuel is exceedingly scarce and 
 dear, the poorest of the low-caste natives fulfil the letter of their 
 religion by simply putting a live coal upon the tongue of the corpse, 
 and they call this " burning." After all, is not that as sensible and 
 complete a "burning," as a few drops of water sprinkled upon one's 
 head is a "baptism," or "burial" with Christ? To my mind one 
 is no less absurd than the other. 
 
 Upon reaching Etawah again we stopped at the wide sand-bar 
 opposite the bathing-ghaut, and while at work with our specimens, 
 
 * Natives who are sufficiently wealthy provide fuel enough to entirely con- 
 sume the body, so that nothing remains after cremation except a few pieces 
 of calcined bone. 
 
68 TWO YEAES IN THE JUNGLE. 
 
 a fine adjutant {Leptoptilus argala) came winging his heavy flight 
 across the river and alighted upon the sand within a hundred and 
 fifty yards of us. Standing upon that barren level he seemed of co- 
 lossal size, and his legs were as white as if they had recently been 
 white-washed. I had with me a boy named Jungi, whom Major 
 Eoss had sent to shoot birds for me, who was a very good shot. 
 Knowing that the adjutant would never suffer me to approach him 
 nearer than one hundred yards or so, I prepared to shoot him 
 fith my rifle, but Jungi asked me to leave the bird to him. He 
 took his gun and walked deliberately across the sand, as if he 
 would pass the adjutant within about fifty yax'ds. The old bird 
 saw a native coming, but did not dream of a trick, and stood still 
 until Jungi reached the point nearest him, threw up his gun, and 
 dropped him dead in his tracks. Upon skinning and dissecting 
 this specimen we found an entu*e dog in its crop, a small animal 
 of course, but still as large as a full-sized domestic cat, weighing 
 perhaps five pounds. The lower mandibles of the adjutant are 
 thin and springy, and e^'idently capable of spreading widely when 
 necessary. No wonder these birds ai*e such efficient scavengers, 
 or that in Calcutta they are protected by law. 
 
 But at last we were done v^ith the Jumna. In three weeks we 
 had killed 26 gavials, for which we had to show 15 skins, 7 skele- 
 tons, and 4 skuUs, besides many skins and rough skeletons of large 
 birds. My experience on the river had been simply dehghtful, and 
 I turned away from it with a feeling of sincere regret. 
 
CHAPTER VII. 
 
 RAVINE DEER AND BLACK BUCK HUNTING. 
 
 An Invitation. — Aspect of the Country. — Major Ross's Camp. — A Luxurious Es* 
 tabllshment. — The Jumna Ravines. — The ' ' Ravine Deer. " — A Day's Sport. 
 — Fifteen Gazelles and aNil-Gai. — The Sasin Antelope or " Black Buck." — 
 Animal Pests — Another Hunt with Major Ross. — Interesting Sport. — A 
 Narrow Escape. — A Stern Chase at Mid-day. — Eight Antelopes Gathered in. 
 — A Holiday at Agra. — The Taj Mehal, of course. — Taj-struck Travellers. — 
 The Trees of the North.- West Provinces. 
 
 Having completed my work on the river, I received a veiy cor- 
 dial invitation from Major and Mrs. Ross to visit them at their 
 camp, thirty-five miles below Etawah, and spend a week in hunting 
 the Indian gazelle, which quite abounded in the neighboring ra- 
 vines. Accordingly, Carlo and I packed up my rifle and ammuni- 
 tion, a bag of powdered alum, a pot of arsenical soap, and a f e v 
 tools, and went by rail down the line to Paphoond station. Spend- 
 ing the night in the road bungalow, we chartered an ekka (an 
 antediluvian species of passenger cari) to take us to Major Ross 's 
 camp, twelve miles south. For two hours and a half we rattled 
 along a splendid " metalled " {i. e. , macadamized) road as fine in 
 every way as any in Great Britain, so far as I have seen — another 
 evidence of British rule in India. The milestones are marked in 
 English and Hindustanee, which gives the natives to understand 
 that the Enghsh have come to stay. The road is provided with good 
 bridges, road bungalows and poHce stations, an I is a type of the 
 great arterial lines of road communication which have been con- 
 structed throughout India since the Mutiny in 1857. The Ganges- 
 Jumna Dooab, i.e., the coimtry lying between these two waters, is 
 also being rapidly traversed by a system of irrigation canals, which 
 will render famine in this district forever impossible. 
 
 Mud villages were almost as thick as farm-houses in Iowa, and 
 before long I found that it required good shooting to fire a lifle on 
 the level without hitting a nat*;: And no wonder. Compared 
 
70 TWO YEARS IlSr THE JUNGLE. 
 
 with very many portions of India, Etawah is very thinly settled ; but, 
 upon an area of 1,631 square miles, of "which quite twenty per cent, 
 is unculturable rapines or reh-stricken plains, there are 1,591 villages 
 and 668,581 people — nearly one %-illage and quite 408 people to 
 every square mile, fertile or barren. No wonder the fields along 
 the roadside were little garden-plots of one to two acres, or that 
 there was no groimd to spare for fences, and nothing to make them 
 of. Each tiny field was bounded by a little ridge of earth, and 
 fences, hedges, and ditches were ahke unknown. The landscape 
 was only redeemed from utter barrenness (for the winter crops had 
 just been harvested), by the scattering mangos, acacias, and occa- 
 sional banyan trees, which dotted the plain at long distances apart. 
 
 After two hom's and a half of cramped limbs and aching backs, 
 we alighted from our antiquated jaunting-car at Major Ross's camp. 
 If the ride was cramped and shaky, it was also cheap, for the twelve 
 miles cost us only one rupee. 
 
 Mrs. Eoss led me at once to a mango tree near the tents, and 
 pointed out a strange-looking animal w^hich had taken refuge in it 
 the night before, and been fairly " treed " ever since. A charge of 
 shot soon brought it to the gTound, and it proved to be a tree-cat 
 {Paradoxurus musanga) ; length, head and body, 23^ inches, tail204-, 
 color, dark gray \^ashed with black. 
 
 I was siu-prised at the elegance and completeness of my friend's 
 campuig establishment, which was simply luxurious as compared 
 with all the camping-out I had ever seen before, and it was man- 
 aged with military precision. There was a main wall-tent, large and 
 roomy, with a double roof and vei'andah all around, and divided into 
 an office, dining-room, and bath-room. Major and Mrs. Eoss had 
 a sleeping-tent, the khansama (cook) had a kitchen-tent, and there 
 was another for me. Contrary to the ordinary rule of camp-hfe 
 there was an abundance of furniture, but it was all made to fold 
 up and pack snugly away. There were five ghan*ys (bullock-carts) 
 to transport the equipage, and thi-ee excellent saddle-horses for the 
 "Sahib" and the "Memsahib." Counting cooks, sweepers, gun- 
 bearers, horse-keepers, and gharry-drivers, there were just twenty- 
 foiu' servants of various castes attachecl to the camp. The morning 
 after my arrival, the camp was struck as soon as we had breakfasted, 
 and moved off to a village nearer the ravines. Major and Mrs. Eoss 
 and I went shooting along the way, and when we reached Jeyt- 
 pore, late in the evening, we found the tents pitched in a green grove 
 of mango trees, the ground cleanly swept, the lamps hghted, and 
 
EAVINE DEER AISTD BLACK BUCK HUNTING. 71 
 
 the table set with snowy linen and glistening silver. Fifteen min- 
 utes later we were discussing the various courses of soup, roast mut- 
 ton, fowls, vegetables, and the finest dish of ciu-ry and rice I ate any- 
 where in the East Indies. The table was set out in the open aii', 
 under the stars, and it seemed that such a roving, out-door life as 
 my friends led in the dry and pleasant winter months was simply 
 a continuous picnic, more enjoyable than life in the best town-house 
 that ever was built. 
 
 IVIrs. Ross was the life of the camp, and her sparkling vivacity 
 imparted to it a chai-m as refreshing as a mountain breeze. Under 
 her energetic management the camp was always a model of neat- 
 ness and comfort, and I was surprised to find that a lady in camp 
 could be so great a blessing. Mrs. Eoss rode, walked, and played 
 lawn tennis daily with astonishing energy, considering the climate. 
 She often accompanied us in our shorter hunting excursions, and 
 we Hterally laid the spoils of the chase at her feet, proudly or other- 
 wise, according to our luck. 
 
 Major Eoss was my Encyclopaedia Indica, and like the model 
 British officer that he is, there was scarcely a subject that his in- 
 formation did not cover. A traveller meets a great many persons 
 who are willing to answer his questions, and he soon learns to judge 
 by the ring of the metal whether it is pure or not. The friendship 
 of a man whose facts are always to be depended upon is something to 
 be prized, and in this world of falsehoods and exaggeration it is 
 like a glimpse of heaven to meet a man who never exaggerates. 
 Such a man is Major Eoss, and his brothers are like him. 
 
 The ravines that border the Jumna for half its entire length 
 are very interesting from a geological point of view. Once these 
 uplands extended in a high and fertile level plain quite down to 
 the river, where they ended abruptly in a long continuous bluff. 
 The water which fell upon this table-land along the river sought 
 the lower level of the stream by pouring over the edge of the bluff, 
 until first little gulleys and then deep ravines were cut down 
 through the plain, and their beds became almost as low as the 
 water in the river. The steep sides of these long ravines were in 
 their turn furrowed and cut through by the little streams which 
 poured down them during the heavy rains of the wet season, and 
 the fertile soil of the plain was washed into the ravines and swept 
 away. Beneath this was a continuous stratum of hard, unweath- 
 ered clay, which does not readily grow grass, etc., and thus 
 collect vegetable mould, and which has stubbornly resisted the 
 
72 TTVO TEARS IN THE JUNGLE. 
 
 disintegrating action of moisture ; so that now, instead of the 
 rich alluvial tracts of low "bottom-land," between the river and the 
 uplands, which we would see had this clay been soft and friable, 
 like that along the banks of ovu' western rivers, we see the deso- 
 late " ra^•ines." Between the fertile uplands and the river lies a 
 broad belt of rugged and bai-ren clay peaks, divided by ragged 
 hollows, the tops of the highest just on a level with the uplands, 
 and their steep sides sprinkled with a scraggy growth of low 
 bushes which seem to put forth thorns instead of leaves. Here 
 and there are miniature table-mountains forty to sixty feet high, 
 their flat tops marking the level of the former plain. Every rainy 
 season the ra^'ines eat farther and farther into the fertile plain, 
 and one field after another is abandoned as the mould and disin- 
 tegrated soil is washed into the ravines, leaving only the hard and 
 barren clay. Upon the top of one little table-mountain, haK a 
 mile from the present head of the ravines, we saw the ruins of a 
 village that was once surrounded by fertile fields. A bird's-eye 
 view of the Jumna ravines reveals a "gray and melancholy waste," 
 apparently desolate and lifeless ; yet these miniatin-e mountains, 
 this lab}Tiath of hills and hollows affords shelter for the gazelle, 
 nil-gai, jackal, wolf, hare, wild-hog, panther, and even the leopard. 
 
 The Indian ga|:eUe (Gazella Bennetti) is commonly called by In- 
 dian sportsmen the " ravine deer," because it is generally found in 
 the dry and barren ravines along the Jumna, and in similar por- 
 tions of Bimdelkund, Eewah, the Central Provinces, and Gwalior. 
 It is also found in the Pimjab and Kajpootana, but does not occur 
 south of the Godavery Eiver. 
 
 This graceful little animal is of a pale, reddish-brown color, 
 varying in the females, the entire under parts from chin to tail 
 being white, while the tail itself is black. My largest buck meas- 
 ured 26 inches in height at shoulders, length of head and body, 3 
 feet 5 inches, tail S inches, and horns 13 inches. The horns of the 
 male are almost perfectly straight, except that the points are 
 tipped slightly forward, and are encircled with rings varying in 
 number from eighteen to twenty-three, from the base to within 
 two inches of the point. The horns never exceed 14^ inches in 
 length, and only one pair out of a hundi"ed exceeds l-i. 
 
 Unlike all other antelopes, the female gazelle possesses horns, 
 although they ai-e short, very slender, and seldom systematically 
 curved. They ai*e usually 4 to 5 inches in length, sometimes 6, 
 but during my hunt with Major Koss I was fortimate enough to 
 
EAVINE DEER AND BLACK BUCK HUNTING. 73 
 
 shoot an old female wliose liorns measured 8^ inches, the long- 
 est by two inches yet recorded. They were very slender, tapering 
 gradually from the base to the tip. 
 
 Although the gazelle is rather dull in both hearing and smell- 
 ing, as we proved many times, its sight is keen and restless, and it 
 furnishes very interesting sport, especially if the little creatures are 
 unusually wary and wild from previous acquaintance with fire- 
 arms. They usually go in droves of five to eight, but we once en- 
 countered a splendid herd of thirty-seven gazelles and four sasin 
 antelopes, feeding in a stubble field in the early morning. On that 
 same ground two English sportsmen - once made a famous "bag" 
 at Christmas time, the net results of the day's shooting being two 
 gazelles, one gazelle's ear, one horn, and one horse and his keeper 
 peppered with bird-shot. 
 
 An account of our busiest day's sport in the ravines, and our 
 best bag of specimens — for from first to last I took either skin or 
 skeleton of every adult animal — will suffice to illustrate one phase 
 of zoological collecting. The following is from my journal : 
 
 " Kiuntra, April 2d. — Major Ross awoke me at half-past three, 
 and after a hasty toilet, two hard-boiled eggs and a cup of coffee, 
 we mounted our horses and were off. Our rifles had gone on an 
 hour before with Wazir and Jungi, the two horse-keepers, and 
 men who went to carry the game home. As we cantered across 
 the fields toward the ravines, daylight appeared in the east, and 
 the cool morning air resounded on every side with the cooing of a 
 hundred doves, blended into one continuous, trembling note rolling 
 close along the earth. 
 
 "At the head of the ravines we planned out our respective 
 courses and separated, so as to shoot over as much ground as pos- 
 sible, and also because we had found that a sportsman does better 
 work alone when hunting 'small deer.' Wazir was to keep me 
 company, and two game-carriers followed us at some distance. 
 This was the place where we expected to find nil-gai {Portax pictus). 
 
 " We caught a glimpse of a fine wild boar crossing a Httle ridge 
 as he was returning from his nightly raid ujDon the fields to his lair 
 in the ravines, and tried to follow him up and get a shot, but failed 
 to see him a second time. Walking down the level bed of a ravine 
 we turned a corner suddenly, and came plump upon five gazelles 
 walking leisurely toward us, when — ivhish ! — there was a dash of tiny 
 hoofs and the agile little creatures bounded out of sight like a flash. 
 We bestu'red om'selves to cut them off, but when we next saw them 
 
74 TWO YEAKS II!f THE JUNGLE. 
 
 call a halt tliey -sN-ere fiilly 300 yards away. I attempted to make 
 a biilliant sliot at that distance, aiming at a fine buck, but ray bul- 
 let sti-uck the bank about three inches above the top of his shoul- 
 ders. Away they went again, and from a hill-top we marked their 
 coui-se until they disappeared entirely. Then we started for them, 
 keeping well in the bottom of the ravines imtil we thought we 
 were near them. Getting upon the top of a ridge we went cau- 
 tiously forward, and veiy soon saw my identical buck climbing 
 out of a ravine about ninety yards in advance of us. Feeling sm-e 
 he would pause a moment at the top of the ridge to look for us, I 
 dropped quietly upon one knee, and covered him with my rifle. 
 Sure enough, as he reached the level he saw us and turned to look 
 for a second or two, when my bullet struck him full in the chest 
 and dropped him dead. It is the almost invariable habit of the 
 gazelle, unless startled suddenly at close range, to stare at the 
 hunter for two or three seconds before tm-ning to run away, and 
 that instant of rest is the hunter's time to fire. As soon as the 
 buck fell, Wazir, who was a devout Mohammedan, ran forward ^\•ith 
 a knife and cut its thi-oat, exclaiming ' Bismillah ! ' (in the name 
 of God) while the animal was still ahve, which rendered the flesh 
 eligible for the cooking-pots of all time Moslems. This operation 
 is called ' hallal kai-na,' and no Mohammedan can eat the flesh of 
 any animal which ' has not been properly ' hallaled ' before Ufe 
 became extinct, by some true follower of the Prophet. Duiing our 
 first two days' shooting, it somehow happened that not a single 
 animal was ' hallaled,' and so, although the camp-followers had an 
 abimdance of fresh meat for which the souls of Mohammedans 
 yearned and theii- mouths watered, not one of them touched a morsel. 
 
 " Shortly after the death of the buck, we saw a fine nil-gai or 
 'blue bull,' on the top of a little table-land neai'ly half a mile away, 
 and we took a good look at him through the glass for fear we might 
 never see him again. As he stood upon the summit of that high 
 ground, his dark body shai'ply outlined against the sky, he seemed 
 as large as our American moose, and he instantly reminded me of 
 that long-legged and ungainly animal. Yet this great lumbering 
 animal, perhaps four and a half feet high at the shoulders, with 
 eight-inch horns and tail nearly two feet long, is an antelope, one 
 of the largest of the antelope family. 
 
 "As the nil-gai disappeared in the ravines, I started across the 
 succession of hills and hollows that lay between us, and in an in- 
 credibly shori time reached the place where we last saw him. But 
 
EAVINE DEEE AND BLACK BUCK HUNTING. 75 
 
 the animal was not to be seen, and after a long search f .-r him we 
 had to give up beaten. It was utterly impossible to track him over 
 that hard and barren clay. We heard two shots from Alajor Eoss, 
 and on looking in his direction saw two nil-gai climb out of the 
 ravines and go galloping oflf across the uplands. They went at 
 a heavy, lumbering pace, more like the running of cows than ante- 
 lopes. The Hindoos, with a total disregard for natural classifica- 
 tion, assert that this animal is a 'cow' and not an antelope, and 
 therefore a very sacred animal. They will not touch the nil-gai^ 
 but will eat all other antelopes. 
 
 " It had been our rule to return to camp about ten o'clock every 
 morning, and rest quietly during the midday heat, which in the 
 ravines was intense ; but in the hope of finding nil-gai we pushed 
 on and on in a wide circuit far into the ravines. While walking 
 quietly down the bed of a ravine we espied two gazelles browsing 
 upon the scanty leaves of an acacia. Both were does, and I fired 
 at the nearest one. They wheeled and bounded out of sight, and 
 upon running forward we found the grass bespattered with ar- 
 terial blood which had gushed out from a mortal wound. We 
 started at once on the bloody trail and soon found the doe lying 
 gasping under a bush. (This was the female which possessed un- 
 usually long horns, mentioned in a former paragraph.) Within 
 twenty minutes from the time we saw her browsing quietly under 
 the acacia, her skin was hanging across Wazir's rifle and the vul- 
 tures were tearing at her flesh. Then I turned my face toward 
 camp. Passing through a village we rested, drank quantities of 
 water and ate some roasted gram, which is about as good as parched 
 corn. Within a mile of camp we met a horse coming for me, and a 
 Hvely gallop soon brought me to the tents. jVIajor Eoss had shot 
 a fine buck gazeUe and a cow nil-gai, which were soon brought in 
 upon a cart. The intense heat of the sun had quite roasted the skin 
 on the side that was uppermost, so that its elasticity was gone for- 
 ever. This animal was of an iron-gray color, without horns, and 
 about the size of the female wapiti [Cervus Canadensis). After 
 coming in from a hunt, we always took a bath the first thing and 
 drained all the jars of drinking-water. ' Give us this day our daily 
 bath,' is the universal cry in India. 
 
 " ' Tiffin ' over (two o'clock dinner). Carlo and I fell to work on 
 om- specimens, and before night the ' bag ' received an addition of 
 one saras crane, three spoonbills [Platalea leucorodia), and three 
 black-backed geese {Sarcidiornis melanono(us), shot by my fi-iends." 
 
76 TWO YEAES IN THE JUNGLE. 
 
 The next day, in the evening, we rode to a bit of lowland be« 
 tween the ravines and the river. On the way we surprised a large 
 wolf {Cams pallipes), making for the ravines with a black kid in his 
 mouth. As bad luck would have it, we were both without our 
 rifles, having sent them ahead with the bearers. We gave chase at 
 once, but the wolf entered the ravines where we could not follow 
 on horseback. These brutes ai-e very destinictive to small animals 
 of all kinds, killing goats, sheep, and calves, and running down ga- 
 zelle and antelope. The Indian Government pays a reward for 
 the killin g of wolves, and in 1876, five thousand nine hundred and 
 seventy-six of these miserable brutes were destroyed. 
 
 On reaching our destination, we found several gazelles feeding 
 out in the open plain with a scattered herd of cattle, and I brought 
 down a buck at one hundred and thirty yards. Major Eoss shot 
 a hare {Lepus riificaudatus) for me. It jumped out of a bush 
 almost at our feet and went bounding off, when the Major made a 
 brilliant shot with his rifle, striking the hare with an explosive 
 express bullet which blew it all to pieces. The head lay in one 
 place, the legs were scattered about in various directions, and the 
 tan hung up in the top of a httle bush hke a signal of distress. 
 
 At the end of seven days' shooting we had accounted for fifteen 
 gazelle and one ^il-gai, not counting smaller specimens ; and, 
 sending my lot of skins and skeletons across country by bullock- 
 cart, I returned to Etawah by rail. 
 
 The sasin antelope, or " black buck " of sportsmen {Antelope 
 bezoartica), is another animal which is found in great numbers in 
 the Ganges-Jumna Dooab, as weU as many other portions of 
 India from the Punjab to Tutucorin, very nearly to Cape Comorin. 
 In some districts they are found in immense herds of several 
 thousand individuals, and, wherever they are, they do gi'eat 
 damage to crops. It is the universal custom, or rather the ne- 
 cessity, of the natives who Uve in the game-infested districts, to 
 build small elevated platforms of poles out in then- fields, on which 
 they patiently sit all night, beating tom-toms and shouting to keep 
 away the deer and wild pigs. As a rule, the common people of 
 India are not allowed to possess fii-e-arms of any description, or 
 rather no one is allowed to supply them, and hence the countiy, 
 notwithstanding the density of its population and the pei-petual 
 hunger of its people, is quite oven'un with game, some kinds of 
 which devour the crops of the agriculturists, while others prey 
 upon domestic animals and the people themselves. The British 
 
EAVINE DEER AND BLACK BUCK IIUNTIIs^G. 77 
 
 Government does not, however, object to the employment of pro- 
 fessional native hunters, or "shikarees," for thinning out the game, 
 and all such persons are duly licensed by the magistrates. 
 
 The sasin antelope stands from 32 to 34 inches in shoulder 
 height, length of body and head about 46 to 48 inches, and tail 6|- 
 inches. The does and all the young bucks are of the same color, a 
 pale yellowish fawn color above, with all the under parts white. 
 As the bucks grow older they begin to acquire a dark streak from 
 the knees straight up to the shoulder, which gradually extends 
 backward along the sides and deepens in color with increasing 
 age, until at last, when the animal has come to full majority, the 
 vertical shoulder stripe is almost black and the sides of the body, 
 neck, and head are of a rich dark brown. The female has no 
 horns, and those of the young light-colored bucks are of course 
 short and comparatively insignificant, biit the old black buck is 
 crowned by a royal pair, twenty to twenty-five inches long. They 
 are black, spirally twisted in four or five turns, strongly ringed 
 from the base up to the last curve, and diverge into a perfect V. 
 The old male is, in every respect, a very handsome animal. 
 
 A few days after our gazelle hunt, my friends completed the 
 survey of their canal and came to Etawah. AVishing now to obtain 
 a specimen of the sasin antelope, Major Koss and I collected our 
 forces once more and went to Shekoabad, a railway station thirty- 
 four miles above Etawah. Here antelopes were very numerous 
 within easy reach of the station, and, putting up at the dak bun- 
 galow, we sallied out morning and evening. An account of our 
 first morning's work will serve to illustrate the character of black- 
 buck shooting and the habits of the animal. 
 
 Starting out at daybreak, we found a small herd within half a 
 mile of the station, but it contained no good buck, and on firing at 
 two hundred yards we each missed a doe and went on. The 
 level plain is so thickly dotted with villages that we saw we could 
 only fire with extreme caution. Fortunately the crops had been 
 gathered and the people were threshing, else we would scarcely have 
 dared to shoot at all. The crops here are watered by irrigation, 
 ■ and every four or five acres has its well and a sloping embankment 
 of earth beside it, thrown up so as to form an inclined plane, down 
 which the bullocks are driven as they haul up the skins full of 
 water. These wells are never covered or enclosed, and before the 
 day was out I nearly came to grief in one of them. 
 
 We found a herd of about forty antelopes, including one fine old 
 
78 TWO TEARS IX THE JUNGLE. 
 
 buck, feeding quietly near one of these wells, and we easily stalked 
 it under cover of the embankment. As usual, Major Eoss gave me 
 the fii-st shot, and scrambling up to the top of the embankment I 
 made a brilliant miss at the old buck, distance one hundred and 
 fifty yards. Major Eoss fired and brought down a young buck, and 
 the herd bolted. Instead of running directly from us, they swung 
 round for nearly a quarter of a cu'cle, in a straggling line, the old 
 buck bringing up the rear as a soi-t of whipper-in ; we paid om* 
 respects to him as he came by but missed, and the herd, now 
 thoroughly alarmed, sprang away at race-horse speed. As they 
 passed us, several old does bounded high in the air as though they 
 were leaping over four-foot hvu'dles, and as they dashed off down 
 the plain, we saw first one and then another spring high in the aii', 
 clear above the backs of the others, come down with stiffened legs, 
 and be lost to view in the flying herd. It was an astonishing sight. 
 This strange demon sti-ation in the face of danger is pecvdiar to the 
 antelope, and whenever observed it betokens thorough alarm, and 
 is a sort of defiant adieu to the sportsman, with the information 
 that he need not trouble himself to follow. 
 
 In watching the herd as it disappeared, I walked backwai'd a 
 few paces, reloading my rifle at the same time, until, happening to 
 look down I saw th^it I was standing upon the brink of the open 
 well. In the excitement of the moment I had forgotten its exist- 
 ence, and had I taken just tvie more backward step, I would have 
 gone dovm head first about sixty feet, ^liat an aggravating, 
 ignominious, and disgusting death it would have been. Hindoo 
 women often commit suicide by jumping into the village welL 
 
 About ten o'clock we found another herd of antelope, many of 
 which were lying down for their midday siesta. Tliere was no 
 cover near* them, so we had to trust to their imwai'iness. With ooir 
 guns in readiness we walked slowly forward, appai-ently without no- 
 ticing the animals, and made as though we would saunter past them 
 at a distance of one hundred and forty yai'ds. There was a beautiful 
 buck in the herd, quietly lying dovm chewing his cud. He rose 
 as we approached but stood quite still, and just as we reached the 
 nearest point I slowly raised my rifle and fired at him. My sohd bullet 
 passed through the muscles of his fore-arm and he fell to his knees, 
 but recovered himself as I ran forward, and staggered away. Major 
 Eoss fired at him without effect, and the herd dashed away, leaving 
 the wounded buck to his fate. We followed him as fast as possible, 
 but the farther he went, the farther he seemed able to go. He 
 
RAVINE DEER AND BLACK BUCK HUNTING. 79 
 
 passed within fifty yards of some natives tramping out wheat with 
 bullocks, and stopped in an adjoining field. Stealing up behind the 
 nearest cover I fired at him again, when he started up and slowly 
 trotted oflf. Major Koss halted under a banyan tree, for the sun 
 was now beginning to tell upon us, but I kept on. Disgusted with 
 my unusually poor shooting, I determined to follow that buck and 
 bring him down by main strength if necessary. He trotted slowly 
 along and I hurried after him to keep him in sight. The hot winds 
 were blowing from the northwest, the heat was intense, and it was 
 risking a sun-stroke to go on, for the buck kept leading directly 
 from the station, now five miles away. At intervals he would stop, 
 but he watched me constantly, and whenever I came within two hun- 
 dred yards of him he would start on again. The perspiration poiired 
 off me Hke rain, and such exertion was beginning to tell upon my 
 nerves. 
 
 After a time I stalked him successfully a third time and got a 
 shot, but perspiration half bhnded me, and my arms were so un- 
 steady that I could scarcely hope to hit. However, I heard the 
 bullet strike with a dull thud upon his hide, and on we went as be- 
 fore. I was determined to measure that buck's horns before turn- 
 ing back. About noon he halted again in an open field, evidently 
 much distressed, and getting him in line with an acacia I made a 
 very creditable stalk, wiped the perspiration out of my eyes, and 
 fired again. This time the buck failed to run away. He stood still, 
 began to gasp violently, staggered, fell over, and the chase was 
 ended. One buUet had gone through his fore-arm, another through 
 his sternum, a third through his withers, breaking one of the ver- 
 tebral processes, and the last went through his liver. I had shot all 
 around the vital parts. His horns measured twenty inches and 
 he was in every way a beauty ; but the manner of his death left me 
 nothing to be proud of. 
 
 Jungi arrived in search of me while I was cutting out the en- 
 trails of the buck to lessen his weight, and two natives who came 
 up to see the quarry, were easily persuaded to sling it under a 
 pole and carry it to the station for a consideration. We were six 
 miles from home, and it was noon ; but the buck was dead, and 
 what cared we if the plain was like the floor of an oven and the air 
 like the breath of a furnace ? 
 
 During my chase. Major Ross killed another buck almost as 
 black as mine. Two hours later, a cold bath, dry clothes, and a good 
 tiffin had set us completely to rights. During the two days we 
 
80 TAVO YEAES IlSr THE JUNGLE. 
 
 spent at Shekoabad, eight antelopes, four bucks, and four does were 
 called upon to yield up their skins and skeletons. There is really 
 very little sport in hunting the sasin antelope, because of the un- 
 wariness of the animal and the ease with which they are approached. 
 Any one who is a moderately accurate rifle-shot at one hundred and 
 fifty yards can usually kill from two to five in a day, and if the 
 hunter is really bloodthirsty he may bring down a good many more 
 than that, but as far as real sport is concerned, it is tame. There 
 is no excellent sport without great labor on the part of some one. 
 
 Upon returning to Etawah, I packed up my collection and 
 shipped it to Calcutta, then took a little holiday trip up to Agra 
 to see the famous Taj Mehal. Ever since the days of Heber, trav- 
 ellers have lavished adjectives and similes upon this pretty tomb, 
 some because they were sincere, and all the rest because it is the 
 fashion to do so. In my opinion, no other structure in the world 
 has been so gTeatly over-praised. I can only account for it by the 
 infrequency of really fine and well-finished specimens of architect- 
 ure in India. The abundance of mud-huts and characteristic Hindoo 
 temples make this really beautiful structure seem to be the most 
 ravishingly beautiful one on the face of the earth. Hence the in- 
 coherent ravings, and the constant strain upon the English language 
 on account of the Taj. I do not believe half the travellers who 
 have written about it were really sincere in such a superlative de- 
 gree of admiration and rapture as they have expressed. It is like 
 the ravings over the expression of the Sphinx — a face with the eyes, 
 nose, and Hps hammered into one unsightly blm', which looks as if 
 some wild animal had been tearing it. Look at the photographs 
 of it, if you cannot. get the object itself. 
 
 What are the elements which make up this "dream in marble," 
 this " psalm in stone," this " essence of architectural beauty," this 
 Taj in fact ? It has not size certainly, for its width covers only one 
 hundred and fifty feet each way. Its dome is a huge marble " chattie " 
 turned bottom uppermost, with bulging sides and contracted base, 
 an exact model of the useful vessel the gentle Hindoo boils his rice 
 in. The building is square, except that the corners are cut off, 
 and the upper half of the walls are set with huge, empty niches, as 
 though they were prepared for statues that were never put in place. 
 
 The minarets on the corners of the terrace are low, dumpy, and 
 plain, and in shape and size are as much like some of the light-houses 
 on our Atlantic sea-board as one billiard ball is like another. But 
 the Taj (as well as the minarets) is built of white marble, which 
 
EAVINE DEER AND BLACK BUCK HUNTING. 81 
 
 fias never Ijeen discolored by smoke and soot ; and I suspect its 
 very cleanliness, j)urity, and lack of Hindoo jjaint is what renders 
 it so all-powerful that ninety-nine travellers out of a hundred fall 
 down before it, Taj-struck, and the hundredth who survives is set 
 down as a dull, soulless, and ignorant fault-finder, destitute of taste 
 and appreciation. "Would the Taj be esteemed so exquisitely beau- 
 tiful and so perfect in plan if it were built of brick or limestone, 
 mstead of white marble ? The inside of the structure is wonder- 
 fully pretty, with its lotuses and lilies of precious stones. The 
 cost of the Taj is entirely satisfactory, and as a monument to Love 
 it is immense ; but to my mind there are many buildings more 
 grand, graceful, and imposing than this, and hundreds which seem 
 more sacred. 
 
 The North- West Provinces offer but a barren field for the bot- 
 anist or entomologist, at least in the dry season. I did not see a 
 single serpent or lizard, nor any insects worth mentioning during 
 my stay there. As for the flora of the country I could tell practi- 
 cally nothing, for, owing to the total lack of rain during the winter 
 and spring months, vegetation is only conspicuous by its scantiness. 
 
 The tree which figures most conspicuously on the plains of the 
 Dooab is the mango (Hindoo, "aam," Mangifera Indica), whose 
 thick and ample green top affords most grateful shade. These 
 trees are grown from cuttings planted by the Hindoos, who never 
 think of cutting down a tree of any kind, or even cutting off long 
 branches, and refuse to learn pruning and forestry. They encour- 
 age the planting of these excellent shade-trees, and the land occu- 
 pied by the mango-gi'oves is exempt from taxation. 
 
 The thorny acacia, or "bubool" {Acacia Arabica), is the com- 
 monest tree in the North-West Provinces, but owing to the fact 
 that the natives feed their goats on its leaves and seed-pods, and 
 the natural scantiness of its foliage, this tree, which is a very small 
 one, always has a stunted, bare, and scraggy appearance. This is 
 the tree which furnishes the gum arabic of commerce. It grows 
 in the driest districts, apparently in defiance of drought, and is 
 common in the "jungles" of Northern India along with Butea 
 frondosa, which possesses a gorgeous, though odorless, scarlet 
 flower. We found it in bloom at Auraiya, on April 1st, its branches 
 loaded with flowers. 
 
 The " neem " {Azadirachta Indica), is found here and there, a 
 small tree of which every part seems to possess some valuable 
 medicinal property. The bruised leaves are used in healing sores. 
 
82 TWO YEAES IN THE JUNGLE. 
 
 swellings, and rheumatism, and also some diseases of the skin ; the 
 bark is sometimes used as a substitute for quinine, and also as a 
 tonic ; a dye is manufactured from the fruit, and the seeds are 
 used as an insect poison ; the root is used as a vermifuge, and a 
 gum exudes from the bark. Its wood is very bitter and is never 
 attacked by white ants. 
 
 Here and there are seen solitary trees of large size, most of 
 which have been planted by past generations in certain sacred spots 
 or near villages, so that the inhabitants can sit in their grateful 
 shade and discuss parish matters. There are four large trees be- 
 longing to this class, which figure conspicuously in the landscapes 
 of Northern India. They are the sacred fig-tree, or "peepul" 
 {Ficus religiosa), the banyan, Hindoo "burgud" [Ficus Indica), 
 the tamarind, " im\\" {Tamarindus Indica), and the "goolur," which 
 latter is used to bottom wells that have walls of masonry. 
 
 From Agra I started for Calcutta, and the Neilgherry HLUs in 
 Southern India, ha^ing spent eight very busy and profitable weeks 
 in the North-West Provinces. 
 
CHAPTER YIII. 
 
 BENARES, CALCUTTA, AND MADRAS. 
 
 The Monkey Temple. — Sacred Animals. — The Fakir. — The Hindoos as Beast 
 Worshippers. — A Beastial Religion. — From Benares to Calcutta. — The Hot 
 Season. — "Punkahs and Tatties." — Departure for Madras. — The Hoogly 
 River. — Sailor Anatomists. — The Hoogly Channel. — Madras. — A Seaport 
 without a Harbor. — Two Years of Drought. — A Famine-stricken City. — A 
 Paternal Government. — The Madras Museum. — Another Language and 
 another Servant. 
 
 On the way to Calcutta I stopped for a day at the holy city of 
 Benares, the Hindoo Mecca and the headquarters of Brahminism. 
 Crossing the Ganges by the bridge of boats, I soon found a baboo 
 who spoke English and was willing to be my guide for a consid- 
 eration. We drove to the Golden Temple, to the minarets, and to 
 the bathing ghauts, and finally to the place I came particularly to 
 see, the Doorga Khond, or Monkey Temple, situated just outside 
 the native town. Along the road leading to the temple there were 
 monkeys chasing each other up and down, sitting on the stone 
 walls and climbing about in the trees, their numbers increasing 
 until we reached the temple itself. So far as its architecture is 
 concerned, this temple amounts to almost nothing. In the centre 
 of a paved yard stands a small stone pagoda no larger than a sen- 
 try-box, in which is a stone image of a hideous black goddess 
 (Doorga), hung with wreaths of marigolds, beside which a stuffed 
 monkey would seem divinely beautiful. Surrounding this open 
 yard is a high stone wall like the walls of a house, furnished all 
 arotmd with shelves and niches for the accommodation of the 
 monkeys. Adjoining this enclosure is a fine tank ; a wide-spread- 
 ing banyan overshadows the place, and that is all there is of this 
 divine monkey-house. 
 
 Buying haK a gallon of gram from a priest at the entrance, we 
 stepped within the enclosure, and then another priest who was with 
 us cried out, " Ah ! Ah ! Ah ! " Directly there was a grand rush 
 
84 TVrO YEARS IX THE JUNGLE. 
 
 through the doorways, over the walls, and from the top of the 
 banyan, as about a hundred and fifty monkeys of all ages, sizes, and 
 degrees of fatness came crowding around us to be fed. Some im- 
 pudent rascals snatched handfuls of gram and scampered off, cram- 
 ming it into their cheeks as they ran ; some took the food timidly 
 and with suspicion, but when we threw handfuls of it on the floor 
 there ensued a vigorous game of " grab-and-snatch-it." So long as 
 the gram held out we were the centre of attraction, and each pair 
 of watchful brown eyes w^as fixed upon us. Some fat old fellows 
 sat and gravely looked at us, others made wry faces, some winked, 
 and some grinned from ear to ear. A few were quarrelsome, and 
 there was continuous biting and squealing, while, after the feeding 
 was over, others busied themselves in examining each other's heads 
 for vermin, just as I remember seeing people do in the streets of 
 Naples more than once. 
 
 What a fine lot of monkey skins and skeletons are here run- 
 ning to waste ! Here are specimens with a vengeance, but one 
 might better risk shooting a native than one of these sacred pets. 
 These monkeys are very sacred, next to the Brahmin bull in fact, 
 because they ai*e descendants of Hunuman, the famous monkey-god 
 of Southern India, "who aided Rama in the conquest of Ceylon by 
 forming a bridge of rocks opposite Manaar. The figure of the 
 monkey who thus greatly distinguished himself is often found in 
 Hindoo temples in the guise of a man, with a black monkey-face 
 and a long taU." * 
 
 The species which infests this temple is the grayish-brown, 
 short-tailed Inuus rhesus, which has conspicuous red callosities and 
 is the common monkey of all Northern India. In this region, one 
 must know the temper of the natives pretty well before venturing 
 to shoot a monkey, for although this charming animal is not wor- 
 shipped, he is gi-eatly reverenced in many districts, and to kill one 
 would precipitate a row with the natives, the net results of which 
 would be highly uncertain. Some Anglo-Indians have assured me 
 that at Benares any one kilhug a monkey would be almost torn in 
 pieces by the natives. But Benares is the headquarters of fanati- 
 cism. 
 
 In the bazaar we met a big Brahmin buU stalking along the 
 narrow street, crowding the people right and left, and sticking his 
 nose into one basket of grain after another as freely as if he owned 
 
 * Jerdon. 
 
BENARES, CALCUTTA, AND MADRAS. 85 
 
 the whole city. And is he not monarch of all he surveys ? These 
 brutes become so accustomed to servile reverence that they are 
 bold and insolent, and whoever does not make way for them wiU 
 very likely get trampled upon, if not knocked down. The most 
 daring European never ventures to strike a Brahmin bull in this 
 city, nor even to swear at him if the natives know it. Any Hindoo 
 would rather kill ten Christians than one Brahmin bull, and it 
 would no doubt be safer for a Christian to kill ten natives than one 
 of these brutes, provided he escaped the British authorities. 
 
 This reminds me of another sacred animal, some specimens of 
 which I saw in Allahabad, and here again in Benares. I refer to 
 the fakirs. Allahabad was full of them. I shall never foi-get an 
 apparition that I encoimtered suddenly one day in the bazaar of 
 that city while Carlo and I were out on a shopping expedition. 
 We were standing at a grain stall buying some rice, when there 
 suddenly appeared at my elbow a man (in external form at least) 
 entirely naked, except a very small and veiy dirty rag around his 
 loins, and a staff in his hand. He was tall, lank, and bony, his 
 beard was tangled, full of dirt, and came far down his haiiy breast. 
 His long, matted hair hung around his shoulders like a bundle of 
 untwisted hemp ropes. His body was mangy and caked with dirt 
 of a year's standing, apparently, his claws were long and dirty, and 
 he was certainly the most disgusting object I ever saw in human 
 form. 
 
 " Carlo," said I, "what kind of an animal is this? " 
 
 " That Hindoo holy-man, sir. He never wash he-self ; all same 
 one pig." 
 
 The fakir was going around collecting money of the shop-keep^ 
 ers. He said never a word to any of them, but walked around and 
 held out a piece of cocoanut shell, into which the bazaar-men 
 dropped their " pice " without a word. He went about it quite like 
 a landlord collecting his rent. And this was one of the fakirs, 
 those holy men (there are nearly ninety thousand of them, it is 
 said) whose feet and garments are kissed by men and women, and 
 who are, in popular estimation, saints ! 
 
 The Hindoos are essentially beast- worshippers. They reverence 
 the Brahmin buU, the monkey, peacock, crocodile, cobra and other 
 serpents — and these are the least objectionable of all their gods. 
 We can forgive them for worshipping all these, because they are 
 cleanly and respectable animals ; but for their reverence of such 
 degraded, filthy, naked, and unclean beasts as these fakirs, there is 
 
S6 TWO YEARS IN THE JUNGLE. 
 
 simply no excuse. Indeed, I believe the animals mentioned above 
 are the only decent objects of worship the Hindoos recognize, A 
 scaly old mugger is a worthy god in comparison with the most 
 common object of worship in all India, the name of which is not to 
 be wi-itten. Theu- gods and goddesses are bloodthirsty and cmel 
 monsters, guilty of adultery and incest, and some of the rites by 
 which they arq worshipped are so obscene that they can never be 
 recorded. If there is a rehgion in existence which is destitute of 
 even one redeeming quahty, Hindooism is the one. If there is one 
 which is wholly " earthly, sensual, devihsh," it is this. It is a re- 
 hgion of frauds, cruelties, and horrors. 
 
 Leaving the Holy (?) City at eleven o'clock in the moi-ning, we 
 rode all that day over the same hot, dusty, and seemingly barren 
 plain which we have been crossing nearly ever since we left Bombay. 
 By dayUght the next morning the scene had changed, and the plain 
 was dotted over with gi'oves of palms. "VMiat a blessed rehef from 
 that ^^ide, level, thirsty-looking expanse, without forest or thickets, 
 hills or valleys, to reheve the eye or excite the interest. As we 
 sped rapidly along, the gi'een palm-groves gradually grew denser 
 and thicker, and finally blended into one continuous jungle. This 
 is the India we have been longing to see — thick jungle with shady 
 lanes running through it, thatched huts nesthng among the cocoa- 
 nut groves, banana-trees reaching their broad green leaves over the 
 garden fences, tanks with villages beside them, and tropical mois- 
 tui-e and luxuriance. Presently we reached Howi-ah, the busy ter- 
 minus of the railway and the Brooklyn of Calcutta, crossed the 
 Hoogly on the fine, new pontoon bridge, one of the finest of its 
 kind ever constnicted, and were in Calcutta, the City of Palaces. 
 "But where are the Palaces '?'" is the natui*al queiy of eveiy trav- 
 eller. It is a conundrum, and I give it up. The palace of the ex- 
 king of Oudh is the only one I saw or heard of, and that is an 
 hour's drive from the city. 
 
 As might be expected, the European quai'ter of Calcutta is per- 
 fectly satisfactory — fine Government buildings, wide and regular 
 streets, a spacious esplanade called the ^Faidan, a pleasure gar- 
 den, the Eden, and the customary statues in each. The Imperial 
 Museum has just taken possession of a huge rectangular pile, built 
 expressly for it, but its collections are by no means what a natural- 
 ist has a right to expect. In some depai-tments the collection is 
 even poor, some of the most important Asiatic forms being con- 
 spicuous only by their absence. The collection of East Indian Che- 
 
BENARES, CALCUTTA, AND MADRAS. 87 
 
 Ionia is very complete and the specimens are beautifully prepared. 
 I had expected to devote a week or more to studying the fishes and 
 reptiles which I should find here, but the absence of classified speci- 
 mens rendered it impossible.* I had, however, the pleasure of 
 meeting Dr. Anderson, the eminent Director of the Museum. 
 
 In Calcutta I began to realize very keenly that the hot season 
 had set in, and hastened my preparations to depart for South- 
 ern India. The thermometer steadily stood at 98° to 100° in the 
 shade, and the nights were almost as hot as the days. There are 
 different qualities of heat, just as there are different degrees. At 
 home, we work out in the fields when the thermometer stands at 
 102° in the shade, with only a thin straw hat for a head-covering, 
 whereas if a white man should attempt anything of the kind here 
 with the same temperature, he would soon be hors de combat. Here, 
 every office is provided with its long swinging fans called " punk- 
 ahs," which hang from the ceiling over the desks and are pulled 
 vigorously to and fro all day long by coolies kept constantly em- 
 ployed for that purpose. Every dinner-table has its punkah, and 
 nearly every European has one over his bed and a coolie crouched 
 down outside his door, pulling steadily all night long, fanning the 
 " Sahib " while he sleeps, or until the coolie himself falls asleep, 
 and the Sahib goes into a nightmare and awakes drenched with 
 perspiration and gasping for breath. Instead of storm-doors such 
 as we have to keep out the piercing cold, here we see the verj^ 
 same idea followed out in an opposite way. The doors of many 
 houses and English shops are provided with open screens of grass, 
 or " cuscus," upon which water is constantly thrown by the coolies, 
 so that the air in passing through them will be cooled and chai'ged 
 with moisture, and render life less of a burden to those within. 
 These are the " tatties " so indispensable to the existence of Euro- 
 peans in Northern India during the hot season, and especially dur- 
 ing the prevalence of the dreaded " hot winds." 
 
 Having carefully packed up my collection, and shipped it aboard 
 a vessel bound for New York, on the morning of May 6th I em- 
 barked on the French Messageries steamer Meinam, for Madras. 
 The broad and deep Hoogly Kiver forms the harbor of Calcutta, and 
 below the pontoon bridge the sailing vessels are moored close to- 
 gether along the eastern shore by strong chain cables, while the 
 steamers lie at the jetties which have been built here and there on 
 
 * It must^^be borne in mind that the above was written in 1877. 
 
88 TWO YEARS IN THE JUNGLE. 
 
 the same side, but farther down the stream. As we steamed slowly 
 down the Hoogly and left the " City of Palaces " (sic) behind us, 
 the palm-groves and cocoanut gardens gradually disappeared, until 
 there remained only a low and flat alluvial plain, dotted here and 
 there with patches of low jungle, straggling native huts, grain 
 stacks, and herds of grazing cattle. 
 
 The delta is, of course, green and fertile, but we ai'e entirely 
 disappointed of the lofty trees and luxuriant tangle of vegetation 
 which we have had indelibly pictured in oiu' mind ever since we 
 first heard of India. And yet, away over on our left lie the Sun- 
 derbunds, a vast labyrinth of channels, creeks, and bayous, and 
 islands clad with low, scrubby jungle, that really does afford shelter 
 for wild hogs, spotted deer, jackals, crocodiles, and an occasional 
 tiger and rhinoceros, I had intended to make a hunting trip to 
 this famous game district, but upon questioning those who had 
 been there I found that I could not be certain of finding anything 
 except wild pigs and deer, which was not a satisfactory prospect. 
 
 How rudely a httle travel lays in ruins some of our most cher- 
 ished ideas, impressions which have been honestly acquiredj too. 
 Here have we travelled over sixteen hundred miles in India, with- 
 out seeing a tropical forest, or even a tropical landscape, until 
 reaching the delta of the Ganges. Judging from the tales of cer- 
 tain travellers and* sea-captains, I expected to see the Hoogly below 
 Calcutta almost covered with the bodies of dead Hindoos, whereas 
 we saw never a one. Neither were there any swarms of native 
 craft. I was surprised at the scarcity of birds along the river, for 
 we saw only half a dozen small egrets {Herodias egrettoides), feed- 
 ing in a salt marsh, and two gniUs {L. rudibunda) flying overhead. 
 
 At sunset we anchored in the river at Diamond Harbor, for we 
 were yet many miles from the mouth, and no vessel dares to navi- 
 gate this treacherous river after nightfall. Even in the daytime it 
 is difficult enough to steer clear of its shifting quicksands. 
 
 While we lay at anchor, some of the sailors (French) went fish- 
 ing over the bows and caught a shark about four feet long. Di- 
 rectly it was landed upon the deck, they procured a lantern and a 
 knife and went to work to dissect their specimen as scientifically as 
 they knew how. For half an hour those big, rough fellov(S worked 
 over that animal, studying its anatomy with as much interest as a 
 party of savants, I wondered if American sailors would have felt as 
 much interest in a common shai'k, and whether an American mate 
 would not have ordered the men to " heave that overboard " for 
 
BENAEES, CALCUTTA, AND MADEAS. 89 
 
 fear of soiling the deck. The first shark I ever caught was at 
 Nassau, B. I., from the deck of the steamer City of New York, and 
 while I was gone below for a knife, Captain Deakin ordered a sailor 
 to "heave that overboard before he makes a mess of it." But Cap- 
 tain Deakin despised second-class passengers on principle, and never 
 lost an opportunity to do them a mean turn ; in which he was like 
 nearly aU the other American and English steamship officers I ever 
 met. 
 
 The banks of the Hoogly sink by such a gentle gTadient into 
 the Bay of Bengal that the mouth of the river is really miles at sea 
 — quite out of sight of land in fact — and the navigation of the river 
 is both difficult and dangerous. A long, winding line of buoys 
 marks the channel out to the light-ship and pilot-brig at the Sand- 
 heads, without which no large vessel could ever reach Calcutta, for 
 the banks are of fine sand and the channel is constantly shifting. 
 The Calcutta Pilot Service very judiciously consists of Englishmen, 
 so that in the event of war no hostile fleet could by any human 
 possibility find its way up to Calcutta. The Sandheads are visible 
 only upon the captain's chart now, but in due course of time there 
 will be villages and rice-fields where is now smooth water. 
 
 The fourth morning from Calcutta we reached Madras. From 
 north to south stretched a low, sandy coast, fringed with white 
 breakers, without a sign of bay, harbor, or sheltering river-mouth, 
 or even a break in the surf. Ships anchor in the open sea, exposed 
 to the full fury of the storms, and during the cyclones which fre- 
 quently visit Madras, vessels are often swept upon the beach and 
 dashed to pieces. Those that are able usually slip their cables and 
 put to sea, preferring to brave the fury of the storm in deep water, 
 with plenty of sea-room. 
 
 Until the construction of the long iron pier which extends out 
 into the sea, far beyond the surf, all communication with the shore 
 was carried on by means of the famous masulah boats common to 
 the Coromandel coast, which are built for the express purpose of 
 going through the breakers. They are very deep and wide in pro- 
 portion to their length, built of a light, tough, and pliant Ceylon 
 wood called "hallmilUa" {Berrya anionilla), and the planks are 
 sewed together instead of nailed, so that when a sea strikes the side 
 of a boat the planks yield sufficiently to deaden the force of the 
 shock. But the fault of the masulah boat is that it will go to pieces 
 by the ripping of its seams just when it ought not. Scarcely a 
 week goes by but the daily papers mention how " Masulah boat No. 
 
90 TWO YEARS IN THE JUNGLE. 
 
 so-aoid-so, returning from such-a-ship laden with rice, went to pieces 
 in the siu-f and the cargo was lost. The crew escaped by swim- 
 ming." 
 
 Looking shoreward from the ship, we see a long row of square- 
 built, flat-roofed warehouses, stores, and banks extending along 
 the shore within a stone's throw of the sui'f. To the south of this 
 there is a tall Hght-house, a fort (St. George), and behind these a 
 wide esplanade, beyond which the city spreads out indefinitely. 
 There is nothing prominent about Madras, no lofty buildings loom- 
 ing up above the smaller one, no domes, nor chiu'ch-spires, nor 
 even a palm-tree. 
 
 In good weather there is not the least difficulty or danger in 
 going through the surf, and a masidah boat soon landed us high 
 and diw upon the sand. Perhaps Madras never appeared to worse 
 advantage than it did then, in May, 1877. The second year of 
 drought and famine had filled the city with an immense crowd of 
 half-starved, and four-fifths naked wretches, men, women, and chil- 
 dren, who faii'ly swanned in eveiy sti-eet and alleyway. The trees 
 were almost leafless, the ground was baked and bare, and from 
 morning till night the sultry air was full of blinding red dust which 
 covered everything, even penetrating the closed sleeping-rooms and 
 coating the fumiti're and bed-curtains. The city had taken on a 
 dull, reddish-brown color, instead of its traditional yellow. 
 
 For half a mile the beach was covered with masulah boats, and 
 bags of rice stacked up eight feet high, at which a swarm of cooHes 
 worked like a huge colony of black ants, unloading boats and car- 
 rying rice-bags up to the level of the street. The streets near the 
 beach were crowded with carts, which, when laden with rice were 
 dragged away to the railway station by coolies instead of bullocks. 
 
 Women and children with baskets followed the laden carts, and 
 whenever a rice-bag spmng a leak and a little gi-ain was spilled in 
 the dust, the dirt was swept up and canied away to be sifted for 
 the few grains of rice it contained. Emaciated beggars swarmed 
 about the hotel doors, begging with the piteous pantomime of hun- 
 ger, or with the long-drawn wail of •'' Sawme e I ■'" In the streets, 
 
 boys ran along beside the open gharry, holding out their hands and 
 crying " Sahib I " at every rod ; and no matter where the carriage 
 stopped, there was always a hving skeleton at hand to rise up, pat 
 its hollow stomach with one hand and hold out the other for alms. 
 
 At fii'st I thought the Madrasees were four or five shades bLacker 
 than the natives of Northern India, but their seeming so was only 
 
BE:N"ARES, CALCUTTA, AND MADEAS. 91 
 
 because they were so very nude. At first so much semi-nudity 
 was very repulsive, but one soon becomes accustomed to it. What 
 a mercy it is that these poor famine-stricken wretches do not have 
 to contend with cold as well as hunger, and that under this blazing 
 sun no one can suffer much from lack of clothes. 
 
 No government ever tried harder to mitigate the horrors of 
 famine than the administration of the so-called Benighted Presi- 
 dency. In the distressed districts there were relief works, relief 
 camps, and hospitals, without which the wretched natives would 
 have died by thousands. The railways were taxed to the utmost 
 of their resources to remove the grain from Madras to the famine 
 districts fast enough to keep the people from absolute starvation. 
 But for the railways, it is probable that three-fifths of the people in 
 the Madras Presidency would have died. The natives look upon 
 the British occupancy of their country as a punishment inflicted 
 upon them by the gods for past misdeeds, and they believe that the 
 expiation of their sins will in time be completed and the punish- 
 ment removed. They had better pray for their gods to punish 
 them some more in that way. Lucky it is for them that English- 
 men have built roads and railways for them, and that in time of 
 famine England still acknowledges every wretch of them as a Brit- 
 ish subject, to be fed and doctored at any cost. 
 
 The Madras Government Museum is an institution of which the 
 " Benighted Presidency " may well be proud. It approaches my 
 ideal of a museum for the people, and to judge from the crowds of 
 natives which throng its galleries, the people appreciate it. The 
 collection of stuffed fishes is the finest I have ever seen, not only as 
 to the number of genera (local forms are best represented, of 
 course), but also as to the beautiful manner in which the speci- 
 mens have been prepared. Fortunately for the taxidermist, Mr. P. 
 Anthony Pillay, he receives nearly all his specimens fresh from the 
 ocean, and fortunately for them, he prepares them with remarkable 
 skill The collection of mammals peculiar to Southern India is 
 very instructive, and that of invertebrates from the Indian Ocean 
 even more so. The Herbarium contains an immense number of 
 botanical specimens. Diu'ing my visits to the Museum I frequently 
 had the pleasure of meeting its director. Dr. Bidie, who kindly gave 
 me much information and useful advice concerning my intended 
 work in Southern India. 
 
 At Madras I encountered another native language (Tamil), and 
 was of course obliged to have another servant to speak it for me. 
 
92 TWO YEAES IN THE JUNGLE. 
 
 The custom with Europeans in India is to have three or four ser- 
 vants to do the work of one man, and had I followed the ordinary 
 rule, I should have hired one man as a cook, another as " bearer," 
 another as general assistant, and a fourth loafer to boss the other 
 three. Instead of that I engaged a man whose caste could not pos- 
 sibly stand in the way of his doing any kind of work, who spoke 
 English very tolerably, and was an impudent rascal I told him I 
 would require him to do the woi*k of two ordinary servants, for 
 which I would pay him double wages, the most satisfactory arrange- 
 ment a traveller can make. 
 
 I had come to Madras to collect mammals of all sizes, and in 
 order to escape the heat of the plains during the hottest months, 
 and also to find good collecting ground at the same time, I de- 
 cided to visit the Neilgherry Hills. Accordingly, three days after 
 reaching Madras, I packed up and started by rail for the foot of the 
 Hills, accompanied by my new servant Appoo, as great a fraud as 
 I could have found in a month. 
 
CHAPTER IX. 
 
 THE NEILGHERRY HILLS. 
 
 The "Blue Mountains." — A Natural Eden. — Physical Aspect. — The Coonoor 
 Pass. —Beauty and Grandeur. — Climbing up to Paradise. — Ootacamund. — 
 Products of the Hills.— The Worst Hotel in India. — A Hunt in the "De- 
 lectable Mountains." — Above the Clouds. — The Todas — A Remarkable 
 People. — Their Negative Qualities. — Phenomenal Laziness. — The "Pau- 
 laul " and the " Paulchi. "—Physique of the Todas. —Dress. — Polyandry, 
 or Plurality of Husbands. — Betrothal, Marriage, and Divorce. — Infanticide. 
 —The Toda Hut.— The Mund.— The Toda Buffalo. —Little Game but 
 Splendid Scenery. — A Cloud Scene. — An Empty Bag, but no Regrets. 
 
 A RIDE of three hundred miles in a southwesterly direction over 
 a hot and dusty level plain almost as barren as a brick-yard, and in 
 places of a brick-red color, brought us to Coimbatore, fi'om whence 
 a branch line leads up north twenty-five miles to the village of 
 Mettapollium, near the foot of the Neilgherries. Between Metta- 
 pollium and the foot of the Hills, lies the Bhowani Eiver and a 
 level belt of luxuriant tropical forest six miles wide, a dense, shady 
 jungle of bamboos, palms, ferns, and forest trees. Beaching the 
 end of this delightful road, we leave the carriage and start to ride 
 on horseback up the Coonoor Pass, while oui* light luggage is car- 
 ried by coolies.* 
 
 The Neilgherry Hills (or " blue mountains " — all mountains are 
 called "hills" in India) rise very abruptly from the low, level 
 plain of Southern India, into a lofty, triangular table-land of an 
 average height of about seven thousand feet above the level of the 
 sea. Except on the north, where a narrow, elevated ridge joins it 
 to the Western Ghauts and the table-land of Mysore, this lofty 
 plateau is completely isolated — a green and smiling garden in a 
 parched and thirsty plain. In general shape it is a right-angled 
 triangle of which the base is to the north, facing Mysore ; the per- 
 pendicular extends from north to south and faces the Malabar Dis- 
 
 * There is now a mountain railway up to Coonoor. 
 
94 TWO YEAKS IX THE juxgle. 
 
 trict ; the bypotlienuse extends northeast and southwest, and the 
 apex reaches down to Coimbatore and Palghaut. 
 
 The base of the Neilgherries is encircled by a wide belt of dense 
 and unhealthful forest, which affords abundant cover for elephants, 
 tigers, bears, hysenas, elk, and small deer, and has long been famous 
 as a hxmting ground for large game. The sides of the hills are 
 either pei'pendiculai' granite cliffs of great height, or very steep 
 wooded slopes scored by deep ravines and rocky gorges. Upon 
 the summit we see a wide expanse of smooth, rolling hills and 
 ridges, which rise up on the northeast and southwest into thi'ee 
 sepai'ate ranges of lofty peaks, one of which, Dodabetta, eight thou- 
 sand seven hundi'ed and sixty feet high, is the second highest peak 
 south of the Himalayas. Five other peaks exceed eight thousand 
 feet in height, and the town of Ootacamund, in the centre of the 
 plateau, is seven thousand three hundred feet above the level of 
 the sea.* 
 
 There are no forests upon these hills, nor continuous jungle of 
 any kind ; but here and there, upon wet hillsides or in moist hol- 
 lows, are small patches of dense, leafy jungle, called "sholas," which 
 afford cover for sambur deer, muntjac, foxes, jackals, porcupines, 
 black monkeys, and even tigers. 
 
 The climate upon the Neilgherry range is truly dehghtfuL 
 O'^'ing to its elevation, it stiikes the happy medium between the 
 extremes of heat and cold, and of drought and flood, so that here 
 there is at all seasons the " ethereal mildness '' of pei-petual spring. 
 Even dming the great drought and consequent famine of 1876-77, 
 which prevailed upon the plains, the clouds which rolled up from 
 the southwest laden with moisture from the Indian Ocean, encoun- 
 teiing the cool peaks of the Blue Moimtains, were compelled to 
 " drop down the dew." The average annual rainfall at Ootacamund 
 is fifty-five inches, and even in 1876, the first year of the famine, 
 there were seventy-six rainy days, and the total rainfall was 25.16 
 inches. The average annual temperature at the same place is 
 55.83 degrees. In 1876, the mean temperature for July was sixty- 
 one degrees. The air upon the Hills is pure, cool, and invigorat- 
 ing, and the nights are decidedly cold. Xatui-ally enough, this is 
 the sanitarium for Southern Lidia, whither come enervated civil 
 and military officers, soldiers, and civilians of all classes, from the 
 
 * The Xeilgheriies are composed almost wliolly of porpliTritic granite, cov- 
 ered bv a deep layer of rich, black, and fertile soil. 
 
THE ]S'EILGHERRY HILLS. 95 
 
 plains to spend the hot months and repair constitutional damages — ■ 
 most of which may be traced to the curse of the East Indies — 
 " brandy-and-soda." 
 
 The Coonoor Pass winds up one side of a deep, rocky gorge 
 which is furrowed straight down the steep mountain side from top 
 to bottom, widening and deepening as it goes. On one hand the 
 steep side of the ravine rises up beside us almost like a wall, while 
 ou the other it descends precipitously from the roadside far down 
 to the bottom of the gorge where the Karteri Eiver, a mountain 
 torrent, goes dashing downward over its rocky bed. All the way 
 up, the road is shaded by forest trees which everywhere cover that 
 side of the ravine with a dense green mantle, and from time to 
 time we cross cool and shady Httle glens of the most romantic de- 
 scription, where little mountain streams, whose moist banks are cov- 
 ered with exquisite ferns, go tumbling downward over gnarled 
 roots and mossy stones. 
 
 Every now and then a turn in the road gives us a clear view 
 across the gorge to where a lofty precipice looms up a thousand 
 feet or more, and looking backward we see the hot plain we have 
 j ust quitted stretching out far below us like a vast, unruffled sea 
 of brown and green. The higher we ascend, the cooler becomes 
 the air, and vegetation takes on a rank and luxuriant freshness 
 wliich contrasts so strongly with the region we have just quitted, 
 that we seem to have climbed up out of a fiery hell into a cool, 
 shady, and well-watered paradise. 
 
 But every rose has its thorns. The " pony " I rode (which was 
 furnished by the Madras Carrying Co. at an exorbitant price) was 
 a wretched, half-starved, and wholly worn-out beast which it seemed 
 a sin to ride. At every step it threatened to collapse, like the fa- 
 mous "One-Hoss Shay." It was the first time I ever bestrode a 
 skeleton, and tried to make it walk. The experiment was not a 
 success, for about every two rods my pony skeleton insisted upon 
 stopping, and, at the end of the second mile, I dismounted and 
 walked on, leaving my fiery, untamed steed standing in the middle 
 of the road with his head down, a prey to his own gloomy thoughts. 
 
 Two miles farther up a " fresh (!) pony " awaited me. It was a 
 slight improvement upon the first one, having been fed only a week 
 previously ; but the fault of this noble animal was that he wanted 
 to stop, and would stop every few minutes, to look at the scenery. 
 After three miles I abandoned him also as a derelict, and finished 
 the ascent on foot. The pass is nine miles long, and at the top we 
 
96 . TWO TEAES IX THE JUXGLE. 
 
 reached the picturesque little -village of Coouoor, at an elevation of 
 five thousand nine hundred and lift}--four feet. 
 
 Twelve miles from Coonoor, in the centre of the Neilgherry 
 plateau, is Ootacamimd, the capital of the Hill district, the fashion- 
 able resort of Southern India, and the headquarters of all the 
 sportsmen who visit the hills. It is the least like a town of any I 
 ever saw or heard of, for it is so effectually scattered, over so many 
 ^lills, that as a town it has no individuality whatever. But it is a 
 highly pretentious one nevertheless, with its hotels, club, pack of 
 hounds, shops, and an assortment of Government institutions. A 
 network of fine metalled roads run around and over the hills, and 
 a goodly number of pretty cottages and fine bungalows perch around 
 on the hill sides, each with its spacious " compound "' of an acre or 
 more laid out in shady, gi-avelled walks, and terraces of flowers. 
 
 As to climate and natui-al scenery, the Xeilgherries surpass any 
 moimtain region I have ever seen, neither cold nor hot at any sea- 
 son, always gi'een and fresh, and always either softly beautiful or 
 precipitously grand. The soil is veiy rich, and produces the finest 
 fruits and vegetables to be found in Southern India, among which are 
 mangos, bananas (or plantains, as they are miiversally called here), 
 mandai'iu oranges, pineapples, and even pears, although I am bound 
 to say the Last-named tasted more like raw tiu-nips than pears. The 
 common vegetables are potatoes, cabbages, and cauliflowers of good 
 size and quality, celery, onions, sweet potatoes, turnips, beets, car- 
 rots, i-adishes, peas, lethice, etc. Tea and coffee ai-e grown in vast 
 quantities, tobacco is grown very successfully, and also large quan- 
 tities of cinchona bark, from which the priceless quinine is manu- 
 factiu'ed. 
 
 The British Government knows how to do some very admirable 
 things now and then out of pure chaiity. For instance, it owns 
 and manages a vast cinchona plantation upon the hills, from which 
 it manufaotui'es quinine in great quantities, and while this great 
 fever specific is selling in the extortionate EngKsh apothecary shops 
 for from fifteen to twenty rupees per ounce, the poor fever-stricken 
 native, or European either, for that matter, can go to the Govern- 
 ment Court-House and procure it for one and a half rupee per 
 ounce. 'What a boon is this to suffeiing humanity 1 
 
 In our glorious repubhc, we have, until very recently, managed 
 this matter rather differently. TVe have chai'ged a snug little thirty 
 per cent import duty upon quinine, which prevented its impor- 
 tation and sale at a low price, and protected a single firm of ehem- 
 
3 
 
THE NEILGHEREY HILLS. 9( 
 
 ists while it rolled up a princely fortune at the expense of the poor 
 " fever-ancl-ager " victims in the back settlements and the Western 
 river bottoms. 
 
 During my stay at Ootacamund (called Ooty, for short), I lived 
 at Leigh's Alexandra Hotel, where, for four nipees a day, I had the 
 poorest fare and the worst attendance I ever put up with in a hotel 
 or boarding-house of any kind, or at any price. Although the fare 
 was poor it had one redeeming feature — there was never very much 
 of it, for mine hostess and her myrmidons seemed to be experiment- 
 ing upon me to see how little a man could live upon. But it was 
 the best I could do under the circumstances. In hotels like that, 
 the traveller who does not spend nearly as much money in brandy, 
 soda, and cigars as his board amounts to, is an unwelcome guest, 
 and from mine host to the water-carrier he is treated accordingly. 
 The servants of the Alexandra recognized one set of travellers as 
 " big gentlemen," who were entitled to their attention, and the 
 " small gentlemen " (such as I) were left to shift for themselves. 
 
 Soon after reaching Ootacamund I met a very enthusiastic young- 
 sportsman, with whom I planned a short trip to the Neddimullahs, 
 a range to the west, to hunt sambur deer (Eusa aristotelis), and 
 the Neilgherry goat (Ilemitragus hylocrius), which is here (in 
 sport, I suppose) called the "ibex." We took with us a native 
 " shikaree " to be our guide, and a party of coolies who carried 
 upon their heads the baskets laden with our camp-outfit, ammuni- 
 tion, and provisions for five days. 
 
 A brisk walk of about twelve miles over the hills and through 
 the hollows, brought us to the range of peaks, and at a lovely spot, 
 known as Betmund, we made our camp beside two little Toda huts, 
 which sheltered us at night. Never have I seen a lovelier land- 
 scape than that which stretched before us then. Looking back 
 toward Ootacamund we saw an endless succession of rolling hiUs 
 and rounded ridges covered with bright green grass, relieved here 
 and there by dense sholas of a darker hue. The hills looked as if 
 they had just been gone over with a lawn-mower, they were so 
 smooth and clean. Near our camp was a clear, cold mountain 
 stream, while on three sides of vis the hills rose into lofty peaks 
 still smooth in outline and covered with short grass. We were 
 really among the '•' delectable mountains." 
 
 At daybreak the next morning we saw four wild goats feeding 
 near the summit of one of the tallest peaks, at the base of which 
 we were encamped. To the naked eye they were the merest dark 
 7 
 
98 TWO YEAES IN THE JUNGLE. 
 
 specks, but with the glass we easily made them out. Dressing 
 hastily, we were soon on our way up the steep side, and after an 
 hour's steady and laborious climbing we reached the summit, made 
 a careful stalk over, and found — nothing. All that day and the 
 next also we climbed up and down those peaks, hunted along dan- 
 gerous precipices and rocky ridges, but found no animals. We 
 were so high that clouds enveloped us more than half the time and 
 greatly retarded our progress. They enabled us to realize what a 
 wet, cold, and disagreeable thing a cloud is, when one is in it, how- 
 ever beautiful it may look from below. 
 
 On the third day we moved six miles to the northeast, and 
 pitched our tent in the edge of a fine shola at the mouth of a smaU 
 cave in the rocks, low down beside a clear running brook, where 
 we were quite sheltered from the wind. A hundred yards away, 
 up the gxassy slope, was a typical Toda village, or " mund," called 
 Muddimund, and I was glad of so good an opportunity to make 
 the acquaintance of these strange people. After all, the Todas are 
 the most interesting animals on the Neilgherries, and before them 
 wild goats and sambur sink into insignificance. 
 
 The Todas of the mund regarded our camping so near them as 
 a sort of invasion of their premises, and their suspicion of us rose 
 to positive dislike^ when, on the second day, they discovered our 
 coolies had stolen a couple of dry rails from their cattle-pen and 
 cut them up for fire-wood. Of course it was a perfectly lawless 
 act, and I quite admked the spirit of one of the men who came 
 down to inform us of the fact, and threaten to have our men up for 
 theft if the offence was repeated. As he stood upon a bare rock 
 above our camp, with a long staff in his hand, clad only in a loin 
 cloth and a cloudy cotton sheet worn somewhat like a toga, with 
 bare arms and legs, and a mass of long, jet-black hair falling in 
 apostolic fashion over his shoulders, he seemed like another " John 
 the Baptist preaching in the wilderness." He soon convinced us 
 of the error of our ways, and a couple of rupees not only acted like 
 oil upon the troubled waters, but rendered him both friendly and 
 communicative. 
 
 The Todas are certainly a remarkable tribe, but their qualities 
 are all of a negative character. Their history — which is really a 
 history of nothings — goes to show that the natural laws which gov- 
 ern the progress of all other races and tribes of mankind do not af- 
 fect them in the least. Man is a progressive being, whose gradual 
 ascent in the scale of intelligence and refinement depends largely 
 
THE JSTEILGHEERY HILLS. 99 
 
 upon the nature of his envh'onment, or whether his surroundings 
 are favorable or unfavorable for his advancement. He reaches his 
 highest level in a temperate climate, and on good soil, where life 
 is not a continual struggle for bare existence. 
 
 With the exception of a few changes which have been forced 
 upon them by the Government, as the cessation of infanticide, for 
 example, the Todas are to-day precisely as they were when, in 
 1814, Mr. Sullivan discovered them on the Neilgherry plateau. 
 They belong to the Dravidian race, but are the least cultivated 
 of all its tribes. Although inhabiting this magnificent plateau 
 from time immemorial, a very Eden in itself, living in a mild and 
 salubrious climate, on bountifully fertile soil, and amid scenery 
 that ought to inspire a mummy, they have never tilled the soil, nor 
 planted fruit-trees, nor built cities, towns, or villages, or even com- 
 fortable dwellings. They have no domestic animals save buffaloes 
 and cats, whereas they might easily have flocks upon flocks of 
 sheep, goats, and fowls, and ponies and bullocks by the score. 
 
 With time enough for anything, they manufacture absolutely 
 nothing, not even weapons ; build nothing except the flimsy huts 
 they Hve in, and like the lazy, indolent brutes they are, subsist 
 wholly upon the milk from their buffaloes, and what grain they can 
 beg of the Badagas, a neighboring tribe which pays an uncertain 
 tribute to the Todas as the original possessors of all the land on 
 the Neilgherries, The drove of buifaloes belonging to the mund is 
 herded by the small boys, and milked by the dairyman only, the 
 "paulaul." The only occupation of the men, aside from the milk- 
 man, is visiting the neighboring villages of Badagas and begging 
 for tribute. 
 
 In a country teeming with game, and also with a natural appe« 
 tite for flesh, the Todas are absolutely Mdthout weapons, or even 
 spears of the simplest sort, either for defence or capture. They 
 make no traps for game, set no snares, dig no pitfalls, nor capture 
 game in any way whatever. And yet they said they were fond of 
 sambur flesh, and two of the men we questioned informed us, with 
 the pride of men who recall a banquet, that they once had all they 
 could eat of a sambur killed by Morgan Doray. They have no 
 caste prejudices to prevent them killing and eating game, as have 
 many Indian natives, and nothing keeps them from the chase but 
 sublime laziness. What total depravity ! 
 
 Having leai'ned the above, I was quite prepared for the informa- 
 tion that the Todas have no written language, no songs, no history, 
 
100 TWO YEAES IX THE JUISTGLE. 
 
 written or unwritten, no liistorical monuments nor compositions 
 of any kind ; in fact, nothing but buffaloes. I believe, however, 
 they have some religious notions and ceremonies, but I did not 
 succeed in getting anything like a clear idea of their nature, and so 
 prefer to omit all mention of them. This much I learned to a cer- 
 tainty, however, that the milkman, the "paulaul," is regarded as a 
 sacred character, a god in fact, and is never touched by any human 
 being \inless it be another sacred milkman of equal rank. The 
 dairy, or " paulchi," is a sacred place, which may not be entered 
 under any circumstances by any one but the paulaul. If there is 
 any surplus milk after the wants of the mund are supplied, it is 
 made into ghee, which, if not also used, he sells or trades to neigh- 
 boring tribes for rice, millet, wheat, sugar, salt, or tobacco. 
 
 ^ven in India, with its many tribes and castes, the Todas are 
 people of remarkably fine appearance. To judge by their form 
 and features, one would suppose them capable of any degree of 
 progress in the social scale. The men are tall and very erect, 
 large-framed, broad-chested, and finely built every way, many being 
 quite muscular. Their color is a blackish brown. The features 
 ai'e well-moulded every way, with Jewish nose, full Hps, massive 
 but not prominent cheek-bones, lai-ge eyes, and low forehead, but 
 otherwise the head is well shaped. 
 
 Theu' hair is very abundant, wavy, jet-black, and rather coarse, 
 and the thick, busTiy beard is also black. I never saw men whose 
 bodies were so densely haii-y, especially on the breast and arms, as 
 are these Todas generally. Every man is an Esau. 
 
 In height the women are, on an average, about six inches shorter 
 than the men. There was one comely face at Muddimund, but the 
 remainder of the women were not nearly so good-looking as the 
 men. Both men and women part their hair in the middle, and the 
 latter wear theirs either in curls or in a wavy mass hanging well 
 down their backs. 
 
 The Toda garment is a sort of mantle of coarse cotton stuff of 
 native manufacture, with a figui-ed border, and when new is white. 
 It is thrown over the left shoulder, brought forward under the 
 right arm, and the corner is again flung over the left shoulder, 
 which leaves the right ai'm entirely bare and free. The female 
 robe is of the same size and material, but it is worn like a mantle 
 over both shoiilders. The priestly milkman usually wears nothing 
 except the loin cloth, and neither men nor women ever wear an;^ 
 kind of head covering. 
 
?HS ISTEILGHEERY HILLS. 101 
 
 The most remarkable fact about the Todas is that they practise 
 polyandry — the man-iage of several brothers or near relatives to 
 one woman. This state of society presupposes a scarcity of women, 
 which is indeed the case with the Todas, and has been from their 
 earliest history. This condition of the population was brought 
 about by infanticide, whereby a large proportion of the female chil- 
 dren born to the tribe were killed at their birth. 
 
 Formerly the males of the tribe outnumbered the females two 
 to one, but since the Madras Government has suppressed infanti- 
 cide, the proportion has risen until now there are three-fourths as 
 many females as males. 
 
 The regulations of these people in regard to marriage are very 
 simple, and result in a perfectly tranquil and harmonious state of 
 society. If my informants knew how to reckon time properly, a 
 girl's marriage to her first husband takes place when she is fifteen 
 years of age, by her own consent and choice only, and her husband 
 receives from her father a dowry of several buffaloes. After that 
 her husband's brothers may also marry her and unite their herds 
 with his, thus forming a joint-stock company and one common 
 herd. The women of the tribe never own or inherit property, and 
 the men are therefore bound to support them. 
 
 Although the social laws of the Todas regarding betrothal, mar- 
 riage, remarriage, and divorce are so extremely elastic they are actu- 
 ally shocking, they bear a resemblance to the customs of the Bible 
 patriarchs, in many respects so close as to be positively alarming. 
 
 With the Todas, marriage seems to be quite a go-as-you-please 
 institution, except that women are so scarce no man is allowed to 
 have more than one wife at a time. Like many of the prominent 
 characters in the Old Testament, who indulged in polygamy and 
 polyandry, their complete social history would not make good 
 family reading. 
 
 The practice of polyandry was brought about by infanticide, 
 and the killing of female children was due to the phenomenal lazi- 
 ness of the Toda, who shrank from the task of supporting a whole 
 woman and four or five children all by himself. But for that, this 
 tribe of physically fine men and women might have expanded and 
 founded upon the Neilgherries a magnificent principality. 
 
 As it is, there were in 1881 only six hundred and seventy-five 
 of them, not so many by about forty as in 1870, and they wander 
 about from one grazing ground to another like the good-for-noth- 
 ing heathens they are. 
 
102 TWO YEARS IN THE JUNGLE. 
 
 By many observers tliey are thought to be directly descended 
 from one of the tribes of Israel — which belief is based on their 
 facial resemblance, their semi-nomadic habits, and their customs 
 regarding marriage and divorce. To my mind, there is something 
 so decidedly Israehtish in their hereditary and violent abhorrence 
 of tilhng the soil, horticulture, and all other manual labor, that I 
 am constrained to believe the suspicion is well founded. 
 
 The habitation of the Toda is precisely what one would expect 
 ©f such an animal. It is of the smallest possible size, close and 
 hot, dark as a dungeon, destitute of furniture, and full of fleas. It 
 is more like a rustic dog-kennel than the habitation of a human 
 being. It looks like an overgrown dog-kennel in every line, and 
 whoever enters it can only do so by going on all-fours. It has no 
 window whatever, no chimney or smoke-hole, and the only opening 
 is a door in one end of the hut. 
 
 The typical hut is eight feet square, and about the same in 
 height to the angle of the Gothic roof. The ends are boarded up 
 tightly with rough boards, the cracks being filled with sun-baked 
 clay. There is but one door, a rectangular hole three feet high by 
 two wide, at the middle of one end, next to the ground. There 
 are no side walls, for the roof reaches quite to the ground on either 
 side, and the raftei^ even run into the earth. 
 
 The roof is thatched with lemon-grass lashed to the bamboo 
 rafters with split rattan. The huts built as above are quite sub- 
 stantial, but sometimes one is put up in more flimsy fashion, of 
 smaller size, with angular peak, flat-sided roof, and low side walls. 
 It was a hut of this kind that sheltered us from the rain at Bet- 
 
 mund, and almost smothered us, too, 
 until we kicked out one of the ends and 
 secured a supply of fresh air. 
 
 In spite of the darkness and fleas I 
 entered one of the huts at Muddimund 
 and examined it carefully. The accom- 
 panying diagram will explain the interior 
 better than any description, a being a 
 0(? shghtly elevated bed of clay, on which 
 
 the adults of the family slept, h a vacant 
 space in the middle of the floor where 
 the children slept, c the fireplace, d the stone mortar, and e a place 
 set apart for the culinary utensils, bags of grain, etc. To me, this 
 place was like a veritable Black Hole, and how three adults and 
 
 Ground Plan of a Toda Hut. 
 
THE NEILGHERRY HILLS. 103 
 
 four children managed to sleep in such a den, ivith the door tightly 
 closed, was a mystery. 
 
 Three such huts as the above standing close together, and the 
 dairy a little distance away, all enclosed by a low wall of earth 
 about three feet high, constituted Muddimund. Fifty yards away 
 was the buffalo pen, built of small saplings twelve feet long, like an 
 ordinary rail fence. 
 
 The Toda buffalo is a distinct breed from the domestic buffalo 
 of India generally, being of a lighter build, more active habit, and 
 having horns with much greater elevation, length, curvature, and 
 divergence. He has more flesh on his bones and some hair on 
 his blue hide, but for all that, he, too, is a very ugly specimen of 
 the bovine tribe. He is " scarey " and sometimes even dangerous in 
 the presence of white men, and the Todas say the herd is always 
 able to defend itself against the tigers and leopards of the Hills. 
 The buffaloes form a regular line of battle, with the largest bulls 
 and best fighters nearest the enemy, and the cows and calves take 
 shelter in the rear of the fighting column. The buffaloes have even 
 been known to rally to the protection of the children herding them. 
 
 For three days we hunted up and down the hills and through 
 the sholas, but with no success. Late one evening we espied a 
 stag sambur feeding near the edge of a dense sliola, but just when 
 we were getting fairly within range of him a dense white cloud 
 came sweeping along and hid him completely from our view. 
 Under the obscurity of this we hurried up nearer, and when it 
 cleared away at last, we saw, through the driving mist, only the 
 antlers and head of the stag as he stood behind a hill looking over 
 the top, straight toward us. It was our only chance for a shot, for 
 it was almost night, and aiming for the throat, we fired together. 
 As we expected, the stag wheeled around, dashed into the shola 
 and was gone. 
 
 All that the hills lacked in the matter of game and specimens 
 they made up in scenery. Every day our hunting led us along the 
 very edge of the Neilgherry plateau, where the hills end abruptly 
 in a precipitous descent of 4,000 feet to a lower and more level 
 plateau. From one spot in particular the view was sublime. 
 Standing at the end of a lofty ridge, we looked down upon a plain 
 which lay spread out before us like a map, surrounded on three 
 sides by the encircling Neilgherries, and stretching away in front 
 for a good forty miles. Nearest us it was dotted over with tiny 
 houses and cultivated fields, and crossed here and there by a road, 
 
104 TWO YEAES IX THE eTUXGLE. 
 
 but in the distance there was discernible only a sea of green forest; 
 broken here and there by grassy glades. My companion pointed 
 out the location of the Government Reserved Forest at Mudumal- 
 lay, where Indian bison [Bos gauriis), and sambur deer were nu- 
 merous, and we planned a trip there forthwith. 
 
 The last day we visited our favorite point of observation we 
 beheld a cloud-scene which was remarkably beautiful. From our 
 loftj- height we looked down upon a sea of billo\\*y white clouds as 
 white as the whitest pearls, which so completely obsciu'ed the plain 
 below that there was no visible evidence of its existence. Above 
 the expanse of clouds the air was clear, the sun shone brightly, and 
 the gi'im, gray precipices and lofty peaks which loomed up round 
 it and gii't it in, were not more motionless than this sea of clouds. 
 As a rule, it is folly for a traveller to describe a cloud-scene, and I 
 mention this only to call attention to the sm-passing beauty of a 
 mass of clouds when seen in sunshine from above and surrounded 
 by gxim and sombre outlines. 
 
 At the end of five days' very laborious himting over the hills we 
 returned to Oocatamund. So far as specimens were concerned the 
 hunt had been a total failm-e, for we had not a single one ; but any 
 man who could regTet such a trip as that on such gi'ounds deserves 
 to be shut up in a, work-shop all his life, and see nothing of nature 
 except musty skins and skeletons. 
 
CHAPTER X. 
 
 THE WAINAAD FOREST. 
 
 A Hunting Trip to Mudumallay. — Monkey Shooting. — The Karkhana. —The 
 Meanest Natives in India. — Obstacles. — An Old Hypocrite. — Record of 
 One Day's Hunting. — Expert Trackers. — Bison. — A Long Chase. — Death of 
 a Sambur Stag. — A Herd of Wild Elephants. —An Attack by an Amateur, 
 on Foot and Alone. — Close Quarters. — Failure. — Lost in the Jungle. — A 
 Sambur Killed by a Tiger. — A Bad Predicament. — Deliverance by a Lucky 
 Guess. — The Author's Status as a Shikaree. — Death of a Bull Bison. — 
 Skinning Under Difficulties. — Instinct of Self-preservation in Monkeys. 
 — Jungle Fever. — Native Cussedness again. — Return to Ooty. — A Good 
 Samaritan. — A Model (!) Physician. — Mr. and Mrs. Dawson. — Departure. 
 
 Upon the Neilgherries, wild animals of aU kinds are now so scarce 
 that they cannot be hunted with any degree of certainty, and the best 
 that either sportsman or naturalist can do is to make Ootacamund 
 his headquarters and hunt in the forests about the base of the hills. 
 Occasionally (three to five times a year), a tiger is met and killed 
 upon the hills, and an enthusiastic sportsman who is a good shot 
 may kill a wild goat or a stag sambur every week he is out ; but to 
 a collector who shoots for skins and skeletons this is ruinously slow 
 work. 
 
 A few miles to the northwest of the Neilgherry plateau, and 
 4,000 feet lower, lies the great Wainaad Forest, like a vast pre- 
 serve, teeming with large game of many kinds and famous as a 
 hunting ground. My sporting friend had visited a certain portion 
 of it known as the Mudumallay Keserved Forest, and he gave me 
 such glowing accounts of the Indian bison and deer to be found 
 there, that, after taking his report at a discount of fifty per cent., 
 I decided to go there for a fortnight's shooting under his advice 
 and guidance. 
 
 We hired four pack-ponies, loaded them with our outfit and pro- 
 visions, and at two o' clock in the afternoon we were all ready to 
 start. All except my fi-iend's chief servant and right hand man. 
 He had been given an advance of four rupees wherewith to buy his 
 
106 TWO YEAES IN THE JUNGLE. 
 
 provisions for the trip, and had been gradually getting drunk evej 
 since eai'ly morning. At the last moment he gave us the slip alto- 
 gether, and hid away in the bazaar. My friend spent an hour in 
 searching for him, with a native pohceman and a stout cane, but he 
 was not to be found, and we started without him. 
 
 We took the road leading north from Ooty to the Segor ghaut 
 and Mysore, and as soon as we were well out of the town it began 
 to rain. For nearly two hours we plodded along through a steady 
 down-pour that completely drenched everything save my two 
 packs, which I had covered with my waterproof blankets. Just at 
 dark we reached the Kulhutty bungalow, wet, cold, tired, and hun- 
 gry, and only eight miles from Ootacamund. But we soon had a 
 good fire blazing on the hearth, a steaming pot of chocolate on the 
 table, and dry clothes on ourselves. 
 
 As if to atone for om- miserable drenching, the next morning 
 broke clear and simny, and we lost no time in starting on our way 
 down the pass. Four miles from the Kulhutty bungalow we reached 
 the Segor bungalow, a mere hovel at the foot of the ghaut, elevation 
 twenty-seven hundred and ninety feet. From thence the road lay 
 through a generally level country, thinly covered with low bushes 
 and short, scrubby trees. Quartz rocks were quite abundant along 
 the road, and in one ledge I found a bed of Muscovite mica, which 
 furnished several jine specimens. Six miles from Segor we reached 
 the village of Musnigoorie, which stands on a smooth bed of red- 
 dish porphyrite, through which run long, narrow, vertical veins ol 
 quartz, several of which extend lengthwise along the middle of the 
 street. 
 
 After leaving Musnigoorie the jungle grows denser and higher, 
 iintil it soon becomes a genuine forest, and the road is both hilly 
 and rocky. Late in the evening we crossed the Moyar Kiver and 
 halted for the night at the Tippecadu traveller's bimgalow, twenty- 
 two miles fi-om Ooty. The next moraing the ponies, which had 
 been turned out to graze, were missing, and it was not until -i p.m. 
 that they were found. To occupy the time, I took my rifle and 
 stroUed out into the forest along the river, which I found in places 
 to be composed chiefly of the common bamboo (Bambusa aTundiT 
 nacea), which here grows in scattering clumps to a height of forty 
 to sixty feet. "While I was walking along, lost in admiration of the 
 first bamboo forest I had ever seen, a large animal suddenly leaped 
 to the ground from a tree a few paces in front of me, flourished a 
 Ions; tail ui mid-aii\ and nished awav throusrh the grass. From the 
 
THE WAINAAD FOREST. 107 
 
 length of its tail I thought it was a young leopard, and immediately 
 gave chase, when the animal ran up a tree, and in another moment 
 my rifle brought down a fine old gray monkey, the Madras langur 
 {Semnopithecus leucoprymus). The report started a whole troop 
 of the same species which had been feeding quietly in an adjoining 
 tree, and away they went at a great rate, galloping through the 
 tree-tops a little faster than I could nm on the ground below. But 
 one of the monkeys could not resist the temptation to stop and have 
 a look at me, a very common habit with monkeys generally, and a 
 moment later he, too, was tumbling to the ground. The largest 
 monkey of this species which I obtained in the Wainaad measured 
 as follows : length of head and body 23 inches, tail 37. I also shot 
 a Malabar squiriel {S. Malaharicus), one of the handsomest of all 
 the Sciuridce, and also one of the largest.* 
 
 By the time I had prepared the skins of my three specimens the 
 ponies amved and we started for the Mudumallay Karkhana, or 
 headquarters of the forest officers, six miles from Tippecadu. The 
 village, which consists of about twenty huts, built of mud or of spht 
 bamboos woven together, stands upon the bank of a filthy, stagnant 
 pond or " tank," a genuine cholera generator in fact, for it furnishes 
 the sole water-supply of the village. The year before our visit the 
 village had been nearly depopulated by cholera and fever, many 
 dying, while the rest fled for their lives. There is a good bungalow 
 here belonging to the forest department, quite vacant when we ar- 
 rived, but owing to ignorance on my part, and lack of management 
 on that of my companion, we had not obtained at Ooty permission 
 to occupy it during our stay, and so we were obHged to go farther, 
 and fare worse. Having come to hunt bison, we went on two and a 
 half miles beyond the Karkhana to the very centre of the best game 
 district, and camped near the house of a well-to-do old native, named 
 Com'ti Chetty. 
 
 The natives inhabiting the Mudumallay forest, forest officers, and 
 all, are certainly the meanest and most disobliging lot I met any- 
 where in the East Indies. As soon as they found we had come 
 among them without any "backing" from the government au- 
 thorities, or without any kind of tangible power over them, they be- 
 came most insolent and disobHging. First of all we saw the hand 
 of the government writer, Kamasawmy, in charge of the Karkhana 
 and its affairs. While we were making our camp, a forest peon 
 
 * See Table of Measurements of S. I. Mammals, Appendix. 
 
108 TWO YEARS IN THE JUNGLE. 
 
 came along and demanded to know who gave us permission to camp 
 in that forest. We politely informed him that we had no permis- 
 sion and needed none. A little later, when we tried to engage 
 trackers and game-carriers from among the natives li\ing near us, 
 they told us Eamasawmy had ordered them not to go with us, 
 and they dared not go at any price. Here was a pretty fix. I 
 at once va-ote a letter to the most excellent Ramasawmy, thi-eaten- 
 ing to mstantly report him to his superior at Ooty, Major Jago, if 
 he hindered our movements or caused us fiurther trouble of any 
 kind. He at once countermanded his obnoxious "order," and be- 
 came the cringing, fawning native who fears authority, even though 
 it be ever so shadowy. 
 
 Then came old Courti Chetty, who had under his immediate 
 control all the natives near our camp. "We gave him various pres- 
 ents to start with, but these only served to whet his appetite to 
 an alai-ming extent. He thought he was doing us a great favor 
 when he furnished us trackers at a rupee each per day (three 
 times their actual value), and pocketed half theii* wages. The 
 Kurumbers themselves, even when hired, would do nothing unless 
 they felt inclined, and what nearly ruined us was that they seemed 
 to be indifferent to the power of the mpee. 
 
 Old Courti Chetty visited our camp very frequently, always 
 wanting something, generally ai-rack or brandy. He had built 
 for himself quite an elaborate family temple in one comer of his 
 yard, and was a very devout old ffindoo, extremely careful of his 
 " caste." One morning his son took my gun and shot a muntjac 
 {Cervulus aureus), near our camp, of which I wanted the skin. 
 The Uttle animal was brought up and skinned by the old man's 
 son under my instructions, but I was not allowed to touch the 
 animal lest I should defile it ! "WTien they had caiiied away the 
 carcase and all the flesh, I was at liberty to take up the skin. An 
 hour later, when Coui'ti Chetty came down and asked for a drink 
 of brandy, I ordered Appoo to pour it out in my drinking-cup, 
 that I might make a trial of the venerable Hindoo's principles. It 
 was done. As usual, the old man declined to receive the cup from 
 the hand of either of us, but had it placed upon the ground in 
 front of him. "S^'ithout another word he took up my cup, which 
 had been at my lips a thousand times, and di-ank off the contents 
 as though it had been mother's milk. The old hypocrite ! 
 
 My fiieud had brought with him from Ooty a strong, healthy- 
 looking cooHe to serve as a gun-bearer, but the day after we 
 
THE WAITs^AAD FOREST. 109 
 
 reached our destination lie stole nearly all the rice belonging to 
 my cook, and refused to do any work about the camp. His mas- 
 ter discharged him at once, and after eating an enormous quantity 
 of rice he started back to Ooty. At the Karkhana he was at- 
 tacked by cholera, and died in a few hours. 
 
 During the first three days my friend and I hunted together, 
 and were completely unsuccessful, whereupon we decided to go 
 out separately. The second day that I went out alone proved to be 
 a very eventful one, and a record of its incidents will give a fair 
 idea of our doings in that locality. The following is from my diary : 
 
 " June 3, 1877. — Started out very early, accompanied by a 
 single old Kurumber, because no other trackers could be procured. 
 The old man carried my rifle and game-bag, which latter con- 
 tained my breakfast and luncheon. I carried my No. 10 gun, and 
 cartridges all loaded with single round balls and six drachms. 
 Throughout the day the character of the forest remained the same 
 as usual here — rolling hills covered with grass waist high, and a 
 very open, scattering growth of low, scrubby trees ; ground hard 
 and dry, and no swamps. 
 
 " About nine o'clock found a very fresh bison trail, and started 
 upon it at once. The way the Kurumbers and Chetties of these 
 parts take up a bison trail through long, thin grass and over hard 
 ground is surprising. They glide rapidly but almost noiselessly 
 along, their eyes fixed upon the ground, but raised every now 
 and then for a quick, piercing glance ahead to sight the herd. The 
 old Kurumber lifted the trail very rapidly, and I followed close at 
 his heels. On we went, up hill and down dale, over hard ground 
 and soft ground, the trail freshening very rapidly. Sometimes it 
 led down moist banks, and then the ground would be quite 
 ploughed up by the hoofs of the herd. At last we were pretty 
 well blown, and sat down beside the trail, under a bush on a bit of 
 rising ground, to rest and refresh a little. I was getting deeply 
 interested in a cold roast chicken, when suddenly we heard a rush 
 and a trampling of feet, and the next instant a whole herd of bison 
 hove in sight, coming toward us over the brow of the hill. 
 
 " * Kahtee, sahib ! Kahtee ! ' said my old tracker, in an excited 
 whisper. 
 
 "I snatched up my heavy gun and made ready. 
 
 " The herd came on at a brisk trot, suddenly turned off to the 
 right when a hundred yards away, and swept along before us like 
 a cavalry squadron under review. It was a grand sight, although 
 
110 'nvO YEARS IX THE Jl'XGLE. 
 
 but a momentaiy visiou of massive heads and huge ■white honis, 
 high humps, sides of chestnut brown, and about thirty pairs of 
 legs, all white from the knee down. They were too far- away for 
 my smooth-bore to hit with certainty, but aiming as weU as I 
 could. I fired at the largest bull one b:u-rel after another — and 
 missed with both. The bison dropped their heads lower, humped 
 their backs higher, redoubled their speed, and swept out of sight 
 like a whirlwind. 
 
 "We were iustiuitly up and :ifter them, and in about twenty 
 minutes saw them wtilking quietly iilong a quai-ter of a mile ahead 
 of us, for the forest was very open. I imdertook to stalk the herd, 
 and was doing very well, when the old man touched me upon the 
 arm and pointed to a fine stag sambur that was standing, head 
 erect and antlers thrown back, motionless as a bronze statue, 
 looking full at us, and only fifty yai-ds away. My poHcy is, ' one 
 bii'd in the h:md is worth two dozen in the bush,* :uid regai'dless 
 of the bison in sight of us. I fired my rifie at the sambur's neck. 
 He dropped instantly, and died almost without a kick. We cut 
 his thi'oat, blazed a tree on three sides to mai-k the spot, and hui'- 
 ried on after the bison. 
 
 " Apparently bison do not run far after being shot at, or heal- 
 ing fire-ai-ms, for half a mile from ciu- dead sambui* we came upon 
 the herd again, and stdked up to vdthin seventy yai'ds of it. This 
 time I fired my rifie at the heart-region of a lai-ge cow that stood 
 neai'est me, 'broadside on." knowing that T\ith that weapon I 
 wovdd hit my mai'k. To my chagrin the entii-e herd went teai'iug 
 ofl', and I saw that my little rifle was too small for such lai'ge 
 game, or at least too small to stop a bison. We followed on after 
 the herd, which fiu:illy led us up a high, conic:il hill, and twice 
 completely ai'oimd it. Twice we came upon the bison where the 
 cniss was as hiirh as our heads, but each time thev saw us first and 
 dashed away. After two hours of such chasing, we reluctantly 
 abiuidoned the trail, and stai-ted back to find the sambiu- we had 
 shot The old man took his beai'ings, and we walked, and walked, 
 and walked, but could not find it. It aftei'wai-d proved that we 
 went directly away fi'om camp and the object of our seai-ch, 
 
 " I soon saw that my giiide had lost his reckoning, and simply 
 cotild not find our dead game. But he tiied his best, I followed 
 without gitimbling, and again we walked and walked. It gi-ew 
 monotonous, but there was no help for it And we could not talk 
 a woi-d except by signs, which made matters so much worse. 
 
THE WAINAAD FOREST. Ill 
 
 *' Late In tlie afternoon we came upon the first herd of wild ele- 
 phants I ever saw. They were moving quietly along through the 
 forest, a quarter of a mile from us, and after watching them for a 
 while at a distance, we went our way without distiu'bing them. 
 Half an hour later we came upon the same herd, this time where 
 there was better cover from which to observe them. The herd con- 
 sisted of one fine old tusker, one young tusker, five females, and 
 two babies. They were feeding upon the grass, pulling up long 
 bunches and jerking it from side to side to shake the dirt from the 
 roots, then winding it up to their mouths. Some threw quantities 
 of dry dirt over then- backs, others fanned themselves with leafy 
 branches. I wanted that old tusker for his skin and skeleton, but 
 I had no right to shoot him there, or even attempt it, without laying 
 myself liable to a heavy fine, and so we again left the herd and went 
 our way. 
 
 " We walked on another half-hour, and came upon the herd for 
 a thu'd time. This was too much for human endurance. Twice had 
 we resisted temptation, but here it was once more. I determined 
 to kill that largest tusker then and there, if possible, and take 
 the consequences. The highest possible fine would be five hun- 
 dred rupees, and he would be worth that as a specimen. When 
 my companion saw my intention he retired a quarter of a mile, and 
 cHmbed a tree. I loaded my No. 10 with hardened balls and six 
 drachms, quite enough for any elephant, I thought, and took up my 
 position in advance of the herd. The old tusker was behind the 
 rest, sauntering slowly along, feeding as he went. I crept up 
 through the grass, keeping a tree-trunk all the time exactly be- 
 tween his eye and me, and stole fi-om one tree to another, until at 
 last I got within thirty feet of him. But unfortunately he kept his 
 forehead from me, and I only knew about the front head shot. He 
 passed on and I had to stalk him again. I stalked him at least six 
 different times, but somehow his forehead was always away from 
 me, and I would not fire at any other part. 
 
 " The elephant is certainly the most stupid animal I ever tried 
 to approach. He is as easily stalked as an old sitting-hen. Evi- 
 dently his hearing, sight, and scent are alike dull, or I would have 
 been discovered. At one time the whole herd was feeding around 
 me in a semi-circle, in a space not larger than could be covered by 
 an ordinary circus-tent, and it seemed as if the elephants were in a 
 menagerie, they were so near and so quiet. 
 
 " At last I had a reasonably fair chance at the tusker at twenty 
 
112 TWO YEAKS IX THE JT'NGLE. 
 
 yards and fired both barrels, aiming to strike the brain throiigh the 
 nasal cavity, at the base of the trunk. My shot was a total failiu'e. 
 The elephants ran ofl" a hundred yai'ds, and to my great sui-prise 
 stopped and began feeding again, all except the tusker, who stood 
 quite still. I stalked him again and this time fii-ed at his temple, 
 but failed to bring him down, and gave up in shame and disgxist. 
 The elephants now made off, trumpeting as they went, and leaving 
 a ti-ail which looked as if a hundred men had marched along in 
 Indian file. Then I regi-etted my folly in firing at the elephant and 
 wounding a noble animal to no piu-pose, and likewise rendering 
 myself liable to a fine whether I killed him or not. But the temp- 
 tation was too great to be resisted. 
 
 '• I found my old Km-umber, and we started home, abandoning 
 the search for the dead sambur. In going through a patch of high 
 gi-ass we came suddenly upon a spot where a tiger had pulled down 
 and devoured a sambur about four days previously. The grass 
 was trampled aU about, and it seemed the carcass had been dragged 
 some distance. "We saw a number of freshly picked leg-bones, and 
 we might have foimd the skull and antlers by looking about a Httle, 
 but I, for one, felt a trifle nei-vous in that dense high grass, con- 
 sideiing who had just been there before us, and we left the spot 
 without any unnecessary delay. 
 
 " "We walked on? until almost s\inset, and then the old man told 
 me by signs that we were lost, would have to sleep (!) in the jungle, 
 and that we might as well prepare for it as best we could before 
 dark. Here was a pretty fix. We had been rained upon several 
 times and were wet to the skin, had no blankets, matches, nor food, 
 nor even a chopper wherewith to build a hut. A night under such 
 conditions, in that wet grass, would surely finish one of us for some 
 time to come, even should the tigers let us alone, and to sit all 
 night in the fork of a tree was not m\ich better as a prospect. I 
 said we must get back to camp, and the old tracker said (hj signs 
 all this) • "Well, I am lost. You may show the way home.' 
 
 "I replied, 'Teiy good, I will. Let us go in that direction,' 
 and pointed across a little valley to a certain low hill. It was 
 simply a hap-hazai-d ' guess ' at the way out of our difiiculty, although 
 I felt, without in the least knowing why, that the Karthana and our 
 camp lay in that direction. ^Without a word of objection the old 
 man waded on through the tall grass in the direction I had indica- 
 ted, and just at stmset we climbed the little hill I had pointed out 
 — and came siiddenly iipon a well-ti-aveUed road ! Then we knew 
 
THE WAINAAD FOREST. 113 
 
 "we could reach some shelter before midnight, at all events. Fifteen 
 minutes later it was pitch-dark, and I can scarcely remember a 
 night of more intense darkness. I could not see my companion 
 two paces in front of me. Fortunately the road passed near our 
 camp, which we succeeded in reaching about ten o'clock, to the sur- 
 prise of every one, for we had long since been given up for lost, and 
 the people were speculating calmly on our probable fate." 
 
 The next day we went back and found our sambur untouched, 
 and I removed and preserved the skin, while the Kurumbers eagerly 
 appi'opriated the flesh. Very soon after this my friend and his gun- 
 bearer, Dena, succeeded in killing a fine bull bison, and as they 
 wanted only the skin, I was allowed to take the skeleton, all except 
 the skull, which the "Lef tenant" proposed to keep as a trophy. 
 But he was a thrifty lad, and afterward sold me the skull for four 
 rupees, which made my specimen complete. Having come wretch- 
 edly provisioned and equipped for such a trip, he soon abandoned 
 his enterprise, which was to shoot bison for their skins and heads, 
 and returned to Ooty, leaving me alone. I was not sorry when I 
 found, immediately after his departui*e, that the chief reason why the 
 Kurumbers were so backward about assisting us was, because my 
 friend had neglected to pay a number of them for services rendered 
 during a previous visit. He was a queer character, to say the least. 
 One day he said to me, "I believe you have been having a war 
 over in the United States, between the North and South. Is it over 
 now ? " " Yes." " Well, which side whipped ? " This question 
 from a man who had but a short time previously held a commission 
 as a " Leftenant in the — th Lancers," was rather a stunner to me. 
 
 I find that, in nearly all cases, I have to see a new animal two or 
 three times and get somewhat acquainted with it before I can be at 
 all sure of bringing it down. Especially is this the case with large 
 game, and with very strange species I am not discouraged if I make 
 two or three flat failures before bringing down a single specimen. 
 After I succeed in killing my first one of any kind, I ask no odds of 
 the rest. Should my reader be an old sportsman, I beg him to re- 
 member all along that these are but the adventures of a " griffin," 
 who, until coming to India to hunt elephants, tigers, and bison, had 
 never shot even an elk or buffalo ; and his fire-arms, for large 
 game, were such as no genuine " old shikaree " would accept as a 
 gift. 
 
 The death of my first bison occurred as follows : 
 
 "June 6, 1877. — Went out this morning accompanied by 
 8 
 
114 TWO YEARS IX THE JUNGLE. 
 
 three Chetties, one of whom is the keenest tracker I have yet seen. 
 About 2 P.M., we struck the fresh trail of a solitary bull bison, 
 worthy game for the most fastidious sportsman. Followed the trail 
 rapidly for some time, when suddenly, with a loud snort and a crash, 
 the old bull stai-ted up and went tearing off thi-ough the jungle. 
 Instantly we were after him, swiftly but silently, half running and 
 half walking. If one man lost the trail, another foimd it again in 
 less than a minute, and on we went. We crossed a httle ravine and 
 clambered up the opposite bank, eveiy one keenly on the alert. 
 On gaining the top of the hill, the foremost Chetty suddenly 
 crouched down, moved back a little, and motioned me to the front. 
 I hm-ried to his side, and there, about eighty yards distant, was our 
 old bison, quietly walking away from us at a shght angle. It was a 
 desperate chance, but I dai'ed not lose it. Waiting a moment until 
 he turned a tiiile to pass a certain clump of bushes, I aimed at his 
 flank so that my ball would range forwai'd into his heart-region, 
 and fired my No. 10. He sank upon his knees, but got up directly, 
 ran straight on, and disappeared in a thicket. Eeloading as I ran, 
 we were soon at the spot where he was struck and saw his blood 
 upon the grass. I hurried along his trail, but before I had gone 
 a hundred yards he rushed out of a bamboo thicket and ran be- 
 fore me along the edge of a deep ravine. As he dashed along I 
 fired a ball into his shoulders. He staggered, lost his balance, and 
 feU, crashing and tearing down through the young bamboos, rolled 
 completely over, and with a mighty bellow landed on his back, with 
 legs in air, at the very bottom of the nullah. Finding that he was 
 breathing freely, I fired a bullet fi'om my Maynard quite into his 
 heart, which saved the noble animal at least some minutes of suffer- 
 iBg." 
 
 But what a time we had measui-ing and skinning him ! He 
 could not possibly have fallen in a worse situation than upon his 
 back in the bottom of that naiTow ravine. Although not of the 
 largest size, he was still a very fine bison, his vertical height at the 
 shoulders being five feet eight and one-half inches, while his horns 
 were sixteen inches in circumference at the base. As this was but 
 the beginning of my experience with the Indian bison, I will defer 
 all observations upon the animal and its habits until we have had 
 a more extended acquaintance with it upon the Animallai HiUs. 
 
 Two days later I shot another buU bison, and some Clietties 
 shot for me a fine brovm flying-squirrel {Pteromys petaurista), and 
 another langur {Senmopithecu^). "While out hunting that day we 
 
THE WAINAAD FOREST. llo 
 
 had a fine illustration of bow the protective instinct varies in 
 animals according to surrounding circumstances. We surprised a 
 couple of gray langurs, feeding in a small grove of low trees in the 
 midst of a very thin and very low forest, which was overgrown with 
 tall grass. When the monkeys saw us they tried to hide in the 
 tree-tops, but finding it impossible to escape in that way, they ran. 
 We chased them through the grove without getting a shot, but at 
 last, when they reached the farther side we felt that we were sure 
 of them. In those low trees they would fall an easy prey to any of 
 our weapons. Who ever heard of a monkey coming down from his 
 native tree-top to escape a hunter ? 
 
 When the monkeys saw that the trees no longer afforded them 
 shelter and concealment, they leaped to the ground and started off 
 at a tearing gallop through the tall grass. We ran after them as 
 hard as we could go, but so long as the monkeys remained upon 
 the ground they were completely hidden from us. Very soon one 
 of them leaped upon a white-ant hill, and looked back to see where 
 we were. The instant my gun touched my shoulder he was down 
 and away again, with the most astonishing bounds, and flourishes 
 of his long tail. 
 
 We renewed the chase at our best speed, and once more a 
 monkey leaped up to see where we were. Four times this manoeu- 
 vre was repeated, the animals gaining ground each time, until at 
 last we gave up beaten. This was the only way in which they 
 could escape us, and they knew it much better than we. 
 
 After sixteen days in the jungle, I decided to return to Ooty 
 without delay, but soon found I had stayed a day too long. The 
 night before we were to start back it rained nearly all night, and 
 with a chill, a splitting headache, and a high fever, the grim Phan- 
 tom of the jungle marked me for his own. In spite of my iron 
 constitution and strictly temperate by-laws, the jungle-fever had 
 fastened upon me, although it was no more than I could expect. 
 But it is not such a terrible ailment after all — in fact it is half good 
 — for, owing to its regular intermittence, it gives its victim a chance 
 to rest and recuperate a little between spells. 
 
 We made ready to return to Ooty at once, and Ramasawmy 
 promised to engage a bullock bandy (cart) for us. Instead of 
 doing so, he did nothing at all about it, and went off shooting in the 
 forest. We lost a day's time through relying on his word, our 
 camp equipage got soaking wet in a rain-storm, and with the jungle- 
 fever to help matters, my patience underwent a severe strain. When 
 
116 TWO YEARS IN TPIE JUISTGLE. 
 
 we asked one of Ramasawmy's peons to find a bandy-man for us, 
 he flatly told us to find him ourselves, for he would not, which in 
 the end we were obliged to do as best we could. It is a source ol 
 consolation to me now to know that cholera prevails at Mudumallay, 
 and that in time it will catch all those wretches. 
 
 When we were starting off from our miserable camping-place, 
 old Courti Chetty made a last raid upon us, wanting arrack, powder, 
 shot, my " cumbley " (double blanket), and some money to spend 
 in redecorating ( !) his family temple, all of which I took great 
 pleasure in flatly refusing. He also begged me to write out a peti- 
 tion to the Forest authorities at Ooty, praying for the removal of 
 Ramasawmy, which petition he and the other Chetties would sign 
 and present. He complained most bitterly of the way the govern- 
 ment writer lorded it over them, compelling them to do this or 
 that without so much as saying " by your leave." He forgot that 
 in the same manner he and his relatives lorded it over the poor 
 Kurumbers and Puniyahs, and that they all had, with one accord, 
 used me about as meanly as they could. To me there was a sweet 
 consolation in the thought that 
 
 *' So, naturalists observe, a flea 
 
 Has smaller fleas tliat on him prey ; 
 And these have smaller still to bite 'em, 
 And so proceed ad infinitum." 
 
 And I left the Chetties to fight their own battles with Ramasawmy. 
 "We hastened our return to the hills, and the first day travelled 
 fi'om the Karkhana to the foot of the Segor ghaut, when the bullocks 
 could go no farther. I at once set out and walked up to the Kul- 
 hutty bungalow, where I spent a wretched night of fever and night- 
 mare. The next day, finding that the bandy did not put in an ap- 
 pearance, and feeling that I must reach Ooty before night, I hired 
 a pony at the toll-gate and tried to ride it bare-back. It balked, 
 bucked, and kicked viciously, and I could not get it a hundred yards 
 beyond its owner's hut, so I gave up in despair and lay dovra by 
 the road-side upon my blanket to enjoy my fever in peace and com- 
 fort. Just then, along came a good Samaritan (otherwise known 
 as Captain E. A. Campbell, of Ooty), who at once dismounted from 
 the fine bay horse he was riding, made me mount in his place, and, 
 walking by my side, brought me to the hotel at Ooty. Then I 
 gave up entirely, and in a few hours was quite out of my head, so 
 that for a time my miserable surroundings at the hotel and total 
 lack of attention did not trouble me at all. 
 
THE WAIXAAD FOREST. 117 
 
 My servant Appoo also came down with fever, was worse than 
 useless, and begged me to send him back to Madras or he would 
 die, I had before determined to discharge him, and forthwith 
 gave him money enough to take him back to Madras, which so 
 completely overwhelmed him that he actually fell upon his knees 
 to express his thanks. I record this as the only instance I ever knew 
 of a Hindoo thanking any one for a kindness, but I doubt if any 
 Ajiglo-Indian ^^ill beheve that it really occurred. 
 
 As soon as I was able to think, I sent for a doctor. After a long 
 delay he came, but to me he seemed only an excuse for a doctor, 
 for all the qualities a good physician should have seemed to be 
 lacking in him. His first step was to find fault because I had not 
 sent him a note instead of a verbal message. I was in a beautiful 
 condition for the composition of a stylish note just then. Then he 
 sniffed the damp, unsavory, and poisonous air of my room, looked 
 dubiously at the chaos surrounding me, and remarked that I 
 '•'ought to get cleaned up a little." Just my own opinion, but who 
 was going to do it when my servant had gone home sick, and the 
 landlord was good for nothing in looking after the comfort of his 
 "small gentlemen " guests ? The doctor felt my pulse, scribbled a 
 worthless prescription, said he would not need to come again, he 
 thought, pocketed his ten rupees, and went away. 
 
 In about a fortnight I was on my feet again, thanks to my own 
 quinine, and able to skin the big black monkeys (>S'. cucullatv^), 
 which were brought me by the native shikarees. This was the 
 only mammal they were able to obtain for me, except the black- 
 naped hare {Lepus nigricollis). 
 
 During my last fortnight upon the Hills I became acquainted 
 with 'Mr. G. A. E. Dawson and his excellent lady, both of whom 
 did all in their power to break the social monotony of my Ufe. 
 3Ir. Dawson is an excellent artist and taxidermist, and was then 
 engaged upon the text of an illustrated work entitled '-'Neilgherry 
 Sporting Eeminiscences," which has since been published by Hig^ 
 ginbotham k Co., ]Madras. 
 
 The illustrations, coming as they do from the hand of an artist 
 as well as a naturalist and sportsman, are truly beautiful and valu- 
 able. Mrs. Dawson is a musician of rare ability, who, at eight 
 years of age, travelled in the United States with ]5(Irs. Bostwick's 
 concert troupe, placing solos upon the concertina. Until meeting 
 her in her charming Neilgheny home, I never for a moment sus- 
 pected what delighful music the concertina can be made to yield in 
 
118 TWO YEARS IN THE JUNGLE. 
 
 good hands, and so long as I remember India I shall recall with 
 pleasure the evenings I spent at Grasmere. 
 
 For some weeks I had been corresponding with Mr. A. G. E. 
 Theobald, a forest officer on the AnimaUai Hills, and he depicted 
 such a splendid prospect for elephants, bison, and other large game, 
 that I determined to visit his locahty for six or eight weeks at least. 
 Accordingly, as soon as I felt strong enough, I packed up my speci- 
 mens and sent them to Madras, while I bade adieu to the Neil- 
 gherries and started south. 
 
 So far as specimens were concerned, my Neilgherry trip was 
 not a complete success, and on that score I felt somewhat disap- 
 pointed. I had the fever in my system, also, as I plainly felt. True, 
 I had escaped the fierce heat of the plains during the hottest 
 months, May and June, and, had I desired, I could not sooner have 
 gone to the Animallais, because there were no rains and therefore 
 no water upon those hiUs, until the burst of the southwest mon- 
 soon late in Juue> 
 
CHAPTER XL 
 
 THE ANIMALLAI HILLS. 
 
 A. Hunter's Paradise. —Getting there. — The Bullock Bandy and its Driver. — His 
 Discourse. — Physical Aspect of the Animallais. — Toonacadavoo. — A Glori- 
 ous Prospect. — Mr. Theobald. —An Eflacient Officer and Faithful Friend. — 
 Character of the Forest. — Seasons. — Protection of the Elephants. — A Per- 
 mit Obtained. — My Mulcer Hunting Gang. — The Karders. — More Orna- 
 mental than Useful. 
 
 The Animallai Hills ! How my nerves tingle and my pulse quick- 
 ens as I write the name ! It seems to have charged my pen with 
 electricity, and no wonder. Let any young sportsman, young 
 naturalist, or " griffin " of any description have a Hunter's Paradise 
 for a four months' inheritance, with nothing to do but chase wild 
 animals and preserve their skins and skeletons ; let him have the 
 keenest trackers in the East Indies, and a faithful friend within 
 reach to help him over the rougher difficulties, and we will see if 
 he does not afterward write and speak of his experiences with en- 
 thusiasm. India is the greatest game country in the world except 
 South Africa, and the Animallai Hills are, beyond all question, the 
 finest hunting grounds in all India. No other locaHty in all the 
 East Indies can boast of possessing such splendid open forests for 
 hunting, and such a genial climate, combined with such a variety 
 and abundance of large game. 
 
 The lordly elephant has given his name to this range of moun- 
 tains. In Tamil, Tellegu, and Canarese, his name is " ani," " arni," 
 and " anay," respectively (which accounts for the variety of ways of 
 writing the name of the hiUs), and "mallai"or "muUay," signify 
 hills or mountains ; hence we have " Animallai," Elephant Moun- 
 tains, a very appropriate name for a range which is the home of so 
 many vast herds of elephants, bison, axis deer, and wild hog. Be- 
 sides these, there is the sambur, or Indian elk, the wild goat or 
 " ibex," of sportsmen, the muntjac or rib-faced deer, all in goodly 
 numbers, while the hunter meets an occasional tiger, leopard, and 
 
120 TWO YEAKS IN THE JUNGLE. 
 
 beai', many squirrels, and black monkeys by the hundred, A glance 
 at my list of Indian mammals * will enable the reader to gauge the 
 accuracy of the above statements. 
 
 The Animallai Hills belong to the great range known as the 
 Western Ghauts, and extend generally east and west along the 
 south side of the great break known as the Coimbatore gap. 
 Through this wide pass runs the Madras and Calicut railway, with 
 the Neilgherries looming up close along the north and the Animal- 
 lais from twenty to thirty mUes farther south. The city of Coim- 
 batore is the point of departure for the latter range, which must be 
 reached by travelHng across country. My friend in the hills, ]VIr. 
 Theobald, had ad^-ised me to bring a full stock of provisions, since 
 nothing was obtainable in or neai* the jungles, except the flesh of 
 vnld animals. Accordingly, when I and my new servant, IVIichael, 
 reached Coimbatore on our way from the Neilghenies, we spent a 
 very busy day in the crowded, hot, and dusty bazaar, buying pro- 
 visions for oiu* campaign in the jungles. 
 
 Our purchases were about as follows : For my native himting 
 gang, 2 bags of coarse rice, simdiy bottles of arrack (native li- 
 quor of the fiery sort), several bimdles of tobacco, salt, and chillies 
 (red pepper). For myself, 20 loaves of fi-esh bread, flour, Eng- 
 lish jams and jellies, sausage, hen-ings, sardines, butter, and " bis- 
 cuits " (crackers) — -all in tins ; rice, potatoes, " curry stuff," cocoa- 
 nuts, and brandy ; and for preserving skins of large animals, 96 lbs. 
 salt and 96 lbs. alum ; also, a new lantern, candles, cocoanut-oil, 
 rope, nails, etc. We expected to remain ui the jungles not less than 
 two months, to prepare one large elephant skin and two skeletons, 
 several ditto of bison, and every other species of mammal we could 
 secure. We fully expected to have jimgle-fever, for no stranger, 
 white or black, can escape it long in the Animallais, so we took a 
 good supply of quinine and chlorodine, the two gTeat remedies of 
 India, and other medicines for cholei-a and dysentery, the twin 
 curses of jungle life, worse dreaded by Europeans than any ntunber 
 of savage animals, 
 
 Ti-aveUing in India is usually done at night, in order to go fas- 
 ter and fai-ther, and to avoid the oppressive heat of the day. The 
 commonest means of conveyance is the covered bandy (cart) drawn 
 by two white bullocks. This ancient vehicle is simply a broad 
 platform on veiy high wheels, completely covered with mats which 
 
 * See page '21G. 
 
THE ANIMALLAI HILLS. 121 
 
 are supposed to be rain-proof. The driver sits astride the tongue 
 of the cart, within easy reach of his bullocks' hmd-quarters, and it 
 is interesting to study the various methods he employs to start his 
 cattle and keep them going. A foreigner could no more drive 
 them than he could fly, until he has fully learned the Madras bul- 
 lock-driver's language. It consists of a complicated system of 
 " boh-boh-boh-ing ! " chirrups, "tock-tocks," and other indescrib- 
 able ejaculations, combined with slapping, tail-twisting, toe-poking, 
 and ordinary goading and lashing. Two or three times I have seen 
 my bandy-man save the heavily loaded bandy from sticking perma- 
 nently in a muddy nullah by biting his bullock's tail in a most 
 fiendish manner. It seems that a bullock has no idea what he can 
 do until his tail is bitten. Their drivers talk to them a great deal, 
 always aspersing the reputation of their female relatives when angry, 
 especially their mothers and sisters — a common custom with Indian 
 natives when quarrelling — and praising them when their homed 
 steeds are doing well. The following was the di'if t of one driver's dis- 
 course to his bullocks as translated by an "Anglo-Indian journalist." 
 " You, Punniah, you a byle ? * Not you ; — your father must 
 have been a donkey, and your mother a pig ; no respectable cow 
 would own so lazy a son. As to you, Moreeah, I believe your father 
 was a Feringhee, and your mother a Pariah. You are the most 
 abominable of all brutes, and how you came to have horns and a 
 tail is quite a mystery to me. Some fine day I shall saw off your 
 horns and sell them to a Mochee, and instead of coloring your long 
 tail with goolal, I shall cut it off and sell it to some rascally Eng- 
 lish dragoon, to stick in his helmet and bring him bad luck, for he 
 is sure to be killed in the first battle he goes in afterward. I wish 
 they were all killed, but never mind, they soon will be, and then 
 won't we have jolly times ? Ah ! now, you behave something like 
 respectable animals : that's the way to get over the ground. You, 
 Punniah, are my father and mother, and you, Moreeah, aU the rest 
 of my relations, except my wife. I'll give you both a fine feed of 
 sugar-cane tops when we come to any, but not if you are lazy — • 
 tock-tock ! tor-rr-ee-ee-ooh-ah ! " f 
 
 ♦Bullock. 
 
 f I have often been surprised at the speed and endurance of the little white 
 bullocks (zebus) which take the place of horses in India. It is no uncommon 
 occurrence for a good pair of bullocks to make 3^ miles per hour for several 
 hoiars, with a light bandy and proper encouragement. With two or three re- 
 lays of bullocks one can easily travel 30 miles in 10 to 13 hours. 
 
122 TWO YEARS IN THE JFNGLE. 
 
 About 4 r.M, of ilio day after wc roacbod Coimbatore, we loaded 
 cue bandy with oui- outlit and provisions, filled the bottom of 
 miotber with stmw for oiu'selves, settled om* dues at the traveller's 
 bungalow, and Avith the little bullocks at a shtu'p trot, started 
 south for the Aniniallais. The road was very good, and it literally 
 swarmed witli people travelling along. "When night came I spread 
 n\y blanket on the straw and then had my boy arrange boxes and 
 bundles all around me, so that when the C4irt tilted sideways I 
 Avould not roll aboiit. The cart wheels are so Lu'ge that a very 
 small stone causes a terrible tilt and a feiu'ful jolt, so that such 
 riding is very wearisome. All night long we went jolting on, 
 stopping only at midnight for the biiUocks to feed smd rest, and at 
 daybreak the next morning the steep blue sides and serrated crest 
 of the Animalliu range loomed up all along the south. At last we 
 reached the little village of Animallai, ten miles from the foot of the 
 hills, a sort of luxlf-way house between the heai't of the jungles and 
 Coimbatore. This is the winter headquarters of the Forest E^mger 
 in charge of the Animallais, and for his iise there is a good bun- 
 galow, in which all wandei-ing white men are allowed to take 
 slielter as a matter of charity. In the coiu'se of my goings and 
 coming's I afterward occupied the place many times, sometimes a 
 week at a time, and it is not stnuige that I conceived quite an 
 aJSection for this •** simg h:vi"bor." 
 
 As soon as we arrived, the Government writer, with the ap- 
 palling name of Yenkatommiah. came and offered his services in 
 helping us jvloug. "We htUted at the bimgalow iintil the next day, 
 when em-ly in the moniing the writer mustered a gang of about 
 twenty-tive coolies to caiTy my luggage up the steep pass, and we 
 diwo on to the "foot of the ghaut." 
 
 On the northern or Coimbatore side, the Animallais rise very 
 steeply up from the plains to a height of fix>m two thousiind to live 
 thousand feet, so that it is a steep, steady climb from the level plain 
 up to the summit of the n\nge. Once the summit is reached, the 
 hills slope very gradually doAATi into Cocliin and Ti'avaucore, drain- 
 ing nearly all the water in that direction ; so that, while the Coim- 
 l^^tore district may be dry and parched by drotight, the native 
 t;trttes on the opposite side will be well Avatered. green, jvud fertile. 
 
 X"^pou ivachiug the foot of the ArdiA-nrum ghaut \Ne liismissed 
 the carts, and the coolies took my luggage upon then- shoulders. 
 A hoi"se \>-as waiting there for me, sent down by the fiiend I had 
 not yet seen, and leaving my serA-ant to accompany the luggage, I 
 
 I 
 
THE AKIMALLAI HILLS. 123 
 
 mounted and rode on alone. After a long, hard climb up the steep 
 and rocky pass, we reached the summit at an elevation of about 
 two thousand feet, and began to descend the gentle slope. Then 
 the road led through lofty bamboo and teak forests, across rocky 
 ravines and mountain torrents, up hill and down, until at last, at 
 the very end of a long ridge, seven miles from the top of the 
 pass, we emerged from the thick forest, and the forest camp, called 
 Too-na-cad-a-voo, lay before us. At the very point of the ridge 
 stood a dozen bamboo huts and a comfortable thatched bungalow ; 
 a little river swept past them on the left and tumbled down a 
 precipice, just beyond which rose a lofty cliff of smooth gray rock, 
 with a fringe of feathery bamboos all along its base by the river- 
 side. On the right rose a conical mountain-peak. Between the two 
 mountains we looked over the camp and far across an unbroken 
 sea of green forest, which in the distance was bounded by a lofty 
 mountain-range. What a spot for a camp ! A moment later I rode 
 down to the door of the bungalow, and received a most cordial 
 welcome from the officer in charge of the forest, Mr. Albert G. K. 
 Theobald. 
 
 Now and then we meet a man whose looks and tones and words 
 strike the cord of our sympathies so forcibly that we feel instinct- 
 ively a kinship and confidence, and we say to ourselves " I shall 
 like him." Such was my experience with Mr. Theobald, and at the 
 end of an hour I felt that I knew him as an old friend and comrade 
 in arms rather than an untried stranger. From the first moment 
 we became fast friends, which feeling only deepened with time and 
 further acquaintance. I found in him one of nature's noblemen, as 
 frank, free-hearted, and steadfast as ever breathed. 
 
 In the course of time I discovered that he was a real genius, of 
 the type so generously credited to the "Yankee." Besides pos- 
 sessing a very considerable fund of medical information and sur- 
 gical skill, he was a good gunsmith and watchmaker, a first-rate 
 photographer and taxidermist, and a very keen sportsman and 
 naturalist. What an invaluable man he would be in an African 
 exploring expedition ! His natural ability as an experienced forester, 
 and his varied accomplishments, entitle him to a higher position 
 in the Forest Department than he now holds ; but he is still a 
 young man. 
 
 During my entire stay upon the Hills, Mr. Theobald never 
 wearied in his efforts to assist me, in every possible way. He 
 doctored me when I was ill ; he divided his provisions with me 
 
r--4 TWO YEAKS IX THE JUNGLE. 
 
 sevonil times when I was off in the jimgles and nearlv starved out ; 
 he lent me his elephtuit-g:iui, and taught me how to use it on 
 elephsvtits : and when mv cook ran away he immediately sent me 
 his. He ;\lso lent me one of his private peons when I Wiis crowded 
 with work upon elephimts, :uid, in short, he helped me with more 
 useful articles thiui I c;uv to mention altogether. A ti-aveller can- 
 not j\fford to caiTv with him all the comforts and conveniences 
 proper for a stationaiy c:imp-life, and his assistcmce was. therefore, 
 iuvduahle. He knew the natives, the wild beasts, and the forests 
 as intimately as a fai-mer knows his barnyard and its inhabitants, 
 and the interesting incidents of jimgle Hfe he related to me would 
 till a volume.* 
 
 His bungivlow w:vs quite a museum in itself, stocked with a 
 magnidcent an-ay of trophies of the chase which proclaimed the 
 genuine "old shikiuve." There were tusks and tails of more than 
 one lordly elephant that had fallen before my fiiends smooth-bore. 
 "SVell-moimted heads of bison, s:unbur, muntjac, sasin antelope, 
 axis vleer and wild boar hung on the walls until they wei-e crowded. 
 Peivhed up on a Ixx^k-^^'ase sat a very line and rare monkey, the 
 ■vsiuideixx) ^^^^i.V': !iv* iv.Vr\ iJong with a small civcodile. shot at an 
 ele^"ation of lifteen hundred feet, and stuffed birds lK>th great and 
 small On the floor were spi-ead, in the most indifferent way, skins 
 of bear, hyiena, leoparvi, :vnd deer, but of the half-dozen tigers 
 killed by mine host only the skulls and claws remained. In out-of- 
 the-way corners of the bimgalow I presently turned up divers and 
 sundry skuUs of bison, antlers of sambmr, and alx>ut nfry black 
 monkey skins; There were chests full of the best-made Indian 
 binl-skins I ever saw. drawers full of eggs and nests, and piles of 
 original scientinc " Eough Xotes " of all kinds. A well-stocked 
 «ool<^cal Ubrary was the crowning feature of this interesting eol- 
 le<^0n of trophies and scientinc specimens, and I did not need to 
 be iold that this hunter-natuxahst had joined the Forest IVejiart- 
 ment to indulge his love of nature, 
 
 * ^nee mj visit to Indi;i. 34r. Theobald encounteied md killed <m the 
 BtHUMST Hills v^oUegad Tsdaq\ a faouoas rogue elei»hani, who begaa his 
 career bv killing nineteeji other captire elephants, and making his escape. 
 Since that time he killed thi«« n&tives and seren^ head of eattle, brides de- 
 ^rojing larp? quantities of standing crops aad teiToriiing the dbfzkA for ser- 
 eral y^ai^ He wxs a gisn: in sixe, and for the gallant exploit irhich ended 
 his career the Msdris government voted Mr Theobald a reward of two htm- 
 dr>?d rupees, with permission to retain the tusks. The latter vere nfty-eiehi 
 ittdidS long, «iA v^^ed together seventy-five pounds — a rerr large jiaur. 
 
 I 
 
THE ANIMALLAI HILLS. 125 
 
 I soon found that I had reached a perfect hunter's paradise, the 
 ideal "happy hunting ground" which is the heaven of our North- 
 American Indians, where all good braves go when they die, where 
 game is ever abundant, and there are no white settlers nor Indian 
 agents. The slope of the Animallais is a succession of high hills 
 and deep ravines, lofty peaks or ridges, and broad valleys, every- 
 where covered with lofty virgin forest. Some portions of the range, 
 those commonly termed the "higher ranges," which lay along the 
 boundary between the Coimbatore District and Travancore, are 
 very lofty. The highest peak has an elevation of eight thousand 
 eight hundred and thirty-seven feet, and is the highest land in 
 India south of the Himalayas, Around Toonacadavoo there were 
 high, rocky precipices for the wild goats, thick bamboo jungle and 
 marshes for the elephants, grassy glades and fine open forests for 
 deer and bison, rugged, rocky hill-sides for bears, and dense patches 
 of underbrush for the sounders of wild hog. The tiger needs no 
 particular kind of jungle, for where other game is, there will you 
 be sure to find him also. Thus are we able to account for the pres- 
 ence of so many large animals in the same locality. 
 
 The forest camp is situated very nearly in the centre of the 
 Government Leased Forest, which is composed mainly of mighty 
 teak trees [Tectona grandis), blackwood [Dalbergia latifolia), the 
 "vellayiaga" {Conocarpus latifolius), "ven-gi" {Pterocarpus marsu- 
 pium), and the common bamboo {Bamhusa arundinacea). Near the 
 foot of the hills, I noticed a tree {Salvadora Indica) which somewhat 
 resembles the weeping willow, and also the Euphorbia antiquorum. 
 
 There are two strongly marked seasons upon the Animallais, 
 the wet and the dry. The former is during the monsoon rains, from 
 June or July to November or December, when the streams and 
 marshes are full of water, grass is abundant, and the forest has 
 taken on the growth and freshness of spring. During this season 
 the force of the Forest Service is engaged in cutting down teak 
 trees, hewing out their trunks, hauling and "slipping" them down 
 the mountain side, to be floated down to Calicut, and there taken 
 charge of by H, M.'s Navy to be used in ship-building. Teak is 
 impervious to the attacks of the white ant and the ship- worm, which, 
 with other good qualities, renders it a very valuable timber. 
 
 The dry season begins at the end of the northeast monsoon, 
 usually about January 1st, and continues six months. Then the 
 leaves fall in the deciduous forest, which becomes open and bare, 
 the streams dry up, and the forest is usually swept by fire. The 
 
126 TWO YEAES IX THE JUlfGLE. 
 
 elephants and bison seek the streams near the base of the hiUs, the 
 members of the Forest Department return to the low lands to escape 
 the fever, and the forest is then inhabited only by wild beasts. At 
 the time of my visit, July 4th, the members of the Forest Depart- 
 ment had come only the previous week from the plains ; the ele- 
 phants were beginning to come down from the higher ranges to 
 feed upon the young bamboo shoots, and the whole forest appeared 
 at its best. 
 
 In India, the elephant is a very useful and valuable animal when 
 trained to service, and large numbers are caught annually by Gov- 
 ernment officers appointed for this work in the Coimbatore Dis- 
 trict, at Collegal, in Mysore, and in Chittagong. Formerly wild 
 elephants were so numerous in many parts of India that they were 
 regarded as a nuisance and a Government reward of £7 per head 
 was paid for killing them. Through the efforts of sportsmen and 
 native shikarees their numbers were reduced to the proper limit, 
 whereupon the reward was discontinued and a fine imposed to pre- 
 vent their destruction. At present, elephants are rigidly protected 
 by law all over India, although it is very evident that their numbers 
 will soon increase so much as to render further elephant shooting 
 positively necessary. 
 
 In 1873 an act was passed to " prevent the indiscriminate de- 
 struction of wild elephants upon waste or forest land," not only in 
 the IVIadras Presidency, but any of the " native territories for the 
 time being subject to that government." The penalty for shooting 
 a female elephant was for the first offence a fine not exceeding 
 five hundred rupees, or three months' imprisonment, and for the 
 second conviction the penalty was double the first. Shooting wild 
 male elephants was also prohibited under the same penalty as fixed 
 for the killing of females, except it be done under a proper au- 
 thorization. The act provides that any zemindar or native pro- 
 prietor of land may shoot male elephants on his own land, and may 
 also authorize others to do the same. Of course, any person is au- 
 thorized to shoot any elephant in defence of himself or any other 
 person, or to save his crop from destruction. Any native prince 
 owning territory frequented by elephants may, if he choose, grant 
 permission for male elephants to be shot, and the law provides that 
 each District Collector shall have the same discretionary power, 
 conditionally, although up to the time of my visit, the latter officers 
 had always refused to give any such permission. 
 
 Before I came to the Animallais my friend Theobald had offered 
 
THE ANIMALLAI HILLS. 
 
 127 
 
 to obtain permission for me to kill two elej)bants in a tract of for- 
 est on the hnis belonging to an old native prince, the Rajah of 
 Kulungud, which adjoined the Government Leased Forest. Mr. 
 T. had done the old Rajah many a good turn in preventing the 
 stealing of timber from his land, and after a good deal of talking 
 and much diplomacy on the part of my friend, the matter wa£ 
 finally arranged, and I Avas given 
 a written permit to kill two tusk- 
 er elephants in the Kulungud 
 Forest. 
 
 The day after I reached Toona- 
 cadavoo I formed a regular hunt- 
 ing gang of five picked men to 
 serve me in the jungles as track- 
 ers, guides, game-carriers, por- 
 ters, and general assistants. 1 
 was fortunate in finding there a 
 hill-tribe, the Mulcers, of which 
 every man is willing to work hard 
 when well fed, is skilled in wood- 
 craft, and is not in the least af- 
 flicted with caste prejudice, which 
 is the most important point of all. 
 The Mulcers are really agricult- 
 urists, but they will do any kind 
 of work that pays, and live right 
 beside it. They are, by prefer- 
 ence, carnivorous ux their habits, 
 being very fond of flesh of all 
 kinds, save that of the tiger, and, 
 possessing no fire-arms them- 
 selves, they hail the visit of a 
 sportsman with delight. When 
 
 well fed, the men are very strong and capable of great physical en- 
 durance. Two of my men once carried a dead wild boar, Aveighing 
 230 lbs., three miles through the jungle, up and down hill, halting 
 only twice to rest. 
 
 The Mulcer men are of medium statui-e, well proportioned, 
 very dark-skinned, with rather thick lips and slightly flattened 
 noses, after the African type, wearing no ornaments whatever as a 
 rule, and no other clothing than the loin-cloth. Ordinarily, their 
 
 Pera Vera. 
 (A Mulcer Sunttr.) 
 
128 TWO YEAitS iisr the jungle. 
 
 long, matted, jet-black hair is simply drawn back and tied in a 
 coil at the back of the head, while they have no beard at all save 
 now and then a few short black, kinky hairs. The women seem 
 to be old and wrinkled from their youth up, and, without exception, 
 are very ugly and unprepossessing. 
 
 Three of the men who formed my hunting-gang, Arndee, Pera 
 Vera, and Channah, were the most expert trackers I ever saw, and 
 X soon had reason to know that all were likewise brave and spir- 
 ited men. When it came to the supreme danger of tracking up a 
 tiger on foot and attacking him fairly and squarely in open ground, 
 with only one little insignificant rifle, the two men who happened to 
 be with me were fully equal to the occasion, and "game " to the last. 
 
 It was famine time, work was scarce, and food exceedingly dear, 
 and the five Mulcers were glad to take service with me. I agreed 
 to pay the head-man of the gang five annas per day in cash (fifteen 
 cents), and each of the others four annas per day, besides which 
 each received one quart of rice, and two leaves of tobacco per day, 
 with salt and chillies ad libitum. This was much more than they 
 could obtain elsewhere, and was amply sufficient for the support of 
 themselves and their families, who would always accompany them. 
 Being, as they were, passionately fond of fresh meat and receiving 
 good wages, it is not surprising that I had a gang of faithful men 
 always ready to undertake the hardest kind of work. 
 
 Besides the Mulcers, there are two other hill- tribes upon the Ani- 
 mallais, the Paliars and the Karders. The former are chiefly mer- 
 chants and herdsmen, and it happened that I saw nothing of them. 
 The Karders, however, were somewhat numerous. To a hunter 
 they are entirely useless, for, owing to their caste prejudices they 
 will not touch a dead elephant, bison, bear, or deer of any kind at 
 any price. They are purely herbivorous in their habits, never 
 touching flesh, but subsisting upon roots dug in the jungle, fruits, 
 rice, etc. They collect honey and beeswax, cardamoms [Elettaria 
 cardamomum), white dammer, a resin from the Valeria Indica, black 
 dammer from Canarium strictum, and another gum resin called 
 "mutty pal" from Ailantus Malabaricus, also wild ginger, turmeric, 
 rattans (Calamus rotang), horns of deer, and " cheeakai" (the buds 
 of Acacia concinna), largely used by the natives for bathing pur- 
 poses instead of soap. These products of the jungle they exchange 
 for rice, tobacco, salt, chillies, etc.^ In physique and physiognomy 
 they very closely resemble the Mulcers, but they dress more elabo- 
 rately, and wear many ornaments. They all file their front teeth 
 
THE ANIMALLAI HILLS. 129 
 
 to sharp points as a marriage ceremony, and the women wear an 
 enormous coil of springy wood, or a strip from the leaf of the pal- 
 myra palm {Borassus fiahelliformis), coiled up like a clock-spring 
 in the lobe of each ear, which causes the flesh to expand into a 
 thin ring two or three inches in diameter, which sometimes hangs 
 nearly to the shoulder. The women also wear beads and neck- 
 laces of various kinds, but no other covering above the waist. The 
 old women are always hideously ugly, and, as is also the case with 
 the Mulcers, the men are handsomer than the women. Formerly 
 the Karders would perform no menial labor at all, and, while con- 
 senting to carry a load of baggage or a gun, they would be deeply 
 offended if they were called coolies. 
 f 
 
CHAPTEE XTI. 
 
 ELEPHANT HUNTING. 
 
 "A Lodge in a Vast Wilderness." — Hut-building with Bamboos. — Elysian at 
 Last.— Character of Elephant Hunting. — Grand but Dangerous Sport. — 
 Indian versus African Methods. — The Skull. — Difficulty of Hitting the 
 Brain. — Cranial Fracture Impossible. — The Fatal Shots. — Physique of the 
 Elephant. — Tracking up a Herd. — Welcome Sounds. — Surrounded by 
 Giants — The Attack — Stampede and Flight of the Herd. — Great Abund- 
 ance of Large Game. — The Charge of a Dangerous Animal. — Fooling 
 around a Baby Elephant. — Charge of an Infuriated Female. — A Grand but 
 " Scarey " Sight. — Kepelling the Charge. 
 
 Although there was really an abundance of game around Toonaca- 
 davoo, such as bison, sambur, wild goat, muntjac and monkeys, 
 there were no elephants, nor would there be any in that immediate 
 vicinity until very late in the season. Moreovei* had there been 
 ever so many, we could not have killed one there. About a day's 
 march farther into the very heart of the forest, they were quite 
 numerous, and I soon decided to go out and camp where game of 
 all kinds was most abundant. Accordingly, when the elephant 
 permit came to hand from the old Eajah, we packed up provisions, 
 preservatives and ammunition, pots, pans, and camp furniture, and 
 took up the line of march for Tellicul, a mere vacant spot in the 
 heart of the forest. And there, at the confluence of two little rivers, 
 the Toonacadavoo and the Teckadee, where the teak-trees and the 
 bamboos were the tallest, where the forest was silent, sombre, and 
 shadowy, where big game was thick all about us and no white man 
 ever came, my men cut down big bamboos and built huts for us all. 
 To me this hut-building is an interesting operation. First a 
 skeleton hut is built of large bamboo stems set upright in the 
 ground, and a ridge-pole, plate and rafters lashed firmly to them 
 with green bark. Then large bamboo stems are cut in lengths cor- 
 responding to the length and width of the hut, and split iiTegularly 
 all over. Finally each stem is split quite open on one side, and the 
 
 I 
 
ELEPHANT HUNTIIS^G. 131 
 
 former cylinder now flattens out into a broad slab, twelve to eigh- 
 teen inches wide. These bamboo slabs are then lashed with strips 
 of bark to the upright posts of a hut and form the walls. Bamboos 
 similarly treated were made into beds, tables, and doors, and it also 
 served as an excellent flooring. My wash-basin was a joint of bam- 
 boo made into a trough, and my pail was a four-foot bamboo stem 
 with all the joints broken out except the lowest one, which served 
 as a bottom. 
 
 The roof of the hut is nothing but young teak-leaves laid on like 
 slates and held by their own petioles, being partly split and hooked 
 over the cross pieces. Besides a good comfortable hut for me, the 
 men built another to serve as a cook-house and servants' quarters, 
 while for themselves, their wives, children, and mothers-in-law, they 
 bunt simply a huge, low shed and covered the ground beneath it 
 with bamboo slabs. 
 
 No man ever experienced half the keen pleasure and delightful 
 anticipation in taking possession of a mansion that I did in tmpack- 
 ing and arranging my guns, ammimition, and camp equipage in that 
 rude little hiit. Before the door stood a large clump of bamboos, 
 an immense bouquet of ornamental grass sixty feet high, the long, 
 green, feathery stems nodding and bending as gracefully as ostrich 
 plumes. Far above us the tops of the giant forest trees met and 
 shut out all but one Httle patch of blue sky, and the sun's rays 
 never reached oar camp until high noon. The shade was so dense 
 that there was no imdergrowth, and usually we could walk through 
 that grand old forest as freely as though it were a meadow. I felt 
 that at last I had reached the " happy hunting grounds " I had 
 so often been disappointed of before, and subsequent events proved 
 that I was not mistaken. 
 
 And now a word in regard to elephant hunting. I consider it 
 the grandest and most exciting of all field sports, and by several 
 of the greatest sportsmen living it is also considered the most dan- 
 gerous. The elephant is the true king of beasts, both as regards 
 size and strengih, mental capacity, and natural dignity of character. 
 As he marches majestically tlirough the forest, monarch of all he 
 surveys, or rushes like a living avalanche upon his foe, he seems 
 the vital impersonation of an Irresistible Force. I have a greater 
 fear of the elephant and a greater respect for him, than any other 
 wild beast I ever saw, either in the forest or in captivity, and this 
 feeling has only increased with protracted acquaintance. 
 
 Elephant hunting is bound to bring into play all those qual- 
 
132 TWO YEAKS ilM^ THE JUNGLE. 
 
 ities of endumnce, perseverance, coolness, good judgment, and 
 knowledge of an animal's habits, which go to make up a successful 
 sportsman. There is a subtle charm about tracking up an elephant 
 which I am sure is never found in any other pursuit. The trail is 
 usually broad and plain, leading rapidly up hill and down, over 
 mountain and through valley, across marsh and river, through dense 
 forest and over grassy plain, mile after mile, growing fresher every 
 hour, but often taxing the skill of the trackers to the utmost. At 
 last the clear, resonant trumpet note, or the cracking and crashing 
 of green branches, or a tall gray back above the bushes, tells the 
 pigmy he is in the presence of the giant. It is a fau* and square 
 encounter every time, and the hunter backs his skill and nerve with 
 his life against the great moiAitain of physical strength and impreg- 
 nability. The game does not skulk in the bushes and wait to be 
 driven out at random by a grand army of beaters ; nor can the 
 hunter chmb into a tree-top and from thence shoot him with as 
 much safety as though he were at home in his little bed ; neither 
 can the elephant be killed at long range. The hunter must boldly 
 walk up in front of him to within twenty paces or less, fire away, 
 and take his chances. "While doing so he knows very well that if 
 any accident or miscalculation places him within the power of that 
 terrible trunk, those vhuge fore-feet or knees will immediately be 
 upon his chest crushing him, Hke a miserable reptile, out of all 
 human shape. Hunters frequently escapfe aUve and recover from 
 the jaws and claws of the lion, tiger, leopard, and bear, but I never 
 yet heard of a man falling into the power of an infui'iated wild ele- 
 phant and living to tell the story. 
 
 Just before I began my elephant hunting, I came across the fol- 
 lowing encouraging (!) paragraph from the pen of Colonel Shak- 
 spere, a high authority on Indian sports : 
 
 " That elephant shooting requires much practice is certain from 
 the fact that young hands at it, though veiy good shots, are rarely 
 successful. Indeed, that famous sportsman, Captain Garrow, who 
 probably at his death had killed more elephants than any man in 
 India, and if you covmt only tusk elephants, perhaps more than any 
 man who had ever shot, assured me that for the first two years he 
 did not bag even one. I have known other sportsmen, who turned 
 out very well afterward, to shoot at elephants for a couple of yeai-s, 
 knock them over, but never able to persuade them to remain." * 
 
 * Wild Sports of India, p. 163. 
 
ELEPHANT HUNTING. 133 
 
 In the jungles of the East Indies an elephant must be shot 
 through the brain, and thus killed at the first fire, or he is very apt 
 to get away. Should the ball not touch the brain, the elephant is 
 only stunned for an instant and is almost certain to move off at a 
 high rate of speed. The latest writer on elephant hunting in 
 India * says, in " Thirteen Years Among the "Wild Beasts of India," 
 " I have never recovered any elephant that has left the spot with a 
 head shot," and my own experience has been the same. True, even 
 in India an elephant may be shot in the shoulder and partially dis- 
 abled, to be followed up and re-attacked time after time until he 
 falls; but this practice is dangerous, unsportsmanlike, and unde- 
 serving of success. It is, perhaps, a surer way of bagging an ele- 
 phant, but there can be no glory in it, nor even satisfaction, it seems 
 to me. Although, by force of circumstances, I have to shoot aU game 
 animals regardless of age, sex, or condition, I yet have pride enough 
 to be above shooting an elephant in the shoulder or anywhere else 
 than in the brain. At the very outset I resolved to bag each of my 
 elephants with a single ball through the brain, in a sportsmanhke 
 manner, or else hire a sportsman to do it for me. 
 
 On the plains of South Afi'ica the famous wild-animal slayei*, 
 Gordon Gumming, used to shoot elephants in the shoulder, and 
 then gallop alongside them for miles, loading and firing until the 
 weight of lead would compel the wretched beasts to fall. He re- 
 lates how he once had to fire forty two-ounce balls into a single 
 elephant before bringing him down. In India no such barbaric 
 modes of hunting are practised, nor are they even possible. 
 
 In examining a section of an elephant's skull we find that while 
 the skull is of great size in order to afford an extensive sm-face for 
 the attachment of the powerful muscles of the trunk and jaws, the 
 brain itself is very small indeed, situated far back, and surrounded 
 by such a huge, irregular mass of bone and flesh, that its exact po- 
 sition in the living animal is very hard for the novice to determine. 
 The skull is really of great thickness, but it is composed of long, 
 narrow cells perpendicular to the surface of the skull, some three 
 to six inches in length, others small, irregular, and honey-comb 
 Hke. The skull has really an outer and an inner wall of consider- 
 able thickness, between which lie these bony cells, separated from 
 each other by walls of bone as thin as pasteboard. These cells all 
 communicate with each other, and through the frontal sinuses with 
 
 * G. P. Sanderson. 
 
134 TWO YEAES IN THE JUNGLE. 
 
 the nasal cavity, so that they are filled "with air only, and thus, 
 while the skull is of great size, it is very light and buoyant in pro- 
 portion to its bulk. 
 
 In the elephant we see an animal which very stiikingly illus- 
 trates the perfect manner in which natiu'e always adapts means to 
 ends to secui'e the siu'vival of the fittest, even under the most tiy- 
 ing cu'cumstances. He is possessed of a colossal body and head, 
 joined by a neck so extremely short and thick that the head is al- 
 most a fixture upon the body. He cannot reach down to graze or 
 drink, as all long-necked animals do, and so nature has provided 
 him with a wonderful flexible proboscis six feet long, which is at 
 once a powerful arm and hand, a drinking-cup, and a movable nose. 
 The eye is veiy small indeed, placed far back upon the side of the 
 head, and owing to the shortness of the neck and general unwieldi- 
 ness of the head, the visual organ is almost a fixtiu'e upon hia 
 head, and its range of vision exceedingly circumscribed. His hear- 
 ing is by no means acute, his sense of smell is also very deficient, 
 and, taken altogether, he is easily approached in the forest. The 
 most unskilful hunter can easily steal up to within ten feet of an 
 elephant when he is feeding, provided there are no others near to 
 discover him, and were the animal's brain enclosed in the same 
 kind of a skull as that of every other terrestrial mammal, the most 
 bunghng hunter — or^natiu'ahst — coidd easUy kill half a dozen ele- 
 phants in a day. 
 
 But nature has not left this noble animal at the mercy of un- 
 skilful hvmters. Instead of the thin, sohd cranium wall which we 
 see in the skulls of nearly all other land quadrupeds, a cranium 
 which can be fractured by a blow or a bullet, thus producing death, 
 a bullet may go crashing through those thin, bony cells, within two 
 inches of the brain itself, and only cause the animal to run away 
 much faster and farther than he otherwise would do. If the ball 
 passes very close to the brain, the elephant may be stunned or 
 knocked down by the concussion, but if he receives no further treat- 
 ment he will quickly recover, regain his feet, and adios ! — he is off, 
 to recover entirely in a short time and live to a ripe old age, bar- 
 ring more serious accidents. The Ceylon Observer once gave an 
 account of the death of a fine old male elephant near Trincomalee, 
 whose skull showed the marks of twenty-three bullets, which had 
 from year to year been fired into it by British naval officers hunt- 
 ing in that vicinity while their ships lay in the harbor. And yet 
 the old fellow's serenity had not been disturbed sufficiently to 
 
VIEW OF AN ELEPHANT'S SKULL AND BRAIN. 
 
 1. Section of an Elephant's Skull. —2. Side View of Brain. — 3. Top View of Brain. — 
 4. How to Hit an Elephant's Brain, a. a. Horizontal plane of the brain ; 6, Front 
 head shot from same level ; c. Front head shot from below ; d, Temple shot from 
 below ; e. Temple shot from level of brain ; /, Temple shot from above. 
 
\ 
 
ELEPHANT HUNTING. 135 
 
 frighten him away from his old haunts, for he frequented the same 
 locality for several years. At last, however, a sportsman stole out 
 one fine night in pajamas and slippers, found the battle-scarred 
 veteran feeding close to the traveller's bungalow, and sent a ball 
 into his brain, which ended his career. 
 
 Much has been written about the vulnerable points of an ele- 
 phant's skull, and they are usually reckoned at two or three, but 
 the fact of the matter is simply this : with a proper weapon, prop- 
 erly loaded, it is possible, nay easy, to reach the brain of an ele- 
 phant from any quarter, side, or front, provided the animal is not 
 charging you, and is not more than twenty yards away. When a 
 gun will send a ball entirely through an elephant's head and out on 
 the other side, even when fired through the thickest part of the 
 skull, it stands to reason that one part of the skull will be as vul- 
 nerable as any other, and it makes no difference whether you fire 
 at the forehead, temple, or ear, from above, below, or behind, so 
 long as it is possible to get a fair, unobstructed shot. When an 
 elephant is charging, the head is held high, the trunk tightly 
 curled and thrown forward, so that the bullet must be sent through 
 nearly two feet of trunk before even reaching the skull, a task al- 
 most impossible to accompHsh with certainty and precision. The 
 hunter must be perfectly familiar with the anatomy of the ele- 
 phant's skull. Then, and then only, will he know at what point to 
 aim in order to reach the brain. When on a level with his ele- 
 phant's head the vulnerable point wUl be somewhere on a horizontal 
 line drawn around the head from the ear-opening, three inches above 
 the eye, and to the very centre of the bump in the middle of the 
 face, which is really the base of the trunk and the nasal opening. 
 When one is above the elephant, the vulnerable point will be above 
 that line according to the height of the hunter's position, and when 
 he is below him, it will be a proportionate distance below. 
 
 The brain of a full-grown Indian elephant is of very irregular, 
 and almost indescribable shape, its greatest width being 10^ inches 
 and extreme length 11. From the side, it is at best a difficult 
 mark to hit, even when seen, and infinitely more so when hidden 
 away in a mass of bone and flesh. 
 
 We encountered a herd of elephants the very day after we 
 camped at Tellicul. We started out about noon to find elephants, 
 if possible, and whatever else we could find in the way of mammals. 
 We had not gone far when up jumped a fine stag sambur, a 
 half-grown fawn, and a doe. The first two dashed away with the 
 
136 TWO YEAES IN THE JUNGLE. 
 
 speed of tlie wind before I could even raise my rifle, but the doe 
 stopped short forty yards away, and for a full minute stood stock- 
 still, staring at me in dull surprise and curiosity. I could easily 
 have brought her down, but she would have been worthless as a 
 specimen, and so we all stood there quietly and had a staring match 
 with the doe, until she tui-ned around and trotted off. The stag 
 carried a fine pair of antlers, and we set upon his trail at once, 
 hoping to come up with him in half an hour, at most. As we were 
 hurrying along, we came to where that trail led across another of 
 a very different description, and the trackers stopped short, pointed 
 to it with broad smiles, and in low tones exclaimed, " Ani, sahib ! 
 ani ! " or in other words, " Elephants, sir ! elephants ! " After ex- 
 amining the trail very carefully they declared that it was only four 
 hours' old, and had been made by a herd of at least ten elephants. 
 Without another word we turned off upon the elephant trail and 
 followed it as fast as we could walk. 
 
 When travelling through the forest, going from one good feed- 
 ing ground to another, elephants usually follow one another in 
 Indian file, so that a whole herd leaves only a single trail ; but that 
 is a broad, well-tramped path, as plain and well-beaten as if a regi- 
 ment of men had mai'ched along in the same order. When it leads 
 through taU grass there is a clear lane a foot and a half wide. 
 
 The trail soon led us into a marsh of mud, water, and tall, rank 
 grass as high as our heads, and there the herd had scattered some- 
 what. The soft mud was tramped fuU of great, deep holes where 
 their huge feet had sunk down, and they had fairly mown down 
 the high grass, as they went along, leaving the marsh cut up into a 
 labyrinth of lanes. A green hunter acquires a very wholesome re- 
 spect for an animal which leaves a track sixteen inches in diameter 
 and eighteen inches deep ! But we crossed the marsh and entered 
 the forest again. 
 
 The traU freshened rapidly fi'om the first, and we had followed 
 it for about an hour at a good pace, when suddenly we heard a 
 clear, resonant trumpet note, coming from the forest on our right. 
 
 Tal-loo-ee ! 
 
 It created a profound sensation, and instantly we turned off the 
 trail and started in a bee-line for the old fellow who was doing the 
 
ELEPHANT HUNTING. 137 
 
 trumpeting. He repeated it at intervals, as if to guide us, and we 
 made the most of it. Soon we were near enough to hear the wel- 
 come " crack ! crack ! crr-vv-rash ! " of the young bamboo shoots 
 upon which the herd was evidently feeding. No sound can be 
 more welcome to the ears of the elephant hunter. There was not 
 a breath of air stirring to betray us, and a moment later we were 
 crouching behind a huge teak-tree, in sight of half a dozen tall, 
 arching, gray backs that loomed up above the bushes. 
 
 I now told four of the men to stay were they were, while Arndee 
 and I pushed carefully forward. The weapon upon which I de- 
 pended was a Westley Kichards double muzzle-loading, smooth- 
 bore No. 8 gun, weighing 9| lbs., belonging to my friend Theobald. 
 Each barrel was loaded with six drachms of powder and a No. 10 
 round ball of pure zinc. Arndee carried my No. 10 gun loaded 
 with hardened balls, and I rather flattered myself I could floor 
 an elephant with that old gun if need be. At first my tracker led 
 the way, and almost before we knew it we were in the midst of the 
 scattered herd. 
 
 The herd contained about sixteen elephants, three of which 
 were young tuskers, but there was one old patriarch who carried a 
 splendid pair of ivories, and I instantly marked him as my own. 
 Being wholly unused to such woi'k, I was aU impatience to make 
 the attack at once, for fear the game would discover us and make 
 off. But Arndee had seen a good many elephants killed, and he 
 forcibly prevented my bringing matters to a crisis at once, telling 
 me by signs and looks to " keep cool and take my time." I obeyed 
 him, and for fully half an hour we skulked around and through that 
 herd, trying to get a sure thing on that old tusker. 
 
 The forest was quite open, with only a little underbrush here 
 and there, and we could easily see an elephant a hundred yards 
 away. Often we were within thirty yards of an elephant, and sev- 
 eral times we crouched down in plain view of two or three. I was 
 amazed at theu- neither seeing nor scenting us. They were feeding 
 quietly on a hill-side, wandering all about, utterly unsuspicious of 
 danger. 
 
 Now stand here with me and watch that lordly old tusker who 
 is coming this, way. See how lazily and leisurely he saunters along, 
 swinging his huge trunk from side to side, until he comes to a thick 
 clump of bamboos. He sm-veys the clump for a moment with his 
 queer little brown eye, and sees in the very centre of it a soft and 
 juicy young shoot, which looks very much like a huge stalk of aspar- 
 
.138 TWO YEAKS IN THE JUNGLE. 
 
 agus, twenty feet liigli. Slowly aud deliberately he forces his way 
 right into the clump, aud reaches inwai'd and upwai'd with his 
 trunk until he gets a turn of it around the coveted young shoot. 
 Now he quietly backs off a few steps, juid the twenty-foot stem 
 tottei-s, cracks, and comes down with a teai-ing crash. Quietly 
 placing his huge fore-feet upon the prostrate stem he crushes it 
 into fragments, winds a soft, juicy piece of it up to his mouth, and 
 begins a measured " champ ! champ ! champ ! " which teUs us he is 
 wholly imsuspicious of our presence. 
 
 At last the elephants began to move off, quietly browsing as they 
 went, and I saw that I must bring matters to a crisis at once. Four 
 of them started off down the hiU, the old tusker in the reju-, crossed 
 a nullah and entered a thick bamboo jungle on the other side. I 
 sneaked along behind my old tusker within twenty feet of his tail, 
 imtil at last the leading elephant turned oft' to the right, and I saw 
 thfit they were all going to pass quite close to an unusually ku'ge 
 clump of bamboos. I quickly made a detoiu' to the right, almost 
 crawling upon hiuids and knees, aud was soon crouching motionless 
 behind it. "When the third elephant had saimtered past me I 
 quietly took my position at the further side of the clump and waited 
 for my old tusker. Slowly he pushed past the thorny tangle aud 
 came into -view. I knelt there ^^■ith the old smooth-bore at my 
 shoulder, iu plain view of the old fellow aud only fifteen feet away, 
 but I never moved a muscle and he did not twig me ! I never felt 
 more certain of killing a robin thau I did of flooring him the next 
 moment. Taking a steady, careful aim at his ear-opening, I fii-ed, 
 and sprang behind the bamboos to be out of his way when he fell. 
 Horrors ! Instead of coming down with a grand crash, as I ex- 
 pected, he threw his trunk aloft, gave a thrilling shriek and rushed 
 oft' through the forest, trumpetiug as he went. My shot had been 
 a failure and a glorious chance was lost. But why ? Or how ? I 
 could not understand it, and could scarcely beheve it was a fact^ 
 
 Of coiu'se my shot alarmed the entii-e herd and set the elephants 
 running in all directions at fii"st, diu'ing which time I executed a 
 series of lively dodges to keep from being seen, and also to keep from 
 impeding the progress of any elephimt who might be rimning away, 
 A hunter who is quite surrounded by elephants, and alai'ms them 
 all by a shot, is often in gi-eat danger of being run over accidentally 
 when the herd mjikes its first stiu'tled rusli. In a moment or two 
 the elephixnts all got together and sttvi-ted off", after which the forest 
 was still as death. We followed them imtil nearly night, without 
 
ELEPHANT HUNTING. 139 
 
 success, of course, and returned home in disappointment, wonder- 
 ing why my shot had failed to hit the brain. I see now, that on 
 account of my kneeling as I did, my bullet passed quite above the 
 mark. Had I aimed ten inches lower, it would have done its work. 
 
 The next morning at daybreak we set out fully equipped for 
 cutting up an elephant, and took up the trail where we abandoned 
 it the evening before. 
 
 "While following it up, we started quantities of game, but dared 
 not fire, not knowing how soon we might come up with the ele- 
 phants. We saw troop after troop of black monkeys, seventeen 
 gangs in all that day, and a number of great horn-bills {Buceros 
 bicornis) flying overhead. Out of a patch of low underbrush we 
 started a sounder of wild hog ; and farther on, a solitary old bull 
 bison feeding upon a hill-side, saw us, gave a snort like a steam- 
 engine, and dashed heavily away. Later in the day we came upon 
 a herd of axis deer feeding at the edge of a glade, and I could not 
 resist the temptation to fire at a buck. I crept up to within sixty 
 yards of him, rested my rifle upon a log, fired at him as he stood 
 broadside — and never touched him ! He did not even jump. 
 Before I could recover from my astonishment and reload my rifle 
 the herd quietly trotted oft*. Verily 
 
 " All hits are history, 
 All misses mystery," 
 
 but this new humiliation was very discouraging. 
 
 We followed the elephant trail until it crossed the Teckadee 
 River and entered the Government Leased Forest, where we had 
 no right to follow it, and then went home in disgust. On the way 
 home we saw a sambur, but could not get a shot at it, and thus 
 ended a day of disappointments. 
 
 For the next four days I had fever. My cook and interpreter, 
 Michael, also came down with it, and declared that unless sent 
 home at once he would die. I doctored both him and myself with 
 quinine so successfully that in a few days the fever was broken, and 
 we were once more able to work. Every day it rained from two to 
 four hours, and the forest was very dark and damp. 
 
 Eight days after the above fiasco, I had another experience of 
 rather a different nature, and was considerably scared by an old 
 cow elephant who took it into her head to run me down. The mo- 
 ment of danger in hunting a dangerous animal is when it " charges " 
 the hunter, as the saying is, at which time nothing but the hunter's 
 
140 TWO YEARS IN THE JUNGLE. 
 
 steadiness and presence of mind can save his life. It is enough to 
 make any man shudder and turn pale to see an infm-iated bear, 
 bison, tiger, or wild elephant rushing down upon him to tear him 
 in pieces or crush him to a jelly. Then the rifle must not miss fire 
 nor the bullet fail to do its work in time. The charge must be 
 stopped, or the hunter goes down. It is a very difficult matter to 
 kill an elephant when in the act of charging, but a well-planted 
 shot will turn him aside and make him glad to run away. 
 
 On that particular day my gang and I tramped about five hours 
 through a drizzling rain, and finally overtook a herd of elephants, 
 which we found to our disappointment contained no tusker at all, 
 only females and young males. One of the females, however, had 
 a cute little calf at her side, in which I soon became deeply inter- 
 ested. He was a cunning little rascal, only about three feet high, 
 as demiire and consequential as any pigmy could well be, and^ 
 hiding safely behind a lai'ge tree, I watched his movements for some 
 time. His hide was smooth, shiny, and of a dark brown color, al- 
 most black it seemed at first. He wandered all around his colossal 
 old mother who caressed him occasionally with her trunk, and oc- 
 casionally he stood dii-ectly under her body, swinging his little 
 trimk and tail from side to side just as naturally as the older 
 elephants. A ^vild elephant is never still a moment when awake, 
 swinging first one foot' and then another, and both trunk and tail 
 almost constimtly. I never saw a more demure and cute looking 
 animal than that absurd little elephant, and I fairly ached to steal 
 up and grab hold of his trunk, and have a tussle with him. 
 
 I knew very well that, like most wild animals, the female elephant 
 is very suspicious and dangerous when she has a young one to pro* 
 tect, but in watching that little calf for a good half-hour at a dis- 
 tance of only forty paces, I must have grown rather careless. The 
 herd was. huddled together in a thick clump of small trees, and 
 my men were hiding near me, waiting patiently for the sahib to see 
 all he wanted to see. At length the little baby elephant wandered 
 oflf to the other side of the herd from me, and I determined to 
 work round to that side also. Immediately around the clump of 
 trees which sheltered the elephants, the ground was level and the 
 cover very thin indeed. I saw that to reach the other side of the 
 herd I would have to cross a small patch of open ground ; but I 
 thougbt the elephants would not notice me if I crouched low and 
 went very slowly. Moxing back a few paces I started to make the 
 circuit, crouching almost to the ground, but keeping a careful eye 
 
ELEPHANT HUNTING. 141 
 
 upon the herd. Just as I reached the middle of that small open 
 space, I heard a profound rustling among the thick branches that 
 screened the herd ; in another instant the branches parted suddenly, 
 and a huge old female came rushing down upon me. 
 
 She had sufficient distance to get under full headway, and al- 
 though my breath stopped and my heart stood still with sheer 
 fright, I yet realized she was the grandest living object I ever saw — 
 und the most terrible. Her head was held high and her trunk 
 <urled up under her mouth to be uncoiled when within reach of 
 /ne, I suppose ; her ears seemed to stand straight out from her 
 head with the tips curled forward, and the strides of her massive 
 legs were perfectly enormous. Luckily she came on in dead si- 
 lence, or I should have been frightened out of my wits. As it was, 
 I felt as if I was going to be run over by a locomotive. I knew it 
 was useless folly to run, for in a few strides she would have been 
 upon me. "When I saw her coming I stood up quickly and faced 
 her, threw my gun up to my shoulder and fired both barrels, at 
 the base of her coiled-up trunk in the direction of the brain. 
 She was within fifteen paces of me when I fired, but the thunder- 
 ing report, the smoke, and two zinc balls crashing into her skull 
 close to her brain, stopped her charge, for she sheered off suddenly 
 and rushed into the forest, trumpeting shrilly once or twice. Di- 
 rectly there was a grand crash and a rush in the thicket as the 
 herd broke away and started off, and that was the last we saw or 
 cared to see of it. 
 
 Then I had time to reflect upon what " it might have been " had 
 my caps failed to explode, or my powder been damp. Once when 
 walking on a railway track in a snow-storm, I was very nearly run 
 over by a locomotive coming down a grade in muffled silence, and 
 my sensations then were precisely the same as when that old female 
 elephant came charging down that grassy slope. The approach of 
 the powerful machine and the living monster seemed exactly alike. 
 
CHAPTER XIII. 
 
 MONKEYS. BEARS, AND ELEPHANTS. 
 
 Tho Black Laugur. — Mouker Shooting. — A Startliug Cry. — Absurd Encounter 
 with Three Bears. — A Steru Chase. — Death of Number Two. — A Woful 
 "Slip 'twixt cup and lip." — Surprise Number Two — The Old Bear Dies. 
 — Habits of the Species. — A Typical Elephant Hunt. — Hunters Hunted. — 
 Wonderful Manoeuvring of the Elephants. — A Stealthy Retreat. — A 
 Double-bairelled Attack. — " Shavoogau I " — Pauic-strickeu Hunters. — 
 Failures, Fever, and Scarcity of Food. 
 
 From the day we entered the forest we began to collect speci- 
 mens of the black Luigur {Scmnopithecus cucuUatu^), which actually 
 swtu-med iu the tree-tops wherever we went. We often saw more 
 than a hundred tiud fifty in a day, and had we desii'ed, might easily 
 Lave killed fifty every week. They ai-e usually found in troops of 
 five to ten iudinduals, and are veiy noisy, uttering a most diabol- 
 ical cry which can be heard a mile in the densest forest. Often 
 when out himting with my gang, stalking like silent shadows 
 through the forest, eveiy eye and eai* keenly on the alert to detect 
 the presence of lai*ge game, we would be suddenly startled by 
 hearing exploded thirty feet above our heads, a terrific guttural 
 " uxih ! wall ! ! itsih ! ! ! " followed by a loud " a-/iO(.>-oo-/jao-oo- 
 hoo-oo," making the forest ring. On looking up we would see a 
 jet-black face encircled by a ling of long, white hair, giinning and 
 making faces at us from the fork of a tree. The moment we raise 
 a gun the whole troop stai'ts up, j\nd the branches ai'e ahve with 
 leaping and climbing black forms, each of which tries to m;ike the 
 quickest time on record in getting out of range. Once fairly 
 started, they go galloping off tlu-ough the tree-tops so fcist that we 
 have hard work to keep in sight of them, iiud miu-k down the larg- 
 est one when he stops. But after about two hundred yai'ds or less 
 the flying column calls a halt to i-est, eoxmt noses, and see how we 
 below are getting on. 
 
MONKEYS, BEARS, A^D ELEPHANTS. 143 
 
 As we liuiTV up, rifle in band, my swiftest-footed Mulcer stands 
 there with a long, bare, black arm, pointing upward into the top of 
 a hundred-and-twenty-foot blackwood tree, and we begin to peer 
 and dodge about to catch a glimpse of the largest monkey in the 
 troop. All the men gather round the tree and peer and point, and 
 try to show me just where he is. At last we see his head, and a 
 pail* of black eyes staring stealthily down at us. The rifle is up in 
 a second, and we are about to pull the trigger when adios ! — the 
 monkeys are up and off again, and the chase begins anew. 
 
 The very same performance is repeated again, and perhaps two 
 or three times more, the monkey running away just as I catch 
 sight of him and raise my rifle. But at last he waits a little too 
 long, the rifle cracks, the monkey starts up violently, clutches des- 
 perately at the branches around him, loses his balance, and with 
 outstretched legs and arms, the big, black body comes flying down 
 through space without touching a single limb to break his fall, and 
 strikes with a terrific thud upon the eai'th. We naturally think 
 such a fearful fall has broken every large bone in his body, but we 
 find only a humeras, or perhaps a femur snapped in two. If he is 
 not dead, or likely to die quickly, I take from my shot-bag a knife 
 with a very slender blade, thrust its sharp point into his occiput, 
 give it a sHght turn and presto ! he is dead. Then the Mulcers 
 peel a long strip of bark fi-om a tree near by and tie together the 
 legs of Semnopithecus cucuUatus, sling him under the pole with the 
 deer or other small game and we start on. 
 
 It would seem that this black langur utters his diaboHcal cry at 
 any animal of which he is particularly afraid, and it is well known 
 that a troop of them will sometimes follow a tiger for some dis- 
 tance, hooting and swearing at him just as they did at us. The 
 whereabouts of a tiger has often been discovered in this way, for 
 instead of running from him they follow him up. After the explo- 
 sive " wah ! wah ! " the remainder of the cry is continuous, every 
 alternate syllable being produced by drawing in the breath, so that 
 the sound is very much like that made by sawing an empty barrel 
 in two. Many times the startling cry above our heads, and so very 
 near, has caused us all to jump and involuntarily grasp our weap- 
 ons, causing much amusement afterwards. At such times it always 
 seemed to me that the monkeys were sweai-ing at us, and the fiend- 
 ish expression of their faces strengthened the belief. 
 
 Fi'om first to last I shot about forty-five langurs, out of which I 
 got twenty skeletons and eight skins. The tree-tops were so lofty 
 
144 TWO YEARS IN THE JUNGLE. 
 
 I was obliged to shoot them all with my rifle, and in order to get 
 a skeleton having no broken bones, I had to shoot one monkey 
 through the head and take its body and legs, and shoot another of 
 the same size through the body for the sake of its skull. The 
 Mulcers ate the flesh of every one I killed, and had it not been that 
 deer were plentiful I should have been tempted to try it myself. 
 
 The black langur is a very handsome monkey. The fur is fine 
 ind glossy, black throughout, except that the head and nape are 
 gray or grayish brown, the face is encircled by a ring of long gray 
 hairs, and in old individuals there is a large gray patch on the 
 rump. The largest of my specimens measured, head and body, 
 29 inches, tail 37 inches. But this was a giant in comparison with 
 all the others, a good sized one being, head and body 23 inches, 
 tail 35, and weight 23 pounds, which should be set down as the 
 average size of this species. 
 
 One morning when out looking for elephants, we had a rather 
 amusing adventui'e with a party of bears. We had tracked down 
 and killed a sambur, but unfortunately it was too young to furnish 
 either skin, skeleton, or skull, and so the game fell a prey to the 
 Mulcers, who joyfully cut it up and loaded themselves with the 
 flesh, while I looked on in disgust. On the way home we were 
 strolling stupidly along in Indian file, utterly listless and inatten- 
 tive, when, happening to cast my eyes to the left, I was amazed at 
 seeing three black bears loping slowly along, one behind the other, 
 and only thirty yards away. They were going to cross our path, 
 and had we all been a trifle more stupid, we would have actually 
 come into collision. The bears were wholly unaware of our pres- 
 ence and so were all my men of theirs' until I awoke the whole 
 crowd by throwing up my rifle and firing at the largest bear. 
 
 Directly there was a terrible uproar. The bear fell to the 
 ground, howling and bawling with all her might, while the other 
 two pitched right upon her, snapping and snarling viciously, and 
 all three yeUing in concert. I had a rubber blanket tied around my 
 shoulders to keep off the rain and the fever, and owing to my en- 
 cumbrance and sudden excitement, I made most awkward work in 
 getting reloaded. The wounded bear tried her best to charge us, 
 although I saw her spine was broken, and as quickly as possible I 
 gave her another bullet through the shoulders, which seemed to 
 satisfy her rather better. By the time I had again reloaded, the 
 two un wounded bears had taken in the situation and started up 
 the hill as hard as they could go. A hundi-ed yards away they 
 
MONKEYS, BEARS, AND ELEPHANTS. 145 
 
 stopped, and one stood up on his haunches to have a good look at 
 us. I fired at the yellow crescent on his breast, but missed, and on 
 they went again. 
 
 TeUing Arndee to come on, I started after them, throwing away 
 my hat and rubber blanket as I ran. We could see the low bushes 
 shake a hundred yards in advance of us, and occasionally we 
 caught a glimpse of a black form, but could not get a shot. We 
 crossed the top of the ridge, ran down the other side and found 
 the bears were gaining on us. We crossed the ravine at the foot 
 of the hill and started up the other side, which was very steep and 
 in places thickly overgrown -with brush and clumps of bamboo. 
 Near the top of the hill we came to an unusually thick patch of 
 underbrush, in which we heard the two bears grumbling and 
 swearing as they paused to rest a little. Keeping a sharp lookout, 
 we soon sighted a glossy black form, at which I fired. 
 
 Evidently the shot took effect, for directly one of the bears set 
 up a terrible bawling, and came rolling end over end down the 
 steep slope, clawing right and left, and yelling "bloody murder" 
 at every tumble. He rolled down to within twenty feet of where 
 we stood and finally lodged in a clump of bamboos, where he re- 
 mained motionless and quiet. Arndee exclaimed that "he was 
 dead ; " I thought so too, and so we started on after bear num- 
 ber three. 
 
 We found his trail at the top of the hill and followed it a little 
 way, when I discovered that my head was aching and throbbing 
 terrifically, so we abandoned the pursuit and went back to bear num- 
 ber two. We reached the spot, but lo and behold ! we beheld not 
 the bear. He had evidently concluded, on thinking the matter over, 
 that he was not quite dead enough to skin, so he had picked him- 
 self up and gone off about his business. He left a few " foot-prints 
 on the sands of time," and a drop of blood here and there, but that 
 was all. We followed his trail for a mile or so, abandoned it finally 
 in disgust, and went back to the scene of our first encounter. 
 
 We expected to find the dead bear, four Mulcers, and my cast- 
 off garments all there together, but to our utter amazement we 
 found none of them ! The whole affair began to look like a dream, 
 but while I was trying to study it out, Arndee found where the old 
 bear had gone off, dragging her hind-quarters, — and my gang had 
 loafed off home. Vowing vengeance on those heedless rascals 
 we started to follow up the broad and bloody trail left by our 
 wounded quarry. 
 10 
 
146 TAVO YEARS IN THE JUXGLE. 
 
 Going up a brushy hillside close by, we came suddenly upon her, 
 and were within twenty feet of her before we knew it. She saw us 
 first, wheeled ai'ound and came charging at us, dragging her hind- 
 quarters, jaws wide set and eyes glistening, while her angry growls 
 told us she was desperate and meant mischief. Ai-ndee shouted a 
 warning and vanished, but I stood still until she got within ten feet 
 of me, then fired at the centre of the yellow crescent on her breast, 
 which shot finished her. 
 
 This specimen was an old female {Ursus labial us), no doubt the 
 mother of the two smaller bears ; but, unfortunately for science, she 
 had been li-s-ing in a rocky cavern which had a very low fi'ont door, 
 for the hair was worn off her back until the skin was qiute bare. 
 She fm*nished a fine skeleton, however. 
 
 The Indian black beai- inhabits all India south of the Ganges, 
 and also Ceylon. It lives chiefly in rocky caverns and fissures and 
 feeds upon ants, both black and white, the larvae of certain longi- 
 corn beetles which it forcibly sucks out of the ground, and various 
 fruits, especiixlly that of the mohwa tree {Bassia htifolia). Like 
 our American bear, this Indian species is very fond of honey. Dui*- 
 ing my hunting on the Animallais I never came upon any other 
 beai's than those mentioned above, but Mr. Theobald has killed a 
 good many there. U7'sus labiafus is found in many other parts of 
 the Madras Pi'esidency, -s-iz. : the Neilgherries, the Shervai'oy Hills, 
 Pulneys, the Wainaad, and also in Mysore. 
 
 In due time another herd of elephants visited om* forest, and 
 we lost no time in hunting it down. The titul led us a meny-go- 
 rouud of between twenty-five and thirty miles before we came to 
 the end of it. Tiiking it up in our forest, it led out of that across 
 the Teckadee River into the Government Leased Forest, made an 
 immense circuit in that and recrossed the river agjun. Presently it 
 led once more out of our forest, across another river, and this time 
 entered the native territoiT of Cochin. "We hoped the herd would 
 recross the river higher \ip, and once more enter oiu' hunting- 
 grounds, so we took off our clothes for the thii-d time that day, 
 waded the river and kept on. Up hill and do\\Ti the trail led us, 
 tlu-ough wet mai*shes, open glades, and dense forest, the signs 
 gx•o^viug fresher every mile, but still it went fai'ther and fai'ther 
 into Cochin. At last, as it led us up a very steep and veiy slippeiy 
 mountain-side which faii'ly took our breath away, I vowed we had 
 fairly and squai'ely earned one of those elephants, and we were 
 going to have it. too ! The fine for shooting an elephant in Cochin 
 
MONKEYS, BEAKS, AND ELEPHANTS. 147 
 
 was even greater than for the same offense in the Coimbatore Dis- 
 trict, but we wanted an elephant terribly. We started our game 
 in our own forest, and being thoroughly excited by the chase, we 
 determined to kill an elephant out of that herd if possible, and risk 
 the consequences. 
 
 We gained the top of the mountain at last, and then Arndee de- 
 clared that the elephants were a great way off yet, it was a long 
 way back to camp, and we had better abandon the chase. I said 
 "No," very decidedly. The men started on, grumbling as they 
 went, and in less than ten minutes more we sighted the herd ! 
 There was a very fine tusker in it, but he was feeding in a bit of 
 open forest, and it was impossible to stalk him successfully. 
 
 Before we were aware of it, Arndee and I had walked into dan- 
 gerous proximity to a group which included three female ele- 
 phants and two calves. Out of a thick patch of underbrush, forty 
 yards from us, there came up the end of a huge trunk with the tip 
 bent in our direction. Then another trunk came up, and sniffed the 
 air suspiciously, first in one direction and then another. Presently a 
 movement was made in our direction, and two of the elephants 
 emerged from the brush and stopped short, scenting the air in 
 every direction. Arndee and I shrunk our bodies up as small as 
 possible and cowered closely behind the foot of a tree, while I 
 cocked both barrels of my gun and made ready to meet a charge. 
 
 For fully four minutes — a very long time imder such circum- 
 stances — those two elephants stood there within twenty-five paces 
 of us, listening intently, watching every object, and scenting the 
 air very suspiciously, actually trying to discover where we were. 
 They knew we were somewhere near them, and they deliberately 
 searched for us to attack us. Every moment we expected to be 
 discovered and charged by both the elephants, which would have 
 been disagreeable, if not fatal. At last, one of the pair started 
 straight in the direction of the other men, who had climbed trees, 
 fifty yards off. When the elephants started for them, Arndee made 
 a frantic signal with his arm, and the Mulcers went on up like 
 squirrels. The old scout walked directly under them, then turned 
 and came back, and during this diversion Arndee and I lost no 
 time in beating a safe retreat. In returning, he came directly to 
 the spot where we had been concealed, paused, and stood motion- 
 less as a statue for about two minutes, then quickly but noise- 
 lessly vanished in the thicket, and all was silent. 
 
 We moved up again and waited to see what the herd was going to 
 
148 TWO YEAKS IN THE JUNGLT:. 
 
 do next. Not a sound was heard for some minutes, not a movement 
 seen. At last we stole up cautiously, and to my utter amazement I 
 found that the entire herd had taken the alarm and stolen off 
 through the thick imdergTowth, without making a single sound that 
 we could hear at a distance of fifty yards ! Not a rustle, not a 
 broken twig, nor a noisy footfall. 
 
 I was really amazed at this exhibition of sagacity and almost 
 military mananivring. We saw them deliberately 
 
 1. Reconnoitre dangerous groimd by sending out scouts and 
 spies. 
 
 2. Communicate intelligence by sigTis, or sign lang-uage. 
 
 3. Eetreat in orderly silence from a liarking danger ; and 
 
 4. March off in single file, like the jungle tribes of men. 
 
 How different was this stealthy, noiseless retreat from the wild 
 stampede which follows an open attack, in which the crashing and 
 teaiiug through the jungle is at first appalling. This time the foe 
 was still in ambush when discovered, and the order signalled was, 
 •'Eetreat in silence and good order." 
 
 And yet there are intelligent people who believe that none of 
 the lower animals ai-e capable of reasoning. 
 
 I have often been led to admire the perfect silence in which the 
 elephant goes through the densest jungle. pai-ticultU'ly when fleeing 
 from an enemy. The sambiu' goes tearing tkrough the forest when 
 alarmed, smashing di*y twigs and galloping over the gTotmd with 
 so miTch noise that he can be heard more than a quai'ter of a mile 
 away ; a herd of bison miikes the eai-th f:ui-ly tremble diu-ing its 
 first bui-st ; but the lordly elephant, largest of all terrestrial mam- 
 mals, ghdes away like a gi'ay shadow, without breaking a twig, or 
 scraping against a bough. His foot is like a hnge, india-rubber 
 cai--6piing, and is Hterally shod with silence. 
 
 Upon finding the elephants had decamped, we immediately made 
 after them, and in half an hour came suddenly upon them, feed- 
 ing quietly in thick luiderbrush. By great good luck the old 
 tusker was neai'est us, and facing in oiu' dii'ection. Without a 
 moment's delay, I crept up in front of him, hid behind a tree con- 
 siderably smaller than my body, and at a distance of twelve paces 
 waited in anxious suspense for him to face me a tiifle more fully. 
 Presently he swung aroimd just right, and presented as beautiful a 
 front head-shot as any hunter could possibly ask or obtain. I fired 
 instantly, both barrels of my No. 10 with twelve drachms, aiming at 
 the base of the tiiiuk in the centre of the face. The srvm kicked 
 
MONKEYS, BEAES, AND ELEPHANTS. 149 
 
 feai'fully, neai-ly knocking me over, and I thought it had killed 
 both the elephant and myself, but to my disgust I found it had 
 done neither. The elephant wheeled around, and in doing so fell 
 upon his knees, but while I was recovering from the stunning 
 effects of my shot, he regained his feet and made off slowly and in 
 silence. 
 
 Wiping the teai-s from my eyes and the blood from my nose, I 
 started after him as fast as I could run, reloading as I went. At 
 every new turn I expected to come upon him lying dead, but some- 
 how I didn't. We were sure of ha^dng him down within an hour, 
 and as we went puffing up that steep mountain-side, I planned just 
 how we would skin and skeletonize him and get his remains to the 
 neai-est road. We were pushing along at our best speed, all excite- 
 ment and eagerness, determined to bring down that elephant before 
 we stopped, no matter whether he ran one mile or twenty, when 
 suddenly we heai-d, " Hi-yoh-ho ! " shouted out loud and clear a 
 quai'ter of a mile directly ahead of us. 
 
 At this clap of thunder fi-om a clear sky, we stopped dead short 
 and looked at each other. " Hi-?/o/i-ho ! " Again and much nearer ! 
 The men turned almost pale with fear, and with one voice exclaimed 
 in a most tragic stage-whisper, " Shavoogan ! " 
 
 It was the only time I ever saw those rascals really terrified. 
 Without another word, they wheeled about, turned off the trail and 
 fled down the mountain at full speed ; of coui'se I followed to see 
 that they all got safely back to camp. We went down the steep 
 slope about six feet at every step, fleeing in dead silence from that 
 terrible " Shavoogan," whatever that was. We went as though 
 the great dragon was close behind us, and never paused a moment, 
 nor uttered a word, until we were at least three miles from that 
 awful "Shavoogan." Then we enjoyed a laugh at our own expense 
 over the sudden and ludicrous manner hi which the tables were 
 tui'ned upon us. 
 
 I need scai-cely add that that elephant escaped, or that we did 
 also, and that I added another word to my Tamil vocabulary. 
 "Shavoogan," is the Tamil word for "watchman" or "peon," and 
 the one we heard belonged to the service of the Kajah of Cochin. 
 
 To my dying day, I shall never understand how I failed to kill 
 that elephant in his tracks. I had a fair shot, had done my very 
 best and failed, and was therefore at my wit's end. Such failures 
 as that and my first one are, of all others, the most disappointing 
 and discouraging. I had done all I knew how to do, and what 
 
ir>0 TWO YE Alls IN THE .UTN(}LE. 
 
 could I do more ? Those were tlie bitterest failures I ever made in 
 hunting. 
 
 During my first six weeks in the hills, all eirenmstances seemed 
 to oomlnue against me. Sevenil times we found the fresh tracks of 
 olophants. and followed them diligently for several hours, only to 
 find whore the tifiil crossed over into the Government Forest, 
 where we had no right to follow. It seemed at last as if the ele- 
 phants knew that when we got txfter them, they had only to cross 
 the Tockadoe Eiver to got beyond our roach, and tinally we almost 
 despaired of ever coming up with olophmits in our forest. 
 
 During jdl this time I devoted myself almost exclusively to ele- 
 phants, killing no other game of any conseqtience, save enough 
 door and saixilnvr to supply the camp with moat. Indeed, I fired as 
 few sliots as possible to avoid frightening away the larger kinds of 
 game, pjvrticularly the elephants. I had had two gloiious chimces, 
 ajid each time failed to kill, although I had done my best. In fact, 
 I was trying to shoot an elophsmt according to the recipe given me 
 by my friend Thoobidd, and it was uphill work. Every week or 
 ten da^-s I had an attack of jungle fever, but it was al\>'ays of the 
 mild, intermittent typo, and after about three days I would have it 
 broken up with quinine, so that I coxild go hunting every day 
 again until it returned. Several times the fever came on me when 
 out hunting, sevenxl niilos from camp, and I would have to citiwl 
 back as best I co\ild, with my head throbbing hke a steam-engine. 
 My ron\ody for the fovor was ton grains of quinine dissolved in half 
 a wino-glass>ful of clear brandy, tjiken two or throe horn's before the 
 fever was expecte<l. then the same dose morning, noon, and night, 
 until once more able to titivel. 
 
 My provisions became exhausted all too soon, and I came down 
 to plain bread, rice, a.nd venison, with a potato now and then, by 
 way of luxury. My cook was a failure at making curry, that "dish 
 fit for the gods," without which India would be uninhabitable for 
 either natives or Euivpeans. Being heavily handicapped on curry, 
 I had to live upon door and sambur tongues, with venison steaks and 
 iwasts by way of A-ariety, and dry Killed rice. Once a week Mr. 
 Theobald and I sent a coolie to Coimbatore ^oO miles), for a basket 
 of bread, but by the time the loaves reached me, they were alwaj*3 
 mouldy. A dozen bananas or potatoes wore a positive treat, so 
 scaive wei*e fi-uit and vegetables during that long period of semi- 
 starvation. After a while, thei-e came upon me an intense craving 
 for A-eg^tables, which could onh- be satisfied bv Crosse ct Black- 
 
MONKEYS, BEARS, AND ELEPHANTS. 151 
 
 well's mixed pickloH. But I cared very littlo about my inuor man 
 during those days ; and, as nearly as could bo possible, ho was loft 
 to take care of himself. 
 
 After my second failure at shooting elephants, I determined to 
 hunt smaller game for a time, and give that persecuted animal, as 
 well as myself, a rest. Very soon after this my luck took a turn 
 for the better, which now makes it necessary for me to say some- 
 thing about tiger-hunting. 
 
CHAPTER XIV. 
 
 A TIGER HUNT. 
 
 Tigers.— The Game-killer.— The Cattle-lifter.— The Man-eater.— Reign of Ter- 
 ror. — Eight Hundred Victims Anniially. — Modes of Tiger-hnnting. — How- 
 dah Shooting. — Machan Shooting. — Shooting on Foot. — An Impromptu 
 Tiger-hunt. — The Trail. — A Light " Battery." — The Game Overhauled. — 
 A Good Shot. — Death of a Superb "Game-killer." — Dimensions and 
 "Weight. — A Proud Moment. — Struggle to Preserve the Skin. 
 
 AcooKPixo to their habits in proeuriDg their food, tigers ai'e divided 
 by the people of India into three classes. 
 
 The least hiu'iuful is the " game-killer," who lives in the hills 
 and dense forests where wild game is abundant, and leads the life 
 of a bold, honest hunter. He feeds chiefly upon deer and wild hog, 
 and so long as he remains a game-killer he is a real blessing to the 
 poor ryots, who have hai'd work to protect their crops from the 
 droves of deer and wild hog which sally forth fi*om the jungle at 
 nightfall to depredate upon them. But the trouble is, there is no 
 knowing when this striped sportsman will take it into his head to 
 ti-y his teeth and claws on cattle or men : in fact, he is not to be 
 trusted for a moment. 
 
 The " cattle-lifter " is a big, fat, lazy thief, too indolent to pull 
 do\\ni fleet-footed wild animals, who prowls ai'ound the villages after 
 nightfall, or the edge of the jimgle where the cattle ai-e herded, and 
 kills a bullock every four or five days. The annual loss to the cat- 
 tle OT\-nei*s whose herds ai-e thiTS preyed upon by the cattle-lifter, is 
 very great for poor natives to bear, since each tiger destroys in a 
 yeai', cattle worth at least four hundred dollai'S. 
 
 But even the most gi'eedy cattle-lifter sinks into insignificance 
 in the presence of the fierce "man-eater," the scoiu'ge and terror 
 of the timid and defenceless natives. Until a tiger has once had 
 his fangs in human flesh, he has an instinctive fear of man, and un- 
 less attacked and brought to bay will neai'ly always retreat from 
 his presence. But with his first taste of human blood that fear 
 
A TIGER HUNT. 153 
 
 vanishes forever. His nature changes, and he becomes a man- 
 eater. 
 
 Tigers who prey upon human beings are usually ex-cattle-lifters, 
 who, from long acquaintance with man have ceased to fear him, and 
 find him the easiest prey to overcome and carry off. A large pro- 
 portion of the man-eaters are mangy, superannuated, old tigers or 
 tigi'esses, Avhose teeth and claws have become blunt with long use, 
 and who find it too great an exertion to kill and drag off bul- 
 locks. 
 
 The presence of a man-eater causes a perfect reign of terror in 
 the district which he frequents, which lasts until he is slain. It is 
 almost invariably the case that the brute confines his operations 
 to a few square miles of territory, and perhaps a dozen villages, so 
 that each one becomes a walking scourge whose form, habits, and 
 foot-prints become thoroughly known to the terrified villagers. At 
 first, perhaps, he carries off a herdsman instead of a bullock, by 
 way of experiment, and soon after an unlucky woodcutter at the 
 edge of the jungle shares a similar fate. Finding that he can 
 easily and with perfect safety kill men, he gradually becomes 
 bolder, until finally he enters the villages after nightfall and seizes 
 men, women, and children from off their own door-steps. No one 
 is safe save when in his house with the door shut and barred. The 
 herder no longer dares to take his hungry herd to graze in the 
 jungle, and for the woodcutter to go forth to his task in the forest, 
 would be to literally walk into the jaws of death. 
 
 The man-eater may be seen in the evening near a certain village, 
 and before morning carry off a man from another five miles away. 
 No one can say that he will not be the next victim. When the 
 people go to sleep at night the last thing they think of is the man- 
 eater, and he is first in their thoughts when they awake in the 
 morning. It is a hoiTible feeling to live in constant fear of being 
 suddenly pounced upon by a big, hungry, wild beast that can carry 
 you ofl' in his jaws and eat jon up clean at one meal. 
 
 But, thanks to English sportsmen, improved fire-arms and the 
 liberal rewards offered by the Government, man-eating tigers are 
 now rare compared with what their numbers once were. It is not 
 now possible for a single tigress to cause the desertion of thirteen 
 villages, and throw out of cultivation ^feen square miles of terri- 
 tory, as once occurred in Central India ; nor for another to kill one 
 hundred and twenty-seven persons before being laid low. And 
 yet, in spite of breech-loadmg rifles and zealous British sportsmen. 
 
154 TWO YEAKS IX THE JUNGLE. 
 
 poison, aiid pitfalls, tlie mau-eaters still devom* over eight liundred 
 liiiman beings in India eveiy yeai\ 
 
 The tiger inhabits all India from the Himalayas to Cape Com- 
 orin, inid is hunted in three different ways. 
 
 The first, the best, and most interesting plan, is howdah-shoot- 
 ing. Li this, the hunter is perched on an elephant's back, high up 
 out of harm's way, in a comfortable square box called a howdah, with 
 his weapons and ammunition placed conveniently around him. Of 
 eoui-se the eleplumt is managed by a mahout, who sits astride his 
 neck vdth an iixm goad in his hand, a very exposed position, in 
 fact, "SMien it is possible, a large number of elephants are mus- 
 tered for the hunt, to assist in stirring up the tigers. Now and 
 then a grt\nd pai'ty is made up of foiu* or five Enghsh sportsmen, 
 and twenty or thirty elephants ; and perhaps five or six tigers and 
 much other game may be killed in a week. But this is a very ex- 
 pensive method, imd cannot be practised except by the wealthy or 
 the mduentiaJ few. This is an eminently safe method, too, the 
 greatest danger attending it being the iiinning away of one's ele- 
 phant and the wreck of the howdah. Ladies often attend hunts of 
 this kind, which tends to place this once noble sport upon a level 
 with lawn tennis and badminton. 
 
 Tiger hmiting ■vs'ith elephimts is most extensively practiced in 
 Central India where thi- jungle is in low, scrubby patches with bare 
 ground between, and in the Terai, a ^^■ide stretch of grassy hjilf- 
 forest skirting the base of the Himalayas, In Southern India there 
 is Httle chance to employ elephiints in this way, because of the wide 
 tracts of dense jungle * and forest in which no tiger can be effeet- 
 iitxUy mtu-ked down and "fiushed," Elephants ctvu be used to 
 great advantage, however, in following iip a woimded tiger, a pur- 
 suit too dangerous for even the most reckless sportsman to prose- 
 ciite s:\fely on foot. 
 
 The second and most general plan of tiger hunting, is called 
 " machan-shooting." A machan is a platform of poles, fifteen to 
 twenty feet high, erected in the daytime near a recently killed 
 bullock, a live bait, or a pool of water. 'rsu:\lly it is placed in the 
 top of the tree nearest the spot or object the tiger is expected to 
 visit. 
 
 In Centi-al India where the jungles can be beaten for tigers, the 
 
 * In th,e East Indies tlie term "jungle'" is applied to all kinds of arboreal 
 growth Iving in large tracts, whether it be composed of heavy forest, low 
 brush-wood, or a scitteriui; srowth of scrubbv trees in tall gr:iss. 
 
 1 
 
TIGEIt HUNTING ON ELEI'IIANT-IiACK. 
 
 [From a pholofiruith by A, O. R. Theobald.) 
 
A TIGEK HUNT. 155 
 
 sportsman builds his machan in the most favorable position, takes 
 his place upon it, and waits while the tigers are actually driven 
 toward him by a grand army of beaters — from fifty to three hun- 
 dred native men blowing horns, beating tom-toms, firing guns and 
 shouting, and then, when the tigers come running past his posi- 
 tion, he kills them — if he can. When a tiger kills a bullock, the 
 hunter quietly builds a machan in the top of the nearest tree, takes 
 up his position in the afternoon, and waits patiently until the tiger 
 returns to his feast at nightfall ; then he shoots him, or at least 
 shoots at him, in the dark. 
 
 It is very seldom that accidents occur in hunting tigers by 
 either of the above methods, for usually the sportsman is not in 
 the least danger. 
 
 Shooting on foot is the third method of tiger hunting, but it is 
 so dangerous that it is not regularly practised except as a last re- 
 sort, and the most reckless hunter never dares follow it up for any 
 length of time. Nine-tenths of all the tiger "accidents," as they 
 are called in India, occur to sportsmen who are shooting on foot. 
 The Collector of the Coimbatore District acknowledges the superior 
 dangers and risks of this method by paying a reward of one hun- 
 dred rupees for a tiger shot on foot, whereas he grants only the 
 minimum reward, thirty-five rupees, for a tiger shot from a machan 
 or poisoned. When a hunter attacks the tiger in open ground, he 
 must shoot the animal in the brain or else break his spinal column, 
 for nothing else is sure to stop his furious charge. A tiger is but 
 a gigantic cat, endowed with the traditional nine lives, and even 
 though shot through the heart, the lungs, body, neck or shoulders, 
 he often has strength enough to spring upon the hunter and give 
 him a terrible mauling or a mortal wound before falling dead. 
 Tigers often become so enraged by the pain of their wounds that 
 they attack the hunting elephants with the greatest fury. 
 
 The Animallai slojae was one vast, unbroken forest, with such 
 endless cover that successful beating for game was simply out of 
 the question. There was such an abundance of it that no men or 
 cattle were ever killed by tigers, and hence our only chance for 
 finding them at all was to track them up on foot, or trust to meeting 
 them by chance. Either plan was risky, but I had enough faith 
 in the accuracy of my little Maynard rifle, and my own steadiness, 
 to believe that between us we could floor a tiger if we ever got 
 a fair chance. In tramping through the forest I often wished I 
 could come face to face with a tiger and get just one fair shot. 
 
156 TWO YEAES IN" THE JUNGLE. 
 
 I thouglit I would like to be a little above him, if possible, so aa 
 to get a better view of his face, and be more certain of hitting the 
 brain. I spun my theories very finely, and all I asked was a chance 
 to give tliem a trial. 
 
 We often tried to foUow up the " pugs " we found in the forest, 
 and it was in this way I finally made the acquaintance of " my 
 first tiger." It was during one of my fever-spells, too, when I was 
 feeHng rather low-spirited. I had been seven weeks in the hills, 
 hunting constantly when not down with the fever, but had killed 
 neither elephant nor tiger, and was beginning to think I never 
 would. I had shot nothing for several days, and consequently there 
 was no meat in camp. The old women gnimbled, the Uttle children 
 cried for it, and, in fact, I wanted some fresh venison myself. 
 
 On that particular day, I had an attack of fever due at 2 p.m., 
 but I thought I could stroll out and shoot an axis deer before it 
 came on. It happened that three of my men had been sent away 
 on various errands, and there remained in camp only Pera Vera, 
 my second tracker, afterwards my head man, Nangen, a very quiet 
 but courageous young fellow, and a small boy. I took along these 
 three for general pui-poses, my little Maynard rifle for the deer, 
 and my No. 16 shot-gun, loaded with bird-shot, for jungle fowl. 
 Not a very heavy "battery," certainly, when compared with the 
 formidable array of doiible rifles from the 4-bore, throwing a 4- 
 ounce ball, down to the double ,577 Express rifle as the least 
 deadly weapon which every genuine English sportsman in India 
 possesses and carries with him when after big game. It takes 
 twenty-nine of my Maynard bvillets (calibre .40), to make a pound. 
 
 We hunted all the forenoon, and found a herd of axis deer 
 feeding in a glade, but I had not enough energy to make a suc- 
 cessful stalk, and so that chance was lost. In fact, I did not care 
 much whether school kept or not. 
 
 We stroUed through the Government Forest until nearly noon, 
 when, just as we were about returning to camp, we heard a fearful 
 growling and roaring a few hundred yards in advance, which set 
 us instantly on the qui-vive. We hurried in the direction of the 
 sound, which continued at intervals for some minutes. I said, 
 " Tiger, Vera ? " and he repHed : " No, sahib, panther. Shall we 
 go for it ? " "Of course," and on we went. 
 
 Presently we heard trumpeting and branch-breaking half a mile 
 beyond us, and then Vera said the low roaring, or gi*owling, noise 
 had been made by the elephants. On our way toward the ele- 
 
A TIGER HUNT. l57 
 
 phants, to have a quiet look at them, we came to a httle nullah,* 
 and there, in the level, sandy bed of the stream, was the trail of a 
 large tiger. 
 
 The men carefully examined the huge tracks in the wet sand, 
 compared notes a moment, and declared the trail was fresh. Then 
 I examined it for myself, looked wise, and said ; " Oh, yes, it is ; 
 very fresh, indeed." Vera looked anxiously about a moment, ex- 
 amined the bore of my rifle doubtfully, tried to measure it with 
 the end of his little finger, and finally asked me very seriously 
 whether I would dare to fire at a big tiger with that small rifle. I 
 said, " Yes, certainly ; just show me one and see." I did not for a 
 moment allow myself to hope for such good luck as a meeting 
 with the animal that made those huge tracks, and a shot at him. 
 But without a moment's delay we started to follow up the trail. 
 
 The little creek ran through perfectly level and very open for- 
 est. Its bed was about eight feet below the level, forty feet wide, 
 and almost dry. The tiger had gone loafing leisurely along down 
 the bed of the stream, walking in the shallow water every now and 
 then, crossing from side to side, and occasionally sticking his 
 claws into the bank, as if to keep them in practice. Vera led the 
 way as usual, I followed close at his heels, and we stole along as 
 silently as shadows. 
 
 We had followed the trail about a mile, when we came to a 
 clump of bamboos growing in a sharp bend in the stream. Vera 
 stopped short, grasped me by the arm, and pointed through the 
 clump. He had the habit of grasping my arm with one hand, and 
 pointing with the other whenever he discovered any game, and I 
 could always tell the size and ferocity of the animal by the strength 
 of his grasp. This time he gave my arm such a fierce grip I knew 
 he must have found a tiger. 
 
 Sure enough, there was Old Stripes in all his glory, and only 
 thirty yards away ! The midday sun shone fvdl upon him, and a 
 more splendid object I never saw in a forest. His long, jet-black 
 stripes seemed to stand out in reUef, like bands of black velvet, 
 while the black and white markings upon his head were most 
 beautiful. In size and height he seemed perfectly immense, and 
 my first thought was, " Great Csesar ! He is as big as an ox ! " 
 
 * '" Nullah ' is an Indian term of the most comprehensive signification, 
 used in speaking of any channel or water-course, and applied alike to a small 
 river or deep ravine, to the sandy bed of a dried-up stream, or a wet gutter." 
 —A. C. McMaster. 
 
158 TWO TEARS IN THE JUNGLE. 
 
 When we first saw him, he was walking from us, going across 
 the bed of the stream. Knowing precisely what I wanted to do, I 
 took a spare cartridge between my teeth, raised my rifle and 
 waited. He reached the other bank, sniffed it a moment, then 
 turned and paced slowly back. Just as he reached the middle of 
 the stream, he scented us, stopped short, raised his head and 
 looked in our direction with a suspicious, angry snarl. Now was 
 my time to fire. Taking a steady, careful aim at his left eye, I 
 blazed away, and without stopping to see the effect of my shot, 
 reloaded my rifle with all haste. I half expected to see the great 
 brute come bounding round that clump of bamboos and upon one 
 of us ; bvit I thought it might not be I he would attack, and before 
 he could kill one of my men I could send a bullet into his brain. 
 
 Vera kept an eye upon him every moment, and when I was 
 again ready I asked him with my eyebrows, " "Where is he ? " He 
 quickly nodded, "He's there stilL" I looked again, and sure 
 enough, he Avas in the same spot, but turning slowly around and 
 around, with his head held to one side, as if there was some- 
 thing the matter with his left eye ! When he came ai'ound and 
 presented his neck fairly I fired again, aiming to hit his neck-bone. 
 At that shot he instantly dropped upon the sand. I quickly 
 shoved in a fresh cartridge, and with lifle at full cock and the tiger 
 carefully covered, we went toward him, slowly and respectfully. 
 We were not stire but that he would even then get up and come at 
 us. But he was done for, and lay there gasping, kicking, and 
 foaming at the mouth, and in three minutes more my first tiger lay 
 dead at our feet. He died without making a sound. 
 
 To a hunter, the moment of triumph is when he first lays his 
 hand upon his game. What exquisite and indescribable pleasure 
 it is to handle the ciniel teeth and knife-Hke claws which were so 
 dangerous but one brief moment before ; to pull open the heavy 
 eyelid ; to examine the glazing eye which so lately glared fiercely and 
 fearlessly upon every foe ; to stroke the powerful Hmbs and glossy 
 sides while they are stni warm, and to handle the feet which made 
 the huge tracks that you have been following in doubt and danger. 
 
 How shall I express the pride I felt at that moment ! Such a 
 feeling can come but once in a hunter's hfe, and when it does come 
 it makes up for oceans of ill-luck. The conditions were all ex- 
 actly right. I was almost alone and entii'ely unsuppoi-ted, and had 
 not even one " proper " weapon for tiger-hunting. We met the tiger 
 faii'lv. on foot, and in fom- minutes from the time we fii'st saw him 
 
A TIGER HUNT. 159 
 
 he was ours. Furtliermore, lie was the first tiger I ever saw loose 
 in the jungle, and we had outwitted him. I admired my men quite 
 as much as I did myself ! They were totally unarmed, and they 
 had seen me miss spotted deer at sixty yards ; but instead of bolt- 
 ing, as I should have done had I been in their place, they stood 
 right at my elbow like plucky men, as they were. What if they 
 had been of the timid sort ? They would never have consented to 
 follow the trail of that dangerous beast. 
 
 I paced the distance from where we stood to the dead tiger 
 and found it to be just thirty yards. My first was a dead centre 
 shot, striking him exactly in the left eye, scarcely nicking the edge 
 of the lid. I had intended that that bullet should enter his brain, 
 but owing to the narrowness of the brain-cavity it only fractured 
 the left side of the cranium. However, it rendered him quite 
 powerless either to fight or run away, and he would have died very 
 soon from such a terrible wound. In fact, I now think my second 
 shot was really unnecessary. Owing to the position of his head 
 I could not possibly have placed a bullet in his forehead so that 
 it would have reached the brain, but had I been using a regula- 
 tion " No. 8-bore rifle," throwing a 2-ounce ball, I could have 
 blown the whole top of his head off very neatly (!) — and utterly 
 ruined him as a specimen. My second shot struck one of his 
 neck vertebrae and cut his spinal cord, killing him instantly, a favor- 
 ite shot with me when I can catch an animal at rest. 
 
 He was a splendid specimen every way, just in the prime of 
 
 tiger-hood, fat, sleek, and glossy. Up to that time I could not make 
 
 myself believe that a tiger can pick up a man in his mouth and run 
 
 away with him as easily as a terrier does with a rat. But when I 
 
 measured that great brute, I saw and realized just how it is done. 
 
 Before touching him with a knife we measured him carefully, tAvice, 
 
 and recorded the figures in my note-book. His dimensions were 
 
 as follows : 
 
 Felis tigris. 
 
 Animallai Hills, September 27, 1877. 
 
 Length from tip of uose to end of tail vertebrae .... 9 feet 8^ inches. 
 
 Length of tail alone 3 " 6 " 
 
 Vertical height at shoulders 3 " 7 " 
 
 Girth 4 " 2 " 
 
 Circumference of neck 2 " 8 " 
 
 Circumference of head around the jaws 3 '* " 
 
 Circumference of fore-arm 1 foot 8 '* 
 
 Width of fore-paw 6i *' 
 
 Weight (by standard American scales) 495 lbs. 
 
100 TWO YEAES IX THE JFXGLE. 
 
 My experience with that specimen will serve as a good illusti*a- 
 tion of the difficuhies I had to contend with in ciu-ing skins in that 
 rainy jungle. In a climate that is dry and hot, skins can be cured, 
 sometimes, almost without preservatives : but in the moist and 
 hot tropics, every bit of skin which does not feel the effects of a 
 powerful preservative at the right time will simply decompose be- 
 fore it will cui-e in the least "VMien the powdered alum does not 
 reach the epidermis, the latter shps off in about four days, taking 
 the hail- along with it, leaving unsightly bald patches on the skin. 
 Thick skins must be thinned down with the knife, so that the alum 
 vrill strike through at once to the roots of the hau*, and harden the 
 whole skin. For the benefit of the sportsman and the general 
 reader, I am tempted to give brief du-ections for skinning a tiger, so 
 that it may be mounted as a fii-st class-miiseum specimen ; for 
 which see the Appendix We removed the skin of oui- tiger, ap- 
 plied the preservatives, and hung it over a pole to dry, expecting 
 that such glorious sunny weather as we were then having would 
 allow it to cm-e in a very few days. That same evening it began to 
 i-ain, and for the next ten days it was either a steady down-pour or 
 a dreary diizzle. Of coui"se, no skin coiild dry in such a vapor 
 bath as that, and, worst of aU, I was very short of alum. 
 
 For a week I played a game with the elements, with that tiger 
 skin for a stake. I hung it out in the aii- whenever the rain ceased 
 for an hoiu- : I built a fire before it, and came near roasting one leg. 
 I had a wide shed built, near my hut, imder which I himg the skin, 
 spread out and stretched so that the air could reach eveiy portion 
 of it freely. I apphed to it all the alum I had, both in the dry state 
 and made into a wai'm bath, but still the skin would not and could 
 not hai'den in the least, nor get dry so long as I remained there. 
 
 Determined not to lose siich a specimen we broke up oiu' camp 
 hastily and huiiied off half a day's march to a spot that was higher and 
 more open, and where less i-ain fell. There we found the sim shining, 
 not hotly by any means, and unpacking oui" tiger skin we spread it 
 out T\-idely in his gi-acious beams, which saved it at the last moment. 
 
 Ml". Theobald sympathized with me vei-y heartily diuing my 
 troubles with it, and congratulated me upon my final success, in- 
 forming me as he did so that he had once lost two fine tiger skins 
 under similai* cii'cumstances, in spite of all he could do to save them. 
 
 I had nearly the s^xme trouble with every large mammal skin I 
 prepai-ed in that i-ainy jungle, and I realized more than ever that 
 '• eternal 's'igilance is the price of " a collection. 
 
CHAPTER XT. 
 
 SKELETONIZING AN ELEPHANT. 
 
 Mischievous Elephants. — Chase of a Large Herd. — Death of a Tusker. — Forbid 
 den Ground. — A Secret. — The Mulcer's Oath. — A Change of Base. — Skel« 
 etonizing an Elephant in Sixteen Hours. — Cacheing the Bones. — The Traces 
 of our Guilt. — Moral Aspect of the Affair. — The Spotted Deer. — A Pretty 
 Picture. — The Indian Elk or Sambur. — Bad Case of Protective Coloring. 
 — Serenaded by Sambur. — The •' Brain-fever bird. " — Tree Rats. — The 
 Muntjac. — Delicious Venison. — The Neilgherry Goat. — Wild Hogs. 
 
 "When we returned to Tellicul after our absence while drying the 
 tiger skin, we found all our huts a total wreck. A large herd 
 of elephants had visited the spot and walked through them from 
 one end to the other, tearing them completely to pieces, smashing 
 tables and cots, and even pulling up a few of the posts, and throw- 
 ing them some distance. All this just for pure mischief, just to be 
 doing something, and to show us what they could do. Many a 
 night in those hills I have heard the trumpeting and squeaking 
 of elephants near our camp, and I would never have been at all 
 surprised to have been awakened by an elephant pulling my hut 
 down over my head. I never went to sleep without Theobald's ele- 
 phant-gun standing loaded within reach of my hand, and other 
 weapons close by, so that in case any wild beast made us a mid- 
 night call we could give him a cordial reception. I also had a 
 hole cut in the end of my hut, at the foot of my cot, so that in case 
 a mischievous elephant should come and knock at my door in the 
 middle of the night, I could get out at the opposite end to receive 
 him in due form. 
 
 Three weeks after the death of the tiger, another herd of ele- 
 phants visited our forest. The moment we found the trail, we 
 set out upon it as fast as we could go, and strained every nerve to 
 come up with the animals before they could get out of our hunting 
 groimd. But once more we were doomed to disappointment and 
 aggravation. An hour before sunset, the trackers declared that 
 11 
 
103 TWO YKAIIS IN THE -iT^NOtLK. 
 
 tlio herd was OTily a half-hour in advance of iis — and the trail crossed 
 tho river into the Gx"»vernnient Forest, of coui-se I "SVe gave it np 
 that day, but the uext morning we took up the trail where we had 
 left it the previous evening, juid followed it rather leisurely for 
 some honi-s, just to see where it would tiually lead to. That herd 
 was the hu'gest I ever Siiw on those hills, containing between forty 
 and tifty elephiuits, five or six of which were tuskers. In some 
 places it left a ti-jvil like the ti*aek of a smjill Lm*rieaue, mowing 
 down the tall giiiss in a swath a hundred feet wide, pulling down and 
 smasliing scores of old bamboos in one place, just for the fim of 
 the thing, tmd. stranger still, we s;\w sevend saplings the size of a 
 nuui's arm or hvrger which had been half uprooted and borne down 
 to the givund. 
 
 Tbe herd had made a wide circuit through a corner of the Gov- 
 ernment Forest, and just before they quitted it they had done 
 still further mischief. They visited a camp of wood-outters on the 
 bank of the Toonacadavoo Eiver, where there were four large huts 
 for the accommodation of over fifty men. We found the huts torn 
 and smashed all to pieces, and of the long row of roimd stones on 
 which the men set their chatties of rice to cook, every stone had 
 been displaced and rolled alK">ut by those iiiscally elephants. 
 
 From the huts, the elephiuits had turned off westward and 
 headed straight for C6chin. In one place we s;\w where an old 
 tusker had been barking a tree with his tusks, just for amusement, 
 and once wheiv he had thrust them into a bank of earth for a foot 
 or moi^. Agtiin we cjmie to where he had lain him down to sleep 
 and left a very j^rfect impression of his right tusk in the moist 
 eai'th. The trail led us thixtugh t\ll sorts of places, and finally 
 crossed the lK»imdary into Cochin. At last, we overhauled the heixi 
 as it was feeding along a rather steep, grassy hill-side, which was 
 strewn hei-e and there with rugged ixx'ks, a capital situation. But 
 alas! we were on forbidden teriitory agtmi. Cochin this time, and 
 once more that tuie loomed up before om- eyes. Apart fix)m the 
 fine, I had no conscientious scruples alx^ut the matter, for when an 
 elephant ivams thixnigh four territories in one day, to which does 
 he belong more th:\n to the others '? I argued the question, gave 
 it up, tmd deoidei^l to kill one of those elephants if possible, ti\ke its 
 skeleton for my collection, and if caught, p^y the fine and call it 
 s^iu:\re, although fin;mci:illy it might prove a losing game. 
 
 We posted oiu"selves :unong some large rocks, well in advance 
 of the elephruits, and wiutevi for them to feed uj> toward us. 
 
SKELETONIZING AN ELEPHANT. 163 
 
 On they came, and we saw there were five tuskers. This time I 
 made my calculations more carefully than before, fired confidently, 
 and my victim sank down in his tracks without a gx'oan, and died 
 without a kick. Being well below our position, he received my 
 spherical zinc bullet high up on the left side of his head, whence it 
 ranged downward, passing through eleven inches of bone and 
 eleven inches of brain, and came out weU below his right ear. 
 I regret to say that he was not the largest tusker in the herd, 
 being siu'passed by one other which was so surrounded by other 
 elephants that he was practically inaccessible, and therefore the 
 victory was not as great as it might have been. 
 
 We returned to camp du'ectly, and ordered all the women and 
 children to start at once for Toonacadavoo. We had a big secret 
 to keep, and preferred to manage it without any of their assistance. 
 Women can keep a secret very closely, but it usually requires a 
 great many of them to accomplish it. As soon as the Avomen had 
 been bundled o£f, bag and baggage, I told my men, through my 
 cook-interpreter, that no other person besides ourselves must ever 
 hear anything about that dead elephant, for should it get found 
 out we would aU get into trouble. They declared the secret should 
 die with them. Then my new servant, Mullen, a private peon lent 
 me by Mi\ Theobald, resorted to a little device to play upon the 
 superstitious feelings of the Mulcers. 
 
 Mullen was a Mohammedan, and a very shrewd fellow every way. 
 He took my two big guns, laid them upon the ground, one across 
 the other, with the hammers at fuU cock, and laid my largest hunt- 
 ing-knife — an infant broad-sword, which I never once carried — upon 
 the guns, where they crossed each other. Then he ordered my five 
 Mulcers to walk up on one side of the altar, and told the first man, 
 Channa, to hold up his hands. Channa did so, whereupon the 
 peon administered a sort of double-geared, self-acting oath or in- 
 vocation, which translated ran about as foUows: "Everybody sees 
 that Channa promises before his sawmy {i.e., his favorite god) and 
 these horrible makers-of-dead-animals, that he will never tell any 
 man, woman, or child anything about the dead elephant, and what 
 the 'Merican sahib is about to do with it ; and that he (Channa) 
 begs his sawmy to remember, and if he ever does tell about it he 
 prays that his sawmy will send a man to shoot him with one of 
 these guns and stab him with that knife, or one just as large." 
 Channa repeats the oath, steps over the " makers-of-dead-animals," 
 and the ceremony is complete. Each of the others followed in 
 
164 TWO YEAEf^ 1"%^ TJIY. -lUXGLE. 
 
 turn, while I stood by with a Aery straight face to lend an air of 
 owlish solemnity to the scene. 
 
 "Without a moment's delaj' we broke up our camp and hvu'ried 
 off to the dead elephant, which lay in a -wild, unfrequented spot be- 
 tween two ranges of hills. We had a small tent, which we pitched 
 in a lovely little valley, beside a running stream, a quarter of a mile 
 from the elephant. The men cleared a place between three bamboo 
 clumps and piled bamboo branches in the openings, so that a wild 
 animal could not walk over them as they slept without their know- 
 ing of its approach. Shortly before sunset our camp was settled 
 and we were ready for work. I " harangued " the men for a mo* 
 ment, telling them we had hard work ahead of us, and that for the 
 next two or three days I would expect them to work hard, and I 
 would double their wages. Then I served out arrack and tobacco 
 all ai'ound, got out the skinning-knives, grindstone, oilstone, lan- 
 tern, etc., and we lit down upon that carcass like a flock of vultures. 
 
 The elephant had fallen upon his side, back doMn hill fortu- 
 nately, and we took his dimensions very easily. He was eight feet 
 foiu- inches in vertical height at the shoulders. As he lay there the 
 top of the cai'cass was just on a level with my chin, and our task 
 was to quai-ry the entire skeleton out of that great mountain of 
 flesh and blood. We decided that we did not dare to attempt taking 
 the skin, for under the' cii'cumstauces we would have all we could 
 do to take even the skeleton and get away with it without being 
 seen by any of the Cochin people. Besides, I wanted the skin of a 
 lai-ger animal than that proved to be. 
 
 Fii'st, we stripped the skin from the upper side of the animal, to 
 have it out of the way, then cut off the two legs which were upper- 
 most, the one at the shoulder and the other at the hip, and set two 
 men at work upon them to cut off' the flesh, piece by piece. We 
 found that it requii-ed the strength of two men to roll the fore-leg 
 over as it lay vipon the ground. From the first we worked very 
 systematically, cutting oft' the flesh in huge chunks and tumbling it 
 down the hill out of the way. The A-iscera soon swelled to an enor- 
 mous size, and when we cut open the abdomen they bui-st out in a 
 huge, uuANieldy mass, that cost us three hours' hai-d tugging and 
 lifting to detach and move out of the way. 
 
 When night came we lighted our lantern, built a lai-ge fire near 
 the carcass, and while one man held the Luitern and piled di-y wood 
 upon the fire to keep it blazing brightly, the rest of us toiled op 
 till midnight, like so many bloody vampii'es. At last we were quite 
 
SKELETONIZING AN ELEPHANT. 165 
 
 tired out, and having made an excellent beginning, we left off work, 
 went down to the little creek and bathed, after which I again served 
 out arrack all around to the men and finished a quart of Bass' ale on 
 my own account. With our tracking, marching to and fro, and work 
 on the elephant, we had had a hard day of it ; but the Mulcers had 
 grown quite plump and vigorous on a two months' diet of game, I 
 had been free from fever for nearly two weeks, and little cared we 
 for any amount of hard work which did not quite kill us. 
 
 At sunrise the next morning we were again at our task, and after 
 cutting the flesh from the entire upper side of the body, cutting 
 off the head and as much as possible of the lower legs, we procured 
 levers and, by dint of great exertion and no small amount of en- 
 gineering, turned the carcass over. After the greater portion of 
 the flesh had been removed, we cut out the sternum in one piece, 
 cut out the ribs one by one, divided the massive spinal column into 
 four sections, and cut each leg in two at ankle and knee. Then all 
 the parts of the skeleton were cleaned neatly and carefully, one by 
 one. The skin of each foot I saved to mount as a footstool, and 
 the tail also was kept as a trophy. 
 
 By 4 P.M., after about sixteen hours' hard work, my five Mulcers 
 and I had cut out all the bones of the skeleton, cleaned them neatly, 
 painted them over with strong arsenical soap and tied them up 
 into bundles suitable for carrying. Being anxious to leave that 
 neighborhood as soon as possible, we carried all the bones about 
 three hundred yards and hid them away amongst some large rocks, 
 after which we spent an hour in making that spot look hke a dense 
 thicket. "We cut green boughs and stuck them up in the heap of 
 bones, and in the clefts of the rocks all around it, making young 
 trees grow up and green branches droop over with a naturalness 
 that was quite artistic. A stranger might have passed within twenty 
 yards of the cache without even suspecting its presence. 
 
 But at the scene of action there was about an acre of meat, 
 pieces of skin, blood, brains, and viscera which showed unmistak- 
 ably that some great animal had been wrecked. That we could not 
 hide, and one of my men, the peon who administered the oath to 
 the Mulcers, proposed that we get several pairs of bison horns and 
 throw them down there, along with a few bones, to mislead any of 
 the Cochin people who might happen to pass that way. It was a 
 good suggestion, but I thought we could risk the matter as it was. 
 Then we " folded our tent like the Arabs and as silently stole away," 
 first obliterating all traces of our camp, and marched boldly down 
 
166 TAVO YEARS IN THE JUNGLE. 
 
 to Toonacadavoo — but we persistently refused to be interviewed on 
 the subject of wild elephants. 
 
 The next day I Sf ut the men back with a week's provisions, by the 
 end of which time they had carried off all the bones without being 
 seen by any one, and deposited them in a safe place in the Kulun- 
 gud forest. I may add in this connection that they were faithful 
 to their oath, at least to a great extent, and I doubt if the people 
 of Cochin have even yet heard of that affair. I suppose I did not 
 do altogether right about that elephant, and many severe morahsts 
 will condemn me. When they do, I shall reply with the well-worn 
 formula, " It was all in the interest of Science." Yeiily, science, like 
 charity, covers a multitude of sins. I hate a scientific thief as much 
 as any one — and the world is full of them — but if any one can 
 steal aught from me, that was not mine yesterday, and may not be 
 mine to-morrow, and which I shall never miss nor ask for, he is 
 welcome to it. 
 
 " He that's robbed, not wanting what is stolen, 
 Tell him not of it, and he is not robbed at alL" 
 
 I am positive the Eajah of Cochin never missed that tusker from 
 the vast herds which roam through his territories, and, considering 
 the purpose and the circimistanees, I think I was justified in tak- 
 ing it. * 
 
 Dm*ing the month of September I spent a good share of my 
 time in hunting smaller kinds of game, deer of all kinds in par- 
 ticular. Being still desii'ous of taking another elephant for its 
 skin, I left my old camp at Tellicul, moved farther up the Teckadee 
 Eiver and camped in a fine open spot called Moochpardi. The 
 hunting ground about this place was, excepting for elephants, all 
 that we could ask, and we endeavored to make the most of it. 
 
 The commonest animal in the Animallais, after the black monkey, 
 is the axis deer {Cervus axis), or "spotted deer" of sportsmen. 
 It was an undei-stood thing between my men and me, that we could 
 go out any day and bring in one of these beautiful animals, and we 
 counted it exceedingly hai-d luck if we ever went out for deer and 
 were obliged to return without one. Had we been so disposed, we 
 could have slaughtered a great many of them, for they were very 
 numerous, but we never shot even one which we did not positively 
 need, either for skin, skeleton, or venison. From first to last we 
 killed about twenty,. a very moderate score, considering the num- 
 ber of tempting opporiimities we had. I hate to see game 
 
SKELETONIZINd AN ELEPHANT. 167 
 
 slaughtered to no j)urpose, and I hate all such game-butchers as 
 those of our Western Territories who have already nearly extermi- 
 nated the American bison. 
 
 All around Moochpardi are numerous grassy glades in the 
 forest, usually of three to five acres in extent, where the ground is 
 low and moist, and the grass is sweetest and tenderest. In these 
 beautiful little pastures, hedged around by the tall, dark bamboo 
 forest, the spotted deer love to feed in the early morning, before 
 the sun gets too hot, "and in the late afternoon when the shadows 
 lengthen. We always found them in those places between four 
 and five o'clock in the afternoon, although, to be sure, we used to 
 happen upon them in all kinds of forest, and at all hours of the 
 day. After a few hours' hard work on specimens and a quiet mid- 
 day snooze in my hut, I would get on my hunting gear, call up Vera, 
 and tell him that we would "go out now." Ten minutes later we 
 would be on the look-out for game. We would go to one glade 
 after another, always coming up to them against the wind, until at 
 last we reached the right one, and our eyes would be gladdened by 
 the sight of a dozen spotted beauties, grazing quietly, or lying at 
 rest upon the gi-een sward. 
 
 One particularly beautiful scene of this kind is stamped upon 
 my memory with photographic accuracy. There was a small glade 
 about the size of a city square, quite surrounded by dense bamboo 
 forest, which was a favorite feeding ground for spotted deer. 
 Stealing up to this through the dark jungle, late one bright after- 
 noon, we espied in the centre of the open space a number of 
 spotted forms which were a feast for the eyes of any lover of 
 nature. Creeping up quite close to the edge of the opening, we 
 crouched behind a thick clump of bamboos and gazed in silent ad- 
 miration upon the lovely picture before us. 
 
 Grouped together in a most charming fashion, were about sixty 
 deer of all ages and sizes, from a tiny fawn up to a splendid stag 
 with horns measuring — but I must not anticipate. How lithe, 
 graceful, and beautifully clean they all looked ! The slanting rays 
 of the sun shone full against their beautifully spotted sides, bring- 
 ing out the white spots in striking contrast against the bright fawn- 
 colored ground. Some were leisurely cropping the short grass, 
 giving an occasional glance into the dark and treacherous forest, and 
 others lay about at their ease, blinking lazily, and patiently grinding 
 away at their cuds, now and then drawing a long breath of content- 
 ment. Surely, the axis deer is the most beautiful of all its tribe. 
 
368 TWO YE*AES IN THE JUNGLE. 
 
 It seemed a pity to spoil such a pretty picture by shedding blood ; 
 but after all, death from bullet, knife, or spear is the most fitting end 
 for any wild animal. Why should I not slay that noble stag in a 
 moment's time and preserve it to be admired by thousands of other 
 men, rather than leave it to be pulled down and torn to bits by a 
 tiger ? Without further argimieut, I sent a Maynard bullet through 
 his shoulders, and he was mine. The next moment the herd dashed 
 away at a gi'eat pace, but I managed to get in another shot, which 
 brought down a fine doe. 
 
 The dimensions and weight of both specimens are given in the 
 table of measurements, and may be taken as the average size at- 
 tained by this species. This deer is difficult to approach within 
 fair shooting distance, but a careful hunter can, in nearly every 
 case, stalk a herd successfully in such forest as that upon the 
 Animallais. At the same time they are exceedingly wary, and in 
 brushy gi'ound would be very difficiilt to kiU. A stick breaking 
 under the hunter's foot is quite sufficient to send the herd off 
 flying, and their sight is usually quite as keen as theu' sense of 
 sotmd. I have noticed that the buck never leads a herd, as many 
 suppose, but lags along toward the rear, while an old doe leads the 
 van. The flesh is always good eating, and that of young indi- 
 viduals is very fine indeed, fine-grained and sweet, but, like most 
 venison, a little dry. The tongue is of course a choice tit-bit. 
 
 The axis is not easily frightened by evidences of civilization, 
 and at times they are guilty of the most barefaced impudence. 
 Once at Moochpardi, a solitary stag came up close to our camp, 
 but on the other side of the river, in broad dayUght, and uttered 
 his loud, clear note of defiance. He repeated it so often and so de- 
 fiantly that I finally went out with my rifle, waded the river, 
 stalked my challenger successfully, and — made a clean miss. But 
 that was not the only time we heard spotted deer calling near our 
 camp. 
 
 The sambur, or Indian elk (Eusa aristotelis), is abundant in the 
 Animallais, although not seen so frequently as the axis deer, nor in 
 anything like such numbers. Usually they are formd solitary, often 
 two or three are found together, and once I saw seven in one herd. 
 The sambur is the largest animal of the deer tribe in the East In- 
 dies, and is in many respects the oriental counterpart of our Ameri- 
 can elk, or wapiti [Cervus canadensis), although the former is not 
 nearly so large and noble looking an animal as its American con- 
 gener. The sambur stands about four feet six to ten inches in 
 
 1 
 
SKELETONIZING AN ELEPHANT. 169 
 
 vertical height at the shoulder, the length of head and body is from 
 six to seven feet, and the tail twelve inches. Its body color varies 
 from dark brown to slaty gray, according to the season and local- 
 ity, the under parts are pale pinkish yellow, and upon the oldest 
 stags the hair is long upon the throat and neck, forming a bristly 
 mane. 
 
 The horns have but three points, a stout, thick brow-antler 
 springing forward directly from the base or burr of the horn, and 
 the beam is bifurcated near its extremity, sometimes the inner and 
 sometimes the outer tine being the longer. The horns of adult 
 stags average thirty-six inches in length, although they often far 
 exceed that size. Mr. Dawson, of Ootacamund, showed me a splen- 
 did pair which measured forty-four inches from base to tip. 
 
 I cannot call the sambur a handsome animal by any means. 
 Certainly a stag without its horns is the homeliest deer I ever saw, 
 and as one rushed heavily away from me in the forest it always re- 
 minded me of a mulley cow. The body is heavy, the hair thin and 
 coarse, and, to judge from the amount of noise made by a running 
 sambur, it struck me as being a heavy-going and rather clumsy 
 animal. 
 
 When lying down or standing motionless against a bamboo 
 clump, a sambur is very difficult to see, at least for my eyes. I 
 once afforded my men a ludicrous and aggravating illustration of 
 this fact. I found that the eyes of my Mulcers differed from mine 
 in their being able to pierce through underbrush and make out an 
 object which I could scai'cely see at all, even when pointed out. On 
 the other hand, I could detect a moving object, even were the mo- 
 tion ever so slight, just as quickly as any of them, and a little quicker 
 than even Vera, as was several times fairly proven. 
 
 One day we were hunting through the bamboo forest for what- 
 ever game we could find, when Vera stopped, uttered his low game 
 signal, " tut-tut-tut," and pointed into a low thicket fifty yards away. 
 He said it was a sambur. I looked intently, made up my mind I 
 saw it, and blazed away. The object I fired at did not move. Vera 
 said, " It is there yet, sahib ! " and I fired again at what I thought 
 was it. The same result as before. The sambur did not run. T 
 fired two more shots at an imaginary deer, and the men began to 
 laugh at me. I was disgusted with myself, and exclaimed, "Blast 
 my eyes ! " with far more fervency than any sailor. 
 
 Presently a twig moved, I saw the sambur and my fifth bullet 
 struck it, but not quite fatally. It rushed out of the thicket, ran a 
 
170 TWO YEAES IN THE JUNGLE. 
 
 tne I 
 
 short distance and stopped behind some bamboos. Vera took me 
 np quite close to it and tried to make me see it. I looked and 
 looked, and he pointed and pointed, saying, "There, sahib ! there !" 
 but I couldn't make it out. The men all gi'inned from ear to ear, 
 and I blasted my eyes more heartily than ever. Finally I sighted 
 a brown object in a thicket fifty yards away, and fired at it through 
 the clump of bamboos near which we were standing. Imagine my 
 i'eehngs when the sambur sprang up from the ground on the other 
 side of the bamboo clump, almost under the muzzle of my rifle, or at 
 least only twenty-five yards away ! He had. been lying doion, and 
 I fired directly over him. As he ran off slowly, I hit him again and 
 brought him down, but this did not atone for my former stupidity. 
 
 It was a bad case of protective coloring, which I had noticed 
 many times before. The summer coat of the sambur is precisely 
 of the same dull gray color as the branching, scraggy base of a 
 bamboo clump. 
 
 Sambur hunting in the Animallais is a mere question of patient 
 tracking and straight shooting. The game is easy to stalk and easy 
 to shoot. All ai'ound Tellikul, sambiu* were very plentiful, and 
 many a time during the night some daring old buck would come 
 up ^^^thin fifty or a hundred paces of our camp, and blow one blast 
 after another on his dinner-horn. I know of no sound which the 
 so-called " bai-k " of th.is animal so nearly resembles, as a short, 
 strong blast on a deep-toned tin horn. "What sounds can be more 
 pleasant to a hunter's ears than such a midnight serenade in the 
 heart of a grand old forest ! 
 
 There was one serenader, however, who often annoyed me by 
 his outlandish song. It was the hawk-cuckoo {Hierococcyx varius, 
 Yahl.), also called the "brain-fever bird," partly because its cry 
 sounds hke " brain-^erer," and also because of its fancied tendency 
 to produce that painful malady. This bird would perch quite close 
 to my hut, and begin with a low whisthng cry of "hew-ee," but 
 ■with each repetition it was given louder until it reached the high- 
 est pitch of the bird's lungs, about like this : 
 
 " hew^ ! Tiew-^ I bev^-UE f HEW-EE ! HEW-EE ! " 
 
 About every five minutes, or less, it would begin at the bottom of 
 the gamut and keep getting louder and louder, until at the last it 
 would end in a shrill shriek, like a steam-whistle, and the exhausted 
 bii'd would stop to rest. This serenade was a gi-eat annoyance tn 
 
SKELETONIZING AN ELEPHANT. 171 
 
 me sometimes, especially when I was feverish and incUned to be 
 wakeful. 
 
 While I lived at Tellikul, two tree-rats {Miis rvfescens) used to 
 come into my hut from the jungle, nearly every night, and gallop 
 over the floor and climb all about the place, ratthng papers con- 
 tinually and rummaging around, until I would get so nervous and 
 irritated that for hours I could not sleep. I tried every plan I 
 could think of to kill those two rats, but somehow my schemes all 
 failed. I tried to poison them, smash them in a deadfall, shoot 
 them, blow them up with gunpowder, and even to spear them ; but 
 something happened every time so that they escaped. At last, to 
 my great relief, their nightly visits ceased. 
 
 When I first came up to the Hills, Mr. Theobald was living in the 
 Deputy Conservator's bungalow, which had a very thick roof made 
 of layers of cocoanut leaves. This thatch literally swarmed with 
 tree-rats, and one or two other species, and at night, after we had 
 retired, they would come down to the floor by dozens, and go gallop- 
 ing and rummaging all about, fighting and squealing until daylight. 
 Several times rats ran over me as I lay in my cot, and once one 
 jumped from a beam and alighted upon my forehead as I lay 
 asleep. At last they annoyed me so much that I had to keep my 
 light burning all night, which kept them away to some extent. 
 Mr. Theobald had got accustomed to them, as I should in time, and 
 it was well he had, for so long as that thatch roof remained upon 
 the house it would be swarming with rats. We tried to poison 
 them, but they were too smart for us. We caught a great many 
 in different kinds of traps, however. 
 
 One of the most interesting of all the small deer is the muntjac 
 (Cervulus aureua), which we frequently met in hunting on the Ani- 
 mallais and studied with unusual interest. This curious little ani- 
 mal is found in nearly all the thick forests and jungles of India, 
 from an elevation of nine thousand feet in the Himalayas * to Cey- 
 lon, and also throughout the Malay peninsula, Borneo, Sumatra, 
 and Java. The muntjac is really the connecting link between the 
 Cervidce and Moschidce, or musk deer, having the antlers of the 
 former and long upper canines of the latter. 
 
 Jerdon f gives the height of the muntjac as 26 to 28 inches, 
 but out of ten adult specimens which I shot in various parts of the 
 East Indies, the largest was only 22 inches in vertical height, with 
 
 * Jerdon, t Mammals of India. 
 
172 TWO YEAES IN THE JUNGLE. 
 
 length of head and body 35^ inches. The body color of the ani- 
 mal is a clear, bright reddish bay. The antlers, which are 4 to 5 
 inches long, are set up on two round pedestals of bone 2 J inches 
 high, covered with skin and densely hairy. There are two long, 
 black ridges of skin and two corresponding furrows extending 
 down the face, which, together with its curious antlers, give the lit- 
 tle animal a very strange appearance. The legs are short, the hind- 
 quarters round and heavy, and it can neither run fast nor far. The 
 head is always carried low, which enables the defenceless little 
 creature to creep through tangled jungle faster than its enemies 
 can foUow. It has a very peculiar cry, which is really a bark, like 
 the yapping of a small dog. The first time I heard it in the jungle 
 I thought, until told otherwise, it was a dog barking. Twice by its 
 cry alone I have found and shot this "barking deer." Each pecu- 
 liarity of this strange little animal has caused it to receive a sep- 
 arate name, so that, besides muntjac, it is called *' rib-faced deer," 
 "barking deer," "red hog deer," and worst of all, "jungle sheep," 
 from the manner in which it carries its head and neck. The flesh 
 of the muntjac is the finest venison I ever tasted, and in fact, aside 
 from birds, I know no wild meat equal to it. Could it be placed 
 upon the table of an epicure, I am sure it would be counted a great 
 delicacy. The meat is very fine-grained, tender, but seldom fat, 
 and possesses an exquisite game flavor quite peculiar to itself, 
 which is indescribable. The most delicious soup I ever tasted was 
 made from the flesh of a muntjac. 
 
 The NeUgherry goat, or " ibex " of sportsmen {Hemitragus hylo- 
 crius), inhabits various precipitous places in the AnimaUais, and is 
 now quite abundant. A sportsman on the Neilgherries does well if 
 he kills one or two in a week, but here I was told of two gentlemen 
 killing six in one day. Once we went after goats to a rocky cliff near 
 Sungam, the elephant camp, six miles from Toonacadavoo, and 
 after a long, laborious climb to the summit, we found one lying 
 on a narrow ledge of rock, half-way down the side of the precipice, 
 and far out of range. We took a good look at him through 
 the glass, and watched him until he finally got up and sauntered 
 out of sight, but we never saw him again. How he ever got down 
 to that narrow ledge on the face of a smooth, perpendicular wall 
 of rock, was more than I could see ; nor could I divine why he 
 chose to go in the most dangerous place he could find, unless to 
 escape his enemies. The only specimen of this wild goat I secured 
 was shot for me by Ai'ndee and brought in quite fresh. With so 
 
SKELETONIZING AN ELEPHANT. 173 
 
 mauj' otlier iuterestiug animals aroiiud me, I was not ambitious to 
 wear my body out, and perhaps break my neck, in trying to get one 
 or two more goats. 
 
 In the coui'se of oui- hunting large game, we occasionally f eU in 
 frith droves of wild hog, or "pig" {Sus Indicus), but somehow I 
 succeeded in killing only two good specimens. We always started 
 them in brushy forest, where the bushes were so thick it was almost 
 impossible to hit a hog running through them. One day, while 
 <ve were in camp at Moochpai'di, we went out in the afternoon, 
 md in less than an hour brought down a fine doe axis deer and a 
 buck muntjac, which we told Nangen and Corlee to caiiy home. 
 In retui-ning, Yera and I were alone, walking along a path which 
 led along the edge of a long, open glade with thick, dai'k jungle 
 on one side. All at at once Vera stopped, knit his brows, focused 
 his keen eyes upon some object among the thick bushes, and the 
 next moment pointed at a large boar standing motionless as a rock 
 behind a tree, with only his head and eai's \'isible. The old fellow 
 thought he was fully screened, but the next instant a rifle bullet 
 went through his ear and into his brain, and we had another fine 
 specimen to add to the day's account. He weighed two hvmdi*ed 
 and thirty pounds, but Vera and Channa slung him under a pole 
 and trotted home with him in fine style. 
 
CHAPTEE XYI. 
 
 THE SECOND YEAR OF THE MADRAS FAMINE. 
 
 Sickness in the Jungle. — Temporary Absence from the Hills. — A Starving 
 Waif.— The Spectre of Famine. — Famine-stricken Natives. — Cause and 
 Effects of the Famine. — The Relief Camp at Animallai. — A Review of the 
 Hungry. — The Government and the Famine.— " Money Doles." — Mortal- 
 ity. — " Be ye Warmed and Fed ! " — End of the Drought. 
 
 Toward the end of September, my supplies of all kinds were quite 
 exhausted, and having a huge pile of skins, rough skeletons and 
 skulls to care for, I determined to go down from the hills for a 
 few weeks, pack up my collection for safe-keeping, and see if a 
 change of air, water, and diet would not benefit my health. I would 
 have quitted the hills then for good, had I not felt in duty bound 
 to bring away the skin of a really large elephant. 
 
 During my three months on the Animallais, I had nine sepa- 
 rate attacks of fever, and all the time there were from five to ten raw 
 ulcers on each of my ankles, which I had to dress daily with court- 
 plaster and cotton before I could wear my hunting shoes. Many 
 times I had to stuff cotton in my shoes all around my ankles, so that 
 I could make out to walk without severe pain. Those ulcers re- 
 mained unhealed as long as I stayed in Southern India, and did not 
 get well until I had been some time in Ceylon. 
 
 At this time Professor Ward kept writing to me, " Take great care 
 of your health, and run no risk of losing life or limb. If you are 
 attacked by fever, leave that countiy at once." But I was not go- 
 ing to be beaten by a little fever. What I constantly dreaded was 
 dysentery, for an attack of that wovdd perhaps have forced me to 
 abandon, my enterprise. I was told it is almost impossible for a 
 European to recover from a severe attack of it without taking a 
 long sea-voyage, or going to England. 
 
 Early in July, Mr. Theobald, who was thoroughly fever-proof, was 
 attacked by it, and in a week he was reduced to a gaunt, colorless, 
 hollow-eyed ghost of his former self. I feared he would never re- 
 
THE SECOND YEAR OF THE MADRAS FAMINE. 175 
 
 cover from it without going to England ; but he did. To my sur- 
 prise and admiration he cured himself, with a little advice from an- 
 other doctor, and that, too, while the Deputy Conservator, who had 
 occupied the Animallai post with him, was on his way to England 
 to get rid of the same disease. 
 
 Ml'. Theobald used to doctor the natives very successfully, curing 
 their fevers and other ailments, one after another. I never saw a 
 man more universally liked by all the natives who knew him than 
 was he. He was particularly kind and charitable to the Mulcers 
 and Karders, poor wretches to whom a powerful friend in the Gov- 
 ernment service was a perfect godsend. He treated them like so 
 many children, and they in return would have done and endiired 
 anything to serve him. 
 
 When the time came for me to leave the hills, I sent for about 
 thirty coolies from Animallai, to carry my collection down to the 
 foot of the ghaut, where some bandies were waiting to take it the 
 remaining ten miles, to Animallai. Theobald gave me his horse to 
 ride, but at the top of the pass I dismounted and gave him in 
 charge of the syce, while I started to make the descent on foot. 
 The weather was simply perfect, and a more glorious afternoon I 
 never saw. From the winding road which leads down the steep 
 mountain side, one catches occasional views of the plain, which 
 stretches out from the base of the mountain, mile after mile, a vast 
 sea of bare, brown earth dotted with green fields, clumps of trees, 
 and red-tiled villages as far as the eye can reach, until in the dis- 
 tance all are blended together. From my cool eyrie, I could easily 
 trace the course of the Animallai Eiver by the fringe of green trees 
 along its banks, and before me, at the end of a long stretch of 
 straight road, lay the village of Animallai. An hour later I was 
 trudging along that dusty highway, with the sun beating down upon 
 me and the perspiration pouring off my face Hke rain. 
 
 Two miles from Animallai there is another village, and as I ap» 
 proached it, my attention was arrested by a little child about four 
 years old, entirely naked, of course, hobbling slowly about in the 
 sandy bed of a dried-up pond. Its feet and legs were swollen with 
 " famine dropsy," as if they had elephantiasis, the ankles being as 
 large as the thighs, and the miserable little thing could step only a 
 few inches at a time. Its sunken cheeks, hollow eyes, and protrud- 
 ing ribs told of starvation, and it was plain to be seen the helpless 
 waif would soon die, unless cared for. I told my boy to take up 
 the child and carry it to the village, or else find some one else to 
 
iTl' TWO \)"VK^ IN nil" UN;; 11', 
 
 >K> it. Wo iloi'lmoil to toiu'h it, i\x\d it was somo tiiuo bofoiv wt» 
 t\nuul ii vOv^io who was wilUuj;- to tnko tho wivtohod littlo wait' in 
 his arms and omry it along, tnou miJor piomiso of liborul pay for 
 lus servioos. 
 
 As wo stoovl ill tho vo.-iaI tnii\;;' to oiirvv out o\iv intontioiis, jh\>- 
 plo $JtopjH\l out of oiirios^ity. tvuil pivssoiitly thovo o;mio towuvvl iv^ 
 i'i\>iu u oUimp of Inishov^, ;i luau in tho last stn.^jo of starvation. Ho 
 \\*as Witiivly uiuU\ o\i-opt n dirty mg nronnJ h\s louis. :vi\d boiug 
 iiatunvlly tall, his ;^-^un\t nppoa.ni.noo was all tho luoro striking*. Ho 
 wa*^ indtHHl !i livin:^' skoloton. litonilly skin and bono. Uo w:is noarly 
 six ftH^t high, but I oonld havo pi^-kod him np in my arms and oar- 
 ritnl him liko a ohild. Kvory largo Knio in his body w;is sharply 
 outlinod tluvugh his dai*k, unhoaltlvy looking skin, and hisstomaoh 
 was shrnnkon in as thv>iigh ho had boon disomlHnvollovl. This ghastly 
 apivmtiou. with a stiok in ouo hand and ;ui old oarthou ohattio in 
 the otlier. slowl^v hobWod xip vvii trviulvlittg Hiul>5j. and stood bofoiv 
 mo, with AVanv writton on ovory foatuiv. As SvHmi as it oamo oloso 
 up to mo 1 Svay iL Ivoauso it stHMUtnl moiv liko tho g-ivunt sjHVtro 
 <vf l^uuiitt' than a liviu^- mau — it slowly >Yont down upon its kmvs, 
 thou ujxnx its hands, tWlxly jvud pivinfully, and fiutUly pivssovl its 
 foivhoad to tho dust at my fo*^t niivl lay thoiv giwolling. Its only 
 wvHxl or oxolatuation was '" 8aw-uuH^oo I " ivpoatod with a dosjviii^ 
 ing- mvvvi\ on tho last svllkblo. 
 
 It moaiit tlio Sivme as " Ob. lord ! ^' in ovir languago. and w:ts 
 addiYss..' .\^ • ^.' v. •• s.-. :.'.ly. as to svn idol ! Tho wivtoluxl mau had 
 Ihvu b. . :, > > . ...; ho cvuld t\n-s.ako his idols and ory to a 
 whito mau t> s .. .\^r. I novov . >-^ :.. riy moau ami holpless. 
 
 Tho abvwo is ^ f'." 'v p. > . oNoixirawn f«.>r tho sjiko of 
 eiRx">t» bvit only o . . ;. : \ s , .d suoh ox^nniouot^ o^vurriug 
 
 daily dvu'in;: •: \ s. : -,. ';il tiiuos- It was tho stwud vc • .^' '.' ;^ 
 famiuo, and ..-.■,.r,v\i> n^oiv dying ovory day of starvatior. r.\i :■•.■.■.- 
 m© dis«^vitst>:s. Every time I stv>pped at the bungalow in Animallai. 
 mov NN.-.uy, :.v.l .'■,'..'•,. V . . thvking to the down's with that 
 dis / \ : S .^^ .\ .\ . u rising in perfect ohorus. They 
 wt . . > y old mou. anvi w\>mon with ohildrvn. s».^motimos babes 
 wlivvli uou- v.ot'\i",;r b'.'.T b.ttlo bl'vA skolotons. The old men wv>uld 
 pat their ho ^^ s .. s n \: . . n\ .ko hanvh aiul extend the 
 other, and :V. n^.- -uu wouUi ^\ni-t '-^ ■ . v . v "d 
 
 hold up tho'.v l\^-.'.N :u"ms. At di-st 1 l\ .;..•.• -..^ /,, y i • "?" 
 
 pers. and !$ometimes<riee. but I soon fovmvi it w\nild not do They 
 csune to me iu such ecoitiQually iv.vv. .-.sv/:: ^ r. w.'.s that I was quite 
 
THE SKOONl) VKAIJ OF TUK lyfADKAS FAMINK. 177 
 
 ovorwholinoil, aiul conipellocl in solf-dol'cnco to rofixao them entirely. 
 Had I oboyod the ilii'tatos of my t'cHiliiigs, I would, in a week's tinu\ 
 have been wholly b!inkrni)fi. About ilint time, however, ellicitnil, 
 measures for ihe relief of the famine-stricken people were adopted 
 by the Government. 
 
 The child we found wandering, and the starving man who ap- 
 peared at the same lime, we took with us to Animallai, where there 
 was a relief camp. AVe were iold that the parents of the former 
 were both dead, and there was absolutely no one left to care whether 
 it lived or died. A coolie carried the child along with me, and the 
 man, being unable to walk, was left to get into one of my bandies 
 when they came along. On reac^liing the relief camp I gave the 
 (^hild into the charge of the doctor, Avho placed it in a liospital ahed 
 and promised that it should have every attention. 
 
 A wide-spread famine of a year's d^iration, in a country as thickly 
 populated as India, means the death of thousands in spite of all help. 
 But when it extends over two years, as did that of Madras in 187(5- 
 77, it means the death of millions. In April, 187(), the southwest 
 monsoon failed to bring rain, and none fell luitil late in the follow- 
 ing year. The ground became literally baked, and refused to yield 
 either grass or grain, the wells and tanks dried up, the people con- 
 sumed all the grain remaining from the previous crop — very little 
 at most — and soon became wholly dependent iipon the grain im- 
 ported from Calcutta, Burmah, and Ceylon, and landed at Madras. 
 The ever-poor agricultural laborers, and ecpially poor ryots, who are 
 all the slaves of the money-lenders, and the small shop-keepers of 
 every description, were the ones who soonest ate up all they 
 owned and sold everything they could spare for food. In the 
 Madras Presidency and Mysore there are thirty-five million people, 
 of whom about twenty millions were directly under the famine 
 scourge. Think of it. Not a few thousand people in the State of 
 Kansas, or Wisconsin, or the burned districts of Michigan, but 
 more than one-third as many people as there are in the ivhole 
 United Stafci^, to be fed upon imported food for nearly two years, 
 and that, too, at famine prices. 
 
 In a comparatively short time, thousands were wholly dependent 
 upon charity, and each succeeding month the number was increased 
 by thousands more. Private charity exhausted itself, and had not 
 the Government taken measures to save life regardless of cost, 
 it would now be easier to count the living than the dead. The 
 treasury of India was opened to supply the starving people with 
 12 
 
178 TAVO YEARS IN THE JUNGLE. 
 
 food, physicians, and medicines. Relief camps were organized in 
 stricken districts, to which the low-caste people flocked in thousands 
 for food and medical treatment ; while thousands more, of higher 
 caste, stayed away and Hved upon the " money-doles " which were 
 distributed faithfully and judiciouslj' by the missionaries. 
 
 I very frequently visited the relief camp at Animallai, and studied 
 its internal economy with much interest. As it was a type of many 
 such, I will try to describe it as I saw it for the first time. On a 
 stretch of open ground near the river stood a rectangTilar enclosure, 
 about four hundred feet long and two hundred wide, divided in the 
 middle by a waU, so that the whole formed two hollow squares. 
 Rough pole sheds with roofs of thatch extended all along the sides 
 of the enclosure, and afforded dry sleeping rooms for the people. 
 In one corner of the yard was the kitchen, in which was a long row 
 of huge, earthen cooking-pots, and next to it was the doctor's office. 
 Outside the camp was another shed which served as a hospital. 
 
 I passed into the camp in the evening, just at meal-time. One 
 yard was empty, but the other was filled with men, women, and 
 children, squatting upon the ground in three divisions, each sub- 
 divided into ranks of ten or twenty. There were about three hun- 
 dred people present waiting to be fed. At a gate near the upper end 
 of the wall dividing the two yards, stood the huge earthen pots ; one 
 containing pepper-water, the other a kind of soup made of gi'am, 
 and some baskets full of boiled rice pressed into balls. Those for 
 the children were about the size of large pop-corn balls, those for 
 the men and women were three times as large, and weighed two 
 and a half pounds each. In each of the pots was a ladle made of a 
 cocoanut, shell with a piece of bamboo for a handle. 
 
 The food was steaming hot, and the people were not only ready 
 but anxious for it. When the word was given, the children rose, 
 approached the gate in single file, and I took my stand beside 
 the jar of pepper-water and prepared to serve it out. The children, 
 most of whom were absolutely naked, came up closely one after an- 
 other, each carrying a receptacle for his portion of food. Some had 
 earthen chatties, some had joints of bamboo or old tin cans, and 
 others had only shallow pieces of broken crockery or leaky tin. 
 Each received a ladle full of soup, another of pepper- water and a 
 ball of rice, and they all filed through into the other yard. The 
 children, as a rule, looked quite well cared for, and some were quite 
 plump. 
 
 Next came the men, and with them we had our hands fulL 
 
THE SECOND YEAR OF THE MADKAS FAMHSTE. 179 
 
 They crowded up to the gate like wild beasts, and several times the 
 attendants had to seize them by the hair of their heads and hold 
 them back, to save the pots from being overthrown. Some begged 
 for a double allowance until they were hustled off ; some came up 
 with a bewildered, dreamy air, and would have gone away without 
 any food had we permitted them. Such a review of beggars, such 
 a procession of hollow stomach, protruding ribs, and fleshless arms 
 and thighs I never saw before. Many were very old, wi'inkled, and 
 skinny, bent almost double and barely able to hobble along ; some 
 had famine dropsy ; some were deformed, several limped, many 
 were blind of one eye, but all were desperately hungry. 
 
 At last the review of the hungry was over, and in the adjoining 
 enclosure we presently found them all sitting quietly on their hams 
 devouring their food. Twice a day was that same scene enacted, 
 each time decently and in order, and in that camp and village but 
 few people died. But this was only a very small camp in compari- 
 son with many others. All were closely inspected, and frequently 
 by the specially appointed Famine officers. The Government quick- 
 ly responded to calls for more grain, or for medicine, surgical instru- 
 ments, blankets or additional assistance. 
 
 The Vice-regal Government (at Calcutta) did not fully awake 
 to the urgency of the situation in Madras until what seemed to 
 me about the eleventh hour. Then the methods of the Madras 
 Government were found fault with, a large amount of executive 
 talent was exported from the Northern Presidencies for the benefit 
 of Madras, and friction was the result. Toward the close of the 
 famine, a host of civil officers were sent from Bengal at great ex- 
 pense, many coming even from Assam, to do duty in the famine 
 districts. I knew one enterprising officer who travelled by rail 
 from Calcutta to Bombay and thence down to Madras, instead of 
 coming direct by steamer, in order to make a snug little surplus 
 of about four hundred rupees on his mileage allowance. 
 
 The difficulty of dealing with a famine in India cannot be fully 
 understood, save by those who are familiar with the character of the 
 people. Natives of high caste would rather die of starvation than 
 go to the relief camps and receive food with the common people. 
 A Brahmin would rather die by inches than partake of food pre- 
 pared by the hands of the fairest missionary lady in all India. I 
 knew of one case of this kind. A Brahmin lay dying of starvation 
 by the roadside in Bangalore, when a kind-hearted lady living near, 
 passed by and saw him. She had some conjee (rice-soup), pre< 
 
ISO TWO YEAT.S IN THE JUNGLE. 
 
 pared immediately and taken to him, but the dying bigot refused 
 to touch it and expired the next hour. 
 
 Instead of allowing all those to starve, who, on account of caste 
 prejudices refused to come to the relief camp for food, the ever- 
 patient, long-suffering government officials caused money to be dis- 
 tributed among them, in sums sufficient to purchase daily food. To 
 the missionaries fell the important and ai'duous work of ascertain- 
 ing which were the deserving ones, and distributing the funds 
 among them. At the Animallai bungalow I had the pleasure of 
 meeting the Rev. Mr. Hutchison and lady, English missionaries 
 from Coimbatore, who had for months been engaged in going from 
 village to village with their native Christian helpers, and distrib- 
 uting the "money doles" among those whom they found to be de- 
 serving of help. If I remember rightly, he distributed about four 
 hundred rupees every day while he was in Animallai. How I envied 
 him the satisfaction he undoubtedly felt in handing out hard cash 
 to those hungi-y wretches. 
 
 It would be impossible to say too much in praise of the energy 
 and activity displayed by the Madras Government in fighting for 
 the lives of the millions under its charge. I do not see how a 
 government could have done more. Month after month a perfect 
 torrent of grain was poui-ed into Madras from seawai'd, and for 
 months the entire resources of the Madras railway systems were 
 strained to the utmost to cai'ry it into the famine districts fast 
 enough to keep the people from dying by thousands. 
 
 But, in spite of all efforts to afford relief, the mortality during 
 the famine was very great. Many died fi-om sheer stai'vation, and 
 more still from diseases engendered by the long scarcity of food 
 and water. The official report places the number of deaths from 
 the famine in the Madras Presidency and Mysore, at 1,400,000, but 
 the most careful reckoning made by private individuals, who could 
 have no reason to mislead, shows that in reahty the number ol 
 deaths was over five million. It is highly probable that only a mod- 
 erate proportion of the deaths that really occurred were officially 
 recorded and reported. The total cost of the famine to the Govern- 
 ment was about thii-teen million poimds sterling. England contri-. 
 buted, by the donations of private individuals, £800,000 ($3,840,- 
 000). The churches of the United States have spent millions on 
 missionary work in India, but so far as I can ascei-tain, the Great 
 Republic contributed only $800 for the relief of the stai-ving peo- 
 ple in Madras. Verily, this is a case of "be ye wai-med and fed ; " 
 
THE SECOND YEAR OF THE MADRAS FAMINE. 181 
 
 for the souls of the perishing Hindoos were liberally cared for, 
 while their bodies were left to shift for themselves. At present 
 there is, in my opinion, nothing which needs so much care, in every 
 respect, as the body of the Hindoo native, and nothing which de- 
 serves so little attention as his soul. If he is only out of debt and 
 well fed he is happy, and no amount of Christianity can better 
 his moral condition in the least, for he simply will not be con- 
 verted (!) unless he can make money by it. 
 
 The Madras famine ended in the autumn of 1877 with the re- 
 turn of the monsoon rains, and when I quitted the Coimbatore Dis- 
 trict in December of that year, the relief camp was deserted, the 
 special famine officers were returning to Bengal, and the ryots were 
 reaping a reasonably good harvest. 
 
CHAPTER XYII. 
 
 THE POETRY OF FOREST LIFE.— BISON SHOOTING. 
 
 Return to the Hills. — Benighted in the Jungle. — Native Meanness. — Doray- 
 sawmy, the "Gentleman's God." — A Jewel of a Servant. — Prospects. — 
 Fever again. — Bass' Pale Ale. — Glorious Weather. — Fine Forest. — The 
 Poetry of Life in the Forest. — Our Mode of Hunting. — A Bison Hunt. — 
 Death of a Solitary Bull. — A Noble Animal. — Characters and Habits of 
 the Species. — Another Hunt. — Four Bison in Five Shots. — The Bison as an 
 Antagonist. — Mr. Morgan's Encounter with a Wounded Bull. — A Close 
 Shave. — A Typical English Sportsman and his Battery. — How to Preserve 
 a Bison -skin for Mounting. 
 
 Leaving my collection stored at Palghaut, I went by rail up to Co- 
 imbatore, laid in a full stock of provisions and preservatives, and on 
 the 25tli of October returned to Animallai village. Aniving there 
 I learned that Mr. Thec.bald's health was very bad, that he had been 
 granted leave to change posts, and was soon going to leave the 
 Animallais for Nelumboor. Being attacked by fever again myself, 
 I was detained at Animallai until he came down, bag and baggage, 
 and we had our farewell visit there. During this short delay, I 
 collected my old hunting-gang, gave the men an advance of money 
 and rice, and sent them to Moochpardi to erect a good large hut 
 for me. We were certain there would be plenty of elephants around 
 that camp by the time I should retvu-n to it. 
 
 TMien I made ready to return to my old hunting-grounds, Mr. 
 Theobald fairly loaded me with favors. He insisted upon lending 
 me a fine young milch cow and calf, which he could not well take 
 with him, his elephant gun, as before, and quite an array of camp 
 conveniences which I had before done without. On November 3d 
 we were ready, and loading our baggage upon six pack-bullocks, 
 six coolies, and a bandy, we started about noon, which was as early 
 as those wretched natives could be pulled together and shoved offi 
 We tried to start the day previous, but owing to an unusual deveL 
 opment of native cuasedness, failed utterly. 
 
 
THE POETRY OF FOREST LIFE. — BISON SHOOTING. 183 
 
 After ten miles of slow but terrible jolting behind the meanest 
 pair of bullocks I ever saw, we reached the foot of the Teckadee 
 ghaut, a terribly steep, rocky pass, and began the ascent. For three 
 hours my boy and I worried with those coolies and bullocks, carry- 
 ing one pack after another, until we finally reached the top of the 
 pass and started for Moochpardi. Eecent rains had made the road 
 very muddy, and the cooHes and bullock-drivers grumbled and 
 complained unceasingly. At sunset, five miles of muddy road 
 through thick forest, and a swollen river, lay between us and om* 
 camp. The man with the cow and calf, and the cooHes with my 
 outfit chest, I allowed to turn off at Teckadee for the night, but the 
 bullocks and their loads were obhged to go on. 
 
 As we passed a large camp of timber-cartmen, I tried hard to 
 hu'e a cart to carry us to Moochpardi, or even a man to show us the 
 way ; but neither could I get for love or money. They would see 
 us get lost in the jungle and perish, too, for that matter, before they 
 would, of their own good will, stir a step to aid us. No one is 
 more cringing, fawning, and servile than the Indian low caste native 
 when he is hungiy, and no one is more arrogant, disobhging, and 
 inhuman when he is well-fed and housed. I am not ashamed to 
 say that I hate the " gentle Hindoo," and if you, my reader, ever 
 fall into his power, or have actual need of his good will, you will 
 soon say the same. 
 
 And so we had to go on, and trust to luck to find the road. We 
 lit the lantern, and my new servant, acting as an advance guard 
 carried it and one of my guns ahead ; after him came the file of bul- 
 locks and cooHes, while I carried a naked candle shielded by my 
 hat, and marched along as a rear guard. It was a tedious and toil- 
 some tramp through the mud and the black darkness, all the time 
 harassed by the fear of a drenching storm and of missing the road. 
 When we reached the river, we undressed and waded it, the men 
 carrying the packs on their heads — how chilly and swift the water 
 was ! — and kept on, until at about nine o'clock we dragged wearily 
 into our old camp at Moochpardi. 
 
 My old gang was there, and hailed our arrival with dehght, while 
 they proudly led me to the fine new bamboo hut they had erected 
 for me, at a total cost of precisely $2.50. And then I found once 
 more what a priceless jewel to the jungle traveller is a really good 
 servant. I had a new one whom I had picked up in Coimbatore in 
 this wise : I had determined to discharge the servant I had brought 
 down fi'om the hills, a clumsy, old, gray-haired man not fit for jungle 
 
184 TWO YEARS IN THE JUNGLE. 
 
 life, and while I was waiting an hour at Pothanoor Junction for the 
 train to Coimbatore, I went to the butler, or "head-boy," of the 
 refreshment station, and asked him where I could find a good 
 servant. 
 
 " Why sir, you got one servant already. What you want with 
 one more ? " " That's none of your business. I want another and 
 a better one. Can you find one for me ? " " No, sir ! " " Where do 
 you think I can find one ? " "I don't know, sir." " Now look here. 
 If you will find me a good ' boy,' that can cook and speak a little 
 English, I will give you a rupee ! " 
 
 You should have seen him brighten up. Telling me to wait 
 there for him, he ran off and in fifteen minutes returned with a fine- 
 looking young man wearing a magnificent black mustache, and rub- 
 bing his eyes in a bewildered way. The butler recommended him 
 strongly and offered to be " secruit " (security) for him to the extent 
 of twenty rupees. I looked at the boy keenly, and he at me, asked 
 him a few questions hurriedly, answered a few, and in five minutes 
 we had struck a bargain. The train was nearly due. He dashed 
 off to where he had been sleeping, in five minutes ran back with a 
 moderate sized white bundle ; I handed him his ticket and three 
 minutes later we were off. 
 
 I saw that the idea of going into the jungle on a hunting spree 
 had stirred him up prof?oundly, and I knew he was my man. His 
 name was Doraysawmy — meaning "gentleman's god!" — and he 
 was worthy of his name. After my other three Madras servants, he 
 seemed almost worthy of adoration. He was a capital cook, a 
 first-rate tailor in his way, clean, neat, and industrious as any New 
 England housewife. Of my own accord I nearly doubled his wages, 
 and at last paid him at the rate of eighteen rupees per month ; 
 but he was worth it. He was a perfect jewel of a boy. 
 
 When we got to my new hut that night, he showed his good 
 qualities at once. First, he tore the cover off a box, fished out a 
 cork-screw and a cup from the camp chest, and in a moment 
 handed me a brimming cup of Bass' pale ale, the most celestial 
 stuff that ever warmed the midriff of a tired and hungry traveller. 
 In return I gave him a dram of arrack, which helped him also. 
 Then he flew around and undid certain of the packs, made the men 
 build a fire, and in twenty minutes a supper of bacon, eggs, and 
 hot chocolate was ready for me. While I was busy with these, he 
 slung my hammock, and got out my pillow and blanket. I sat and 
 watched him in dumb astonishment ; it was so totally unlike any- 
 
THE POETET OF FOREST LIFE. — BISON" SHOOTING. 185 
 
 thing I had been accustomed to. Such was Doraysawmy's style, 
 and he kept it up right along. 
 
 During the first few days following our return to Moochpardi, 
 which is in the Kulungud forest, I sent my men all over the terri- 
 tory searching for elephant signs. Every year previous to that, 
 there had always been from one to thi'ee herds roaming about that 
 territory in October and November, but to the surprise of every 
 one, we found none at all. At first I stayed in camp, husbanding 
 my strength for the grand crisis when it should come, and ever}' 
 day we kept hoping a good herd would pay us a visit. A week 
 after oiu* return I was attacked by hard chills, a high fever and a 
 horrible vomiting, which was repeated again and again, until I felt 
 as limp, exhausted, and dry as though I had been run through a 
 clothes- wringer. 
 
 The quinine I took for the fever acted like tartar emetic, and this 
 time I actually threw up my jungle fever, for after the ninth inn- 
 ing (or rather outing), it left me suddenly and did not return in 
 full force for a month. 
 
 It is strange how quickly one recovers from such sharp attacks 
 of fever. I always made it a rule to eat heartily right along, no 
 matter whether I felt hungiy or not, and at the last I leaned upon 
 Bass' ale and port wine as if they were a paii' of crutches. Until 
 my last two months upon the hills, my habits had always been 
 strictly temperate, never using tobacco in any form, nor drinking 
 any kind of spirits, wine, or beer, or even tea or coffee when at 
 home, where good cold water is procurable. During my former 
 trips to the tropics I was never sick a day, nor took a dose of medi- 
 cine, but I took to coffee, temporarily. When I was told, on reach- 
 ing India, that I would have to drink ale, or brandy-and-soda, or 
 else wine, right along, I said "Never," and for the first six months 
 I stuck to coffee, chocolate, and water. After three months of fever 
 and fasting I tried Bass' pale ale, and found it always created an 
 appetite. After a long, exhausting tramp through mud and rain, a 
 pint of that immortal stuff was equal to a four hours' rest. I 
 strongly recommend it to every " temperance man " whose lot may 
 be cast in the jungles of the East Indies. To me it was a glorious 
 medicine, and whenever I was ready to drop down, it was always 
 ready to pick me up. 
 
 While hanging on at Moochpardi, waiting for some elephants to 
 pay us a visit — there were plenty of them across the river in the 
 Government Leased Forest — we decided that we would never have 
 
186 TWO TEARS IN THE JUNGLE. 
 
 a better opportunity to kill a few more bison and prepare their 
 skins ; so at them we went. 
 
 During the whole month of November we had simply perfect 
 weather, clear, sunny, and rather di-y, just warm enough to be 
 comfortable in the shady forest. Then we enjoyed the very poetry 
 of forest life. Every morning we rose early, ate a good hearty 
 breakfast, packed away a bottle of ale and a substantial luncheon 
 of bread and meat into one side of my cartridge-bag, and called up 
 the men. In a few words I informed Doraysawmy what I wanted 
 him to do during the day, and what I myself wanted to do, which 
 last he would interpret to the men, with many injunctions to take 
 good care of the sahib. I always can-ied either my rifle or a larger 
 gun. Channa always came behind me with another weapon and 
 my large shot-bag ; another man earned my rubber blanket and a 
 sharp hatchet, another carried a bundle containing six skinning 
 knives, a whetstone, and a coil of half-inch rope, while very often 
 the fifth man carried another gun. Vera nearly always led the 
 poi'ty, but sometimes Channa, while I followed at his heels. 
 
 It was Vera's special business to sight the game, but at the 
 same time every other man, save myself, was always on the lookout, 
 and the hindmost men often took pride in calling us back to point 
 out an animal the leading trackers had not noticed. I did not try 
 to keep a sharp lookout., but resen-ed all my powers for the game 
 when fovmd. I take a little pride in the fact that I always carried 
 a gim, no matter how many miles we tramped in a day. In going 
 through the forest we always went slowly and in perfect silence, 
 no ttdking save an occasional word in a very low tone, no stick- 
 breaking, every sense keenly on the alert. Whenever any one 
 stxw an animal he would instantly utter a hiss or a low, rapid, "tut- 
 tut-tut-tut," made by pressing the tongue against the roof of the 
 mouth, and suddenly withdrawing it with a sucking noise, a signal 
 which was never made under any other circumstances, and at which 
 every one would instantly stop and look shai-ply about him. Often 
 we would get so near our game that no one dared make even that 
 low signal, and then Vera or Channa would quickly grasp me by one 
 arm and point at the animal. 
 
 What a romantic life it was to hunt with such men, through 
 those noble teak and bamboo forests, in such fine weather as we 
 had most of the time, knowing that we were Hable at any moment 
 to fall in with some lai'ge animal, though, whether it would be 
 axis deer, muntjac, bear, boar, sambiu", bison, tiger, or elephant, 
 
 I 
 
THE POBTRY OF FOREST LIFE. — BISON SHOOTING. 187 
 
 we could not possibly tell. There was a great charm in this glori- 
 .ous uncertainty. At noon, we would sit down beside some clear, 
 cold, running stream, put away the lunch and the bottle of ale, and 
 rest for half an hour. We always managed to get back to camp at 
 least an hour before sunset, either with one or two dead animals 
 borne upon a pole, or else a big skin or skeleton, and a few choice 
 pieces of meat. Near our hut was a fine sheet of bare rock, where 
 we cleaned skins, and the clear, running river near by, in which we 
 had our bath when the day's work was done. Ah me ! those were 
 indeed halcyon days, each one of them worth a whole year of 
 every-day life, and I would gladly have them back again, fever and 
 all. 
 
 Around Moochpardi, bison were very abundant. The death of 
 our first one there occurred as follows : We were hunting through 
 fine bamboo jungle one morning, hoping to find a fresh bison trail, 
 when, glancing down a long narrow opening through the trees and 
 bamboos, I thought I saw a pair of horns move, down in a ravine 
 fully two hundred yards away. Vera was ahead of me, but had 
 passed along without noticing anything. I called him back and 
 pointed out what I had seen, and directly he declared that it was a 
 bull bison. We stalked down to where we had seen him, in a most 
 picturesque little glen, but he was not there. He had not seen us, 
 and we knew he could not be far away. As we surmised, he was a 
 solitary bull, which was a sort of guarantee that he was a fine 
 animal. 
 
 We at once set upon his trail, and in ten minutes came full upon 
 him at the top of a bushy ridge. Vera seized my arm, pointed 
 ahead quickly, and crouched down to be out of the way. Not 
 more than forty paces from us, head proudly up and looking full in 
 our direction, stood the noblest bison I ever saw. In an instant I 
 took a quick aim at his shoulder, well down, and fired with the No. 
 8 -bore. 
 
 He wheeled around and tried to dash away, but it was hard work. 
 He fell once, but picked himself up, and went staggering down the 
 slope at a tenrible pace. Near the bottom of the hill he stumbled, 
 went down upon his knees, and then pitched forward upon his 
 side, legs in air and kicking furiously. To put a speedy end to his 
 sufferings I fired a bullet from my rifle into his heart as he lay 
 there, and a moment later his earthly troubles were ended. 
 
 What a splendid animal he was every way ! He had a very 
 handsome head and horns, an intelligent, noble-looking face, and a 
 
188 TWO YEARS IN THE JUNGLE. 
 
 beautiful mild blue eye. Even my meu remai-ked upon tlie beauty 
 of his head and face. His measurements were as follows : 
 
 Feet. Inches. 
 
 Height to top of hump 5 10 
 
 Height at shoulders 5 4^ 
 
 Length of head and body 11 5 
 
 Length of tail 2 7 
 
 Girth 7 1C4 
 
 Extreme width of liorns 3 9 
 
 Ciroumf ereuce at hase 1 5^ 
 
 Distance between the tips 1 4 
 
 Length on outer curve 3 6^ 
 
 After all, this was not a bison of the very largest size, for the 
 lai'gest bulls ai*Q sjiid to measure 6 feet in vertical shoulder 
 height. Somehow, I c:m never kill an animal so large but that 
 some one else has killed a f:u' lai-ger one. The " Old Shikaree " 
 teiis of killing a bison measm-ing 6 feet 4 inches at the shoulders, 
 and feet inches to the top of the hump ; but it is my opinion 
 the "Old Shikaree's" rule slipped back very fi-equently when he 
 was measuring game. 
 
 The Indian bison (Bos gauj-us) is the liu'gest of all the Bovida' 
 or hollow-horned ruminants, and is in every way a noble animal. 
 It is much liu-ger than its American congener, the bufi"JUo {Bos 
 Americonus), but, unhke the latter, it has no mane whatever. The 
 hail* is short and thin, and upon the hind quarters of old bulls it is 
 so scivnty that the skin is almost biu'e. Its body color is a dai'k 
 mahogany brown, deepening to black in old bulls ; the forehead and 
 legs below the knees are dirty white, while the inside of the fore- 
 arms, thighs, and eiu's, both skin and hair, are of a rich ochre yellow. 
 The iris is pale blue, the end of the nose and the lips dirty white. 
 The hump of the bison is neiu'ly in the middle of the back, from 
 which the dorsal ridge drops abruptly four or live inches to the loins. 
 The legs ju-e very neat and tapering, and the hoof is small, compact^ 
 and deer-like, indicating that the bison is intended for a life upon 
 hard groimd and among hills and rocks. The foot-print of the 
 lai'ge bull mentioned above, meas\u'ed only 4 inches long by 3:^ 
 wide, a remai'kably small foot for so hea-s-y an animal. 
 
 Unless they have been thoroughly alju'med, bison ai'e very \m- 
 suspicious, and sire easily stalked imd shot. They usually go in 
 herds of fi"om ten to thirty individuals, sometimes more, and, when 
 feeding, can be appi-oached within easy gun-shot without much 
 
 1 
 
^1 
 
 o 
 
 Pi r^ 
 O ^ 
 
 o 
 
THE POETRY OF FOREST LIFE. — BISON SHOOTING. 189 
 
 difficulty. I never found much " sport " in sliooting a bison out of 
 a herd, except in following the trail, for there is so little difficulty 
 and danger connected with it that I felt no more pride in attack- 
 ing a herd of bison than I would a herd of bullocks. In fact, when 
 in a drove they seemed too much Uke ordinary cattle. To show 
 what tame sport bison shooting is when once the game is found, 
 I will relate the following : 
 
 Two days after the death of the solitary bull mentioned above, 
 we went out and found the trail of a similar individual, but just as 
 we came to the end of his trail we found he had joined a herd of 
 about fifteen others. I stalked up close to the herd, and fired 
 across a little grassy glade at a fine bull, bringing him down 
 promptly with a shot in the shoulders. Then I fired my remaining 
 barrel at another bull standing among the bamboos, eighty paces 
 distant, but he did not fall. Not feehng very murderously in- 
 clined, I leisurely reloaded my gun, the No. 8 muzzle-loader, and for 
 fully three minutes the two bison stood on the opposite side of the 
 glade, watching my movements with the stare of curiosity. When 
 I was ready to fire again the herd sensed the danger and made oif, 
 but having one bull I declined to follow. 
 
 The next day I shot a large cow, and the day following an- 
 other, making four bison bagged in five shots. I am sure we could 
 have killed a bison every day for a month or more, had we been so 
 inclined ; but my fixed principle is never to kill a harmless animal 
 which I do not actually need as a specimen, or else to eat. 
 
 Judging from my own experience with bison, I consider them 
 very timid and inoffensive animals, except under cu'cumstances of 
 great provocation. From first to last I killed only eight, five bulls 
 and three cows, no one of which made the slightest attempt to 
 charge us. Indeed, in my bison-hunting I never took into ac- 
 count the fact that a bison could charge and make mischief ; but at 
 the same time the natives of India regard the bison as a dangeroua 
 animal, and many experienced English sportsmen also have a thor- 
 ough respect for him. I saw one native on the hills, who had been 
 attacked by a bull-bison a few years previous, and so badly mauled 
 that his left arm was almost useless. In Coimbatore I met a 
 young Englishman, Mr. Rhodes Morgan, Deputy Conservator of 
 Forests, who once had a severe taste of a bison's horns, and at my 
 request he kindly furnished me the following account of how it 
 happened : 
 
 "It was in June, 1874, when I was inspecting a low range of 
 
190 TWO TEARS IN THE JUNGLE. 
 
 hills some twenty miles from Coimbatore, that I was going through 
 a forest with a party of Irulars, and suddenly started a young soli- 
 tary bull bison. After a long, stem chase we came up with him, 
 and saw him standing still and looking at us, eighty yards off. I 
 was armed with a .500 express rifle, and instantly fired at his nose ; 
 but, unluckily, he dropped his head as I fired, and the ball, instead 
 of penetrating his brain, passed through his palate and tongue. 
 It evidently severed some large blood-vessel, as the bushes were 
 covered with blood, and we had no difficulty in tracking him. After 
 following him about a mile, we came suddenly upon him, climb- 
 ing a little, grassy hill some thirty paces above us. The instant 
 he caught sight of me he turned to charge, when I gave him both 
 barrels in the shoulder, which made him gallop madly off iato 
 the forest. Tracking him on, I soon saw him standing still and 
 looking at me, some twenty yards off, and instantly gave him an- 
 other bullet behind the shoulder. He now went crashing down the 
 hill-side and apparently fell, as we heard him kicking, and then he 
 uttered a faint bellow, 
 
 " When a bison bellows after being wounded it is almost al- 
 ways a certain sign of death, but in this instance it was not. 
 
 "We followed the bull down the side of the hill, where he had 
 evidently rolled, and I was looking about trying to make out where 
 he could have gone, when I suddenly caught sight of his nose 
 not two feet from me ! He had backed himself into a dense mass 
 of creepers, and was lying in wait for me ! Nothing was visible 
 but his nose, and the instant I saw it, I felt that I was caught. 
 
 " In half a second, with a snort hke a steam-engine, he sent me 
 flying through the air. I lit on my back, and was immediately 
 struck a blow on my ribs that made them spring inward as the 
 top of a hen-coop would with a heavy man sitting on it. I felt 
 that my last hom* had come. He struck me with his head again 
 and again, sometimes on my breast, back, and sides, sometimes 
 on my thighs, while sometimes he struck the gi'ound only in his 
 blind fury. The blood was pouring in a stream from his open 
 mouth, and the hot breath from his nostrils sent the blood in 
 sprays all over me. 
 
 " I lay quite still, and he presently stopped and looked at me. 
 Imagining that I was dead, he walked slowly away a short dis- 
 tance, and stood there eying me. There was the stump of a huge 
 tree near me, and I thought that if I could only drag myseK be- 
 hind it I would be safe, I began to draw myself along, bit by bit. 
 
THE POETRY OF FOREST LIFE. — BISON SHOOTING. 191 
 
 toward it, but in an instant the bull rushed at me again and struck 
 me several fearful blows. I felt now that nothing could save me. 
 He tried to turn me over with his nose, that he might get his horns 
 into me, and getting one horn under my belt he lifted me up bodi- 
 ly. Luckily it was an old belt, and the buckle snapped. He then 
 endeavored to rip me up, so I seized his horn and held on to it 
 with aU my strength. In trying to shake himself free he took the 
 whole of the skin off the under side of my right arm with his horn. 
 
 " The whole of this time, no fewer than six Irulars had been 
 calmly looking on, and I heard one of them say : ' Dear me ! the 
 bison is killing the gentleman ! ' and another said : ' Send for the 
 shikaree to shoot it.' (The shikaree was two miles away with my 
 tiffin basket !) One of the Irulars now uttered a most diabolical 
 yell. The bull threw up his head, then turned tail and dashed 
 down the hiU. Had they only yeUed at first, I might have been 
 saved from being pounded almost to a jelly. 
 
 "The Irulars all ran forward now to help me to stand up. One 
 of them picked up my rifle, which was lying stamped into the mud 
 and broken by the fall. I was then supported to a large rock, 
 where my first act was to feel myself all over to see if any bones 
 were broken. After lying on the rock for an hour, my shikaree 
 came running up, lamenting. I must have presented a horrible 
 spectacle, for I was one mass of black mud, and smeared all over 
 mth blood. The shikaree gave me a drink of water, and, having 
 washed off the blood and dirt, I felt so much better that I deter-^ 
 mined to kill that bull if possible. 
 
 "An Irular climbed a tree and reported that the bull was 
 standing close by, and that if I could get to a certain large rock I 
 could have a good chance at him. Getting upon the rock, I saw 
 him standing just below me, and immediately let him have both 
 barrels of my No. 12 smooth-bore, but my aim was very unsteady. 
 He then went down the hill, crossed a small stream, and stood 
 again on a bit of level ground. I got up within twenty yards of 
 him, when he charged, and I gave him two more barrels. He now 
 attempted to cross a small nullah, when he fell from weakness, but 
 regaining his feet, he went a little farther, and fell between two 
 rocks, where he got firmly jammed. A bullet through the heart 
 then finished him. 
 
 "The next day I was carried into Coimbatore, where I was 
 confined to my bed for a fortnight, my whole body being black 
 and blue." 
 
192 TWO YEARS IN THE JUNGLE. 
 
 I may remark in passing, that Mr. Morgan, who was about such 
 a youngster as myself, in many respects, showed me at his house 
 a really wonderful collection of hunting trophies, all shot and 
 mounted by his own hands. Ranged around his dining-room were 
 about twenty well-moimted heads of bison, among which was the 
 young bull which mauled him so severely, and the walls were liter- 
 ally covered vnth skulls, antlers, and stuffed heads of sambur, 
 axis deer, muntjac, boar, bison, bear, etc., etc. 
 
 In his parlor were two mounted tiger-heads, two splendid ele^ 
 phant tusks, a tiger-skin mat, a cabinet of bird's eggs, and many 
 smaller specimens of great interest. It is truly refreshing to meet a 
 sportsman who is such an industrious saver of trophies, and who, 
 like myself, cannot bear to kill an animal and let it go utterly to 
 waste. 
 
 Among other things, Mr. Morgan showed me his " battery," con- 
 sisting of eight deadly weapons ! The largest was a smooth- 
 bore, B. L., C. F. gun, No. 4-bore with a bai-rel 3^ feet long, carry- 
 ing twelve drachms of poioder and a four-ounce ball. This is the 
 cahbre recommended by Su* Samuel Baker, Sanderson, and other 
 noted sportsmen, for elephant shooting ! It requires three cooHes 
 to carry this gun, turn and turn about on a day's shooting, and Mr. 
 M. fires it from a small tripod-stand he has invented for the pur- 
 pose. Such a weapon is really a young cannon, and is perhaps 
 such a one as Professor Ward had in mind when he wrote me at the 
 last to " get a howitzer if you can't bring down elephants with your 
 smaller ordnance." 
 
 It is a difficult matter to prepai'e, in the jungle, a large bison 
 skin so that it can be mounted successfully, and for this reason I 
 will describe how I accomplished the task. 
 
 My largest bull was killed about 10 a.m., and, being fully pre- 
 pared, we measured and skinned him immediately. We removed 
 the skin in the same way as described for the tiger, except that to 
 skin the head, we cut the skin loose from around the base of each 
 horn, then slit the back of the neck and head into a perfect Y, with 
 the long limb extending along the back of the neck, and each of 
 the short ones reaching up to the base of one horn at the back. 
 The head can thus be skinned very easily and Hfted out through 
 this hole. We canied the skin home slung under a pole — a heavy 
 load for four men — and after spreading it out on a bit of bare 
 ground we all went at it with oui* knives, to thin it down. On the 
 back, and sides of the neck, the skin was more than an inch thick, 
 
THE POETRY OF FOEEST LIFE. — BISON SHOOTING. 193 
 
 which we had to pare down until we could see the roots of the 
 hair. This was a very laborious task, requiring thin-bladed and 
 very sharp knives. 
 
 Late in the afternoon, we rubbed the inside of the skin very 
 thoroughly with arsenical soap, then sprinkled over it about twelve 
 pounds of coarse salt and rubbed it in vigorously with a flat stone. 
 In a short time the salt drew quantities of water out of the skin so 
 that it stood all over in puddles. We then rolled up the skin, let 
 it lie over night, and the next morning thinned it down still more, 
 io that the preservatives could strike the roots of the hair at once. 
 Next we sprinkled powdered alum all over the skin and rubbed it 
 in, using about seven to eight pounds. 
 
 After letting the skin lie spread upon the ground for a few 
 hours, fairly pickled in its own moisture, we hung it over a pole in 
 a shady place, spreading it widely with sticks placed cross-wise in- 
 side, and the legs were pulled out in various directions and tied 
 fast to stumps. Every night we took it down and put it inside my 
 hut to keep it from the dew and rain. After one very rainy day, 
 two very fine ones, and one that was rather damp, the skin was al- 
 most stiff, and quite dry enough to fold up permanently. This 
 skin has since been mounted very successfully at Professor Ward's 
 establishment, and the old bull now stands in the Museum of Com- 
 parative Zoology, at Cambridge, Mass. 
 13 
 
OHArTKK XVIII. 
 
 A MKIklORARLK ELKPUAXT HUNT, 
 
 A "Run of TU-luok.— Tho Climax.— Strainod Uolations with an Official.— The 
 Ttirn of tho Tido. — M_v Last Card. — .\u Olftoial Favor. — Poruiissiou to Kill 
 a Tiiskor. — Jlovo to Suujiam. — A ^lomoraWo Elophant Hunt. — A Bad 
 Shot, — Daugorous Oi\nind. — A UoUl .Vdvauoo and a Pisordorly Kotroat. — 
 MuU'or riiilosophv. — A I.oug and Tirosomo Oliaso. — Dosporato Charaotei 
 of tho Juniilo. — l-uok at Last. — Tho Attaok. — An Anxious Moment. — Vio^' 
 torv. — Tho Poad Tiiskor. — A Soli on 'ho Muloovs. — Skinnins; a \ino-.i.nd> 
 a-half Foot F.lophant. — The Modus Oporandi. — Oamp on tho Fiold of lv»t- 
 tlo. — Surroundod bv Wild Boasts. — Gottins; up a Soaio. — Buniinij Bam. 
 boo. — A Tigor about. — An Aooidont. — Back to Suugani. — A Muloor Row.— 
 Fever again. — Mutiny in Oamp, 
 
 DuKixa tlio first two weeks I spent at Moodijvvrdi, svfter my ivttu'u 
 to tlio hills, my luck wont stondily a^uinst mo. and I soon found 
 mysolf in :i " soa of tronblos." In tho t\i:>t phioo, wo s^iw thoro was 
 simply no hope of our tinding a wild tuslcor in tho Kulungud for- 
 est hoforo tho oloso of tlio soason. My funds had booomo so noai'ly 
 exhausted that at last, in spito of ooonomy. I had not ten rupees 
 loft, and uttor bankrupt oy stared mo in tho faoo. !M'r. Theobald was 
 out of roaoh, or I oould have borrowed. Throe months before, I 
 had iveeived fwm Professor "Ward a fii-st bill of exohange for .£100, 
 AN-ith tho information that tho sooond would follow by tho next mail ; 
 but it had failed to turnup, and I was omb:u-n\ssod. I had\\Titteu 
 all over India about it, and also home, but it might be weeks longer 
 before I oould traoe it up, and until I got it, my I'u-st of exohange 
 was utterly worthless. My twelfth attaok of fever oame ou and 
 tlooivd mo in short order, and for two days I tried my best to tlnvw 
 up my stomaoh. My ankles were still covered with niw uloei*s, sis 
 or eight iu number, which at times were very punful. 
 
 To cap tho climax of my ditHoxiltios, one day while I lay on my 
 Kack with fever, I received an otlicial doouniont, bo:u'ing tho legend 
 "On Her Majesty's SoiTice," fivm Mr. Gass, otlicor in tompomry 
 chiu-ge at Tovmacadavoo. The communication politely, but tii-mlj, 
 
 I 
 
A MEiSrOTlABLK ELEPTIAT^T HUNT. 195 
 
 requested mo to send him all my men, to work for the Government. 
 He claimed that during my absence from the hills, he had made 
 advances of money and clothing to the Mulcers, and therefore their 
 services properly belonged to the forest department. 
 
 Here was a pretty fix. The loss of the men I had trained to 
 assist me meant nothing less than the destruction of all my plans. 
 When told the contents of the letter and the mission of the Govern- 
 ment peon, my men with one accord declared they would not stir 
 a step, and were fairly enraged at the demand. They stoutly as- 
 serted they had received no advances from the Government, and i^o 
 one save myself had any claims upon them. After careful reflec- 
 tion, I made up my mind as to the course I should pursue. It was 
 risky, but I had faith in its success, and acted immediately. I re- 
 plied to Mr. Gass' letter very politely and respectfully, without ex- 
 pressing any of the indignation I felt, and had all my men except 
 Vera, accompany my communication. But I firmly insisted that the 
 services of the men properly belonged to me, and were only given 
 up that I might avoid even the appearance of doing anything to 
 hinder government work. I also stated that I had made advances 
 of blankets and money to the men, which would therefore be a total 
 loss to me. My gang marched off with the peon, but they privately 
 assured Doraysawmy that after two days, they all intended to run 
 away and come back. 
 
 When my men had gone, I began to review my situation, and 
 calculate the chances of ever getting the skin of a big tusker out of 
 the forest in good condition. I noticed that for some time all 
 things had combined against me, and it made me mad. I repeated to 
 myself my always-encouraging doctrine — the only sure thing about 
 " luck " either good or bad, is, that it is bound to change. A long 
 streak of bad luck always rouses the bull-dog element in my nat- 
 ure, and I feel like fighting it until it gets tired enough to quit. 
 With my fever still burning, and my men all gone but one, I was 
 only able to solemnly declare to Doraysawmy that I would " have 
 an elephant before I left those Hills, or die." A sensible resolu- 
 tion for a sick man ! 
 
 The very next day my run of bad luck came to an end, and 
 from that moment it steadily improved. While I was taking a bath 
 in the river, my Mulcers suddenly ran down the opposite bank and 
 waded across to me in great glee, with a letter from Mr. Gass, in 
 which he relinquished his claim upon them, and expressed his re- 
 gret at having proposed to deprive me of their services, under the 
 
196 TAVO TEARS IN THE JITNOIE. 
 
 existing circumstances, of which he had not been fully awai*e. 
 Thi-ee days later, a coolie from Animallai brought me the letter 
 from Professor Wai-d, which contained the truant bill of exchange, 
 and it was at once dispatched to Madi-as to be cashed. I was 
 now ready to play what was very nearly my last cai-d. 
 
 There were no elephants in ovu* forest, but across the river, two 
 miles away in the Government Forest, there were two herds. One 
 day we undertook to drive the smaller herd about a mile and make 
 it cross into our forest, so that we might kill one of the tuskers. 
 The plan was a good one, but I needed sixty men instead of six, 
 and practically it wouldn't work. Then I determined to ask the 
 Madras Government for pennission to kill an elephant in the 
 Government Forest. It was ti'uly a forlorn hope, with all the 
 chances against its success. A month previous, young IMi-. "Wed- 
 derbiuTi, a son of the Collector of Coimbatore, had assiu-ed me 
 that it would be useless to ask his father for permission to kill an 
 elephant, because he was veiy much interested in "keddah opera- 
 tions" (elephant catching) and had never gi-anted such a per- 
 mission to any one, although often asked to do so. I had no letters 
 of introduction, and no personal reputation whatever to recommend 
 me to the favorable notice of the Government authorities. If they 
 granted the request I proposed to make, it would be only from 
 motives of pure chai-ity, .'oid not by reason of any claim I could es- 
 tablish. Without dai'ing to hope my request would be granted, I 
 sat down and \^Tote the following letter : 
 
 Caatp rN THE Akimallai Hills. 
 
 November S, 1877. 
 To A. Wedderbubn, Esq., Collector of CaimbaUve jyistrict. 
 
 Dear Sir : At last I find myself compelled to address you on the subject 
 of wild elephants. Mr. Douglass * advised me to do so when I first came to 
 these hills, but I have refrained until now, hoping it wo\ald not be necessary. 
 Vnder the present circumstances I am forced to make a virtue of necessity and 
 beg your permission to shoot one or two male elephants in the Government 
 Forest. I feel justified in doing so by the following reasons : 
 
 Althoiigh I am located in the forest belonging to the Kajah of Kulungud, 
 and have his written permission tokilltwoeleph.ants in his territory, there are 
 uo elephants here now, none have been here for weeks, and the chances are, 
 I will never find a herd in this small forest so full of people. On the con- 
 trary, there are two herds in the Government Forest that .ire likely to remain 
 some time, having already Wen there some days. 
 
 My being a naturalist and not a sportsman, and working directly in the in« 
 
 * Deputy Conservator of Forests. 
 
A MEMORABLE ELEPHANT HUNT. 197 
 
 terests of science, should, I think, give mo a chiim to consideration that 1 
 would not think of asking were I shooting merely for the sport and glory of 
 the thing. I shoot nothing that I do not want as a museum specimen. Pro- 
 fessor Ward, whose Natural History Establisliment I represent, has tried long 
 and hard to purchase specimens of the Indian elephant, but without success, 
 and at last I have been sent out here at great expense and trouble, with the 
 elephant as the main object in view. But for the generosity of the Rajah of 
 Kulungud I should have been obliged to make this application to you long 
 ago. 
 
 I have come up here again solely for elephants and find none where I ex- 
 pected. The season is rapidly coming to an end, when I shall be obliged to 
 leave these parts, and the chances are that, unless I am permitted to shoot an 
 elephant in the Government Forest as soon as possible, my work is doomed to 
 end in failure. I wish to kill a full-grown tusker, of which I would prepare 
 both skin and skeleton complete. 
 
 Hoping that you will consider an exception in my favor justifiable under 
 the circumstances, I remain, dear sir. 
 
 Yours obediently and respectfully, 
 
 Wm. T, Hoknaday. 
 
 Everything depended upon this letter. Had I only been a 
 " Dr." or " Professoi'," or the possessor of any handle to my name, 
 I would have felt less doubtful of the result. 
 
 My letter was received by Mr. Wedderburn and forwarded by 
 him, with a favorable indorsement, to his Grace the Duke of Buck- 
 ingham, Governor of the Madras Presidency. Almost by return 
 mail, it seemed, I received the following official document : 
 
 Proceedings op the Madras Government. 
 
 Read the following letter from the District Magistrate of Coimbatore, dated 
 November 10, 1877. No. 248. 
 
 Order thereon dated November 14, 1877. No. 2670. 
 
 The Governor in Council sanctions Mr. Wm. T. Hornaday shooting one 
 full-grown tusk elephant in the Animallai Forest. 
 
 (Signed) C. G. Master. 
 
 Secretary to Government. 
 
 This was extremely gratifying in more ways than one. Aside 
 from the success of my plans, it gave me great pleasure to know 
 that my ai-duous labors as a field naturalist were substantially rec- 
 ognized, and that the Government had gi'anted me a great favor 
 solely upon the merits of my case, in spite of the fact that I was 
 a nobody. While I felt feally entitled to an elephant, and it was 
 
198 TWO YEARS IN THE JUNGLE. 
 
 no great loss for the Government to give nie one, as elephants 
 may never be caught on the Animallais, yet it would have been an 
 easy and natural thing for the Governor and Executive Council 
 to have refused my rather cool request. But the favor was granted, 
 cordially, gracefully, and promptly. And the people of Northern 
 India and Ceylon call this the Benighted Presidency ! Then my 
 worst wish for them is, that the same dai'kness may overtake them 
 soon. 
 
 Two days after the above-mentioned order came to hand, we 
 moved our camp to Suugam, a timber depot and elephant camp in 
 the Government Forest, near which were the wild elephants. 
 Learning the general whereabouts of a large herd, we equipped 
 ourselves for the chase with cooked food, knives, blankets, ham- 
 mock, ropes, etc., and set out to find the trail, determmed to bring 
 down a tusker before returning. It was a memorable chase, an 
 appropriate ending of my laborious work in those hills, and I am 
 tempted to narrate its chief incidents. 
 
 We found the trail where it crossed the road, within a mile of 
 Toonacadavoo, and led straight away into Curran Shola, a wide 
 tract of wild, tangled, and feai-fully hilly jungle, which I had never 
 before penetrated. In one place Vera and Channa did some very 
 skilful tracking. This was in a bit of dense jungle where the earth 
 was as bare, smooth, and hard as a base-ball ground, upon which 
 the soft, rubber-like feet of the elephants left scarcely any impres- 
 sion. In this spot, the herd had scattered and fed all around over 
 several acres, and the trackers had great difficulty in finding the 
 direction finally taken by the herd. But they ciphered it out at 
 last and on we went. 
 
 In passing through a sti'etch of fine, lofty, bamboo forest, we 
 came to a place where the elephants had apparently started to make 
 a clearing. On a space of nearly two acres in extent, nearly every 
 bamboo, old and young, had been pulled down and smashed to 
 splinters, and their long, green stems lay twisted, torn, and piled 
 in dire confusion. Whole clumps had been pulled down, a stem at 
 a time, just for fun. The place looked as if a small cj'cloue had 
 struck it. 
 
 About noon we came upon a portion of the herd feeding upon a 
 steep hiU side, and, taking up a position on the opposite slope but 
 quite near by, we rested and watched them. Unfortunately there 
 was no tusker in this lot, nor even a "nuickna," or tuskless male. 
 As we sat on the steep hill-side, the elephants fed toward us, but 
 
A MEMOEABLE ELEPHANT HUNT. 199 
 
 below our position, and finally they passed along the bottom of the 
 nullah almost at our feet, within ten yards of us. But we had seen 
 the marks of tusks on several trees as we came along, and we knew 
 there were tuskers in the herd somewhere. 
 
 FeeUng sure these females would join the rest of the herd, we 
 followed them, and about two miles farther on came upon the en- 
 tire herd feeding in a dense patch of dead and fallen bamboos, rank 
 weeds, grass, and young bamboo shoots. Curran Shola is full of 
 just such patches, where the fallen bamboos have destroyed the 
 shade and the moisture, and caused the place to grow up with rank 
 grass, thick thorn bushes and trailing vines, the very worst place 
 in the world in which to attack elephants. 
 
 We manoeuvred around the herd untU the elephants began to 
 work out of that wretched brush patch into the open jungle which 
 surrounded it, and then by making a very risky stalk I got close 
 up to a splendid old tusker and fired at his temple. A total fail- 
 ure. Fool that I was, I undershot the brain because the elephant 
 was below me. The tusker rushed into the thick patch, several 
 other elephants rushed out of it toward me, then stopped and 
 stood motionless for some seconds. Presently they turned about, 
 went back into the thicket, and began feeding again. 
 
 We undertook to follow up the tusker, but it was very nervous 
 work. We could not get along at all save by following the elephant 
 paths, and a charge under such circumstances might easily have 
 been fatal to some of us. 
 
 I posted Nangen up in a small tree, whence he could see all over 
 the thicket, and with Vera leading the way and Channa at my heels 
 with a spare gun, we went in. The bushes, grass, and weeds were, 
 in places, nearly twice as high as our heads, and except for the ele- 
 phant paths we could not see five yards in any direction. We kept 
 a careful eye upon Nangen all the time, and it was well for us that 
 we did so. All at once his arms began to fly about like the sails of 
 a wind-mill, as he violently gesticulated at us and looked unutter- 
 able things. Directly we darted back to a place of safety, and the 
 next moment two large elephants walked rapidly across the very 
 spot from whence we first saw Nangen's warning pantomime. Then 
 we concluded not to risk getting amongst twenty-five or thirty ele- 
 phants in such a place as that was. 
 
 After a time the herd quitted that thicket, walked rapidly 
 through the open jungle for a mile, and entered another of the 
 same nature, only much worse. For an hour the elephants went 
 
200 TWO YEARS i:n^ the jungle. 
 
 feeding up and down in that thorny tangle, crashing over the fallen 
 bamboos, within thirty yards of us sometimes, but I dared not at- 
 tack them. I supposed then that I was over-cautious, and that an 
 older hunter would have gone at them as they were without delay ; 
 but I resolved I would not do it, cowardly or not. I have since 
 found that even the oldest hands sometimes find their elephants in 
 such cover that they dai'e not ventui-e into it, and my caution was 
 well-timed. 
 
 Once I screwed my coui-age up and ventured into the thicket 
 for about forty paces, alone, but with my gun ready for instant use. 
 Suddenly there rose, out of the thick bushes close before me, the 
 end of a huge trunk with the tip bent forward, scenting the aii'. 
 In an instant I was discovered, and the elephant gave a perfect 
 bugle call, loud, cleai", and thrilling. Directly the elephants went 
 crashing wildly up and down over the fallen bamboos, making a 
 feai'ful noise ; I tui-ned and ran for open ground, and at that mo- 
 ment there came a shai'p clap of thimder. For a moment I believe 
 my hair actually stood on end, for it seemed as if bedlam had 
 broken loose ; but I soon gained the shelter of a tree, and had a 
 quiet smile at my fright. Shortly after this it began to rain in tor- 
 rents, and being within about five miles of camp we went home. 
 
 Doraysawmy expressed himself as ha'viug been deeply con- 
 cerned lest I should come to gi-ief under the feet of an elephant, and 
 my safe return took a great weight from his mind. That night he 
 held a solemn council with Yei*a and Channa, enjoining them to 
 take the greatest cai'e of me. My trackers said to him, so he told 
 me, that "it would not do at all for the sahib to get killed, for if 
 he should, who would give them and their people rice and tobacco, 
 arrack and money, to say nothing of fresh meat ?" Yes, they said, 
 they would be very careful of him. 
 
 The next morning at daybreak, equipped as before, we set out 
 for the spot where we left the trail the previous evening. The 
 chase that day led through the worst jimgle I saw anywhere in India, 
 and over the roughest ground. 
 
 Early in the day it took to the side of an immense ridge several 
 miles in extent, half a mile from top to bottom, and everywhere 
 very steep. The ridge was scored all along with deep nullahs, one 
 after another, and the whole slope was a tangled mass of dead bam- 
 boo clumps, some fallen bodily and others still standing ; rank, 
 green bushes and rines, set with cruel, hook-like thorns, and tall 
 grass everywhere, making the tangled density more complete. 
 
 I 
 
A MEM OE ABLE ELEPHANT HUNT. 201 
 
 Ahead of us that ridge-side seemed to stretch out interminably, and 
 of the same desperate character all the way. Of course we could 
 not stir a step through such thick stuff without following in an ele- 
 phant trail, and in case of a charge we could not have run ten paces, 
 except forward or back. 
 
 The dead bamboos lay in piles across our track, and, while the 
 elephants stepped over them with ease, we were obliged to clirab 
 and scramble over as best we could. It really seemed that the trail 
 led up hill all the time, and that the jungle was all thorns and briers 
 to scratch and tear us. 
 
 About noon we overtook the herd, but in such cover we dared not 
 think of attacking it. For three hours we followed along within 
 hearing of it, hoping it would enter a more open tract somewhere 
 in which we could dare to move about. Once we spent a laborious 
 half-hour in trying to approach the herd from the upper side, but 
 utterly failed. At last I began to feel quite exhausted, and my men 
 also complained of being very tired. Getting fairly desperate, I 
 determined to bring matters to a crisis immediately, no matter 
 what the consequences might be, and then fortune favored us a 
 little. The herd dispersed and began feeding on the side of a 
 ridge which ran down the steep side of the mountain ; the cover 
 was more open, and the wind was in our favor. 
 
 I soon found three large elephants feeding together on the hill- 
 side below me, and after watching them a few minutes I saw through 
 the leaves a gleam of white tusks. Bidding all the men stop at the 
 top of the hill, I went at the group alone, and five minutes later was 
 crouching behind a small bush, within twenty feet of the tusker's 
 head. He seemed to be a monster in size, and I thought his tusks 
 were very fine also. He was standing almost broadside to me, but 
 a thick green bough concealed nearly the whole of his head, and 
 prevented my fii'ing. In anxious suspense I crouched behind my 
 little bush, with bated breath and finger on trigger, waiting for the 
 old fellow to move on a single step and pass that branch. But he 
 would not. I fretted and fumed inwardly, and was about to fire 
 through the leaves and risk it, when a young, half-grown elephant 
 pushed up alongside my tusker, reached out his trunk deliberately, 
 laid hold of that identical green bough and swept it down ! Thank 
 you, my young friend ! 
 
 In an instant I saw I had neither the fair temple nor forehead 
 shot, but just between the two. Aiming about six inches above the 
 eye, my old No. 8 woke the echoes the next moment, which was 
 
202 TWO YEARS IN THE JUNGLE. 
 
 followed by a grand rush on three sides of me, I wheeled around, 
 ran up the hiU a few paces to a small tree, and reloaded with all 
 haste. I Hstened to hear a fall, but if there had been one the 
 noise made by the fleeing herd would have drowned it. Fearing 
 my shot had been a failure, and another laborious trial lay beforyj 
 us, I hui-ried down the hill again. 
 
 Victory ! There lay my noble old tusker, stone dead ! He had 
 Bunk down in his tracks and died without a struggle or a sound. 
 My zinc bullet had passed entu'ely through skull and brain, and 
 buried itself ten inches deep in the flesh of the neck. Our dan- 
 gerous and tiresome chase was ended at last, successfully, and we 
 all rejoiced. 
 
 After the manner of griffins generally, I scrambled upon the 
 top of the huge carcass, and opened a bottle of Bass' best in honor 
 of the occasion. Then I called for a certain black bottle in one of 
 the Mulcers' bundles which, as they well knew, had been carried 
 for their especial benefit. There was a general smacking of Hps as 
 I produced a cup, drew the cork, and poured out — cocoanut oil ! 
 There was a stare of blank astonishment, a general murmur of 
 disappointment and wrath at Doraysawmy, and the next moment, 
 despite om* chagrin, we all bui*st out laughing at the absui'dity of 
 the occurrence. My boy had simply given us a bottle of cocoanut 
 oil instead of the arrack 'the souls of the Mulcers yearned for. 
 
 Our first care was to measure our prize, which we managed to 
 accomphsh with fair exactness. His dimensions were as follows : 
 
 Vertical height at shoulders 9 feet. 
 
 Height at middle of back , 9 " 6 inches. 
 
 Length, tip of trunk to tip of tail 22 " 10 " 
 
 Length of tusks 3 " 6 " 
 
 Although oiu* elephant was a large one, his tusks were in reality 
 rather short, but thick in proportion to their leugth. 
 
 It is no light task for six men to skin an elephant weighing four 
 tons or more, in thick jungle, miles from any road, and preserve it, 
 in spite of rain and sun, in a fit state to be transported and success- 
 fully mounted afterwai-d. Many of my fiiends in India, and at 
 home in the Establishment, had expressed the opinion that such a 
 task could not be successfully accompHshed under such circum- 
 stances Mr. Tlieobald was not only doubtful but quite certain that 
 it could not be done. It is a very difficult matter to remove and 
 preserve the skin of a large elephant, even in a menagerie, with all 
 
A MEMOEABLE ELEPHANT HUNT. 203 
 
 possible assistance and appliances at hand, but it is infinitely more 
 so in a rainy jungle. In fact, Professor Ward and I were about the 
 only persons who believed it possible to accomplish what I had un- 
 dertaken. For my part, all I asked then was that the fever would 
 keep away from me for about ten days. 
 
 After a short rest, in which our previous fatigue was entirely 
 forgotten, we got out our knives and went to work. The elephant 
 lay fairly on his side, and the top of the carcass was just as high as 
 the top of my head ; — "a mountain of mummy." I decided that 
 it would be impracticable and unnecessary to remove the skin 
 entire, although we could have done it, had it been desirable. I 
 think it inadvisable to remove and handle an elephant skin entire, 
 even under the most favorable circumstances, and were I called 
 upon to skin an adult elephant in a menagerie, I should proceed 
 precisely as we did then. We decided to cut the skin in three 
 pieces, in such a way that when mounted none of the seams would 
 show, and to this end we slit it open straight along the under side 
 of the animal, straight along the middle of the back, and cut off the 
 head, as the third piece, just at the crease in the neck. Dividing 
 the skin along the middle of the back was ten*ible work, it being 
 fully an inch and a half in thickness and indescribably tough. 
 Then I congratulated myself upon having thin-bladed knives of 
 the best shear steel, made especially for such work. 
 
 Of course each leg was slit from the sole of the foot, straight up 
 the inside, to the opening along the breast and abdomen. When 
 the opening cuts had all been made, we began at the middle of the 
 back and skinned down the side which was uppermost, rolling the 
 heavy skin over as we went along. When we reached the hip and 
 the shoulder, we cut away a few cubic feet of flesh, cut off both the 
 legs, and worked on down to the cut along the abdomen. After 
 getting this half of the skin clear of the animal, we spread it out 
 upon the ground and skinned the two legs without much trouble. 
 
 By the time we had accomplished this it was night, so we 
 washed in the stream at the foot of the hill, built a large camp- 
 fire, slung my hammock, ate our rice, and prepared to be comfort- 
 able. We camped just above the carcass, but quite near it, and 
 while the Mulcers sat around the blazing fire, piling on dry 
 bamboos and discussing the events of the day, I lay in my Ashantee 
 hammock, swinging gently to and fro, gazing up at the green 
 leaves dancing in the firelight. To be sure, I glanced occasionally 
 at the huge red and white carcass just below us within the circle o/ 
 
204 TAVO YEARS IN THE JUNGLE. 
 
 light, and in thinking of its fine proportions all the fatigues and 
 dangers of the chase were forgotten, or remembered only with 
 satisfaction and pride. The night was clear and balmy, and the 
 stai's came out and peeped down through the leaves to see what we 
 were doing. A light breeze came from the west, setting all the 
 leaves a-whispering, and the bamboos rubbing together with pe- 
 culiiu* measured " creechy crawchy " sounds, like the creakings of a 
 ship's rigging. We were many miles from a human habitation of 
 any kind, in a AvlioUy unfrequented part of the forest, and our 
 only neighbors were the wild beasts of the jungle ; but as I rolled 
 myself snugly in my blanket and surveyed the wild scene, I vowed 
 that this was " the joUiest life that ever was led." 
 
 Just as we were about to settle down for the night, we were 
 rather startled at hearing a loud, ringing trumpet-note issue from 
 the jungle on our right, and rather near us, too. This did not 
 greatly matter, only we hoped the herd would not come our way 
 just then. But a moment later this call was answered by a similar 
 note from the valley on our left, and then we knew we were just 
 between the two portions of the divided herd, and the elephants 
 wei'e trying to get together again. Neither party was much more 
 than a quarter of a mile from us, apparently, and the Mulcers be- 
 gan to grow uneasy. They built another lai'ge fire and piled on 
 dry bamboos until both biazed high ; and I concluded I would feel 
 more comfortable if I swung my hammock just between the two. 
 
 But the elephants kept trumpeting and answering back across 
 that half-mile of jungle, waking the silent echoes far and Avide with 
 their shrill bugle calls, until at last we saw that the}' were mimis- 
 takably approaching each other in a direct line for oiu* camp. 
 
 Then we bestirred ourselves. The Mulcers piled a lot of blaz- 
 ing fagots at the foot of a thick clump of dead and dry bamboos 
 which still stood upright close by. The dry branches and stems 
 caught fire directly, and the flames climbed to the \evj top of the 
 clump, roaiing and crackling fiercely, and throwing out a great 
 light all around. Then the Mulcers began to yell like demons, in 
 which noise I also joined my gentle voice, and I am sure that, 
 could my reader have passed that way just then, he would have 
 taken us for a party of imps out on a midnight spree, and trying to 
 frighten all the wild animals out of their senses. 
 
 As might be imagined, the elephants gave us a vdde berth, but 
 their trumpeting was kept up at intervals all through the night. 
 The Mulcers sat up all night by turns, watching, and keeping up 
 
A iMKMOllAUMO ELEPNATnTT irUNT. 205 
 
 the fires. In the small hours of the morning, when all was still, 
 Channa quietly awakened me Avith the whispered words, " Narce, 
 sahib ! " In another moment I heard the low, deep growling of a 
 tiger in the thick jungle near us, the second time I ever heard that 
 sound in the forest. It was repeated at intervals, in the same half- 
 angry, menacing tone in which a cat warns an intruder away from 
 its prey. I felt that there was little danger of the tiger falling foul 
 of us, because in the first place I knew he could not be a man-eater, 
 •and it was evident that he had been attracted to the spot by the 
 ricent of warm blood and the flesh of the elephant. He evidently 
 recognized the fact that possession is nine points in law, and ad- 
 mitted the superiority of our claims by keeping away ; but the 
 next day we found his pugs, and saw where he had made his lair 
 and lain him down to sleep within seventy yards of our camp. 
 
 The next morning we went at the carcass almost as soon as it 
 was light enough to see. "We first cut out the entrails and vital 
 organs, and with indescribable difficulty dragged the unwieldy 
 mass a short distance down the hill. That done, we cut off a quan- 
 tity of flesh from the breast and pelvis, then went to work with a 
 series of levers, props, and ropes attached to the two remaining 
 legs, and after about two hours' hard work, we succeeded in rolling 
 the carcass completely over, with the head still on. One member 
 of my gang, Corlee, had stayed at camp playing sick, so there 
 were only five of us to manage that elephant. After rolling the 
 body over, which we considered quite a feat of engineering skill, 
 we soon removed the second half of the skin and partly skinned 
 the legs. That done, we spread out the two sides of the skin, in^ 
 side uppermost, covered them with green boughs so that the sun 
 should not shine full upon them, and leaving the head as it was, 
 started for Sungam about 2 p.m. 
 
 Just as we were starting, a misfortune overtook me. In picking 
 up our traps Vera stepped upon a sharp knife that had been 
 dropped in a pile of green leaves. The Mulcers are always bare- 
 footed, and the keen blade made an ugly gash in Vera's foot, sever- 
 ing a small vein which bled profusely. Being provided for all such 
 slight emergencies, I at once took two stitches in the cut, applied 
 court-plaster and cotton, bound it up, and we started for camp, 
 cutting a path through the jungle as we went along. As I feared, 
 the exertion made Vera's wound bleed profusely in spite of all I 
 could do, but he insisted upon going on. 
 
 When within about two miles of camp we crossed a small rocky 
 
206 TWO yl^.\lI^; T\ VUV. ,irX(U-K. 
 
 etrcani, ami I luado Yoiii bathe his foot in the cold water while 1 
 out a pair of forked sticks to serve him as crutches. A native of the 
 East Indies has no more idea of a crutch, and how to use it, thsin 
 of a quadnint. I was stooping down on a broad, sloping sheet of 
 rock, trinnning a stick with my hatchet, with Yem standing above 
 and behind me. when he suddenly fainted from loss of blood, suid 
 the tii-st thing T knew, he pitched forward full upon my back, 
 knocking me flat upon the rock and half into the water. It was a 
 lucky fall for him, for had it not been broken by me as it was, he 
 would have pitched head tirst upon the rocks, and very likely 
 broken his neck or cmcked his skull. 
 
 We brought him round in due time, and leaving Niuigeu with 
 him we stiu-ted on to camp, to send back four men with my ham- 
 mock slung to a pole io bring him in. I sent after him immedi- 
 ately upon reaching camp, but the men met him half way, wjilking 
 slowly along, and a good dose of arrack helped him to accomplish 
 the remaining distance. But he was utterly incapacitated for work 
 for an indefinite time, and I lost his valuable services during the 
 remainder of our task. 
 
 This was the first of a series of unnecessjiry and iinlooked for 
 misfortunes and difficulties which came upon me during the prepa- 
 iiition of that elephimt skin and skeleton. That night there was a 
 social scandal and a grand row iu the Mulcer camp, not f:u* fi-om 
 our huts. About bed-time, while I was writing iii my journal a 
 i*ecord of the day's events, the usual murmur of voices in the huts 
 across the river gradudly swelled into a loud jangle, which rapidly 
 increased in volume every moment until it became a perfect tem- 
 pest of migiy voices, pitched on their highest key. Very soon it 
 became evident that jui unusual commotion wi\s afoot, for the 
 lights suddenly went out, a bamboo hut was torn down, women 
 and children beg^sm to sciv;uu, suid we distinctly heai\l the sound 
 of men struggling and blows frilling upon btu-e flesli. 
 
 Thinking it high time to interfere. I called for Powysawnny 
 and the elephant doctor, suid snatching up a lantern, we nm do^Ti 
 the hill towjinl the Mulcer camp. Tlie place was in tot;il d;u-k- 
 ness, but the sounds which met our eai*s plainly indicated that the 
 ]\Iulcei*s had gotten up a little hades of their own. Our sudden 
 appe:in\uce upon the scene, with a loud cjill for "order" fivm the 
 doctor, caused most of the ^Iulcei"s to fall back, but the principals 
 in the fight paid no attention. We soon pulled them apart, how. 
 ever, and commanded tliem to keep the peace. The boy Moreeah, 
 
A MKMOIiAlU.K KLKIMIANT IIIINI'. 207 
 
 liad \)ecn piiniHlicd inowt. of all, wliicih alTordiuI luc no little satiH- 
 faction, for ho had always been the wornt griunbler in my gang, 
 and made mo the most trouble. More than once I was tempted to 
 thrash him myself. After considerable trouble the camp was re- 
 stored to a peace footing, and all hands settled down for the night. 
 The next morning, while making up the pac^ks, I had a (^hill, 
 which of course was followed by fever and a splitting headache. 
 Can it be possible, I asked myself, that I am to lose that eloijhant 
 skin on account of fever? It really did seem possible. Nothing 
 short of my presence and assistance could save it from ruin within 
 the next twenty-four hours. As my fever increased, I began to be 
 discouraged. Doraysawmy finished making up the packs, consist- 
 ing of the small tent, necessary provisions, and about a hundred 
 pounds of salt and alum. When all was ready for a start I called 
 up the men and told them we were ready, whereupon they sat 
 down upon the ground, and all but Channa refused point blank to 
 go ! Here was a pretty situation for a man with the fever upon 
 LimI 
 
CHAPTER XIX. 
 
 END OF THE ANIMALLAI CAMPAIGN. 
 
 Balky Mulcers. — Work on the Elephant again. — Wild Beast versus Tramp and 
 Burglar.— My Mulcers go on a Strike.— Playing a Lone Hand. — Bringing 
 the Men to Terms. — A Bloodless but Complete Victory.— Another Tiger 
 about.— Treatment of the Elephant Skin.— The March out to Sungam. — 
 The Season. — The Last of my Hunting Gang. — Descent from the Hills in 
 a Storm. — Paradise Lost. — Fever Again. — Good-by to the Animallais. — 
 My Collection of Mammals. 
 
 The lazy rascals knew there was hard work ahead, and I was soon 
 to leave the hills, and having accumulated a goodly number of 
 rupees in my service they shrank from further exertion. This, too, 
 in the face of the fact that I had doubled the wages of each man 
 on the evening previous ! When we started on the hunt I prom- 
 ised the men a present of five rupees each when we had killed an 
 elephant and skinned it, and the men demanded their money then 
 and there, declaiming they would not go a step unless I paid it. 
 Knowing full well they would immediately desert me if I complied, 
 I firmly refused their demand, and declared that unless they all 
 went with me, and at once, none of them would ever receive a single 
 anna of the prize money. 
 
 They were stubborn as mules, and refused to stir. In the pres- 
 ence of them all, I called up a messenger and told Doraysawmy to 
 order him, in their hearing, to start at once for Animallai village, 
 and bring me ten chucklers (tanners) before night. He understood 
 my game, and started at once, apparently on the errand. Ani- 
 mallai village was twenty miles away, and before a messenger could 
 go and bring help from there, the skin of my elephant would be 
 ruined by decomposition. An uncured elephant skin cannot lie 
 long in hot weather without spoiling. AVhile Doraysawmy and 
 the elephant doctor were wTangHug with the Mulcers, the sun kept 
 climbing higher and higher above the tree tops, and I knew that a 
 few hours more would seal the fate of the skin I had akeady worked 
 to hard for. 
 
END OF THE ANIMALLAI CAMPAIGN. 209 
 
 My little ruse set the men to thinking. Their wives soon found 
 out the situation, and with lame Vera to back them, came across 
 the river to where the men squatted sullenly ai'ouud the door of 
 my hut, and attacked them with a perfect volley of abuse for their 
 laziness and stupidity in throwing away their claims upon the sahib's 
 rupees. 
 
 The combined pressure was more than the men could stand, 
 and Doraysawmy soon announced their willingness to go. By the 
 time they had theu* packs ready I had passed the turning-point in 
 my fever, but felt miserably ill. Knowing, however, that if I 
 showed how I felt, the men would refuse to go a step, and that I 
 must get to that elephant or lose it, I took a stick to lean upon, and 
 started on ahead at a snail's pace, with my brain throbbing and 
 jumping at every step. I determined to walk as far as possible, 
 and if I gave out entirely, would be carried the rest of the way. 
 The day was clear and fine, I bathed my head in every stream we 
 crossed, rested about twenty times, and finally climbed up the 
 steep hill-side to the scene of the wreck. 
 
 By that time I felt much better, and without the loss of a 
 moment, we got out our knives and went to work. We had a few 
 hours of daylight left, and all worked like beavers. I had Channa 
 and two others cut off the head and skin it carefully, while the 
 rest of us — we were the^ seven in all — skinned the feet and cleaned 
 the inside of the entire skin, removing from it a quantity of adher- 
 ent flesh. Half an hour before sunset we had the entire skin ready 
 for the preservatives. At that time it weighed not less than nine 
 hundred pounds (I believe eleven hundred would be nearer the 
 mark !), being in many places an inch and a quarter in thickness. 
 
 With a brush, I washed the skin over on both sides with a strong 
 solution of arsenical soap and water, and then sprinkled salt over 
 it in liberal quantities and rubbed it in vigorously with a flat stone. 
 Both sides were treated in this way, after which we folded it up 
 compactly and let it lie to absorb the preservatives. At sunset the 
 skin was safe. 
 
 Then we pitched the little tent, slung my hammock inside, the 
 men made a lair for themselves under a clump of bamboos close 
 by, we ate our suppers and turned in. 
 
 During the night we heard elephants trumpeting in the valley 
 
 below us, reminding me of the distant band-music one often hears 
 
 in a city on summer evenings. This led me to wonder how many 
 
 elephants, tigers, bears, deer, and wild boars were at that moment 
 
 14 
 
!^10 TWv^ Vv vi:-; IN I m- HNi;i.K. 
 
 NYjViVvltM'ing a\vnt tho »lark foitvst \\itlut\ u utile's nulius of owi 
 K'^\\\\\\ A ^\hhUv nun\btM\ bewviui vloubt, onou^h to mako u\v 
 j^v^uitxr »\uuUitn\ j^txvhrtivj, at tho lw.w tho\ii:»ht of Innng^ thwtx Bwt 
 isv^ft\v ! WiUi l>«\'i5*ts }Mv far hotter oo\u|\v»\\ than the vli"viukoi\ wmglist. 
 tho t.hiovos. bmyhw?*, xuvvuvtuu'vos nuvl »uui\Unv»-s nv1u> smnxnind 
 ^■\ni v»\ tUo oitv. <vr tho tnuups, tHvmlviuitii^' jUI thoso d\sj»givt\'»Mo ww 
 iv»tio\\H, who infost tho innuitrv i^vuonUlN-. If I mw to ohvH>so Ihv- 
 twtHxn tj'jMwp iv»\vl tigtvr. 1 NviU ssj^y. ^ivo uvo tho t\iivr ovovy tinio, fv>r 
 ho is far uvvnv honovst and ivspootal^U^ j>s a }^\^uoiul thiiig, fiU' losa 
 iVYOi\^\>t\»l, and a Ivttor momlw of j^vvioty ovory \v^v>»". 
 
 W<> had savtHi tho skm ivf v>«v <^lojvhw\t» w \v<vi\> iu a fair \>-j\j' to 
 do sv^ at h^vjst, ln»t thow \v^uai\u\l tho tas^k of ovitt.in^^- out tl\o Ivwos 
 tx( tl>o sskoh^toti alsvv Ovn* animal huvl bo<ni vloavl tluvo day^ anvl ho 
 Ih^uu tv> siuvoll hko l,aj5ar\»!!» iu tho svpulohiv. Tho oaivass hsul 
 Ihhhmuo a |vrt\H't an\u\ouia-^vnomtvxr vvu a lai^v svalo }U\d tho vnjHvr 
 Jiivxvu Kvaiuo ahnvvst OYt\r|Hnvori\vg. It \v?ws utwj^wy to mit out tho 
 lHn\t>*> Yory miiv^kU. or rtvlYa\v».\\l dtwuwiHVsitiou >\\ndd yv^vy ssvHni 
 ivwvhn* it iu\jHv»JKilvU\ 
 
 My Kn* aud I \yow up at d{\Ylm\>Uv, and aft or driukiw^' a pint 
 ivf jiwxl !sti\M\>i' i\>tYtH> T oaIh\l tho tuon. Tnsst^vul of gvtt.\i\j^- up auvl 
 pwiwvin^- tv> ^Yvn•k. thoy nxoivly si^t up and sstaxwl; at tuo in a siloopy. 
 stuivid YYH^Y'. Yvitliout otYoviiY^' to oWy. IXvray^YYiny o\hort«\l 
 thoiu lunsiikly tv^ gx^t up and ^v to yyvm^K. fv^r tho oaivasssi \Yas Ih^ 
 giwuiii^^ tv^ sjuoU Kad. 
 
 Th«» nxou wplitsl, 'vHow oax» \Yt> YYwrk v>u that sstinViu^^ thiu^? 
 1% wottlvl tujilkO our stvvtwaohs ssuok ! " Moi\wt;n\ thoy vi<vlaivv^ thoy 
 had ^Mily a^i"^Hl to w\xi*k ivu tlio siikiu. aud that w»s dvvuo ; thoy divl 
 uot i"^v tv^ \Yv\rk iM\ that thvu^ji' fvxr o\iiht aixuas a day ! Thou, iu 
 iwy luvvst v\vn\tnanvUt\4;" tnannor I ^v.inu\andt\\ t.hou\ tv^ j^vt up auvl 
 tvolp itt«\ I v\n\\n\anvit\l in ^s^xUxnvhd sstylo, but thoy Ywndvhxt olnn- ! 
 Thoy u\owl\ gHat\l at u\o in suUoii ssiUnxotx jitublvrn as iuxiU^sii. auvl 
 aft*cr a YYhilo l!*y dv^wu to slo^^p a^^u. 
 
 It wai» a x>^ulai* striko, f\\Mw sho<t>r laiaiut^^iii!^ and NYa?i jvrt\vtlY' 
 €*x»s^>watitv^\ !!>i\ould I tak<> a stout stiok ai\d attonipt to thi-ash 
 thwu iutv^ oKxliouvv ? If I divi th^y would <L>f a vwrtaiuty run aYxi\v, 
 ai\d that YYVuUl Iv a calaiuvty iudo^i I thvMight v>f a xuildor aud 
 few- Ivttor ivlau. althou^i^h I <.vvild uot oxjwt *uy \v*sult$ ftwiu it 
 uutil thtx noxt day. An lndiai\ uati\>;> i* ptvud and iu!!5v\lowt so lon^ 
 a» his stotuaoh is full aud ho has yvu iu his jv\Yor ; hut whou it is 
 wuptv, h^ is yvYur hmuW<i> sorvai\t I tvxld l\M*aY-^wu\y K» taki? no 
 fortl^ notion ot' th«? m<3>a iu any way, and aft* r shai^vjoiu^ th« 
 
MNI> <)\' I'll 10 ANIMAI,I,AI <tAMI'AI<m. 311 
 
 \vli<)l<< Mcl, of Iviiiv<!M, I lollod lip my ulnovJiH, (riivo my olfiuiioiint 
 l(()iv<t to I4iis|>(tii<l work for iJio <Ihj, itiid vv«tiii iili IJki liiifo nircaMii tui 
 (iii(.^(irly iiH if ii< htid boon ii ]>Iiiin-])ii(l<liiifJf. It wiiH lii|di l,iiii<\ for 
 il, wiiH iiIiiiohI. roiuly l.o wiilli uwiiy of il,H own lUM^ord. 
 
 II, WIIH not Doru^Hiiwiiiy'ii duly io <l(» work of Mini, kind, aiid, 
 l)(»iii^( my <50()k, 1 fjfroaily pn^forrod thai ho Hhoiild iioi, ; biit ilu» 
 faifliful follow ('(ntld not Hfaiid it fo hoo Ihh maHl.<!r work al(nio. 
 Jio throw ofV liin ja,<-k<tt, lit hin |>ipo, rollod Win hK^ovoh 1ii(;;h up an<l 
 foil to work on tlio Hi<lo opponito nnv 'l^lio IVIiilt^crH look(td on in 
 wondor. Wo workod liko a oon[)lo of Htttam on({iii<n^, and tiio llt^xli 
 rollod ofl' tho Hkolotoii in (ihiinkH half uh hir^-^o aH oiu'HoIvoh. I^'roni 
 tJino to tiirio, I lirod up with ItaHM'aloand jtort wino, and tho lon^rr 
 tlio fovor kopt away tlio liardor I worked. 'I'lio MiiIcoih liiy tlioro 
 within iiwonty yardH of uh, vvraj)i)od in IJioir <;lotliH, Hl<i«ipin|^ tlio 
 hIo(^P of iniKxufiKMv 
 
 |{y four o'oloctk w<( had tho ontiro l)ody and jutlvin roii('ho<l out, 
 und tho woi'Ht wiiH ov(!r. Tlion tlut MiiNmim (^ot ii|», yawn«Ml, nhook 
 out tlioir olotliH and ntartod down U> work. Wo took no notioo of 
 thom until tho (irHt oonuvr picikod up u knife, und thou I bawled 
 out at tlni top of my voioo, 
 
 " Drop that knifo I " 
 
 Ho droppod it. Ho did not undorntand tho wordn, but tlio tono 
 und f^onturo woro unniintakablo. 'I'lio JVluhiorH w(!ro aHtoninhod. 
 
 " lint wo aro {joinf^ to woik ! " tluty naid to Doraynawniy. 
 
 "Tho sahib HiiyH you Hhan't touch thin clophuJit," ho ropliod in 
 u Hava{fo tono. 
 
 " Well, thon wo will RO ! " 
 
 T]\(') boy told mo what thoy Huid, und In thoir own lungungo I 
 told th(im, " (h), you raH(;alH ! " 
 
 Thon Huid DorayHawmy imj)r(!HHivoly, "If y<ni MiihiorH ffo o(lf 
 und louvo tho wahib alono in Iho jiin;jl<!, 'I'hoobald Hahib will (m'vo 
 ouch ono of you Hix monthn in jail ! " 
 
 'I'horo wan far moro truIJi than jxxitry in that ntatiimont, and tho 
 mon know it wo,ll. Wo know thoy would not daicj to }.^o unhiiiH I 
 abuHod thorn. Homohow, lOuropfian Hportnmon and Govornmcint 
 f)ni<!orH liavo all nativoH ho thorouf^hly trained that thoy have a 
 wholoHomo four of tho oonHO<iuoiuu'H whon thoy aro tonij>t<!d (o 
 abandon a whito man in tho jiuiglo. UHually thoy will not do it 
 undor any oirouniHtanc^iiH, for I romomlxir that whon 1 wantod tho 
 Mudumallay ('hotti(!H to loavo mo alono with a doad ]>ull luHon 
 while thoy went after moro mon, they rofiiHod point blank und 
 
212 TWO YEAKS IX THE JUXGLE. 
 
 obliged me to accompany tlicin. The Mulcers feared a day of reck- 
 oning would come, so tliey did not dare leave mo in the lurcli. 
 
 At night, while my boy Avas prepai*ing my snpper, the men tim- 
 idly asked him for rice. We always kept the rice in my tent, and 
 served it out every night, with their salt, tobacco, and money. To 
 save trouble, I paid my men their wages every day. Their request 
 was brought to me, and putting on an awful look I said " No ! " 
 
 Then the men were stricken with penitence and confessed theu' 
 sins, saying they had been very bad, their heads were all -v^Tong, 
 and they would never be so lazy agaui. But they got neither rice 
 nor tobacco. As they Avere squatting around the door of my tent, 
 watching every mouthful I took at supper-time, a happy thought 
 stiiick me. I told my boy, and he went almost beside himself. 
 He told the IN [ulcers to "bring the arrack cup," and they said 
 " Oh ! the sahib is going to give us arrack ! " How they smiled, 
 and smacked their lips ! They brought the ciip instantly, I took 
 out a bottle of arrack, uncorked it, and poured out a good drink, 
 looked at the men and saw that they eagerly followed my move- 
 ments, then handed the cup to Doraysa■^^ny. He drank it otf, and 
 smacked his lips fervently several times, while I quickly corked the 
 bottle and put it back in the box. A murmur of mingled surprise, 
 disappointment, and remonstrance arose from the group outside, 
 and presently the men went slowly and sadly away to their own 
 lire. 
 
 The next morning the Mulcers awoke hungiy. They immedi- 
 ately came to me and announced that they would work if I would 
 give them something to eat. I replied, '"How can I give you food 
 when you do not work ? You must work before you eat my rice ! " 
 
 Seeing there was no help for it, they took the knives and fell to 
 work upon the half-cleaned elephant bones as though their souls 
 had yeju'ned for that business. I sent Doray iind Channa oli* to 
 Toony for fifty pounds of salt, and all day I stood over the remain- 
 ing men, scowling fiercely but saying not a word, like a veritable 
 overseer of slave times, gxinding their knives at intervals, and 
 watchmg their movements. 
 
 I never saw men more devoted to their work. They could not 
 even spare time to talk to each other, except now and then to speak 
 in a low tone of " conjee " (rice soup), with the reverence accorded 
 to the name of a departed friend. "When sunset came I told 
 them to stop work ; and after the knives had been cleaned and put 
 away, wood collected for my camp-fii-e, and water brought from the 
 
END OF THE ANIMALLAI CAMPAIGN. 213 
 
 little rhailet, I served out a day's rations of rice and tobacco. They 
 Lad had forty-eight hours between meals, and never were strikers 
 more efiectually cured. From that time until I left the hills, they 
 worked faithfully, with never a grumble, and when on final settle- 
 ment, I pai'tly carried out my threat by stopping a rupee out of each 
 man's prize money, they did not offer a word of complaint, but 
 frankly admitted they had used me very ill. 
 
 The next da}' being my birthday, I took a holiday, and wrote 
 up my journal. The only incident of the day was our hearing a 
 tiger roaring in one of the ra\iues below us, not more than a 
 quarter of a mile away. I declined to go after him in that thick 
 underbrush, for had I gone in his neighborhood, he would prob- 
 ably have done a httle hunting on his own account. 
 
 I had the men unroll the elephant skin, and we found it full of 
 water, but beginning to harden quite properly, and after keeping 
 them at work half a day, thinning down the thicker portions with 
 their knives, we freely applied salt and powdered alum together 
 upon both sides, and again folded it up. I found by experiments 
 that the best way to preserve a very thick skin without a bath in 
 which to soak it, is to treat it with salt first and let it lie a day or 
 two before putting on any alum. Salt strikes through a thick hide 
 where diy alum only goes half-way, leaving the other side to de- 
 compose. After decomposition has been arrested by salt, then it is 
 best to apply powdered alum to hai'den the skin and dry it up com- 
 pletely. 
 
 After the men got through with their little strike, I had them 
 clean all the elephant's bones very thoroughly, and after soaping 
 them they were tied up into bimdles and made ready to carry out. 
 By the time we were ready to break up camp and move to Sungam, 
 a gang of about twenty coolies arrived from Animallai to assist in 
 carrying out our elephant skin and skeleton. Each of the large 
 sections was slung imder a couple of stout poles, and eight men 
 were required for each section. Four more men carried the skin 
 of the head, while my Mulcers carried my camp equipage and a few 
 bones of the skeleton. Doraysawmy again showed his estimable 
 qualities in helping me manage the packing up. It was a queer 
 procession that marched down that steep hill and through the 
 forest toward Sungam. This time I brought up the rear, to see that 
 no valuable article was dropped and lost. 
 
 When we reached Sungam, the Mulcers had scarcely time to 
 put down their loads before they were set upon by their wives^ 
 
214 TWO YEAKS IX THE JUNGLE. 
 
 who had heard all about the strike, and they wei-o ix>undly ab\ised 
 for their lazinesis and neglect of their families. The men looked 
 thoivughly ashamed, and eaoh took his leetuit? very meekly. Poor 
 Avretohes I it ^Yas proK-ibly the ^iist time in their lives they ever 
 felt fat enongh to strike, and they wanted to see how it wowld feel 
 to defy a white man and refuse to wc>rk. 
 
 The next day, part of the men went back and bi-ought awiiy all 
 that i-emaiued of the skeleton, while I set the remaining ten. who 
 belonged to the chuekler caste — tannei"s — at work \ipon the skin to 
 fhin it down still moi-e. They all worked, \ipon it three days, in which 
 time th.\v out off sevei-al Inmdrevl pounds of the tough fibre. We now 
 kept the skin spivad out all the time, and it began to dn*- rapidly. 
 
 Having succeeded in adding to my collection of Indiivn mam- 
 mals the skin of a fuU-sized male elephant in perfect condition, 
 I was i-eady to leave the hills. It was then the fii"st we^k in De- 
 cember, and I had had all the hunting I wanted. Mr. Thei^bald 
 was gone, and so weit> nearly all the people attached to the Forest 
 Department. We wei"© then in the middle of the northeast monsoon, 
 it i-aiucvl a gi-eat deal, and the forest, being now almost deserted, 
 set^me*.! ivally gloomy. On the other hand, however, the elephsvnts 
 and bison had come down in great numbt^i-^s fi\>m the higher i-anges, 
 and were quite thick all at\">\ind Sung^am and Toonacadavoo, where 
 they wei-e seldom seen «tt*lier in the season. In many localities 
 whei"e, four months pa-evious, I had hunted throxigh grass not more 
 than a foot high, it was then all of five or six feet. It always made 
 me feel uneasy to walk through grass as high as my head, w^hich 
 eo\ild conceal a crouching tiger so closely one might ahnost stum- 
 ble over it befoi-e seeing it. It is oiily the abundance of game that 
 presei-ves the defenceless hill-pec^ple fivm being eaten one after 
 another, and I have often wondei"ed that the game-kiUiug tigers do 
 not occasionally strike down a man by mistake. There are plenty 
 of tigei-s on the Animallais, for we often saw theii- pugs, but the 
 cover for them is so continitoxis, and game so plentiful, that regular 
 tiger hunting is out of the question, and perhaps always will be. 
 
 As soon as the elephant skin was dry enough to be transported, 
 1 sent for three bandies to meet me at the foot of the hills, and 
 thi-ee more to cai-t my collection and camp eqmpage down. The 
 day we were to start, we loaded the carts and were almost ready 
 for a move, when a terrific rain-storm came up and delayed us for 
 some hoxu"S. AWut noon it cleared up, however, and being very 
 anxious to make a move, we set out. Mv M\ilv.vi-s maivhed with us 
 
END or THE AlSriMALLAI CAMPAIGN. 215 
 
 for about five miles, to sliow their good will, and even in spite of 
 their late waywardness I felt quite sorry to part from them. They 
 were bound to me by the ties which only a hunter can understand, 
 and I shall always have the " man-and-a-brother " feeling for my 
 faithful and coui-ageous comjoanions of the chase. Together we had 
 been in at the death of many a fine animal. They had always shown 
 themselves plucky in the face of danger, and except in two instan- 
 ces, they had always been faithful and obedient. They begged me 
 to come back soon and shoot some more elephants, and loudly la- 
 mented that I needed to go away at all. Poor wretches ! it will 
 be a long time, I fancy, before they have another such a " continual 
 feast " of bison, deer, pig, and monkey as they grew fat upon dur- 
 ing my four months' shooting on those hills. They are too poor 
 to own fire-arms, or even to use them, hence the greater j)art of the 
 time they hunger for flesh with game all around them. 
 
 "When our train reached the top of the pass and began to de- 
 scend the winding, slippery, and dangerous road, heavy clouds 
 swept against the mountain side, enveloping us in their disagree- 
 able mist, which very soon gave way to more serious moisture as 
 the rain began to descend upon us in blinding sheets. Luckily I 
 had packed into one of the bandies the articles which it was abso- 
 lutely necessary to keep dry, and this load I effectually covered 
 with my tent-cloth and rubber blankets. Of course we were all 
 drenched to the skin, and the rain was very cold. Half-way down 
 the ghaut, one of our bandies took a sudden slide in rounding a 
 sharp curve, and came within two inches of going over a precipice 
 and smashing the whole outfit. The road had become a running 
 tream and progress was very unsafe. 
 
 Thus was our Paradise lost. Like the pair that was driven 
 from Eden, we went down the rugged road in storm and darkness, 
 into the cheerless and inhospitable plains. How different from the 
 gloom surrounding our departure was the balmy sunshine of our 
 first ascent, when all nature seemed to smile. 
 
 Just at dark we reached Ardivarum, at the foot of the ghaut, 
 thoroughly bedraggled, and chilled to the bone. The other ban- 
 dies were waiting for us, and we lost no time in transferring our 
 freight to them. Doraysawmy was attacked with a severe chill 
 which made his teeth chatter for two hours. Luckily we found 
 at Ardivarum a fourth bandy, and I struck a bargain with the 
 driver to take my boy and me to Animallai. We put into it our 
 camp-chest and box of clothes, and, leaving the heavily loaded carts 
 
216 TWO YY.Xnf^ IN THE JUNOLE. 
 
 to follow on, wo set o\it. It was a miserably cold and tedious ride ol 
 ten miles, l>ut we readied our liaven at last, and at midnight landed 
 in a good, tight bungalow. "We soon put on dry clothes, and aftef 
 a hot supper we found there was yet something left to live for. 
 
 But our ducking cost us detu-ly, or it did me at least. The next 
 day but one, after my bandies had arrived, everything been safely 
 housed, and the elephant skin folded up permanently, I began to 
 shake and burn. During the next live days the fever shook me up 
 more violently than ever before. The quinine I took to check it 
 ftcted every time as an emetic, and I cast up accounts about six or 
 seven times daily. My boy became quite alarmed at last, and thi'eat- 
 ened to tjike the matter into his own hands, and have me cai'ried 
 forthwith to Ooimbatore to be doctored ; but I persuaded him to 
 wait a little. I say persuaded, because I had no power to prevent 
 his having mo carried anywhere. A famine officer, Mr. Huddle- 
 ston, stationed in Psdachy, heai'd of my unfortunate predicament 
 and came fortJiwith to see me. I had previously met him under 
 very pleasant circumstances, and it was with great difficulty that I 
 prevented his carrying me ofl', nolcnif voJens, to his bungtUow, to be 
 doctored and ctu'od for. I pei-suaded him also to give me a Httle 
 time, and in a few days my fever begiin to abate. IMr. Huddleston 
 insisted upon diA'iding his choicest stores with me, and kept me 
 sitpplied Avith the best th6 country atibrded. He, too, had hunted 
 " ravine deer," black buck, and nil-gtii ai"ouud Etawah in the ravines, 
 and had bagged soA'criil leopards in the same district. He was a 
 very keen sportsman, and while I was convalescing he used to 
 gallop over on horseback and spend his spare time with me, talking 
 of the chaso, which I verily believe helped me more than medicine. 
 
 I remained at Animalliu imtil I was able to get about again, and 
 then I gave my collection a linal overhauling and packed it up in 
 some large packing-cases which I procured from Coimbatore.* 
 
 * I found that my Animallai collection contained the following mammals, 
 tkins or skeletons: — 2 Elephants (Hhp/uis Jndu^tis) ; 2 Tigers (/<■//* tign's); 
 1 Jungle cat (Felii <•/(<(»»<) ; 1 Tree oat {Paradoxuriis musanga) ; 8 Bison (B(.)s 
 gauriitt)', 4 INhmtjao {Ct'n'uhis aiiirii^)', 5 Samlnir deer (ii'H^'(J amioUlis) \ 14 
 Spotted deer (di'tus axis); 1 Neilgherry wild goat {IToiiifragits hyl<\-rius) ; 
 1 Black bear {Crstis loMatus) ; 3 "Wild hoar (^^/w Lulia/s)', 3 Madras langnra 
 (StunnopitJit'ciis leufopri/miun)) ; 38 Black langnrs (Stinnopithtrus ciwiiUaius) ; 1 
 Madras monkey {iFdcacu^ radiiitiis) ; 1 Flying squirrel (Ptrromys jviait mta) ', 
 5 Malabar squirrels (Si't'tintft Malohirh'tis) ; iJ» Flying foxes ( Pit'mpus £kU 
 tranfuii) ; '^ Indian haros (Lepus iii'gHcM'i!). 
 
 I 
 
END OF THE ANIAIALLAI CAMPAIGN. 217 
 
 The elephant skin I had carefully folded before drying, so that I 
 was able to pack the whole of it in a box measuring 2 feet 6 inches 
 by 2 feet 6 inches by 2 feet, and the whole weighed only two 
 hundred and ten pounds. I may add here that in 1880 this skin 
 was mounted at Professor Ward's establishment in Kochester, by 
 another taxidermist, Mr. J, F. D. Bailly, and myself, requiring 
 four months' labor, and the old tusker who fell under such ro- 
 mantic circumstances on the Animallai slope now stands, still 
 "monarch of all he surveys," in the Museum of Comparative Zo- 
 ology, of Harvard University, Cambridge, Mass. 
 
 At last the day came for me to leave, bag and baggage, for 
 Madras. Usually, in my wanderings in the tropics, when the time 
 comes for me to turn my back upon a given locality, I am able to 
 do so without a sigh, or a single wish ever to return and have my 
 experiences over again. Very often, I am glad to think that I am 
 leaving a place forever ; but not so with the Animallais. When 
 the time came for me to take my last look at the precipitous range 
 which loomed up like a wall all along the south, shrouded in a soft 
 blue vapor, I felt the sad conviction that never again would I carry 
 a rifle into such another hunter's paradise as that. The jungles 
 had treated me kindly in yielding up so much, and from that day 
 until my last I shall always have a longing to fight those battles 
 over again. 
 
 By dint of the greatest determination, I managed to hold my 
 head up long enough to ship my cases of specimens at Coimbatore, 
 and take the train for Madras. I was not able to call on the Col- 
 lector, Mr. Wedderbum, to express my thanks for his official kind- 
 ness to me, and to report my success, but was obliged to make my 
 acknowledgments in writing. After enjoying another fever fit at 
 Madras, I shipped my Southern India collection, five wagon-loads 
 of big boxes, for Rochester, via London, on a Peninsula and Orien- 
 tal steamer, bestowed my blessing and twenty rupees backsheesh 
 upon Doraysawmy, the gentleman's god, and took passage on a 
 steamer bound for Ceylon. 
 
CHAPTER XX. 
 
 THE INDIAN ELEPHANT. 
 
 Geographical Distribution. — Indian and African Species Compared. — The Cey« 
 Ion Elephant. — The Capture of Wild Elephants. — Breeding in Captivity.— 
 Gestation of the Elephant. — Duration of Life. — Growth and Height. — Size 
 of Tusks. — Classes of Elephants. — Uses. — Table of Values. — Intellectual 
 Capacity and Temper. — Elephants at Work in a Timber Forest. — Feeding 
 Elephants. — Cost of Keeping. — "Must," or Temporary Insanity — "Rogue " 
 Elephants. — How an Elephant Kills a Man. — Swimming Power of Ele- 
 phants. 
 
 DuEiNG my stay in Southern India I was so frequently brought in 
 contact with elephants, both tame and wild, that I was able to study 
 them with some care. As a fitting appendix to the record of my 
 experience in the "Elephant Mountains" (AnimaUais), I will en- 
 deavor to give a brief ske1;ch of this interesting animal. 
 
 According to the classification of most naturahsts, there are only 
 two species of elephants now living, the Indian and the African, both 
 of which are very much smaller than their extinct ancestors, the 
 mammoth {EIe2?has p?-i?nog'e»!»5) of Europe and Asia, and the Ele~ 
 phas ganesa of Northern India. The Indian vai'iety (Elephas In- 
 dicus) is found in a wild state in most of the large forest tracts 
 from the Terai, at the foot of the Himalayas, to within a few miles 
 of Cape Comorin, and also throughout Assam, Burmah, and Siam, 
 and almost the entire length of the Malay Peninsula. In Southern 
 India, elephants are most abundant on the Animallai Hills, in the 
 Wainaad Forest, Coorg, and part of Mysore, particularly the Billiga- 
 rungan Hills. In the north, they are common in the Bhootan HUls, 
 Assam, and the mountains of Chittagong, and in the Territory of 
 Selangore, near the lower end of the Malay Peninsula they are so 
 numerous and mischievous that an elephant hunter is welcomed by 
 the officers of the government and the natives as well. Elephants 
 are also found in Ceylon in great numbers, and in Sumatra and 
 Borneo, of which hereafter. 
 
THE INDIAN ELEPHANT. 219 
 
 The African elephant is still abundant in Africa generally south 
 of the Sahara, except that near the Cape they have been driven back 
 into the interior by the colonial settlements, extending from the 
 Orange River to the Limpopo, and Ukewise on the west from Sene- 
 gambia to the mouth of the Niger. On every side their numbers 
 are decreasing with great rapidity, and those that remain are being 
 rapidly crowded toward the heart of Africa. Even there the na- 
 tives make war upon them, as far as they are able, for the sake of 
 bheir ivory. Next to the traffic in slaves, ivory-hunting is the 
 most important business carried on in the interior of the continent. 
 Like the gold-hunters of California, those who engage in it pene- 
 trate the most remote and dangerous wildernesses, braving the 
 dangers of death from starvation, fever, and poisoned arrows in their 
 adventurous search for tusks. 
 
 In a brief comparison of the two species, the following are the 
 most striking points of difference : 
 
 The African elephant is undeniably larger than the Indian. Sir 
 Samuel Baker informs us that both males and females of the former 
 average about one foot taller than the latter, of which not more than 
 one male in a thousand attains a vertical shoulder height of ten feet 
 The African elephant has a convex forehead, that amounts to a de- 
 cided hump ia the middle of the face, the head is peaked at the top, 
 and the ears are of such enormous size that they meet and overlap 
 each other above the shoulders. The Indian variety has a very 
 broad, concave forehead, and the head has a deep, central furrow 
 lengthwise along the top, by reason of which the crown is surmounted 
 by two large rounded humps. The ears are not quite half the size 
 of those which literally cover the entire neck and fore-shoulders of 
 the African individual, and the species are easily distinguishable 
 by this point alone. There are various anatomical differences which 
 it is unnecessary to state here. 
 
 The Ceylon elephant differs from that of India proper in so 
 many points as to necessitate the belief that it is a distinct variety. 
 Hundreds of new species have been founded, and acceptably, upon 
 far slighter differences than we find here. In the first place, while 
 nine out of every ten male Indian elephants have tusks, not one 
 out of every fifty Ceylon elephants possesses them, and Sir Samuel 
 Baker goes so far as to assert that they are present in only one ani- 
 mal out of every three hundred. The Ceylon elephant has twenty 
 pairs of ribs and twenty dorsal vertebrae, against nineteen of each 
 in the Indian species, while the latter possesses one more sacral 
 
220 TWO TEAES IN THE JUNGLE. 
 
 vertebra than the former. The Ceylon elephant is, without doubi^ 
 of smaller average size than its congener of the peninsula, and I be- 
 lieve it could be proven that the same difference in size exists be< 
 tween these two that is found between the Indian and the African. 
 
 Strange to say, the elephant which inhabits Sumatra exactly re- 
 sembles that of Cej'lon in point of structure, and many eminent 
 naturalists regard this coincidence as strong evidence in support of 
 the theory that the two islands were once connected by a vast con- 
 tinent. It is, however, much easier to account for the presence of 
 the Ceylon elephant in Sumatra by supposing it to have been orig- 
 inally transported from the former island in a domestic state and 
 afterward allowed to run wild. 
 
 The Indian elephant in a wild state is now an inhabitant of 
 Northeastern Borneo, but it is highly probable that in a few centu- 
 ries all the records will be lost or obscured which now inform us 
 that more than a hundred years ago the East India Company sent 
 some elephants as a present to the Sultan of Sulu, and he, fearing 
 the huge beasts would devour the whole annual crop of liis little 
 island, had them landed on the coast of Borneo, at Cape Unsang, 
 where they were to be cared for by his subjects. It is easy to con- 
 jecture how long an indolent Malay would exert himself to feed an 
 utterly useless animal with the appetite of an elephant, and how 
 soon the animals would be turned loose to feed themselves in the 
 jungle ; nor is it difficult to imagine the naturalists of the twenty- 
 third century regarding the presence of the Indian elephant in 
 Borneo as proof positive that that great island was once connected 
 with the mainland of Asia and Ceylon by a continent. 
 
 Up to this time, the African elephant has never been systematic- 
 ally captured alive and trained to service by the natives, but in 
 Ceylon, India, Burmah, and Siam, elephant-catching has been car- 
 ried on regularly from time immemorial. About the time of the 
 Enghsh occupation, the island of Ceylon contained, almost beyond 
 question, as many wild elephants as the whole of the peninsula of 
 Hindustan, whole districts being completely overrun with them. 
 Great numbers were caught in corrals, sometimes as many as one 
 hundred and sixty head at a single drive, and even as late as the 
 last decade but one, the number exported annually amounted to 
 an average of one hxmdred and ninety-three. Since the Enghsh 
 occupation, thousands have been slaughtered by sportsmen, and 
 thousands more captured and exported, until finally, in 1870, the 
 Colonial authorities decided that the proper Hmit of destruction 
 
THE USTDIATT ELEPHANT. 221 
 
 had been reached, and a fine was imposed upon the shooting of 
 elephants. 
 
 In former times, elephants were so numerous in Southern India 
 that the Madras Government paid a reward of £7 per liead for their 
 destruction. Had this law remained in force up to this time, it is 
 quite sure there would now be very few of the animals remaining 
 in the Presidency, and their complete extinction would be but a 
 question of a few years. In 1873 an act was passed to prevent 
 their destruction, and they are now protected in all parts of India 
 and Ceylon. 
 
 In Hindustan, elephants have been caught in the Coimbatore 
 District under the direction of the collector, IVIi-. "Wedderburn ; in 
 Mysore by Mr. G. P. Sanderson under government authority and 
 support ; and in Chittagong, also, an annual catch has been made on 
 government account for many years past. Smaller operations have 
 also been conducted by private individuals (natives) in the same 
 region with official sanction. It is far cheaper, and more expedi- 
 tious, to catch elephants for service than to breed and rear them, 
 on account of the fact that an elephant is from fifteen to twenty- 
 five years in coming to maturity. 
 
 The plan pursued in capturing a wild herd is, like the shooting 
 of one's first elephant, very easy to understand, but very difficult 
 to execute. In a tract of forest which is periodically visited by 
 large herds, a spot is selected with reference to the natural advan- 
 tages of the groiind, sach as streams of water, or high banks, and 
 some days or weeks before the elephants are expected, a large force 
 of natives is set to work to build an enclosure. A keddah, as it is 
 termed in India, is constructed by enclosing several acres of forest 
 with a stockade ten to twelve feet high, built of stout posts set 
 close together and strongly braced on the outside, the whole 
 being firmly lashed together with green bark or creepers. At the 
 proper place, usually on an elephant path, a wide gateway is left, 
 and either a heavy gate is made and suspended above the opening, 
 ready to be instantly dropped, or else a number of stout sliding 
 bars are arranged. From each side of the gate, a long guiding 
 wing is built, similar to the stockade itself, the two diverging and 
 extending some distance out into the open forest. 
 
 When a wild herd wanders near enough to this huge trap, and 
 on the gate side, an army of native beaters, from three hundred to 
 two thousand men, with tom-toms, rusty firearms, and brazen 
 throats, surround the elephants on three sides, and by judicious 
 
222 TWO YEARS ITT THE JUNGLE. 
 
 use of their noises, drive them into the enclosure, after which the 
 gate is instantly closed and secured, 
 
 A keddah is never so strongly built but that the larger elephants 
 could break through it anywhere, by a combined and determined 
 rush, and when a herd is caught, the defence of the stockade im- 
 mediately becomes a matter of great importance. The beaters sur- 
 round it with firearms, torches, and long poles, and whenever an 
 attack is threatened upon any given point, the men rally there 
 promptly, and frighten the assailant away. Judging from what I 
 have heard, I should think native music (!) would be a most ex- 
 cellent thing to employ in defending a keddah. It is so thoroughly 
 frightful that I think even the most determined elephant would 
 rim from it. 
 
 When the captives have finally abandoned their frantic efforts to 
 escape, and stand huddled together in a terrified group in the cen- 
 tre of the enclosure, the tame elephants and the noosers are in- 
 troduced at the gate, and one by one the wild ones are singled 
 out and surrounded. Usually three or four tame elephants com- 
 pletely surround one of the others and hold him in his place, while 
 the noosers slip down, quietly tie his feet together with strong, 
 soft ropes, and before he is fully aware of the situation he is ready 
 to be marched out of the k;eddah between two of the tame animals. 
 Most wild elephants are completely tamed, and ready for work, 
 within three or four months after capture, and not unfrequently 
 good-tempered animals can be ridden with safety in a few days. 
 It is, however, a matter requiring more time to bring an elephant 
 up to the perfection of training. Sanderson declares that the lar- 
 gest and oldest elephants are frequently the most easily tamed, aa 
 they are less apprehensive than the younger ones. 
 
 There are other ways in which elephants are caught now and 
 then, namely, in pitfalls and by hunting with tame females. The 
 former method is no longer followed except among the most be- 
 nighted natives, and the latter can succeed only under the most 
 exceptional and favorable circumstances. 
 
 It is so much more economical and expeditious to catch wild 
 elephants and train them, than it would be to breed and rear them 
 in captivity, no particular attention is paid to the latter means of 
 keeping up the supply of serviceable animals. Notwithstanding 
 this, elephants are frequently born in captivity, and have been 
 ever since the days of Pliny. On the Animallais, five were born in 
 one year in the stud belonging to the Forest Department, all of 
 
THE INDIAN ELEPHANT. 223 
 
 which lived. Sanderson mentions the birth of eight calves (be- 
 tween September and November) in a herd of fifty-five elephants 
 he captured in Mysore. Even in the United States, under the most 
 unfavorable circumstances for elephants, two have been born very 
 recently in a menagerie, and are still alive. 
 
 The period of gestation in the elephant is about twenty-two 
 months. The foetus at twelve months is almost jet black, the 
 teeth are destitute of the cementing crusta petrosa, and therefore 
 the enamelled plates, called laminae in the mature molar, are entirely 
 separate from each other, lying one upon the other in the cavity of 
 the jaw. At birth, the baby elephant is from thirty to thirty-six 
 inches high and weighs from one hundred and forty-five to two 
 hundred pounds. All those I have seen, both wild and in captivity, 
 have been of a dark brown color, several shades darker than adult 
 animals, and were usually quite hairy, especially upon the back and 
 head. 
 
 The female elephant reaches the age of puberty at fifteen years, 
 but continues to grow for several years after. An elephant may be 
 said to attain its full growth between the ages of eighteen and 
 twenty-four years in captivity, and between twenty-four and thirty 
 in a wild state. Although there is no possible way of verifying the 
 accuracy of this statement so far as the wUd elephants are con- 
 cerned, it certainly stands to reason that those in captivity, by rea- 
 son of overwork, underfeeding, exposure to the heat of the sun, and 
 irregularities in their treatment, will stop growing much earlier 
 than the wild animals. It is well known that captive elephants stop 
 growing between the ages first mentioned above, and more than 
 this, that elephants reared in captivity seldom reach the extreme 
 limit of size, which is found only in animals captured after their 
 full growth has been attained. It may therefore be made as a gen- 
 eral statement, that the elephant acquires his perfection of form, 
 size, and general physique at about the same age as does a well- 
 developed white man of the temperate zone. 
 
 At sixty years of age the elephant is considered to be in the 
 prime of life. According to Sanderson, experienced natives believe 
 that elephants generally live to about eighty years of age, and but 
 rarely attain an age of one hundred and twenty years ; his own 
 opinion, however, is, that under favorable circumstances the ani- 
 mal attains an age of one hundred and fifty years. 
 
 As is the case with nearly all large animals, the height of the 
 Indian elephant is usually recorded in exceptional figures, which. 
 
224 TWO YEARS IIJT THE JUNaLE. 
 
 being far liiglier than tlie average adult animal, convey an erroneous 
 impression. Even the best scientific \vi*iters are apt to fall into the 
 habit of giving the lai'gest measurements fairly attainable, which 
 therefore brings the average animal far below the standard they set 
 «p. I can scarcely recall an instance of having shot a mammal, 
 «ven out of a score of the same species, which came up to the meas- 
 urements recorded by Jerdon in his "Mammals of India." 
 
 The height of the male Elephas Indicus should be recorded as 
 9 feet 6 inches, vertical measiu-ement, at the shoulder, and the female 
 8 feet, for these figures represent the height of from eight to twelve 
 individuals to be found in every hundred ; in other words, animals 
 which can be seen without searching throughout the length and 
 breadth of India. 
 
 The height of the Indian elephant is neai'ly everywhere recorded 
 as being from 10 to 10|- feet. The lai'gest animal of the species 
 ever measured by reliable hands was a tusker described by Mr. 
 Corse in 1799 as belonging to Asaph-ul-Daula, a former Yizier of 
 Oudh, which reaUy measured 10 feet 6 inches, perpendiculai'ly, at 
 the shoulder. This animal was merely one out of ten thousand, 
 and it would be quite as sensible to measure Chang, and record the 
 height of Chinamen as being seven and a half feet, as to say that 
 the Indian elephant is as tall as the Vizier's giant. 
 
 As furnishing the most J)ositive and accurate information on this 
 point, I tako pleasure in quoting the following paragraphs from 
 Mr. G. P. Sanderson's delightful book, " Thirteen Yeai-s Among 
 the Wild Beasts of India." In this work the author has given us 
 the freshest, fullest, and most accurate information ever penned 
 concerning the Indian elephant, as well as the most chai-ming story 
 of jungle life I have ever read. On page 55 he writes as follows : 
 
 " Out of some hundreds of tame and newly-caught elephants 
 which I have seen in the south of India and in Bengal, also from 
 Burmah and the different parts of India, and of which I have care- 
 fully measured all the lai'gest indiNiduals, I have not seen one 10 
 feet in vertical height at the shoulders. The largest was an ele- 
 phant in the Madras Commissariat stud at Hoonsoor, which meas- 
 ured 9 feet 10 inches. The next largest are two tuskers belonging 
 to his Highness the Maharajah of Mysore, each 9 feet 8 inches 
 captured in Mysore some forty years ago and still alive. 
 
 " Of females, the lai'gest I have measured, two leggy animals in 
 the stud at Dacca, were respectively 8 feet 5 inches, and 8 feet 3 
 inches. As illustrating how exceptional this height is in females, 
 
THE INDIAN ELEPHANT. 
 
 225 
 
 I may say that out of one hundred and forty elephants captured 
 by me in keddahs in Mysore and Bengal in 1874 and 1876, the 
 tallest females were just 8 feet. The above are vertical measure- 
 ments at the shoulder There is little doubt that there 
 
 is not an elephant 10 feet at the shoulder in India." 
 
 Ml'. Corse also makes the following statement : 
 
 " During the war with Tippoo Sultan, of the one hundred and 
 fifty elephants under the management of Captain Sandys not one 
 was 10 feet high, and only a few males 9^ feet high." 
 
 The following table, showing the rate of an elephant's growth, 
 has been compiled from sources of undoubted authenticity — chiefly 
 from the two authors quoted above — and is submitted in the be- 
 lief that the figures are correct. 
 
 Table of Growth of a Male Elephant. 
 
 Period of Life. 
 
 Height at Shoulders. 
 
 Weight. 
 
 At birth 
 
 Feet. Inches. 
 
 2 11 
 
 3 10 
 
 4 6 
 
 5 
 5 5 
 
 5 10 
 
 6 H 
 
 6 4 
 
 7 
 
 8 6 
 
 9 6 
 
 Pounds. 
 
 200 
 
 When one year old 
 
 
 When two years old 
 
 
 When three years old 
 
 940 
 
 When four years old 
 
 
 When five years old 
 
 
 When six years old 
 
 2,725 
 
 When seven years old 
 
 
 When eleven years old 
 
 4,313 
 
 When eighteen years old 
 
 When thirty years old 
 
 8,864 
 
 
 
 As may readily be inferred from the relative size of the species, 
 the African elephant has the larger tusks. The largest tusk taken 
 by Gordon Cumming during his famous hunt for ivory was 10 feet 
 8 inches long and weighed one hundred and seventy-three pounds. 
 I have never seen a well-authenticated record of a larger single 
 tusk, although Cuvier, on hearsay evidence, mentions a tusk sold 
 in Amsterdam as weighing three hun'^red pounds. It was very 
 probably a pair. The tusks of the Indian elephant are, in general 
 terms, about half the avei'age length and weight of the African. The 
 largest tusk ever taken in India, so far as can be ascertained, was 8 
 feet in length and weighed ninety pounds, which may be regarded 
 as one out of ten thousand. The largest taken by Sanderson out 
 of twenty elephants shot, was five feet in length and weighed 
 thirty-seven and one-half pounds, which may justly be considered a 
 15 
 
226 T^vo YEARS i?^ the jungle. 
 
 tusk far above the average size. In a pile of nearly a hxindred Indian 
 elephant tusks which I saw in the Custom House at Bombay, not 
 one measured five feet in length, and most of them were \mder 
 four feet. 
 
 In Hindustan, all male elephants have tusks, except about one 
 out of every ten, which, on account of their absence, is called a 
 " muckna." The tips of the tusks project beyond the Hp of the 
 male animal almost as soon as born, and I have even seen them 
 sho\\-ing very distinctly in a haK-grown fcetus. Sanderson asserts, 
 well supported by the best of evidence, that these baby tusks ai'e 
 never shed, notNNathstanding the common assertion to the contraiy. 
 The female elephants and the mucknas all have miniatiu-e tusks, 
 the points of which at first project a few inches beyond the lip, 
 but they are very soon broken short off at the hp, leaving a rough, 
 jaggvv' end which is much used in barking trees, etc. 
 
 The natives of India divide elephants into tlu-ee very distinct 
 castes, or classes, ^ith as much precision as do the most captious 
 breeders of fancy animals, and all local prices are based upon 
 this classification. Commercially, all tame elephants ai-e di-s-ided 
 into two classes, those for iise, and those for show. For the 
 same reason that every English gentleman of distinction has a 
 long retinue of choice initial letters mai'ching in solemn pro- 
 cession after his name, eveiy Indian prince or nobleman keeps a 
 train of showy elephants to add to his prestige. Lately, however, 
 the elephants, besides being very expensive to keep, have become 
 very high-priced, and the EngUsh Government, with commendable 
 forethought, has commenced to distribute initials among the native 
 i-ajahs and mahai'ajahs to take the place of the animals. I beheve 
 that among the more enlightened natives, " C. S. L" is considered 
 equal to thi-ee fii-st class tuskers. 
 
 All other things being equal, the price paid for an elephant in 
 the Indian market depends almost wholly upon the points of the 
 animal, or, in other words, upon his class. Sanderson says : " Ele- 
 phants are divided by natives into thi-ee castes or breeds, distin- 
 guished by their physical conformation ; these are termed in Bengal, 
 Koomeriah, Dwasala, and Meerga, which terms may be considered 
 to signify thorough-bred, half-bred, and third-rate. 
 
 '* WTiole herds frequently consist of Dwasalas, but never of Koo- 
 meriahs or Meergas alone ; these, I have foimd, occur respectively in 
 the proportion of fi-om ten to fifteen per cent, among ordinai-y 
 elephants. 
 
< 
 
THE IISTDIAX ELEPHANT. 227 
 
 " The Koomeriah, or thorough-bred, takes the first place ; he 
 alone can reach extreme excellence, but all the points required for 
 perfection are very rarely found in one individual. He is, among 
 elephants, what the thorough-bred is among horses, saving that hi& 
 is a natural, not cultivated superiority. The points of the Koo- 
 meriah are ; barrel deep and of great girth ; legs short (especially 
 the hind ones) and colossal, the front pair convex on the front side 
 from the development of muscles ; back straight and flat but slop- 
 ing from shoulder to tail, as an upstanding elephant must be high in 
 front ; head and chest massive ; neck thick and short ; trunk broad 
 at the base and proportionately heavy throughout ; bump between 
 the eyes prominent ; cheeks full ; the eye full, bright, and kindly ; 
 hind-quarters square and plump ; the skin rumpled, thick, inclin- 
 ing to folds at the root of the tail, and soft. If the face, base of 
 trunk, and ears be blotched with cream-colored markings, the an- 
 imal's value is thereby enhanced. The tail must be long but not 
 touch the ground, and be well feathered. 
 
 " The Dwasala class comprises all animals below this standard 
 but which do not present such marked imperfection as to cause 
 them to rank as Meergas, or third-rates ; all ordinary elephants 
 (about seventy per cent.) are Dwasalas. 
 
 "A pronounced Meerga is the opposite to the Koomeriah. He 
 is leggy, lank, and weedy, with an arched, sharp-ridged back, diffi- 
 cult to load and liable to galling ; his trunk is thin, flabby, and 
 pendulous ; his neck long and lean ; he falls off behind ; and his 
 hide is thin. His head is small, which is a bad point in any ele- 
 phant ; his eye is piggish and restless. His whole ajDpearance is 
 unthrifty and no amount of feeding or care makes him look fat. 
 The Meerga, however, has his uses ; from his length of leg and 
 lightness he is generally speedy ; the heavier Koomeriah is usually 
 slow and stately in his paces." * 
 
 In India, elephants still form the most imposing feature of every 
 ceremonial procession which involves a display of the "pride, pomp 
 and circumstance " of a native ruler or prince. Of all created ani> 
 mals, the lordly elephant alone was born to wear splendid trappings 
 of gold cloth surmounted by a magnificent howdah of gold and sil- 
 ver, a perfect diadem in itself, and carry princes upon his back. 
 At such times the king of beasts is fairly crowned, and no monarch 
 in royal purple ever walks with more majestic tread or bears him- 
 
 * Wild Beasts of India, p. 84. 
 
23S 
 
 TAVO \F.\KS IN 'VUV. .ITNOLE. 
 
 t,c\f ^^■itl^ more kingly dignity than ho. Delhi siiw a goodly sights 
 the like of which will probably never occur agtiin. ^Yhen it beheld 
 during the Imperial Assemblage of Jauuiuy 1. 1877. a procession of 
 elephants, the linest in all Indin. splendidly caparisoned and sur- 
 mounted by magnitlcent ho^Ydahs, in which sat the swarthy prmcea 
 of a scoi^e of native states, bedecked with the most gorgeous coloi*s 
 tmd glittering with jewels. On such occasions as this the eleph:mt 
 is in his proper sphere. 
 
 Aside from the piu'poso nientioned above, the trained elephimt 
 in of great value both to the government and private individuals for 
 dragging timber in forests luid piling it at the dopk^ts. carrying tmd 
 ilniwing pieces of artillery, and also carrying stores on military 
 campaigns, particularly in mountainous regions. 
 
 In 1S70 the government of Ceylon imposed an export duty of 
 £20 per head on elephants, which has completely stopped the an- 
 nual supply of India fron\ that source, and caused a great advance 
 in prices in the ^ladi-as and BtMigjvl markets. Since the prices of 
 elephants of the same size imd age depend upon their class, it is 
 impossible to state more th:m their relative v.ilues. In the follow- 
 ing table I have endeavored to give the ruling prices in India at 
 this date (ISS'i) according to sex :uid size, indicating the r;uige of 
 prices in each case. , 
 
 I need luu-dly say that in the United States, elephajits do not 
 figui-e either in Lord Mayor's processions or timber forests, iUid :u-e 
 of \ivlue to the showman onlv. 
 
 1 
 
 .1 1 
 
 (Quality. 
 
 sliouUlars. 
 
 Fivt. Inches, 
 
 Bal\v, diaring first ypar ^i to 
 
 Fom.slo. four yoars old 
 
 Foiualo, stnen yo.>»rs old t> 
 
 Feiualo. elovou vonrs old 
 
 Fomalo, ois;htooi\ vears old 
 
 Fomalo, over twontv-tivo yoiirs old. S 
 
 Tuskor, four yoivrs old S 
 
 Tuskor, sovou yo.-u-s old 6 
 
 Tiiiskor, elovon years oUi ..... 
 
 Tii&ker, oijilitooii yo.irs old. 8 
 
 Tusker, over twouty-tivtf yosu-sold.! 9 
 
 Tuskt^r, hightjist cl«ss .,9i to 10 
 
 
 I) 
 4 
 
 10 
 
 Value in 
 India. 
 
 £00 to 
 
 •::> to 
 r>o to 
 
 I0l> to 
 loO to 
 ow to 
 
 .I'tO 
 35 
 73 
 loO 
 175 
 075 
 
 50 to SO 
 IW to OlHl 
 8W to 50il 
 600 to {^00 
 8lH> to 1 ,OlH) 
 1,300 to ;i,lX)0 
 
 Talus in 
 Amwcioa.'* 
 
 sflOO.lXV 
 0.500 
 o.OlX) 
 
 r>.5iH) 
 
 4.000 
 4,5(.X) 
 
 8.1XX) 
 3.51X) 
 4,0lX1 
 5.0(X) 
 7.0iX> 
 15,000 
 
 * Statement furnislied \>y Mr. P. T. l>:iruum. 
 
THE TNDTAN ELEPHANT. 229 
 
 TliG elephant is the most patient and obedient of all animals, 
 and by far the most intelligent. He has more ability to reason 
 from cause to effect than most other auimixls of docile temperament, 
 and he is, beyond all question, the most capable of being taught and 
 tlie most willing to obey after he has been taught. To me it is a 
 matter of surprise that IMr. Sanderson, who has, I presume, more 
 personal knowledge of the animal both tame and wild than any 
 European living, should place so low an estimate upon his mind. 
 He declares that " its sagacity is of a A'cry mediocre description," 
 and also that " its reasoning faculties ai'e far below those of the dog, 
 and possibly other animals." 
 
 From this view, which I think is due to the fact that " familiar- 
 ity breeds contempt," I differ very widely. My acquaintance with 
 tame elephants has created in my mind a respect for their intellect- 
 iial qualities which I never could have acquii-ed in any other way. 
 A trained dog or horse is such a rai-ity, even among the thousands 
 of theu- species, that it is considered a proper object to exhibit at 
 a circus. A horse which will promptly back at the word of com- 
 mand, or a dog which will bark or stand on its hind legs when told 
 to do so, is considered quite accomplished ; but in India, any well- 
 trained elephant, at a word or touch from his driver, who sits astride 
 his neck, will "hand up," "kneel," "speak" (trumpet), "salaam" 
 (salute with his trunk), stop, back, lie down, pull down an obstruct- 
 ing branch, gather fodder and "hand up " to his attendant, turn 
 or lift a log, or drag it b}' talcing its drag-rope between its teeth. 
 He M'ill also protect his attendants or attack a common enemy with 
 fury. I think I am safe in asserting that there are in India to-day, 
 scores of captive elephants who ai'e capable of performing all the 
 ser\'ices enumerated above. But of course there are many which 
 are not so intelligent. 
 
 Contrast this with the performances of our most intelligent 
 breed of dogs, the pointer. Even when taken young and trained 
 under the most favorable circumstances, they are at best capable of 
 being taught only a few things, as to "go on," to "charge," to go 
 in a given dii'ection, and retrieve. Tlie extreme difficulty of 
 teaching a dog anything after he has passed his puppy-hood is so 
 universally acknowledged as to have given rise to the famihar prov- 
 erb, " It is hard to teach an old dog new tricks." "SVliat a strong 
 contrast is seen in the wild " koomeriah " elephant, caught when he 
 was about sixty years old (by IMr. Sanderson), who "was easily man- 
 aged a few days after his captui-e. " Of all animals in the world 
 
230 TWO YEARS IN THE JUNGLE. 
 
 what other would have so quickly learned that mind is superior to 
 matter, that man is master of the dumb brutes, or would have suc- 
 cumbed so gracefully to the inevitable ? 
 
 While staying at Sungam, the elephant camp and timber depot 
 on the Animallais, I had a fine opportunity to watch the elephants 
 at work and to learn something of their management. Many an 
 hour I spent in the timber yard, quite fascinated by the sight of 
 those giants at work. The first work of the elephant is in the jungle 
 where there are no roads for carts. The teak-trees have been felled 
 and hewn into timbers from 9 to 12 inches square and 15 to 20 
 feet long, with a handle called a "drag-hole " at one end, through 
 which the drag-rope is passed and made fast. The drag-rope is 
 about two and a half inches in diameter and eighteen feet long, and 
 is made by the Mulcers from the inner bark of a tree called "vaca 
 nar " {Sterculia villosa). These ropes are very strong, unaffected 
 by wetting, but are also quite soft, so that the elephants use them 
 without injuring their lips. One end of the rope is made fast in 
 the drag-hole of the log to be moved, the elephant seizes the free 
 end with his trunk and places it between his huge molars, and with 
 the log almost by his side he bends his head toward it, grips the 
 rope firmly between his teeth, and drags it along. If he is a tusker 
 he puts the rope over his tusk next the log, which gives him con- 
 siderable leverage. Whea the rope is about to slip between the 
 teeth, or the jaws begin to tire at a critical moment, I have often 
 seen the elephant wrap his trunk tightly around the rope and pull 
 vigorously vdth it, apparently to assist his jaws. 
 
 This method of working elephants always seemed to me a 
 heathenish and stupid one, and I do not see how it can be charac- 
 terized in any other way. Instead of walking straight away with 
 the log, as the animal would undoubtedly do in proper harness, the 
 poor beast is obhged to stop every fifty yards to rest his jaws and 
 neck, upon which the whole strain comes. It is entirely unnatural 
 for any animal to draw a load from the head, with its neck bent 
 around sidewise, instead of from the shoulder or the girth. 
 
 In turning square timber a tusker puts his tusks under the 
 edge, lifts upward and forward at an angle of forty-five degrees 
 and easily throws it over ; but the female or muckna, having no 
 tusks, has to kneel, place the base of the trunk, not the forehead, 
 against the side of the log, and by a downward and forward press- 
 ure against the upper edge of the log, push it over. In either 
 case the work is done in less than a minute, if there be no special 
 
THE INDIAN ELEPHANT. 231 
 
 difficulty to overcome. In the Sungam timber depot, all the work 
 of piling and arranging the logs in regular order, at equal distances 
 apart, with the right side uppermost, was performed by elephants, 
 under the dii-ection of their mahouts. A word of command, a silent 
 touch of the hand or knee was enough. There was no loud bawling 
 nor angry swearing at the laborers, such as would have been abso- 
 lutely necessary had they been Barbadoes or Demerara negroes, nor 
 was there any insulting back-talk or insubordination, such as those 
 abominable scallawags are wont to indulge in. In fact, the elephants 
 worked like intelligent human beings of the better sort. 
 
 The elephants of the Forest Department were every night al- 
 lowed to run loose in the jungle around the camp to feed upon the 
 succulent bamboo shoots and grass, by which they secured their 
 own green fodder, and rendered the services of the usual grass-cut- 
 ters unnecessary. Every morning they were hunted up and 
 brought in by their mahouts and taken to the stream to bathe. 
 They were made to lie down where the water was deepest and en- 
 joy a full bath and good washing, after which they were ready for 
 breakfast. Another attendant always remained in camp to prepare 
 the cooked food for the herd. The daily allowance of rice for each 
 elephant was one maund, or twenty-four pounds. The entire daily 
 allowance was cooked at once in a huge copper kettle, and when 
 thoroughly boiled, each elephant's share was made up into four or 
 five balls the size of a man's head, and the whole breakfast was laid 
 out on a mat spread near the kettle. The seven or eight elephants 
 then marched up and took their places around the mat facing in- 
 ward, two on each side, and with the utmost gravity and perfection 
 of " table-manners," stood still to be waited upon in turn. One by 
 one, the cook lifted the baUs of rice and placed them carefully in 
 the mouths of the elephants, who always gracefully elevated their 
 trunks while receiving them, and remained quietly untU the meal 
 was finished. I often assisted in this interesting performance, and 
 the huge animals never showed me the least incivility. 
 
 When a mahout wishes to mount his elephant, he gives a word 
 of command, at which the animal Hf ts one of his fore-feet and bends 
 it upward, the bare-footed driver steps upon it nimbly, seizes the 
 elephant by the ear and scrambles up the foreleg to his place. On 
 account of my thick-soled shoes, I could not swarm up an elephant's 
 leg in that way, and being without a ladder the elephants always 
 knelt to enable me to reach the riding pad. 
 
 Except in forests like the Animallais, where there are no culti- 
 
232 TWO YEARS I:N" the JU:tTGLE. 
 
 vated fields to be trespassed upon, elephants cannot be turned 
 loose at night to browse at will, but must be furnished with a daily 
 supply of green fodder, grass, leaves, sugar-cane, or in lieu of that, 
 dry fodder, in a smaller quantity. The daily government allow- 
 ance in Bengal is 400 pounds of green fodder, or 240 pounds of 
 dry, while in Madras it is only 250 pounds and 125 pounds respec- 
 tively for elephants of the same size and internal capacity. Mr. 
 Sanderson has proven, by careful experiments in feeding elephants, 
 that the government allowance in both the Presidencies is wholly 
 insufficient for the actual wants of the animal. He found that dur- 
 ing eight consecutive days, eight female elephants consumed a daily 
 average of 650 pounds of green fodder each, and a large tusker 
 consumed 800 pounds of the same food in eighteen hours. In ad- 
 dition to this the animals had each 18 pounds of grain daily. 
 
 The following figures show the cost of keeping an adult female 
 elephant in the Madras Commissariat Department, per month : 
 
 1 malioiat (driver) 9 Rupees. 
 
 1 grass-cutter 6 " 
 
 25 pounds rice per diem (30 pounds per rupee) 25 " 
 
 Salt, oil, and medicines 2 " 
 
 Fodder, average monthly purchase 6 " 
 
 48 " 
 The rupee is equal to about forty-four cents in gold, which 
 would make the cost of keeping an elephant about $21.12 per 
 month in our currency. 
 
 Male elephants which have passed the age of puberty, twenty 
 years or thereabouts, are subject to fits of " must," or temporary 
 insanity, when they are not sufficiently worked or exercised, and 
 sometimes even when they are. According to all accounts, ele- 
 phants of advanced age are most subject to these dangerous 
 paroxysms, and the fits vary in duration from four or five weeks 
 to four or five months. They also vary in intensity from dull leth- 
 argy in one animal, to the most murderous fui'y in another. The ap- 
 proach of " must " is indicated by the discharge of a peculiar yellow 
 matter from a small orifice behind the eye, upon the appearance of 
 which the elephant is closely watched, if not chained up altogether. 
 An elephant in a violent fit of "must" sometimes becomes the 
 incarnation of murderous and destructive deviltry. Many of the 
 so-called " rogue " elephants are, no doubt, old males who from 
 over-eating and lazy habits have been attacked by fits of " must." 
 Sanderson mentions an elephant at Mandla^ near Jubbulpore, which 
 
THE IjSTDIAlSr ELEPHAIS^T. 233 
 
 a few years ago " killed an immense number of people " before its 
 bloody career was ended by two officers. 
 
 In Mr. Dawson's fascinating volume, "Neilgherry Sporting 
 Keminiscences," there is a very interesting account from the pen of 
 General Morgan, of the doings of a "must" elephant at Mudumallay 
 (where I did my first bison-shooting), in January, 1870. The ele- 
 phant went mad, almost killed his mahout, and had inaugurated a 
 perfect reign of terror at the karkhana when General Morgan ap- 
 peared upon the scene. For fifteen days all work had been stopped, 
 and the station was almost entirely deserted. The vicious brute 
 had smashed down huts, upset carts, broken into the writer's bunga- 
 low to get at some sugar (I wish he had caught Eamasawmy !) and 
 every person whom he scented was immediately charged, although 
 strange to say no one was killed. General Morgan was charged 
 almost immediately upon his arrival, but sent a bullet into the ani- 
 mal's forehead above the brain, which caused him to retreat. At 
 another time it required two bullets to stop a more determined 
 charge, upon receiving which the brute fled to the jungle. In the 
 meantime a number of elephants were sent for, and when they came, 
 ten days later, the vicious beast was surrounded and captured without 
 accident. General Morgan's account of the event concludes as follows : 
 
 " When he broke loose, I asked the mahout how it happened, as 
 he was nearly killed at the time. He said : ' I was just going to 
 mount, when he knocked me off his foreleg and pressed me down 
 upon the ground across the loins with his tusk (he was a muckna). 
 I exclaimed, " O Rama ! (name of the elephant), spare me, have pity 
 on me ! How often have I given you jaggery (sugax) and cocoanut ! 
 Have I not ever been kind to you ? Have I ever defrauded you of 
 your just rights ? O Eama ! remember I was always good to you and 
 spare me this time ! " On which Rama relaxed the awful pressure 
 on my loins and I got up, made him a salaam, and walked away, 
 though I felt as if my back was broken.' Apparently the mahout 
 had treated him fairly, or certainly the elephant had never let him 
 go. The cavadie, or grass-cutter, would have fared differently had 
 he fallen into Rama's hands, for the pain of many a prod from his 
 spear was fresh in Rama's memory, and he no sooner let go the 
 mahout than he took up the scent of the unfortunate cavadie, and 
 hunted him like a dog. The man escaped that day with difficulty. 
 The elephant winded him at a distunce of more than two hundred 
 yards, and he was nearly caught, so that finally the cavadie had to 
 abandon the forest, and take refuge across a river ten miles away.* 
 
VSt TNVO W.VKS IN TllK .IV^OLF. 
 
 (.''ov'.'V^iowrtllY ft solitary olophaivt, m noivrly ovory onso t\ uvalo, 
 tftkt^s to toivriiig- down luits. malioiouv4y dostivying- owps imd kill- 
 ing pooplo. l\v whioli lio spoovlily o;vvus for liimsolf tlio titlo of " a 
 n">j;xio." «ludj;iu!;' fi\>ti\ what I huvo ho:vi\l about siioli individuals, 
 I Miow it iHHild bo piweu tluit no olophivnt booouios a ivgiie un- 
 loss ho is svit\xn-iui;* fivni soiuo uouto juluiout, or olso ti tit of *' niiist." 
 A sportsman anoo sliowod nio a tusk ho liavl o\tf:u'tod fivm a f:\n\ous 
 i\^i;"\i<\ tho oondition of NvhioU atVorilod a ivavly explanation of the 
 animal's vicious toiujvr. At sonvo lato period of his life a heavy 
 kvU had Ihh\u tmxl into the baso of his right tusk, shattering the 
 ivi'iry. splitting' the tusk aT\d driving sharp splintei's of it into the 
 medullary pxilp. The pain must h:ive been exeruoiating. and yet, 
 like luuuau toothache, it ivnlvl i\ot kill. 
 
 Au !VT\gry elephatxt usually kills a nuui by treadit\g or kneeling 
 ujxvn his Knly, ai\d crushii\g it to a jolly. Occivsion:Uly. however, 
 the victim is subjected to still inoiv terrible tortuiv. as the follow- 
 ing jvvss;\gv fivm Mr. iSv-vuderson's work will show : 
 
 " He (the Ksxkankote ivgoie) had now roturueii. evidently not im- 
 pix>ved in teiujHxr. and had n\arked his arriv.vl by killing a Kurraba, 
 a ivlativo of one of the tnuvker^ I had with n\e on our late exjHHli- 
 tion. The Kurnilv^ wns surpristnl while dig-ging t\x->ts in the jungle. 
 but vwuld pivbalvly not have been caught had he Iven j\lone. Tnvo 
 youthfvd aborigitxes weiv vith him. .and it was after putting them 
 up a tiw, and attewpting to follow, that he w;\s pulled down and 
 torn Un\b fivux lin\b by the eleph.ant. The KurraKas who found 
 th« bodj.\ Stud that the elephjuxt had held the nnfortvmate man 
 down Avith one fvnv-flx^t, whilst with his trunk he tore legs aud .arms 
 fixnu their sockets, :«\d jerked then\ to son\e distance." 
 
 This v\-j\s the thinl tuau killed by the Kakankote ivgue, who was 
 himself siHH>dil^- hunttxl down juid killed by Mi\ Scuidei-son. 
 
 One of the sti*ang^^t featurt^s of the eleph.ant is its swimming 
 poAwr. ^Vith a c\\k-»ss>al Kxly attd legs, .and with feet almost wholly 
 unadapttxl to mjvking pivgivss thi\n\gh the water, the elephant 
 swims better than any other tenvstrial quadruped. Upon this 
 point. Ml*. Sivndersoix whites as follows : 
 
 " A IvUch of se\-\vnty-nine ^^eleph.ants'^ that I despatclnx^ from 
 Paiva to Ran-ackpur. nejvr C.alcutt.a, had the Oangvs .ai\d several of 
 its lai-gt> tid.al Innuxches to civss. In the longi^st swim they wvre six 
 houi-s without touching the Wttom : afti?r a rest on a sand-Kank, 
 they ^vmpleted the switu in thrtv mow. Xot one w^ lost. I have 
 heanl of even moiv K-msirkable swims thiui this," 
 
PART II.— CEYLON. 
 
 CllArTER XXI. 
 
 COLOMBO. 
 
 Madras to Colombo. — Farewell to Jungle Fever. — The Queen of tlie Tropios. 
 — The SinglialeKC.^ — The Nativn SliopH.-— Exorbitant Duty on Methylated 
 Spirits. — An Appeal, and its Ilesult. — I'ublio Opinion. — A I'roteat. — Leg- 
 islation for the "Odd Man.". — The Sea View Hotel. — Natives as Collect- 
 ors. — A Morning's Work. — How to (ylean and I'resiirve Echini. — The 
 Gatherings of one Day, — The Fish Market. — The Colombo Museum and 
 its Director. — Native Taxidermists. — Need of PJuropean Preparateurs in 
 the East Indies.— An Obliging Firm. 
 
 The next clay after leaving Madras, our steamer called at Pondi- 
 cherrj, a little corner of only one hundred and seven square miles, 
 but the largest of tlie French possessions in India, which all told, 
 amount to only one hundred and eighty six square miles of territory. 
 The city of Pondiclierry is a pretty little place, cleaner and whiter 
 than Madras and with the additional advantage over the latter city 
 of having no "harbor works." We lay at anchor in the open sea 
 a mile from shore, and discharged a portion of our cargo into 
 the heavy masulah surf-boats common along the shelterless Coro- 
 mandel coast. 
 
 The following day we called at Negapatam and went through 
 the same programme. The sea was very rough and landing pas- 
 sengers was no joke. It is not an easy matter for any one except 
 an athlete to step from a ship's ladder into a boat which is rising 
 and falling seven feet, three or four times a minute, and if a man 
 is inclined to be clumsy he had best decide before starting whether 
 he prefers to fall on his back or his stomach. 
 
 The morning after leaving Negapatam found us on the coast of 
 Ceylon, the pearl of the East Indies. All day we were in sight of 
 
236 TWO YEARS IN THE JUNGLE. 
 
 its shore line of golden yellow sand lying below a bright green 
 fringe of palm-trees, while the forest-clad summits of the mountains 
 loomed up far in the interior. The narrow channel which separates 
 the mainland of India from Ceylon at Paumben is too shallow by 
 about ten feet to allow ocean steamers to pass through, and we 
 were obHged to sail three quarters way around the island to reach 
 Colombo, No one ever had a better opportunity to " scent the 
 spicy perfume of the cinnamon gardens " at long range than did 
 we on that occasion, but a stone image could not have failed more 
 utterly to detect anything of the hind. 
 
 For yeai's and years, until the absurdity has become bald with 
 age, has it been asserted as a fact that the spice-laden breezes from 
 Ceylon proclaim the presence of the island to voyagers miles at sea, 
 and some writers have even had the hardihood to assert that they 
 noticed the aroma of the breezes before sighting land. It is time 
 this dear old delusion should be given up. 
 
 My first impressions of Colombo were never received. Early in 
 the morning while I was eagerly anticipating the delightful experi- 
 ence of steaming up to the city and landing in Ceylon " at last," 
 my head began to ache, cold waves began to sweep up and down 
 my back, my throat began to fire up and I was soon shivering as 
 though the equator had no existence. By the time we came to an- 
 chor it was the fever's innings, and my only thought was to get 
 ashore and find a hotel. 
 
 When I landed on the jetty I was half-blinded with the pain in 
 my head ; my brain was dizzy, and I was as sick at the stomach as a 
 drunken man. I looked and acted so much like one that the na- 
 tives said, " Look ! look ! the gentleman is di'unk ! " and immedi- 
 ately collected around me to see the fun. A native policeman hov- 
 ered obligingly near, to assist me or take me in charge as the case 
 might require, and from his actions I could not tell which thought 
 was uppermost in his mind. But the thought of being in Ceylon 
 braced me up, and I presently crawled to a cool and comfortable 
 hotel, where I went to bed and enjoyed my fever with a certain de- 
 gree of comfort. 
 
 The best physician in Colombo was Dr. White, the Ai'tillery 
 Surgeon, although, by a strange coincidence his house stands with 
 a hospital on one side and a graveyard on the other. I sent for 
 him without delay, and without delay he came, and told me I had 
 best take a trip home (to England), in order to get the fever out of 
 my system. I replied that such a calamity was not to be thought 
 
 I 
 
COLOMBO. 237 
 
 of, and lie must cure me on the spot. In five minutes he wrote a 
 prescription which proved the death-blow of my fever. It came 
 the next day and took leave of me forever, after having stuck to 
 me faithfully for nearly seven months and floored me sixteen times. 
 The Doctor advised me to keep out of the jungles for a month or 
 two, and remain close by the sea, or upon it if possible for that 
 length of time. I followed his advice to the letter, my fever was 
 effectually stamped out in four weeks, and my former energy re- 
 turned in full force. The prescription which wrought my salvation 
 I will record here for the benefit of suffering humanity in the East 
 Indies. It is as follows : 
 
 5 . Quin. sulpli. (Sulphate of quinine) § ]"• * 
 
 Liq. stryclm. (Liquor strychnise) § j. 
 
 Tinct. card. co. (Tincture of cardamom, compound) 3 iv. 
 
 Acid, sulph. dil. (Dilute sulphuric acid) 3 ij. 
 
 Aqua (Water in quantity sufficient to make) ad | xij. 
 
 M. ft. Mist. 
 
 Half a wine-glassful to be taken three times a day. 
 
 Colombo is by all odds the most beautiful city I have ever seen 
 in the tropics. Of course, parts of the Pettah, or native quarter, 
 are wholly uninviting, as is the case with nearly every oriental city, 
 and I leave them out of consideration. But take first, if you 
 please, the aristocratic section called the Fort, perched by itself on 
 a little peninsula formed by Colombo Lake and the sea, standing 
 proudly aloof from the Pettah. Here cluster nearly all the Govern- 
 ment buildings, the banks, the hotels, all the European shops and 
 the high-class native ones. The streets are beautifully clean and 
 smooth, well shaded by tulip-trees {Thespesia populnea), and at the 
 intersection of the two principal ones there stands a tall, square 
 tower, or campanile, in the top of which is the Colombo Hght, and 
 directly under it the town clock. From the lower end of the Fort 
 there stretches away toward the south in a clear undulating sweep 
 of a mile and a quarter, the finest esplanade in the world. Why it 
 is stigmatized with such an abominable name as Galle Face, I have 
 been wholly unable to divine, and therefore, suppose that name was 
 given it for some strategic purpose. People will tell you it " faces 
 
 * The above is the quantity of quinine called for in the druggist's copy of 
 the original prescription, but the amount (one ounce) is so great as to lead one 
 to believe that one drachm is the quantity intended. In making up the rem- 
 edy I would advise the substitution of the latter quantity, as the former 's 
 palpably a copyist's error. W, T. H. 
 
S38 TWO YEARS IX THE JUNGLE. 
 
 Galle," but it does no such thing ; it faces Aden. It is long and 
 rather narrow in places, with the sea on one side and the lake on 
 the other. It is simply an open stretch of gently-rolling, smooth, 
 green lawn, without a sign of a fence, a gravelled foot-path, tree, 
 shrub, or even the inevitable marble statue. There is nothing 
 hackneyed about it. It is as free as the air, and you may walk 
 across it, or gallop over it on horseback to your heart's content. 
 
 In the evening toward sunset the wealthy Europeans drive 
 round and round this beautiful Esplanade in their best turnouts, 
 to enjoy the balmy breezes ; and the Europeans who are not 
 wealthy walk out, and sit on the benches along the shore. Some- 
 how I always preferred the benches. To me there was a world of 
 quiet enjoyment in sitting there alone, watching the sun as it sank 
 slowly into the sea, the tiny sail-boats of the fishermen gliding by 
 as they sought the hai-bor ; the calm, blue sea, stretching in wide 
 expanse before me, and the surf creeping up the sand at my feet. 
 
 The view of Colombo from the clock tower is full of exquisite 
 beauty, particularly when looking south. Along the boundaiy of 
 the Fort stands a zig-zag row of five long, two-story, many -win- 
 dowed, pale yellow buildings, clean and handsome, which are the 
 military barracks. Immediately beyond them stretches the Es- 
 planade with the Hospital on the left, the Club House fairly tres- 
 passing on the green sward farther do-^Ti, while at the lower end is 
 the Galle Face Hotel, embowered in a beautiful gi'ove of cocoanut 
 trees. Almost in the centre of the city, with the Esplanade for its 
 western shore, lies Slave Lake, a body of water many acres in ex- 
 tent but -with such a wonderfully iiTegular shape, and so many 
 sinuosities of shore-line that one cannot obtain anything Hke a 
 comprehensive view of it except from a height. Its southern shore 
 curves in and out and all about ; but a well-kept carriage-drive 
 winds along its entii-e length, patiently following all the curves, 
 leading past shady bungalows siurounded by well-kept groimds 
 fuU of cocoanut-trees, flowering shi-ubs and beautiful plants found 
 only in the tropics or in hot-houses. No drive can be more de- 
 lightful than that around the lake about siinset, the time when all 
 hot countries are the most enjoyable. 
 
 Beyond the lake, toward the southeast, lie the Cinnamon Gar- 
 dens, the Museum, wide streets and the airy bungalows of the 
 wealthy European ojQ&cials and merchants. Let it be remembered 
 that the whole city is embowered in cocoanut-trees, and the ground 
 is nearly everywhere carpeted with green grass. What a striking 
 
COLOMBO. 239 
 
 contrast is this genuine luxuriance of vegetation to the parched 
 and barren landscapes of famine-stricken Madras ! 
 
 East of the Fort lies the native town, extending in a vast semi- 
 circle from the edge of the inner harbor around Slave Lake to the 
 seashore below the Galle Face Hotel. The Pettah is well-built but 
 crowded of course, and in the quarter where the principal shops 
 are, the streets are thronged with people and bullock carts. To 
 the north lies the inner harbor, where the small native craft lie in 
 shallow water. From the seaward extremity of the Fort peninsula, 
 a long arm of concrete is being slowly pushed northward out into 
 the deep water, to increase, by one skilful stroke, both the size of 
 the harbor and the depth of it, by enclosing behind the breakwater 
 a portion of the open sea. Toward the west we look down upon a 
 mass of huge bowlders and masses of rock lying along the beach, 
 against which the surf dashes unceasingly with showers of silvery 
 spray. Beyond these stretch the calm blue waters of the Indian 
 Ocean, dotted with white sails of fishing-boats, until, at the distant 
 horizon, the blue of the sky blends with that of the sea. 
 
 A walk through the Fort reminds the traveller that he is in 
 contact with a different class of people and a different language 
 from anything he has met in Hindustan. The language of South- 
 ern India (Tamil) is spoken in portions of Northern Ceylon, but the 
 bulk of the native inhabitants are Singhalese, and speak a language 
 known by the same name as that by which they are distinguished. 
 
 Here for the first time in our journey eastward we meet with the 
 sarong, which is universally worn by the Malays, and one's first 
 thought is that the fashion was originally borrowed from them. 
 
 The average Singhalese gentleman is a curiosity, so far as his 
 " get-up " is concerned. Instead of pantaloons he wears about two 
 yards of cloth, either plain or figured, white or colored, wound 
 tightly around his legs from his waist down to his feet, held either 
 by a belt at the waist or by roUing the edge under. 
 
 This primitive petticoat lacks all the good features of the mod- 
 ern garment and possesses not a solitary advantage over trowsers. 
 Unlike the sarong of the Malay, which is worn quite short in com- 
 parison, this antiquated " pull back " reaches to the shoes. 
 
 Its small circumference destroys all the freedom of the lower 
 limbs so necessary to a man, and compels the wearer to take short 
 mincing steps like a girl. The meanest thing I remember doing 
 in Ceylon was to inveigle two Singhalese gentlemen into climbing 
 a high picket fence. I climbed it first, to show them how, and for 
 
240 TWO YEARS IX THE JUXGLE. 
 
 the next few miiuites was intensely interested in watcliing their 
 gymnastics. Li fairness to them I record the fact that they got 
 over ! 
 
 Besides the sai'oug, the gentleman aforesaid wears his htur very 
 long, combs it straight back, coils it up at the back of his head and 
 catches it with a high tortoise-shell comb. He wetu-s eai--rmgs also, 
 has at best a very scanty beai-d, and if he is a beardless boy you 
 will be very apt to think him an uncommonly pretty gii'l for a 
 native. The men are, as a rule, much better looking than the 
 women, the latter being more masculine in general appearance. 
 
 A visit to the native ciuiosity shops on the Fort is full of in- 
 terest. With but one exception, they :u'e all kept by Moormen, 
 who are easily distinguished by theii- bright red caftans, their 
 shaven heads, :uid theu' anxiety to cheat every stranger. The un- 
 initiated titiveller should bewiu-e of every man in Colombo or Galle 
 who has his head shaved and weai'S upon it a tall, rimless sti*aw 
 hat, resembling an inverted flower-pot suffering from an overdose 
 of decorative ai"t. 
 
 The shops of these worthies contain carved ivory and ebony 
 elephants, ebony canes also elaborately carved, beautiful paper 
 weights made of elephant's teeth sawn into sections and polished ; 
 chessmen of carved ivory and Siindalwood boxes (from China) ; 
 tortoise-shell work-boxes, w'atch- chains, combs, jewel caskets of 
 porcupine qxiills, ebony wood and ivory ; and precious stones of 
 poor qujxhty to the end of the chapter. Even tlie best of Ceylon 
 native c^u•^•ing is clumsily done, and is not tit to compare with that 
 of the Chinese. 
 
 A visit to the business quarter of the Pettah reveals a long 
 i-ow of shops packed closely together, substiuitially built and well 
 stocked with oil the common European oj'ticles used in the tropics, 
 tmd ai'i-anged quite in Em-opeou style. I was sui-prised at the ex- 
 tensive vaiiety of goods to be foimd in many of them, and, taken 
 siltogether, they were imusually well appointed for native stores. 
 There lu-e no petty bazaai's here with impudent Madrasees bawling 
 out at you as you pass quietly along, "You wont buy socks'?" 
 " What you want ? " 
 
 The stores of the Chetties who deal in rice ai-e full of gi-ain 
 from floor to ceiling, and it seems a sin that those old fellows 
 should be able to mtike such piles of money as they do, and not 
 know how to spend it. A fat old Chetty, with his mouth running 
 over M-ith betel juice, a fifty-cent tm-bim on his head, ntvked to the 
 
COLOMBO. 241 
 
 waist, and clisplaying; a breast as hairy as Esait's, whom a stranger 
 would not suspect of being able to buy a lieu and chiclcens, will sit 
 down and sign bis name to a check on the Oriental Bank for fifty 
 thousand rupees as calmly as I would. But the similarity would 
 end there, for he would get the money, and I would "get left." 
 
 My reception by the Government authorities at Colombo was 
 of a highly characteristic nature, and I am tempted to record it as 
 a fair illustration of the aggravation a traveller is sometimes forced 
 to endui'e. The incident may serve as a caution to other natural- 
 ists who intend to visit Ceylon. 
 
 When Professor Ward and I were in London we looked up the 
 question of alcoholic supplies in the East Indies, and upon being 
 informed that methylated spirits (alcohol charged with methylic 
 acid to render it forever unfit for drinking in any way), by virtue 
 of its character, entered all ports free of duty, the Professor pur- 
 chased ninety-six gallons of it at 3s. 2d. per gallon, or seventy-six 
 cents. Thirty-six gallons were shipped to Colombo, care of Messrs. 
 Lee, Hedges & Co., to await my arrival, and the remainder was sent 
 to Singapore. I hardly need to say that this spirits was of greater 
 strength than anything procurable in Ceylon, and was to be used 
 in preserving fishes, small reptiles, and crustaceans. 
 
 The case of spirits lay in the Custom House until I reached 
 Colombo, when it so happened it was cleared by our agents, at my 
 request of course, while I was oft' for a few day's shooting. 
 
 Imagine my horror to find upon returning that the customs au- 
 thorities had levied an import duty of six rupees per gallon ($2.70) 
 on the spirits, the same as if it had been good alcohol, and of course 
 Messrs. Lee, Hedges & Co. had paid it. It amounted to the neat 
 little sum of two hundred and sixteen rupees, or over a hundred 
 dollars, and the case was in my possession. 
 
 I mentioned the matter to Mi*. Ferguson, editor of the Cexjlon 
 Observer with a statement of the circumstances, and he immediately 
 assured me that some one had blundered ; that the authorities cer- 
 tainly could not intend to give me so hostile a reception ; and that 
 without doubt, a proper representation of the case to the Governor 
 would procure a rebate of the amount charged. Our agents were 
 of the same opinion. Accordingly I went to see the Collector of 
 Customs, Mi\ W. D. Halliday, who, when he had heard my state- 
 ment, gruffly remarked : 
 
 " Might write to the Colonial Secretary about it ; that's all the 
 }),dvice I can give you ; good day." 
 l(i 
 
342 TWO Yl^Xl^-i TX TUT. JTXaLE. 
 
 .Viul with a ninjostio wnvo of tho hand. I was ilisniissod from the 
 piosouoo of the most bo!iri5>h and imoivil VaigHshnum I ever saw. 
 I then called upon the acting Colonial Seci-etaiy who was very 
 courteous indeed, and after explaining the matter. I left with him 
 a formal petition addressed to the Colonial Seeretary. which stated 
 the purpose for which the spirits had been imported, and asked 
 him to sjwction a i-cbate of my rupees. In a week an answer came, 
 sapnj* the Governor was unable to comply with my request 
 
 "Mr. Ferg'uson asked me oi\e day conoerni!\g- the result, and I 
 s]\owed him a copy of my letter, and the reply to it. His tii-st ex- 
 damaticm was " "What a shame ! " and he declaretl he wo\ild let the 
 people know just how I had been treated. He did so. The next day 
 there appe.-vred in his paper {i\\o Cc'ulon Observer) a scathing' article 
 headcil, " Courtesy to an American Xatui-nlist visiting Ceylon : The 
 Ceylon Goveriuuent at Fault : Who is to Blame ? " from which I 
 must quote the following pan^graph : 
 
 ** So. the Ceylon Government feel it to be their duty in protect- 
 ing the interests and revenue of the public, to mulct an America.t\ 
 naturalist visiting the island in the sum of two hundred and sixtetui 
 rupees, for the spirits used in preser\nng his specimens ! Such a 
 thing has s\nvly not happened in the history of the colony before 
 this time. If the Legislature were sitting we should press for ai\ 
 explanation, for the pivcedent which has been followeil, or for the 
 i-egiiliition which prevents His Excellency the Governor using his 
 discivtiou in a i*emissiou of duty in a matter wlieit^ the promotion 
 of science, of international good feeling, of onlinary courtesy and 
 considei-atiou for a stranger and natm-tUist, so especially called for 
 the step. So f;u* as our experience goes, this is certainly not the 
 pl:ui usually followed by the Indian ai\d Ceylon Governments in 
 the case of scientitic visitors, and we heivrtily I'egret the blunder — to 
 s:^y the least — which has been committed." 
 
 S\ich ^v;^s the language of the leading journal iu Ceylon. All 
 the other p\pei"S, except one. commented upon the matter in the 
 same tone, juul it was a Siitisfaction to me to tlud \mmist;vkably 
 that the action of the authorities was universally condemned as be- 
 ing utterly stupid jukI inexcusable. The i-egulation tixing a high 
 rate of duty upon clear dcohol, acconling to its strength, is designed 
 to pi\">tect the revenue, and to pivtect the people ag-jiiust the im- 
 portation of stivng ;\lcohol to be used in adultei-atiug Hquors, and 
 in mjvnufacturing vile stuff. By no known process can poisonous 
 methylatcvl spii-its be rendered tit to use for drinking piu-posf^s, or 
 
COLOMBO. 24'} 
 
 even for adulterating liquor, and while alcohol is everywhere heavily 
 taxed, the former passes duty free. It was exceedingly annoying 
 that I should be compelled to pay an import duty of four hundred 
 per cent., and had I only known in time, I would have kept my 
 rupees and left the case of spirits in the Custom House till dooms- 
 day. I tried to get the authorities to take it back, return my four 
 hundred per cent, duty, and have the case sold as unclaimed. They 
 "couldn't do it." Would they receive it back, return the duty, and 
 let me ship it to Singapore? "Couldn't do it." I then offered, if 
 they would return my rupees to take the unlucky case of spirits 
 through the Custom House, and bury it in a quiet corner of the 
 back yard where it wouldn't smell bad. Still they " couldn't do it." 
 Could they if I would erect a tombstone over it, and a monument 
 to its memory in the square? No. They "couldn't do it." They 
 had those rupees, and they meant to keep them. 
 
 To many men a hundred dollars is a mere trifle, but to a natural- 
 ist in the field it means quite a goodly collection of rare and valu- 
 able specimens. Unless such a man has a million to back him he 
 cannot go about spending money recklessly from the beginning to 
 the end of the chapter. He always longs to do five times as much 
 as he has means to accomplish, and does not have a dollar to spend 
 unnecessarily. Ten chances to one he spends more money than he 
 has, and is compelled to borrow funds to get home with. 
 
 Just here I wish to record the opinion that no country has any 
 business to exact custom-house duties on the scientific apparatus, 
 outfit, or supplies of any kind carried by a travelling naturalist or 
 scientific investigator, either great or small. The expenses of all 
 such persons should be made as light as possible, and both govern- 
 ments and corporations should take pleasure in making exceptions in 
 their favor.* The unavoidable expenses of such travellers are al- 
 ways heavy ; they usually receive small pay for their labors, if, in- 
 deed, they receive anything at all ; and their plans always reach to 
 the bottom of their purse. Moreover, the visit of every hard-work- 
 ing naturalist to a foreign country is very apt to result beneficially 
 to the place visited — even though the benefit be small and long de- 
 layed. At all events the traveller is certain to leave a good portion 
 
 * The C. H. Mallory line of steamships plying between Galveston, Texas, 
 and New York, carry all boxes of Natural History specimens at half rates, and 
 transship them in New York free of charge. Is there any reason why all 
 steamship lines should not do the same ? The effect upon our museums would 
 be a tremendous increase in specimens of all kinds. 
 
244 TWO YEARS IN THE JUNGLE. 
 
 of his hard cash behind him, and he takes none of the country's 
 wealth away. 
 
 When a collecting naturalist makes a tour through the Indies, 
 either East or West, and visits a number of colonies, it is very dis- 
 couraging to have to pay from ten to twenty dollars duty on his 
 guns and outfit every two or three months. There is no sense or 
 justice in making such an individual pay duty on articles he is go- 
 ing to use in a place for a few weeks or months and then carry 
 away with him again. A traveller does not visit a colony for the 
 purpose of holding an auction sale of second-hand goods, neither 
 does he give away all his effects. 
 
 In this case there should be special legislation for the benefit 
 of the traveller and naturalist. "But," said an editor to me in 
 Demerara, "we can't legislate for the odd man." A government 
 with common sense can legislate for the odd man, and some do it. 
 Venezuela can do it and has done it. With all her failings, she is 
 able to teach her enlightened colonial neighbors a lesson which as 
 yet they are too duU to learn. There is a special act which provides 
 that all naturalists visiting Venezuela shall be allowed to import 
 their entire outfit and supplies free of duty, and when we arrived 
 at Ciudad BoUvar, where everything is subject to duty, spirits and 
 firearms in particular, our boxes and barrels were not even opened. 
 We imported a ban-el of salt, which under any other circumstances 
 would have been declared contraband and confiscated, and a barrel 
 of spii'its which could easily have been used for drinking purposes. 
 The authorities showed us every cotu'tesy during our stay, and we 
 were careful not to abuse oiu' privileges. 
 
 Now, mark the contrast ! From the Orinoco we returned to 
 Trinidad, where three months previous we had purchased our cask 
 of rum. We returned with it full of fishes, tm'tles, eels and snakes — • 
 and the astute custom-house inspector would not allow us to take it to 
 the hotel unless we paid duty on the spirits around the dead animals! 
 
 We were obliged to repack the cask, so we did it in the Custom 
 House. Alcoholic specimens are vile-smelling objects at best, and, 
 before we got through we had our revenge. At Demerara, we 
 could not take our guns into the colony for a month's collecting 
 without paying $8 duty on them. By a strange coincidence. Sir 
 James Longden, who, as Governor of Ceylon, exacted the outrage- 
 ous duty on my methylated spirits, was Governor of British Guiana 
 in 1876, at the time of my visit, when they found it " impossible to 
 legislate for the odd man." 
 
COLOMBO. 24S 
 
 Although the authorities at Colombo gave me a very hostile re- 
 ception, its aggravating effect was more than counterbalanced by 
 the kind courtesies I received from all the private individuals and 
 business firms with which I had anything to do. Indeed, I received 
 favors in Ceylon which, under the same circumstances, I might have 
 sought in vain in most of the States at home. 
 
 I took up quarters at the old Sea View Hotel, the smallest in 
 the city kept by Europeans, but it was cosy and comfortable and 
 just the place for me to carry on my work to the best advantage. 
 It occupies the finest hotel site in Colombo, standing, as it does, 
 within a stone's throw of the Flagstaff battery, close to the sea. 
 The elevation is about forty feet, which affords a beautiful bird's- 
 eye view, like that from a ship's maintop. Day and night a delicious 
 sea-breeze swept through my sunny little room, and from my win- 
 dow I looked out upon the surf dashing against the rocky reef or 
 tumbling upon the sandy shore farther down ; at the fleet of out- 
 rigger fishing canoes which sailed by every morning like a vast 
 flock of white-winged gulls, and came scudding back every night 
 laden with their prey ; at the movements of the huge ocean steam- 
 ers as they steamed up from Point de Galle, and away again — all 
 of which formed a delightful panorama full of moving figures, with 
 a vast sheet of calm blue sea for a background. At night I was 
 lulled to sleep by the soft music of the surf breaking gently on the 
 shore and swishing up over the pebbles, and at five o'clock, in the 
 morning I was nearly bounced out of bed by the deafening report 
 of the time-gun, fired, seemingly, just by my ear. The gun might 
 as well have been fired from my window ledge so far as I was con- 
 cerned, for it was only sixty yards away, at the Flagstaff battery, 
 but, although it used to startle me considerably at first, I became 
 so accustomed to the explosion after a while that it utterly failed to 
 waken me. Such is the force of habit. 
 
 As soon as I got fairly over my last touch of jungle fever, I set 
 to work collecting, and from that time forward was busy with 
 specimens from daylight till dark. I rented two rooms upon the 
 ground floor of the hotel, opening upon the paved quadrangle, and 
 there I held high carnival with specimens of all kinds. I had 
 reached a locality where large land animals were not so numerous 
 as in India, but where fishes, reptiles, shells, corals, and marine in- 
 vertebrates abounded, and to these I turned my attention almost 
 wholly. 
 
 In places where natives are numerous and cheap, a collector al- 
 
246 TWO YEARS IN THE JUNGLE. 
 
 ways finds it more profitable to buy whatever small specimens can 
 be caught and brought to him, than to go out and try to make all 
 the captures himself. When the gentlemen of leisure are once well 
 interested, and made to beUeve they are making money without 
 working for it — for collecting is usually regarded as mere play — 
 they will ransack the country over for whatever is required. The 
 best way to get natives started at collecting is to say nothing about 
 one's wants or intentions, but put on old clothes and go out to some 
 jftt'omising spot. When the people see a white man wading after 
 turtles in a muddy pond, or plodding along the searshore after 
 shells, star-fishes, or echinoderms, or digging crabs out of the sand, 
 they are struck with the novelty of the thing at once. When they 
 find that the crab-digger has money in his pockets, and will give it 
 for such "trash," they set to work at once and collect whatever wiU 
 fetch the most money. I have often been amused at the way the 
 West India negroes take hold of such work. A collector may be 
 carrying home a basket of squirming and crawUng specimens after 
 a lively day's work in the field, when an astonished darkey breaks 
 in upon his meditations with : 
 
 " Oh, boys, lookee dah ! Ho ! ho ! ho ! See what dat man got, 
 hey ! Say, boss, d'ye want to buy any mo' o' dem air critters ? " 
 
 " Yes, I do, all I can get," will be the reply. 
 
 "Why, lawdy-massy! inan, I kin git you 'osts o' dem air. 
 How much you give fo' dem ? " 
 
 " I will pay you a fair price." 
 
 Off they go, laughing at the absurdity of the thing, but they 
 will be almost sure to bring in something, either good or bad. 
 The news is quickly spread that "a man at the hotel is buying 
 snakes and things," after which he soon has enough to do in buy- 
 ing and caring for what is brought in, and giving directions about 
 what else is wanted. 
 
 One morning about sunrise, I di*essed for rough work, and, tak- 
 ing with me a coolie and a basket, started for the reef of rocks 
 along the shore in front of the battery. There is nearly always 
 something for the naturalist in such places, often a good deal, and 
 the examination is sure to afford a series of pleasant sxu^rises. 
 On the sheltered side of the rocks we visited, or down in the hollow 
 crevices between the huge bowlders which were piled up along the 
 shore, we found scores of black-spined echini sticking tightly to the 
 rocks, in such situations that the incoming surf submerged them 
 one moment, and, receding the next, left them for the time, almost 
 
COLOMBO. 247 
 
 high and dry. The little animals clung by means of the converg- 
 ing spines on their under surface, and to get them off it was neces- 
 sary to work the point of a screw-driver under, and pry at them 
 patiently until the spines were loosened from the rock, and the 
 fragile animals came off without being damaged. 
 
 It was impossible to secure large specimens without getting wet 
 in the surf, so it was well we came prepared. There was a strong 
 breeze blowing, and the surf was much higher than usual, which at 
 times made our task somewhat interesting. One moment I would 
 be working away among the bare rocks, and the next the surf would 
 come tearing in between the huge bowlders with a boom and a 
 rush, so that in an instant the water would be boiling and frothing 
 up to my waist. Once or twice I was carried off my feet by the 
 force of the surf, but it would presently recede, and then I could 
 go on with my task until the next roller came in. It was rather 
 lively work, but we secured a basketful of fine large specimens. 
 
 In our search for echini, we came upon some very curious little 
 jumping fishes {Salarius alticus) which were hopping about over the 
 rocks, apparently as lively and comfortable out of the water as in. 
 Every time a roller came in, they received a good wetting, but when 
 it receded they were always found clinging to the sides of the rocks, 
 quite high and dry. It was a strange sight to see the little crea- 
 tm-es go jumping up the sides of the smooth and sKppei-y rocks, 
 sometimes so steep as to be almost perpendicular. They bend their 
 tails as far as possible toward the left, straighten their bodies sud- 
 denly, with the caudal fin stuck to the rock, and jump straight for- 
 ward from six to eighteen inches at a time. They are foiu' and a 
 half inches long, slender bodied, with a queer little comb or crest 
 on the head, light gray in color, with red eyes. Sometimes one 
 would hop up the side of the rock and perch himself on top, ap- 
 parently to view the scenery around him. They were so nimble 
 that we had great trouble in catching as many as we needed. 
 
 We saw many fine specimens of the handsome painted crab 
 (Graspus strigosiis), scrambling over the rocks, and after hard work, 
 caught a few to show the natives, as samples of what we wanted. 
 
 Echinoderms, or " sea eggs," as they are sometimes called, are 
 cleaned by cutting away the membrane Avhich closes the mouth and 
 entirely removing the jaws, or "Aristotle's lantern." Then, with a 
 piece of iron wire flattened at the end, all the fleshy matter adher- 
 ing to the inside of the shell must be scraped loose and drawn out 
 at the mouth opening, after which the inside of the shell should be 
 
248 TWO YEAES IN THE JUNGLE. 
 
 washed thoroughly. When the specimens have been cleaned, they 
 must be immersed for thirty hours in proof spirits, after which 
 they may be put out in a shady place to dry. It is a curious fact 
 that all the echini of Ceylon and Malayana lose their spines unless 
 soaked in spirits before drying, whereas those of the Eed Sea, the 
 Mediterranean, and the West Indies can be dried without soaking, 
 and the spines will not fall off. 
 
 In a very short time nearly a dozen natives were at work col- 
 lecting for me and I had my hands full in caring for what they 
 captured and brought in. My instructions from Professor Ward 
 were very simple, but widely comprehensive. "Plunder Ceylon. 
 Rake the island over as with a fine-toothed comb ; catch every- 
 thing you can in three months time, and send me the best of it." 
 
 During my first three weeks in Colombo I reaped a rich harvest 
 of fishes, reptiles, crustaceans, and shells, some of which I pre- 
 served in spirits while the rest were dried. To give an idea of the 
 richness of Colombo as a collecting groimd I will copy from my 
 journal a list of what was brought to me in one day. 
 
 3 Soft-slielled turtles {Emyda Ceylonenm). 
 
 1 Tortoise {Mnys trijuga). 
 31 Crabs (Matuta victor). 
 
 6 Painted crs^s {Oraspus strigosus). 
 12 Alabaster crabs {Ocypode ceratop(hal'mu8\ 
 15 Sea cockroacbes {Benipes sp.). 
 12 Green lizards (Calotes terskoloT). 
 
 4 Lizards (C'alotes nigrUabris). 
 
 2 Bats ( Vespertilio). 
 
 9 Jumping fisb (Salarius alticus). 
 1 Horned skate {Dicerobatis eregoodoo), 
 6 Fisbes of various species. 
 4 Prawns (Peneus). 
 100 sbells, more or less, of many species. 
 
 This represents a fair day's work. The next one brought me in 
 snakes of various kinds, frogs, fishes, and invertebrates, making a 
 Hst quite different from that given above. When the more com- 
 mon species of animals had been gathered in, I used to stimulate 
 my collectors by offering a reward for the first specimen of any 
 desirable kind not already obtained, and in this way my motley 
 crew was induced to search the fields, the sea-shore, and the fresh- 
 water ponds high and low. I have never anywhere else had native 
 collectors who were so active and diligent in the field when left to 
 
COLOMBO. 249 
 
 themselves as those who worked for me at Colombo. They seemed 
 able to get anything I asked for if it was anywhere to be found. 
 
 In due time, I began to visit the fish market every morning 
 when the fish were brought in. 
 
 The market itself is a poor affair every way, badly situated, 
 wretchedly appointed, dirty and foul smelling to an uncommon de- 
 gree. Why the principal fish market of Colombo should be so far 
 beneath comparison with those of Bombay, Calcutta, and Madras I 
 cannot divine. A good building in a suitable locaUty, would make 
 it one of the finest sights of the Queen City. At present, the mar- 
 ket is redeemed from utter unattractiveness only by the magnifi- 
 cent array of fishes, great and small. I believe the fauna of Ceylon 
 comprises a greater variety of both vertebrate and invertebrate 
 forms, than any other locality of twice its area. 
 
 At the first opportunity I visited the Government Museum, and 
 was very pleasantly received by the Director, Dr. A. Haly, whom, 
 upon continued acquaintance, I found to be very genial and obHg- 
 ing, and scientifically fitted for the duties of the position he oc- 
 cupies. I quite envied him his beautiful new building, well 
 stocked library of scientific works, his airy office and laboratory, 
 and above all, an island teeming with animal life to draw upon 
 for specimens with which to fill his mahogany and plate-glass 
 cases. 
 
 The building is really a beautiful structure, designed by the 
 government architect, and is almost a model of its kind. I was 
 greatly surprised that this, the handsomest modern structure in all 
 the East Indies, cost only £12,000. It is quite new, and as yet the 
 collections are very small ; but a few years will show great change 
 in this respect. I was sorry to see that the institution has not on 
 its staff of workers a man thoroughly skilled in all the latest 
 methods of taxidermy and osteology, with years of working expe- 
 rience to fall back upon in the business of collecting, preserving, 
 and mounting specimens of all kinds. 
 
 At the time of my visit, the work of moimting specimens was 
 done by cheap and clumsy natives, who were very poorly fitted for 
 their task. It cut me to the heart to see a deer skeleton mounted, 
 in that humid climate, with iron wire instead of brass, and the skin 
 of a seven-foot shark loaded at the mouth as if it were a cannon. 
 Somehow, all the museum people of the East Indies think that 
 native preparateurs are good enough, and the result is the worst 
 mounted specimens in existence, if I except the fishes in the Mad- 
 
250 TWO TEAES IN THE JU:N'GLE. 
 
 ras Museum. "What else can be expected of a taxidermist who 
 works for a rupee per day ? 
 
 I take pleasiire in acknowledging my obligation to Dr. Haly, 
 for assistance in determining tbe species of my Ceylon reptiles 
 and crustaceans, and for his valuable service in identifying and 
 naming all the fishes I collected in the island, seventy species in 
 all, except such as were undescribed. I spent many hours in his 
 pleasant company at the museum, assisted by his advice and his 
 books. 
 
 After four weeks of busy collecting in Colombo and vicinity, my 
 myrmidons and I had gathered specimens of all the common ani- 
 mals, and it was time to move on. I had calculated my expenses 
 altogether too closely ; the remittances I expected from Professor 
 "Ward were delayed, and I found myself with insufficient funds for 
 any vigorous work outside of Colombo. I had planned a trip to 
 the Northern Province, but without a loan from some one I would 
 be detained in Colombo, and lose valuable time in waiting for my 
 drafts from headquarters. I was anxious to push on, for I had 
 allowed myself only thi-ee months for Ceylon. I brought no letters 
 of inti'oduction to moneyed men, and was a total stranger. But in 
 my pei-plexity I plucked up coiurage and stated the circumstances 
 to the firm of Lee, Hedges & Co. 
 
 Mr. Bennett, the manager of the house in Colombo, immediately 
 exclaimed, in the most pleasant manner, " "Why, now, I'm glad you 
 have mentioned it, and given us a chance to help you out. "We 
 shall be very much pleased to open an account with you. How 
 much money do you need ? " 
 
 " Well I need about three hvmdred rupees, but it's too much to 
 take, seeing that I am unable to give you any security." 
 
 " That's all right. That's all I want to know." And he gave 
 me a check for the amount, saying, " Now just go ahead up 
 there at JafEna to suit yourself, and if you need anything more by- 
 and-by, or before you get back, just let us know." Had I been 
 doing the firm a favor worth a thousand dollars, its members 
 could not have been more pleasant and cheerful than when thus 
 advancing money to a stranger without the sHghtest security be- 
 yond his good intentions. 
 
 I mention this cii'cumstance to show one of the many bright 
 sides of English character, which is not uniformly so reserved ajid 
 unapproachable as it is sometimes represented. 
 
CHAPTER XXn. 
 
 THE NORTHERN PROVINCE. 
 
 Trip to Jaffna. — The Paumben Passage. — Jaffna. — Coral Gathering. — Tho 
 Beauties of Living Coral.— Shallow Waters. — A Harvest of Cartilaginous 
 Fishes. — Rhinobati. — Large Rays. — A Handsome Shark. — A Rare and Cu- 
 rious Pish. — Rhamphobatis ancylostomus Described. — Sea Turtles. — Ques- 
 tionable Value of Native Help. — Start for Mullaitivu. — Jaffna to Point 
 Pedro. — The most Northern Point of Ceylon. — Native Cussedness again. — • 
 The Slowest Sailing-Craft on Record. 
 
 On February 15th, I embarked with my outfit and a Singhalese 
 servant named Henrique, a necessary evU, on the little colonial 
 steamer Serendih to go to Jaf&ia, near the northwestern extremity of 
 Ceylon. It was my intention to make a short stay there, and then 
 work my way down the northern coast, toward Trincomalee, until I 
 foimd good collecting ground. We left Colombo harbor at 5 p.m. 
 and early the next morning, sighted a low-lying strip of sand re- 
 lieved from utter barrenness by a few green shrubs and Palmyra 
 palms. This was the island of Kamisserama, and we very soon 
 dropped anchor at the mouth of a shallow strait which separates 
 the island from the mainland of India. The Paumben passage — or 
 river, as it is sometimes called by the natives — is a narrow breach 
 a hvmdred yards wide through a ledge of soft sandstone which 
 extends east and west from the island of Ramisserama to the oppo- 
 site promontory on the continent of India, east of Eamnad. It is 
 said that at one time the island formed a part of the mainland, and 
 pilgrims passed over it dry shod, but that diiring many violent 
 storms the sea broke over the chain of rocks at Paumben, and 
 finally a channel was formed which has gradually deepened ever 
 since. 
 
 There is only eighteen feet of water at high tide even now, and 
 part of this depth was obtained by dredging. Small as the Seren- 
 dih is, she has to wait for the flood tide in order to pass through. 
 One of the most singular facts in the geographical distribution of 
 
252 TWO YEAES IN THE JUNGLE. 
 
 animals is here forcibly brought to mind. Although the tiger is a 
 good swimmer and has been known to swim Singapore Strait, which 
 is over a mile wide, he has never crossed from the mainland of 
 India into Ceylon, even though the Paumben Passage is not (if I 
 remember rightly) more than a hundred yards in width at its nar- 
 rowest part. Although Felis tigris is common throughout nearly 
 the whole of Southern Asia, Sumatra, and Java, it has never existed 
 in Ceylon, It certainly was not the width of the strait which hin- 
 dered its immigration, and the inhabitants of Ceylon have to thank 
 their lucky stars that the two long arms which in reahty connect 
 the island and the peninsula, are barren wastes of sand instead of 
 being covered with thick jungle. Had there been sufficient vege- 
 tation upon them to afford cover for the tiger, or encourage his mi- 
 gration, there is no doubt that the island would now be infested by 
 these dangerous beasts. 
 
 About two o'clock in the afternoon we left Paumben, passed 
 close to DeKt Island, and also Middleburg, and at sunset sighted 
 Jaffna. The water was so shallow that our little steamer was 
 obliged to anchor about five miles from the town. The next morn- 
 ing I went ashore with Captain Wellesley in the cutter, and took 
 up quarters in the traveller's bungalow, or rest house, as these 
 valuable institutions are universally called in Ceylon. 
 
 Half an hour after landing, I visited the fish-market, a wide open 
 shed down on the beach with the bare ground for a floor. It was 
 not the time of day for fish, and I found only a lot of large and 
 beautifully colored crabs {Lupea sanguinolenta), and about a hundred 
 specimens of the common cuttle-fish (Sepia officitialis), sometimes 
 called the ink fish, which furnishes the sepia water color of com- 
 merce, as well as the cuttle-fish bone so indispensable to our canary- 
 birds. The bone in question is the only skeleton the animal possesses, 
 and forms the back of the animal's body, being covered only with 
 a thin skin. The ink with which this cuttle-fish beclouds the water 
 when attacked by an enemy is secreted in a gland near the head, and 
 is discharged with considerable force in time of danger so that the 
 animal is instantly enveloped in a murky cloud. The sepia is very 
 abundant around Jaffaa, scores of them being brought in daily ; so 
 it seems that the natives not only eat them, but are fond of them. 
 Some of the specimens I obtained were a foot in length. 
 
 The morning after my arrival in Jaffna, I hired a small boat, 
 two boatmen and a diver, and made ready for a cruise in search of 
 coral. Before starting, I undertook to tell the men what we were 
 
THE NORTIlEHJr PEOVINCE. 253 
 
 going after, but " coral " was to my servant-interpreter a word of 
 unknown meaning. By no possible description could I make the 
 natives understand what I wanted, and finally, as a last resort, I 
 made a little sketch on a piece of paper, when they all exclaimed, 
 " Oh ! Koki calli ! " The mystery was solved. 
 
 We got into our boat and pulled along the eastern side of Man- 
 detivu, a small island to the south of Jaffna, with the expectation 
 of finding coral off its most southern point. It was low water when 
 we started, and the ebbing tide had left bare a wide strip of sand 
 and mud all along the Jaffna shore. For fully five miles around, the 
 sea is very shallow, the depth at low water varying from one foot 
 to six ; but it is oftener thi-ee feet than otherwise. Small as our 
 boat was we had to follow the channel until clear of the sandbanks, 
 and then we headed south. We saw a number of native fishermen 
 (among them some women also) wading around out in the sea more 
 than a mile from shore, catching crabs, and picking up other edi- 
 ble invertebrates. We overhauled one old woman who was thus 
 cruising about waist deep in water, with a basket slung at her side 
 and a stick in her hand. Her basket contained three fine crabs, two 
 curious little chsetodons, and a large sea-anemone {Actinia) which 
 quite resembled a cauliflower with a concave centre. We bought 
 her entire catch for ten cents and went our way. These waders 
 sometimes take cast-nets with them when they go a-wading, with 
 which they catch a good many small fish. The water is so clear that 
 all objects on the bottom are quite discernible, and the crabs, being 
 very slow on foot, are easily caught by hand. 
 
 All around Jaffna, the bottom of the sea is of white sand, in 
 some places thickly overgrown with seaweed and in others clean 
 as a floor. 
 
 After two hoiu's' pulling at the oars we came to good collecting 
 ground, just off the southeastern shore of Mandetivu, The water 
 was only three to four feet deep, and my old diver got out of the 
 boat to wade around. First we found dozens of holothurians lying 
 scattered about like so many brown sausages, six inches long ; so 
 numerous were they, in fact, that one wonders why the natives do 
 not collect and dry them for shipment to China, as is done farther 
 down the coast in the Gulf of Manaar. We could have gathered 
 a hundred without much trouble ; but a dozen were sufficient for 
 our wants. It is strange the natives do not eat them, as they do 
 nearly everything else that comes out of the sea. 
 
 Next we found some very pretty little star-fishes {Asteria), and 
 
254 TWO YEARS IX THE JFIS^GLE. 
 
 after drifting over a bed of tall green sea-weed, whicli swayed in the 
 currents like a field of grain moved by a gentle breeze, we came to 
 a wide tract of clean sand where the coral grew. My diver brought 
 up a piece as a sample and we told him that was what we wanted. 
 Presently he espied something in the water and dived quickly to 
 the bottom. A moment later his feet and legs appeared at the 
 surface, kicking wildly while the rest of his body wrestled with 
 somethiag below, and when he finally righted himself he rose with 
 a huge Madrepora in his hands. One of my boatmen went to his 
 assistance and the specimen was soon safely deposited in the boat. 
 Upon examining it, we found quite a collection of little animals 
 caught amongst the myriad branches of the cluster, of such variety 
 that I took an inventory of the lot. There was 1 squilla, 1 tiny 
 star-fish, 3 tiny crabs of two species, 2 fishes four inches long, 2 
 yellow and black chsetodons, and 56 tiny fishes about one inch long, 
 gorgeously banded with blue, black, and red. The little fellows had, 
 no doubt, taken refuge among the thicMy growing coral branches 
 to escape their natoiral enemies — the larger fishea 
 
 We presently foimd quite an extensive grove of coral, where the 
 beautiful branching clusters grew thickly all about over the clean 
 white sea-bottom, in water only five feet deep and clear as crystaL 
 Such a beautiful sight almos>t made me long to be a merman or a 
 fish, that I might dwell on that clean floor of sand, among the 
 glassy coral groves, the shells and other treasures of the sea. 
 
 We loaded our boats with living madrepores of three species, 
 two being of the long-limbed, tree-like variety, and the other, Mad- 
 repora cytherea, was of a curious saucer-shaped iorm, a very large 
 disc hollowed in the centre, and set thickly all over with tiny 
 branches about an inch long. It was grand fun, truly, and down- 
 right sorry were we when the boat was piled full and calm posses- 
 sion took the place of eager pursuit. 
 
 We landed on the eastern side of Mandetivu, on a raised beach 
 composed almost wholly of fossil coral {Astreopora and Meandrina), 
 which cropped out here and there in large masses. Near the beach 
 we noticed several tons of bleached coral, chiefly madrepores, 
 heaped up in huge piles to be burned into lime. The lime thus 
 obtained becomes, when fully treated, the " chunam " so dear to the 
 palate of every betel-chewing native. 
 
 In the fish-market I reaped a rich harvest. Every evening the 
 fishermen bring in their morning's catch and expose it for sale 
 under a shed which stands in the centre of an open space on the 
 
 ae I 
 
THE NORTHERN PROVINCE. 255 
 
 sliore, close to a convenient landing-place for the boats. The 
 men catch the fish and the women sell them. At that time (Feb- 
 ruary) very few scale-fish were caught, not a dozen species all 
 told, and I congratulated myself on having made a good collection 
 at Colombo. Just as I expected, however, from the shallowness of 
 the sea all around, I found that the flat-bodied Chondropterygii 
 (rays and skates) were taken in great variety and abundance. The 
 Jaffna waters seem to be the headquarters for all the species of this 
 order to be found in the Indian Ocean, and I doubt if any other 
 locality in the world of ten times the area can boast as many 
 species as I collected there in one week. 
 
 "While it is true that none of the specimens I saw could for a 
 moment compare in size with some of the monster rays known to 
 inhabit the vicinity of Madagascar, nor yet the gigantic devil-fish 
 {Manta hirostris. Walb.) of our own coast, it is not to be sup- 
 posed that such fishes could attain such vast dimensions in a local- 
 ity where they constitute a staple article of food for the people, 
 and are fished for constantly. 
 
 On getting home from our trip after coral I set out for the fish- 
 market, in obedience to my rule to visit such places every day, rain 
 or shine ; for no man knoweth what a day's fishing may bring 
 forth. On the way I met an old Tamil woman of most repulsive 
 features and form, carrying on her head a rhinobatus {R. thouini), 
 five feet long, and without a break in its skin. Necessity knows 
 no law, except that the first specimen must always be taken for fear 
 another of the same species is not met, and like a true Dick Tur- 
 pin I made the old woman stand and deliver. It is always safe to 
 assume that a native will sell anything for money, and in this case 
 the fish was willingly delivered to me, for about double the price 
 paid for it ! 
 
 I sent this prize back to the rest house and went on to the mar- 
 ket where I found a fine large spotted ray [Trygon uarvak) which 
 measured 3 feet 6 inches in width, and 9 feet 6 inches in length 
 including the tail, which alone was 6 feet 7 inches. This specimen 
 I bought for one rupee and carried home in triumph — by proxy. 
 This species is readily distinguished by the black spots of various 
 shapes which thickly cover its entire upper surface on a pale slaty 
 blue ground. The entire under surface is creamy white. 
 
 The next day after skinning one of the big fish and skeletonizing 
 the other I visited the market as usual and this time bought two 
 rays of another species {JEtobatis narinari), three more spotted rays 
 
356 TWO TEARS IK THE JUKGLE. 
 
 (2! uarnak), and four butter-fisli {Gar an x gallus), all of wMch, ex 
 eepting the spotted rays, I prepared before I went to bed that 
 night. Lucky it was for me that I knew how to make every stroke 
 count. 
 
 The next day after finishing my three remaining specimens I 
 hastened eagerly to the market to see what fresh conquests were in 
 store for me. Another Rhinohatus five feet long, and a splendid 
 specimen of a most beautiful species of shark, the elegant spotted 
 "tiger-shark," — it should be leopard, — Stegostoma tigrinum.* Its 
 ground color is the bright tawny yellow of the tiger, to be sure, but 
 instead of stripes it is dotted all over with jet-black leopard-like 
 spots. Its form is quite as striking as its colors. Instead of the 
 shapeless flabbiness usually seen in sharks, this one was compactly 
 built, with a very shapely body, having two ridges along the back 
 on each side, and the upper lobe of the tail lengthened for more 
 than two feet. This handsome shark was 6 feet 3 inches in length. 
 In the Colombo market I was one day very much disturbed by find- 
 ing a piece of skin from one of these creatures which had been cut 
 up and sold. Fortunately for me, fish in Jaffna sell for less than 
 one-third of what they fetch in Colombo, and I was able to buy a 
 great deal without spending much money. The shark cost me only 
 a rupee, and its skin, nicely mounted, may now be seen in the 
 Museum of Comparative Zool»j*gy at Cambridge. 
 
 At this juncture I was somewhat distracted by the arrival of two 
 boat loads of very fine coral, in which aU the species found around 
 Jaffna were well represented. The pale-green madrepores were 
 certainly very beautiful, but the finest specimen was a huge Madre- 
 pora cytherea. This superb specimen, nearly three feet in diameter, 
 was exceedingly fragile, and I did not succeed in getting it to Koch- 
 ester unbroken. I was told that it arrived in about a thousand 
 pieces, but I think the number must have been exaggerated. But 
 at that time I was especially interested in cartilaginous fishes, and 
 for a few days made little account of corals. 
 
 My next addition was a round thick-bodied ray, studded all over 
 with very sharp spines ( Urogymnus asperrimus), from which it de- 
 serves to be known as the spiny ray. After it, came the largest 
 ray of all, 4 feet 3 inches wide, thick-bodied and of a uniform 
 bluish gray color. This was a Trygon sephen, distinguished by hav- 
 ing a large fin on the taU near the end. A little later I secured 
 
 * Called by the natives, Talei sura, or sea-weed shark. 
 
 1 
 
LUOIOCEPHALUS PULCHEB. (Page 386.) 
 
 (Drawn by F. A. Lucas, from a sjiecimen.) 
 
 fcJTEUOSTOJIA TiaRINUM. (Page 956.) 
 
 {From Author''' s sketch.') 
 
 I 
 
THE NORTHERN PROVINCE.- 257 
 
 another specimen of this species, but with all my catches of big 
 fish I did not disdain to gather in such smaller fry as four speci- 
 mens of Trygon .ivalga, a small shark with black fin tips [Carcharias 
 melanopterus), and four specimens of C. acutus. Another small spe- 
 cies of Rhinobatus was also rescued from the hands of the spoilers 
 and tenderly cared for. 
 
 I was very busy those days, and nights also, for that matter ; 
 for I often worked till near midnight. The back yard of the rest 
 house was roomy, shady, and inviting, and in it I planted my table 
 and cut up big fish from morning till night. The poor people 
 came in crowds to get the meat I had to give them, and finally they 
 became such a nuisance I had to forbid theii* coming inside the 
 yard at all. Still, it was a satisfaction to know that such a quan- 
 tity of good food was not wasted. 
 
 My last catch was the most valuable and important of all. I 
 had collected a goodly number of such specimens as I have already 
 mentioned, and had about ceased to expect anything else particu- 
 larly new ; though I still made my daily visit to the market. 
 
 One evening as I drew near the landing-place, I saw lying on 
 the sandy shore, a large fish of truly remarkable appearance. What 
 could it be ? Without evincing any of the hvely interest I felt, I 
 strolled forward and looked it over carelessly. I could have shouted 
 with delight, but dared not, for any demonstration of the kind on 
 my part would instantly have sent the price of the fish away above 
 par value. It was a very strange and exceedingly rare shark-like 
 fish, half shark and half ray, known to ichthyologists as Bhampho~ 
 hatis ancylostovius, and by the natives called " cul uluva." 
 
 In length it lacked two mches of seven feet, and its width across 
 the pectoral fins was four feet two inches. The head was flat hke 
 that of typical Rhi/nchobafi, but instead of being prolonged into 
 the flat triangular beak so characteristic of R. Djeddensis and others, 
 it was abruptly rounded off in front of the pectoral fins. The most 
 striking feature of the animal is the high and angular crest which 
 springs from just behind the head and rises into a rounded hump 
 twelve inches high, studded all along its crest from back to front 
 with a wide band of white tooth-like spines, closely crowded to- 
 gether. Low down on the side there is a much smaller row of the 
 same ; another on the head, partly surrounding the eye and gill 
 opening, and a still smaller row directly in front of the eye. These 
 curious rows of clean white teeth — for they certainly are more 
 like shark-teeth than spines — render the animal easily distinguish- 
 17 
 
258 TWO YEARS IN THE JUNGLE. 
 
 able, even at quite a distance. The color of the body is blackish 
 gi-ay, but on different parts of the body the shades vai-y from gray 
 to dull black. The under parts are dirty white, mottled here and 
 there with pink tints. The dorsal fin is mai'ked by a few large, 
 round, white spots. 
 
 In the course of removing and preserving the skin, I found 130 
 small spines from the tails of as many small sting rays, sticking in 
 the head around the mouth and in the muscles ai'ound the corners 
 of the mouth. Evidently our anci/Jostomus had a gi-eat liking for 
 ye tender little ray, and sovereign contempt for his many-bai-bed 
 spine, a single insertion of which would be apt to give a man the 
 lock-jaw on short notice. Appai-ently they did not cause our shark- 
 i-ay the shghtest discomfort, as the number of these trophies showed 
 that he ate all the rays he could catch. 
 
 Even the fishermen declai-ed that this fish was very rarely 
 caught, and but for my good luck in buying it from " first hands " 
 — the catcher — I should have been obhged to have paid a good 
 round price for it. The bai-gain was concluded before the lusty fe- 
 males who act as "middle-men " suspected the danger ; and the way 
 they all set iipon that poor fisherman, when they leai'ned he had 
 sold the fish to me for thi-ee paltiy shillings, and envu'oned him, and 
 howled in his ears in impotent rage, must have made the poor man 
 ■^^'ish us all at the bottom of the sea, 
 
 "^Tien I reached Colombo again, my fi-ieud Dr. Haly offered me 
 one hundred and fifty rupees for this specimen for the museum, 
 and being in need of hai-d cash, I reluctantly let it go. I have 
 never seen but one other individual of this species. 
 
 On my ret\u-n from Mullaitivu, in the middle of April, I found 
 cartilaginous fishes had quite gone out of fashion, and in their 
 stead, big sea-tui-tles were all the i-age. I was very glad of such an 
 opportunity to collect some large specimens of the cai'ey {Chelonia 
 virgata), the Indian counterpai't of oiu* green tiu-tle (C mi/da$). 
 The cai-ey is the largest of the genus Chelonia, good-sized specimens 
 being almost, if not quite, one-thii-d lai'ger than our lai'gest green 
 tm-tle. The chief difference in form is in the gi-eater convexity of 
 the shell of the former. I secured four very good specimens of the 
 carey, the shell of the lai-gest of which measm-ed underneath 44 by 
 32 inches. The weight of this specimen I estimated at four- hun- 
 di'ed pounds, and yet I think it was not so large as one other which 
 I saw in the Calcutta Museum. 
 
 The fiesh of the cai-ej is considered about on a pai* with that of 
 
THE korthee:^ province. 25ft 
 
 the shark, and, so I was told, is not eaten by Europeans at all. 
 Nevertheless, I found it very good, tender, and of far better flavor 
 than any of the Jaffiia beef I encountered. I was very glad to find 
 the Ja£Eaa market-women do not cut steaks from living turtles in 
 the harrowing manner alluded to by Sir Emerson Tennent in his 
 "Natural History of Ceylon." The animals are killed and after- 
 ward cut up in Christian style. They are ridiculously cheap, even 
 to strangers, the price of those I bought ranging from three to ten 
 rupees. 
 
 As a fair sample of the eternal cussedness of natives in work 
 like mine, I may cite an incident in the preparation of the large 
 turtle referred to above. I roughed out its skeleton at the market, 
 first sawing out its lower skull, and after putting all the loose bones 
 in the upturned shell, I directed my Singhalese servant, Henrique, 
 to take the bones down to the sea, wash them, and then carry them 
 to the rest house. I charged him particularly not to lose a sin- 
 gle bone, but it seemed almost unnecessary, the bones being so 
 large and the skeleton in so few pieces. I went on to the rest 
 house, and after a reasonable delay Henrique put in an appearance 
 with the shell on his head and the bones in it — all that remained 
 at least. The stupid donkey had actually lost both shoulder- gir- 
 dles ! How he accomplished the feat, I never could understand, 
 for the bones were so large and of such awkward shape that neither 
 of them could have been put in a peck measure. I should have 
 thumped the stupid fellow's head against the wall, but somehow I 
 always fail in my duty toward my servants. The bones were never 
 found, and that fine, large skeleton is without them to this day. 
 The above is only a fair instance of the value of natives as assist- 
 ants. The very next day Henrique further distinguished himself 
 by leaning over the edge of a large box I was packing with corals, 
 holding in his hand a pound can of jam, which he managed to let 
 fall exactly in the centre of a splendid madrepore I had just placed. 
 Of course the cluster was a total wreck. 
 
 One of the most pleasant episodes of my very busy fortnight in 
 Jaflfna was a call from Mr. Leys, the genial and hospitable manager 
 of the Oriental Bank, He came to tell me there was a deposit in 
 his bank for my benefit in case I should need more fiinds — thanks 
 to the thoughtfulness of Messrs. Lee, Hedges & Co., and Mr. Ben- 
 nett — and to invite me, a total stranger, to dine with him the next 
 evening in company with several other gentlemen. I accepted the 
 invitation, enjoyed a fine dinner, and spent an evening most agree- 
 
260 TWO YEARS IN THE JUNGLE. 
 
 ably with very pleasant company. Among the guests were Mr 
 Samuel Haughton, an Assistant Government Agent at MuUaitivu, 
 on the north coast, where crocodiles abound and animal hfe in gen- 
 eral is also abundant. On the strength of information obtained 
 from him I determined to go to MuUaitivu at once for a short 
 stay. 
 
 The next day I finished packing up everything I had collected 
 in Jaffiia, and arranged for its storage until my return, or fiirther 
 orders. I was ad"\dsed to go to MuUaitivu by sea from Point Pe- 
 dro, the extreme northern point of Ceylon, twenty-one miles from 
 Jaffna. Accordingly I loaded a bandy with my regular impedi- 
 menta, and started it off early in the morning with Henrique as a 
 conductor, whUe I remained and took the Koyal Mail Coach at 4 
 P.M. The coach was rather crowded. My feUow passengers were 
 "educated natives," rather interesting animals of the "government 
 clerk " type, but they elbowed my ribs, questioned, cross-examined, 
 and talked at me untU I was tired and out of patience. For five 
 mUes two of them compared notes on the prospects of the petitions 
 they had sent in for certain appointments and promotions. One 
 of them started to read aloud a copy of his, but it covered so many 
 foolscap pages that his friend weakened long before he had finished 
 and abruptly choked him off. The composition stamped the writer 
 as an " amoosin' cuss," and I regret that I cannot produce a copy 
 of it. The petition laid great stress on the writer's two years of 
 service as a scribe in MuUaitivu, and gave a harrowing account of 
 how he was afflicted with fever, and how his wife " was also knocked 
 down." 
 
 The country lying between Jaffna and the northern coast is flat 
 and steiile, and not particularly interesting in any way. The rank 
 vegetation and general tropical luxuriance one sees elsewhere in 
 Ceylon is conspicuous by its absence, and on the contrary the 
 country is rather open. What jimgle there is, is low and scrubby, 
 and the face of nature had the dry and thirsty look so characteris- 
 tic of the plains of India in the dry season. 
 
 We changed horses every fotu* miles and reached Point Pedro 
 about 8 P.M. The village is smaU, very prettily situated in an ex- 
 tensive grove of palmp'a and cocoa palms, but almost totaUy barren 
 of food fit for a white man. There is no harbor, but there is here a 
 break in the coral reef which permits boats to land. This fringing 
 reef, composed chiefly of madrepores, lies close along the shore, and 
 I am told extends for mUes without another gap. The coral looks 
 
THE ]SrORTHER]Sr PEOVHSTCE. 261 
 
 very pretty from the shore, and but for my boxes full in JaflEaa, I 
 would have been tempted to gather a few clusters. 
 
 In half an hour after we reached the rest house, I learned that 
 a small native boat was just ready to set sail for Batticaloa, and 
 would for a consideration land me at Mullaitivu. The captain 
 came and said they had cleared and were ready to start at once. 
 "What, to-night?" "Yes, to-night; we will take you for twenty 
 rupees," I said, "Wait till to-morrow and I will go." "No," said 
 the captain, "if we wait till to-morrow we will charge you thirty 
 rupees." "All right, then off we go to-night. Boy, pack up the 
 boxes again, and send for a bandy." The boatman was caught. 
 "Sir," said he presently, "we can't go until to-morrow. We haven't 
 cleared sufficiently yet." 
 
 " Oh ! I thought so ! What an honest man you are, to be sure." 
 He thought to swindle me out of ten rupees by way of introduc- 
 tion. So after dining sumptuously off a tough old rooster, and a 
 dish of curry and rice that was like hving fire, I went to my blankets 
 on the cot. 
 
 The next day, Henrique ransacked the \Tllage for eatables, and 
 a long search panned out nothing but two scrawny fowls and a few 
 eggs. No fish, vegetables, fruit, bread, or other meat. Being ex- 
 ceedingly tu'ed from my Jaffna work I was glad to lie nearly all 
 day in my hammock, in delicious, restful idleness. 
 
 The boat was to sail at noon, and also at 4 p.m., but the "tyn- 
 dall " (captain) made the excuse that they had not thoroughly 
 cleared. Then I saw my enemy and knew my work. After get- 
 ting everything in readiness to start I went for the tyndall and in- 
 sisted that we should set off. For two hours I made his life a 
 burden to him, and by that time we had got the crew together and 
 were really ready to go. At dark, my luggage was taken aboard 
 and we sailed at once. 
 
 The name of the old Tamil tub was Ardi Letchme, and I think 
 she was the clumsiest and slowest craft afloat. She was fairly 
 clean, however, and had a sort of cabin with bunks, in one of which 
 I lay and slept while dozens of big, black cockroaches marched 
 over me in solemn procession. We were four whole days in mak- 
 ing that seventy-two miles to Mullaitivu, and at times I thought I 
 should go wild with impatience to get on. The breezes were not 
 very favorable, I admit, but instead of beating up to windwai'd and 
 making some headway, the clumsy old craft just wallowed like a 
 log in the water. Once the captain brought his vessel to anchor 
 
262 TWO YFAKS IN THE JUNGLE, 
 
 for half a day becaiise the winds were eoutiiuy I It was on such a 
 craft that I paid first-elass steamer rates, and the captiiiu had the 
 withering audacity to ask me to pay for the rice and oocoanuts my 
 servant ate. 
 
 I spent the days on deck in the blazing heat, reading and 
 grumbling jmd wishing for a "Whitehead torpedo or a chiu-ge of 
 dynamite A^th which to blow the old tub into the :ur, captiun, 
 crew, cockix->aches and all. I would have taken my chances of get- 
 ting ashore for the &ike of the i*evenge. 
 
 But all things eju'thly end at last, and so did that voyage, "We 
 reached Mullaitivu at sunset on March Gth. 
 
CHAPTER XXIII. 
 
 MULLAITIVU. 
 
 An Unwholesome Village Site. — Dirt and Discomfort. — Crocodile Hnntiug.-* 
 Cannibalism and Leprosy among Crocodiles. — Flying Foxes. — A Big 
 Haul. — A Heronry. — Hot Jungle. — Death of Mr. Leys by Sunstroke. — 
 Mammals. — A live Manis and its Doings. — On Short Rations. — Exasperat- 
 ing Failure to Receive Supplies. — Tropical Hunger. — A Gloomy Proposi- 
 tion Strangely Refuted, — A Delicious Beverage. — Journal of a Trip into 
 the Interior. — Monkey-shooting. — Character of the Jungle. — Joseph Em- 
 erson. — Elephant Skeletons. — Self-buried Frogs. — Two Hundred Monkeys 
 in Four Hours. — Their Fleetnessin the Tree-tops. — Deer. — Overland Jour- 
 ney to Jaffna. — Elephant Pass. — Return to Colombo. 
 
 Just half-way between Point Pedro and Trincomalee is the village 
 of Mullaitivu, with the sandy shore and clear blue waters of the 
 Bay of Bengal in front, and a deadly fever-breeding lagoon at the 
 back, a most ill-chosen site truly. As villages go, it is quite a pre- 
 tentious one, and contains a rest house, a well-appointed hospital, 
 which, thanks to the site of the village, is also well filled, and a 
 court presided over by an European official — an Assistant Govern- 
 ment Agent, I believe. I was much disappointed in finding the 
 rest house a very miserable affair, small, baiTen of furniture, ill- 
 ventilated, and with a floor composed of finely pulverized plaster 
 three inches deep. 
 
 Its one small room was to be my home during my stay there, 
 but the condition of the floor was such that I could not live in the 
 room at all, and was fain to content myself with occupying the ve- 
 randah, which opened into a nice back yard. Even at this distance 
 I shudder to think of the dirt and discomfort I endured at that 
 place, and but for the pleasure I found in my work it would have 
 been insupportable. 
 
 Needing a coolie to accompany me as a game-carrier when I 
 went hunting, and for other purposes as well, I hired a poor deaf 
 fellow, a young man in years and stature, but a timid boy in spirit 
 
264 TWO YEARS IN THE JUNGLE. 
 
 His wages were nine pence per day, and although he was al* 
 most as deaf as an adder, and knew not a word of EngHsh, he im- 
 derstood the sign-language perfectly, and his eagerness to please 
 quite counter-balanced his infirmity. He was a simple-hearted 
 fellow, faithful as a watch-dog, and hung so constantly on my looks 
 and desires, that from the character of his devotion to me he 
 hourly reminded me of one. 
 
 From this resemblance I called him Canis. I gi-ew to like the 
 poor fellow very much, and was really sorry to see the last of him 
 when I went away. He asked to be taken with me, but of course 
 that was out of the question. 
 
 MuUaitivu is a notorious place for fever, and also a worse 
 disease, as I learned by a visit to the hospital. The old physician 
 in charge, a very intelligent and well-educated native, showed me 
 a number of cases of a mild form of leprosy, which is the result of 
 a syphilitic venereal disease, from which the doctor solemnly assured 
 me not a single native in that district was free. Some of the cases 
 were feai-ful to behold, each patient being a living, breathing hell. 
 The disease is, of course, hereditary, which accounts for its univer- 
 sal prevalence. 
 
 Although there is absolutely nothing either pleasing or attract- 
 ive in either the village or the adjacent country, the jimgle round 
 about, within easy reach, is »good collecting groimd. As Mr. 
 Haughton had told me, all the lagoons in the vicinity were inhab- 
 ited by crocodiles, and to them I turned my attention first. Even 
 the stagnant little fever-breeder within rifle shot of the rest house, 
 at the foot of the Government Agent's compound, has its comple- 
 ment of these scaly scavengers, swimming lazily around and among 
 the lotuses. I shot two specimens almost from imder " my own 
 vine and fig-tree." 
 
 The next day after my arrival I made an excursion thi-ee miles 
 back into the country, to Avhere the road crosses a narrow arm of 
 the lagoon. Although the pool was not more than sixty feet wide, 
 it was quite deep, and literally swarming with crocodiles. The 
 banks were level and perfectly bare, and the only chance for a sure 
 shot was by crawling on hands and knees for seventy-five yai'ds, up 
 to a pile of boards which lay within easy range. 
 
 This bit of water, which I called Crocodile Pool, became my 
 regular hunting ground, and for more than a week I visited it daily 
 At about fom- o'clock in the afternoon, the crocodiles began to come 
 out to lie on the banks and from that time imtil neai'ly simset was 
 
MULLAITIVU. 26r> 
 
 the time to gather them. It was my habit to start for the pool 
 at three o'clock, when the sun was blazing hot, taking with me 
 my poor little deaf coolie. Cards familiaris, and also Henrique, if 
 his work allowed, to assist in carrying home the bag. Canis al- 
 ways carried a couple of half-ripe cocoanuts, with which to slake 
 our thirst at the pool, for there it was 
 
 " Water, water everywhere, 
 Nor any drop to drink." 
 
 Some days, when the sun was excessively hot and I shot poorly, 
 we got nothing, but on others, when everything went well, we 
 killed and secured all we could care for. Our best day's work was 
 when we shot and got three good specimens, the largest of which 
 was nine feet in length. Altogether I took an even dozen Groco- 
 dilus palustris — varying in length from five to nine feet — out of 
 that little pool. 
 
 I made the discovery that this species is cannibalistic. On 
 more than one occasion I found their stomachs well filled with 
 flesh which I had cut from the bones of their mates in skeletoniz- 
 ing, and left near the water. 
 
 Not only did the loose chunks of meat disappear promptly dur- 
 ing the first night of their exposure, but the whole carcasses of the 
 crocodiles I skinned were likewise disposed of. Every morning I 
 would find the ground picked clean, not a vestige either of body, 
 bones, or entrails remaining in sight over night. The flesh (and in 
 some cases the bones also) of twelve crocodiles was thus eaten by 
 the friends and relatives of the deceased. 
 
 Two of the crocodiles I shot, specimens seven feet long, were 
 grievously afflicted with a cutaneous disease like leprosy. In one, 
 the whole left side of the head, the neck, and throat were the parts 
 affected, and in the other it was the entire tail. On these parts the 
 epidermis had peeled off entirely, and the skin was covered with 
 huge, scale-like scabs, which, when peeled off, left the diseased skin 
 of an unwholesome bluish color. Both specimens had running 
 sores at the points where the sternum and pelvis touched the 
 ground, and both were so emaciated as to be little more than skin 
 and bone. In the stomach of one I found a handful of swamp 
 grass and a lot of small pebbles. Thus were the weak and sickly 
 individuals crowded to the wall in the struggle for existence which 
 was going on in that over-crowded pool. 
 
266 TWO YEAES IlSr THE JUNGLE. 
 
 I noticed that Crocodilus palustris has one habit which I never 
 observed in other saurians, and which would seem peculiar to this 
 species. They often stand high up on their legs, and walk off hke 
 big iguanas, carrying their bodies from six to eight inches above 
 the ground. It is a very novel sight to see an eight-foot crocodile 
 actually stand up and walk, but from the fact that I saw it done by 
 seven or eight individuals, it would seem to be a regular habit with 
 them. The end of the tail always touches the ground, but that mem- 
 ber is not dragged by any means. I saw one lean individual run at 
 a very good pace in that position.* 
 
 The largest crocodile I shot or saw at Mullaitivu was a fine, ten- 
 foot specimen, which I encountered at very close quarters as it lay 
 in the bushes one hot afternoon, on the banks of the lagoon, north 
 of the village. "WhUe hunting quietly along the low, grassy banks, 
 rifle in hand, winding in and out among the bushes, I suddenly 
 espied, just five paces ahead of me, the end of a crocodile's tail pro- 
 jecting past the root of a tree. The rest of the animal was con- 
 cealed by the foHage. I halted, breathless with fear lest I be dis- 
 covered and my prize escape, and stood there for several minutes 
 studying the ground. I soon discovered there were two big fellows 
 lying very close together, and both asleep, but ready to awaken at 
 the slightest noise. One twig snapped, or one noisy step, would send 
 them plunging to the bottom of the lagoon. I backed out with 
 great caution and advanced at another opening, until I got a fair 
 view of both the sleeping beauties, as they lay dreaming of big fish, 
 dogs, coolies, and perhaps men. I fired at the largest specimen 
 and he died. It was the nearest I ever came to stumbhng over a 
 live crocodile on his native heath. 
 
 At the edge of the big lagoon, not far from the Crocodile Pool, I 
 found a heronry in a small grove of low, scrubby trees, which grew 
 out in the mud and water a short distance from the bank. I was 
 attracted to the spot by seeing flying foxes {Pteropus Edwardsii) 
 flying near it, and on a nearer approach I saw a small tree-top 
 hanging full of them. No pear-tree was ever hung more thickly 
 with pears than that Httle tree with those huge bats, whose wings 
 spread four feet when extended, and whose peculiar fox-like heads 
 have given them the popular name of flying fox. They hung by 
 
 * It will be noticed that this strange habit, which seemed almost universal 
 with individuals of this species, was observed and recorded after the two iso« 
 lated instances mentioned on page 55. 
 
MULLAITIVU. 267 
 
 their legs, of course, head downward, looking at a little distance 
 precisely like the pear-shaped nests of our Baltimore oriole, and of 
 about the same size. They actually crowded each other on the 
 limbs, quarreUing, squealing, and occasionally shifting their posi- 
 tions. 
 
 I saw that I had a bonanza, for I wanted a hundred specimena 
 of that species, and up to that time had secured only ten. Not 
 having with me the firearms and cartridges I wanted for a regular 
 haul, I left them undisturbed, and returned the next day with my 
 No. 10 double barrel and some very fat cartridges loaded with No. 
 8 shot. I easily approached within range, and with five shots 
 killed and secured forty-four specimens, in less than a minute. It 
 looked Uke wholesale murder, but it was not, for I preserved every 
 specimen in the form of either skin or skeleton, and now they are 
 scattered far and wide through the museums of the United States. 
 
 Just before I opened fire, a large crocodile lay on a little islet of 
 mud in the middle distance, sunning himself, but he took water in 
 fine style at the first discharge. The birds rose from the trees in a 
 cloud and flapped away, but I knew they would return. After I 
 had disposed of my flying foxes, two days later, I returned for the 
 birds and their eggs. Our first haul was of eggs, and we took 
 home 70 of lesser cormorant (Graculus Javanicus), 9 of darter 
 {Plotus melanogaster), 18 of Herodias garzetta, 4 of large egret {H. 
 alba), and 4 of night heron (Nycticorax griseus). I shot several birds 
 of each species, and also killed the crocodile which frequented that 
 incubatory, but the water and mud was so deep and treacherous I 
 was afraid to wade out to where it lay, and left it as a solemn warn- 
 ing to all other crocodiles who might feel inclined to hang about 
 there until the crop of young birds got ripe and fell into the water. 
 
 Of course I hunted in every direction around Mullaitivu, and 
 nearly always with good success. Sometimes the bag was an in- 
 teresting small mammal, and sometimes a large bird or reptile 
 which I had not known to exist there. As a rule, I endeavored to 
 be at home during the hottest part of the day, from ten till three, 
 but more than once I was out all day. I will always remember 
 one particularly roasting, blazing hot day, when I went about five 
 miles above the village, between the great lagoon and the sea-shore, 
 and was out all day hunting through the low, sandy scrub jungle 
 after monkeys, with not a breath of air stirring. My dusky com- 
 panions from the village complained of the heat more than once, 
 and it really was almost unendurable. The salt perspiration ran 
 
268 TWO YEAES IN THE JUNGLE. 
 
 into my eyes and caused them to smart and inflame painfully. Ai 
 times we actually gasped for breath. I afterward learned that on 
 that very day my new friend, Mr. Leys, of the Jafi&ia bank, died of 
 sunstroke while hunting in just such jungle as that, on the other 
 side of the island from me, near Manaar. It " gave me quite a 
 turn," as the English say, when I heard the news and compared 
 the dates. 
 
 Not more than a mile from the village, in a bit of the same low. 
 sandy jungle common all along the coast, I saw the bones of two 
 elephants, a cow, and a calf, which the villagers say wandered 
 thither from the interior and perished for the want of water. It 
 may be true. 
 
 My reward for the hot day's work mentioned above was two fine 
 monkeys, one, a pretty little rilawa, or bonneted macaque [Maca- 
 cus pileatus), and the other a big, .fat, graj', wanderoo {Semnopithe- 
 cus leucoprymus), and a black-naped hare {Lepus nigricolKs). In 
 my short jungle excursions round the village I shot specimens of 
 jackal [Ganis aureus), mungoos {Herpestes griseus), grizzly squirrel 
 {S. macrourus), and jungle striped squirrel {S. tristriatus). I once 
 encountered a large troop of wanderoos within half a mile of the 
 village, two of which were added to my collection. 
 
 As usual, I encouraged the natives to hunt and trap quadrupeds 
 for me, and they brought me ^a number of very desirable speci- 
 mens, among which was a very pretty little muntjac ( Cervulus au- 
 reus), two civet cats (Viverra malaccensis), a,nd a live loris (Lorn 
 gracilis), a most curious little animal. The most valuable and in- 
 teresting of all the specimens I obtained at MuUaitivu was a Hve 
 manis or pengolin {Manis pentadactyla), caught by a native thirty- 
 six miles away. By good luck its captor had heard of me, and that 
 I bought all kinds of animals, and, being an enterprising fellow, he 
 carried it in a bag all that distance to offer me. I gave him a 
 month's wages for the animal, five rupees, and enough coppers ad- 
 ditional to enable him to carry home his silver intact. He was 
 quite delighted with his sale, I equally so with my purchase^, and 
 we parted with mutual blessings. 
 
 My new pet evidently expected fair treatment at our hands, for 
 he soon uncoiled himself and stood up for examination. He was 
 just three feet long, including his tail — which by itself measured 
 seventeen inches — and his weight was eighteen pounds. This tail 
 was a most useful appendage, for it was very broad, measuring five 
 and a half inches across where it joined the body, slightly hoi- 
 
MFLLAITIVU. 269 
 
 lovred underneath and rounded on the top, its official pui"pose being 
 to protect the animal's head. In walking he carried his back very 
 highly arched in the middle, and the long, curved claws of his fore- 
 feet he bent under his feet until they pointed directly backward, 
 and literally walked on them. His heavy tail barely cleared the 
 ground in walking, and his nose was always canied low, on the 
 lookout fc,r ants. He often stood fully erect on his hind legs, like 
 a kangaroo, when looking about in search of food. Like the knights 
 of old, his armor clanked as he walked along. 
 
 Whenever he found a colon}' of ants he would begin to dig 
 most industriously, and nothing but brick or stone could resist the 
 attacks of those powerful claws. It was great fun to see him attack 
 an ant-hilL After digging a httle distance into the hiU and expos- 
 ing the interior, he would thrust his slender, gelatinous tongue for 
 six inches or more into the passage-ways one after another, and 
 draw it out thickly covered with ants. It made my flesh creep to 
 see the vicious httle insects upon the animal's tongue and going 
 into its mouth ; but I wished there were enough ant-eaters in the 
 world to exterminate the whole family. 
 
 If ever a small animal was especially created to resist the at- 
 tacks of destroyers, that manis must have been the one. In such 
 plate-armor as he wore he could roll himself up and defy the teeth 
 of the jackal, or leopard, or the fangs of the cobra. Having no 
 teeth at all, and claws fashioned only for digging, he would have 
 fared badly in the jungle without his defensive coat of mail. From 
 the tip of his nose to the tip of his tail, he was covered with broad, 
 flattened, shield-shaped plates of clear, gray horn. These plates — 
 which were concave underneath and convex above — lay close down 
 upon the skin upon each other, and were arranged in rows with 
 great regularity, beautifully imbricated, and overlapped as perfectly 
 as the slates of a good roof. 
 
 My toothless pet was quite peaceable, but not at all affectionate, 
 and when I undertook to cultivate his acquaintance, my advances 
 were received in true English style. Not having any one to intro- 
 duce me, I undertook to get along without that formality ; but it 
 was of no use. He immediately tucked his head down between his 
 four legs, brought his tail under his body and up over his head, 
 and held it there, forming of himself a flattened ball completely 
 covered with scales. 
 
 I said to him, "My fine fellow, I really must insist upon know 
 ing you more intimately ; so here goes." 
 
270 TTTO YEARS IN" THE JUNGLE. 
 
 I then undertook to uncoil him, but found I could not accom* 
 plisli the task alone. I called Henrique to help me, but the tail 
 stuck to the body as if it had been riveted there. 
 
 I also called Canis to help, and while I held to the body, the 
 other two braced themselves against me and pulled on the tail with 
 aU their strength, to uncoil it. We vrrestled with it until we were 
 faii'ly exhausted, failed utterly, and gave up beaten. Such was the 
 wonderful power in the tail of that small animal. 
 
 This led an old Singhalese, from the jungles of the interior, to 
 inform me that the manis sometimes kills elephants in the follow- 
 ing manner : 
 
 When an elephant ti'oubles a manis, the little animal coils him- 
 self ai'ound the elephant's tnmk, squeezes it so tightly the huge 
 beast cannot breathe, and holds on imtil the elephant di'ops dead 
 of suflfocation. 
 
 It is hardly necessary to say that the above is mere fiction. 
 
 Fi'om the very first, I had no end of trouble with my scaly pet. 
 During the day he was reasonably quiet, but at night he was very 
 restless, and anxious to go ant-hunting. I could not tie him, for 
 on no part of his body would a rope hold without hiu'tiug him, and 
 not for long even then. The fii'st night I had him, I shut him up 
 in the rest house, and in the morning I found him just ready to 
 break thi'ough a hole he had dug with his big claws in the six-inch 
 concrete wall. I actually felt a cold chill when I saw how near 
 I had come to losing my rare and valuable specimen. 
 
 The following night I put him in a lai'ge tin box which had once 
 done duty as the lining of a diy goods box sent from England. I 
 covered the top with boards, piled hea^'y stones upon them, and 
 went to my hammock feeling sure he could not escape. The box 
 stood in the back yard some distance from where I slept 
 
 About three o'clock in the morning the village dogs suddenly 
 began a furious bai'king just outside the walls of the compoimd, 
 and Henrique ran out to see what was the matter. It was the 
 manis. It had found a small rust hole at one comer of the tin 
 prison, and with its powerfid claws had worked away imtil it actu- 
 ally tore a hole in the tin large enough to permit the passage of its 
 body. It was making sti-aight for the jungle, and but for those 
 miserable dogs, who had so often annoyed me bj' trying to steal 
 my specimens, I would have lost my manis. 
 
 The next day it died. Having no chlorofonn, I di'owned it in 
 a clean artificial pool near the village. Veiy little of it was wasted. 
 
MULLAITIVTJ. 271 
 
 I preserved dry botli the skin and skeleton, the tongue and stomach 
 went into alcohol, and the flesh we ate. Part of it made a deHcious 
 stew, rich, sweet, and well-flavored, and part of it we roasted. 
 The latter was dark meat, and although it had a queer flavor, it was 
 tender and very good. 
 
 In addition to the discomfort of living in, or rather at, the 
 worst rest house I ever saw, I presently had to contend with a 
 much gi'eater misery than dirt, namely, scai'city of food, I reached 
 Mullaitivu vnih. two weeks' provisions, expecting to stay only that 
 length of time, but in case I should desire to remain longer, I had 
 arranged to have further supplies sent me from Jaffna. I, of 
 course, expected to purchase certain kinds of food in the village, 
 but found nothing whatever for sale save rice — neither fruit, vegeta- 
 bles, fowls, nor meat of any kind. What the people lived on remains 
 a mystery to this day. 
 
 At the end of a fortnight, I wi-ote to a friend in Jaffna, a rev- 
 erend gentleman who had very kindly offered to do anything in 
 his power to assist me, and asked him to pm-chase and send me 
 forthwith, by a coolie, certain staple articles of food which I men- 
 tioned, and for which I enclosed twenty rupees cash. I counted 
 upon the arrival of the goods before the end of the third week, as 
 surely as my hunger, and until that time I lived on quarter rations. 
 The time expired, but no coolie came. I waited with gi'owing im- 
 patience and sharpening appetite day after day, foiu* days longer, 
 and on the fifth sent a letter to my friend, deploring the failure to 
 connect, and expressing the opinion that my letter had never 
 reached him, or else that the coolie sent to me had stolen away 
 with the whole outfit. I begged my friend to send something at 
 once, as I was almost famishing. 
 
 After several days, when I was almost ready to retm-n to Jaffiia, 
 a letter came from my reverend friend, saying that my letter and 
 the cash enclosed had been received, "' but owing to my illness and 
 the difficulty of finding an honest coolie, I have been unable to 
 send you the articles you requu-e." Great Csesar! Had my cleri- 
 cal friend been eavesdropping then, he certainly would have heard 
 nothing good of himself. He closed by saying that as he was about 
 leaving Jaffna, he had left my rupees with the Superintendent of 
 Police, who would hand them to me on my return. When I re- 
 turned to Jaffna, he had indeed gone, and the Superintendent of 
 Police had never received from him any cash for me. So I never 
 again saw either my reverend friend or my rupees. 
 
272 TWO YEAES IN THE JUNGLE. 
 
 The loss of the money was a mere trifle, but the outrage upon 
 my inner man I could not condone, and have not to this day. 
 After about twenty meals of plain boiled rice with no accompani- 
 ments my appetite succumbs, and my palate refuses it entirely. 
 In a hot climate I believe I could starve easier than eat food 
 which has lost all relish. My hunger was of the kind which called 
 not merely for food of any sort, but palatable, relishable food. In 
 A cold climate, one's hunger is of the ravenous kind that devours 
 whatever comes within reach, and feels satisfied with fulness. In 
 the tropics, I have always found it necessary to have something in 
 reserve to afford the appetite an entire change, even if it be only 
 for a single meal, to break the monotony which would otherwise 
 cause a good article of food to become utterly unpalatable. 
 
 "When my larder was at its lowest ebb, Mr. Long, the road en- 
 gineer, whose bungalow was just on the other side of the fever- 
 breeder, kindly sent me a good-sized pumpkin as a present, one of 
 two he had secured from some distance. It was perfectly dehcious, 
 and as long as it lasted I lived high. That pumpkin was an oasis 
 in a desert of rice. 
 
 About this time letters came from Professor Ward informing me 
 that, on account of continued hard times, he might be obliged to 
 call me home soon, even in his next letter. The funds sent me 
 were so meagre that I scarcely dared go on collecting, and at most 
 had not enough to go far. Another letter conveyed the intelligence 
 that a dear friend at home was very ill. Add to the above, the 
 hunger, dirt, and discomfort in which I lived, and the sum of my 
 discouragements was complete. As I lay in my hammock one night, 
 thinking over the gloomy situation and quite unable to sleep, I 
 summed up everything and said to myself, " I could not be any 
 worse off than I am." The thought had not more than taken shape 
 in my mind when a hook snapped, and my hammock went down 
 "bows foremost," giving my head and shoulders a good bang on 
 the concrete floor. It was such a forcible and instantaneous refu- 
 tation of my gloomy proposition that, in spite of the stars dancing 
 before my eyes I took the joke and laughed over it. 
 
 The water available for drinking purposes at Mullaitivu is so 
 wholly bad that I did not taste it a second time, and during my en- 
 tire stay drank only water from green cocoanuts. 
 
 Fortunately there is a fine gi'ove of cocoa palms a mile above 
 the village, fi'om which I di'ew my supply of green nuts at the rate 
 of one rupee per dozen. 
 
MULLAITIVU. 278 
 
 To my mind, no other beverage in the world, either natural or 
 artificial — not even champagne at its best — can equal, in refreshing 
 dehciousness, the water of a half-ripe cocoanut fresh from the tree. 
 They are best when there is a goodly deposit of soft meat on the 
 walls of the nut, for at that stage the water has a sharp, sparkling 
 acidity, and a delicate cocoanut flavor, the Hke of which is unsur- 
 passed by any other liquid I ever tasted. The water is not so good 
 when the nut is perfectly green, and before any meat has been de- 
 posited. 
 
 It may be only a fancy, but it really seemed to me that the 
 water of the Ceylon cocoanuts have a richer and finer flavor than 
 any others I have tasted. Being a hard drinker, it took five nuts per 
 day to supply my wants ; and I am sure no old toper ever enjoyed 
 his dram more than I did those dehcious draughts. When inclined 
 to imbibe, cut the hard green husk from around the blossom end 
 of the nut with a sharp hatchet or hunting-knife, until it is whittled 
 down to a point, with the shell of the nut in sight. 
 
 On cutting through the shell to make a drinking-hole, I have 
 often seen the water spurt up two feet high, and sometimes into 
 my face. To get the fullest possible enjoyment of the draught it 
 should be taken directly from the nut, nature's own cup. When 
 poured into a drinking vessel its delicate aroma is lost. After this 
 cooling draught, the experienced hand will attack the soft meat on 
 the inside with a spoon without any delay, for it is a dehcious 
 morsel. 
 
 Being desirous of obtaining some elephant skulls and a lot of 
 odd bones, I learned, after many inquiries, of the death of an ele- 
 phant the year previous, near a village called Nedunkenni, nineteen 
 miles southwest of MuUaitivu. Making this an excuse for a little 
 collecting trip back from the coast, I hired a covered bullock bandy 
 and set out on the morning of April 2d, accompanied by Henrique, 
 intending to be gone five days. While I am not partial to journal- 
 ism in books of travel, in this instance I can hardly do better than 
 to copy the daily record of that trip. 
 
 " Tuesday, April 2c?. — A short distance from Mullaitivu we took 
 the wrong road, and the stupid driver did not discover his mistake 
 until we had travelled four miles upon it. Now four miles out of 
 one's way when the sun is scorching hot is a serious thing, espe- 
 cially when one has to turn back that distance, and is thereby un- 
 able to reach the end of the journey that day. I could scarcely keep 
 18 
 
274 TWO YEARS IN THE JUKGLE. 
 
 my hands off that driver, and was only able to do so by scolding 
 like a shrew. The bullocks shared my feeling of disgust, for when 
 we turned to go back the}' became very refractory, and the poor 
 wretch of a driver actually burst out crying. When the tears be- 
 gan to make furrows in the dust that lay on his dusky cheeks, my 
 anger vanished and I was content to make the best of the situation. 
 At length, we took a short cut through the jungle to reach the other 
 road, and the track we got into was loose sand. By this time the 
 bullocks were almost fagged out and contrary, and for the last half- 
 mile of the short cut Henrique and I had to push with all our 
 strength to keep the cart going. This, at noon, in April, one of 
 the hottest Indian months, in a bed of hot sand, with the sun pour- 
 ing down upon us and not a breath of air stirring ! I thought the 
 conditions for sunstroke were about all there, but neither of us 
 dropped. 
 
 " At last we got out, having lost nearly eight miles. Rested a 
 while, then on. Shot a grizzly squirrel («S'. ^nacrourus). At night- 
 fall, reached a small village twelve and a half miles from home. 
 Stopped for the night, and quartered under a shed. Bought and 
 shot a chicken, and while Henrique did the cooking act I skinned 
 the squirrel. 
 
 " Wednesday, April Sd. — On early in the morning, when the air 
 was balmy and refreshing. At 'once we started a lot of wanderoo 
 monkeys, of which I killed three of the largest. Also shot three 
 Macaaus pileatus, one of which was an old female with a tiny young- 
 one clinging to her body. It was aHve and unhurt, so I kept it. 
 Farther on shot three more big wanderoos, making sis in all, and 
 another grizzly squirrel. 
 
 " The jungle which everywhere covers this low, level country be- 
 tween the sea-coast and the mountainous interior, can scarcely be 
 dignified by the name of forest. To my mind, it may be regarded 
 as typical jungle, low, dense, very thorny as a rule, barren of grass 
 and difficult to penetrate. Taken all over, it is decidedly low and 
 scrubby, the top of the leafy mass averaging scarcely more than 
 thirty feet in elevation above the ground. There are few trees of 
 good size, and all have a very scraggy appearance, due to the cor- 
 rugated and irregular growth of their trunks. There is no ground 
 verdure to speak of, and the undergrowth consists of brush with 
 slender, leafless stems. By stooping low and crawling under this 
 growth, one can get along pretty well, but it is very tiresome. 
 In looking under, it is often possible to see for fifty yards around, 
 
MULLAITIVU. 275 
 
 and in this way I saw, to-day, the legs of two deer walking quietly 
 along when I could not see a single hair of their bodies. A monkey 
 or a squirrel is quickly lost to view when running over this thick 
 scrub. 
 
 " Reached Nedunkenni about noon, and at once fell to work on 
 the pile of dead monkeys. By sunset I had skinned two of them 
 and skeletonized four, and another had been prepared as a skeleton 
 by Henrique. We quartered in a sort of hut erected for the ac- 
 commodation of the road engineers, a roof of cocoa palm leaves, 
 mud walls three feet high, and a clean dirt floor. 
 
 " Thursday, April 4th. — After I had skeletonized the eighth 
 monkey we went to the burial place of the elephant. Sold. It was, 
 or had been, a baby elephant, a wretchedly small baby at that, and 
 the bones were worthless. The people of the village told us of the 
 remains of another and much larger elephant near a village named 
 Ayladdi, five miles farther on, and we started for it at once, bag 
 and baggage. Reached the village just before nightfall, and for 
 four annas hired a roof under which I slung my hammock and slept 
 in peace and comfort. Noticed in the village two skins of axis deer 
 and one of sambur from animals killed near by. 
 
 " Friday, April 5th. — Took three men from the village, and set off 
 very early on foot through the jungle to look for the remains of the 
 elephant. We traversed a lovely path, and once when we emerged 
 into a little open glade I caught sight of a jackal, which was more 
 than he could say of me. He presently opened his mouth and be- 
 gan to pour forth his morning song, but just as he reached the sec- 
 ond verse, my bullet went through his liver. He suddenly stopped 
 singing, spun round like a top for a few minutes, snarled, yelped, 
 bit, and scratched, and then quietly lay down, never to get up any 
 more. At noon his skeleton hung on the side of our bandy cover. 
 
 " Sold again. The elephant proved to have been a young one, 
 also, but not quite so babyish as the other. The skull alone was 
 perfect and we carried it off, rather disappointed at the net results 
 so far in elephant debris. 
 
 " Went back again to Nedunkenni, where we arrived at 3 p.m. 
 Although this is a very small village of not more than a dozen huts, 
 it boasts a free mission-school kept by an old Tamil native-Christian, 
 educated at the Jaffna mission, and there named Joseph Emerson. 
 Joseph was very intelligent and polite, and spoke English with an 
 ease and fluency which quite startled me. But he was wasting hia 
 sweetness on the desert air, for his school contained only six pupilsL 
 
276 TWO YEAKS IN THE .lUNGLE. 
 
 He said that a great many wovild come to liim from the neighbor- 
 ing' villages, but that the parents were afraid to send their children 
 through the jungle on account of the ' cheetahs ' (leopards), bears, 
 and wild elephants. He said there are elephants within two miles 
 of the village now. 
 
 "Ml-. Emerson told me he had just learned of the remains of an- 
 other elephant, which he assured me was a very large one, and had 
 died only a year pre\ious, neai' a village called Padicodooirupu, 
 eight miles to the southeast. 
 
 " This jaw-breaking name came very near intimidating me, but 
 after \\Testling with it a few minutes I found I could pronounce it 
 from beginning to end without getting lock-jaw, so we came to an 
 about face and started for the place named. Joseph gave me his 
 blessing and a large yellow pumpkin, and having no present in kind 
 to oflEer, I bestowed upon him two riipees. That pumpkin I would 
 not have bartered for a coat of arms. 
 
 " After a hai-d drive over a rough road we reached Padicodooi- 
 rupu just at dark. The natives gave me a roof to sleep under 
 where I made myself as comfortable as I could in my hammock. 
 Joseph's pumpkin was sweet and good ; and, for the fii'st time in 
 many days, I had a dish of curry and rice that I could eat with 
 relish. As I had nothing else, it was lucky for me that Henrique 
 made it fit to eat. How absui'd to tliink that one's happiness 
 should hinge on a dish of pumpkin cm-ry ! 
 
 " The people of this village are rather mean, and ill-disposed 
 toward strangers. One man had fever, and I should not greatly 
 mourn if it became an epidemic. 
 
 " Satu7'day, April 6th. — Set off early in the morning with foiu* 
 men fi-om the village, and walked three miles tkrough the jungle to 
 the spot on the sandy bank of the Parayan Ai', where lay all that 
 was left of a once mighty elephant. Bravo ! Treasure-trove, or 
 the next thing to it at all events. There lay the entire skeleton ex- 
 cepting the foot-bones and caudal vertebrse, of an old and very 
 large elephant, bleached clean and white. For a wonder the huge 
 skull was absolutely perfect, not even a tooth missing, for which I 
 am vmder obligations to native shiftlessness. Such teeth as those 
 sell readily for five rupees each, in Colombo and Galle. I sent oflE 
 at once for reinforcements, and in a short time had nine men on 
 the ground. First we cut a path through the jungle to the road, 
 and then I picked out what bones I wanted, almost the entii-e lot 
 except tl>.e pelvis. We got hoes and dug the sand over in a careful 
 
MULLAITIVU. 277 
 
 search for the small foot-bones, which, for several reasons, I par* 
 ticulai'ly wished to secure. 
 
 " In digging for the bones we found several small frogs quite 
 solidly entombed, alive, a foot and a half deep in the solid, sandy 
 earth. We found three species altogether [but I regret to say I 
 never had an opportunity to identify them]. 
 
 " Although their bodies were greatly distended by the extraor- 
 dinary quantity of water they contained, they threw up half of it as 
 soon as they were taken from their living tombs, and then became 
 quite active. They had evidently been buried there by their own 
 knowledge and consent during the rains of the northeast monsoon, 
 and, but for our disturbance, would have remained where they were 
 all through the dry and hot season, and until the commencement of 
 the next monsoon. The stream was perfectly dry, and the natives 
 said there was no water for many miles around except in the weUs. 
 
 " My nine men were heavily loaded with the bones I selected, 
 and at midday, when the sun was flaming hot, we marched out to 
 the bandy, loaded it carefully, and started immediately for Nedun- 
 kenni, which we reached a little before sunset and halted for the 
 night. 
 
 "Sunday, April 1th. — Rose very early, coflfeed in haste, and just as 
 the sun sent his level rays over the top of the jungle, we set out 
 for MuUaitivu. I walked the first six miles and shot three jungle 
 cock and two wanderoo monkeys {S. leucoprymnus). 
 
 " These bigwanderoos are very numerous all around Nedunkenni 
 for five miles at least, and by going along the road one could easily 
 kill enough in one day to load a cart. This morning I saw more 
 than fifteen big troops of them, each of which contained from ten 
 to fifteen individuals. Usually there are about fifteen in each gang, 
 so that the total number we saw must have been about two hun- 
 dred. They literally lined the road for seven miles, sometimes in 
 the trees and sometimes on the ground. One troop of very large 
 old fellows we found playing in the road like school-boys, gallop- 
 ing up and down, or chasing each other about with their long tails 
 held up at an angle of forty-five degrees. Their favorite gait is 
 a gallop, unless the branches are too thick to permit it ; and they 
 can run almost as fast through the tree-tops as over bare ground. 
 When hotly pursued and thoroughly alarmed, it is marvellous to 
 see them run. They head straight away from their pursuer and 
 gallop madly along the larger branches without a second's pause 
 or hesitation, without a fall or even a misstep, spring boldly from 
 
278 TWO YEARS IN THE JUNGLE. 
 
 one tree-top to the next, and, unless the ground below is very open, 
 they are gone from the hunter's gaze like a flash. Their minds 
 must act like lightning-flashes to enable them to choose the safe 
 and unbroken line of retreat. There is no time to stop and study 
 as to which branch they shaU jump upon next, no halting between 
 two opinions, but on they go, the hand and the eye keeping time 
 exactly in the dangerous race. Unless the hunter brings down his 
 specimen before the gang has fairly recovered from its surprise 
 and started ofij he may as well give up the chase. 
 
 " In these hot jungles the game is afoot in the morning from sun- 
 rise till about nine o'clock, and also in the evening just before sun- 
 set. Any animal that would go prowling about at midday, instead 
 of lying close in the shade, deserves to be shot. This morning we 
 saw a wild hog trot across the road ahead of us, and a little later a 
 jackal loafing along in a trampish sort of a way. I tried to get 
 within range of him, but he was too knowing for me. We also 
 saw three spotted deer standing quietly in the jungle less than fifty 
 yards from the road, in full view ; and six miles from Mullaitivu, we 
 saw three more in the road ahead of us. Had I not killed twenty 
 in the Animallais there would have been a death in each of those 
 families ; but having specimens already, and not caring to run the 
 unnecessary risk of being mulcted by the Ceylon Government in 
 the sum of £5 for shooting a >deer without a license, I let the 
 tempting creatures go in peace." 
 
 On reaching Mullaitivu I found a fat packet of letters from 
 home, some containing money, some good news, and one the com- 
 forting assurance that the expedition to the East Indies should go 
 on as planned. After resting a day, I spent two more in getting my 
 collection into shape, and then engaged two bullock bandys to take 
 me to Jaffna forthwith. The trip was, to me, full of interest, and I 
 again yield to the temptation to drop into journalism. 
 
 " April I'iith. — Rose early, loaded up with a rush, and after a few 
 any-thing-but-tearful good-byes, we were off. Both bandys were 
 heavily loaded. Of course, I took plenty of cocoanuts (twenty) to 
 drink on the way. As we crossed the two bridges I took a last 
 fond look at my Crocodile Pool, but not a head was above water to 
 shed a tear at our departure. I rode in the front bandy and read 
 'Hypatia.' At the six-mile post the handymen begged a halt, for 
 by that time old Sol was getting down to business. For breakfast 
 
MULLAITIVIJ. 279 
 
 Henrique made a disli of curry and rice which beat my gastro- 
 nomic powers completely, and I came near beating him in turn. 
 The trouble was there were too many stones mingled with the rice 
 to call it rice, and not quite enough to call it road-metal, I sol- 
 emnly promised to fine him two rupees for a repetition of the of- 
 fence, and he as solemnly promised to reform. 
 
 *• Jungle just the same as between Nedunkenni and the coast. At 
 dark we halted at a school-house at the fifteenth mile, with the 
 usual thatch-roof and mud walls two feet high, and I hung my 
 hammock under the shelter. The ventilation of the apartment was 
 perfect. 
 
 " April ISth. — Eose at 3 a.m. and started ; I finished my nap in 
 the bandy as we jogged along. Halted for our midday rest at Ka- 
 raputamooripu, at the twenty-fifth mile, where we struck the Kan- 
 dy and Jaffna road, sixty miles from the latter place. Halted for the 
 night at the fifty -fifth mile from Jaffna, and I shot a Macacus pileatus. 
 
 " April 14:th. — On at 3 a.m. as usual, and by breakfast time were 
 at Kokavil, forty-eight and a half miles from Jaffna. This seems to 
 be a favorite halting place for bandys. The road is well littered with 
 straw, and as a result it is a fine feeding ground for the jungle 
 cock [Gallus Stanleyi). I got out and shot five while Henrique was 
 making a cup of coffee, and we had a square meal of their flesh. 
 Halted at noon, at the Veddakkacheri rest house (forty-third mile), 
 in which I shot a very curious bat (Rhinolophus Irifoliatus) that 
 Avas hanging from a rafter. 
 
 "The road to-day was a continuous bed of loose sand, and get- 
 ting on was simply awful. The bullocks toiled through it slowly 
 and painfully with the heavy carts, feet, and wheels sinking in 
 deeply. In order to get along at aU we had to lift at the wheels or 
 push behind, while the drivers yelled and belabored the bullocks, 
 and called their mothers and sisters bad names. By what process 
 of reasoning these Tamils are led to suppose it makes a bullock 
 pull better to asperse his mother's reputation, I cannot imagine. 
 
 "Over such loose sand the heat is terrific. When I could ride 
 with a clear conscience and ' take it easy,' I sat in the front bandy, 
 sweltering and gasping for breath, bathed in perspiration from 
 head to foot, and covered with dust, which hourly increased in 
 thickness, and formed on me a regular alluvial deposit. As we 
 neared Elephant Pass the jungle gradually grows shorter and thin- 
 ner, until it altogether disappears. Camped for the night out in 
 the open plain, at a well close to the thirty-sixth mile-post, on the 
 
280 TWO TEARS ITT THE JUNGLE. 
 
 edge of the strait. How delicious and refreshing was the bath 1 
 took. It was a beautiful moonlight night, cool and balmy — a 
 heaven after the hades of the day. 
 
 " Apinl 15th. — Crossed Elephant Pass just at sunrise. It is a 
 shallow strait of salt water, a mile and one-third in width at the 
 narrowest part, where the road crosses, and only two feet in depth 
 at the middle. The bottom is hard gray sand, and to wade through 
 the cool sea-water is a delightful diversion to both man and beast. 
 Strange to say, I saw not a single bird at the Pass on either side. 
 
 "There is a fine rest house on the Jafiha side. On getting 
 across, we struck into as fine and smooth a " metal " road as I ever 
 wish to see, and then we rattled along gaily enough. We now came 
 to great gi-oves of cocoa and Palmyra palm-trees, but in the latter I 
 find nothing to admire. The Creator made the Palmyra out of 
 ragged odds and ends of leaves and stems, and never finished the 
 job at that. They look like seedy, weather-beaten, ragged, and 
 unshaved tramps. 
 
 " Shot a jungle cock for breakfast, and also killed a wanderoo, 
 but it fell into a pool of water, sank like so much lead, and I declined 
 to go in after it. Breakfasted at the PaUai rest house, twenty-four 
 miles from Jaflha. In the compoimd I found some very interesting 
 specimens of laterite or ' cabook ' — a very curious stone much used 
 for building purposes in Ceylon. , "^^Tien we halted just before dark 
 to rest and eat our ciu-ry and rice, the handymen requested per- 
 mission to go on to Jaffna, get the bandys unloaded and out of 
 sight before daybreak, to save themselves from being fined for not 
 ha\ing 'registered' at Mallaiti\'u. I said 'go,' and they went. I 
 lay down to sleep, and the next moment, as it seemed to me, Hen- 
 rique aroused me by saying, ' Sir ! sir ! This is the rest house, 
 sir.' Sure enough, we were in Jaffna, and it was three o'clock in 
 the morning. 
 
 " By the time I had packed up my entire collection, and finished 
 up my work in the Northern Province quite to my satisfaction, the 
 little steamer Sei'endib touched at Jaffna on her way around the 
 island, and after sending aboard thirteen large cases of specimens, 
 a fifty-gallon cask, and. a large crate of turtle skeletons, we took 
 passage to Colombo." 
 
CHAPTER XXIV. 
 
 KANDY AND POINT DE GALLE. 
 
 The Interior of Ceylon. — A Run up to Kandy. — Native Plows and Plowing. — 
 The Mountains. —Kandy. — An Overpraised Town. — Summary of Ceylon 
 Collection. — The Royal Mail Coach. — Governmental Eccentricities. — The 
 Ride to Galle. — Charming Coast Scenery. — A Church Episode. —Ben- 
 totte. — Point de Galle. — Neptune's Garden. — Ceylon Gems. —Classifica- 
 tion of Dealers.— Study of a Scoundrel, in Black and White. — Diamond 
 cut Diamond. — Farewell to Ceylon. 
 
 Justice to the reader and to the subject demands the statement, at 
 this point, that the glories of the island of Ceylon do not lie in that 
 portion of the Northern Province described in the previous chapter. 
 It is the rugged and mountainous interior south of Kandy which 
 contains the picturesque waterfalls, bold precipices, romantic 
 streams, and grand forests full of large game, which constitute what 
 is best worth seeing in this lovely isle. That is the region Sir 
 Samuel Baker has made famous in his two charming books, " Eight 
 Years' Wanderings," and "Kifle and Hound in Ceylon." But for 
 the expense, I would at least have seen Newera Ellia and the hill- 
 country generally, Adam's Peak, Horton's Plain, the World's End, 
 and the magnificent forests which cover the southern slope of the 
 great plateau. I would have gladly devoted a month to the hill- 
 country and the adjacent forests in the south, and but for the meth- 
 ylated spirits episode, I could and would have done so ; but the 
 Neilgherries and AnimaUais were behind me and Borneo ahead ; so 
 I was partially consoled for being obliged to leave the most inter- 
 esting half of Ceylon, as an excuse for another visit in the mysteri- 
 ous future. 
 
 However, at the last moment I went up to Kandy, as do all well- 
 behaved travellers who visit the " balmy isle." The distance by rail 
 is seventy-two miles. From Colombo to Kambukana the country is 
 low and covered by a succession of rice-fields or swamps, alternat- 
 ing with jangle -covered knolls, which rise out of the rice-fields like 
 
382 TWO YEAKS IN THE eTUNGLE. 
 
 islands. In many places the landscape reminds one of the Florida 
 Everglades, with its ai'chipelago of low islets covered with dark 
 green jungle. The rice, or "paddi," grows in soft mud covered by 
 several inches of water, the flow of which, from one little field to 
 another, is regulated by means of small dykes. 
 
 It is a strange sight to see all the ryots plowing these fields 
 preparatory to planting the crop. A pair of splay-footed buffaloes 
 ai'e hitched to a wooden plow, which is an exaggerated model of 
 a dog's hind leg ; and then they go floundering through soft mud 
 up to their knees, dragging the plow after them, which slips along 
 quite easily and without seriously disturbing the mud in any way, 
 while the driver flounders along at the rear of the procession. The 
 plow does not tui'n up the earth at all, but merely tickles it a little 
 to put it in good humor for another crop. 
 
 From Eambukana it is a steady cHmb to Kandy, and another 
 engine kindly came to the assistance of the one which brought us 
 from Colombo. The scenery along the line of ascent has a narrow 
 escape from tameness. At one point, called Sensation Eock, where 
 the line is cut in the steep side of a mountain, the view is truly 
 grand. Thei*e is a precipice of seven hundred feet for the train to 
 go over if it ever runs off the track at that point ; and, below that, 
 another steep descent of more than a thousand feet to where the 
 bright green paddi-fields lie level in the sun, not a himdred feet 
 above the sea. 
 
 Some of the hills near the railway are covered with coffee 
 bushes, but those in the distance and also around Kandy were clad 
 with forest. They are neither grand nor beautiful, and in contrast 
 with the Neilgherries they are very tame. But then I doubt if this 
 world can produce another mountain plateau which can match the 
 Neilgherries in beauty and grandeur combined. 
 
 Kandy also is very disappointing — as far behind Ootacamund 
 as Madras is behind Colombo. In the pictures it looks pretty 
 enough, but in reality it looks straggHng, topsy-turvy, and more or 
 less dirty. There is a lake in the middle of the town, elaborately 
 walled round, but alas ! its waters ai-e murky, brownish yellow, and 
 thick with mud. It gives one a bilious feeling to look at it, and, 
 even after a good breakfast, the eye tm'ns from it to the distant 
 hills for comfort. 
 
 The lake is of considerable length and a very pleasant drive 
 follows its sinuous margin all the way ai'ound. On the hill-sides 
 which rise on either side are the shops and bungalows nestling in 
 
KANDY AND POINT DE GALLE. 283 
 
 cocoanut groves, which constitute the only really attractive feature 
 of the town. 
 
 The botanical glories of Peradenia gardens I did not have a 
 chance to see — another excuse for a second visit. 
 
 Reaching Colombo again, I shipped home my Ceylon collection, 
 which contained the following specimens gathered fresh from the 
 woods and waters in less than four months' time. 
 
 20 species of Mammals 104 specimens. 
 
 10 
 
 8 
 
 27 
 
 68 
 
 80 
 
 18 
 
 120 
 
 3 
 
 8 
 
 Birds 20 
 
 Birds' Eggs 153 
 
 Reptiles 124 
 
 Fishes 180 
 
 Lepidopterous Insects 155 
 
 Crustaceans 181 
 
 Mollnsks 1,500 
 
 Radiates 55 
 
 Coral 44 
 
 In addition to the above the collection included a quantity of 
 such miscellany as elephant skulls, bones, and teeth, specimens of 
 rock, precious stones, woods, minerals and the Uke, in great variety. 
 
 I made no e£fort to collect birds, for the reason that nearly 
 every other collector makes a specialty of them ; and for insects I 
 had no time. 
 
 At the last moment I again found myself embarrassed for hard 
 cash. With all my bills paid, and over a thousand dollars await- 
 ing me in Singapore, as a cable message from Professor Ward in- 
 formed me, I had not money enough to enable me to leave the 
 island. Much against my will I was obliged to avail myself of the kind 
 offer of Messrs. Lee, Hedges & Co., accept a loan from them with- 
 out the ability to offer security, and coolly sail out of their reach.* 
 
 The ride from Colombo to Galle in the Royal Mail Coach is one 
 never to be forgotten. Very few of the ocean steamers plying be- 
 tween Europe and the far East touch at Colombo, since Point de 
 Galle has an equally good harbor and lies directly in their track ; 
 hence the trips of travellers between the two points by coach. 
 
 We made the start at six o'clock in the morning with a light 
 load and very respectable passengers. The only bitter drop in that 
 day's cup of happiness was that, because I was a white man and 
 
 * Since my return home, my gratitude to these and similar commercial 
 friends in the East Indies, who aided me in time of need, has caused me 
 to make advances to several parties situated as I was then, not one of whom 
 has ever returned what he borrowed ! Such is life ! 
 
284 TWO YEARS IN THE JUNGLE. 
 
 couldn't help it, I had to pay twenty rupees for my ride, while an 
 old Singhalese porker, who weighed at least seventy-five pounds 
 more than I, and who had wealth enough to buy up forty men like 
 me, was carried for ten rupees. Anywhere but in Ceylon such a 
 regulation would be too absurd to exist long, but the policy of this 
 remarkable government is to do " as it dam please " in everything. 
 On this impregnable ground it refuses to allow a healthy and 
 wealthy company to build a railway between Galle and Colombo, 
 for fear the seat of commerce in the island would be disturbed and 
 Galle outgrow their intentions. In enlightened countries, such a 
 high-handed attempt to control the natural channel of commerce 
 would be considered remarkable, to say the least, but in Ceylon 
 there is nothing extraordinary about it. All the same, it is a pity 
 there is not some wicked New York reporter on the ground to 
 prowl around for a week or two and find out just what the "diwy" 
 amounts to, when the Colombo rice merchants, shopmen, and hotel- 
 keepers have their quarterly " whack-up " with the government. 
 
 Having paid my ten rupees for the ride and ten more for not 
 being black, I climbed up beside my Singhalese Falstaff and was 
 followed by an ayah black enough to satisfy any government, who 
 had in charge two sweet little boys — white, too, poor little dears — 
 Avho were going to Galle to enter school. They occupied the front 
 seat, and nicer children I never'' saw. It was a real pleasure to 
 have such a long ride with two such rosy, round-faced, blue-eyed 
 httle cherubs before one's eyes all the way. Without a moment's 
 delay the driver mounted his box, the bugle sounded, and the 
 horses started off at a gallop. All too quickly we were whirled out 
 of the "fort" and across the beautiful esplanade, which I saw, 
 with regret, for the last time. ' 
 
 Our Royal Coach was rather loose in the joints, and we went, 
 literally, at a rattling pace. The horses were large and rather 
 raw-boned Australian "plugs," well qualified for the work they had 
 to do, and, as we had a fresh pair for every six miles, they were 
 kept either at a very fast trot or a gallop for the whole distance. 
 The road was a dead level, skirting the sea-shore all the way, and 
 beautifully smooth and hard. 
 
 Near Panadura, the terminus of the railway which set out for 
 Point de GaUe, and would have got there on schedule-time but for 
 the overruling of an all-wise official providence, the road runs 
 along the bank of a lagoon which looks like a large river, and 
 ought to contain countless crocodiles. Not for one moment does 
 
KANDY AND POINT BE GALLE. 285 
 
 the shady avenue leave the jungle, save to take us for a short run 
 through the continuous grove of ever-lovely cocoa palms, which 
 stretches along the sandy shore like dark green fringe. I envy 
 the lazy Singhalese whose clean and tidy little huts nestle in the 
 cool cocoanut groves, surrounded by thrifty banana trees that are 
 bowing down with the weight of the green fruit clusters. Looking 
 through the forest of clean white cocoa-trunks, you get glimpses of 
 the sea which make you eager for a better view, until presently an 
 indenture in the coast brings it close to the roadside and opens 
 before you a charming prospect of calm blue water dotted over 
 with tiny white specks which you know must be the sails of the 
 small fishing-boats. We pass two large parties of seine-haulers 
 just in the act of hauling their long seines up to the shore, but we 
 dash by too quickly for detailed investigation. No doubt their 
 nets contain treasures of the deep which we would gladly seize 
 upon, but it is too late now. 
 
 By and by we reach Kaltura, at the mouth of the Kalu Ganga, 
 one of the largest rivers of Ceylon. From the bridge it looks more 
 like a lagoon than a river. Kaltura ! Aha ! This is the place where 
 a wealthy and influential old Singhalese gentleman, a member of 
 the Church of England in good standing, died a few weeks ago, and 
 was refused a Christian burial by the pastor in charge. The re- 
 fusal was based on the suspicion, or I may say rumor, that in his last 
 moments the old gentleman had renounced his Christian faith and 
 accepted the offices of a native priest. Two sons of the deceased, 
 whose Christianity no one doubts, were greatly distressed by this 
 unfeeling refusal, and the bishop was appealed to by telegraph, and 
 also by letter, for a mandamus, to compel the minister to perform 
 the duty of his office. It was of no avail, and the family was at last 
 obliged to convey the father's remains to Panadura, where they 
 found a minister of more liberal views, who read the burial service 
 in due form. For days the papers of the island were fuU of arti- 
 cles anent the matter, for and against both parties, and the public 
 mind was wrought up to quite a pitch of excitement. " Fie on 't ! 
 oh, fie ! " As if the reading of the service would have offended 
 God or harmed the minister ; or the entire omission of it for one 
 moment disturbed the peaceful repose of the tired old man. Thus 
 do representative Christians affect an exclusiveness which their 
 Master utterly condemned and bring His cause into contempt. 
 Why not have given the dead man the benefit of the doubt, and 
 bestowed upon his remains the usual ceremony which his sons had 
 
286 TWO YEAES IN THE JUNGLE. 
 
 been taught to consider necessai'y to the welfare of the soul ? After 
 such an exhibition of bigotry and bad temper among the official 
 followers of our meek and lowly Saviour, I thought that, should I 
 die in Ceylon, I would fii'st request the omission of the burial ser- 
 vice. I would rather have a single tear shed above my grave than 
 a hollow ceremony performed thereat. 
 
 Shortly before noon we halted at the Bentotte rest house for 
 breakfast, a little more than half-way to Galle. The rest house is 
 charmingly situated on a pretty little knoll close to the beach and 
 the mouth of the Bentota Ganga, partly surrounded by a gi'ove of 
 tamarind-trees and cocoa-pahns, commanding a fine view of the 
 cool and refreshing ocean. We breakfasted, chiefly on fish, with 
 the music of the tumbling surf in our ears and a dehcious breeze 
 from the ocean fanning our cheeks. Who would not like to spend 
 a whole summer at Bentotte ? Thence, onwai'd, the road lay about 
 as close to the beach as it could get and preserve its straightness. 
 I watched that endless strip of yellow sand, mile after mile, but 
 truth compels me to say that I did not see a single living creatui-e 
 upon it, nor even a good shell. 
 
 The cocoanut grove along the shore seemed as endless as the 
 shore itself. From Panadura to Galle the road is lined, nearly the 
 whole way, with native huts and bazaars, so that it seems like a 
 ride through a continuous village.' To the slow-moving and slow- 
 thinking natives our rapid passage must seem like the passage of 
 an express train at home. The Royal Mail Coach has the right of 
 way, and on we go at a gallop, the wet sand flying from the whirl- 
 ing coach-wheels, dashing through one bazaar after another, the 
 bugle blowing every now and then, the children and old women 
 scattering to right and left, and the bullock bandys hastily drawing 
 off to one side to let our coach dash by. We started at six o'clock, 
 changed horses twelve times, halted forty-five minutes at Bentotte, 
 and at 4 p.m. drove across the draw-bridge which spans the moat 
 of the old Dutch fort, dashed up the main street of Point de Galle 
 with a grand flourish, and pulled up in front of the hotel. The 
 coach was wretchedly uncomfortable, but otherwise the ride was 
 all that could be desired. 
 
 Galle is a small place, but its natural advantages aa'e immense. 
 Aside from the beautiful harbor with its fringe of cocoa-palms and 
 sandy beach, I was most interested in the wide coral reef which lies 
 along the southern wall of the fort. At low tide, when the sea is 
 calm, one gets from the hght-house a beautiful bu'd's eye view of 
 
KANDY AND POINT DE GALLE. , 287 
 
 the best portion of Neptune's Garden. At the sight of this lovely 
 grove of pale-green coral (the madrepores are most conspicuous, 
 growing in the crystal sea-water on clean white rocks and sand), I 
 wished that, for a time at least, I could have the power to roam at 
 will over the bottom of the sea. What treasures one could gather, 
 provided one were not gathered first by a shark or octopus. 
 
 Galle is a famous place for precious stones, and rascally Moor- 
 men who deal in cut-glass imitations. The island produces very 
 fine sapphires, blue, yellow, and white ; cat's eyes, moonstones, 
 garnets, " Ceylon ruby " (ruby topaz), star stones, carbuncles, tur- 
 quoise, and "Ceylon diamonds." The sapphire is the piece de re^- 
 sistance of the dealer ; but, while stones of poor quality are offered 
 by the score, really fine ones are few and far between. Of all the 
 Ceylon gems this is the most successfully imitated in glass, and it 
 is hazardous for the average traveller to buy of any but a respon- 
 sible dealer. 
 
 Pearls may be had by the quart, good ones, too, at from one 
 shilling to twenty shillings each. Gems are equally reasonable in 
 price, and I took the opportunity to select a series of both rough 
 and cut stones of all the kinds for sale in Galle, as so many mineral- 
 ogical specimens for Professor Ward's private cabinet. Some time 
 previously I had made the acquaintance of as honest a dealer as I 
 ever wish to see, Mahommed Ossen by name (if you care to know), 
 who took pains to supply me with all that I wished at very satis- 
 factory prices. His shop is, or was, very near the Oriental Hotel, 
 and this wholly gratuitous advertisement is inserted solely for the 
 reader's benefit when he visits Galle. 
 
 There is one class of dealers to be encountered in Galle, which 
 is a verj' important factor in the sum of every traveller's happiness, 
 whether he will or no. They are vampires of a mild sort, and feed 
 upon travellers only. The moment your steamer drops anchor in 
 the harbor they swarm on deck and crowd around you, offering the 
 most beautiful gems (of cut glass) you ever saw. They dazzle you 
 with sapphires in all colors, as large as filberts sometimes, topazes, 
 rubies, and pearls, chiefly set in rings, warranted in every case, 
 "good estone, good gole, sar ! " If you buy, by all means go to a 
 respectable dealer as soon as possible, and get the gauge of your 
 gulUbility. Their best " saffer " rings would be dear at fifteen 
 cents a dozen, for the metal is brass of the poorest kind, and will 
 show its true colors in about a fortnight. 
 
 These venders of bogus jewelry are all Moormen, easily distin- 
 
288 TWO YEAKS IN THE JUNGLE. 
 
 guisbed by their shaven heads and inverted flower-pot caps. There 
 are really three varieties of the species, the first of which, re^ecta- 
 bilis, is found in well-filled shops, with good wares at reasonable prices. 
 
 Another, semi-respectabilis, makes a specialty of tortoise-shell 
 jewelry, both real and imitation, ivory elephants, ebony walking- 
 sticks and elephants, and sandal-wood fans, glove boxes, etc., im- 
 ported from China. But, it must be admitted, this also drops into 
 bogus jewelry. The other variety, vampirus, makes a specialty of 
 young travellers, and also old ones who have not yet cut theii* wis- 
 dom teeth, who are fooled to the top of their bent, either with bogus 
 gems or worthless stones at a high price. 
 
 Both the last-named vai-ieties infest the steamers and hotels, 
 where they will offer the same articles to the same person, time 
 after time, with most annoying pertinacity and impudence. Occa- 
 sionally enterprising specimens of vampirus have shops and at- 
 tempt to pass for rei^pectabilis, which they can easily do up to a cer- 
 tain point. While studying up the varieties and values of precious 
 stones, previous to making up my series of specimens, I had an ex- 
 perience with one of these worthies, who " took me in," pai't way, 
 at least. He came to me at the hotel, presented his card (M. C. 
 Joonoos, 21 Pedlai- Street), and politely invited me to visit his shop. 
 It was very near, and after a very little urging I went, really in- 
 tending to make purchases if I fou\id anything desmxble. 
 
 When we reached the shop, the quiet retirement of which at 
 once made me think of a bunko establishment, we sat down on 
 opposite sides of a small table, and while the dealer's son was 
 bringing out the stones, I had time to scan the face of my vis-a-vis. 
 INIi-. Joonoos was black, but not " comely," his jaws were heavy, his 
 shining black eyes were small and set close together, and his mouth 
 had an ugly droop at the corners. His black beai'd was thin and 
 straight, and his shaven head was capped by the usual flower-pot of 
 colored straw. The rest of his dress was Singhalese — a loose-fitting 
 coat of white linen cloth, and a petticoat (or sai'ong) of gayly fig- 
 ured stuff held up by a waist-belt. In upright cases around the vraUs 
 was an assortment of the fancy articles and " curios " usually pm- 
 chased by strangers, and in two small show-cases were the " gems." 
 
 First we had peai-ls of all sizes, for the smallest of which 'Mr. 
 Joonoos asked three rupees each, exactly double the regular price, 
 and urged me to take twenty. I ci\'illy decUued peai-ls, and for the 
 next course we had sapphires, two large blue ones which vampirus 
 set to work in dead earnest to sell, then and there. The lai'gest 
 
KANDY AND POINT DE GALLE. 289 
 
 stone was positively the worst of its kind I ever saw, having in its 
 interior, near the apex, a large opaque blur, Hke a cataract in an 
 eye, which was visible as far as the stone itself. My close examina- 
 tion of this really curious fault misled Mr. Joonoos into thinking I 
 had fallen in love with the gem (!) and he immediately assured me 
 most earnestly that it was " the finest stone in Galle." I was at 
 first amazed at the impudence of the man, but light suddenly 
 dawned upon my mind as to his real character, and I determined 
 to take a hand in the little game. He urged me to buy the stone 
 and I said, "How much?" 
 
 "Ten shillings per karet." I examined it more closely and ar- 
 rested the dealer's encomium by saying, " Weigh it, please, and let's 
 see how much it will cost." He weighed it. Nearly thirteen 
 karets. "About a hundred and thirty shillings," I said, musingly. 
 
 "Yes, sir. That's cheap price, sir! Good estone." 
 
 " It may be, but I would never give that for it." 
 
 Instantly Mr. Joonoos became all eagerness and animation. 
 
 " Well, sir, howmuchyougive ? Yousayoneprice ! ffoiu much ? " 
 
 " Why, there's a flaw in the stone." 
 
 " No, sir ! That's notaflaw ! That's good estone. Howmuch- 
 ^ugive ? You say one price." 
 
 " Oh ! I've no idea what it's worth." 
 
 Mr. Joonoos waxed more and more eager as I seemed to hesi- 
 tate. He leaned half-way across the table with the sapphire in his 
 hand and eyed me hke a rat. He took off his cap like a man labor- 
 ing hard, and then I saw what an ugly, jail-bird look he had when 
 his head was uncovered. His excitement at having found a victim, 
 and his eagerness to grasp the goodly roll of notes he saw almost 
 within his reach, made the perspiration run off his black scalp in 
 great drops ; but the room was cool and comfortable all the while. 
 
 I tried to get him to talk of other gems. No, he had set his 
 heart on seUing me that particularly worthless stone, with the big 
 milky flaw in it, half as large as the entire stone, and it was ex- 
 asperating to see his eagerness to foist it upon me at thirteen shil- 
 hng per karet. Miserable liar that he was, he swore by all the 
 oaths that he knew, again and again, that that was the " finest stone 
 in Galle." At last I could stand it no longer and told him that the 
 stone was worthless and he knew it, and that furthermore I would 
 not give five shiUings for it. He was utterly disgusted, and could 
 not conceal his disappointment, but he held his peace and ordered 
 
 his young hopeful to bring other objects. I must have looked un- 
 19 
 
'290 TAVO YEARS IN THE JUjS^GLE. 
 
 usually verdant that day, for vanipirus evidently took me for an 
 out-and-out greenhorn. 
 
 I asked for uncut Ceylon diamonds. Yes, he had some, fifteen 
 shillings per ounce ! (Mr. Ossen's price was one shilling per ounce.) 
 I said I thought I would take an oimce, and looking up qmckly at 
 his young hopeful standing near the table, I surprised him in the 
 midst of a significant gi'in, which he instantly sought to extingTiish. 
 
 " What's that boy gi-inning for ? " I demanded of the dealer. 
 
 Mr. Joonoos was gi'eatly annoyed by this unfortunate contre- 
 temps, and looked it. 
 
 " Oh, he's a little fool ; don't you mind, sor ; he grins all the 
 time. Go into the other room ! " to the boy, with a black scowl. 
 
 By that time I had had enough of the httle game, and to pay 
 Mr. Joonoos for his efforts in trying to swindle me, I selected about 
 seventy rupees worth of ciystals, sapphires, tiu-quoise and emeralds, 
 and had them wrapped up. He thought I was going to pay cash, 
 but he grumbled openly that I took so httle. I ought to have taken 
 " for two hundi'ed or thi-ee himdi-ed rupees anyhow." He declared 
 he ought to have sold .£2,000 worth in that time. When the goods 
 were WTapped up, I told him to put the parcel aside and keep it 
 imtil I called again and paid for it. " And when I do," I added, 
 " you will know for siu-e just how big a fool I am. Ta ta. Try 
 again, Mr. Joonoos." ' 
 
 I left him utterly bewildered at the extent of his failure to make 
 a haul, and never saw him again ; but even to this day it enrages 
 me to think how the wily scovmdi-el spread his net for me. It is 
 humihating to think I was ever taken for such a fiat. 
 
 On May 16th, I took passage in the superb steamer Tengtse, of 
 the Messageries Maritimes Company, for Sing-apore, and Ceylon be- 
 came to me a memory of the past. Adieu, lovely isle ! Good-bye 
 to your sunny sea and gToves of coral, your gii-dle of yellow sand 
 and cocoa-palms, yoiir scrtibby jungle, and troops of fat and saucy 
 monkeys. Farewell to your noble forests and moimtains, which I 
 did not see, and your hiunbug cinnamon gardens, which are not 
 worth seeing, nor hing about either. A fond adieu to Colombo and 
 the good friends who hve there. Good-bye, too, to oflicial cussed- 
 ness, to Singhalese laziness, and to Moormen both good and bad. 
 
 My thanks are due to the doctor and the climate which cured 
 me effectually of fever, and without any penalty either. Ceylon 
 holds a mortgage on my affections which will never be lifted in this 
 world, I know. Happy Ceylon ! 
 
PART III— THE MALAY PENINSULA. 
 
 CHAPTEE XXV. 
 
 SINGAPORE. 
 
 New Hartor. — A Back-door Entrance. — Mangrove Swamps and Malay 
 Houses. — Street Scenes. — The Sailors' Quarter. — Well-planned City. — 
 Chinese Shops and Houses. — Populace. — Social Life. — The Curse of the 
 East Indies. — The American Consul. — Two American Travellers. — A Model 
 Millionaire. — The Climate of Singapore. — Market for Live Animals. — A 
 Visit to Mr. Whampoa's Villa. — Curios. — A Tigerish Orang-Utan. — Curios- 
 ities in Gardening. 
 
 The twentieth of May found us steaming down the Strait of Ma- 
 lacca, close along the shore of the Malay Peninsula. The strait was 
 almost as smooth as a river, and all day long we sat comfortably 
 under the double awning, enjoying the slowly moving panorama of 
 forest-clad hiUs and mountains, stretches of level jungle, a river 
 mouth and a Malay village here and there, and pretty green islets 
 rising jauntily out of the water along the shore. The next sunrise 
 saw us threading our way through a bewildering maze of islands, 
 large and small, a perfect archipelago in fact, with only a narrow 
 passage for us at best. Pi*esently we passed a flag-staff upon a hill, 
 and a little later three buoys described a semi-circle to the left 
 around a group of islets, and then we saw far across the water many 
 ships at anchor, and back of them a long line of white buildings two 
 stories high, with a monotonous row of upper windows staring across 
 the water at us. Beyond that lay a background of low, green hills. 
 
 This is Singapore, the great central ganglion of the Malay 
 Archipelago and Southeastern Asia, the hub of the Far East. 
 The spokes are steamship lines running in almost every direction, 
 to Bangkok, Saigon, China and Japan, Manilla, Sarawak, Pontianak, 
 Batavia, Sumatra, Ceylon, Calcutta, Eangoon, and Malacca. 
 
 We had scarcely exclaimed, " Yonder is Singapore ! " when it 
 
292 TWO YEARS IN THE JUNGLE. 
 
 began to pour in literal earnest, and kept it up during tlie greater 
 part of that day. 
 
 Our steamer, instead of making straight for the town, describes 
 a perfect fish-hook on the chart, leaving Singapore away off to our 
 right and behind us. We enter a little strait which at first we take 
 to be a river, it is so narrow and so completely shut in by green 
 hills and banks of reddish brown shale. But there are large ocean 
 steamers and ships, wharves, dry docks, and coal sheds all along 
 the northern side ; so this must be New Harbor. 
 
 Having reached the barb of our fish-hook, we tie up at the 
 Borneo Company's wharf, and pull our relaxed energies together 
 for another collecting campaign in a strange locality. I was very 
 loth to quit such a delightful ship as the Yengtse, and actually en- 
 vied the passengers who were going on to Japan in her. Usually, 
 however, one does not feel so. 
 
 This is indeed the end of our voyage, but we are still three 
 miles from the European quarter of the city, so off we go in a rickety 
 bandy with a cai^t-load of trunks and boxes following slowly after. 
 
 Entering Singapore by way of New Harbor is like getting into 
 a house through the sctdlery window. One's first impressions of 
 the town are associated with coal-dust, mud, stagnant water, and 
 mean buildings, and I foimd it required quite an effort to shake 
 them off. This back-door entrarsce is by no means fair to Singa- 
 pore, for under its baleful influence the traveller is apt to go away 
 (by the next steamer usually) with a low estimate of the city, every 
 way considered. 
 
 For the first stage out from New Harbor, the road is built 
 through a muddy and dismal mangrove swamp. Here and there 
 we pass a group of dingy and weather-beaten Malay houses stand- 
 ing on posts over the soft and slimy mud, or perhaps over a thin 
 sheet of mui-ky water. Delightful situation, truly, for the habita- 
 tions of civilized human beings. Monkeys would choose much 
 better. A Malay prefers to build over water ; and, faihng that, 
 he builds over the softest mud he can find, usually on the bank 
 of a river or lagoon. His house is quite in keeping vidth its 
 location. The roof is made of palm leaves, and very often the 
 walls also. The windows are mere sHts across the wall near the 
 floor, with clumsy wooden bars across ; there is not a speck of 
 paint or whitewash or colored paper visible anywhere, and the 
 whole structure reminds one of an old crow's nest. 
 
 Farther on, we emerge from the swamp and pass a Chinese Joss 
 
SINGAPOEE. 293 
 
 house and cemetery on a hill-side, beyond which we have for a 
 mile, on our right hand, a sohd row of Chinese shops and dwell- 
 ings, and on the other side of the road, a creek flowing mud and 
 shme instead of water. Talk of malaria ! It could be cut in that 
 creek, in blocks a foot square, like ice in the Hudson. And the 
 worst of it is that creek stinks — pardon, I mean sticks — by us un- 
 til we are well into the city itself. 
 
 How odd the Chinese shops look with their huge red lanterns, 
 wonderful signs, and flaming inscriptions in black on red paper 
 pasted on the door-posts, lintels, and window-casings. How fat and 
 sleek and hearty-looking are all the Chinese men and women, and 
 how plump and saucy-looking are all their children. I am sure the 
 Chinese are more fleshy, man for man, than any other people in 
 the world. 
 
 Rattling on we go. Here are Chinamen smoking big stems of 
 bamboo, large enough for hitching-posts ; here is one having his 
 pig-tail combed and his head shaved as he sits smoking unconcern- 
 edly on a bench. We pass four Chinamen with a huge and clumsy 
 coffin upon a cart in which there will soon be a fifth, please heaven. 
 Here is a Malay woman combing her hair in a doorway, and here, 
 ah ! old enemies ! Here axe three shops kept by Tamils, or Khngs, 
 as they call them here. 
 
 How odd everything looks. The houses are all two stories 
 high, with part of the lower story cut out to give a dry passage 
 way, and the overhanging upper portion supported by huge square 
 pillars of masonry. 
 
 Aha ! The sailors' quarter, it would seem, if we may judge by 
 the tavern signs. One announces, quite regardless of space, 
 
 THEMANONTHELOOKOUT, 
 and displays the portly figure of a Jack tar holding a small Krupp 
 cannon up to his eye, while he squints horribly into the muzzle. 
 Another sign in base imitation of the former proclaims, 
 
 THEMANATTHEWHEEL ; 
 and another, the best painted of them all, sets forth, in beautiful 
 letters but homicidal orthography, 
 
 THE SILVER ANKER. 
 Still another proclaims 
 
 THE ORIGINAL MADRAS BOB, 
 which is equivalent to the assertion that there are spurious 
 Madras Bobs about, and "all others are base indtations, unless 
 
294 TWO YEARS IN THE JUNGLE. 
 
 stamped by our trade mark, and liable to be prosecuted accordiBg 
 to law." Verily human nature seems to be very much the same in 
 Singapore as in Rochester. 
 
 The streets are wide, the shops are trim and orderly, and appa- 
 rently filled to overflowing with their respective wares. What fine 
 times we shall have loafing about these queer streets, and poking 
 our nose into everything that is new ! 
 
 Just now, however, it is pouring rain, so we rattle on through 
 the Chinese bazaars, across an iron bridge, spanning a sort of inner 
 harbor for Hghters and small boats (Singapore River), and, without 
 having passed a single European house or shop, we alight at a hotel 
 just at the foot of Fort-Canning-on-the-hill. 
 
 Singapore is certainly the handiest city I ever saw, as well 
 planned and carefully executed as though built entirely by one 
 man. It is like a big desk, full of drawers and pigeon-holes, where 
 everything has its place, and can always be found in it. For in- 
 stance, around the esplanade you find the European hotels — and 
 bad enough they are, too ; around Commercial Square, packed 
 closely together, are all the shipping offices, warehouses, and shops 
 of the European merchants ; and along Boat Quay are all the ship 
 chandlers. Near by, you will find a dozen large Chinese medicine 
 shops, a dozen cloth shops, a dozen tin shops, and similar clusters 
 of shops kept by blacksmiths, tailoYs, and carpenters, others for the 
 sale of fruit, vegetables, grain, " notions," and so on to the end of 
 the chapter. All the washerwomen congregate on a five-acre lawn 
 called Dhobi Green, at one side of which runs a stream of water, 
 and there you will see the white shirts, trowsers, and pajamas of 
 His Excellency, perhaps, hanging in ignominious proximity to and 
 on a level with yours. By some means or other, even the Joss 
 houses, like birds of a feather, have flocked together at one side of 
 the town. Owing to this peculiar grouping of the different trades, 
 one can do more business in less time in Singapore than in any 
 other town in the world. 
 
 Architecturally considered, Singapore has little to boast of ex- 
 cept solidity and uniformity. With but few exceptions the build- 
 ings are all Chinese, and perfectly innocent of style. It is a two- 
 story town throughout, solidly built of brick, plastered over, and 
 painted a very pale blue or hght yellow. There is a remarkable 
 scarcity of the tumble-down, drunk, and disreputable old buildings 
 so essential to the integrity of all other large cities. Some of the 
 Chinese shops and dwellings of the rich merchants are quite elab- 
 
SINGAPOEE. 295 
 
 orately ornamented on the front with fancy tile and brick work, 
 figures of apocryphal dragons and Chinese lions in high relief, 
 and surrounded by beautifully kept gardens of tropical plants and 
 shrubs. All of these impart a tasty and luxuriant air to the 
 streets. The wealthy Chinamen take very kindly to European lux- 
 uries of all kinds except in matters of dress. They are lavish in 
 the use of fine furniture, wines, and food, and their turnouts are 
 really dazzling with their fine open carriages, matched horses, ele- 
 gant harnesses, and liveried servants, though in dress they draw the 
 line at the white stiff hat of Enghsh make. Theu* dress is cool and 
 roomy, made of white silk or linen, and they wear no jewelry what- 
 ever. 
 
 The population of Singapore (about one hundred thousand) is 
 a sort of omniuyn gatherum from the various over-crowded coun- 
 tries of Southern Asia generally. The Chinese are by far the most 
 numerous, the most thrifty and enterprising, and the most satisfac- 
 tory to deal with. The Malays come next, and after them the 
 Tamils from Southern India and Ceylon. The population includes 
 a goodly sprinkling of Portuguese half-castes, a few Javanese, 
 a few Siamese, and of Europeans, a mixture of English, Dutch, 
 Germans, French, Swiss, and last but not least, three Americans, 
 our consul and his daughters. 
 
 Of the social life of Singapore I know nothing ; but from what 
 I was told, I judge it is not at all different from other British colonies. 
 There are the usual baUs and dinner parties, and the usual number 
 of grades in society, each of which knows its station to a line and 
 never ventures beyond it. To an American it seems extremely 
 silly for wholesale merchants and their clerks to hold themselves, 
 socially, above the retail merchants and their clerks, regardless of 
 the amount of business they do, and their moral and intellectual 
 standing. For my part, I have no patience with society's nonsensi- 
 cal standards, in accordance with which a man's business or profes- 
 sion is everything, and he himself is nothing. Thank God for 
 America, where every man stands on his merits, if he has any. 
 
 The hotels of Singapore are all bad, and life in them is exceed- 
 ingly dull. The liquor consumed in them, and the drunken men 
 one sees almost daily, keep the abstemious traveller in a state of 
 perpetual disgust. The extent to which intoxicating liquors of all 
 kinds are drunk in the East Indies is simply appalling. The drink- 
 ing habit is so universal, that, as a general thing, when you go to 
 call on an acquaintance at his house, or to visit a stranger in com* 
 
296 TWO YEAKS IN THE JUNGLE. 
 
 pany with other friends, the greeting is, " What will you have to 
 drink ? " If you say you do not drink, or do not wish anything, 
 you are urged most urgently to " take something" until it becomes 
 positively disagreeable ; and really the easiest way is to compromise 
 by taking a glass of their beastly lemonade or abominable soda. 
 Furthermore, when your new acquaintances, or old ones either, for 
 that matter, call upon you at yovu* hotel for half an hour's chat, 
 you are expected to order drinks for the crowd, until the crowd is 
 full of whatever it likes best. To omit this feature is to give posi- 
 tive offence in some cases, and even at the best to send your visi- 
 tors away saying that you are uncivil and not worthy the acquaint- 
 ance of gentlemen. 
 
 Again and again, I have seen men sit down in a hotel and dehb- 
 erately drink themselves drunk and helpless. At the old Sea-view 
 Hotel in Colombo, there is a room down-stairs kept for the exclu- 
 sive use of gentlemen who get too intoxicated to leave the 
 premises. Some get foohshly drunk at the dinner-table with their 
 wine ; some drunk and quarrelsome ; some destructively drunk ; 
 others disgracefully, and many helplessly. It was painful to see 
 poHshed and intelligent yoimg men make free exhibitions of 
 themselves in the pubHc rooms, and become objects of contempt 
 even to the hotel servants. The curse of the East Indies is 
 brandyism. "Wrecked Hvers and stomachs are always charged 
 to the "beastly climate," but in many, many cases the beastly 
 bottle is to blame. Of course no one will be so unthinking as 
 to suppose there are not hosts of good and true men in the East 
 who draw the hne at Bass' pale ale or claret, and who never think 
 of touching more fiery intoxicants ; there are plenty such, but I 
 fear they are in the minority. 
 
 In due time, I called upon oui' consul. Major Studer, to pay my 
 respects, little thinking that in him I wovJd meet a "fellow-citizen " 
 from my own proud State, Iowa, and be received almost with open 
 arms. Yes, that was my good fortvme, and more than that, I had 
 the pleasure of an early introduction to the Major's charming 
 daughter, then Miss Studer, but now a lass no more, a genuine 
 American girl — which is the highest praise I can bestow upon a 
 young lady. It was a great treat to me all around, and their kind 
 hospitahty made my stay in Singapore, at the three different times 
 I was there, far more endurable and free from social dulness than 
 would otherwise have been the case. 
 
 I think Major Studer is one of the most efficient consuls with whom 
 
SINGAPOEE. 297 
 
 I have yet become acquainted. First, last, and all the time, he is un- 
 compromisingly American, loyal to the backbone, and devoted heart 
 and soul to the interests of the government he represents. In ad- 
 dition to this he has the stamina which such a position requires, 
 and does his duty without the sHghtest fear of what those around 
 him may say or do. I was not surprised to learn that his official 
 acts have not always met the approbation of those most affected by 
 them, for to my mind no consul can do his duty unflinchingly 
 without making some enemies. From him I learned more of the 
 political history of the Straits Settlements, and the Malay Archi- 
 pelago, both inside and out, than I could ever have obtained else- 
 where. 
 
 It was at the Major's, one evening after my return from Borneo, 
 that I met two Americans of the kind one is proud to meet abroad, 
 and pleased to meet at home. Mr. Andrew Carnegie and Mr. Van- 
 devorst (" Vandy ") had just then reached the "haK-way house" 
 on their pleasure trip around the world, where they stopped for a 
 few days to see the sights. In spite of his Scotch blood, Mr. 
 Carnegie is quite an ideal American, with nothing but praise for his 
 adopted country and all her institutions. More than this, he is what 
 I should call a model miUionau-e, whom great gain has not rendered 
 insatiably greedy for more, and who industriously coins his money 
 into human happiness instead of reversing the operation, as most 
 of our wealthy men do. 
 
 It increases one's estimate of human nature to meet such a man, 
 who, in manner, is as cordial and unassuming as one's best friend, 
 whose human sympathy is his most conspicuous trait, and whose 
 greatest happiness is found in making others happy. While these 
 tardy pages have been in course of preparation, Mr. Carnegie has 
 finished that journey, and made another ; and now the public 
 knows him well through the charming pages of "Around the 
 "World," and "An American Four-in-Hand in Britain," both of 
 them books of the kind which it warms one's blood to read. 
 
 The city of Singapore is situated on an island of the same name, 
 twenty-five miles long by fourteen broad, which is separated from 
 the mainland of the Peninsula by a strait from one-half to three- 
 fourths of a mile wide. The island is covered with low hOls, the 
 highest of which has an elevation of about five hundred feet. Al- 
 though Singapore is only seventy miles north of the equator, the 
 temperature is by no means so hot as might at first be supposed. 
 The thermometer seldom rises above eighty-seven degrees in tha 
 
298 TWO YEAES IN THE JUNGLE. 
 
 shade, and usually stands at about ten degrees lower than that 
 There are absolutely no seasons, and nothing to mark the climatic 
 changes which occur elsewhere. It rains nearly every day, copious 
 showers of short duration, quite unlike the all-day down-pour of 
 the monsoons in India. The air is very humid, so that the heat is 
 far less noticeable than would otherwise be the case. One does 
 not swelter as in Calcutta or Madras, although a daily bath is as 
 necessary to comfort as daily bread. Taken altogether, Singapore 
 is really a delightful resting-place for a traveller, fuU of interesting 
 sights, and pleasant walks and drives. The Raffles Library and 
 Museum, the well-kept Botanic Gardens, the Fort, the markets, the 
 Joss houses, and various bazaars, are all well worth visiting and 
 enjoying. The harbor in front of the town often contains some 
 queer craft, including lumbering Chinese junks and Malay trading 
 proas of thoroughly antique design. 
 
 With the exception of shells, star- fishes, and corals, I found 
 nothing on the island that I cared either to collect or buy, and 
 even these were not nearly so abundant as I expected to find them. 
 The Malays assured me it was not the right time of the year for 
 them ; but I beHeved this was only an excuse with them, until I 
 returned from Borneo in December, when they brought me shells 
 and coral, star-fishes, and huge Neptune's cups, literally by the boat 
 load. ,, 
 
 Had I been a showman or collector of live animals, I could have 
 gathered quite a harvest of wild beasts in Singapore, at very small 
 cost. I was o£fered a fine tiger at $150 ; baby orangs at $20 to $30, 
 a fine pair of proboscis monkeys at $100 ; a pair of full-grown 
 tapirs at the same price ; manis and slow lemurs at $2 ; and a rhi- 
 noceros at $250. These were the asking prices, and it is quite 
 certain that much smaller sums than those named would have pur- 
 chased the animals in question. The greatest bargain I heard of, 
 was the sale of a full-grown orang-utan (Simia satyrus), four feet 
 two inches in height, to the Hon. H. A. K. "Whampoa, for the ridic- 
 ulous sum of $65, or $35 less than the price first asked. My desire 
 to see this animal led me to pay a visit to the country seat of his 
 owner, a very wealthy Chinese merchant, quite advanced in years 
 and honors. I went by invitation, and the call was one to be re. 
 membered. 
 
 On one side of a quiet street in the suburbs, there is a wall en- 
 closing a spacious garden. Passing through an open gate, the 
 posts of which are very high and ornamented with carved figures 
 
SINGAPOKE. 299 
 
 of Chinese dragons, we drove through a well-kept garden, sighted 
 a spacious but unpretentious white house, and drew up before the 
 massive and finely carved front doors. A gardener, who was trim- 
 ming a shrub close by, took my card and thrust it through the open 
 carving. Presently the doors opened wide, and I saw Mr. Whampoa 
 coming slowly from the farther end of the wide hall to meet me. 
 He was an old man with a low stoop in his shoulders, a large head, 
 a very thin queue of white hair, small twinkUng eyes with a very 
 pleasant expression, perfect manners, and a very kind, unassuming 
 smile. He speaks English as well as I, and has the honor to be 
 Chinese Consul, Turkish Vice-consul, member of the Legislative 
 Council, and the happy possessor of many, many dollars as the re- 
 sult of his labors. 
 
 My errand was to see the big orang-utan, but the contents of 
 that lofty hall quite drove the charming creatui-e out of my mind. 
 The first thing that caught my eye was a rounded gray stone about 
 the size of a small coal-scuttle, lying upon the floor as if it were of 
 small account. I scanned it idly, until my glance rested on a spot 
 that had been polished, and I saw that it was jade ! Value about 
 three thousand dollai's, a present from the owner of a mine for 
 whom Mr. Whampoa had once done some business. We passed 
 through three large, square apartments, which formed a grand 
 saloon, in which were tables for the reception of rare objects 
 of virtu, and the walls and niches were quite fiUed with 
 '' curios." On a table stood a bronze elephant with a pagoda on 
 his back, three feet high, Japanese work evidently, and exquisitely 
 done. Near it hung a huge Chinese gong, four feet in diameter, 
 on which were two dragons inlaid in gold. Above that, hung a 
 huge — almost colossal — pair of stag-homs, on the massive branches 
 of which were perched stuffed birds of paradise. Bronze storks 
 stood upon the floor, and elsewhere were numerous dragons in 
 bronze, elephant tusks, spears, etc. The furniture was all of ebony, 
 exquisitely carved and lavishly inlaid with mother-of-pearl and ivory. 
 On the walls and cornices were divers and sundry inscriptions in 
 Chinese characters, painted very large and very red. I had hard 
 work to repress the curiosity I felt, and the questions that rose 
 to my lips at every step ; but I did not wish to tire the feeble old 
 gentleman, or make him regret my visit, so I held my peace. 
 
 Then we went out into the back yard to see the orang. He was 
 a perfect monster in size, compared with all other orangs I had 
 seen in captivity, and as savage as a tiger. My presence seemed 
 
300 TWO YEAKS IN THE JUNGLE. 
 
 pai'ticulai'ly obnoxious to liim, for lie scowled and growled at me, 
 made faces, and sprang at me against the wooden bars of his cage 
 in great rage. When I approached him for a neai-er view, he 
 thrust his big, hairy arm out from between the bars for about four 
 feet, it seemed to me, and made a grab in my direction, with his 
 huge, black hand. His canine teeth were very large, almost like 
 those of a bear of medium size, and I was very glad he had not an 
 opportunity to try them on my flesh. The brute really acted as if 
 he recognized in me an enemy to his race, and foresaw the slaugh- 
 ter to his kind my visit to Borneo afterward caused. Mi\ Wham- 
 poa had had him about six months. He was fed with leaves, plan- 
 tains, and pineapples, and seemed in very good condition, but a few 
 months later he died ; his skin was stuffed, and is now on exhibi- 
 tion in the Museum. 
 
 Besides the oraug, I was shown quite a collection of live animals, 
 including tortoises of three species, argus pheasants, golden and 
 silver pheasants, a gazelle, porcupine, kangaroo, and some beautiful 
 mandarin ducks. I regretted to see that the latter so completely 
 sui-pass our pretty summer duck {Aix sponsa). 
 
 Having viewed the animals, we walked through the gardens, 
 which have been gotten up regardless of expense, and are kept in 
 fine order. One of their most notable featiu'es is the abundance of 
 a Httle shrub, a species of box [BuXus) which has been trained and 
 trimmed into vai-ious animal forms. The leaves are small, stiff, and 
 very thickly set, and the branches seem willing and able to assume 
 any form which is desired. It was fashioned into Chinese dragons, 
 elephants, tigers, pigs, rhinoceroses, and even deer with antlers. 
 Eveiy animal was perfectly recognizable at a glance, and the effect 
 was heightened by the addition of lai-ge wooden eyes painted some- 
 what like Hfe. Some of the animals were four or five feet high, 
 while a representation of a Chinese junk, of which there were sev- 
 eral, was quite eight feet in length, and very cai'efully reproduced. 
 
 There were flowers after flowers, and shrubs by the score, but 
 what pleased me most was a tank containing an old Demerara 
 friend, the Victoria regia, queen of lilies. Yet a bed of touch-me- 
 nots took me back like a flash to the terrace flower-beds at college, 
 and further still, to my mother's mounds at our old home, so very, 
 very long ago. Ah, me ! The Victoria regia was eclipsed. 
 
CHAPTEE XXVI. 
 
 ON THE SELANGORE SEA-COAST. 
 
 Malacca. — Selangore. — Klang River and Town. — A Kindred Spirit. — Visit to 
 Jerom on the Sea-coast to Collect. — Bamboo Creek. — A Filthy Chinese 
 Village. — A Foul Stream. — Crocodiles. — Catching a Twelve-foot Crocodile 
 with Hook and Line. — The " Alir." — A Harvest of Saurians again. — Croco- 
 diles in the Sea. — Birds. — Shrimp-eating Monkeys. — An Iguana, — The 
 Slowest Race on Record. — Remarkable Fishes. — Catching PerioptJialmi. — 
 An Adventure in Mud. — Various Vertebrates. — Centipedes and their 
 Doings. — Doctoring a Ray-stung Fisherman. — Malay Character. — Return 
 to Klang. 
 
 A WEEK after landing in Singapore, I set off up the coast toward 
 Malacca, in search of good collecting ground. I took with me an 
 intelligent young Portuguese half-caste as assistant and interpreter, 
 my regular jungle outfit, and all the information I could procure 
 regarding that region. Messrs, Katz Brothers, merchants in Sin- 
 gapore, had advised me to visit the newly opened Territory of 
 Selangore, above Malacca, and supplied me with a letter of intro- 
 duction to Tunku Dia Udin, a Malay noble, living at Klang, the 
 capital, in case I should decide to go there, 
 
 Malacca is about ninety miles up the coast from Singapore, It 
 takes four dollars and fourteen hours by steamer to get you there, 
 and after you have reached it you find only a dull and uninterest- 
 mg, but prettily shaded town. A few hours spent in industrious 
 inquiry convinced me that Malacca was not the place for me, and 
 without a moment's unnecessary delay I changed my programme en- 
 tirely. The little steamer Telegraph was already getting up steam 
 to go to Selangore and I hastened aboard. In the person of the 
 chief engineer, ]Mr. J. M. Hood, a Scotchman, of course, I met a 
 "jolly good fellow," who, from first to last, did everything in his 
 power to make my trip to Selangore agreeable. But for his 
 thoughtful kindness from time to time, I would not have fared 
 nearly so well as I did. He was another of those good feUows 
 one meets in knocking about the world, who are so free with their 
 
303 TWO YEAKS IN THE .U'XOLE. 
 
 favoi-s tlisit it is hopelessly impossible for Jiiiy but the wealthy 
 traveller to fully requite tliem. 
 
 We left ^Lilaooa at 5 p.m. ; and at daybreak the next morning, 
 were in a narix">\v stmt which sepiu'ates a ohjiin of islands from the 
 mainland of the Mtxlay Peninsula. I thought at first we were in a 
 river ; but after steaming smoothly along for a few miles we made 
 a turn tow:u-d the mainland, passed a stockade and a white house 
 on a point, showeil our ooloi-s, and entered the mouth of the Eivei* 
 Klang. two hundred miles from Sing:\pore. 
 
 Although this is the l:u*gest river in Solangore, it is only a h\m- 
 dred and fifty yards wide at the mouth. Tlie water is brown smd 
 thick with mud. and looks biUous. The banks are low juid swampy, 
 and covered >\ith mangix)ves and uipa piUms givwiug in the soft 
 mud. Twelve miles from the mouth, the ground suddenly rises 
 high and dry. iuul we come to Klang. the capitjil.* 
 
 On a stretch of level ground about as large as a mce com-se, 
 on the left b:uik. ai*e about fifty gr:\y houses covered by roofs of 
 weather-beaten thatch. This is the town. Near the rather inse- 
 cmv whfvrf stands a gcx^d-sized modern building of masonry, painted 
 white, which we know, instinctively, is the pubhc building of the 
 place, the com-t-house, treasm-y, post-office, and the like. Neju* 
 the river b:vnk. just below the town, we see a smoothly shfiven hill, 
 the top of which is encii-cled with jl gin^ssy eiu-thwork and shiUlow 
 moat, minus water. Tliei*e is a dusky sentr}' at the gtite and two 
 othei"S on the embankment, so that must be the fort. A short dis- 
 tance back of the fort, at the top of a higher hill, stands a spa- 
 cious and comfortable modern residence overlooking the town smd 
 fort, as if to keep a watchful eye over all. This is the British 
 Kesidency, and it does not belie its looks. 
 
 I went ashore with Mr. Hood and up to the fort, where he in- 
 troduced me to Mr. H. C Syei-s. Superintendent of the police and 
 militai-y force of the Territory, who forthwith gave me a coivlial in- 
 vitation to " put up " '^'ith him at liis quarters in the fort. Find- 
 ing there was neither hotel nor bo;irxling house in the town I ac- 
 cepted the offer with a sneaking sense of thiinkfulness that I w:w 
 r«ally obliged to do so, for I hate hotel life. 
 
 Mr. Syers and I became friends directly, for I greatly aduiii-ed 
 his strength of character and he was not avei*se to the companion- 
 ship of one interested in shooting quite as much as himself. 
 
 • The seat of gorernment is now at Qusillali Liimpor. 
 
ON 'J'lIE SELANGOllE SEA-C0A8T. 303 
 
 Hfj was a character fit to do duty as tlic hero of a vigorous 
 romance, and I found great interest in drawing him out. He was 
 a young EngHshman from London, only a httle older than I, frank, 
 big-hearted, fearless as a lion-tamer, and tenacious as a bull-dog. 
 He had been a soldier in the British army, but purchased his dis- 
 charge in order to enter upon a wider field of usefulness in his 
 present position. No officer could be better fitted by nature to fill 
 a position than ho to fill his. He has built up out of very suspi- 
 cious materials, and solely by his own efforts, the present military 
 force of Selangore, which is now well-armed and equipped, and 
 well-drilled, and his grip upon the law-breaking element is so firm, 
 so severe, and so certain, that outbreaks are now extremely im- 
 probable. The vigilance with which murderers are hunted down 
 and executed, has rendered crime of that sort very rare. 
 
 From Klang I made one short shooting trip uj) the river, an- 
 other down it, and another into the hilly jungle back of the town, 
 all of which were rather barren of results, I thought, and convinced 
 me that I must look elsewhere for good collecting ground. Mr. 
 Syers and I planned a trip into the interior after large game ; but 
 just then, the Resident, Captain Douglas, was in Singapore and 
 the execution of the j)lan had to be deferred till his return. Act- 
 ing on the information and advice of Mr. Syers, I packed up and 
 hired a Malay boat and crew to take me down the river, and thence 
 up the coast, about fifteen miles, to a little Malay hamlet called 
 Jerom. 
 
 We started from Klang with the ebb tide, about two o'clock in 
 the afternoon, passed out at the mouth of the river just at sunset, 
 and, hoisting our sail, to catch the gentle breeze, bore away up the 
 coast. We were soon clear of islands and on the open sea. It was 
 a beautiful moonlight night, of the kind made especially for boat- 
 ing, and I think even the stolid Malays enjoyed it. 
 
 We reached Jerom at one o'clock, and all the Malays went 
 ashore while I slept in the boat until morning. I went to sleep 
 with the water patting the side of the boat and tumbling in tiny 
 breakers on the shore in front of the house, but when I awoke in the 
 morning all was still and silent as the grave. The boat lay helpless 
 upon the sand, and the sea had quietly stolen away from the shore, 
 leaving between itself and us a barren bank of mud and sand more 
 than half a mile wide. No wonder it was still. It was well for us 
 we made the shore during the high tide, for otherwise we would 
 have been compelled to wait several hours. 
 
304 TWO YEAKS IN THE JUNGLE. 
 
 The only house in the hamlet which could afford me shelter 
 was that of Datu Pudeh, the Malay headman of the place, and hav- 
 ing been confided to his care by Mr. Syers, he took me in, and gave 
 me a corner of his front room, in which I hung up my hammock 
 and musquitero without further ceremony. When the tide was in, 
 the house stood almost at the water's edge, rather low upon its 
 posts, with slatted floor, and roof of thatch which had in it several 
 <ioles large enough to have thrown a dog through. I suppose that, 
 like the man of Arkansaw, when it rained they couldn't fix the roof, 
 and when it did not rain they didn't need to. We had no sooner 
 moved in with our belongings than it began to blow and rain very 
 hard. The bamboo curtains outside were let down over the win- 
 dows, and the place made as snug as possible, but the wretched old 
 roof leaked like a shower-bath. 
 
 A mile above Jerom, a muddy little creek, called Sungei Bulu, 
 runs into the sea between two wide banks of soft mud which are 
 submerged at high tide, and left four feet out of water when the 
 tide is out. A little way up from the mouth is a village of Chinese 
 fishermen who are engaged in catching prawns and making them 
 up into a stinking paste called blachang. Every house in the vil- 
 lage is tumble-down, rickety and dirty beyond description, and the 
 village smells even worse than it looks. The Chinamen live more 
 Hke hogs than human beings ; and, for my part, I would rather 
 take up quarters in a respectable pig-sty than in such houses at 
 those are. 
 
 At high tide there is no ground visible along the banks of the 
 creek, but, when the ebbing tide empties the miurky little stream, 
 the channel flows between sloping banks of soft, sHmy, gray mud. 
 I never before encountered mud having such a nasty, putrid smell 
 as that emitted when exposed. It smelled like sulphuretted hydro- 
 gen, and was, at times, almost overpowering. If I were making up 
 a hell out of the most disagreeable elements on earth, I would put 
 in it the Sungei Bulu at low tide, as being the most dismal, wholly 
 repulsive and sense-offending stream on the earth. Its water is a 
 kind of mud gruel, seasoned with salt, dead leaves, and rotten wood 
 finely pulverized. One would think that even the meanest Hving 
 creature would find Ufe unendurable in such a place ; but never- 
 theless the creek is swarming with salt water crocodiles {Croco' 
 dilus porosus), all of which deserve to be shot for living in such a 
 vile place. 
 
 At low tide they crawl out and lie among the mangroves, wal- 
 
ON THE SELANGOEE SEA-COAST. 305 
 
 lowing in the soft, hot mud until the water rises again. I got sev- 
 eral specimens by floating quietly down the stream and shooting 
 them before they were aware of our proximity. The largest ones 
 however, were too smart to be taken in that way, and having be- 
 come convinced of this fact by the failure of several attempts to 
 shoot a weU-known individual of large size, I determined to go 
 a-fishing for him. 
 
 Acting under the advice of a Chinese fisherman who seemed to 
 know how to catch crocodiles with a hook and line, we got a rattan 
 about forty feet long for a hne, and a dry cocoanut to tie at one end 
 as a float. The Chinaman then proceeded to make an " alir," such 
 as the Malays use in Sarawak, by whittling an inch piece of tough 
 green wood ten inches long into a shape something hke a crescent, 
 sharp at both ends and with a groove running round the stick at 
 the middle, which was the thickest part, where the Hue was to be 
 attached. 
 
 Some soft but very tough green bark was then procured from 
 the jungle, and braided into a line six feet long, which was at one 
 end fastened firmly round the middle of the alir, and at the other 
 to the long rattan rope. This bark line was supposed to be so 
 soft and tough no crocodile could bite it in two. The bait used 
 was the body of a sting ray caught by one of the fishermen, which 
 was lashed securely to the alir, one end of which was then bent up 
 close to the bark Hne and tied to it with a bit of string that could 
 be broken by a slight puU. The intention was that the alir shoidd 
 be swallowed point foremost, and when we pulled on the line the 
 upper point would catch in the side of the stomach, break the 
 string and instantly bring the aHr crosswise in the crocodile's 
 interior. 
 
 The crocodile we wanted to catch was weU known by his re- 
 peated appearance at the village, within stone's throw of the houses, 
 and he was described as being a perfect monster, with a throat large 
 enough to swaUow a large-sized man instantly. The villagers man- 
 ifested great interest in our effort, and helped us in every possible 
 way. 
 
 We took our tackle just far enough above the village to be out 
 of sight, for we wanted our victim to have so good an opportunity 
 that he would not feel bashful. Following the custom of the 
 Malays we found an overhanging branch, quite low down, over the 
 end of which we threw our Hne so that the bait hung within six 
 inches of the water at high tide, and so adjusted that a very sHght 
 20 
 
306 TWO YEARS IN THE JUNGLE. 
 
 pull would bring it down. The rattan line we threw into the 
 stream with the cocoanut buoy at the end, and quietly retired to 
 the village to await developments. 
 
 At the close of the day the bait still hung there undisturbed, 
 and I walked home to Jerom hoping for better luck on the morrow. 
 The next morning we were there soon after sunrise, and the China- 
 man joyfully informed us the bait was gone. We got into a small 
 Malay sampan and paddled up the creek at once to investigate. 
 We found the cocoanut moving slowly through the water against 
 the cui'rent and upon laying hold of the line we felt there was big 
 game at the other end. We gave a vigorous puU, and the next in- 
 stant were almost capsized in mid-stream by a pull we got in re- 
 turn. We then passed the line over the stern of the canoe and 
 while I held it, the rest began to paddle down stream toward the 
 village where we proposed to land our catch. 
 
 Then he showed himself. He rose to the surface apparently to 
 see what was the matter, and, after giving a good look at us, started 
 forward and began to turn as if about to go up stream. Before he 
 had turned half round he fetched up with a violent jerk which 
 must have given one point of the alir a vicious dig into the side of 
 his stomach ; for he began to plunge and thrash around with great 
 violence, sending the water circling around him in huge waves. 
 There was also considerable excitement at our end of the line, for 
 the sampan was small, light, very tipsy, and contained three men 
 of good weight. Chinaman, Malay, and Anglo-Saxon, each shouted 
 at the other two in his own language. Had we been capsized I 
 scarcely know which would have disgusted me most, the ducking 
 in that dirty creek, ixd\ of crocodiles, or the loss of my rifle. As 
 soon as we could I tied the weapon fast to the boat so that in the 
 event of a mishap I would not lose it. 
 
 After this struggle the crocodile seemed to give up the fight, 
 for he allowed himself to be towed down to the village without 
 further resistance. But as we neared the landing place where we 
 intended to haul him out, he made a final and still more vigorous 
 struggle to get free. He snapped his jaws angrily together in an 
 effort to cut the Hne, but it was no use, so shutting them together 
 Hke a vice he plunged first to one side and then the other, striking 
 out with tail and legs, diving deeply one moment and suddenly 
 thrusting his ugly snout far out of water the next. 
 
 Another boat came to our assistance at this point and the huge 
 old reptile was dragged shoreward by main force. The men landed 
 
ON THE SELANGORE SEA-COAST. 307 
 
 and dragged him close up to the shore without further resistance 
 on his part, whereupon I fired a bullet iuto his neck from the side 
 which cut his spinal marrow so neatly that the vertebra was but 
 very sHghtly injured. He was the very crocodile we wanted, and 
 his death occasioned no sorrow. He measured exactly twelve feet 
 in length, and his weight was four hundred and fifteen pounds. 
 He was so old, so dingy, dirty, and ugly every way that I concluded 
 to take his skeleton instead of his skin, and spent a day in rough- 
 ing it out neatly. 
 
 Encouraged by this venture, and a satisfactory offer of hard 
 cash, my Chinaman caught for me (on his own hook) two other fine 
 crocodiles, one being eleven feet in length and the other nine, both 
 of which were skinned. I got altogether ten crocodiles out of the 
 Sangei Bulu, which yielded four skins, four skeletons, and one 
 skull. 
 
 I was gi'eatly sui'prised one morning at seeing two crocodiles 
 swimming out in the open sea, directly opposite Jerom, fully a mile 
 from the shore, and three miles from the mouth of the Sungei 
 Bulu. It was a calm, clear day, and I watched them for half an 
 hour with the glass as they floated at the surface of the water, or 
 swam slowly about with their entire length visible the most of the 
 time. One was very large, probably twelve feet in length, and the 
 other was apparently eight feet long. At length they disappeared 
 and we saw them no more. It is not unusual for crocodiles to live 
 in salt water, but I never before saw one out in the open sea. 
 
 Tlie mud flats at the mouth of the Sungei Bulu were excellent 
 collecting ground, both when under water and out. Water birds 
 were really numerous when the conditions were favorable for their 
 appearance. Some came to fish in the shallow water and others to 
 pick up a living on the flats when the tide was out. I saw several 
 pelicans {Pelecanus rufescens ?) perching on some dead trees near 
 the shore, small white egrets {Herodias garzetta) and a soHtary booby 
 {Sula piscator). On a httle islet of igneous rock opposite Jerom I 
 saw stone plovers {Esacus recurvirostris), two species of tern {Sterna 
 caspiaf and Sternula minutaf), two of ibis, snipes, sand pipers, etc. 
 At low tide many small shi-imps were left stranded on the mud, and 
 I often saw troops of small gray monkeys, called krahs {Macacus 
 cynomolgus), wading about in the mud among the mangroves, 
 picking them up. At such times it was easy to shoot them, but 
 difficult to get them afterward. 
 
 Once we discovered a fine, large kabra goya or iguana {Hydro- 
 
308 TWO YEAES IN THE JUNGLE. 
 
 saurus salvator), wading about on the mud banks, also looking for 
 food. At my solicitation my young man Francis at once jumped 
 out into the mud and gave chase. He sank almost to his knees at 
 every step, and the race was certainly the slowest on record. The 
 official time was one hundred yards in twenty minutes ; but the 
 kabra goya got beaten, although usually a swift runner ; the soft 
 mud so impeded its progress that it was finally overhauled and 
 killed with a stick. Its length was just six feet. We often found 
 small crocodiles Ijmg hidden in the little gullies which the reced- 
 ing water cuts in the mud banks, and shot several as they came 
 chai'ging out toward the deep water. 
 
 The most interesting animals we found on the mud flats were some 
 fishes whose actions were really remarkable. Although apparently 
 stranded there, they seemed to feel perfectly at home, and went 
 jumping round over the mud in ever}' dii-ection with the greatest 
 indifference to their sudden change of element. In reahty they 
 were feeding upon the tiny cinistaceans left on the bank by the re- 
 ceding tide. They were very Kvely considering the nature of theii* 
 play-gi*ound, and when I tried to beguile my Malay boatmen into 
 catching some specimens for me, they declared it would be impos- 
 sible to catch them on account of the deep mud, and the swiftness 
 of the fish. Neither was my young man Francis to be tempted 
 into such a muddy enterprise, ano as I make it a rule never to ask 
 a servant or assistant to do anything I would not be willing to do 
 myself, I saw that I would have to lead the attack in person. 
 
 The Malays were thunderstruck when I pulled off my shoes and 
 told them to put me ashore. Seeing that I was really going, 
 Francis, like a good boy, did not hesitate to follow, and we stepped 
 out of the sampan into mud and water hip deep. 
 
 We will never know the actual depth of the mud on that bank, 
 but we sank into it to our knees at eveiy step, and were fortunate 
 enough to stop sinking at that point. What a cii'cus it must have 
 been for those who looked on ! But, in for a penny in for a pound, 
 and, bidding Francis choose the largest fish when possible, we went 
 for them. There were probably a dozen in sight, hopping spas, 
 modically about, or lying at rest on the mud, but when we selected 
 the nearest large specimens and made for them, they developed sur- 
 prising energy and speed, and made straight for their burrows. 
 They progressed by a series of short but rapidly repeated jumps, 
 accomphshed by bending the hinder third of the body sharply 
 around to the left, then straightening it very suddenly, and at th« 
 
ON THE SELANGOKE SEA-COAST. 309 
 
 same instant lifting the front half of the body clear of the ground 
 by means of the armHke pectoral fins which act like the front flip- 
 pers of a sea lion. These fins are almost Hke arms in their struct- 
 ure and use, the bones being of great length, and thus giving the 
 member great freedom of movement. Owing to the soft and yield- 
 ing nature of the mud the leaps were short, about six inches 
 being the distance gained each time, but they were so rapid, the 
 mud so very deep and our progress so slow, the fish always suc- 
 ceeded in getting into their holes before we could reach them. 
 Their burrows were simply mud-holes, going straight down to a 
 depth of three to four feet, large enough in diameter to admit a 
 man's arm easily, and, of course, full of water. Although the mud 
 was soft it was not sticky, and we were able to use our hands for 
 spades very effectually. By digging a big hole two feet deep, and 
 standing on one's head in the bottom of it, we were able to reach an 
 arm down two feet farther and seize our fish at the bottom of the 
 burrow. Lucky it was for us that they had no sharp and poisonous 
 spines, hke the mud-laff which stung me in Singapore and para- 
 lyzed my right hand for some hoiu's. 
 
 My first fish was hard to get and hard to hold, but, in the im- 
 mortal words of "The Shaughraun," "begorra, 'twas worth it." 
 
 The species is known scientifically as Periophthalmus schlosserii, 
 (Pallas, Bl. Schn.) a member of the family Gobiidce, whose expanded 
 ventral fins serve as a foot, the lengthened pectorals as organs of 
 locomotion, while the small gill opening allows the retention of suf- 
 ficient moisture to sustain the fish for a considerable period on land. 
 
 Adult specimens are nine inches long, of a uniform slaty color. 
 
 As I remarked before, our living specimens were hard to hold. 
 When I was trying to pass a string through the gills of my first 
 fish, he struggled out of my grasp, and the moment he touched the 
 mud started at his best speed for the water twenty yards distant. 
 
 I was horrified at the thought of his getting away, and instantly 
 falling upon my hands and knees I pursued him frantically " on all 
 fours." It must have been a sight fit for the gods, for even my 
 stolid and ever respectful Malays actually shouted with laughter to 
 see the tuan go over the mud like a " buaya " (crocodile). My 
 change of base was successful, however, for I was able to go over 
 the mud instead of through it, and I overhauled my fish in fine 
 style. A few minutes later I saw Francis execute the same brilliant 
 manoeuvre for the same cause, and it certainly was a most laugh- 
 able spectacle. 
 
310 TWO YEAKS IN THE JUNGLE. 
 
 We got seven fine specimens altogether, one of which is figm*ed 
 herewith, and of all the muddy human beings you ever saw — but 1 
 will draw the veil. 
 
 We were fated to have another adventiu*e in mud which was not 
 down in the programme. We left the mouth of the Sungei Bulu 
 very late one evening with the tide at the ebb, and did not an-ive 
 opposite Jerom until after sunset. To my horror, our boat grounded 
 in the mud three-foiu-ths of a mile fi'om shore, and stuck fast, leav- 
 ing us to choose between staying in the boat, with the mosquitoes 
 biting vigorously, for five hoiu's, imtil the tide came in, or wading 
 asliore tlu"ough that sea of mud. Of com-se we chose the latter. 
 It is easy to imagine mud knee deep ; but it is a different thing to 
 go through it, when one actually sinks to the knee at every step. 
 We had a quai-ter of a mile of that, floundering along, slowly and 
 painfully, the dim lights on shore seeming fai'ther away every time 
 we looked. At last we emerged from this slough of despond upon 
 firm ground of sheUs and sand, and the last half of the distance was 
 quickly accomplished ; but we were never caught in that way again. 
 
 But for a clean sandy shore line, Jerom would be intolerable, 
 for it is entirely surrounded by mud. No prospect could be more 
 dreary than the vast mud-flat left bai-e all along the shore at low tide. 
 But even the sandy shore is being rapidly eaten away by the sea. 
 The beach is thickly strewn with the ti-unks of cocoanut trees which 
 have been undermined and overthi'own by the waves, and many 
 more ai'e doomed. Back fi'om the beach, for an unknown number 
 of miles, extends a swampy -vNilderness inhabited at present only by 
 wild beasts. Mi*. Syei-s once penetrated it a short distance, with a 
 French count as a companion, in search of wild cattle {Bos sondai- 
 cus). After proceeding a little over a mile, the GaUic sportsman 
 made his attendants cousti'uct a litter and carry him back to 
 Jerom. IVIr. Syers proceeded, but foimd no game, and returned ia 
 disgust. Along the banks of the Sungei Bulu I saw where the 
 high gi'ass had been trampled down quite recently by wild ele- 
 phants. 
 
 Besides the specimens of 3Iacacus cynomolgus, the only other 
 mammal species I obtained at Jerom was an otter {Lutra leptonyx), 
 brought in by a Chinaman, who killed it ^vith his parong. 
 
 Half a dozen smtill box-turtles {Guora Amhoinensis) were brought 
 to me, and one lai'ge tortoise {Emys trijuga), which was caught 
 near Jerom. The fishermen catch and eat a good many spiny- 
 backed rays {Urogymnus asperrimus) of large size, the dry backs of 
 
ON THE SELANGOKE SEA-COAST. 311 
 
 wliicli lay all about Jerom. One was caught diuiug my stay there, 
 but the stupid Chinaman ruined it as a specimen by cutting off the 
 skin of the back, which he brought to me instead of the whole fish 
 I had called for. It was a very large specimen, measiuing 2 feet 9 
 inches across the back, and I exceedingly regi-etted its destruction. 
 
 A collector of insects could have made quite a collection in the 
 house which (partially) sheltered us. On putting on my clothes 
 one morning, I found a fine healthy centipede in my trousers- 
 pocket, along with my knife and keys. I took this wai-ning rather 
 cai-elessly, and paid for it the very next day by putting on my shirt 
 with a four-inch centipede in the shoulder. Feeling something 
 crawling vigorously on my flesh, I reached up and made a grab for 
 it, but unfortunately seized it in such a way that the head was left 
 free, and it instantly bit me. Before I could catch its head it bit 
 again, but it never bit any more. When Francis had helped me 
 out of my shii-t, and I loosened my grip on the insect, it looked as if 
 it had been through a clothes wringer. After all, its bite was not 
 so terrible as I had been taught to expect. The sensation was 
 similar' to what I would have felt had thi*ee or four hot needles 
 been thrust into my shoulder a quarter of an inch or so. I bathed 
 the bite dii-ectly with tincture of arnica, my favorite remedy for all 
 such ills, and, after several applications, the pain ceased entirely at 
 the end of about two hours. 
 
 Just before I left Jerom one of the Malay fishermen living there 
 was badly hurt by a sting-ra3% While reaching down in the water 
 to pull up one of his fishing stakes, he distiu'bed a large ray, who 
 instantly struck at him and drove the ragged, bony spine on his 
 tail completely thi'ough the poor fellow's hand, making a dread- 
 fully ragged and painful wound. Datu Pudeh came for me to 
 doctor him, saying that he was about to die. Catching up my 
 little tin box of medicines I went to the injured man, and found 
 him lying Hmp and helpless in the ai-ms of his fi'iends, sm-rounded 
 by a sympathizing crowd, not one of whom knew what to do for 
 him. "Will he die, tuan?" was the universal question. "Cer- 
 tainly not," I replied, with assurance that would have astonished an 
 Abernethy, I dare say. I dreaded lock-jaw, but he had no symp- 
 toms of it then. Calling for cold water I kept a stream running 
 on the man's hand for fifteen minutes, and then steadily bathed the 
 wound with arnica for half an hour. After that I saturated 
 cotton with the same divine stuft' and bound it upon the wound, 
 with the repeated assurance to the patient that he would not die. 
 
312 TWO YEARS IN THE JUNGLE. 
 
 The nest day, -while I was busy packing up to leave, in walked 
 my patient, so briskly as to take me by surprise, to express his 
 gratitude. He certainlj' did recover much quicker than I expected. 
 Datu Pudeh begged me to give him some of that wonderful " obat " 
 (medicine) ; and, having used up my supply, I earned his gratitude 
 by sending him some from Klang on my return. 
 
 At Jerom I had a very good opportunity to study Malay 
 chai'acter, in one phase at least. I had to respect them for their 
 sobriety, their quiet, dignified manner under all circiunstances, 
 their entii-e disinclination to loud-mouthed brawling, and their 
 freedom fi'om all symptoms of the offensive and impertinent curi- 
 osity so chai'acteristic of the higher races of men. I was con- 
 strained to regret then* chai'acteristic indolence, and lack of enter- 
 prise, for this national failing, and this alone, has kept the Malays 
 from holding all Malasia securely in their grasp. Procrastination 
 is the evil genius of the Malay, and the exasperation of whoever 
 looks to him for help in time of need. 
 
 The people of Jerom treated me well fi-om first to last, but their 
 ways were too slow for me. Somehow they seemed never ready to 
 start, and delay was ever the order of the day. Being totally un- 
 used to theu' deliberate ways, I lost my temper more than once 
 when depending upon them as boatmen and guides. Even when 
 we were ready to retm-n to Klang,* and the boat and crew en- 
 gaged well in advance, neither were ready on the day appointed, nor 
 had a move been made except by ourselves. At last, when we got 
 the boat all ready to load, the Datu declared it had no sail, and we 
 must wait a day, or imtil one could be procured. After we had 
 given up in despair, the Datu bestirred himseK and enabled us to 
 get off with a loss of only two days. And what ai*e two days to a 
 Malay ! 
 
 Before leaving I gave the Datu's wife a very nice figui-ed sarong, 
 which pleased her mightily, and called forth from her most eai-nest 
 apologies for their inability to entertain me in better style during 
 my stay. She insisted on cooking a hot dinner for me just before 
 we were to start, to which I finally consented, to please both the 
 lady and myself. There was presently forthcoming a very nice and 
 highlj' palatable meal of fried bananas, preserves of nutmeg and 
 pomegranate, and a dry short-cake to eat with butter and sugar, 
 made by the Datu's mother-in-law. In one sense it was not much, 
 ail told, but in another it was a feast, for it was the very best tho 
 house could offer. 
 
ON THE SELANGORE SEA-COAST. 313 
 
 The mother-in-law and daughter had often peeped through the 
 crack of the door at me, but never had shown themselves until I 
 sent in to the old lady a knife, fork, and spoon as a present, instead 
 of the spoon she had craved as a cuiiosity ; whereupon she forth- 
 with donned her best sarong and jacket, and came into the room 
 where I was, to thank me for her presents and her daughter's. 
 (Nothing makes a man feel meaner than to give a poor present and 
 see it appreciated far beyond its worth.) But her daughter's face I 
 never saw. 
 
 We got off about an hour after dark, spread our huge matting 
 sail, and glided slowly along the shore. Francis spread a bed for 
 us under an extemporized roof, and we slept weD. In the middle 
 of the night I was rudely awakened from a dream of bison-hunting 
 by my bedfellow, who sprang to his feet, clawing violently at the 
 back of his neck, and " uttering strange oaths " as well as famihar 
 swear words. He had been bitten by " an awful big centipede, " and 
 advised me, for my own safety, to get up quickly. Being a firm be- 
 liever in the truth of the saying that " lightning never strikes twice 
 in the same place," I lay still and went to sleep. At noon of the 
 next day we reached Klang again. 
 
CHAPTER XXYIL 
 
 . HUNTING IN THE INTERIOR OF SELANGORE. 
 
 A Trip to tlie Interior. — Road to Kwala Lumpor. — The Town. — "The Cap* 
 tain Cheena." — A Bonanza in Champagne. — Sungei Batu. — A Foolish 
 Feat. — Our House. — Feasting on Durians. — A Jacoon House and Fam- 
 ily. — Resemblance to the Dyaks.— An Impromptu Elephant Hunt. — At- 
 tack in a Swamp. — Death of a Young Tusker. — Plague of Flies. — Another 
 Elephant Hunt. — A Close Shave and a Ludicrous Performance. — Discov- 
 ery and Exploration of Three Fine Caves. — Cathedral Cave. — Mammals. 
 — Visit to a Tin Mine. — Chinese versus Malays. — Political Condition of 
 Selangore. — Statistics. — Snakes. — Good-by to Klang. — Mr. Robert Camp- 
 bell, my Good Genius. 
 
 On again reaching Klang I found there Captain Douglas, the Brit- 
 ish Kesident, who, much to my advantage, was kind enough to 
 interest himself in the object of my visit. Through his co-opera- 
 tion Mr. Syers obtained fourteen days* leave of absence for the trip 
 we had planned to take into the interior, and, on the evening 
 of June 27th, we started up the river in IVIr. Syers' boat. Four 
 Malays puUed the boat, while we lay down and slept comfortably 
 until we reached Damensara, eighteen miles up, where we tied up 
 tiU morning. From the Pohce Station at that point a good car- 
 riage road leads east seventeen miles to Kwala Lumpor, the largest 
 town in the territory, in the centre of the mining district. 
 
 After our cup of coffee at the poHce station, I hastily skinned a 
 Macacus nemestrinits (broque monkey), which I bought alive of one 
 of the policemen, and then we started for the other end of the 
 road. ]VIr. Syers had his two ponies in readiness, and we rode 
 them, leaving our luggage to foUow on a cart. 
 
 The road lay through very dense, high forest, composed of 
 large and very lofty trees (among which the camphor was often 
 noticed), growing very thickly together, while the groimd under- 
 neath was choked with an undergrowth of thorny palms, rattans 
 and brush so thick it seemed that nothing larger than a cat 
 could get through it. Nowhere was there the smallest opening in 
 
HUNTING IN THE INTERIOR OF SELANGORE. 315 
 
 this dark and damp mass of vegetation, and it made me shudder to 
 think of attempting to go through it. Surely, I thought, we will 
 not attempt to hunt in such forest as that. 
 
 Six miles from the river, we came to another police station, 
 Kooboo Ladah, where we halted to wait for the baggage to come 
 up. Two miles farther on we reached the end of the road,* where 
 we found a gang of government coolies waiting to carry our lug- 
 gage the remainder of the distance. Without these men, whose 
 services were thoughtfully supplied by Captain Douglas, we should 
 have been obliged to pay a ruinously exorbitant price for coolie 
 hire, almost as much as our baggage was worth. 
 
 For the remainder of the way, we had only a very rough bridle 
 path through hilly jungle and across many muddy little streams. 
 At the twelfth mile we passed the Sungei Batu police station, very 
 prettily situated in a highly romantic spot. 
 
 After passing two or three clearings, we reached the top of a 
 long, steep hill, and, at its foot, Kwala Lumpor lay before us, on 
 the opposite bank of the river Klang, here reduced in size to a 
 nari'ow but deep creek. A sampan came across to ferry us over, 
 while our ponies swam beside it, and at 5 p.m. we were at our rest- 
 ing place for the night. 
 
 All along the river bank, the houses of the Malays stand in a 
 soUd row on piles ten feet high, directly over the swift and muddy 
 current. The houses elsewhere throughout the town are walled 
 with mud, and very steeply roofed with attaps (shingles made of 
 nipa-palm leaves), so that a view of the town fi'om any side dis- 
 closes very Uttle except high, brown roofs slanting steeply up. In 
 the centre of the town is a large market where fruits, vegetables, 
 meats and various abominations of Chinese cookery are sold. The 
 vegetables are sweet potatoes, yams of various kinds, beans, melons, 
 cucumbers, radishes, Chinese cabbage, onions, egg-plant and 
 "lady's fingers." The fruits were the durian, mangosteen, pine- 
 apple, banana, and plantain, oranges (of foreign growth), limes, 
 "papayah," and other small kinds not knoAvn by English names. 
 
 In the centre of the market-place are a lot of gambHng-tables, 
 which, a Httle later in the evening, were crowded with Chinamen 
 earnestly engaged in the noble pastime of "fighting the tiger." 
 The principal streets are Hned with Chinese shops, and are uni- 
 formly clean and tidily kept. The streets inhabited by the Malaya 
 
 * This road was completed soon after to Kwala Lumpor. 
 
316 TWO YEAES IN THE JUNGLE. 
 
 can be recognized at sight by the accumulation of dirt and mal- 
 odorous rubbish, and the dilapidated appearance of the houses. 
 
 We went straight to the house of the Captain China (pro- 
 nounced Cheena), the man of importance in the district, who is 
 governor of the Chinese in every sense of the word. His title is 
 Sri Indra Purkasah Wi Jayah Bucktie (" Fau--fighting Chief and 
 Hero "), and his name, Yap Ah Loy, commonly called by Europeans 
 the Captain China. In return for his services to the district in 
 opening new roads and preserving good order, with his own police 
 force, the government allows him a royalty of $1 on every bhara 
 (which equals three piculs, or four himdi'ed pounds) of tin ex- 
 ported, and from this source, and also from his eleven tin mines, he 
 is said to be the wealthiest man in the territory. He has in his 
 employ sixteen hundred and twenty-seven men, and entertains at 
 his house, in true European style, every white man who visits Kwala 
 Lumpor. Unfortunately he was absent at that time, but his peo- 
 ple received us quite as if he had been there, and made us comfort- 
 able with a fine dinner, an abundance of excellent champagne and 
 good beds. 
 
 The next morning, while in the largest Chinese store in the 
 place, buying provisions for our stay in the jungle, we struck a 
 bonanza. We found Mumm's champagne for sale at sixty cents a 
 quart, and India pale ale at fifteen cents per pint ! How they ever 
 managed to sell either at such ridiculously low prices we could not 
 understand, and, to ease our consciences before victimizing the 
 dealer, we told him he must have made a mistake in mai'king his 
 goods. No, that was the price, and we could have all we wanted. 
 It would have been flying in the face of a kind Providence to have 
 neglected such an opportunity as comes but once in a lifetime. 
 
 Engaging the strongest coolie we could find we loaded him with 
 champagne (at sixty cents per quart !), and marched him ahead of 
 us into the jungle. It was the proudest moment of my life. I 
 may never strike oil, or gold-bearing quartz, or di-aw a prize in the 
 Louisiana lottery ; but I have stnick Jules Mumm's best at sixty 
 cents a quart. My only regret is that I did not fill a tub and take 
 a bath in it, for champagne is the only artificial drink I really like- 
 
 Having slept and breakfasted at Kwala Lumpor, we saddled our 
 ponies, and prepai'ed to move on six miles farther to Batu. Not 
 having enough government coolies, we had to hire two Chinamen, 
 who charged us $2.00 for can-ying a sixty-pound box six miles. 
 
 We crossed the river again, rode along a bridle-path thi'ough 
 
HUNTING IN THE INTERIOR OF SELANGORE. 817 
 
 some dense jungle and one or two clearings, and presently reached 
 Batu, on the Klang River, our journey's end. And right there 
 we did the most foolish thing we could possibly have done, for 
 attempting which we both deserved to have oui' necks broken. 
 There is a narrow foot-bridge across the river, a single line of 
 planks a foot wide, supported on posts about eight feet high over 
 the bed of the river, and without any railings whatever. IVIr. Syera 
 asked if we should ride our ponies over the bridge instead of ford- 
 ing, and I told him to do as he liked, and I would foUow. Fool that 
 he was, he started to ride across the bridge, "just for a lark," and, 
 fool that I was, I followed. The least nervousness, or a mis-step 
 on the part of either pony, would have thrown us all over pell-mell, 
 and, considering everything, it is a wonder we got safely over. Not 
 satisfied with this, and to tempt fate stiU fai'ther, we presently re- 
 crossed in the same way. The next day we were amazed at our 
 foUy, and ascribed our safety to the Providence which watches over 
 fools and drunken men. 
 
 At Batu there are fom* Malay houses and two Chinese. The 
 headman was absent in Klang, but his wife proved herseH a woman 
 capable of meeting an emergency, and forthwith had one of the 
 Malay families vacate their residence, which stood a good distance 
 away from the others in a very pretty grove of durian trees on the 
 high bank of the river. The family moved out, bag and baggage, 
 in twenty minutes, and we moved in with quite as much furniture 
 and general luggage as the dispossessed. The floor was of bamboo 
 slats, tied down to the sleepers, an inch apart, and raised on posts 
 five feet above the ground. The walls were of bark, and the roof 
 of attap. The principal room, in which Mr. Syers and I himg 
 our hammocks, was cool and comfortable, but rather dark from lack 
 of windows. In the other room were quartered our companions, 
 consisting of two Malay policemen, one of them a smart, active 
 young fellow named Yahop — a keen sportsman withal ; my boy 
 Francis, Syers' Chinese boy, Cat's Face, cook and servant, and also 
 his Malay horse-keeper, a good servant at aU times. The ponies 
 were stabled very comfortably underneath the house. 
 
 The jungle all around Batu, although swampy in places, was so 
 open that one could go through it on foot with tolerable ease. 
 Here and there were patches of low and thin forest, broken occa- 
 sionally with fine grassy glades, such as large animals love to visit 
 for a sight of the sun and sky. But we soon fotmd that beyond 
 this fine ground lay a wide tract of swampy forest, very difficult 
 
318 TWO YEARS IN THE JUNGLE. 
 
 to traverse, and very bad ground on which to attack dangerous 
 game. 
 
 The day of our arrival we did nothing ; but set out bright and 
 early the following morning mth a Malay guide who knew the 
 locality well. We went to look the ground over, and if possible 
 find wild cattle. 
 
 For an hour, our guide led us along a muddy path, through 
 very thick jungle, and finally we halted at a place where there 
 were a number of duriau trees, and a party of Malays gathering 
 the ripe fi'uit as fast as it fell. Being an animal of largely frugiv- 
 orous habits, I have marked that day with a white stone as being 
 the one on which I ate my first durian. 
 
 It is said that most Em-opeans have to learn to hke this cele- 
 brated fi'uit. Te gods! Learn to sip nectar from a blushing 
 maiden's lips, if you must, but if you are fond of fruit at all, you 
 will not need to be taught to eat what is at once the most dehcate 
 in substance, and delicious and ai-omatic in flavor, of all the many 
 good fruits of the tropics. 
 
 This remarkable fruit [Dinno zibethirius) grows upon a tall 
 forest tree, sixty to eighty feet in height, having a smooth, naked 
 trunk, and otherwise a general resemblance to our hickory. The 
 fi'uit is very much the same in size and shape as a pineapple, but 
 the entire outside is a bristling array oi dark-gi-een, conical spines, 
 three-fourths of an inch high and very sharp. Sometimes, how- 
 ever, the fruit is smaller, and quite round. It is a painful matter 
 to hold a diirian except by the stem, and I would about as soon have 
 a six-pound shot fall upon me as one of them. This wholly 
 abominable pod smells even more offensive than it looks, the odor 
 given off being like that of a barrel of onions at its most aggressive 
 stage. Many people are unable to eat durians at all, on this ac- 
 count, but my first one disappeared so suddenly as to greatly 
 astonish and amuse the spectators. 
 
 The fi'uit hangs upon the tree until it ripens and falls of its 
 own accord, and then the husk is pulled open veiy easily fi-om the 
 blossom end toward the stem, which discloses five longitudinal 
 compai'tments or cells, in each of which is a row of large chestnut- 
 shaped seeds, about five in each shell, each of which is thickly 
 coated with a soft, grayish, pulpy mass, which is the edible portion. 
 In consistency it resembles flour paste, but in flavor it resembles 
 nothing under the sun. There are, indeed, faint suggestions of 
 black walnuts and rich cream, chocolate and sugar, but all these 
 
A JACOo:-: HOUSii. 
 
 {From Autliur''^ sketch.) 
 
HUIJ^TING IN THE INTERIOR OF SELAXGOEE. 319 
 
 are lost in the flavor peciiliar to the fruit itself, indescribable both 
 iu deHcacy and richness. If there are no durians in heaven it vdU 
 be the fault of the husk, not the kernel. 
 
 The Malays had built a lofty platform of poles to which they 
 could retreat from wild beasts, and also sleep upon at night, and as 
 fast as the durians fell they gathered them. They sold them on 
 the ground, seventeen for a dollar, at which price I invested a dol- 
 lar forthwith. No Anglo-Indian is half as fond of " brandy-aud- 
 soda " as I am of fniit, and I am siu-e the number of durians ex- 
 ported that week must have fallen off considerably. 
 
 While hunting through the forest in search of wild cattle or 
 rhinoceros spoor we came upon the strangest human habitation I 
 ever beheld. It was a Jacoon house, if we may dignif}- such a 
 structure by that name, and the family was at home. The site had 
 been selected with reference to four small trees, which grew so as 
 to form the four comers of a squai*e about nine feet each way. 
 Twelve feet from the gi'ound four stout saplings had been lashed 
 to the trees to form the foundation of the house, and upon them 
 was lashed the flooring of small gi'een poles. Sis feet above it was 
 a roof of gi'een thatch, sloping shed-like fi'om front to back. There 
 were no walls whatever to this remarkable dwelling, which was 
 reached by means of a rude ladder. Upon this platform we found 
 three men, two women, a nursing baby, a miserable little dog, two 
 or three old parongs, some sumpitans and poisoned aiTows, and a 
 fire smouldering on a bed of earth at one corner. There were no 
 mats of any kind, and the people slept on the bare poles. The men 
 were naked, with the exception of a dii*ty loin-cloth, but the women 
 were satisfactoiily covered with mantles of ding;\' cotton cloth. 
 
 In physique, physiognomy and habits the Jacoons so closely re- 
 semble the forest people (Dyaks) of Borneo as to lead one to 
 believe they have descended, and that, too, by no very long line 
 of ancestiy, from some of the numerous sub-tribes now flourish- 
 ing in that gi'eat island. Judging from Mr. Bock's admu'a- 
 ble portraits and description of the Poonans, the Jacoons are as 
 much like them as it is possible for two separated tribes to be like 
 each other. The Poonans, like all the Dyaks, have progressed 
 thi'ough Borneo from south to north, and it is more likely that the 
 Jacoons are accidental, perhaps involuntary, emigrants from Bor- 
 neo than that the reverse has been the case. 
 
 The Jacoons are a very peaceable, almost timid, people, very 
 ignorantj and wholly averse to living in %illages, however small. 
 
320 TWO YEARS IN THE JUNGLE. 
 
 They are nowhere numerous, the total number in Selangore being 
 estimated at only seventy. They subsist wholly upon the fruit and 
 vegetable products of the jungle, and the game they kill with their 
 sumpitans, or blow-guns and poisoned arrows. Some of them are 
 said to be very expert in the use of this singular weapon. The 
 present Eajah Brooke states that he once saw a Jacoon drive an 
 arrow into a single crow-quill at a distance of fifteen yards ! We 
 learned accidentally, a few days later, that the Jacoons are very 
 fond of bats, and were stopping at that place in order to capture 
 them in some large caves near by. 
 
 They were very accommodating people, and our party held quite 
 an animated conversation with them upon the subject of wild game, 
 as they sat perched aloft and looking down upon us. Fortvmately 
 they knew the value of money, and we engaged two of the men to 
 act as our guides when we went in quest of wild cattle, rhinoceros, 
 and other animals. One of them came down forthwith and led us 
 a long tramp through the silent and gloomy forest for the remain- 
 der of the day, but we saw nothing worth shooting. Much to our 
 disappointment, the Jacoons said there were, at that time, no rhi- 
 nocerous in that region, but plenty of elephants. 
 
 The next morning about daybreak, as we were dozing comfort- 
 ably in our hammocks, our sleepy ears were suddenly saluted by a 
 clear, ringing note, like a blast of a hunter's horn, coming from the 
 thick jungle half a mile away. We were instantly galvanized into 
 action. 
 
 "Elephants!" we both exclaimed in the same breath, as we 
 sprang out of owe hammocks, and into our clothes. Never was a 
 reveille responded to with more alacrity. 
 
 We swallowed our coffee, albeit rather hastily, crammed down 
 a substantial breakfast, buckled on our himting-gear, and mustered 
 the men, who were ready as soon as we were. The Jacoons were 
 not there yet, but no matter ; I knew we could track up a herd 
 without them. Leaving orders for the Jacoons to track us up if 
 they came, and overtake us as soon as possible, we hurriedly set out. 
 
 To our surprise it took us nearly an hour to find the trail of the 
 herd, and even when we did it was apparently two to three hours 
 old. Evidently we had lost our bearings, to begin with. There 
 was nothing to do but follow up the spoor as we foimd it, so away 
 we went. Our whole party was there, except Mr. Syers' cook, 
 Cat's Face. 
 
 My weapon was a rather ancient Sneider rifle, and Syers was 
 
HUNTIKG IN THE INTERIOR OF SELANGORE. 321 
 
 armed with a double rifle carrying the same cartridge, good enough 
 for deer, but very light for elephants. 
 
 The trail led us through thick forest for a while, but very soon 
 entered a clearer tract and passed through the very grove of du- 
 rian trees we had visited the day before. Our Malay friends, the 
 durian gatherers, hailed our warHke appearance with dehght, and 
 gathered in an excited group around the ruins of their pole plat- 
 form, which the rascally elephants had torn down with their trunks 
 just before daybreak. They puUed it down as a sort of elephan- 
 tine joke on the Malays, just to show them they had not built 
 beyond their reach. The Malays, however, regarded it as any- 
 thing but a joke to be compelled to quit their platform, climb 
 up into the tree-tops and sit there for several hours in a badly 
 scared condition. No wonder they begged us to shoot all the 
 beasts, one by one, which we solemnly promised to do. 
 
 Within the next hour, the trail led us up and down through the 
 more open jungle, four times across the river, and for some dis- 
 tance along its pebbly banks. At one time, nearly an hour was 
 lost in trying to carry the trail across a stretch of hard, bare ground, 
 where it got inextricably mixed with a number of other trails made 
 by elephants which had fed about at random. Dispersing, we 
 searched carefuUy, scrutinizing every broken twig and blade of 
 grass in our effort to find the direction finally taken by the herd. 
 At last we found where our elephants had marched off into the 
 grassy jungle along an old trail for some distance. No wonder we 
 were at fault. 
 
 At this juncture up came the Jacoons. " You vagabonds," ex- 
 claimed Mr. Syers in Malay, " why didn't you come up an hour ago 
 and save us all this trouble ? " 
 
 " The white gentlemen walked so fast we thought we would 
 never come up with them," they answered very frankly. 
 
 The trail then led straight away for a tract of low, swampy for- 
 est, and the character of the jungle changed entirely. Near the 
 edge of the swamp huge, spreading clumps of thorny pahns grew 
 in great abundance, and rendered our progress difficult and pain- 
 ful Strangely enough, however, the farther we got into the 
 swamp the thinner became the undergrowth, until presently it 
 almost entirely disappeared, and in its stead we found iiprooted 
 trees, decayed tree-trunks, dead branches, and gnarled surface-roots. 
 The trail had disappeared entirely under a foot of water, save when 
 it crossed a bit of dry ground. We were wading along in water 
 31 
 
'S22 TWO YEARS IN THE JUNGLE. 
 
 half way to our knees, with slow and tiresome progress, when sud- 
 denly the old Jacoon ahead of us stopped, and with his parong 
 pointed through the forest. 
 
 " There they are, boys ! " exclaimed Syers, in an excited whisper. 
 
 A hundred yards away across the tangle of fallen trees and dead 
 branches we plainly saw the massive dark-gray forms of nine wild 
 elephants. They were standing in the water, leisurely browsing 
 upon the juicy aquatic plants that grew here and there, and wholly 
 unconscious of our presence. It was a fearful place for an attack, 
 either upon them or by them. Greatly to our amusement our 
 brave Jacoons immediately swarmed up the nearest saplings, and 
 the other members of the party fell back in good order and con- 
 cealed themselves. 
 
 As the reader is possibly aware, I had had trouble with ele- 
 phants before, but this was my friend Syers' first experience with 
 such colossal game. Like a true sportsman and green hand at 
 elephants, he was for attacking the herd instantly, before it took 
 alarm and ran away, and I had great difficvdty in even partially re- 
 straining him. 
 
 We quickly looked the herd over and saw that the only tusker 
 in it was a rather small one, with short tusks, but fortunately he 
 was the one nearest us. It seemed Hke an utter impossibihty to 
 get near enough for a svire shot througli that open swamp ; but, se- 
 lecting our line of attack, and keeping carefully behind the tree- 
 trunks as long as possible, we crouched low and stole forward. In 
 spite of our caution, a stick would snap every now and then, and 
 our feet make a noisy disturbance in the water. IVIr. Syers, who was 
 eager and excited, took the lead, altogether too rapidly I thought, 
 and I followed, almost upon his heels. 
 
 At last we reached a large tree at the foot of which was a bit of 
 bare ground. Syers stepped up on it and cocked both barrels of 
 his rifle. The elephant was in clear view forty yards away, but his 
 hind quarters were toward us and his head was hidden by the root 
 of an upturned tree. Syers threw his rifle up to his cheek with a 
 look that meant business, and was glancing along the barrels for a 
 shot, when I gave him a dig in the ribs and hurriedly whispered : 
 
 " Confound it, man, don't fire yet ! " 
 
 " Why, I can hit him here well enough," he protested, in an 
 excited whisper. 
 
 " But you couldn't possibly kill him. We must get up to that 
 root close by his head before we fire." 
 
HUNTING IX THE INTERIOR OF SELANGORE. 323 
 
 I hardly knew whether to be vexed or amused at my good 
 friend's impetuosity, for I felt that as an old elephant hunter of 
 four months' standing (and nmning also !) he should have allowed 
 me to lead the attack. I shall always regard it as a hunter's mira- 
 cle that we succeeded in approaching that animal when making so 
 much noise and going ahead so precipitately in open cover. 
 
 With every nerve strained to highest tension, we crept out 
 recklessly toward the upturned root, crouching almost into the 
 water, and after a few moments of breathless anxiety we reached it 
 and were within twelve paces of our elephant. I was totally sur- 
 prised at his not seeing, hearing, nor scenting us. He was utterly 
 unconscious of our presence until we both stepped from our cover, 
 aimed quickly at his temple and fired together. 
 
 The great beast gave a tremendous start as the bullets crashed 
 into his skull, threw his trunk aloft with a thrilling scream and 
 wheeled toward us. 
 
 Before he had time to make a single step forward we aimed for 
 the fatal spot over the eye and fired again. Down sank the pon- 
 derous head, the legs gave way, and the huge beast settled down 
 where he stood and rested in the mud, back uppermost, with his 
 feet doubled under him. 
 
 We instantly reloaded and came to a "ready," just as the tough 
 old pachyderm began to slightly recover and struggle to regain his 
 feet. Choosing our positions this time, a couple of shots behind 
 the ear penetrated his brain and settled matters. With a convul- 
 sive shudder and a deep groan the great creature slowly sank 
 back upon the gi'ound, moved his trunk feebly a few moments, 
 fetched a deep sigh and expired. 
 
 Of course all the other elephants had bolted at the first alarm, 
 and were by that time far away. Our followers came running up, 
 grinning from ear to ear at our success, and when they surrounded 
 the fallen giant their exclamations of astonishment were loud and 
 fervent. We could not measure our game, but according to the 
 circumference of his fore foot, and his general appearance, he was 
 about eight feet in height at the shoulders. His back was thickly 
 encrusted all over with a half -inch coating of dried mud, the wise 
 provision of a sagacious animal against the attacks of the swarm of 
 huge gad-flies which buzzed about him. They bit the blood out 
 of us more than once, and annoyed us exceedingly while we were 
 at work on the dead elephant. 
 
 In a pouring rain, we cut off his head and took his skull, cervi- 
 
324 T"\VO YEARS IN THE JUNGLE. 
 
 cal vertebrae, and feet — quite enough of that sort of thing in that 
 pestilential swamp. We carried home all except the skull, -which 
 we left to be brought out the next day by a party of Mala3's. 
 
 We reached home thoroughly tii'ed, hungry, and bedraggled, 
 but Jules Mumm and Cat's Face came to oiu' rescue, and as Syers 
 and I sat on the slatted floor and banqueted from the top of our 
 camp chest we ran the chase all over again. 
 
 The next day the elephant's skull was carried out of the jungle, 
 and I stayed at home to clean it carefully with knife and scraper, 
 while ]\Ii*. Syers went off on an tmsuccessfvil hunt after wild cattle. 
 
 The day following that we had another go at elephants. We 
 overtook a herd, and attacked it in thick cover, bareheaded, in a 
 pouring rain which half blinded us. The only tusker in the herd 
 was small and young, and I was for letting him go, but my eager 
 companion insisted that elephants were a nuisance in Selangore, 
 and ought to be killed off for that reason if no other. We fii-ed at 
 the young tusker, but failed to biing him down, and the herd made 
 off vei-y dehberately. They thought our firing was thunder, or at 
 least a pai't of the storm. I was willing to let them go, but Syers 
 voted to follow them up, so I assented with eveiy appearance of 
 satisfaction. For three mortal hoiu-s we went at oui* best speed 
 along that trail, thi'ough mud and water a foot deep, thi'ough bog 
 and brake, over fallen trees, and through thickets of thorny palms, 
 until finally, when quite tii*ed out, we came up to the elephants in 
 the densest of cover. 
 
 As we were advancing promptly to the attack, across a bit of 
 open ground with the herd on our left, we heard a sudden crashing 
 in the bushes on our right, and in another instant saw a young 
 seven-foot elephant coming full tilt, straight towai'd us, and not 
 twenty yards away. I thought, "Merciful heavens! The beast is 
 charging us ! " and we instantly thi-ew up oiir guns to fii-e. I took 
 a quick aim at his forehead, and was in the act of pressing the 
 ti-igger, when the elephant, then mthin twenty feet of us, suddenly 
 sheered off at a right angle to his foi-mer com-se, and faii-ly humped 
 himself to get safely away. He went at a splendid gait, dii-ectly 
 away from us. 
 
 "All right, my young friend, its a bai'gain ! " thought I, thank- 
 fully. " You let me alone and 111 do the same by " bang ! went 
 
 Syers' lifle, vn.th an infernal roar just beside my ear, aimed at the 
 fast retreating elephant. Had he shot him in the hind quarter ? 
 The animal gave a shrill little scream, humped his back still higher, 
 
HUNTING IN THE INTERIOR OF SELANGORE. 325 
 
 pulled his throttle wide open, and rushed off through the jungle 
 like a runaway locomotive. 
 
 I turned to Syers in astonishment. 
 
 " What on earth did you shoot for, and where did you hit him ? " 
 
 " Why, confound it, I thought he was going to rim over us, and 
 he scared me so I put a ball through the butt of his ear to pay 
 him off." 
 
 I enjoyed a good laugh at my vindictive friend's expense, in 
 which he joined very heartily, for I certainly never saw a more ab- 
 surd performance in the hunting field. The idea of his firing a 
 ball at that little elephant, who was already doing his best to get 
 away from us, was comical, to say the least, and the joke lasted 
 many a day. 
 
 On the way home we made a very interesting discovery, quite 
 by accident. We fell in with an old Malay and some Jacoons, 
 who walked along with us for some distance. As we were going 
 through the forest, a short distance from the foot of a gray lime- 
 stone cliff about two hundred feet high, covered on the top with 
 forest, we noticed in the air a very curious, pungent odor, like 
 guano, the cause of which we could not divine. Mr. Syers turned 
 to the old Malay, who was familiar with the neighborhood, and in- 
 quired : 
 
 " What is it that stinks so ? " 
 
 " Bats' dung, sir." 
 
 " Bats' dung ! Where is it ? " 
 
 " In the cave yonder in the rocks, sir." 
 
 " Why did you not tell us of it the other time we were here, old 
 simpleton ? " 
 
 "I didn't know you wanted to know about it, sir," said the old 
 fellow, innocently. 
 
 We turned about directly and made for the cliff, under the old 
 man's guidance. The cave was soon reached. We cUmbed up 
 forty feet or so over a huge pile of angular rocks that had fallen 
 from the face of the chff, and on going down a sharp incline found 
 ourselves underneath a huge mass of bare limestone rock, leaning 
 at an angle of forty-five degrees against the side of the cliff, form- 
 ing a cavernous arch, open at both ends and a hundred feet high. 
 It was hung with smooth, dull-gray stalactites, which, when broken 
 off, showed such a clean white limestone formation that it might 
 almost be called marble. 
 
 From near the bottom of this curiously formed arch a wide 
 
326 TWO YEARS IN THE JUNGLE. 
 
 opening led into the cave proper. "We procured a torch of drj 
 bamboo and entered forthmth. This cave, which it seems is called 
 Gua Belah, or the Double Cave, is about sixty feet wide, a hundred 
 and fifty feet long, to where it terminates in a narrow cleft in the 
 rock, and about forty feet high at the highest point. The ground 
 plan of the cavern is therefore an isosceles triangle. The walls 
 were smooth, of a light-gi-ay color, and without stalactites. The 
 floor was covered to an unknown depth with a layer of loose and 
 dry bat guano, which gave off the odor we had noticed half a mile 
 away. 
 
 The cave was full of bats {Eonycteris spiUa) which left their 
 resting places on the walls as we entered, and flew round and round 
 above us in a roaring swarm, at times coming within a foot of our 
 faces. Our footsteps fell noiselessly on the soft and spongy bed of 
 guano, and had we been provided with sticks we could have easily 
 knocked many bats from the walls. There must have been two 
 thousand of them there. In the outer cavern we easily shot a num- 
 ber of specimens as they clung to the rocks high above us. 
 
 Not far from that cave was another in the same mountain, 
 which we visited on the following day. The mouth was simply a 
 hole in the base of the rocky wall, leading straight into a low, but 
 very extensive, cavern, which must have been an acre and a half in 
 extent. The low roof reminded me of a mine, and the numerous 
 galleries and narrow passages leading oft' on either side rather 
 heightened the resemblance. In the Hght of our torches the roof 
 was yellowish-white and very clean looking, generally smooth, and 
 without stalactites. The floor also was bare rock. 
 
 We found the mouth of the cave entirely stopped with branches 
 — excepting one opening about a foot square — and were informed 
 that, after thus blocking the mouth, the Jacoons send two or three 
 men inside to scare the bats out so they can be knocked down by 
 the sticks of those who stand outside at the opening. We tried 
 the same dodge in order to get a few more perfect specimens, and 
 easily secured five by this knock-do^\^l process. The scheme is so 
 easy to work, however, and so successful that the Jacoons have al- 
 most entirely depopulated the cave of its winged inhabitants. 
 
 After leaving this cave, which is called " Gua Lada," or Chilli 
 Cave, we were conducted thi-ough a mile of very wet jimgle to a 
 third cave, called " Gua Lambong," which is really a very fine cav- 
 ern. At the mouth there is a perfect little vestibule scooped out 
 of the solid rock by the hand of natui'e for the express accommoda- 
 
HUNTING IN THE INTERIOR OF SELANGORE. 
 
 327 
 
 tion of the party who will keep a stand there for the sale of refresh- 
 ments, photographs, and torches to the tourists who will visit the 
 cave during the next century. 
 
 On entering the cave at the yawning black hole, we found our- 
 selves in a grand cathedral, whose floor, walls, and roof were of 
 smooth white limestone rock. Descending for a few yards from 
 the mouth we came to a clear stream of water rippling across the 
 rocky floor and seeking an exit near the mouth. Crossing this, we 
 
 walked forward along a grand gallery, with clean and level floor, 
 perpendicular walls and gothic roof, like the nave of a cathedral, 
 fifty feet wide and sixty feet high. At the farther end of the gal- 
 lery — which was by oiu' estimate about three hundred feet in length 
 — the roof suddenly rose in a great round dome ninety or a hun- 
 dred feet in height, completing so perfectly the resemblance of St. 
 Peter's, at Kome, that had I the privilege of naming the cavern I 
 could call it nothing else than Cathedral Cave. The accompanying 
 diagram represents a vertical section, as nearly as could be ob- 
 tained without measurements. 
 
 We stood for some time gazing in silence about us, quite awed 
 by the grandeur of the natural rock-temple we had discovered. 
 
 Remembering the Baptistiy at Pisa, and, recalling its beautiful 
 echo, I sang out clear and strong, 
 
 ^ 
 
 I 
 
 Sol mi do. 
 
 The echo of the three notes mingled directly in a beautiful chord, 
 wonderfully prolonged, like the sound of three voices winging their 
 way upward until they were lost in the distance. The illusion was 
 
328 TWO YEARS IN THE JUNGLE. 
 
 perfect and the effect of the echo highly weird and impressive. It 
 seemed fully a quarter of a minute that the echo reverberated in 
 the top of that rocky dome. As a further experiment, Mr. Syers 
 discharged his rifle, and the report sounded like a deep boom of 
 thunder, prolonged and rolhng, echoing in the dome and at the 
 farther end of the long gallery with a long-continued roar. 
 
 Under the dome the floor began to rise as we progressed, and 
 sloped up all the rest jof the way to where the cavern terminated 
 in a narrow cleft. This portion of the floor was covered with a 
 thick deposit of bat gviano, loose and dry, but there were very few 
 bats in the cave. 
 
 All these caves are about three miles east of Batu, and nine 
 from Kwala Lumpor, in a northerly direction. The whole hill is a 
 soUd mass of white crystalline limestone, and its greatest height is 
 about three hundi'ed feet. Besides catching bats in the caves, the 
 Jacoons say that they often retreat to them for safety at certain sea- 
 sons when the woods are overrun by wild elephants and other dan- 
 gerous animals. 
 
 We made several other hunting excursions in different direc- 
 tions from Batu, always under good guidance, but, although we 
 often saw the tracks of wild cattle, we were never fortunate enough 
 to fall in with the animals themselves. The inevitable krah monkey 
 (Macacus cynomolgus) was often seen anvi sometimes shot. 
 
 Squirrels were plentiful, and besides two other species {Sciu7'us 
 ephippium and bicolor) we shot several specimens of the beautiful 
 black and white Sciurus Rafflesi. 
 
 The Malays and Jacoons brought us many specimens of the 
 pretty little mouse-deer {Tragulus napu and kanchil), several small 
 Felinte [Felis marmor-ata and Bengalensis), and two species of civet cat 
 ( Viverra), all of which they caught in traps for our especial benefit. 
 We collected a few bright birds also, and one rhinoceros hornbill. 
 
 Having spent a week at Batu with both pleasure and profit, we 
 sent our elephant bones, rock specimens from the caves and other 
 dead weight down to Klang by the river, while we packed up and re- 
 tui-ned to Kwala Lumpor. On the ride back Mr. Syers' pony went 
 down when at full gallop and gave him a terrible fall, which, but for 
 the protection of his thick pith helmet, might have resulted very seri- 
 ously. It would have sent almost any other man to bed for a week, 
 but my plucky friend insisted on his ability to carry out the pro- 
 gramme, and would scarcely let me rub him with my favorite 
 remedy. 
 
HUNTING IN THE INTEEIOR OF SELANQORE. 329 
 
 On reaching Kwala he took me off four miles south to see a 
 number of tin mines. The road was good all the way, and lay 
 through open uplands of dark alluvial soil. We passed several fine 
 fields of sugar-cane, two of tobacco, and my guide pointed out sev- 
 eral coffee bushes hanging full of berries. There were houses and 
 huts of both Malays and Chinese scattered along the road, and the 
 two could always be distinguished at a glance. Those of the Chi- 
 nese were always in good repair, and surrounded by flourishing and 
 beautifully-kept vegetable gardens of one to two acres in extent. 
 The houses of the Malays were always in bad repair, and their gar- 
 dens, when they had any, were neglected and weedy. Every China- 
 man we met or saw was carrying something, or else at work in his 
 garden. Every Malay was either strolling along empty-handed, or 
 else loafing in the door of his hut. If Selangore were my territory I 
 would give it to the Chinese. Before returning, however, we were 
 astonished beyond measure at seeing two Malays actually at work 
 in a garden, and we stopped and gazed at them in incredulous 
 amazement. 
 
 The first tin mine is about four miles from Kwala, situated in 
 the middle of a "flat," near the foot of a range of hills. 
 
 The tin is found in the form of dark-colored sand or fine gravel 
 about fifteen feet below the surface, and is reached by simply re- 
 moving all the over-lying strata of soil, clay, and gravel. The tin 
 lay in a bed, like a vein of coal, about two feet in thickness. The 
 water which runs into the excavation is pumped out by an overshot 
 water-wheel and an endless chain, a very ingenious contrivance 
 which I cannot take time to describe. In the smelting-shed near 
 by the tin is simply melted out and run into ingots of a size and 
 shape convenient to handle. 
 
 On reaching Kwala again we found the " Captain Cheena " at 
 home, and he sat us down to a superb dinner, consisting of soup, 
 fish, roast capon, roast duck, green peas, potatoes, cucumbers, pork 
 chops, curry and rice, a monster tart, mangosteens, durians, ba- 
 nanas and champagne. The captain does not speak English, so I 
 lost the benefit of a conversation with him. 
 
 The next day we returned to Klang, and after a day's rest I be- 
 gan to get ready to " move on." 
 
 We were again entertained at dinner by Captain and Mrs. 
 Douglas at the Residency, and spent a most enjoyable evening. 
 Although the country is perfectly tranquil, the Malays are a trifle 
 uncertain and the Chinese also, as the murder of Europeans not 
 
?J30 TWO YEARS IN THE JUNGLE. 
 
 long since in Perak, and later at the Bindings, has rendered pain* 
 fully evident. A body guard of six stalwart policemen from Mr. 
 Syers' force watches over the Eesidency night and day, so that 
 there is little to fear from foes without. Captain Douglas has en- 
 tered, heart and soul, into the development of the territory of 
 which he is virtually the governor ; and it is gratifying to see such 
 a promising country in such good hands. Under the control of 
 the shiftless Malays its resources would never have been developed. 
 
 It takes the British Government to rule such places and make 
 them habitable for producers, and worth something to the world. 
 
 Nominally, the old Sultan of Selangore is stiU a sultan, and 
 ruler of the country, but actually he is a mere figure-head, Hving 
 off in a corner at Selangore, and quietly enjoying the royalty of 
 $2,000 per month, which is paid him out of the revenues of the 
 country which he is not competent to govern and develop. His 
 son, the heir apparent to the figure-headship, has a much larger 
 harem than his sultanic papa, and also some notions of his own 
 about government, which may result in giving the country a back- 
 set if he ever acquires the power to put them in force. 
 
 The Territory of Selangore has a coast line of one hundred and 
 twenty miles, and it extends into the interior about fifty miles, 
 where it joins Pahang, another territory of the same political com- 
 plexion. Its population in 1880 was fifteen thousand. The chief 
 productions of the country are tin, gutta, rattans, rice, gambier 
 (pepper), and tobacco. The principal industries are tin-mining, 
 gardening, and gambhng. The average monthly production of tin 
 is six hundred bharas, or two hundred and forty thousand pounds. 
 The soil of the interior is certainly very rich, and I should think 
 could be made to produce sugar-cane, tobacco, and perhaps coffee 
 also, with great profit. 
 
 As a sort of parting send-off, we were dined the last evening of 
 our stay by Mr. Turney, Treasurer of Selangore and his estimable 
 lady. This is what the Klang people mean by being " civil " to 
 strangers. Healthy civiUty surely, but the odds are every time in 
 favor of the stranger. 
 
 Almost my only disappointment in Selangore was that, from first 
 to last, we found no snakes in the jungle. I fondly hoped to meet 
 a python in his native wilds and see what he would do, or at least 
 an Ophiophagus elaps — snake-eating cobra — but neither did we see. 
 My imagination had pictured the forests of the East Indies as pro- 
 ducing a big snake for every square mile, but they are almost aa 
 
HUNTING IN THE INTERIOR OF SELANGORE. 331 
 
 scarce as snakes in Ireland. In all my jungle wanderings in the 
 far east I did not encounter a snake four feet long, although I 
 looked for them very hopefully. It was disgusting after all the 
 big snake stories I had heard. The only snake I saw in Selangore 
 was a vicious httle viperine affair, eight inches long, which I killed 
 with a prayer-book in Captain Douglas' drawing room at the Resi- 
 dency, while kneeling at prayers one Sunday evening. He came 
 wriggling toward me across the matting, and I took him in. Just 
 before my visit Mr. Syers killed three cobras in his house in the fort, 
 which had taken up quarters under the floor. Fortunately I am 
 not at all nervous, and this discovery did not disturb my slumbers 
 in the least. 
 
 On the last day of my stay, an old Malay came into the fort 
 dragging the headless body of a python which measured twelve 
 feet six inches. He was walking through the jungle, and in pass- 
 ing by a hollow tree, the snake thrust its head out of a hole near 
 the bottom. He whipped out his parong and very neatly decapi- 
 tated the reptile at a single blow. I bought the body and sent him 
 back for the head, which he presently produced, and at the last 
 moment we removed the skin and preserved it for mounting. The 
 jungle had relented and given me a snake after all. 
 
 A few months later I saw in Singapore a fine living Ophiophagus 
 elaps, about seven feet long, which Captain Douglas had sent down 
 to the Museum — the third specimen of that species he had secured. 
 
 When the time came for me to leave Klang I was in no way 
 thankful to go. My visit had been so pleasant that I was really 
 sorry that I could not stay longer. My collection made a very sat- 
 isfactory showing for six weeks* work, and Mr. Syers' hearty hospi- 
 tality had made the place seem like a home. He himself was the 
 most interesting specimen I found in this territoiy, and as a char- 
 acter study he was " immense." In point of modest reminiscence 
 of "dangers he had passed, and moving accidents by flood and 
 field," he was another Othello, a fit type for the hero of a stalwart 
 romance. 
 
 But my time came, and I had to leave his rambling, roomy, and 
 cool bungalow in the fort ; the Malay bugler who used to practise 
 the " Dead March in Saul" every morning ; the drills and parades ; 
 and the jolly friend who entertained me so patiently to the last. 
 At parting, he gave me a Malay kris, and a " pig-tail " which he cut 
 from the head of a Chinese murderer just before hanging him, as 
 souvenirs of the visit. 
 
332 TWO YEAKS IN THE JUNGLE. 
 
 Three days later I reached Singapore once more, and prepared 
 to depart for Borneo. 
 
 At this point I desire to mention the kindness of Mr. Robert 
 Campbell, now, alas ! numbered with the silent majority, who was 
 my good genius all the time I remained within his reach. I was a 
 total stranger to him until a London firm placed a sum of money 
 to my credit with the firm of Messrs. Martin, Dyce & Co., of which 
 he was the head. When the time came for me to start to Borneo 
 the balance remaining to my credit was not at all sufficient for the 
 trip, and my good friend insisted upon advancing all that I needed. 
 From that time until I started home I spent my funds faster than 
 they came, and every time I became embarrassed Mr. Campbell 
 generously came to my relief. But for his self-forgetful generosity 
 I should more than once have foimd myself in most unpleasant 
 straits, due, I admit, to my own fault in disregarding Professor 
 Ward's instructions, and going ahead full speed with my work in- 
 stead of resting and waiting for funds. All thanks to Eobert 
 Campbell, and the firm of Martin, Dyce & Co. Thank heaven that 
 my faith in hiunanity is so often and so handsomely justified ! 
 
 But it passes my understanding how any stranger, who under 
 such circumstances is trusted without any security, can be so un- 
 speakably contemptible as to defraud his benefactors, as I have 
 known some to do. 
 
PART lY.— BORNEO. 
 
 CHAPTER XXVIII. 
 
 SARAWAK, PAST AND PRESENT. 
 
 Geographical Position and Area of Borneo. — Explorations. — From Singapore 
 to Sarawak. — The Finest City in Borneo. -^Historical Sketch of Sarawak 
 Territory. — Sir James Brooke. — Anarchy and Oppression. — Cession of the 
 Territory. — Order out of Chaos. — Evolution of a Model Government. — A 
 Wise and Good Rajah. — Justice in Sarawak and the United States. — 
 Present Prosperity. — A Lesson for Political Economists. 
 
 Theee hundred miles east of Singapore, directly under the equator, 
 lies a vast island clad from centre to circumference with a wonder- 
 ful and luxuriant growth of unbroken forest, and peopled with the 
 strangest men and beasts to be found in all the East Indies. 
 
 Rich in both vegetable and mineral products, teeming with 
 animal life, and filled with both social and scientific problems, 
 Borneo is a most inviting field, interesting alike to the naturalist, 
 the anthropologist, and the student of political economy. In time, 
 also, when its vast agricultural resources are properly developed, 
 it will offer a chance for life, Hberty, and happiness to the over- 
 crowded millions of China, Hindostan, and even Europe. 
 
 With an area of one hundred and ninety thousand square miles, 
 and a coast line of over three thousand miles, Borneo is the second 
 largest island in the world. When we look at its proportions on a 
 map which compresses the whole of Asia or Australasia into the 
 Umits of a single atlas page, we fail to realize its actual immensity. 
 The whole of New England, the Middle States, and Maryland 
 could be set down in the forest which covers Borneo, and still be 
 surrounded by a wide belt of jungle. The length of the island is 
 eight hundred and fifty miles, and its greatest width six hundred 
 and twenty-five. 
 
334 TWO YEARS IN THE JUNGLE. 
 
 Politically, the island is divided into the Dutch Territory, which 
 embraces the whole southern, centi-al, and western pai-ts of the is- 
 land, fully one-half its entire area ; the Territory of Sarawak on 
 the north coast, ruled by an English rajah ; the sultanate of Bru- 
 nei, or Borneo Proper, northeast of Sarawak ; and beyond that a 
 fine tract of territory, now called Sabah, almost as lai-ge as Sara- 
 wak, which has had the good fortune to pass from the protection 
 of the sultan of Sulu into the hands of a new mercantile organiza- 
 tion called the British North Borneo Company. This territory has 
 the Kimanis River (between Gaya Bay and Labuan Island) for its 
 western boimdary, and the Sibuco Eiver on the east coast, for its 
 southern boundary. Its area is between twenty and twenty-five 
 thousand square miles. Its five hvmdred miles of coast line iuclvide a 
 great many finely sheltered bays and harbors, and its interior has not 
 only a number of large rivers, but, also, the highest mountains in 
 Borneo, includmg Kina Balu. It is extremely gratifying that such 
 a naturally rich and promising country should have fallen into such 
 good hands as those of Sir Rutherford Alcock, and Messrs. Dent, 
 Martin, Read, and Mayne. Success and long Hfe to the British 
 North Borneo Company ! 
 
 South of Brunei Ues Kotei, a lai'ge triangular territoiy, ruled 
 by a Malay sultan, imder Dutch protection, but as independent of 
 the Dutch Government as Nicai-agua is of the United States, and 
 which should have boundaiies and a color of its own on every map. 
 Above Kotei lies another independent tenitoiy of similai* shape, 
 also vmder Dutch protection, but about as httle known as the Kina 
 Balu countiy which joins it on the north. 
 
 Even in this age of venturesome and persistent travellers, no 
 white man has crossed Borneo fi-om side to side, and its interior 
 remains in gi'eat measure a sealed book. No Eiu'opean has ever 
 succeeded in doing more than to ascend one river to near its 
 source, cross a nai-row water-shed and descend a contiguous stream 
 to the same coast from which he started. In this way Von Gafl5.-on 
 ascended the Barito and descended the Kapooas, Bock journeyed 
 up the Mahakkam and down the Baiito, and Wallace traversed the 
 Sadong and the Sarawak. An energetic Scotchman, prospecting 
 for diamonds, also crossed fi-om the Kapooas Eiver to the Sai-awak, 
 St. John thoroughly explored to their sources the Limbang and 
 Baram Rivers on the north coast, and both he and Hugh Low as- 
 cended the great mountain of Kina Balu, near the northeastern 
 extremity of the island. 
 
SARAWAK, PAST AISTD PRESENT. 335 
 
 Nothing could be more arduous and full of risk to life and limb 
 than overland travel in the interior of Borneo, where the traveller 
 is confronted by dense, dark forests and rugged mountains from 
 the beginning to the end of his journey. The interior is practi- 
 cally an uninhabited wilderness, destitute of nearly everything fit 
 for human food, and he who would explore it must carry on his 
 back, through forests and rivers, and over mountains, sufficient 
 food, clothing, and medicines, to last to the end of the journey. 
 The heart of Africa is not nearly so inaccessible as the heart of Bor- 
 neo. The difficulties of overland travel in the interior are almost 
 beyond belief. 
 
 Even in the extreme northeast, accessible from the coast on 
 three sides, there is said to be a gTeat lake and a mountain-peak 
 higher than Kina Balu, never yet visited by a white man, which 
 beckon to the explorer with whispered promises of undiscovered 
 wonders. From the remote interior of the island come wonderful 
 stories of a race of men with tails, with descriptions of their form 
 and habits, stories implicitly believed by many intelligent natives. 
 but which even the most skeptical white men are powerless to dis- 
 prove. 
 
 The dense ignorance which prevails in Singapore regarding 
 Borneo is quite phenomenal. Although so near and in regular 
 steam communication with the island, I found it utterly impossible 
 to obtain there any definite information regarding the distribution 
 or abundance of the orang-utan. At last, when on the point of buy- 
 ing a steamer ticket for the Dutch settlement at Pontianak, I was 
 introduced, quite by chance, to the late A. R. Haughton, Esq. — His 
 Highness' resident of the Eejang District, Sarawak — which piece 
 of good fortune led to an immediate and important change in my 
 plans. From this most agreeable and obliging official, who, from 
 his eighteen years of service in the Sarawak Government, was pre- 
 pared to answer any question regarding Northern Borneo, I learned 
 that the orang-utan had not yet been exterminated in the rajah's 
 territory, and that the valleys of the Sadong and Batang Lupar 
 Rivers abounded in animal life. I forthwith purchased a ticket for 
 Sarawak, and prepared to accompany my new friend, who was re- 
 turning from leave of absence to England to regain his shattered 
 health. 
 
 I often think how differently I might have fared in my visit to 
 Borneo had I not met Mr. Haughton at the critical moment 
 Thanks to his courtesy and friendly interest, my introduction to 
 
336 TWO TEARS IN THE JUKGLE 
 
 the island was a yery agreeable one ; and I shall always remembei 
 that but for him I should have gone further and fared worse, for 
 I learned later that Pontianak would not have been the place for 
 me. Since my return to America, the sad news has reached me 
 that my genial friend has gone forever from the land he helped to 
 govern both wisely and well. In his nineteenth year of service his 
 health failed utterly, and on the voyage home he died on the pas- 
 sage up the Eed Sea. The rajah lost a valuable officer and the 
 Dyaks a valuable and trusted friend. 
 
 The trim little steamer Rajah Brooke, belonging to the Honor- 
 able Borneo Company, makes tri-monthly trips between Singapore 
 and Sarawak (pronounced Sar-a/t-wok), caiTying to the latter Chi- 
 nese emigrants, cloth, brass, and ironware, crockery, opium, to- 
 bacco, sugar and manufactiu-ed sundries, and returning with sago, 
 flour, gutta-percha, dried fish, rattans, edible bird's nests, timber 
 and other jungle products, and also a very considerable quantity 
 of antimony and quicksUver from the mines of the Borneo Com- 
 pany. 
 
 On August 7th I embarked myself, a first-class Chinese servant 
 named Ah Kee, a half-caste Portuguese lad named Perara to assist 
 in hunting and preparing specimens, and a complete jungle outfit, 
 with provisions for three months. 
 
 At three o'clock we left the Singapore Broads, and, while at om* 
 six o'clock dinner, steamed out between Horsburgh Light and 
 Point Bomania, the extreme southeastern point of Asia, heading 
 " east-b'-north " for Sarawak. The day following was one of 
 smooth, uneventful sailing o'er a " sultry summer sea," with here 
 and there a pretty green islet in sight, but the cloudless sunrise of 
 the third day out found us running close along the coast of Bor- 
 neo. Cape Datu lay directly astern. Cape Sipang stood out di- 
 rectly ahead, while all along the south stretched the yellow, sandy 
 beach and evergTeen forest of my new land of promise. Borneo at 
 last, the land of apes and monkeys, the home of the orang-utan, 
 the country of the head-hunter, perhaps the sepulchre of the mys- 
 terious Missing Link ! 
 
 Far in the interior there loomed up the rugged masses and iso- 
 lated peaks of the Krumbang range, clad with tropical verdure, 
 looking dreamily blue and hazy in the distance. As we proceeded, 
 the view disclosed still more lofty and extensive ranges farther in- 
 land, until at last the whole interior seemed to be composed of 
 mountains only, between which and the sea there stretched a wide 
 
SARAWAK, PAST AND PEESENT. 337 
 
 expanse of level forest. A lofty, flat-topped mountain called Penris- 
 sen, elevation four thousand four hundred and fifty feet, lying di- 
 rectly south from Cape Sipang, was pointed out as the site which 
 had been selected by the Government of Sarawak for a sanitarium. 
 
 The Sarawak Eiver has two main entrances, one called the 
 Santubong, which forms a northwest pass, while the Moritabas is 
 the northeast pass. On the triangular island thus formed, Santu- 
 bong Peak rises grandly up, like a nearly perfect cone, to a height 
 of two thousand seven hundred and twelve feet, and forms a noble 
 landmark at the river's mouth, visible forty miles at sea. 
 
 The Santubong entrance is difficult and dangerous to navigate 
 on account of its sand banks and shoal water, and the Bajah Brooke 
 always acts on the principle that the longest way round is the 
 shortest way to Sarawak. We passed Cape Sipang and presently 
 rounded Po Point, upon which rocky promontory sits a dumpy Ht- 
 tle light-house. From the flag-staff floats the flag of His Highness, 
 the Kajah of Sarawak, a St. George's cross half black and haK red 
 on a yellow field. The face of Po Point is a smooth cliff of brown- 
 ish limestone, which shows pale yellow in places where masses of 
 rock have been freshly broken away by round shot from British 
 gunboats and men-of-war. These vessels are in the habit of using 
 the cliff as a target for cannon practice whenever opportunity affords. 
 
 At the mouth of the Moritabas entrance, the river is about three 
 hundred yards in width. The west bank rises in a considerable 
 hill, but the eastern shore is a level, alluvial plain of soft mud, 
 scarcely above tide level. At the foot of the hill is the village of 
 Santubong, inhabited by Malay fishermen. The tide is at the ebb 
 as we enter, and the smooth surface of the river is covered with 
 dead leaves and stems of the nipa palm, decayed logs, dry bamboo 
 stems, chimks of wood, sticks, leaves, and trash — in short, a level 
 plain of driftwood floating swiftly out to sea. We wondered which 
 of those logs would be the one to drift far out past Point Po, into 
 the great equatorial current of the East Indies corresponding to our 
 Gulf Stream, and be borne along on the bosom of the Black Eiver, 
 past Japan, until finally cast ashore on one of the Aleutian Islands 
 to serve some islander as firewood, or timber for a new harpoon 
 handle. The river needed skimming, badly, and like most equato- 
 rial streams, it needed straining and filtering also, for it was brown 
 and murky with decayed vegetation and vegetable mould. 
 
 The banks are covered with low mangToves and nipa palms 
 {Nipa fruticans) growing in the soft mud, the latter sending up 
 
338 TWO YEARS IN THE JUNGLE. 
 
 their tall, feathery leaves so thickly in places as to exclude tha 
 monotonous mangrove entirely. The nipa palm resembles a bunch 
 of cocoanut leaves growing stiffly up, and a cocoanut leaf looks like 
 a huge, uncurled ostrich plume dyed a deep green. 
 
 The scenery of the Sarawak Kiver below the capital is decidedly 
 monotonous, and uninteresting except for the distant mountains ; 
 but I venture to assert the same may be said of any equatorial river 
 for the first twenty miles up. The banks are of soft mud, the 
 jungle is low and swampy, and the trees are so small and strag- 
 gling that even the monkeys disdain to inhabit them. We must 
 get farther from the coast to find the grand forests which are fairly 
 alive with wonderful monkeys, and apes, deer, wild "pigs" (fancy 
 a " pig " standing thirty-seven inches high at the shoulders !), civet 
 cats, flying squirrels, hornbills, and argus pheasants. On the way 
 up the Sarawak we saw not a single monkey nor other mammal, and 
 only one or two stray birds. 
 
 We followed the tortuous windings of the river for nearly four- 
 teen miles before we came to any signs of civiHzation ; and, for a 
 time, we were in a quandary whether or not to class as such the first 
 Malay houses we saw. The Malay loves water like a duck, and, if 
 possible, he builds his house on piles over a running stream. Fail- 
 ing in that, he builds over stagnant water ; and, failing in that, he 
 builds over the softest mud he can find. ^ 
 
 He cannot build over the Sarawak Eiver suitably for various 
 reasons, so, leaving thousands of dry acres tenantless, he builds 
 over the soft mud on the river-bank. His boat-house is a pole 
 stuck in the mud, and his wharf is a slimy, slippery, slanting log, 
 reaching down from the top of the bank, across the mud, and into 
 the water indefinitely. K your Malay is really industrious and en- 
 terprising, he may even go so far as to cut a few rough notches 
 along the top of his landing-log ; but even then it is a difficult and 
 perilous feat for a booted European to make a landing just after 
 the tide has gone out and left a good thick deposit of sHppery mud 
 all along the top of the wharf. 
 
 As we neared the capital a lofty green peak seemed to rise 
 from just behind the town, but in reality it was several miles 
 beyond. It was Matang Peak, three thousand one hundred and 
 sixty-eight feet in height. We passed a number of Malay houses 
 and straggHng villages strung along the banks, passed a flourishing 
 pottery, a warehouse containing a million rattan canes, a number 
 of small boats and a few large ones, came to some airy European 
 
\ 
 
 
SARAWAK, PAST AND PEESENT. 339 
 
 houses, ronncled a little promontory and came in sight of the suow- 
 ■white walls and battlemented tower of the new prison. We passed 
 the point, the clean white " go-down " (business house) of the 
 Borneo Company, and next to it the long sheds in which the racing- 
 boats are housed from one New Year's Day to the next. Wherever 
 an Englishman goes he takes with him all his national institutions, 
 and from Nova Zembla to New Zealand, wherever two or three 
 Englishmen are gathered together, there will they have their an- 
 nual races and regatta ; their club, theatricals, and athletic sports ; 
 their Times, Punch, and Bass' pale ale. Forty-six hours from our 
 starting finds us at Sarawak, here known only as Kuching — the 
 Malay for " Cat " — sixteen miles from the sea and four hundred 
 and twenty miles from Singapore. 
 
 After the Borneo Company's " go-down " came the Chinese 
 bazaar, a long regular row of two-story Chinese shops built solidly 
 together, designed and executed in the most substantial style of 
 Chinese architecture. On the opposite side of the river, which is 
 here about one himdred and fifty yards wide, is the new fort perched 
 upon a hilltop, a substantial brick structure, rather better calculated 
 to withstand an attack than the flimsy wooden stockade which the 
 Chinese assaulted and carried so easily during their insurrection 
 in 1857. 
 
 Just above the fort, at the top of a grassy slope which sweeps 
 up from the riverside and overlooks the town, is the Astana, the 
 residence of His Highness the Eajah, the palace, in fact. It is really 
 three complete houses such as Europeans build in the Straits Set- 
 tlements, differing from the regular Indian bungalow in being 
 much higher and possessing two stories instead of one. The base- 
 ment floor contains the dining-room, billiard and store rooms, 
 while the more spacious upper floor, being well above the mala- 
 rious dampness of the earth, contains the drawing-room, library 
 and sleeping apartments. Along the entire front of the main 
 building runs a cool and roomy verandah, furnished with tables, 
 easy chairs, and newspapers. Long strips of striped black and 
 white matting hang between the pillars which support the roof, 
 and, when let down at full length, they form for the verandah a 
 continuous ventilated screen to protect the interior from the dash- 
 ing of rain, the glare of the sun and the inquisitive gaze of the 
 passers-by. 
 
 An ancient-looking square tower with battlements forms the 
 entrance to the Astana, which, together with the coat of arms over 
 
.•vlO TWO YEAUSi TNT THK .irNlU.E. 
 
 the door aud the swarthy sentry in the doorway, gives to the edi- 
 tioe the air of a feudal castle. But it is a very modest residence 
 for a man who is absohite monarch over such a hirge tordtory, and 
 who. wore he avaricioxisly disposed. cou\d phmdcr liis subjtH'ts suf- 
 ticiently to enabU> him to mtiintain Ins position in truly regal style. 
 
 The river is well tilled with craft, including decent schooners 
 of modei-n type, Malay tmding praus, INIalay and Dyak "sampans" 
 — every snnill canoe is a " sampan " in IMalayana —Chinese junks, 
 clumsy coasting vessels, a number of large sailing ships, and the 
 steam vessels Aline and Fiix/ly of H. H.'s Navy. 
 
 As soon as we touched the wharf, n\y fellow-passt^nger was sur- 
 iv)undcd by a crowd of gt>od-hH>king young .Englishmen, in I'orded 
 white luiiform coats and cork helmets, who welcomed him back 
 with enthusiasm. Meanwhile, I was busy with my two servants, 
 and ill a very sliort time we hired a cm't and loaded it with the 
 boxes, bags, and parcels I'ontaiuing our jungle outtit. which in- 
 cluded canned provisions, kitchenware, guns, ammunition in great 
 vaiiety, preservatives, tools, alcohol cans, bedding, clothing, and 
 books, and — last but not least — two bags of Spanish dollai-s. 
 
 AVe took our way up a broad street which leads from the 
 handsome new jail, passed the south side of the bazaar, the court- 
 house and public offices in the centre of a squai-e, the hospital, the 
 government dispensary, the library, Europeaji residences in plenty, 
 and at last came to the hotel of the place, the Eajah's Arms. Just 
 above this hotel, on a pretty knoll, stands the handsome residence 
 and grounds of the Kesident of Sai-avN-ak proper, an oifioe tilled at 
 that time by Mr. William M. Crocker. 
 
 In front of the court-house I m^ticed nearly a dozen extremely 
 long and widt>-mouthed brass cannons, all of small calibre, however, 
 but each liad a history. Some had been taken fi-om pirates, othera 
 from the stockades of rebellious rajsdis in early days, while others 
 i-epresented tines imposed by the government ai\d paid by native 
 chiefs who had violated the laws. It soiuuls oddly enough to be 
 told that "Nipah Tuah, of Tatu, has confessed to having murdered 
 a Mukah Dyak, supposing him to be under arms against the gov- 
 ernmeut, aud had been lined six piculs " ^^about eight hundred 
 pounds of braiis guns) ! 
 
 A torn* of obsen-fition thi-ough the bazaai-s aud the town is full 
 of interest. One fii-st notices that the streets are scrupulously 
 clean, the drainage good, and that the to\ni has been laid out with 
 Evuvpetui ivgularity. There is nothing slip-sliod or loose-jointed 
 
SARAWAK, PAST AND TKESENT. 341 
 
 about Kuching. The principal business street is that facing the 
 river for about lialf a mile. The shops, which are kept almost ex- 
 clusively by Chinese and Klings (Hindoos), are filled with a moder- 
 ate assortment of European sundries, which include u gaudy array 
 of colored cotton cloth, cheap cutlery, fancy mirrors, tin boxes, 
 combs, glass beads, perfumery, belts, handkerchiefs, Malay caps, 
 tools of many kinds, thread, needles, buttons, brass wire, paddles, 
 spectacles, ammunition, etc. In the provision shops were the usual 
 food staples; and also quantities of alum, blue vitriol, washing- 
 soda, soap, indigo, and various kinds of roots, herbs and seeds " for 
 the healing of nations." 
 
 Fruits were abundant, but vegetables were scarce. I noticed 
 quantities of bananas, jak fruit, custard apples, watermelons and 
 dates ; also hundreds of fresh turtle eggs from an island near the 
 coast, and poultry in plenty, but in the fish market the supply of 
 fish was very scanty. 
 
 Unlike all the other cities and towns in Borneo, Sarawak is 
 high and dry, and quite substantially built. The houses are nearly 
 all of brick, neatly whitewashed, and those of the European resi- 
 dents are nearly always surrounded by spacious ornamental grounds 
 full of trees and flowering shrubs. The houses of the Malays line 
 the river-banks for a considerable distance both above and below 
 the bazaar, but there is not a Dyak residence in the place. They 
 prefer the freedom and seclusion of the jungles. 
 
 When we compare the present condition of Sarawak Territory 
 and its people with the state of affairs which existed prior to the 
 year 1841, we are lost in wonder at the mighty changes which have 
 been effected, and admiration for the agencies by which they have 
 Vjeen wrought. 
 
 In the year 1839, there landed at the town of Sarawak an Eng- 
 lish gentleman of fortune with a heart full of good-will to men, in 
 short, a real nobleman of the highest type our modern civilization 
 is capable of producing. He found the country in a state which 
 must have awakened sympathy in any but a heart of stone. As a 
 study in political economy it is interesting to note the principal 
 features of the condition of Sarawak then and now. 
 
 When James Brooke, Esq., arrived from England in bis little 
 vessel, the Royalist, he found the territory in an almost indescrib- 
 able state of anarchy, oppression, and murderous confusion. Form- 
 ing, as it did at that time, a part of the Kingdom of Borneo proper, 
 and under the dominion of the Malay Sultan of Brunei, Sarawak 
 
I>42 TWO YKAKS IN TllK ,lliN(n;H. 
 
 wat4 rnloil, or ratlior inisniltHl, bv <lio luijjili IMiulii ITussiin aiul 
 his priiuo uiiuistor. rjuij^onm IMakota. tho {^roatost villain who over 
 Avoro a saronj;'. Attacvliod to (hoso wortluos aiul their imtuodiato re- 
 latu>ns was :i swariu of roprobato IMalay noblos (?) ami lossor fol- 
 lowers, ii-prrsiMiting evGry iU\;>;iri> o( worthlessuess aiul protligacy, 
 most of whom lived solely by otVieially plnnilerim;' the people, and not, 
 a few by eovert. piraey. The l\vaks were the only prcnlueers, and, 
 as sudi, iho Mjvlays considered tliem tlieir lawful prey. Upon tliose 
 vretelied jnnglo-dwellei'is were practised every species of oppression, 
 extortion, and ojhmi robbery from the mt>st brutal to tlie most re- 
 tined. To prevent any attempt at a combined resistance, the various 
 tribes were encouraged to wage uuu'derous wars witli each othei", 
 which often led to the \itter (Extermination of whole villages at a 
 single blow. In this way the short-sighted ^Malays more tlian om'o 
 destroyed their (.>wn sources of revenue. Head-hunting was tho 
 chief busint >ss of life with tJie Dytiks ; and robbery was tJiat of tlie 
 Mahays 
 
 The degK >e of oppression patiently endured by the poor Dj'aks 
 is almost incre^lible. The Malays, from time inuuemorial. have 
 regarded them as their uatuitvl bondsmen, lieatlicus with no more 
 cltiinis to consideration than oxen, with no inalienable rights even 
 io life. Therefore, in the tlist place, they were taxed tirst by tho 
 local orticers on account c>f the rajah, an^l Ihen for the benetlt of 
 the t^iVu'cis themsclvos. The jungle proihice collected by tJie Dyaks 
 was monopoli.cd. i.r.. taken at a lixed price by the patingi, who 
 also claimed thcii- n\;its, boats, fowls, and fruit at his pleasure, and 
 had the power to claim their services at whatever price suited his 
 convenience. When the rajah t>r the patingi had received sill they 
 em*ed to extort, tlunr relatives Jiud inunediate followers claimed the 
 right of forcetl traile. and gradually this privilege was extended to 
 every Malay in the territory. 
 
 To the Dyaks this was a two-edged swoiil, which Tvas wielded 
 in a very simple manner. The Pangeran IVlakota^ for instiince. would 
 send io a Dyak village an invoice of rice, cloth, gongs, irirn, or Siilt 
 at a price from six io eight times their real value, and in payment 
 he would demai\d, at ont>-eighth of its value, any produce the Dyaks 
 possessed. The pivtits from these transivctions sometimes reached 
 !is hi;;'h as one thousand t\ve hundred per cent, of the anunu^t in- 
 vested. If the Dyak declared himself wholly without property, 
 starving', and unable to pay. the i"eply would be : " Then give me 
 your wife, or your child : " and there was generally sufficient power 
 
HARAWAK, PAST AND ritKHIONT. 343 
 
 behind ilio domand to enforce payment in Home ff)rm. If a whole 
 clan Htubhornly refused payment, it would bo threatened with 
 an attack from a more powerful hoHtile clan, and, in one way or 
 anotlier, the Malays managed to keep them in abject poverty. The 
 arcli-villain, Makota, used to assert that he liked to get even their 
 cooki)ig-potH from them. Not only were tlie Dyaks rolil^ed, but in 
 most inHi,am;eH th(!y were coinpcilled to (!arry to the Ijoats the very 
 plunder which had been taken from them. 
 
 If a Malay was ever injured in body or estate, and the injury, 
 however slight, could in any way be attributed to a Dyak, the latter 
 would bo lined heavily for " a fault." To seriously injure a Malay, 
 no matter how accidentally, was ruin to the Dyak. Matters finally 
 came to such a pass that the wretched aborigines abstained from 
 growing crops which only brought their opprosHors upon them, 
 and, in many instances, were able to live only l)y secreting food in 
 the jungles. Hundreds of women and children were seized and 
 kept as slaves, and scores of Dyak men became slave debtors. 
 SorifT Sahib and his brother, Boriff Muller, two atrocious pirate 
 chieftains, both of whom were incontinently thrashed and utterly 
 crushed by Captain Keppel and Rajah Brooke, were formerly in the 
 habit of sending armed parties to the Dyak settlements to bring 
 down all the young boys and girls they could catch. It is stated, 
 on good authority, that three hundred boys and girls have fre- 
 quently been captured at one time, and kept as slaves. 
 
 The Malay rulers not only permitted indiscriminate head-hunt- 
 ing and sanguinary warfare among the Dyak tribes, but openly 
 connived at it. It is hard to imagine a ruler giving a powerful 
 clan permission to attack and exterminate a weaker one, also his 
 own suVjjects, but this was often done. 
 
 As a consequence, the Dyaks could no longer live in clans, but 
 sought refuge in the mountains or the jungle, a few together ; and 
 one of them pathetically said : " We do not live like men ; we are 
 hke monkeys ; we are hunted from place to place ; we have no houses; 
 and when we light a fire we fear the smoke will draw our enemies 
 upon us." 
 
 All these miseries were inflicted upon a people naturally amiable 
 and peaceful, honest, of cheerful disposition, and almost childlike 
 simplicity of manner. The result can be readily imagined. In 
 two years' time, by reason of famine, sword, slavery, forced labor, 
 and sickness, the Dyak population of Sarawak proper was reduced 
 from 14,360 persons to 6,792, or less than one-half! Some clans 
 
344 TWO YEARS IN THE JUNGLE. 
 
 were reducecl from 330 families to 50 ; one of 100 families had lost 
 all its women and children ; another had been reduced from 120 
 famihes to 2 ; and two tribes had been utterly exterminated, or 
 driven from the territory. 
 
 Such was the condition of the people when, on September 24, 
 1841, the Territory of Sarawak proper was formally ceded to James 
 Brooke, and he became its ''rajah" ^^•ith the fullest powers. He 
 was the msin for the hour. His first official act was the release and 
 restoration to their families of over a hundi'ed married women and 
 girls who had been confined at the capital for a whole year by the 
 former rajah. Just previous to this formal cession of the territory, 
 there arrived at the capital, Kuching, a hundred war-boats manned 
 by two thousand five hundred blood-thirsty Dyaks, who came to ask 
 permission of Muda Hassim to attack a weaker tribe on the Sambas ! 
 But James Brooke was there, and the petition was urged in vdn. 
 
 For once it really seems that Pi-ovidence directly espoused the 
 cause of suftering humanity in sending a philanthropic statesman 
 to distressed Sju-awak. The diplomatic difficulties he encountered 
 would have hopelessly entangled a smdler mind or crushed a 
 weaker character. It is surprising that he was not assassinated by 
 Makota's followers during his first year of office. But out of re- 
 bellion and chaos he brought tranquillity and order. He ruled a 
 siiperior and an mferior race, masters and slaves, to the complete 
 satisfaction of both. With a judicial ^^-isdom imparalleled in the 
 history of nations, he formulated a code of laws and a system of 
 government which actually dispensed equal justice to all, in practice 
 as well as theory, and which was entirely satisfactory to Moham- 
 medsin Malays, and heathen Dyaks. 
 
 The present Territory of Sarawak is the fruit of Rajah Brooke's 
 policy, as inaug-urated by him and perpetuated by his successor. 
 From a territory of at first only 3,000 squtu-e miles, Sarawak has 
 been increased by concessions until its area is now 25,000 square 
 miles. The population of the capital has risen from 1,500 to 21,000, 
 while that of the whole territory is 225,000, of which there are of 
 Hill and Sea Dyaks 125.000 ;Kyans, of all clans, 30,000 ; Malays 60,- 
 000, and Chinese 8,000. The government " is able and willing to 
 maintain order and to ofler security to life and property." The Dyaks 
 are peaceful, prosperous and happy : head-hunting has been en- 
 tirely suppressed, and pu-acy. on the north coast of Borneo at least, 
 is a thing of the past. Even-handed and speedy justice is meted 
 out to every subject so ftiirly that none can complain. 
 
SARAWAK, PAST AND PRESENT. 345 
 
 Criminal cases are tried by jury, but there are no lawyers in the 
 territory, and no elaborate system of loop-holes known as "legal 
 precedents," whereby error is systematically perpetuated and jus 
 tice perverted. 
 
 The Sarawak murderer is certain to meet his just deserts, and 
 quickly, for the native juror has not yet acquired that degree oJf 
 civilized intelligence which would enable him to find a verdict of 
 " not guilty " for a wilful and brutal murderer. A short residence 
 in some of our more enlightened States would be a revelation to 
 their simple minds. In Sarawak it is the barbarous custom to hang 
 murderers as soon as their guilt is proven, instead of keeping then^ 
 in confinement and trying them again and again at great expense, 
 or putting them in prison to be pardoned out on the Connecticut, 
 plan. Sarawak has very few laws, but " a heap of justice," which 
 is cheap, speedy, and of prime quality ; in all of which she is the 
 opposite of every other civilized country in the world. In Sarawak 
 no innocent man is convicted and no guilty man escapes. To most 
 of my countrymen this statement may sound preposterous and ab- 
 surd, but to any one who can imagine a country absolutely without 
 lawyers to shield criminals and thwart justice, or "legal precedents" 
 and " technicalities " to convict the innocent and acquit the guilty, 
 the assertion is, perhaps, not beyond belief. 
 
 Sir James Brooke's success was very largely due to the liberality 
 of his views on aU political matters. When he framed the primary 
 code of laws for the government of his distracted little country, he 
 pleased the Mohammedan Malays and disarmed the suspicions of 
 their priests by incorporating in it many of the precepts of the 
 Koran. He was extremely tolerant of harmless native prejudice. 
 The dignity and candor of his character, his firmness and courage, 
 and his devotion to justice won the respect, confidence, and even 
 affection of the better class of Malays and all the Dyaks, save those 
 who were professional pirates. The latter soon had good cause to 
 fear him, for, with a large force of Dyaks, aided by Captain Keppel 
 and other officers of the British navy, the pirates all along the north 
 coast were thrashed into peaceful agriculturists, and their depreda- 
 tions stopped forever. 
 
 Sarawak is a model of good government. It has already been 
 stated that the people are peaceful and prosperous, and that life is 
 secure in all parts of the country. With a revenue, in 1879, of 
 $229,302, the rajah managed to maintain a civil list which included 
 about twenty picked European officers and a host of Malays ; a mili- 
 
346 TAVO YEAES IN THE JUNGLE. 
 
 tary force of about two liundred men ; fourteen forts with their gar. 
 risons ; a number of light-houses ; a steam war vessel, the Aliyie, and 
 two steam launches ; to pay pensions ; to build two new forts ; to 
 operate a coal mine ; to pay European passages to and fi'om Eng- 
 land ; to take $20,000 for his own use, and yet have the snug little 
 sum of §37,673 remaining from the annual revenue to the credit of 
 the government. What a lesson for the ex-Khedive of Egypt, and 
 others nearer home I 
 
CHAPTER XXIX. 
 
 FROM SARAWAK TO THE SADONG. 
 
 Hunting near Kuching. — Crocodiles in the Sarawak. — A Dangerous Pest. — War 
 of Extermination. — From Sarawak to the Sadong. — The Simujan Village. 
 — A Hunt for an Orang-utan. — In the Swamp. — On the Mountain. — Valu- 
 ahle Information at Last. 
 
 While I remained a few days at Sarawak to gather information 
 about the orang-utan and other animals before making a start for 
 the jungles, I purchased from a Malay a very good small boat to 
 use as a hunting-boat, and made several excursions up and down 
 the river. 
 
 I was surprised at finding proboscis monkeys (Nasalis larvatus) 
 along the west bank of the river, not more than two nules below the 
 town. I fired my rifle at one we found sunning himself at the edge 
 of the jungle, knocked him off his perch in a twinkling, and the 
 next moment we sprang ashore, or at least into two feet of soft 
 mud, and waded landward. We reached the edge of the under- 
 growth and endeavored to penetrate it, but after a long struggle 
 with the thorny tangle we gave up beaten, and the monkey got 
 away. We found another monkey, the krah {Macacus cynomdgus), 
 quite numerous along the river, but, the mud was so deep and the 
 jungle so thick and thorny that we failed to secure more than one 
 specimen. Had this been my only opportunity we would have 
 secured good specimens of both species regardless of difficulties' ; 
 but we knew we would have better chances elsewhere. 
 
 A few specimens were brought to me at the hotel, among which 
 was a fine female Manis Javanica, here called " tingeling," with a 
 tiny young one clinging to her. The latter was quite a prize, being 
 of a good size to preserve entire in alcohol, while the mother fur- 
 nished a fine skeleton. Squirrels are abundant along the river, and 
 my new hunter distinguished himself by bringing in half a dozen. 
 Turtles and beetles were brought to me by the Malay small boy, 
 
348 TWO YEAES IN THE JUNGLE. 
 
 and for a few days we did a thriving business. Two professional 
 crocodile hunters brought in a Crocodilus porosus eleven feet long, 
 and delivered it to Mr. Buck, the superintendent of police, for the 
 government reward of thirty-five cents per foot. The reptile was alive, 
 but securely bound, and IMr. Buck kindly placed it at my disposal. 
 Having just taken a goodly number of the same species at Selan- 
 gore, I decided to take the head only, and a Malay was called to 
 decapitate the animal as it lay. He drew his "parong latok," a 
 very heavy sword with an edge like a razor, and with two terrific 
 blows severed the crocodile's head from its body. 
 
 Owing to the fact that the crocodiles which infest aU the rivers of 
 Sarawak Territory are voracious man-eaters and destroy several hves 
 annually, the government is waging a wai' of extermination against 
 the species, and with telling effect. During that year (1878) 266 
 crocodiles were brought to Kuching for the reward, 153 of which 
 were caught in the SaraAvak River and its branches, and 113 in the 
 Samarahan ; 53 were caught by one man, a Malay named Mau, and 
 48 by another named Bujang, both of whom follow that business 
 exclusively. Nearly all were taken with the "aHr," on the same 
 plan as that we pursued in Selangore, described in Chapter XXVI. 
 The lai'gest crocodile taken that year measured 13 feet 10 inches, 
 and of the whole number only two others exceeded 13 feet. Two 
 were between twelve and thirteen feet, ten between eleven and 
 twelve, and eighteen between ten and eleven, while the remaining 
 two hundred and thirty-three were imder ten feet, the majority 
 measuring from seven to nine feet. The amount paid out in re- 
 wards was $738.28. 
 
 ]Mr. Crocker gave me a huge skuU of Crocodilus porosus, which 
 was 2 feet 10 inches in length, and must have come from a speci- 
 men not less than sixteen feet long. Besides the salt-water croco- 
 dile, a true gavial {To^nistoma Schlegellii), is found growing to a 
 great size in the Sarawak River and the Rejang, and perhaps, in 
 rearly all the large rivers of the territory' above tidal influence. I 
 procured of Mr. A. Hart Everett, the naturaHst, a very large skuU 
 of this species from the Upper Sarawak, which measured 3 feet 3 
 inches in length. This species, however, is much more rare than 
 the other, and I did not succeed in seciuing a fresh specimen. 
 
 The information that I received concerning the orang-utan wag 
 to the effect that they inhabit the vaUeys of the rivers Sadong and 
 Batang Lupar, but not the Sai-awak or Samarahan, and are usually 
 seen in the fruit season. But the fi'uit season had passed months 
 
FEOM SARAWAK TO THE SADONG. 849 
 
 before my arrival, the orangs had retired to the depth of the forest, 
 and no one could give me the least information as to where they 
 had gone, or how I could manage to find them. Three or four 
 were killed annually on the Sadong or its tributaries, and I decided 
 to visit that locality in search of others. Mr. Crocker, the resi- 
 dent of Sarawak proper, very kindly offered me the government 
 house on the Sadong as a residence and base of operations during 
 my stay in that region, an offer which I was very glad to accept. 
 In addition to this he also offered me a passage in the government 
 schooner Gertrude, then about to make a trip to Sadong for a 
 cargo of coal. 
 
 One day about sunset, we dropped down the river with the ebb- 
 ing tide and, catching a light breeze at the river mouth, stood out 
 to sea. All the next day we moved quietly along, and at svmset 
 stood in and came to anchor at the mouth of the Sadong, to wait 
 for the flowing tide to carry us up. Late that night I was dimly 
 conscious of the fact that something was done about the anchor, 
 and it seemed to me that the very next minute our vessel brought 
 up with a loud " bump " and a violent jerk. " Eun aground ! " I 
 said to myself, and went on deck to see what the trouble was. It 
 was gray dawn of another day, a mist was slowly rising from the 
 river, and the cocks were crowing loudly among the weather-beaten 
 attap roofs that lined the river banks. We were at anchor in the 
 mouth of the Simujan River, where it enters the Sadong, about 
 twenty miles up. Along the left bank of the stream were about 
 thirty Malay houses, nestling among the cocoanut-trees, forming 
 the Malay kampong, while on the opposite side about half as many 
 dwellings and shops built close up to the edge of the bank made 
 up the Chinese kampong. As is the rule throughout Sarawak, the 
 Chinese own nearly all the shops and do nearly all the trading. 
 What the Malays do for a living I never could imagine. 
 
 The government house stands a hundred yards above the con- 
 fluence of the two rivers, and I was surprised at finding it so well- 
 built, roomy, and comfortable. It was built to accommodate such 
 of the government officers as might have occasion to visit this local- 
 ity in the discharge of their duties. As usual the house stands on 
 posts six feet high, and the space underneath is quite well adapted 
 to such work as skinning and skeletonizing animals. It contains 
 two suites of rooms, and a latticed verandah in front of each sleep- 
 ing apartment, which is a capital place for keeping pet monkeys 
 and orang-utans. 
 
850 TWO YEARS IN THE JUNGLE. 
 
 At the front of the house the steps lead up iuto a spacious audi- 
 ence-room, from the door of which there is a fine view of several 
 miles dii'ectly down the Sadong, here a mighty river half a mile 
 wide. The house is used as a police station by a detachment of 
 half a dozen men, whose duties consist mainly in striking the hoiu'S 
 on a deep-toned gong which hangs in the verandah. Ah me ! that 
 gong! As I recall its deep mellow "boom," which was always 
 music to my ears, there rise before me pictiu-es of half-naked 
 Dyaks, red-haired orang-utans, dark-green jungle, wet trousers, 
 canned salmon, green peas, and Bass' pale ale. 
 
 The grounds in front of the house are tastefully laid out, and 
 quite filled with flowering shi'ubs and curious plants from the sui*- 
 rounding jungle, all of which seem to thrive without care. 
 
 The virgin jungle comes up to within a himdred yards of the 
 house at the back, and the Malay kampong nestles at its edge. 
 Neax the house stands the government rice store, where the Dyak 
 revenue (of one dollar's worth of rice per family) is received and 
 stored. The whole establishment was then in charge of Mr. Eng 
 Quee, the government writer, a Chinese half-caste, to w^hom I 
 brought, from INIr. Crocker, a letter which proved an open sesame 
 to all the privileges the place aftbrded. No one could be more 
 obliging than I found Mr. Eng Quee, and he was of infinite ser\ice 
 to me. 
 
 An hour after we landed, the Malay headman of the village 
 came to pay his respects ; and a Httle later a party of Dyaks came 
 to be questioned regarding the possibilities of finding orang-utans. 
 In his own coimtry this animal is universally called the " mias," al- 
 though he is occasionally referred to by the Malays as an "orang- 
 utan," which means, literally, jungle-man, from " orang " man, and 
 " utan " jungle. 
 
 The English name of the mias is a corruption of the Malay, 
 commonly written as " orang-outang." 
 
 None of the Dyaks or Malays could give any definite informa- 
 tion as to the abundance of these animals in the Sadong valley, their 
 present whereabouts, or the best ways and means of finding them. 
 
 They assured me there were " mias somewhere in the jimgle," 
 but they could not tell me where to seek them. They thought I 
 might kill at least one every week, which was quite encoui-aging, 
 and I thought I would be satisfied with as good luck as that would 
 be. I gave powder and lead to such of the Dyaks and Malays as 
 were willing to hunt orangs for me, and started them out. 
 
FROM SARAWAK TO THE SADO]S"G. 361 
 
 Two miles from the Chinese kampong, on the eastern side of 
 the Simujan, is the government coal mine, to which a wooden tram- 
 way leads through the swamps, the only railway in all Borneo. 
 With a letter in my pocket to Mr. Walters, the superintendent of 
 the mine, I started to walk up the tramway, and half way to the 
 mine I found the gentleman himself coming to see me. We were 
 friends in five minutes. He entered heartily into my plans, and 
 gave me much valuable information and advice. Our acquaintance 
 throughout was a most pleasant one, and I never wearied of his 
 sketches of jungle life. But on the subject of orang-utan hunting 
 he confessed himself at fault. He had seen many orangs and killed 
 several, but for several months he had not even heard of any in 
 that vicinity. 
 
 Two days later he hurriedly sent word to me that a mias had 
 just been seen in the jungle about two miles above the mine. In 
 less than an hour we were at the mine, and, accompanied by Mr. 
 Walters and several Dyaks and Malays, we set out under consider- 
 able excitement to find the animal. We followed a rugged forest 
 path until we reached the spot, but the mias was nowhere to be 
 seen. We divided our party and hunted about until nightfall, but 
 found nothing save a fresh mias' nest, and so returned in disap- 
 pointment. 
 
 The next day we determined to try the experiment of hunting 
 through the forest at random. Early in the morning there arrived 
 a Dyak named Dundang, who has the reputation of being a very 
 successful hunter. He was a fine specimen, though too muscular 
 to be considered a typical Dyak. His entire costume consisted 
 of a yard-wide strip of bark-cloth wound around his loins and 
 passed between his thighs with the ends falling down apron-wise 
 in front. His head-gear was a strip of faded pink calico wound 
 around his head and partly confining his long jet-black locks. He 
 was accompanied by another Dyak, and, with them to guide us, 
 Perera and I set out for a tramp. 
 
 No sooner had we fairly turned our backs on the coolie quarters 
 at the mines than we were in the jungle. We had decided to try 
 the swamp forest first, and if that yielded us nothing we would 
 take to the low mountain which rises out of it like an island. We 
 plunged into the swamp and for several hours waded through its 
 miry mazes, but saw no animals save one monkey and a few small 
 bii'ds and insects for which we cared nothing. 
 
 The trees were rather low, as a rule, but grew very thickly to- 
 
352 TWO YKAUS IN THK -UXGLK. 
 
 getlior. so tJiivt tlioiv tops forniod a ooiupact mtiss of green foliage 
 whioli sliut out every i*!iy of smiligbt from the ground below. In- 
 stead of tjuigled and spreading bnisliwood, the undergrowth con- 
 sisted of sjiplings, with the stems of rattans, rope-like creepers and 
 liauas hanging fi*om the ti-ee-tops or twining in awkwai-d, angular 
 fashion aroimd their trunks. The gro\uid beneath Avas little more 
 tluui a net-work of gnarled roots, rising out of a thick pulp of water 
 4ind decayed vegetable matter often a foot deep. It was not water, 
 for it Wits too thick to be ctxlled a Hquid ; it was not nuid, for there 
 was scarcely any soil in it ; but it was as wet as water and soft as the 
 softest mud. It is this vegetable pulp which, when washed into 
 the rivers of Borneo, is immediately dissolved, and impiu'ts to the 
 streams neai- the coast tlieii- miu-ky brown color. 
 
 Almost the entii'e isljuid of Borneo is quite encii-cled by a belt 
 of swamp forest such as the above, extending back from the sea- 
 shore a distance of fifteen to forty miles, where the land rises smd 
 asserts itself. Along the coast of Sivi-awak, p;u"ticuhu-ly between 
 the Siuubas and Biitimg Lupiu- Eivers, isolated hills and lofty peaks 
 rise abniptly fi'om the level forest here and there — evergreen islands 
 rising out of an evergreen sea. Along the seashore, the jiuigle 
 is low sind scrubby, but it reaches quite down to tide-mtu'k. 
 Where the beach is clean jiiid s:uidy it is fringetl with graceful 
 cnsutU'inas [C. littorea), here cjilled the iUTOoree tree : but where the 
 shore is of mud, as it is between the Sadong and Ratang Lupiu", the 
 mangi'ove forms the bouudaiy of the jiuigle. A few miles back 
 from the sea the jungle nipiiUy rises in height and attains its gi'eat- 
 est dtitude on the hills. 
 
 Pix^gress on foot thi-ough the swamp is slow and difficult at 
 best, and even the man who prides himself on his abihty to follow 
 wherever a native can lead, will find his powers of endiu-ance put to 
 the test when he stiu-ts out to follow a ntiked Dyak through his na- 
 tive swamps. It seems stitmge that any terrestrial quadruped 
 shoxild voluntarily make its home in these gloomy fastnesses, where 
 there is not even a spot of di-y gi-omid l:u-ge enough for a km-, and 
 yet the sambiu- deer {Busa equina), the wild hog. and the tiny 
 Java deer ai"e abundjuat in this very swamp. I &\y abundjuit, be- 
 cause sevei*al were taken thei^e during my stay, although on the 
 day of which I am now speaking we s;iw not one. The only 
 animj^l we s:iw was a ku'ge monkey with a short tail, called a pig- 
 tailed macaque [Macacus neme^frinu.^), which I shot and skinned. 
 
 A day in the swamp, together with two or thi'ee shorter excur- 
 
rnOM SARAWAK TO TITE RADOXG. 353 
 
 sions, convinced me that my way to the orang-utan did not lie in 
 that direction. Then we tried the mountain back of the coal mine. 
 We traversed its entire length, hunted over its top and along its 
 sides, over sticks and stones, and across rocky gorges, but not a 
 sign of mias could we discover. After a week spent in such hunt- 
 ing at random, without any success, we gave it up. Once more I 
 began to interview the natives as fast as I could catch them, Dyaks, 
 Malays, and Chinese as well, as to the present whereabouts of the 
 >nias. I elicited no information which I considered valuable until 
 one day two Dyaks arrived from the head-waters of the Simujan 
 River to buy rice at the government store-house. They informed 
 me that they saw two mias as they came down the river, that 
 they often saw them near their village at Padang Lake, and they 
 gave it as their opinion that if I would go up there and hunt for 
 three or four days I might get two or three mias, and perhaps 
 more. " Two or three ! " I held my breath in suspense until they 
 brought out their figures, and when they said " two or three " I 
 could have hugged them. Had they said I would find them in 
 " millions, sir, millions!" they would have blasted all my hopes for 
 that river. But the Dyak statement had a ring of truth in it, and 
 I instantly decided to put their advice to the test. I felt so certain 
 it would " pan out " well that I made aiTangements to start up the 
 river immediately, and prepared for a prolonged absence. 
 3< 
 
CHAPTER XXX. 
 
 AMONG THE ORANG-UTANS. 
 
 St.-irt lip the Simiijan. — Boat-roofs. — Among the Head-luinters. — A Dyak Long* 
 house. — Monkeys. — Fire-Hies. — A Night on a Tropical River. — Mias' Nests. 
 — " Miiis, Tiian." — Death of the First Mias. — Another Killed.— Screw 
 Pines. — " Three Mias in one Day ! '' — Laborious Work. — Swamp Wading. 
 — Padang Lake. — Cordial Reception at a Dyak House. 
 
 Just twenty-four hours after our interview with the Dyaks fi-om 
 Padang Lake we started on an expedition up the Simujan, solely on 
 the strength of the information given us l\v two semi-savages, 
 "WTiat if they were lying to me, as so many white, black, yellow, 
 and red men had done before, and sent me on fool's errands ? The 
 stock of pro^'isious. ammunition, and preservt\tives I ciu-ried in my 
 boat showed that I fully believed every word told me by those sim- 
 ple-minded children of the jungle, 
 
 Mr. Eng Quee had business up the river, and accompanied me 
 in his own boat, with two stout INIalays. Blou and Lamudin. My 
 boat was manned by a quiet and obedient little IMalay named 
 Pobah, whom I had engaged by the month, Perara, my Portuguese 
 hah'-oaste. All Kee, my servant and best man, and myself. Both 
 boats were amply roofed with kadjaugs, which make a roof at once 
 water-proof, very light, easily adjusted, jxud so flexible that, when 
 desired, each section can be rolled up and stowed away in the bot- 
 tom of the boat. 
 
 These kadjaugs are made of the long, blade-like leaves of the 
 nipa palm, on the same principle as a tile roof. The leaves tire each 
 six or seven feet long by two inches wide. They are sewn together 
 with strips of rattan, each alternate leaf overlapping its neighbor 
 on either side, and so on until a section of roof is formed about six 
 and a half feet square. This section is then made to bend m the 
 middle cross-wise, at a sharp !\ngle, so that it can be folded once 
 
AMONG THE OUANCi-lJTANS. 855 
 
 and rolled up, or partly opened and made to stand up, tent-wise, 
 when it forms the very best kind of roof for such a climate. 
 
 We started up early in the afternoon with the flood tide, and 
 paddled along at good speed very comfortably. For the first ten 
 or twelve miles the Dyaks have cleared away the jungle on both 
 sides of the river for a hundred yards back, and grow their 
 crops of "paddi " (rice) there. At that time of the year (August) 
 the clearings were all overgrown with rank grass four feet high. 
 About eight miles above Simujan we came to a typical village of 
 the Sea Dyaks, and halted to pay it a visit. It stands on the left 
 bank of the river, quite near the stream, and, from the river, one 
 sees only the end of a house, with its single door and a long, gi"ay, 
 moss-patched roof running far back, in ragged lines of perspective, 
 toward the jungle. The lower part of this structure is almost en- 
 tirely concealed by the broad-leaved banana-trees which grow 
 closely around it. 
 
 The view from the top of the bank discloses, not a collection of 
 houses, but one immense house, one hundred and ninety feet long 
 and thirty feet wide. It stands on a small forest of round posts, 
 five or six inches in diameter, set firmly in the ground, and the floor 
 is ten feet above the ground. At either end is a door, to which 
 there leads up a small tree-trunk, cut on the upper side into notches, 
 which serve as steps. Four rows of posts, the two outer and two 
 middle rows, run up through the floor to the roof, and the rest are 
 cut off at the floor. 
 
 What is really the back wall of this long village house leans 
 outward rapidly as it rises from the floor, and is without either 
 door or window. The front is entirely open all the way along, 
 and the floor extends out thirty feet farther on additional posts, 
 forming a convenient open-air platfoiTn for drying rice and other 
 jungle produce. The ground underneath the house — it is much 
 more like a house than a village — is damp, wet, littered and dirty, 
 and smells feverish. 
 
 We climbed the notched tree-trunk at the end of the house and 
 entered. A delegation of mostly naked men, women, and children 
 met us at the door, with here and there a " Tabet, tuan ! " (Good 
 day, sir ! ) in friendly greeting. Directly two or three women 
 appeared with clean mats, which they spread upon the floor so 
 that a considerable space was covered, and we all sat down. Mr. 
 Eng Quee opened a conversation with the old men, our Malays 
 talked with the young men, and the women and children flocked 
 
356 
 
 TWO YEARS m THE JLTNGLE. 
 
 round to have a good look at the " orang-piitei " (white man), who 
 repaid theii* inspection in full, principal and interest. 
 
 From the numerous posts which ran up thi'ough tlie house there 
 hung a great many deer antlers, lower jaws of wild boai', parongs, 
 back-baskets (juahs), fish-traps, paddles and speai-s. Naked chil- 
 dren scudded hither and thither over the floor, chasing the fowls, 
 teasing the dogs and playing with the little gibbon, all of which 
 rightfully belonged to the population of the village. As we en- 
 tered, we found a young w^oman with a five-foot bamboo pail on 
 her shoulder just starting to the river for water ; one man was 
 sitting on the floor making a fish-trap, and another was hewing out 
 a new door with liis " biliong," or adze-axe. 
 
 We were seated in a long hall, which extended without any 
 division the entii-e length of the house, and occupied a trifle more 
 than half the entire structure. It was on the open side of the 
 house and faced the open-aii* platform. Along the other side of 
 the house, likewise extending its entii-e length from one end to the 
 other, was a row of sixteen rooms, each about twelve feet square, 
 entered by a single door from the middle passage. 
 
 FIRE 
 
 E9 
 
 d 
 
 B 
 
 FAMILY 
 
 ROOMS 
 
 S 
 
 EI 
 
 B 
 
 FIRE 
 
 COMMON HALL 
 
 P UBLIC 
 FIRE 
 
 V PASSAGE 
 O O 
 
 COMMON HALL 
 
 L 
 
 OPEN-AIR PLATFORM 
 
 Plan of Dyak Long-house. 
 
 All the timbers of the house were lashed together with rattans, 
 not a nail nor even a wooden pin being used anywhere. Nor were 
 any of the timbers mortised together at any point. The Dyak idea 
 of fastening two objects together is to lash them with green rattan ; 
 civilized man beheves in nailing, pinning, mortising, or fastening 
 with screws. 
 
 The floor was of narrow strips of the nibong palm, an inch and 
 a half wide, lashed to the sleepers about an inch apart, thus giving 
 a floor more open than lattice-work. The wall which divided the 
 rooms from the open hall was of Avide boards hewn out with the 
 "biUong," placed upright, and lashed together and to a base-board 
 with rattans. Each door was one wide board with a projecting 
 
AMONG THE OEANG-UTANS. 357 
 
 point at the bottom for it to turn upon in lieu of a hinge. On one 
 of the doors nearest us I noticed a figure of a crocodile rudely 
 carved in low relief. The outline was very good but no time had 
 been spent in working out the details. 
 
 The side of the house which was enclosed, and also the ends, 
 were made up of wide slabs of bark lashed to the framework. The 
 roof was of " attap," or large square sections of palm-leaves sewn 
 together and lashed to the rafters in courses, like shingles. 
 
 Each room in a Dyak long-house represents a family, or at 
 least a married couple, and a village is taxed according to the num- 
 ber of its "doors." This, then, was "a village of sixteen doors." 
 The young unmarried men and boys slept over the hall in the loft 
 which forms a part of every such habitation, partly for storage and 
 partly for domiciliary purposes. 
 
 Each private room has no other door than the one opening from 
 the passage. The floor is generally covered with mats. In a cor- 
 ner of the room next the outer wall is a bed of earth on which the 
 famUy fire is built. At this corner the roof is so constructed that a 
 portion of it, usually two or three rafters, can be lifted up bodily 
 for about two feet and propped up to admit light and air, and also 
 to allow the smoke to escape in case there should be an excess 
 of it. There are no tables or chairs — indeed no furniture of any 
 kind. 
 
 In the centre of the long hall a fire was burning on a bed of 
 earth, and above it hung a bundle of about twenty human heads, 
 or rather skulls, for not a vestige of flesh remained on any of them. 
 Each skull was bound round securely with rattan, evidently to keep 
 the lower jaw in place. All were black and grimy with smoke and 
 soot, and those at the bottom of the bundle, nearest the fire, were 
 quite charred. We were among the head-hunters, and those were 
 trophies which our money could not buy. Thanks to the govern- 
 ment of Sir James Brooke, those heads were all old trophies, no 
 doubt collected prior to 1841, by the skinny and toothless old fel- 
 lows who now totter about the village, and pound their betel in a 
 joint of bamboo because they cannot chew it. 
 
 According to all accounts, the Dyaks of Southern Borneo are 
 tame subjects in comparison with the dashing, dare-devil tribes of 
 the north. A man may travel the whole length of the Mahakkam 
 or the Barito and visit the villages of the most warlike tribes with- 
 out being able to set eyes on more than one skull. Here in the 
 Sadong we find a score in the first village of Sea Dyaks we set foot 
 
358 TWO YEARS IN THE .IUNGLE. 
 
 iu, and wc afterwtu'd saw a beautiful collection of forty-two skulls 
 in tlie tirst village of Hill Djaks wo Wsited ou the upper Ssu-awak, 
 
 As I liad abundant opportunity later on to study tlie Dyaks 
 tliemselves, I will not attempt here a description of the inhabitants 
 of this village. At the terniiuatiou of our call two of the women 
 came and oftered me half a dozen fresh eggs, which I accepted, 
 and gave them iu return what their souls longed for — tobacco. 
 As we returned to the boat, all the women and children of the 
 house trooped along after us, respectful and well-behaved to the 
 last, to see us off — and to modestly request a little more tobacco. 
 I duly stood treat all round with leaves from the bundles I had laid 
 in store for this purpose, and we partotl on good terms. 
 
 Just before sunset we passed the last Dyjik tillage and cleai-ing, 
 and came to where the Lu*ge trees ixnd dense undergrowth clothed 
 the banks to the water's edge and even beyond. Then we began 
 to see monkeys by the score, and as evening approached their num- 
 bers seemed to increase as they began to perch in the bnmches that 
 overhung the river, and settle themselves for the night. Some- 
 times as many as five or six would bo soou sociably huddled to- 
 gether on a single bough, and often one small tree-top contjiined 
 from fifteen to twenty of the little animals. They were all of one 
 species, ]iracih'us cynomoJguii, the commonest in Borneo, if not of 
 the neighboring islands as well, and by the iiativos it is called the 
 krah. They are about the color of a gi'ay squirrel, jxnd three times 
 as largo. I think I never elsewhere saw so many monkeys in the 
 same length of time. I counted them as we paddled along until in a 
 few minutes I nui the number up into the eighties, and was obhged 
 to give up the attempt. They showed not the shghtest fear of us, 
 and I could easily have killed a great many. As it was, I shot two, 
 which was all I ctu'od to preserve just then. 
 
 Just as diuknoss sot in we came to a Large band of proboscis 
 monkeys [Nasalis larvatas), and, althoxigh we could only distin- 
 guish their moving forms for a moment now and tlien, their pecu- 
 liar nasal cry told us what they were. 
 
 Fifteen minutes after simset the last gleam of t^vilight faded 
 out, and darkness closed over the forest. The river had nanxiwed 
 rapidly, and was tlien not over forty ytu'ds wide. On either side a 
 wall of green leaves rose from the surface of the stream, and the 
 banks were quite hidden behind the leafy screen. 
 
 Just here we wore treated to the most glorious exliibition of 
 tire-flies I over beheld. They congregated on certain trees in him- 
 
AMONG THE OKANG-UTANS. 359 
 
 dreds — if not even thousands, in some instances, and resting quietlj' 
 on the leaves kept up an incessant and rapid scintillation, each 
 insect flashing about a hundred and twenty times per minute. For 
 three or four miles we passed in about every hundred yards a tree- 
 top literally filled with brilliant flashes of white light, which, in the 
 darkness, shone with novel and beautiful effect. 
 
 It gives one quite a feeling of awe to paddle along a narrow 
 river between two dark walls of forest in thick darkness. At such 
 times the most garrulous boatmen are quiet, the traveller's mind is 
 filled with romantic thoughts, and the only sounds which break the 
 sombre stillness are the measured dip of the paddles, the swish of 
 the eddies they make, the chirp of the tree-frogs and the occasional 
 twitter of a night-bird. 
 
 Having made several miles after sunset, we tied up to some 
 bushes, ate a frugal dinner, and lay down in our boats to sleep. 
 The mosquitoes were troublesome to the men who had no netting, 
 but being provided with adequate protection I fared better. But 
 my boat leaked from being overloaded, and I slept in water the 
 greater part of the night. 
 
 At break of day we were off again, and soon passed the mouth 
 of the southern branch of the Simujan. A few miles farther on we 
 halted at a small bit of cleared ground, built a fire over the water 
 on a pole platform which we covered with mud, and cooked break- 
 fast. Before starting again we cleared the deck for action on Mr. 
 Eng Quee's boat, and made ready for aggressive warfare on the 
 monkey tribe. The kadjangs were rolled up, the supports taken 
 down and stored away below. This " sampan " of Eng Quee's was 
 the best shooting-boat I ever used, and, outside of Borneo, I shall 
 never see its like again. It was a simple dug-out, about fifteen feet 
 long by three and a half feet broad in the middle, pointed at both 
 ends, and just deep enough to be steady. Just below the edge it 
 was completely decked over with strips of nibong palm, and on this, 
 amidships, I placed my ammunition-box for a seat, arranged rifle 
 and double gun, cartridges and field-glass within easy reach. 
 Leaving my boat to follow we again set out. 
 
 We were now some distance above tidal influence, and the river 
 had narrowed to twenty yards, but it was still very deep and flowed 
 swiftly. The water was much cleaner than below, and was indeed 
 moderately clear. The banks on both sides were entirely suIj- 
 merged for an unknown distance back from the stream, miles per- 
 haps, but the forest was composed almost entirely of trees. The 
 
360 TWO YEARS IN THE JUNGLE. 
 
 nipa palm had been replaced by the screw pine, rasow etam of the 
 Malays {Fandanus candelabrum), which formed a fringe along both 
 sides of the river. They grew in water eight to ten feet deep and 
 very thickly together, so that no boat could reach the shore with- 
 out a great effort to get through them. The stems were from two 
 to three inches in diameter and thickly studded with short spines. 
 Owing to the depth at which they grew, it was sometimes possible 
 to push them aside and drive a boat through them, when they grew 
 rather thinly, but usually it was necessary to cut a passage in order 
 to reach the shore. I mention them thus particularly because they 
 afterwards caused us great trouble. 
 
 We saw no proboscis monkeys that morning, nor any others. 
 The men had to work hard at the paddles to make headway against 
 the rapid current. Early in the day we passed several abandoned 
 orang-utan nests, which aroused expectations of something better, 
 and presently we passed a green nest. From that moment four 
 pairs of eyes sharply scrutinized every dark object or moving twig 
 in the tree-tops as we paddled slowly and silently along. Every 
 doubtful object was instantly pointed out and examined by the 
 " tuan " with the field-glass. 
 
 We had just sighted another very green and fresh-looking nest, 
 when there was an excited whisper of, 
 
 " Mias, tuan ! mias ! mias ! " and a long arm in front of me 
 pointed it out. 
 
 " There he is, sir ! there he is !" (in Malay, of course). The light 
 sampan fairly flew along until we came nearly opposite the tree 
 containing our intended victim, but he had recognized the approach- 
 ing danger and hidden himself in a thick clump of leafy branches. 
 Presently we saw a big hairy arm clasping the trunk of the tree 
 about fifty feet from the ground, but that was all. The boat was 
 stopped directly, and as we could do no better I stood up and sent 
 a bullet through the arm that was exposed, to stir the old fellow up. 
 It startled him, for with an angry growl, he immediately showed 
 himself and started to climb away. As. soon as we saw his body I 
 fired again, which caused him to stop short for a moment. Then 
 the two Malays put forth all their strength and drove the boat as 
 far as possible into the thick frmge of screw pines. They stood 
 very thickly together, but their stems yielded a good deal, and by 
 frantic pulling, pushing aside, and chopping we forced a passage 
 through for several yards. At last we came to a dead stop ; there 
 was not a speck of land in sight, but the boat could go no farther. 
 
WADING AFTER A WOUNDED ORANG-UTAN. 
 
 {From Autkoi's sketch.) 
 
AMONG THE ORANG-UTANS. 361 
 
 We were near the large trees by this time, so two of the Malays 
 seized their parongs and slid down into the water while I quickly 
 followed with my rifle and a pocket full of cartridges. Fortunate 
 it was for me in my wading after orangs that my rifle was a breech- 
 loader and that Maynard cartridges are water-proof. 
 
 We went quite under water, at first, but after swimming a few 
 yards, were able to touch bottom. We waded up to our necks in 
 water until it got shallower, the Malays pushing ahead as fast as 
 possible to keep the mias in sight, until presently they stood still, 
 waist deep in the water, and pointed upward. I soon saw the mias, 
 a fine large one, swinging himself slowly from one tree to another, 
 evidently disabled. I immediately fired for his breast, whereupon 
 he struggled violently for a moment, then made oflf in frantic haste, 
 climbing along a straight horizontal branch by the aid of his hands 
 alone, swinging along as a gymnast swings underneath a tight rope. 
 He reached fully five feet at every stretch. 
 
 Presently he stopped short and let go with one hand, which 
 dropped heavily at his side and came below his knee. For three 
 minutes he hung there facing us, holding by one hand only. How 
 huge and hairy he looked, outlined against the sky ! Presently his 
 hand slipped, his hold gave way entirely and, with outstretched 
 arms and legs, he came crashing heavily down through the branches 
 and fell into the water near us with a tremendous splash. He strug- 
 gled up and turned savagely to bay, grasping the trunk of a sapling 
 to hold himself erect. The Malays rushed at him with their par- 
 ongs, and one gave him a fierce slash in the neck while I was 
 shouting to them to desist. They were as yet wholly untrained, 
 and would have ruined the skin in a moment. The old mias flung 
 his long arms about, gasped and struggled violently, then quietly 
 settled down in the water, and in another moment was dead. Then 
 we towed him along back to the boat, lifted him in with consider- 
 able difficulty and began to examine our prize. 
 
 Truly, he was a prize. His back was as broad and his chest as 
 deep as a prize fighter's, while his huge hands and feet seemed 
 made with but one end in view — to grasp and hold on. His arms 
 were remarkably long and sinewy, but his legs were disproportion- 
 ately short and thick. His body was large and heavy, with a chest 
 both broad and full ; his eyes were villanously small and his canine 
 teeth were as large as those of a small bear. His arms and legs 
 were covered with long, coarse, brick-red hair, which grew also on 
 his abdomen and sides, but the skin which covered his breast hung 
 
362 TWO YEARS IN THE JUNGLE. 
 
 in a loose, baggy fold. The face was bare except for a thin growth 
 of hair on the jaws and chin, which, in pictures of the orang utan 
 is usually magnified to a luxuriant beard. His skin was of a shiny 
 brownish-black color, darkest on the face and throat. 
 
 We transferred the body of our dead mias to the other boat and 
 proceeded up the river as before. Nests were now quite numerous 
 in the trees along the banks, but we saw none even fifty yards back 
 from the shore. The Dyaks and Malays both assert that the orangs 
 are subject to fever, and resort to the open margins of rivers and 
 lakes for the benefit of the cooling breezes which blow there. 
 
 The nest of the orang-utan is simply a lot of small green boughs 
 and twigs broken off by the animal, and piled loosely in the fork of 
 a tree, or the top of a sapling. The pile is usually about three feet 
 in diameter, and on this the orang-utan lies on his back, and sleeps. 
 
 A few miles from the scene of our first capture we came to a 
 very fresh green nest, and Eng Quee remarked : 
 
 " Now there must be a mias very near that." 
 
 The next moment we saw the movement of a heavy body in a 
 tree just beyond, and he added : 
 
 " There he is, sir ! There's the mias ! " 
 
 We paddled quickly up and directly saw the mias climbing rap- 
 idly away. I fired immediately, and the next moment the boat was 
 driven with full force into the screw pines. ^ We tugged frantically 
 at the stems to force a passage, but were soon brought to a stand- 
 still. Holding my rifle above my head, I sHd into the water, and 
 this time found it only up to my shoulders. The Malays followed 
 me closely in our wading-match, and in a few minutes we found 
 the mias in a tree-top, disabled, as I had expected. This time my 
 bullet went through his head, whereupon he settled back quietly 
 across two large branches which grew close together, and remained 
 there, dead, with forty feet of bare tree-trunk between him and us. 
 I offered half a dollar to any one who would climb up and throw 
 the mias down, which offer was accepted by one of the Malays. 
 After a hard struggle up the smooth trunk, he reached the animal 
 and sent it tumbling into the water below. Two mias in one day 
 was far better luck than we had dared hope for. 
 
 The river narrowed rapidly as we proceeded, and at length there 
 remained only a passage between the screw pines, which formed a 
 barrier thirty yards wide on either side between us and the shore. 
 In two places we found the channel choked with a wide drift of 
 dead pine stems, completely bridging the river, and barring our 
 
AMONG THE OEANG-UTANS. 363 
 
 progress. Witli great labor we cut through one drift and cut a 
 passage around the other wide enough for our boats. 
 
 Just before reaching Little Padang Lake, we came to a spot 
 where about forty acres of jangle had been killed — by fire, the Ma- 
 lays said, although I hardly see how it could have been burned. 
 The trees stood in the water leafless, dead, and bare, save for a 
 green epiphyte here and there on their branches. Acres of dead 
 screw pines reared their leafless stems aloft, and the prospect was 
 dreary enough. Winding in and out, and turning a great many 
 times, we came to Little Padang Lake, and found it a perfect jungle 
 of Pandanus. Threading our way through that, we came to forest 
 again, and a httle farther on entered Padang Lake, also a labyrinth 
 of screw pines. As we were crossing a bit of open water, one of 
 the Malays chanced to look back and immediately exclaimed, in an 
 excited whisper : " Mias, tuan ! mias ! mias ! " 
 
 Sure enough, there we espied a mias fast asleep in a Httle tree 
 close to which we had passed. He lay on his back in the main fork 
 of the tree, holding on by the large Hmbs. 
 
 We paddled up very quietly to within fifty yards, when he dis- 
 covered us and started up. I fired at him, and, as the boat crashed 
 into the pines, took another shot. The pines were very thick, and 
 there was no shore anywhere. We were obHged to take to the 
 water or lose the animal, so overboard we went, and kept our heads 
 above water by holding to the spiny stems which pricked our hands 
 painfully. After a while we touched a bottom of mud, and were 
 able to wade, though the water was up to our necks. It was slow 
 work. Our feet often got caught in vines, and roots, and some- 
 times we came against submerged pine-stems waist high, while up 
 to our chins in water. Had the mias not have been hit hard, he 
 would have escaped, for, in spite of our eagerness, our progress 
 was slow and painful. After forty yards of wading we came up 
 with him, and found him badly hurt, and visibly weakening. Not 
 wishing to prolong his sufferings, I sent a bullet through his head, 
 which smashed his skull all to pieces, and tumbled him Hke a log 
 into the water. Lamudin took him in tow, and we toiled back to 
 the boat. 
 
 Three orang-utans in one day ! The men hurrahed loud and 
 long ; and I beheve I must have indvdged in a little shout on my 
 own account. 
 
 When you remember, my reader, that it was for the orang-utan 
 that I had made an expensive \isit to Borneo, and up to that day 
 
864 TWO YEAES IN THE JUNGLE. 
 
 had been in great doubt as to its whereabouts and abundance, you 
 can perhaps forgive a httle honest enthusiasm over the results of 
 our first day's work. 
 
 A narrow and tortuous channel led for about a mile through a 
 wide tract of pines, from which we finally emerged on the open 
 lake. It was a shallow body of clear water, about five miles long 
 by two miles at the widest part. The whole western half of the lake 
 is filled with Pandanus, which also chokes it at its southern ex- 
 tremity. On the east they are happily absent, and the water is open 
 quite up to the edge of the forest. 
 
 About two miles from the outlet of the lake, up the western 
 side, is a conical mountain, called Gunong Popook, about nine 
 hundred feet high, the end of a chain of low mountains extending 
 westward from the lake. 
 
 It was nearly sunset when we reached the open waters of the 
 lake and made for a Dyak house at the foot of Gunong Popook. 
 We landed and walked fifty yards over " batangs " (saplings), 
 passed some huge bowlders of reddish porphyry and just beyond 
 them came to a small Dyak village, or long-house. We climbed 
 the ladder and were greeted very cordially by a pleasant-faced 
 young man, named Hakka, his wife Noonsong, and another woman 
 who spread clean mats for us to sit upon. The betel box was 
 brought out, and we all sat down for a chat. ■■ We asked if we might 
 be allowed to stay there that night and perhaps a little longer. Of 
 course we could stay there ! Why not ? Any stranger was wel- 
 come to stay ; and who ever heard of a Dyak refusing shelter to a 
 white man and the best the village afforded ? They would be glad 
 if we would honor them with a visit two months long. 
 
 Very true ; a Dyak was never known to refuse hospitality to 
 a friend, and aid when needed, in which my simple-minded 
 savage without any religion whatever is about five thousand per 
 cent, better than the canting, hypocritical Hindoo, who would pre- 
 fer to have you sleep out in the rain rather than have yom* pres- 
 ence desecrate his mud sanctuaiy or even his verandah. The Dyak 
 is the man for me. 
 
 We were informed that the whole of the open hall was at our 
 disposal, and in a very short time we had taken formal possession. 
 Our three dead orangs we hung high up in the trees near the house 
 to get them beyond the reach of the lean and hungi-y dogs, or 
 rather animated dog-skeletons, which roamed about. The Dyaks 
 were reaUy glad to see us, for to them ovu- visit was quite an event, 
 
AMONG THE ORANG-UTANS, 365 
 
 and had we owned the house we could scarcely have felt more at 
 home. I gave the men and women tobacco-boxes and looking- 
 glasses, and to tlie children about fifty coppers apiece, all of which 
 were received with childish enthusiasm. 
 
 After a long confab by lantern and torch-light, I hung my ham- 
 mock and musquitero, for the mosquitoes were quite troublesome, 
 and Eng Quee rigged up his curtain in a corner close by. The 
 other members of our party sought soft places on the floor, and 
 (being thoroughly tired with our long day's work, we were soon 
 beyond the realms of thought or care. 
 
CHAPTEK XXXI. 
 
 DOINGS IN THE ORANG-UTAN COUNTRY. 
 
 Preparation of Orang Skins and Skeletons. — Return down the Simujan.— • 
 Three Orangs Killed. — A Troublesome Infant. — Accessions from Native 
 Hunters. — Seven Orangs in One Dav. — Miscellaneous Gatherings. — A 
 Battle-scarred Hero. — The Bore in the Sadong. — Another Trip up the 
 Simujan. — Doctoring an Injured Hunter. — The Dyak at his Worst. — Death 
 of a Huge Orang, "the Rajah." — Dimensions. — A Rival Specimen. — Two 
 Captives. 
 
 The day following our an-ival at the Popook village was a busy 
 one. We had three mias to skin and also to skeletonize, for all 
 the great apes (gorilla, chimpanzee, and orang-utan) are so rare and 
 valuable that the entire skeleton of each specimen is carefully dis- 
 sected out, and makes a complete specimen by itself, quite as valu- 
 able as the skin. «' 
 
 Near the house was a low platform of poles upon which the 
 Dyaks spread their paddy to di-y, and being vacant at that time, 
 we converted it into a very serviceable work-table. We erected 
 the kadjangs over it to protect us fi'om both svm and rain, and, 
 calling all the members of our party, gathered round the festive 
 board for a picnic with the three dead mias. After each specimen 
 had been carefully measured and one sketch made we sharpened 
 the knives and went to work. 
 
 The forenoon was very hot and the afternoon very rainy ; but 
 we kept di-y under the kadjangs and worked steadily on. It was a 
 great bother to skin the fingers without mutilating them. Fore- 
 seeing that all my companions would very probably assist on simi- 
 lar occasions in the future, I took pains to teach them the modus 
 operandi, and was pleased to find how intelligently and skilfully 
 they took hold of the work in hand. It was weU that I did so ; for 
 not very long after that our resources were taxed to the utmost. 
 
 My method of preserving the skins and skeletons was veiy sim- 
 ple, and I am happy to say proved entirely satisfactory. After re- 
 
DOINGS IN THE ORANG-UTAN COUNTRY. 367 
 
 moving and carefully cleaning the skins, we first treated them with 
 a liberal application of arsenical soap dissolved in a little water, and 
 then rubbed on all the powdered alum that would stick to the skin, 
 A pole was passed through the arms, and the skins were then hung 
 up to dry, the head and legs being distended with a little loose 
 straw or dry grass, and the skin of the body slightly distended by 
 short sticks placed crosswise. 
 
 In the hot, moist, bath-room air of Borneo a skin must dry im- 
 mediately or it spoils. If it is hung up loosely, or in folds so that 
 the air cannot reach both sides of the entire surface, the hair will 
 drop off all portions that do not dry quickly. I have ventured to 
 state the above facts for the reason that the ignorance of them, sim- 
 ple as they are, has entailed the loss of many a fine skin of orang, 
 chimpanzee, and gorilla. 
 
 Orang skeletons, like all others, are prepared, in a rough state, 
 by carefully denuding them of flesh with a knife, but leaving the 
 bones of the various members attached to each other by their liga- 
 ments, anointing them with thin arsenical soap, then tying each 
 skeleton in a compact bundle and allowing it to dry in the shade. 
 
 Being fully convinced that our best plan for hunting orangs lay 
 in making trips up and down the Simujan Kiver we decided to re- 
 turn forthwith to Sadong, hunting on the way down. On the fol- 
 lowing morning we loaded our boats and took leave of the hospit- 
 able Dyaks. They were loud and long in their invitations to us 
 to come again and stop a long time, promising to do all they could 
 to help us find animals. Having comforted them with the assur- 
 ance that they would soon see us again, we embarked and set off. 
 
 Soon after entering the river, we started several troops of pro- 
 boscis monkeys, but being just then in quest of grander game, 
 we let them go, promising to call and pay our respects a little 
 later. A little farther down we surprised an orang in the act of 
 taking a drink. He had climbed down within reach of the water 
 and hung at the foot of a stout sapling, dipping one hand iato the 
 water, then holding it over his mouth and sucking the water off as 
 it dripped from the knuckles of his closed fingers. He was so 
 busily engaged that I got a good look at him with the glass before 
 he saw us. He was near the open water and I easily brought him 
 down with my rifle, after which we paddled our boat in to where 
 he fell and secured him without even getting out. 
 
 Three miles farther on I espied a baby orang up in a tree-top, 
 hanging to the small limbs with out-stretched arms and legs, look- 
 
368 TWO YEARS IN THE JUNGLE. 
 
 ing like a big, red spider. It gazed down at us in stupid, childish 
 wonder, and I was just aiming for it, when Mr. Eng Quee called 
 my attention to the mother of the infant, who was concealed in the 
 top of the same tree. As soon as I fired at her, she climbed with 
 all haste up to her little one, which quickly clasped her round the 
 body, holding on by grasping her hair, and, with the little one 
 clinging to her, the mother started to climb rapidly away. 
 
 Fortunately, we were able to get the boat in amongst the trees 
 without much trouble, and all immediately went overboard. We 
 had scarcely done so when a third orang, a young male about two 
 years old, was discovered looking down from a nest overhead, which 
 he immediately left and started to follow the old mother. As he 
 went swinging along underneath a limb, with his body well drawn 
 up I gave him a shot which dropped him instantly, and then we 
 turned our attention to the female. She was resting on a couple 
 of branches, badly wounded, with her baby still clinging to her 
 body in great fright. Seeing that she was not likely to die for 
 some minutes I gave her another shot to promptly end her suffer- 
 ing, and then she came crashing down through the top of the small 
 trees and fell into the water, which was waist deep. 
 
 We sprang to secure the baby, but it was under water fully a 
 minute before we found it, quite unable to swim and very nearly 
 drowned. We managed to resuscitate it, however, then the other 
 two were lifted into the boat and we drew ouii; into the stream. 
 
 As soon as the baby recovered the use of all its faculties, it 
 seemed possessed of a little devil. It was only about six months 
 old or eight at the most, and weighed about eleven pounds, but it 
 had the temper of a tiger. It made such persistent efforts to pull 
 my hands up to its mouth in order to bite them that I was obliged 
 to tie its elbows together behind its back, pinion its feet also and 
 make it fast by a cord to the side of the boat, so that it could not 
 reach me with its teeth. This, of course, increased its rage. 
 
 It was restless as an eel, and gave me endless trouble. Once 
 when I was not watching, it rolled over and before I was aware of 
 the movement seized the calf of my leg between its teeth with a 
 perfectly fiendish expression and bit me very severely. But for 
 my thick woollen stockings and cotton hunting trousers under- 
 neath, I think the little wretch would have bitten out a piece of my 
 flesh. I gave him a sounding slap on the side of his head, which 
 caused him to let me go ; but for many days after I carried a large 
 black and blue mai-k in memory of him. 
 
FEMALE ORANG-UTAN, INFANT AND NEST. 
 {From the group in the U. S. National Ifaseuin mounted by the Author.) 
 
< 
 
DOINGS IN THE OKANG-IJTA]Sr COUNTRY. 369 
 
 Once it tumbled overboard, and I let it get a good ducking be- 
 fore rescuing it. 
 
 A heavy rain came on during the afternoon but we set up our 
 kadjangs and kept quite dry. As soon as it ceased, we took to our 
 paddles and went down swiftly with the current, reaching Simujan 
 at sunset, wet, tired, and hungry, but very happy in the possession 
 of seven orangs taken in two days' hunting. 
 
 At the back of the government house, there was a wide open 
 space, between the two bath rooms, where the roof projected over 
 the hard ground, which made a capital open-air dissecting-room. 
 
 Mr. Eng Quee placed a table for me and there I skinned 
 orangs and received deputations of natives who came bringing 
 specimens, or wanting gunpowder. The ground under the house 
 was hard, dry and clean, and my motley crew of assistants retired 
 under the floor with their work. Mi\ Eng Quee quite enjoyed the 
 novelty of orang-skinning, and quickly became an expert hand at 
 the business. Ah Kee, Perara and the three Malays, worked slowly 
 and required constant supervision, but they learned rapidly. 
 
 Early the next momtag after our return, came an old China- 
 man to whom I had given gunpowder a week previous, escorting 
 two other Chinamen, who carried on a pole the dead body of a 
 good-sized orang, which he had shot the day before. I received it 
 with open arms, paid for it, measiu-ed it, and was proceeding to re- 
 move the skin, when there arose a loud shout from those around 
 me, and the next moment, three naked Dyaks staggered up, also 
 bearing on a pole another dead mias. This was a fine, large " mias 
 chappin," with the intensely black skin and the remarkable expand- 
 ed cheeks, or cheek callosities, so characteristic of Simla Wurmbii. 
 This was larger than any of the specimens I had taken thus far. The 
 Dyaks said they were out the night before trying to noose a deer, 
 and found this mias swinging himself from one tree to another, 
 when a branch suddenly broke and let him fall to the ground. 
 They attacked him at once with their spears and killed him. There 
 were fifteen spear wounds in his chest, but I sewed them up care- 
 fiilly and entered the old fellow as No. 8. The men facetiously re- 
 marked that we had about enough mias to last through the remain- 
 der of that day. 
 
 About noon there arose another and louder shout from the men 
 
 under the house, which increased to a perfect yell as a party of 
 
 Malays came around the comer with another mias, the largest of 
 
 all, alive, swinging underneath a pole which had been passed be- 
 
 24 
 
370 TWO YEAKS IN THE JITNGLE. 
 
 tween his hands and feet after they were tied together. Tliis was a 
 veiy old male, " mias rombi " {Simia sati/rus), witliout the expanded 
 cheeks. He was nmch emaciated, and the Malays said he had jmi- 
 gle fever, wliieh really seemed to be the case. The Malays shot 
 him in the ankle, and, being too weak to chmb fast, he fell an easy 
 prey and was taken ahve. 
 
 Had he been luihurt I would gladly have kept him alive, but I 
 am avei'se to prolonging the siilierings of hopelessly woimded ani- 
 mals under any pretext, or keeping any animal in painful and bar- 
 barons capti-s-ity. So I qiiickh' thi'ust the point of my knife into 
 the occiput of the half-dead animal, pierced his mediiUa oblongata, 
 and, with a hoarse gTowl, he instantly expii'ed. This specimen 
 measiu'ed foiu" feet four inches in height from head to heel, and 
 eight feet between the tips of his lingers with the ai-ms extended. 
 
 Two hom-s later, the httle baby orang reheved me of all anxiety 
 on its account by dying. Blou dryly remai'ked that it had foimd 
 dying was getting fashionable ^^•ith the mias and it wanted to go 
 with the rest This made seven dead orangs, big and httle, to skin 
 and skeletonize in one day ! I had adult specimens of both species, 
 male and female, and two yoimg ones ; and, by a happy coincidence, 
 the Chinese, Dyaks and Malays had almost made a dead heat in the 
 race after specimens. 
 
 There ai-e many good people who are at ,a loss to understand 
 how a natiu'alist '* can bear to skin and cut up dead animals," no 
 matter how rai'e and interesting they are. Many wonder how he 
 can have "an appetite to eat," and ciy out in holy horror at sight 
 of the raw flesh under his knife. "Well, tastes difler, that's alL As 
 for myself, I woidd not have exchanged the pleasm-es of that day, 
 when we had those seven orangs to dissect, for a box at the opera 
 the whole season through. 
 
 It is a pity that men who " don't see how you can do it " could 
 not have been there on that memorable occasion. When we finished, 
 there was a small mountain of orang flesh, a long row of ghastly, 
 grinning skeletons, and big, red-haired skins enough to have car- 
 peted a good-sized room, I forgot to eat, and did not think of 
 sleeping till after midnight. It was the most valuable day's work I 
 ever did, for the specimens we preserved were worth, immounted, 
 not less than eight hundred dollars. 
 
 It was fortunate that we had such excellent facilities for diying 
 skins as the open space at the back of the house aflbrded. I ap- 
 plied tiie preservatives myself to evei-y skin and skeleton, and 
 
DOINGS IN THE ORANG-UTAN COUNTRY. 371 
 
 watched them daily to see that they cured properly. The necessity 
 for this constant care of them kept me at Simujan several days, 
 during which time the natives hunted diligently, and brought me 
 many fine specimens both dead and alive. This is the list of one 
 day's gatherings, exclusive of insects : 
 
 2 Spiny turtles [Oeoemyda spinosa). 
 1 Box turtle {Emys Thurgii). 
 
 1 Hombill head {Buceros rhinoceros). 
 1 Orang-utan skull {fiimia Wurmbii). 
 
 3 Java deer, alive ( Tragulus). 
 
 3 Thread fish (Polynemus). 
 
 4 Long-armed prawns {Pceneus). 
 1 Python, seven feet long. 
 
 1 Gibbon, " wah-wah," alive {Hylobates concohr). 
 
 A few days after our great orang-utan day, a Dyak brought in 
 another specimen, which in some respects was a remarkable one. 
 It was a male mias chappin, with cheek callosities ten inches across, 
 and it was evidently a dwarf, though of adult age. Its height was 
 only three feet ten and one-fourth inches, and extent of arms six 
 feet nine inches. The hair on his arms and legs was extremely 
 long, that on his shoulders measuring twelve to fourteen inches in 
 length, which was the longest I have ever seen in an orang. 
 
 He bore the scars of many a hard-fought battle. A piece had 
 been bitten out of his upper lip, and the lower lip also had been 
 bitten through ; both middle fingers were off at the second joint, 
 leaving mere stumps ; the third right toe had disappeared from the 
 same cause ; the fourth left toe and both the great toes had been 
 bitten off at the end ; one finger was quite stiff and misshapen from 
 a bite, and, to crown all, he was actually hump -backed, caused, as 
 I found on dissecting, by some violent injury, possibly a fall. He 
 had evidently been a regular prize-fighter in his day, a first-class 
 desperado. One of his canine teeth had entirely disappeared, shat- 
 tered in some bloody fracas, perhaps. I warrant his enemies had 
 good cause to remember him, for he was in prime fighting condition. 
 But, alas ! for him, his fighting days are over, and he now peacefully 
 sits on the branch of a tree in the American Museum of Natural 
 History, quietly eating a wax durian. 
 
 On the last day of August we made ready for another trip up 
 the Simujan to Padang Lake. The boats were ready at two o'clock, 
 but the tide was still at the ebb, a strong current was setting down 
 the river, and we waited for the flow. Moreover, a great bore was 
 
372 . TWO YEAES IN THE JUNGLE. 
 
 expected to come up the river when the tide turned, and we were 
 anxious to see it. Two miles down the Sadong we saw a ragged 
 brown fringe, reaching across the broad river, and rapidly com- 
 ing nearer. As it swung, like a long arm, around the point a 
 mile below, we plainly heard it roaring like a distant waterfall. On 
 it came, like a tidal wave, a great wall of surf, rolling and curling 
 over at the top, backed by a rushing plain of water nine feet thick. 
 It seemed hke a thing of life and purpose, powerful, irresistible. 
 I watched it every moment with the glass until it reached the 
 mouth of the Simujan, where our boats lay. There were no boats on 
 the Sadong, except two little sampans, manned by daring Malays, 
 both of which were upset by the bore, but the occupants clung to 
 their boats, and presently got ashore. 
 
 The height of the bore, as nearly as I could determine, was between 
 nine and ten feet, and it travelled upward at the rate of about twelve 
 miles an hour. At a distance of half a mile, the sound it made 
 was like the roar of surf on a stormy beach. As the advancing 
 wave struck the sharp point of land at the confluence of the two 
 rivers, with a truly surf-like roar and thunder, a great volume of 
 water came sweeping up the Simujan, filling the little ditches and 
 catching up the boats that lay stranded high and dry on the muddy 
 banks. In less than half a minute the little river rose eight feet, 
 while, in the Sadong, we saw the great brov^rn billows rolling past 
 the mouth of our snug harbor, and chasing each other up the river 
 in pursuit of the advancing torrent. Our light sampans swung 
 round with the rushing current, the word was given, and we sped 
 swiftly up the river with the advancing tide. 
 
 A short distance up we met a sampan containing two Dyaks 
 who were bringing me two more mias, one dead and one alive. 
 The latter was a two-year-old youngster, tied to a stout stick, with 
 its hands above its head and its feet drawn well down and pinioned 
 also. 
 
 It bit viciously at everything, and made strenuous efforts to 
 seize any one who came near it. I would as soon have trusted a 
 finger in a steel-trap as between those vicious jaws. 
 
 At last, despairing of getting a chance at any of us, the raging 
 little wretch seized one of the fingers of its dead companion and bit 
 it to the bone. 
 
 Both orangs were found on a tree near the Dyaks' village, and, 
 having no fire-arms, they promptly chopped down the tree. The 
 old one was killed with spears and parongs, and so badly cut to 
 
DOINGS IN THE ORANG-UTAN COUNTRY. 373 
 
 pieces that its skin was almost worthless. But I sent them on to 
 Simujan, where I had left Perara to receive and take care of what- 
 ever specimens might arrive in my absence. 
 
 The Dyaks said that when the tree fell, a limb struck one of 
 their companions and dislocated his hip, and they begged us to stop 
 at the village and give him " obat " (medicine). An hour later we 
 came to the village where our enterprising Dyaks lived, and, taking 
 my box of medicines, I went ashore to see what I could do. 
 
 The house was of good size, containing about fifteen doors, and 
 we were conducted to a room at the farther end where the injured 
 man lay. He was not half so badly off as had been reported — a. 
 native rarely is for that matter. He lay on the floor with his in- 
 jured leg lying in a swing, bared to the hip, and smeared all over 
 with turmeric, which gave the limb an appearance of ghastly morti- 
 fication. 
 
 I soon found that the hip had not been dislocated, and that the 
 injury was only a very painful bruise. I bathed the limb with ar- 
 nica and bound on a cloth saturated with the same, not so much 
 for the effect it would have upon the injured Hmb as upon the 
 mind of the sufferer. 
 
 Of course the inhabitants of the village crowded into the room 
 and around the door to see what was going on — and such a crowd ! 
 Some had that repulsive skin disease called ichthyosis, which causes 
 the epidermis to crack and loosen somewhat, and roll up in thou- 
 sands of minute rolls, giving the otherwise dark brown body a gray- 
 ish appearance. Others had large ulcerous sores on their arms and 
 legs, which had been smeared over with turmeric and betel juice. 
 Some had sore eyes, others had tetter and ringworm, and I think 
 that of all the women who surrounded us in that room, about four 
 out of every five were afflicted with visible ailments. It was the 
 most unwholesome and affiicted crowd of Dyaks I ever saw, very 
 different indeed from nearly all those I had seen elsewhere and saw 
 subsequently. 
 
 Those who were not afflicted with cutaneous diseases were mostly 
 old women and men, toothless and gray, with the skin hanging on 
 their bare bodies in countless folds and wrinkles. Add to the 
 above, tangled masses of jet-black hair, general nakedness, plenty of 
 dirt, a little colored rattan and plenty of brass wire ornaments, and 
 you have the most prominent features of the crowd which sur- 
 roimded us. The house stood rather low on its posts, and the 
 ground underneath was in a terribly filthy state, which, in a great 
 
374 TWO YEARS IN TJIE JUNGLE. 
 
 measure, accounted for the ill-health of the occupants. My onlj 
 wonder is that they did not die off altogether in a single year. In 
 this village, be it remembered, we saw the Dyak at his worst, and 
 we gladly left it behind. 
 
 Just before dark we passed the last Dyak village and kept on 
 paddling for some time longer, until high water, in fact, when we 
 tied up to the bushes for our evening meal, and, in spite of mos- 
 (juitoes, slept soundly in the boats until morning. 
 
 About ten o'clock the next day wo killed another good-sized 
 orang, and at noon occurred the grand episode of our experience 
 in Borneo, tlio death of the "Rajah," the largest orang of all. 
 
 We had just met a Malay sampan coming down the river, and, 
 in answer to our inquiries, the occupants said they had seen no 
 mias. Half a mile higher up we heard a deep guttural growl or 
 roai", coming from the jungle back from the river, we thought, 
 which put us on the alert. Presently Blou, who was steering my 
 boat, whispered, " Mias ! mias, tuan ! " and struggled franticdly 
 to stop the boat. The paddlcrs backed water directly, although 
 we saw nothing imtil the boat had backed several yai'ds. Then we 
 espied the knee of a lai'ge orang, who was lying on a branch about 
 twenty feet above the water and only twenty yards from us. His 
 body was entirely hidden by tlie green foliage, so I stood up in the 
 boat and fired at his leg to rouse him. * 
 
 "The Tm-k awoke." He stai-ted up instantly, growling hoai'sely 
 with pain and anger, and started to swing away. His roach was 
 surprising in its length. Fortmiately the water was deep, there 
 were no screw pines to hinder om- progress, and in a moment our 
 sampan was directly under the old fellow, who then climbed high 
 to escape us. It was a huge mias chappin, long-haired, big and 
 burly. He groAvled savagely at us, and one of my men kept saying 
 in large capitals, 
 
 " Ch-vti'in ! CHAPPIN ! MIAS CHAPPIN ! FIRE, Sir ! fire ! fii-e ! — That's 
 mias chappin, big, big ! ! ! " 
 
 The men were all greatly excited, but I knew that the old fel- 
 low was om-s and waited for a good shot. In a moment the oppor- 
 tunity came, and I fired t^vice in quick succession at the orang'a 
 breast. He stopped short, hung for a moment by his hands, then 
 his hold gave way and he came teai-uig down, snapping off a lai-ge 
 dead branch as he fell, and landed broadside in the water, which 
 went flying jill over us. He foil within ten feet of our boat, and 
 we secured him without getting out 
 
A KIGIIT IN 'J'llK 'I'UHK-TOrS. 
 (Drawn fruin the gvoxtp in the U. S. National Museum mounted by the Author.) 
 
DOINGS IN THE ORANG-UTAN COUNTRY. 
 
 375 
 
 As we seized the arms and pulled the massive head up to the 
 surface of the water, the monster gave a great gasp, and looked re- 
 proachfully at us out of his half-closed eyes. I can never forget 
 the strange and even awful sensation with which I regarded the 
 face of the dying animal. There was nothing in it in the least 
 suggestive of anything human, but I felt as if I had shot some 
 grim and terrible gnome or river-god, a satyr indeed ! 
 
 "Ahdo ! Ahdo ! " exclaimed Lamudin in Malay, "the Kajah of 
 all the mias ! " 
 
 We were all filled with wonder at the huge beast before us. 
 He was a perfect giant in size, larger than any the natives had ever 
 seen before, and the largest ever shot by a naturaHst. His head, 
 body, and limbs were simply immense, and his weight could not 
 have been much, if any, less than one hundred and ninety pounds. 
 
 To give an idea of his size and proportions, I append his meas- 
 urements, together with those taken of a man of average weight 
 and stature. 
 
 Height, head to heel 
 
 Spread of arms, between finger-tips . . 
 Length of arm, armpit to finger-tips. . 
 
 Length of hand 
 
 Length of foot 
 
 Breadth of face 
 
 Length of face 
 
 Circumference of head, behind ears. . 
 
 Circumference of neck 
 
 Circumference of chest 
 
 Circumference of waist 
 
 Circumference of arm 
 
 Circumference of forearm 
 
 Circumference of thigh 
 
 Circumference of calf 
 
 Weight (estimated) 
 
 The Orang. 
 
 Medium-sized Man. 
 
 (Male.) 
 
 (Anglo-Saxon.) 
 
 Feet. Inches. 
 
 Feet. Inches. 
 
 4 5i 
 
 5 8 
 
 7 lot 
 
 5 7i 
 
 3 3 
 
 3 5 
 
 lOf 
 
 n 
 
 12i 
 
 10 
 
 13 
 
 H 
 
 lU 
 
 8i 
 
 2 n 
 
 1 10* 
 
 2 3f 
 
 1 3 
 
 3 5i 
 
 3 2i 
 
 4 2 
 
 2 lOi 
 
 m 
 
 IH 
 
 1 2 
 
 lOf 
 
 1 7 
 
 1 9 
 
 11* 
 
 1 2i 
 
 185 pounds. 
 
 160 pounds. 
 
 In another chapter will be found a somewhat extended descrip- 
 tion of both species of the orang, and therefore I will not offer here 
 any information concerning the external characteristics of the ani- 
 mal referred to above. He has since found a place, with several of 
 his nearest relatives, in a huge glass case in the National Museum 
 at Washington, where he is engaged in a sanguinary " Fight in the 
 
376 TTTO YEAES IN THE JUXGLE. 
 
 Tree-Tops." In our illustration of that group, under the above 
 title, the figui-e on the left is that of the "Eajah." 
 
 Late in the afternoon we anived at the Popook village, where 
 we stopped on our previous trip, and took up quarters as before. 
 We remained one day to prepai'e our specimens, and one more in 
 order to visit a large Dyak village, two miles above the north end of 
 the lake, and on the day following returned again to Simujan. On 
 the way down we took four mias, two old females and two young 
 males, and overtook my old Chinese orang hunter in a sampan 
 with two Dyaks and two dead mias, the latter for me, of course. 
 One of the mias was a very large and fine one, although rather 
 sparely built, and my mind was filled with gloomy forebodings 
 that he was equal to the Eajah in height. "When we reached Si- 
 mujan I measured him forthwith, and my worst feai's were realized. 
 The animal was actually half an inch taller than the Kajah, and his 
 height was therefore 4 feet 6 inches. 
 
 This was indeed a sad blow to us aU, and cast quite a gloom 
 over our spiiits. Up to that moment the Rajah had been the tallest 
 orang that ever feh into the hands of a naturalist, and I would fain 
 have had him remain so. The old Chinaman had used me very 
 badly, and I was shocked to observe that he did not feel the slight- 
 est contrition. 
 
 But, after all, the specimen I shot was considerably larger than 
 the other, and surpassed it in every thing except height and length 
 of arm. The Eajah outmeasured him in every other respect, had a 
 broader face, longer and thicker haii', and a far more massive build 
 generally. But for that disgusting half inch my specimen would 
 have been entirely satisfactory. 
 
 Duiing my absence Perara had received three other orangs, 
 which made twenty-one in all. I had scarcely paid the old celes- 
 tial for his specimens when a party of Dyaks arrived with two hve 
 ones. I recognized the larger as the one we met on our way up, 
 and he was, if possible, more savage than ever. Even when I cut 
 his bonds he tried hard to bite me, and when he was free, with the 
 exception of a cord round his neck, the company very promptly and 
 respectfully made way for him. I tied him by a long Hne in the 
 unused bath-room, and he climbed up to the rafters, where he 
 hung, suUenly refusing food, and even knocking the bananas out 
 of my hand when I oftered them. 
 
 The other live orang was a httle fellow,, a baby about six 
 months old, of very different disposition from the other two. He 
 
DOINGS IN THE ORANG-UTAN COUNTRY. 377 
 
 was quite peaceable, not even once attempting to bite, but whined 
 softly when I approached him, and rolled up his big brown eyes 
 appealingly. His petition was not to be refused. I cut the bark 
 that bound his hands and feet, and placed a pile of soft straw in the 
 verandah for him, into the middle of which he immediately crawled 
 and curled himself up. Thus began a great friendship between 
 ape and man. 
 
 As a pet, the larger orang was not exactly a success. Day and 
 night he clung to the rafters of the bath-room, as high up as he could 
 get, sullenly refusing all food and repelling my most friendly ad- 
 vances. In the middle of the second night after I got him we were 
 awakened by hearing something strike with a terrific " bang " on 
 the bath-room floor, and, on going in, we found him lying where he 
 had fallen, stone dead. 
 
CHAPTER XXXn. 
 
 COLLECTING AEOUND SIMUJAN. 
 
 Native Hunters. — Two Orangs Killed at Simujan. — Nest-making by an Orang. 
 — A Harvest of Mammals. — A Deputation of Dyaks from the Sibuyau. — • 
 An Inviting Invitation. — The Rise and Progress of the Baby Orang. — An 
 Interesting Pet. — Humanlike Habits and Emotions. — A Tuba-fishing 
 Picnic. — Third Journey up the Simujan. — Snake Curry. — A Voyage in 
 the Dark. 
 
 I GAVE gunpowder (" obat," or gun-medicine !) quite liberally to aU 
 the natives who requested it, Dyaks, Malays, and Chinese, and in 
 every possible way encouraged them to hunt animals for me. I 
 found them very diligent and businesslike, and not in the least 
 tricky or dishonest, as were the natives of India and Ceylon, whom 
 I had occasion to employ in the same way. It was a great pleasure 
 to deal with the Simujan people, for they were so frank and honest. 
 
 Only one of my hunters was ever guilty of a breach of trust, 
 and that was a young Chinaman of our village, who shot a wild 
 boar in the jungle, a mile from the kampong, and cut it up without 
 giving me a chance to skin it. Getting word of it I went over, con- 
 fiscated the head, and read the young celestial a lecture that he re- 
 membered afterward to our mutual advantage. 
 
 After getting back from my second trip up the Simujan I de- 
 termined to remain some weeks at the village, and, with the aid of 
 my native hunters, give that locality a thorough overhauling. 
 
 Early one fine morning we heard the report of fireai'ms coming 
 from the jungle on the right bank of the Sadong, not more than a 
 mile below the village. It continued for about an hour, during 
 which time about twenty-five shots were fired, when it ceased, and 
 a Malay came with a sampan after me. I got my rifle and returned 
 with him, and, on wading three hundred yards into the forest, we 
 found a large party of Dyaks and Malays with a dead mias on the 
 ground and a live one " treed " in the top of a lofty tree. They 
 
COLLECTING AEOUND SIMUJAN. 379 
 
 were unable to hit it with their weapons, and no wonder. They 
 were all old flint-lock muskets, and while the Malays aspired to 
 leaden buUets, the poor Dyaks used chunks of iron, made by cut- 
 ting round iron rods or bolts into pieces an inch long. I now 
 understood why the Dyaks had never asked me for percussion caps. 
 
 I got there just in time to see the orang build a large nest for 
 himself. He took up a position in a fork which was well screened 
 by the foliage, and began to break off small branches and pile them 
 loosely in the crotch. There was no attempt at weaving, nor even 
 regularity in anything. He reached out his long, hairy arm, snapped 
 off the leafy branches with a practised hand, and laid them down 
 with the broken ends sticking out. He presently got on the pile 
 with his feet, and standing there to weight it down he turned 
 slowly, breaking branches all the while, and laying them across the 
 pile in front of him, until he had built quite a large nest. When 
 he had finished, he laid down upon it, and was so effectually screened 
 from us that I could not dislodge him, and after two or three shots 
 I told the natives they would have to cut the tree. 
 
 Three or four Dyaks were provided with biliongs, and after 
 hastily lashing together a few poles, to serve as a platform to enable 
 them to get at the trunk above the spur roots, they mounted it and 
 began chopping. 
 
 The rapidity with which those insignificant little axes ate into 
 the tree was wonderful. In an incredibly short time — less than 
 half an hour — the tree fell, the orang revealed himself and was 
 promptly killed. After we got home I devoted the remainder of the 
 day to sketching the larger of the two orangs, a fine mias chappin, 
 in different positions. With considerable difficulty we hauled him 
 into the top of a tree that stood near the house, put liim in a life- 
 like attitude, with his hands and feet grasping the branches and 
 lashed him there, after which I made a careful sketch of him from 
 the ground. 
 
 My native hunters brought me many fine specimens of mammals, 
 a few large birds, many reptiles and a few fishes. The most suc- 
 cessful of aU my collectors was a fine Dyak named Dundang, already 
 spoken of, who shot four orangs, several rhinoceros hombills, two 
 or three proboscis monkeys, a wild hog, and quite a number of 
 small mammals. One of the orangs he brought me had the hair 
 on its back quite blackened and singed, as if it had been killed at 
 close range. Upon being questioned, he said he woimded the mias, 
 but could not bring it down, and having fired all his charges but 
 
380 TWO YEARS IN THE JUNGLE. 
 
 one, he climbed into the tree containing the orang, put the muzzle 
 of his gun so near the animal's body that he could not fail to hit, 
 and fired. 
 
 The Malays are quite expert in catching deer. Besides noosing 
 a fine sambur buck {Biisa equina?) they caught for me Java deer 
 (" plandok "), one after another, until I cried enough. The latter 
 {Tragulus napu) is the smallest of all the deer tribe, being a true 
 pigmy only nine inches high, very trim, graceful and pretty, but, 
 unfortunately, without antlers. The sambur was a much-dwarfed, 
 faded-out, thin-haired representative of his species, in comparison 
 with the noble stags of the Animallais. His antlers were also very 
 insignificant in comparison, but as for that I have seen fully as 
 great variation in the antlers of our Virginia deer in a far smaller 
 area of distribution. 
 
 Two specimens of a curious viverrine animal, half cat and half 
 otter, the Cynogale Bennettii, were brought in, several civet cats, a 
 beautiful flying lemur (Galeopithecus volans), and a slow-paced 
 lemur (Nycticebus tardigradus). The Cynogale, for which I believe 
 there is no common name unless we call it the otter cat, is peculiar 
 to Borneo, and only one species is known. Its muzzle is extremely 
 broad at the end (2f inches), but narrows suddenly midway be- 
 tween the end of the nose and the eyes, which gives the head a 
 very strange appearance, totally unlike that bf any other quadru- 
 ped I am acquainted with. The animal is 24f inches in length of 
 head and body, and the tail measures 7 inches. It is covered with 
 a rather thick coat of moderately long but fine fur, of a uniform 
 dark-brown color. I shot in the neighborhood several specimens 
 of the common gray monkey {Macacus cynomolgus), a pig-tailed ma- 
 caque {M. nemestrinus), here called the " broque " in Malay, from 
 which the outlandish common name of " bruh " has been evolved. 
 
 One day a party of Dyaks arrived from the head of the Sibuyau 
 Eiver, between the Sadong and Batang Lupar, bringing several 
 fragmentary skins of argus pheasant, which had been taken off in 
 native fashion for the wing and tail feathers, and also a live argus. 
 The poor bird had had a hard time of it, and in looking at it I felt 
 guilty of cruelty to animals. In its struggles it had lost half its 
 body feathers, and, worst of all, when it was caught in the noose 
 one of its legs had been dislocated. I lost no time in putting it 
 beyond the reach of further pain. 
 
 The Sibuyau people told me that argus pheasants and animals 
 of many kinds I had not yet found were plentiful around their vil- 
 
HEAD OF CrXOCrALE BEXXETTII. 
 
 {SketcJiedfrom life.) 
 
 EMBRYO OF CROCODILUS POROSrS. 
 
 ( Xatural size.) 
 
THE "OLD MAN." (Young Oeang-utan.) 
 
 (From an inslatUaneous photograph.) 
 
COLLECTING AROUND SIMUJAN. 381 
 
 lage, and gave nie a pressing invitation to make them a long visit. 
 I determined to accept it as soon as I had worked up the Sadong 
 region sufficiently, and told them they might expect mo in a few 
 weeks. 
 
 The baby orang mentioned at the end of the preceding chapter 
 became a striking example of the survival of the fittest. While my 
 first two captives were vicious to the last degree, and died promptly, 
 without repentance, my third pet turned out to be all that heart of 
 man could desire in an orang. He was by no means a thing of 
 beauty, but he certainly was a joy forever. 
 
 Judged by our standard of human beauty, he was perhaps as 
 ugly as any healthy child could be and live ; but, for all that, his 
 homeliness was interesting; it seemed to conform to a general plan 
 of ugliness, and nothing was lacking to make it perfect. But, 
 judged by the standard of anthropoid beauty, he was as handsome 
 and wholesome a little orang as ever climbed. His eyes were large, 
 bright and full of intelligence, and he had a forehead like a philos- 
 opher. 
 
 Because of his bald and shiny head, his solemn, wrinkled and 
 melancholy visage, his air of profound gravity and senatorial wis- 
 dom, we got to calling him the Old Man, and forgot to give him any 
 Christian name. A thin growth of brick-red hair grew straight up 
 the back of his head and over the crown, making, in certain lights, 
 a perfect halo around his bald, brown pate, reminding one rather 
 forcibly of certain pictures by the old masters. 
 
 I measvu'ed him, for the first time, on October 15th, in spite of 
 his vigorous opposition, and found that his height was 21| inches, 
 extent of arms 34|^ inches, and his weight 10|- pounds. His body 
 was short and thick, and, like all orangs, his arms were so long and 
 his legs so short that by stooping forward a little, his hands easily 
 touched the ground. In walking, he invariably went on all fours, 
 placing the back of the fingers and ball of the thumb, instead of 
 the palm, upon the ground, and he also turned his toes under. His 
 gait on the ground was very much like that of a man going on 
 crutches with both feet injured ahke. On the ground he moved 
 slowly, seeming quite out of his element, but his feats in climbing 
 and his performances on the slack-rope were highly entertaining. 
 
 He was fresh from the jungle when brought to me, but I soon 
 convinced him that my intentions were honorable, and slowly gained 
 his confidence. For three or four days he would not allow me to 
 bold him in my arms unless I would let him grasp some firm object 
 
389 TTTO TEAES IX THE JUXGLE. 
 
 with at least one hand. The action plainly showed that he feared I 
 would play a trick on him br letting him fall. Presently, how- 
 ever, I hit upon a plan which conquered his suspicion. I made 
 him climb up to my shoiilder to get the bananas of which he was 
 very fond, and, after that, a banana held at arm's length above my 
 head would start him to chmbing my body as if it were a tree 
 until the tempting bait was reached. 
 
 He soon became very fond of being held in my arms, and when 
 I gi-ew tii'ed of holding him, he would grasp the folds of my flannel 
 shirt and hold himself — quite an improvement upon the puny help- 
 lessness of human infants. 
 
 Next to eating seven bananas at once, his greatest dehght was 
 in sitting lazily in my hip while I sat reading, writing, or even eat- 
 ing, sprawling out his legs and arms, catching hold of my book, or 
 my penholder, or pulling at the table-cloth. 
 
 Once while holding him in my lap at dinner, he suddenly made 
 a pass at the roast duck which lay before me, and had his teeth ia 
 it before I could recover from my surprise. On one occasion when 
 I sat eating, he leisurely climbed up the back of my chair, squatted 
 on the topmost round, leaned lazily forward against me, and rested 
 his chin comfortably on my shoulder. And there he sat all 
 through the meal, watching the performance with the air of a 
 connoisseur. , 
 
 For a long time he would eat nothing but bananas and sugar- 
 cane, and I was at my wits' end to find a way to teach him to eat 
 boiled rice. One day, however, as he was sitting in my lap while 
 I was at dinner, I noticed that his eyes followed the journeys of my 
 spoon with great iaterest, and it occurred to me that human beings 
 always want what they cannot have. Happy thought I I began to 
 pass each spoonful of rice close to his mouth on its way to mine. 
 He soon began to open his mouth every time he saw the spoon 
 coming, only to be disappointed by seeing it travel on to his next 
 neighbor. From being merely wilhDg to tiy the rice, he became 
 very anxious when he saw it was denied him, and a little more 
 tantalizing set him to struggling violently for the food he had 
 previously despised, "When it was finally given him he ate it with 
 the greatest satisfaction, and thereafter, with the addition of milk, 
 it became his daily food. 
 
 He also learned to eat -with relish all kinds of cooked meat, 
 vegetables, canned fruit and bread, and to drink tea, coffee, milk 
 and chocolate, in all respects evincing the tastes of a human being 
 
COLLECTING AROUND SIMUJAN. 383 
 
 — except that he would not touch beer, wine nor spirits. He lived 
 and died a teetotaler. 
 
 The Old Man soon grew fat and mischievous, and always did 
 his best to amuse me. Many an absurd childish game we 
 played upon the floor in highly undignified fashion. One of his 
 favorite tricks was to seize my hand suddenly, draw it to his mouth, 
 and make a feint of giving it a terrible bite. But he always knew 
 that he must bite gently, which is more than can be said of any 
 human infant I ever experimented with. Often he would entertain 
 me for half an hoiu* by making the most comically wry faces, for 
 which his broad, india-rubber lips were specially adapted. He 
 was also a great contortionist, and, having no ligamentum teres, the 
 freedom with which he used his legs was at first quite surprising. 
 
 When at Simujan I slept in a tall and wide " four-poster," and 
 the little feUow was always anxious to sleep with me. Whenever I 
 permitted him to do so, his happiness was complete. His favorite 
 position was to lie sprawling upon my chest, affectionately clasp- 
 ing my body with his outstretched arms and legs, with his head on 
 my shoulder and his face close to my neck. Being as clean and 
 wholesome as any human being, and without any odor of tobacco 
 or Hquor on his breath, he made a very agreeable bed-fellow until 
 he got into the habit of snoring and sneezing so much as to disturb 
 my slumbers, when it became necessary for him to sleep by him- 
 self. Meanwhile, I watched him closely, and did everything I could 
 think of to arouse his mind to action, and stimulate it to act in 
 different directions. 
 
 About this time I had another very interesting anthropoid pet, 
 a young gibbon, which I purchased at a Dyak village. Instead of 
 hobbling along like the little orang, which used its arms as if they 
 were crutches, it woiild stand perfectly erect, partially extend its 
 long, tlain arms out sideways to balance himself, and walk across 
 the floor with brisk confidence. When in good health it was quite 
 friendly, and even affectionate, but in spite of my efforts to prolong 
 its life it soon sickened and died. 
 
 On September 27th, a bore again came up the river, and on the 
 day following the tide rose to an unusual height, about fourteen feet, 
 covering every speck of land in the kampong, so that the Malays 
 paddled from house to house in their sampans, and Ah Kee had 
 to wade knee deep in water to get my dinner from the cook« 
 house to the table. It was like a Mississippi freshet, except that it 
 departed as suddenly as it came. 
 
384 TWO YEAES IN THE JUNGLE. 
 
 On October 2d Mr. Eng Quee got up a grand tuba-fishing 
 party, and invited me to make one of it, wbich I was very glad to 
 do. We rose at midnight and started down the river with the 
 ebb tide. I lay down in the boat and slept until we arrived at the 
 mouth of the Ensengi Eiver, a large creek which empties into 
 the Sadong from the west, about six miles below the village. We 
 found there a number of Malays in sampans, patiently waiting for 
 Haybreak, and, after a good deal of time-killing banter, all hands 
 lay down and went to sleep. 
 
 At daybreak the little fleet of canoes started up the creek, and, 
 after paddling about two miles, the stream rose above tidal in- 
 fluence, and the banks were thickly fringed with pandanus. The 
 rendezvous was about four miles up. 
 
 When all had arrived there were present twenty-three sampans, 
 manned by about sixty Malays. The first thing in order with the 
 Malays was the usual breakfast of boiled rice, which many had 
 brought cold, wrapped in banana leaves, and others cooked on the 
 spot. After that, all fell to work to prepare the tuba, which is the 
 fine, fibrous root of a chmbing plant (a species of 3Ienispermum\ 
 which possesses a powerful narcotic principle, and is grown for the 
 special purpose of taking fish. It was done up in small, close bun- 
 dles, the thickness of a man's wrist and six or eight inches long, 
 and was dry and hard. 
 
 The bimdles were distributed so that each boat received four or 
 five, each man procured a stout little club of green wood, and the 
 poimding began. The game was to reduce the tuba to a pulp, and 
 for an hour sixty clubs beat a lively tattoo on the root bundles as 
 they were held on the edges of the boats. A quantity of water, 
 perhaps twenty gallons, was dipped into each boat, into which the 
 tuba was dipped and wrung out from time to time, until it gradu- 
 ally softened under the pounding process and was reduced to 
 shi'eds. When water was squeezed out of the tuba it had a white, 
 frothy appearance, like soap-suds. 
 
 As fast as the bundles of tuba were reduced to fine shreds, they 
 were chopped up with a parong, and the particles mixed with the 
 water in the boats. When all the root had been thus pounded and 
 chopped up, the Malays procured lumps of clay and dissolved them 
 in the solution until it was made quite murky. Each boat con- 
 tained about twenty gallons of this narcotic extract. 
 
 The stream was about forty feet wide and eight to ten feet deep, 
 the current was swift and the water rather mui'ky. 
 
COLLECTING AROUND SIMTJJAN. 385 
 
 We waited until the tide was half out, and then, after selecting 
 a good place, the boats drew close together, the word was given, 
 and with a ringing cheer the extract was quickly dipped up and 
 thi'own into the stream. As I looked at the small quantity of tuba- 
 water and the volume of water in the creek I must confess to en- 
 tertaining doubts of the result. 
 
 Having performed the act of faith, we began at once to look for 
 fish. The stream absorbed the tuba-water as though it had been 
 so much dirty soap-suds, and not a trace of it was to be seen five 
 minutes after. We drifted slowly down to where there were curves 
 and quiet eddies in the stream, and each man looked for what he 
 considered the most likely place for a fish to rise. Presently we 
 saw two little fellows floating helplessly at the surface, and the man 
 nearest them kindly took them in out of the wet. 
 
 Each man had a small dip-net and a " grains " with two or 
 three prongs. The spear-head was set in the end of a bamboo 
 handle so that it would come out when a fish was struck, and of 
 course the spear-head was made fast to the handle by a stout Hne. 
 Mr. Eng Quee had provided me with a spear, which I was very anx- 
 ious to use. 
 
 Just as our boats reached a wide bend in the stream, a large fish 
 showed its sHmy, black back at the surface, just out of our reach. 
 My first thought was that it was a porpoise, it was so large and 
 black. Presently it appeared again and floated for a moment with 
 its back out of water. It was certainly four feet long. Mr. Eng 
 Quee and one of his Malays threw their sjoears at it but missed. 
 Then I skipped to the bow of my boat, and finding myself within 
 reach of the fish drove my spear into its side. It gave a lunge for- 
 ward, almost throwing me overboard and upsetting the boat, and 
 then — Oh ! my soul ! the line snapped ! Down went the huge fish, 
 and we never saw him again. I hoped that some one of the party 
 would see him and take him in, but was disappointed. 
 
 Fifteen minutes later, another big fish of the same kind came 
 up, was speared by two Malays, and after a gallant struggle was 
 secured. It was a httle over three feet long, scaleless, with a 
 broad, flat head, somewhat like that of a catfish, a thin body, small 
 dorsal fin and the anal fin very broad and long. Its color was 
 blackish-brown, with three light bands along the middle of the 
 side. Altogether nine large specimens of this species (Wallago 
 leerii) were taken during the day. 
 
 The tide was stiU running out when we arrived at the mouth of 
 25 
 
386 TWO YEARS IN THE JUNGLE. 
 
 the creek, and many fish were found stranded on the mud along 
 the banks, dead and dying. The Malays waded along at the water's 
 edge, knee deep in mud, to secure those that came ashore, and 
 also others that rose to the sui-face close to the bank. 
 
 Just at the mouth of the creek we found numbers of small fish 
 floating at the surface, of which we easily secured fifteen with our 
 dip-net. All but three were thread fishes, a strange species of 
 Polynemus, which is readily distinguished by the extremely long, 
 white, threadlike filaments, more than twice the length of the 
 whole fish, attached to the pectoral fins. This is, in more respects 
 than one, a very curious fish, as may be seen by an examination of 
 the excellent figure given herewith. 
 
 The Malays were desperately fish-hungry, and I coidd not in- 
 duce them to sell many of their largest fish, but I consoled myself 
 with the purchase of the smaller ones, and also a very fine large 
 turtle which was caught in a net. 
 
 Among the most interesting species taken were Periophthalmus 
 schlosserii, our old friend of the Selangore mud banks, the aii-- 
 breathing Ophiocephalus, and the celebrated gourami {Osphro- 
 vienus gourami), a large and fine fish of great economic value, and 
 well known to ichthyologists, especially those engaged in fish cul- 
 ture, from the numerous efforts that have been made, many of 
 them successfvd, to acclimatize it in various countries from the 
 East Indies to the United States. I found it native to Selangore, 
 where I obtained one very fine specimen. Since there is already 
 an abvmdance of literature on the gourami, I will add only a refer- 
 ence to the accompanying illustration, which is a reproduction of a 
 figm-e given by Dr. Theodore N. Gill in his paper on this species, 
 which appeared in the Report of the U. S. Commissioner of Fish 
 and Fisheries in 1876. 
 
 On the tuba-fishing pic-nic referred to above, I was fortunate 
 in securing a specimen of the very rai'e and curious little pike-head 
 {Luciocephalus pulcher),* the jaws of which are capable of being 
 protruded far forward, thereby rendering the mouth sub-tubular. 
 The name, Luciocephalus, meaning as it does, "pike-head," is a 
 very apt one, for the head certainly much resembles that of the 
 familiar pike or pickerel of our home waters. The fish, however, ia 
 
 * For the identification of tlie fishes I collected in the Sadong River and its 
 tributaries (35 species), I am under obligations to Dr. Tarleton H. Bean, Cura- 
 tor of Fishes, U. S. National Museum. 
 
COLLECTING AROUND SIMUJAN. 387 
 
 not at all related to the pike, but is nearest akin to the pecuUar 
 fishes with labyrinthiform pharyngeals, known as the Anahantids, 
 and comprising, among others, the climbing fish and gouraml 
 Its combination of pecuUar characters renders it an object of 
 great interest to naturalists, and by them it is considered to be 
 the representative of a special family, — the Luciocephalids. 
 
 The next day my hunters brought me a rhinoceros hornbill, 
 two proboscis monkeys, a live slow-paced lemur {Nycticebus tardigra- 
 dus) and a brilliant emerald-green tree-snake {Passerita), about six 
 feet long, which was the most beautiful serpent I ever saw, A 
 Dyak boy brought it in his hands, and I received it in mine with- 
 out any of the revulsion of feeling one ordinarily feels in handUng 
 a live snake. 
 
 It was a sociable sort of a snake, not in the least nervous on ac- 
 count of its captivity, and I kept it alive for some hours, and al- 
 lowed it to crawl quietly over my table and around the room. I 
 was quite charmed with its splendid color, lithe, beautiful form, and 
 graceful movement. It was a painful matter to both of us when 
 I was at last obhged to consign it to the alchohol can. 
 
 Late in the afternoon of October 4th, I started on my third and 
 last trip to Padang Lake, with the intention of living at the Po- 
 pook village for two or three weeks. Our starting was delayed 
 by the arrival of a large civet cat, a wild cat, and a wild hog's head, 
 all of which had to be attended to immediately. I took the little 
 baby orang with me, partly because I did not Hke to risk leaving 
 him, and also because I liked his company. 
 
 Darkness overtook us before we had gone far, but it was a clear 
 moonhght night and we expected to make a long pull before tying 
 up. Very soon, however, the sky became overcast with heavy black 
 clouds, making the darkness very intense, and the lightning and 
 thunder foretold an approaching storm. Just before it broke, 
 we came to a tiny Dyak hut, about eight feet square, recently 
 erected at the edge of the bank, and, making fast to the shore, we 
 quickly climbed the ladder and craved shelter. " The man of the 
 house " was at home, with his wife and two children, and we were 
 received with true Dyak cordiality. A dammar torch was burning 
 near the door, and in a comer a small fire was smouldering on a bed 
 of clay. The hut which sheltered us from the pouring rain was of the 
 kind frequently seen along the Sadong and Simujan, a mere tempo- 
 rary erection, built in three days, and occupied only while the owner 
 was planting a crop of paddi and afterward while harvesting it 
 
386 TWO YEARS IN THE JUNGLE. 
 
 the creek, and many fish were found stranded on the mud along 
 the banks, dead and dying. The Malays waded along at the water's 
 edge, knee deep in mud, to secure those that came ashore, and 
 also others that rose to the svu'face close to the bank. 
 
 Just at the mouth of the creek we found numbers of small fish 
 floating at the surface, of which we easily secured fifteen with our 
 dip-net. All but three were thread fishes, a strange species of 
 Polynemus, which is readily distinguished by the extremely long, 
 white, thi'eadlike filaments, more than twice the length of the 
 whole fish, attached to the pectoral fins. This is, in more respects 
 than one, a very curious fish, as may be seen by an examination of 
 the excellent figure given herewith. 
 
 The Malays were desperately fish-hungry, and I could not in- 
 duce them to sell many of their largest fish, but I consoled myself 
 with the purchase of the smaller ones, and also a very fine large 
 turtle which was caught in a net. 
 
 Among the most interesting species taken were Periophthalmus 
 schlosserii, our old friend of the Selangore mud banks, the au-- 
 breathing Ophiocephalus, and the celebrated gom-ami {Osphro- 
 menus gourami), a large and fine fish of great economic value, and 
 well knowTi to ichthyologists, especially those engaged in fish cul- 
 ture, from the numerous efforts that have been made, many of 
 them successful, to acclimatize it in vaiious countries fi'om the 
 East Indies to the United States. I found it native to Selangore, 
 where I obtained one very fine specimen. Since there is ah-eady 
 an abimdance of literatui-e on the gourami, I will add only a refer- 
 ence to the accompanying illustration, which is a reproduction of a 
 figure given by Dr. Theodore N. Gill in his paper on this species, 
 w'hich appeared in the Keport of the U. S. Commissioner of Fish 
 and Fisheries in 1876. 
 
 On the tuba-fishing pic-nic referred to above, I was fortunate 
 in securing a specimen of the very rai-e and curious little pike-head 
 {Luciocephalus pulcher),* the jaws of which ai-e capable of being 
 protruded far forward, thereby rendering the mouth sub-tubulai\ 
 The name, Luciocephalus, meaning as it does, "pike-head," is a 
 very apt one, for the head certainly much resembles that of the 
 famihai' pike or pickerel of our home waters. The fish, however, is 
 
 * For tlie identification of the fishes I collected in the Sadong River and its 
 tributaries (35 species), I am under obligations to Dr. Tarieton H. Bean, Cura- 
 tor of Fishes, U. S. National Museum. 
 
COLLECTING ABOUND SIMUJAN. 383 
 
 and how we ever got through that narrow, zigzag tunnel in the 
 dark without going astray also passes my comprehension at this 
 time. In many places the channel was so filled with floating Pan- 
 danus stems as to be almost impassable, and many times oui' boat- 
 roof was caught by overhanging branches and nearly dragged oK 
 Aided by the lightning flashes, and the slight reflection on the open 
 water, I was able to spy out the passage a few yards at a time and 
 give directions to the steersman. 
 
 At last, to our inexpressible rehef, we emerged on the open 
 water of the lake, and headed north. By this time the clouds had 
 lifted a little, and we were able to distinguish Gunong Popook, 
 After several trials we found the landing, and a few moments later 
 climbed the ladder of the village. Great was the astonishment of 
 the Dyaks when they saw a white man enter at the door, rifle in 
 hand, with a little red-haired orang-utan clinging to his shirt. 
 There was a large party of visitors in the village, and when we 
 told them from whence we came since nightfall their siirprise was 
 profound. 
 
 " And who showed you the way ? " they demanded. 
 
 " The tuan " (mister). 
 
 " Ah-doe ! Ah-doe ! Ah-doe ! " 
 
 We were wet, cold, and hungry, but all these evils were speedily 
 corrected, and our enjoyment of them was intensified by the thought 
 of Lamudin and his companion in their wet boat on the river, 
 plagued by darkness, rain, mosquitoes and hunger. 
 
d 
 
 CHAPTER XXXIII. 
 
 COLLECTING AT PADANG LAKE. 
 
 A Hunt on Gimong Popook. — A Lost Hunter. — A Handsome Dyak. — A Recep- 
 tion by Torchlight. — More Orang-utans. — How an Orang Sleeps. — Probos- 
 cis Monkeys. — Living irrsus Stuffed Specimens. — A Remarkable Nose. — 
 Luckless Gibbon-hianting. — Luckless Wild-hog Hunting. — Mud and 
 Thorns. — Picturesque Vegetation. — Fresh-vrater Turtles and Fishes. — Re- 
 turn to the Sadong. 
 
 I SPENT a, most deliglitful fortnight with the Djaks at the Popook 
 ■\-illage. The weather was continuously fine, the Djaks were 
 agi'ceable and interesting, the jungle yielded a good hai'vest of 
 specimens, and every day there was something new to see and 
 to do. 
 
 I presently sent Lamudin and his companion back to Simujan, 
 and with my three other men settled dovm. comfortably to hve and 
 work. 
 
 My first experience was a rather ridiculous one for me, and con- 
 sisted in my getting lost, almost within sight of the village. Dur- 
 ing the afternoon of the day following oiu' aiiival, we heard some 
 wah-wahs (gibbons) crying in the tree-tops, far up the steep side of 
 Gunong Popook, and, hastily catching up my shot-gim, I started 
 for them. 
 
 My boy Pei-ara was also hiuiting on the moimtain, and, before I 
 had quite reached my game, he fired twice, close-by, which scared 
 the wah-wahs into silence and out of the neighborhood. I cHmbed 
 on until I reached the summit of the mountain, which is a perfect 
 cone only a few yards across at the top. Just as I reached the 
 summit, a female sambur deer ran along the steep slope, forty yards 
 below me, in full view. Having only small shot in my gun, it would 
 have been worse than useless to have fii*ed. 
 
 Presently, I began to slowly descend As I was quietly stoop- 
 ing down to examine some shells, another sambur, also a doe, trotted 
 
COLLECTING AT PA DANG LAKE. 391 
 
 up, halted, and stood stock still in full view, not more than twenty 
 yards away. I thought of Balaam and how he wished for his sword, 
 and sympathized with him while I thought of my rifle. She im- 
 pressed me as being the least handsome of all the deer tribe, except- 
 ing, perhaps, the female moose. After we had stared at each other 
 a few seconds she trotted off, and a few moments later I saw a stag 
 of the same species, whose antlers were in the velvet. It literally 
 rained sambur because my dish was bottom up. 
 
 After wandering about for some time to no purjaose, I set out to 
 return to the house. Half way down I shot a black monkey or 
 " bijit " {Semnopitheais femoralis), slung it over my shoulder to 
 carry home, and made for the clearing on the mountainside. After 
 a slow and painful struggle through several acres of thorns I heard 
 a dog bark, saw the edge of the clearing, and knew that I was near 
 the house. At last I reached the edge of the clearing and heaved a 
 sigh of relief, but lo ! it wasn't our clearing at all ! I had never 
 seen it before, and knew that there was no such spot within a mile 
 of the Popook village. The explanation was not difficult. In com- 
 ing down the mountain I had made altogether too many degrees of 
 longitude at the top, which brought me out on the west side in- 
 stead of on the south. It was almost sunset, there was no path 
 leading south from the clearing, and I knew that I could not possi- 
 bly make my way through that thorny jungle at that time of day 
 without getting lost and benighted. 
 
 Seeing smoke at the farther end of the clearing, toward the 
 north, I went toward it, resolved to bivouac in good style, and, if 
 it became necessary, roast my black monkey and sup on it. But I 
 found a path leading away from the clearing, and followed it up 
 rapidly. After walking about a mile, I came to a small Dyak house 
 of four or five doors. Calling out the inhabitants I said to them 
 in Malay, " Give me two men go Popook Dyak house, quick ! " 
 
 They asked a question or two which I did not quite understand, 
 and therefore answered somewhat at random. They civilly iuAdted 
 me to come in and sit down, and chew betel with them, but with 
 equal civility I declined and urged them to come on. Straight- 
 way two of the young men arose, took a fresh chew of the betel, 
 girded up their loins, tied on their parongs and said they were 
 ready. I said we had " better go lake, go boat," and we started 
 for the lake at once. 
 
 Both my guides were as fine-looking Dyaks as any I saw in 
 Sarawak Territory. One was a youth about seventeen years old, 
 
802 TWO \KAKS IX THE JUXGLE. 
 
 ■u-ith an intelligeut, even handsome face, a beautifully-moulded form, 
 erect cai'riage, and easy, graceful movement. On tlie score of good 
 looks and general physique he coidd discount nine-tenths of aU the 
 white boys I ever saw. 
 
 The two were dressed ahke, in decidedly pictiu'esque cos- 
 tumes. The head-dress was a clean tiu-ban of bright scai'let cloth, 
 neatly wound around the head, with a loose end fiiUing over the 
 left 0!U-. Tlie oro^^^l of the head was whoUy uncovered, and a pro- 
 fusion of jet black locks fell over the top of the tui-ban. The 
 '' chawatv," or loiu-cloth, was also scai-let cloth disposed in ample 
 folds, fringed at both ends, one of which hmig down apronlike in 
 front, and the other at the back. 
 
 Each of the Pyaks wore behind him. suspended by a cord around 
 the wnist, a sliield-shaped mat of m:my coloi*s, which quite covered 
 the body from the loins hiilf way down to the thighs, and was evi- 
 dently worn to sit upon. One of these protectors was ornamented 
 by a border of cowiies sewn on close together till the way roimd. 
 
 Theu' paroug sheaths were each bedecked at the end with a 
 bimch of the most showy wing and tail feathei-s of the ai-gus pheas- 
 :uit. The pei-sous of my guides were f m-ther ornamented by sevei-al 
 copper rings worn in each eai\ which proclaimed them to be Seri- 
 bas men, bracelets and armlets of finely -pLuted ratfcui, and leglets 
 of beaded ratt;m worn just below the knee. T:iken altogether they 
 were as hiuidsome savages as one could wish to see. 
 
 On reaching the lake, which was about a mile from the house, the 
 Byaks found two paddles that had been hidden iu the grass, dipped 
 the water out of a simken canoe, and, getting into it, we set off just 
 as it gi-ew d:u-k. As we ne:u-ed the Popook village we heai'd people 
 calluig for me far up the side of the moimti\iu, but I was not able 
 to make them he:ir my answering shout. As soon as we reached 
 the -village the gong was beaten and sevenil shots fii-ed to call back 
 the foiu- Dy:vks :md Dobah, who were then f:u- beyond the cleai-ing. 
 I was very well ple^ised to find that they had tiu-ned out so prompt- 
 ly to look for me ; going, as they did, naked and barefooted, iu 
 the dai-k, into thick jungle among rocks and thorns. As they were 
 retm-ning. one of the Pyaks was ch:\i-ged upon by some lai-ge ani- 
 mal, presumably a deer, knocked down, considerably bruised and 
 dreadfully scratched, besides receiving a cut on his leg and another 
 on his e^u". The suddenness of the assiuilt and its mysterious nat- 
 ure caused great excitement and a volmne of loud tcilk. I served 
 out tobacco to the crowd and di-essed the wounds of the injured 
 
COLLECTING AT PADANG LAKE. 393 
 
 party with arnica and court plaster, which pleased all the Dyaks 
 veiy much and placed us all on confidential terms. 
 
 The natives sat by and looked on with great curiosity while I 
 ate my supper. Afterward they examined my shoes with great 
 interest, and one man succeeded in putting one of them on. They 
 also inspected my feet closely, and a comparison of theirs with mine 
 was the cause of much merriment. 
 
 I took advantage of their good humor to ask them about the 
 little metallic plates on some of their fi'ont teeth, which looked like 
 gold. I found that each ujjper incisor and canine tooth was capped 
 by a smooth plate of copper, held in place by a pin driven into a 
 hole in the tooth. The Dyaks showed me how the hole is drilled 
 (with a bow), and one imitated the agony they endure during the 
 operation. He was a good actor, and his facial and bodily contor- 
 tions and writhings excited roars of laughter. 
 
 The next day, while again cUmbing up the mountain after wah- 
 wahs, my Dyak companion discovered an old female orang-utan 
 seated quietly on a branch not more than thirty feet distant. I 
 fired at her, and my bullet killed both her and the baby which she 
 was holding in her arms. Although she was very small, only 3 
 feet 6 inches in height, she was so old her teeth were worn down 
 to mere stumps, and several had entirely disappeared. Her hair 
 was rather short, on account of which the Dyaks declared her to be 
 a "mias kassar," and therefore different from the other varieties, 
 " rombi " and " chappin." 
 
 On the morning of the third day, I took one Dyak and Dobah, 
 and set off in my boat to visit the southern end of the lake. It 
 was dehghtful weather. There was not a ripple on the surface of 
 the lake, which lay like a polished mirror, reflecting the blue sky 
 and its fleecy clouds, the dark-green mountain and the fringe of forest 
 trees along the banks. Scarcely a bird's song broke the stillness. 
 It was like a landscape in a dream — sunny, silent, balmy and clear. 
 One day in such a spot is worth the toil of half a year to gain it. 
 
 Half way down the lake we discovered a fine old orang, lazily 
 finishing his morning nap. His nest, which was nearly three feet 
 across, was not more than fifteen feet above the water, and he lay 
 sprawled out upon it, flat on his back, with the sun at the back of 
 his head, sound asleep. His hairy arms and legs were thrust out- 
 ward and upward, and his hands (an orang has hands on his legs, 
 if you please) were firmly but mechanically grasping the largest 
 branches while he slept. The back of his head was toward us, and, 
 
394 TWO TEAKS IN THE JUNGLE. 
 
 after silently paddling up to witliin fifteen yards of him, I stood 
 in the boat to observe and afterward to make a rough sketch of him 
 on the inside of an envelope. 
 
 While we were watching him, he snored almost continously, 
 *' not loud, but deep," until presently the flies bothered him and 
 he awoke. With a slow, awkwitrd sweep of his ponderous right arm 
 he di'ove the flies from his face, and a moment later was \vide 
 awake. He was just rising to a sitting posture when my rifle-ball 
 caught him between his shoulders. He sprang up quickly, gave a 
 deep growl, flung himseK forward into the tangled mass of green 
 vines and branches which surrounded the nest on three sides, and 
 was instantly lost to view. He went crashing forward for a few 
 yards aud then stopped ; there was a moment's silence, then a heavy 
 fall and a dull splash. Lamudin and Blou went into the water and 
 worked their way in to where the old fellow lay, and presently 
 towed him out. 
 
 We went on down to the head of the lake, which, like the west- 
 ern side, is completely filled with screw pines growing in the water. 
 A small creek called Batang Rejang empties into the lake at this 
 point. We entered it and paddled up until it became so obstructed 
 with overhanging branches that fi.irther progress was impossible. 
 
 On the way back we encountered a large troop of proboscis 
 monkeys, and. by a sudden assault, I succeeded in killing two fine 
 old male specimens. As usual, they were over "water, and, being 
 swift climbers and quite shy, were hard to kill. I saw, altogether, 
 during my rambHngs in the forests of Borneo, perhaps a himdred 
 and fifty proboscis monkeys ; and, without a single exception, all 
 were over water, either river, hike or submerged forest. As long as 
 they are in sight they are very conspicuous objects, choosing the 
 most commanding positions in open tree-tops. Once I saw thirteen 
 in one tree, sitting la2dly on the branches, as is their habit, sunning 
 themselves and enjoying the scenery. It was the finest sight I ever 
 saw in which monkeys played a part. 
 
 The cry of the "blanda," as the natives call it, is peculiar and 
 unmistakable. Written phonetically it would be " honk," and occa- 
 sionally "kee-honk," long drawn and deeply resonant, quite like 
 the tone of a bass viol. 
 
 As the name would imply, the most striking feature of the pro- 
 boscis monkey is its nose. In old male specimens this organ reaches 
 its gi'andest proportions, and is triily enormous in length, breadth 
 and thickness. It hangs from the face like — well, totally unlike any' 
 
i'UilTiiAXT OF A I'KOIiOSCIS MONKEY. 
 
 {Frora a sketch by tlie Aai/tur.) 
 
< 
 
COLLECTING AT PADANG LAKE. 395 
 
 thing else in the world, coming quite below the lowest point of the 
 chin, shaped like a pear except for a furrow down the middle and 
 a contracted septum, which causes the organ to terminate in two 
 points. It is broadest at the middle of the free portion instead of 
 at the base. 
 
 Nothing could be more unnatural than the noses of all the 
 stuffed proboscis monkeys I have yet seen in museums. They do 
 not even suggest the natural form or size of the organ. The pict- 
 ures of the animal sin against nature in the same fashion, and, in 
 order to set Nasalis right before the world and vindicate his nasal 
 character, I fixed my best specimen on a branch in a natural atti- 
 tude, and drew a picture of him, to scale, a copy of which is sub- 
 mitted in the accompanying engraving. 
 
 The proboscis monkey, which, by the way, is found only in 
 Borneo, is a large animal and of striking appearance both in form 
 and color. Its face is cinnamon brown, and its body conspicuously 
 marked with reddish brown and white, the tails of old specimens, 
 being white as snow. Taken altogether, Nasalis larvatus is, to the 
 hunter-naturalist, a very interesting object of pursuit, and were he 
 not partially ecHpsed by the orang he would be the most famous 
 quadrumane in the East Indies. 
 
 I tried six different times, on as many days, to get a shot at the 
 family of wah-wahs which called to us daily from the summit of 
 Gunong Popook, but the mountain was so steep and the tree-tops 
 so thick that I did not even get a shot. At last I gave it up as a 
 bad job, and determined to reserve my efforts for the Sibuyau, 
 where they were said to be plentiful. Dundang, who followed me 
 up the Simujan in order to hunt for me, killed one fine large speci- 
 men during my stay at the lake, but where he shot it I could not 
 quite understand. He also killed more proboscis monkeys for me, 
 a wild pig, two small orangs, and a few other animals. Black mon- 
 keys {S. femoralis) were numerous within two hundred yards of the 
 house, and Perara succeeded in killing several, which was about all 
 he did kiU. 
 
 Wild hogs were so plentiful in the jungle that the Dyaks had 
 built a pole fence four feet high around three sides of their 
 clearing to protect their crop of rice. Both Mr. Houghton and 
 Eng Quee had assured me they had seen wild pigs which stood 
 thirty-six, and even forty, inches high at the shoulders, their great 
 height being due to the unusual length of their legs, developed in 
 the animal's struggle for existence in low, swampy forest 
 
300 TM'O YKAKS IN THE .TUXOLE. 
 
 The accounts; I luul had of tho wild pig made mo very anxioiiS 
 to seem"e at least one large specimen. But, although they wei-e so 
 abuTulaut in the jungle about U3 as to seriously threaten the rice 
 field. I did not even get sight of one in my tirst week's hunting on 
 Gimoug Popook. so I determined to try for them in the swamps. 
 The oldest Pyak in the village, who was therefore tm experienced 
 hunter, offered to guide me to the most likely spots, and, with a 
 stout, active lad, named ^Munkah. to accompivuy us, eai-ly one bright 
 morning we set out. 
 
 For several hours we toiled through the swjimp, wailing through 
 ■water and thin n\ud of various depths from ankle to hip, and finally 
 crossed it and came to high groiuul. at the edge of which we ex- 
 pected to find wild pig« feeding on the ftillen fruit of a tree the 
 Pyj\ks called ejoke. But the pigs were not there. Then we took 
 to the high ground, and for some hours longer we tramped up and 
 dowTi a succession of the steepest of hills, covered with the thorniest 
 kind of jimgle. Thorns, did I s,\v ? Well, I meant fish-hooks, 
 needles, pins, tacks, and poiTupine qmlls. 
 
 Magnificent spreading p;vlms {Livisfona i^inensis) grew thickly 
 everywhere : very beautiful to the eye their long, slender stems 
 were, but alwavis set with rows of stout and shivrp thoi-ns, curved 
 just the wrong way for comfort, and always ready to catch a pfiss- 
 iniir victim. The branches of a worthless chmbing. rattivn ( Calamus) 
 were particularly cruel. This species is very abundant, chmbing 
 over the imderbru^di and sen^ling out many long, slender bninches 
 which droop like those of the weeping willow. The end of each 
 is leafless for aboxit two feet from the tip. and the slender, sup- 
 ple stem resolves itself into a long rv>w of animated trout-hooks. 
 The way those threadlike stems will i-each out to seize a victim 
 and then hjmg on, is enough to make one believe them an invention 
 of the devil. One will catch you suddenly by the eai* and hold 
 you very still, while another fiies back from the man ahead of you 
 and rakes you across the cheek like a fine saw, cutting a neat httle 
 fjash as it cfoes. Ag'ain. one will spring sxiddenly and lay hold of 
 yoirr neck with a score of needlehke points, while others fasten 
 themselves in yoiu' clothes, or upon your biu-e hands. 
 
 If anathemas could kill. I would take l-i^-ll and candle and so 
 curse every thom-bearing phvnt of the ti\->pics, that beside my 
 anathema the curse of the Catholic Church on Yictor-Emmanuel 
 would read hke a blessing. In all the vegetable kingdom, there is 
 nothing so useless and wholly objectionable as a thorn, especially the 
 
 I 
 
COLLECTING AT PADANG LAKE, 391 
 
 accursed fish-hook thorn of the tropics, and if any intelligent reason 
 can be assigned for either its deliberate creation or its evolution, it 
 would be balm to my wounded cuticle. For my part, I consider 
 the thorn one of nature's unmitigated blunders. 
 
 Our long tramp was wholly fruitless, for we saw not a single 
 object worth shooting. Fortunately for my collection, my native 
 hunters were more successful, for Dundang sent in a large broque 
 (Macacus yiemestrinns) and a baby of the same species ; a friendly 
 Dyak brought a large soft-shell turtle which he caught in the lake, 
 And Perara managed to shoot a bijit. 
 
 A few days later, Hakka and I made another trial for wild pigs 
 to Gunong Poondah, a low mountain a short distance to the north. 
 We went by boat quite to its foot, up an arm of the lake, and along 
 a narrow creek which led through a bit of lovely forest. The 
 mossy tree-trunks were often covered with beautiful orchids, small 
 ferns, and other parasitical plants, while palms of many species rose 
 out of the water and drooped over the banks. The warm, still air, 
 the subdued light of the forest, and the profusion of picturesque 
 vegetation made up a bit of tropical forest scenery which quite 
 reaHzed my preconceived ideal. 
 
 We hunted along the foot of the mountain and stalked carefully 
 up to the ejoke trees, but saw no pigs. Once indeed we started 
 a troop of wah-wahs, but when I was about to fire we heard un- 
 mistakably the grunt of a wild pig. Turning reluctantly from the 
 " bird in the hand " we tried to discover the pigs, but failed, and so 
 lost both. The Dyaks fished d^ ' igently in the lake during my stay, 
 and everything caught wcs brought to me. The largest fish taken 
 was a very handsome goby [Eleoiris marmorata), seventeen inches 
 long ; and the most interesting were three species of climbing perch, 
 Anabas scandens and two others. 
 
 After a fortnight's sojourn at the Popook village, I felt satisfied 
 that I had exhausted that locality, and, when Mr. Eng Quee's boat 
 arrived, we loaded up, took leave of our friendly and hospitable hosts 
 — not without regret, on my part, I am bound to say — and returned 
 to Simujan without hap or mishap. 
 
CHAPTER XXXrV. 
 
 FACTS ABOUT THE ORANG-UTAN. 
 
 Distribution of the Orang-utan. — Its Affinities. — External Appearance. — Re- 
 markable Facial Ornament (?). — Color of Skin. — Hair. — Eyes. — Mode 
 of Fighting. — Pugnacity. — Food. — Unsocial Habits. — Young at Birth. — 
 Nesting Habits. — Locomotive Powers. — Inability to Walk or Stand Erect. — 
 Height of Adults. — General Measurements. — Two Species Recognized. — 
 Characters of Simia Wurmbii and Satynis. — Individual Peculiarities. 
 
 Borneo is truly the land of apes and monkeys. Among its four- 
 teen species, five of which occur nowhere else,* are found the fol- 
 lowing very interesting forms : the orang-utan (two species), the 
 proboscis monkey, the gibbon, the slow lemur, tarsier, and the fly- 
 ing lemur. 
 
 For an island, Borneo is favored with a great variety of very in- 
 teresting quadrupeds, both large and small, and a far greater num- 
 ber of species peculiar to itself than any of its neighbors of the 
 Archipelago can boast. So far as known at present, it has ninety- 
 six species of mammals, thirty-three of which, or more than one- 
 third, are not found elsewhere. The largest species are the 
 elephant, rhinoceros, tapir, wild cattle, sambur, and wild hog, and 
 the most interesting are the apes and monkeys, insectivores, bats, 
 and porcupines. 
 
 The genus Simia occurs in northern Sumatra, but its distribu- 
 tion in Borneo is so much more extensive that we may well say 
 the latter is the home of the orang-utan. It inhabits that wide 
 belt of low, forest-covered swamp forest which lies between the sea- 
 coast and the mountain ranges of the interior, extending entirely 
 around the western half of the island. But even this great alluvial 
 plain is inhabited by the orang in certain districts only ; although 
 
 * The following are the species peculiar to Borneo : Hylobates concolor, 
 Nasalis larvatus, Semnopithecus rubicundus, Semuopithecus chrysomelasi 
 Semnopithecus froutatus. 
 
FACTS ABOUT THE ORANG-UTA]Sr. 399 
 
 all those portions which are covered by lofty virgin forests seem to 
 present the same features. In the Territory of Sarawak the orang, 
 or "mias," as it is called by the natives, is found along the riverfe 
 Batang Lupar and Sadong and their small tributaries, such as the 
 Lingga and Simujan. It does not occur at all along the Sarawak 
 or Samarahan rivers, but farther west it is found, though more 
 rarely, from the river Sambas to the Kapooas, which latter lies di- 
 rectly under the equatoi-. It is also found in Kotei near Samariuda, 
 at the mouth of the Mahakkam, and also on the Tewah River, which 
 flows into the Barito from the east, almost directly under the equa- 
 tor. 
 
 Leaving the genus homo out of the question, the orang occu- 
 pies the third place from the highest in the animal kingdom. The 
 gorilla {Troglodites gorilla) is given the highest place, next in order 
 is the chimpanzee {T. niger), after which comes the orang-utan 
 {Simia Wurmbii and satyrus), followed by the Siamavga syndactyla, 
 the Hnk between the orangs and the gibbons (Hylobates). The 
 orang well deserves the place it occupies. It agrees with the go- 
 rilla and chimpanzee in positive size and quality of the brain, but 
 its fore-limbs, as compared with the hind ones, are longer than 
 theirs, while they are also proportionally shorter than those of 
 Siamanga and Hylobates. The heel-bone (calcaneum) is proportion- 
 ally longer in Simia than in Hylobates, and its thumb is also better 
 developed than that of the gibbons. Among the higher apes, 
 the orang comes nearest to man in the number of ribs (twelve pairs) 
 and form of the cerebral hemispheres, but differs from him in 
 other respects, especially in the limbs, more than do the gorilla 
 and chimpanzee. 
 
 The chimpanzee approaches man most closely in the character 
 of its cranium, its dentition, and the proportional size of its arms. 
 The gorilla is more manlike in the proportion of the leg to the 
 body, size of the heel, curvature of the spine, form of pelvis and 
 absolute capacity of the cranium. In its habits the orang resem- 
 bles the gorilla and chimpanzee, which are not gregarious, while 
 the gibbons are. 
 
 The most striking feature of the orang is its great size and gen- 
 eral resemblance to man. The chest, arms and hands are espe- 
 cially human in their size and general outline. Since the animal 
 depends mainly upon these members for the means of locomotion 
 they are necessarily of massive proportions. The natural position 
 of the human hand at rest is with the fingers slightly bent, but 
 
40(> TWO TEARS IN THE JUNGLE. 
 
 that of the orang is with the fingers tightly closed, and, when meas. 
 uring our dead specimens, we often found it an absolute impos- 
 sibility to straighten a single finger without cutting the tendon in 
 the palm of the hand. Thus, when an orang is asleep, the most 
 natural position he can assume is to firmly grasp a branch with 
 each hand. 
 
 Male individuals of Simia Wurmbii are distinguished by their 
 wonderful cheek callosities, each side of the face being greatly ex- 
 panded and flattened into a thick, semi-circular disk extending ver- 
 tically from the top of the forehead to the angle of the jaw. This 
 remarkable feature is a sexual characteristic, for it is never pos- 
 sessed by the female orangs. So far as I have been able to deter- 
 mine, these facial callosities are purely ornamental, since they are 
 not controlled by voluntary muscles, and are composed merely of 
 tough, white, semi-cartilaginous tissue. In different individuals 
 these callosities vary in width from ten to thirteen and one-half 
 inches. 
 
 The skin color of orangs varies according to age, as follows : In 
 infants and all young individuals up to three or four years of age 
 the skin is generally chocolate brown, yellowish on the abdomen 
 and in the palms, while the skin surrounding each eye to the edge 
 of the orbit, and the entire muzzle, or projecting lower portion of 
 the face, is of a more decidedly yellowish or raw-si^nna color. In- 
 dividuals between childhood and middle age vary from dark-yel- 
 lowish to blackish-brown, the latter color largely predominating. 
 Very often the face and neck is almost or quite black, the palms 
 light -brown and the breast and abdomen mulatto-yellow. In 
 old specimens, especially males of Simla Wurmbii, or the "miaa 
 chappin " species, the skin is everywhere a deep, shiny-black, ex- 
 cept in the palms, where, from constant wear on rough bark, the 
 cuticle Hes in several thick, calloused layers, and is of a dirty 
 gray color. 
 
 The hair of orangs varies greatly in color, quantity, quahty, and 
 distribution, and has no bearing whatever on the question of spe- 
 cies. Speaking generally, it may be described as brick-red, or to 
 be exact, of the color known to painters as Indian-red. It may be 
 said, however, that marked differences in color are found almost 
 entirely on adult male specimens. On all others, it varies but 
 little from pure Indian-red ; but on old males it often assumes a 
 faded yellow or raw-sienna color on the arms and legs. 
 
 It is always longest on the arms, shoulder-blades, and thighs, 
 
FACTS ABOUT THE ORANG-UTAN, 401 
 
 and shortest on the breast, abdomen, and back. The face and 
 throat are quite bare except for a scanty chin-beard of uncertain 
 length in adidt specimens, the longest hairs never exceeding four 
 inches. On the flat cheek callosities of Simia Wurmbii there is a 
 curious growth of very short and uniformly dispersed hau-s not 
 more than one-eighth of an inch in length, which lie so closely 
 upon the skin as to escape notice except upon very close inspection. 
 
 On the back of the arms and thighs, and on the sides and 
 shoulder-blades of old male orangs, the hair is long, coarse, straight 
 and thick, sometimes reaching a length of from twelve to fifteen 
 inches. 
 
 On most individuals of this class, the entire back will be found 
 almost bare from the neck down, having been worn off in the nest. 
 On younger specimens, the hair on the back is thick, and longer 
 than on the abdomen. The back of the hand and the fingers are 
 thinly covered with short stiff hairs. On the forearm the hair 
 grows upward fi'om the wrist to the elbow, where it meets the 
 downward growth on the arm, and the two come together in a 
 point. 
 
 The eyes of adxilts are always very small, with iris of a dark 
 chestnut-brown, and no white visible. The teeth are invariably 
 very much discolored by vegetable acids and juices, and the base 
 of each tooth is always black. 
 
 On most of the Wurmbii there seems to be a superabundance of 
 skin on the throat and breast, for it is often found to hang in a 
 great baggy fold. Externally, the orang seems to have no neck 
 at all, the head being set squarely down upon the shoulders. The 
 chest is massive to correspond with the arms and head, but the 
 pelvis is small, and the lower Umbs are small, short, and compai-a- 
 tively weak. The orang never sits down as do the gibbons, and 
 therefore has no ischial callosities like the Hylohates. 
 
 There is no ligamentum teres in the orang, and the absence of 
 this permits great freedom of movement in the lower limbs. In- 
 deed, the legs seem to possess almost as much freedom of move- 
 ment as do the arms. I have often seen my little pet orang hang 
 to a rope, with one arm at an angle of fully seventy degrees and, 
 with the greatest comfort imaginable, reach up with his leg at the 
 same angle and grasp the rope with his foot. 
 
 Some naturahsts attach importance to the facial resemblances 
 of different orangs. I have never seen living specimens of the Su- 
 matran orang, but so far as Bomean species are concerned, I am 
 2Q 
 
402 TWO YT]ARS IN TUB JUNGLE. 
 
 certjiin that eacli individual difters as widely fi-om his fellows, and 
 has as many facial peculiarities belonging to himself, as can be 
 found in the individuals of any unmixed race of human beings, 
 
 Miile orsuigs are much given to fighting, and often bite oft' each 
 other's fingers and toes. The upper lip, sxlso, is often found in a 
 nnitilated condition fi'om the smue cause. I have never heard of 
 their biting oft' each other's ears, as human roughs do occasionally, 
 but a few himdred year's more of evolution may bring theii- intelli- 
 gence up to that point. Indeed, may we not confidently predict 
 that this is the next step in intellectual development the orang will 
 tjxke, if he is ever to approach nearer to man. 
 
 It is the natural instinct of an orang to seize and bring the of- 
 fending htxnd of another to its mouth, instead of mo^'ing its own 
 heavy head imd body to the object. Thus, in every imaginable 
 wixy do the powerful and capable limbs and hands serve the inert 
 body and head upon all occasions. 
 
 The battered condition of one of my male specimens has akeady 
 been described (Chapter XXXI.) ; another orang. No. 34, male 
 Wurmbii, had almost lost the edge of his entii-e upper lip. It had 
 been bitten diagonally across, but still adhered at the left corner, 
 and the wound had CA-ideutly healed very quickly, for that trian- 
 gular piece of upper lip still hung dtxugling down two inches from 
 the corner of his mouth. He had also lost an entii-e finger. 
 
 No. 36 had lost a piece out of his upper lip, and one of his left 
 toes had been bitten quite oft'. 
 
 Diu-ing the fruit season, which is from the middle of January 
 to the first of May, the food of the orang is the diu-ian, mangosteen, 
 and i-ambutan, which ai*e usually found upon the hills. There are 
 also other fruits which ripen at dift'ereut times, such as the raso and' 
 kapayjmg, but of the former the orangs eat the shoots only. Be- 
 sides these, they devour the shoots of the Pandanus, and also the 
 leaves of certain trees. Dm-ing the months of May, Jime, and 
 July, they retire far into the depths of the forest and are exceed- 
 ingly diflicult to find, but during the season of the heaviest i-ains, 
 i.e., from August to November, when the forests are quite flooded, 
 they are foimd in the vicinity of the rivers. 
 
 The orang is quite solitai-y in his habits, the old males always 
 being found alone ; nor are two adult females ever found together. 
 On two occasions I foiuid thi'ee individuals together, but one was 
 an old female with a niu-sing infant, and the third was her next 
 oldest oft'spi-iug, apparently about a year and a half old, who had 
 
FACTS ABOUT TIIK OUAI^^G-UTAN. 403 
 
 not yet left his mother's side to shift for himself. The female 
 orang has but one young at a birth, and from the instance just 
 cited, I infer that it does not leave its mother until nearly two 
 years of age, by which time it is fairly supplanted by a successor. 
 
 The size of the young of the orang at birth is quite remarkable, 
 considering the small stature of the adult female. My twenty- 
 eighth specimen was a gravid female 3 feet 8| inches in height, 
 carrying a foetus which weighed 7 pounds 3 ounces, and was, of 
 course, fully developed. 
 
 The nest of the orang-utan has already been described. He 
 usually selects a small tree, a sapling in fact, and builds his nest in 
 its top, even though his weight causes it to sway alarmingly. He 
 always builds his nest low down, often within twenty-five feet of 
 the ground, and seldom higher than forty feet. Sometimes it is 
 fully four feet in diameter, but usually not more than three, and 
 quite flat on the top. There is no weaving together of branches, 
 for they are merely piled cross-wise as a natural consequence of 
 their being broken off on different sides of the nest. In short, the 
 orang builds a nest precisely as a man would build one for himself 
 were he obliged to pass a night in a tree-top with neither axe nor 
 knife to cut branches. I have seen in the forest one or two such 
 nests of men where the builder had only his bare hands to work 
 with, and they were just as rudely constnicted, of just such mate- 
 rials, and in about the same general position, as the average orang 
 nest. 
 
 During one day's travel along the upper Simujan River we 
 counted thirty-six old nests and six which we set down as new or 
 fresh. I have never been able to ascertain to a certainty, but it is 
 my opinion that an orang, after building a nest, sleeps in it several 
 nights in succession, unless he is called upon to leave its neighbor- 
 hood altogether. Certain it is that whenever a hunter finds a per- 
 fectly fresh nest he may with confidence expect to find the builder 
 somewhere near it. An orang never uses a nest after the leaves 
 become withered and dry, no doubt for the reason that the bare 
 branches afford an uncomfortable resting-place. I never saw nor 
 heard of any house-building by orang-utans, though I am led to 
 beUeve that some individuals may have a habit of covering their 
 bodies with branches for protection against the dashing of the 
 rain-drops during a heavy storm. My little pet orang would in- 
 variably cover his head and body with straw or loose clothing the 
 moment it began to rain, even though he was under a roof. 
 
404 T^VO YEAKS IX THE JUNGLE. 
 
 Even under the most favorable circumstances, orangs are 
 neither graceful nor active in their movements. I think "we may 
 justly consider them the most helpless of all the quadrumana. 
 Owing to the gi*eat weight of then* bodies, and the peculiai* struct- 
 ure of theii* hands, they cannot run nimbly, and never dare to spring 
 from one tree to the next. The smaller monkeys gallop madly 
 along the larger branches, with outspread ai-ms, legs, and tail, leap 
 recklessly from the tree-top, go flying tlu'ough the air for several 
 yai"ds, and fall sprawling and unhurt upon the side or in the leafy 
 top of the next tree. Not so the orang-utan, with his huge, flabby 
 stomach, fleshy thighs, and massive head. His weight, of one hun- 
 dred and twenty to one hmidred and sixty pounds, compels him to 
 move slowly and circumspectly so that he may not find himself 
 falling heavily to the gromid. Owing to the disproportionate 
 shortness of his legs, his progress depends mostly upon his long, 
 sinewj' arms, and very often he goes swinging through a tree- 
 top by their aid alone. I have frequently seen them svsing along 
 beneath the lai-ge Hmbs as a gymnast swings along a tight rope, 
 reaching six feet at a stretch. "W'hen passing fi*om one ti-ee to 
 another, he reaches out and gathers in his gi*asp a number of small 
 branches that he feels sure will sustain his weio-ht then swinqs 
 himself across. 
 
 Upon the ground the orang is a pictm-e of abjfect helplessness. 
 In his native forests he is very seldom known to descend to the 
 earth, and so far as my experience goes, I have never seen nor 
 heai'd of a single instance of the kind. True, he cHmbs down 
 when thirsty iintil he can reach the water with his hands, but this 
 occurs where there is no diw land to walk upon. 
 
 The orang-utan is utterly incapable of standing fully erect with- 
 out touching the ground with its hands. I have seen many orangs 
 in captivity, but not one of them ever stood erect upon its hind 
 legs for a single instant, and for orangs to be so represented in 
 di'awings or museums is contrary to nature. 
 
 There has been considerable discussion in regard to the maxi- 
 mum size attained by the orang-utan, and its general measiu-e- 
 ments. IMi*. A. R. Wallace, in his work on the " Malay Archi- 
 pelago," pp. 72 ef seq., makes the following statements : 
 
 "I have myself examined the bodies of seventeen fi-eshly-killed 
 orangs. Of this extensive series, sixteen were fully adult, nine being 
 males and seven females. The adult males of the lai'ge orangs only 
 vai'ied from 4 feet 1 inch to 4 feet 2 inches in height, measui*ed 
 
FACTS ABOUT THE OKANG-UTAN. 405 
 
 fairly to the heel, so as to give the height of the animal if it stood 
 perfectly erect ; the extent of the outstretched arms from 7 feet 2 
 inches to 7 feet 8 inches ; and the width of the face from 10 inches 
 to 13^ inches. The dimensions of other naturahsts closely agree 
 with mine. The largest orang measured by Temminck was four 
 feet high. Of twenty-five specimens collected by Schlegel and 
 Miiller, the largest old male was 4 feet 1 inch, and the largest 
 skeleton in the Calcutta Museum was, according to Blyth, 4 feet 1^ 
 inch ; and no specimen has yet reached Europe exceeding these 
 dimensions, although the total number must amount to over a 
 hundred. On the whole, therefore," concludes Mr. Wallace, "I 
 think it will be allowed that up to this time we have not the 
 least reliable evidence of the existence of orangs in Borneo more 
 than 4 feet 2 inches high." 
 
 The total number of specimens of the orang-utan of both spe- 
 cies, killed by me and my hunters, was forty-three, every one of 
 which I carefully measured while fresh, recording each measure- 
 ment the moment it was made. I saved the skin of every one of 
 these specimens, and the skeletons of all save three or four of the 
 very youngest ones. 
 
 No fewer than seven of my specimens exceeded the maximum 
 height for orangs as given by Mr. Wallace, viz., 4 feet 2 inches, 
 even by the most liberal measurement. My tallest Simia Wicrvibii, 
 or " mias chappin," measured 4 feet 6 inches from head to heel, 
 and the next in size 4 feet 5^ inches. Then a safyrus, or " mias 
 rombi," measured 4 feet 4^ inches, two other Wurmbii, 4 feet 4 
 inches, and 4 feet 3 inches respectively, a satyrus, 4 feet 3 inches, 
 and a Wurmbii, 4 feet 2^ inches. Only one specimen measured 
 exactly 4 feet 2 inches, and the remaining nine fell below that 
 height. One male specimen, with hair which grew to a length of 
 12 to 15 inches, in some places, measured only 3 feet 10|^ inches in 
 height. The largest female measured 4 feet, and the smallest adult 
 female 3 feet 6 inches. 
 
 These measurements were a great surprise to me, and, feeling 
 that their accuracy might some time be questioned, I made and re- 
 corded them with unusual care and exactness. To obtain the height 
 it was my practice to lay the animal upon its back with the legs 
 held straight by an assistant, then holding the blade of a large knife 
 flat against the top of the head, it was thrust perpendicularly into 
 the table or the earth. Then, while an assistant held the top of the 
 head against the first knife-blade, I pressed another blade firmly 
 
406 
 
 TWO YEARS IN THE JUNGLE. 
 
 agjiinst tJie bottom of tlae heel and tlirust it into the eai-th alsa 
 After moviBg the animal aside a tape line stretched between the 
 inner surfaces of the knife-blades gave the height of the animal. 
 Not a single figiu'e was ever trusted to my memory alone, and my 
 largest ortmgs were each measured and recorded twice. 
 
 From the subjoined table of measiu-ements it will be seen that 
 orangs vaiy in theu' proportions in precisely the same way as human 
 beinga Some ai-e short and thick-set ; and others ai-e more slen- 
 derly built and longer hmbed. Specimens Nos. and 9 have short 
 legs and bodies but unusually long ai-ms, while Nos. 43 and 38 
 are just the reverse. It will also be noticed that the breadth of the 
 facial callosities of iVurmbii betu's no relation whatever to the size of 
 the auimd. The t^iUest specimen of the whole series, No. 18, meas- 
 iired only 11]- inches across the face, while No. 25, which stood 
 three inches shorter, and was much smaller every way, measiu'ed 
 13i^ inches at the same point. 
 
 Measurements of Omng-Uans, Adult Males and FemaJes. 
 (Given in inches.) 
 
 Height, from he«d to heel . . 
 K.Tt«nt of outstrotohevl arms 
 Lt'iigth of arm and hand 
 
 f i\MU armpit 
 
 Leut^th of hand 
 
 of foot 
 
 l>ro.vlth of haud 
 
 of foot 
 
 Ciromnference of head (per- 
 
 VH-'udioiUar') 
 
 Bn-adth of faoo 
 
 Cirv-'umforouiv of ne<:k 
 
 " of chest 
 
 64 53.V 
 96 V WV 
 
 41 89 V 
 n\ lOVj 
 IS'V l'J'« 
 
 8\ S\ 
 
 ^' \}R 
 
 683^69 61 
 
 ye {883^90 
 
 40 'sS 37 
 11 H> lOVj 10 
 1S\, V2\ V2\ 
 
 8N, S 
 
 60X 
 883^ 
 
 60 
 
 493i 
 84X 
 
 4SX 48 
 - |87X 
 
 46X 
 79 
 
 4% 
 74)tf 
 
 ® 
 
 of loin... 
 
 of arm 
 
 of forearm, 
 of wrist.. . . 
 of thigh. . . 
 of c«lf 
 
 8t1«i- SI Si 
 11>» 13 
 
 43 41,Vi 
 SOVj 
 19,V ISV 
 ,18.S, 14 
 I 9 ' 
 ,18 19 
 IIVIIV 
 
 •J6V 99 V 9SV 
 19 I8V9 
 
 25 ss •>:>, 
 
 39 40Vv 8^)v, 
 9SS) St^** 
 5 'lis* 11 
 
 X 
 
 S7 S63^S6 36 133 34V 31 V 39 
 
 lOv, 10 ' 9\ 10 V 10 V 10 V 9»i 9 9 
 19', 13 19»4 19Vb 11\10V10»tf 
 
 8Vi| ,3 S,*, 9»4 9'^ 'i\i 
 
 8»tt| 9»4 3 9'^ -Jv, 9>^ 
 
 9t??tf'97 95V 96V 97V 94Vi CC^ OC'.! 99%' 
 
 19V 13V 7 I 9 '"^S 6 ^S 
 
 91SJ 9'? CCia CI IT 16 ia\ 
 
 36,V 81V 87V *^V S6»4 39 81V 9i5V 98V 
 
 "" 96V S6 i ,81 ,aa 
 
 15V,^I^I>I,^I 
 
 SoV 
 
 
 96 
 
 uviov 
 
 ,11V 
 7V 
 
 1 9V 
 
 . 
 
 Of the orang-utan there ai'e two clesu-ly defined species, and only 
 two, xiz., Simia Wunnbii txnd S. Aityrus. While the points of dif' 
 
FACTS ABOUT THE OKANG-UTAN. 407 
 
 ference between the males of the two species are strongly marked 
 and unmistakable, both externally and anatomically, the females 
 are all very much alike in their external appearance, but readily 
 distinguishable by their skulls. 
 
 Male specimens of Wurmbii are distinguished by their remarka- 
 ble cheek callosities, already described, ivhich are observed in young 
 as ivell as old individuals, and also by the joining of the two tem- 
 poral ridges on the top of the skull to form an elevated sagittal 
 crest, of varying height. In females and young males the temporal 
 ridges subside to the level of the skull either at or before meeting in 
 front of the parietal suture, and are continued backward in a rough 
 line, almost to the lambdoidal crest. 
 
 In the skull of the male satyrus the temporal ridges pass back- 
 ward and slightly converge, but still remain widely separated until 
 they diverge again at the back of the skull and rise to form the 
 lambdoidal crest. The skull of the female shows no continuous 
 elevated ridges, but a rough line instead, which scarcely rises above 
 the level of the skull. No female skull in the collection made by me 
 possesses either the two continuous temporal ridges or the elevated 
 sagittal crest, but the rough lines correspond to the elevated ridges 
 of the males of their respective species in every case, and leave their 
 identity unmistakeable. 
 
 Orangs are liable to possess individual peculiarities to a greater 
 extent than perhaps any other of the apes or monkeys. To illus- 
 trate : No. 26, Simia Wurmbii, with a very prominent cranial ridge, 
 was utterly destitute of facial callosities or any signs of them, and 
 until dissection, was supposed to be a satyrus. No. 13 had a nail on 
 the hallux of its hinder hands. No. 21 had four molars in each side 
 of its lower jaw, while the other forty-two orangs had only three 
 each. The distance between the temporal ridges of satyrus, and the 
 elevation of the sagittal crest of Wurmbii, varies greatly in different 
 specimens. 
 
 "We will not say anything about the place the orang has in the 
 long chain of evolution ; but, while abstract argument leads hither 
 and thither, according as this or that writer is most ably gifted for 
 the same, there is still one argument or influence to which every 
 true naturalist is amenable, and which no one will ignore who has 
 studied, from nature, any group of typical forms. Let such an 
 one (if, indeed, one exists to-day) who is prejudiced against the 
 Darwinian views, go to Borneo. Let him there watch from day 
 to day this strangely human form in all its various phases of exist- 
 
40S TWO TEAKS IN THE JUNGLE. 
 
 ence. Let him see the orang climb, walk, bxiild its nest, eat, 
 driuk, and fight lite a human rough. Let him see the female 
 suckle her young and cany it astride her hip precisely as do the 
 cooHe women of Hiudostan. Let him witness theii* human-like 
 emotions of aflection, satisfaction, pain, and rage, — let him see ail 
 this, and then he may feel how much more potent has been thia 
 lesson than all he has read in pages of absti"act ratiocination. 
 
CHAPTEE XXXV. 
 
 A MONTH WITH THE DYAKS. 
 
 Journey to the Sibuyau. — The River. — A Malodorous Village. — Barriers.— 
 Proboscis Monkeys and Flying Lemurs. — Head of Canoe Navigation.^ 
 Swamp-wading. — Our Journey's End. — A Lodge in a Vast Wilderness. — 
 Fine Hunting-grounds. — Source of the River. — Hunting Gibbons. — Lively 
 Sport. — Gibbons' Remarkable Mode of Progress. — A Mias. — A Successful 
 Hunt. — Affection and Courage of a Male Gibbon. — Helplessness of the 
 Baby Orang in Water. — A Live Tarsier. — More Gibbons Shot. — Argus 
 Pheasants. — Dyak Mode of Snaring. — A Deadly Pig-trap. — A Shiftless 
 Village. — A Magnificent Bird. — Curious Rodent. — Visit to Lanchang. — 
 A Village of Head-hunters. — Trophies of the Chase. — A Fine Dyak Speci- 
 men. 
 
 It was only a buncli of argus pheasant feathers that lured me from 
 Sadong to the Sibuyau, to stay a month with the Dyaks, for better 
 or worse. The promise of wah-wahs, also, had something to do 
 with it, I suppose, even though they are hard to shoot. The Dyaks 
 said their settlement had never been visited by a white man, and in 
 spite of all I could learn from them, the nature of the country re- 
 mained a profound mystery. But then, the greatest charm of 
 travel is going to places one knows nothing at all about, and satis- 
 fying one's geographical curiosity. 
 
 Behold us, then, starting down the Sadong with the turning of 
 the tide, early on the morning of October 28th. At home the trees 
 have taken on their gayest autumn tints, but here the forest is still 
 clad in the same persistent, never-changing, monotonous green it 
 has always worn. 
 
 Under the kadjang roof of the old Malay headman's large boat, 
 there sit the " orang putei " (white man), " orang China " (China- 
 man), and the " orang utan " or jungle man, my little pet, while 
 three stout Malays furnish the motive-power. Perara and Dobah 
 are coming after us in my own boat. It is a delightful day, quiet, 
 clear, and warm, such as fills a man with a sense of keen enjoyment, 
 provided his digestion is good and his conscience clear. My little 
 
410 TWO YEAKS IX THE JUXGLE. 
 
 baby mias seems to eujov liis suiTOundings as well as the rest of us, 
 for, with tnie childish instinct, he leans lazilr over the edge of the 
 boat and dabbles in the water with his haiiy brown hands as it 
 sweeps past the side. 
 
 On reaching the sea, we put up oiu* much-mended sail and 
 steered eastward along the coast for a few miles, until, when almost 
 within the mouth of the Batang Lupai\ we came about shai-ply and 
 ran into the mouth of the Sibuvau. A conical mountain rises on 
 the east bank, at the foot of which is a small Malay kampong, and 
 the house of Seriff Hassan, the Port-cleai'ance clerk. TVe stopped 
 long enough to dehver oiu* papers and hastened on up stream with 
 the flowing tide, to get as fiu* as possible by night-fall. 
 
 The Sibuyau is a small stream, not over a hundred yards in 
 width at the mouth, and for a long distance up the banks are 
 prettily fiinged with nipa palms. There are a few paddy fields 
 ivlong the banks and the usual accompaniment of flimsy little tem- 
 poraiw huts on stilts, reminding one of birds' nests. 
 
 About simset we reached a Dyak village of eight doors standing 
 close to the bank, at which we stopped for the night It was a 
 miserably dii-ty and foul-smeUiug place, or at least the gi'oimd un- 
 derneath the house was giving off an odor like an ancient pig-sty. 
 The Dyaks were almost as dii-ty as their surroundings, but they 
 were civil, and immediately produced, for us to sit upon, two of the 
 finest mats I ever saw of Dyak manufactiu'e. I tiied to buy the 
 smaller one of the two, but they positively refused to sell it. Per- 
 haps their mat-maker was dead. 
 
 We had a long confab about the prospect of getting up to the 
 settlement at the head of the river, and were told that the way was 
 long and difficult ; that our large boat was too lai"ge to go at all ; 
 that they had no boats which could take us ; and, fuithermore, 
 that they would not go with us imder any circumstances. Being 
 imable to see my way out of the (.iifficulty which had suddenly pre- 
 sented itself, I slung my hammock and mosquitero and went to 
 sleep. 
 
 In the morning thi*ee of the Dyaks agreed to go with me, for a 
 consideration, to help with the large boat ; but, when the time 
 came to stai't, they and two others put their weapons and dogs — I 
 mean dog skeletons — and cooking pots into one of their own 
 canoes, got into it, and paddled off down stream. With a devout 
 wish, expressed in foiu' languages, that they might ''' go to the 
 devil," we detei-mined to paddle om* own canoe, and immediately 
 
A MONTH WITH THE DYAKS. 411 
 
 set off. I changed places witli Dobah, thus leaving the four Malaya 
 and Ah Kee to manage the large boat. 
 
 After a few miles, we passed the limit of the nipa palm, and 
 then the screw pine took its place. As the stream became more 
 narrow the fringe on either side became wider and almost impene- 
 trable in density. About noon, we came to where the channel was 
 blocked by thousands of Pandanus stems, which had drifted 
 together and formed a wide barrier like a "jam" of pine logs. 
 The top of the drift was covered with rank grass, which bound the 
 whole mass together — sometimes strongly enough to walk upon. 
 
 During the course of the afternoon we passed eight or ten such 
 barriers ; and each one cost a struggle. There was always a 
 passage cut large enough to accommodate small sampans ; but 
 our large boat was heavily laden, and the passage had to be in- 
 definitely enlarged. We were all of two hours in getting her 
 through one drift, which was finally accomplished by cutting a 
 wider passage and then hauling on her from the small boat made 
 fast a few yards in advance, while others lifted on her at the same 
 time. No wonder the Dyaks were chary of trusting their muscles 
 in our keeping for that day. 
 
 During the afternoon we saw several troops of proboscis 
 monkeys. They were not so shy as on the Simujan, but sat uncon- 
 cernedly in the trees, watching us as we went by. As night ap- 
 proached we tied up to the bushes at the edge of a fine bit of open 
 water, fourteen feet deep, and shifted owe baggage so that we 
 could lie down. After a most refreshing bath in which all partici- 
 pated, we ate our rice and turned in. Ah Kee and the little mias 
 had a long and violent dispute as to whether they should sleep to- 
 gether, of which question the mias took the affirmative side and 
 finally carried the day. 
 
 The large boat leaked badly, and, but for Ah Kee, I think we 
 should have fiUed and gone down before morning. Being unable 
 to swim he felt a lively interest in keeping the craft afloat, and 
 baled her out five times during the night. 
 
 As we proceeded, the next morning, we entered a perfect laby- 
 rinth of screw pines, but fortunately there were no more bad drifts 
 and we wound our way along very agreeably. During the forenoon 
 we came upon a troop of proboscis monkeys which contained about 
 thirty-five individuals — the greatest number of that species I ever 
 saw together. I could not resist the temptation to " collect " one 
 of the handsomest specimens of the lot, and the shot started two 
 
412 TWO YEARS IN THE JUNGLE. 
 
 flying lemiu's {Galeopithecus variegatus) just out of range. They 
 spread their parachutes to their widest extent, launched boldly out 
 of a tree-top, sailed slowly through the air at an angle of about 
 forty-five degrees, and alighted low down on the trunk of a tree 
 about forty feet distant from the one they had quitted, CHmbing 
 nimbly up to the top of that tree, they sailed off again, and so on 
 untU they were out of sight. 
 
 In the afternoon the growth of screw pines ceased abruptly, 
 and we entered a narrower and more tortuous channel which wound 
 in and out among trees and bushes, just wide enough for our 
 boats, but with nothing to spare. After four or five miles of this, 
 the identity of the river was completely lost ; but we followed the 
 channel persistently, and at last found ourselves in a little canal 
 not more than eight feet wide, that came down tkrough the forest 
 as though cut by the hand of man. On either side were solid 
 banks and the trunks of great forest trees beautifully decorated 
 with ferns, orchids and dark-green moss, while the bare stems of 
 creepers, both great and small, hung in many a curve and twist 
 from the branches which met far above our heads. I would like 
 to rave a little over that scenery, and would, but for a constitutional 
 objection to emotional descriptions. 
 
 At length our httle canal led out of the forest and into an open 
 grassy swamp of considerable width, at the edge of which we ar- 
 rived at the head of navigation, and a getting-out place for everybody. 
 
 There was no house nor village anywhere in sight, but one of 
 our Malays said we could reach one by night-fall, so four of us 
 bundled up oiu' beds, a cooking pot and food for one meal, and set 
 out. Our first half-mile lay across a swamp, through mud and 
 water from one to two feet deep, from which we landed on a bit of 
 dry ground and crossed over to another stretch of morass, worse 
 than the first. The water was from two to five feet deep, but on 
 the top lay a carpet of matted grass which kept us from sink- 
 ing down out of sight. Once I had the luck to break through 
 and sink down to my waist before the others could fish me out. 
 After a mile of dreadful floundering we came to some fields of 
 growing paddy and emerged upon terra firma once more. We fol- 
 lowed a path through a bit of fine, dry open forest, crossed a beau- 
 tifully clear rtmning brook, o\u' canal again, or rather the Sibuyau 
 Eiver — and two hundred yards further on, came to a small clearing 
 in the middle of which (welcome sight) stood a Dyak village, or 
 long-house of five doors. 
 
A MONTH WITH THE DYAKS. 413 
 
 We climbed the notched sapling which served as a ladder at 
 the end of the house, and received the customary Dyak greeting 
 of cheery smiles and pleasant words of welcome, while one of the 
 girls skunied off to fetch the clean mats. We were not sorry to 
 have reached our journey's end, and Ah Kee, never too tired to get 
 up the best meal the larder afforded, set to work, without a mo- 
 ment's delay or waiting to be told, and soon had ready a fine cup 
 of tea with buttered toast accompaniment, and a plate of rice 
 rfdorned with butter and sugar. Ah Kee was the prince of good 
 servants, and I would that every traveller who knows how to treat 
 a servant could have one like him. He was marked with small-pox 
 and was not what an esthete would call handsome, far from it, but 
 in the jungle, his cheerful and efficient service condoned every phys- 
 ical defect. 
 
 The next morning the Dyaks turned out in force and carried 
 up our luggage, of which there were seventeen loads, at thirteen 
 cents per load. We took the three kadjangs which formed our 
 boat-roof and with them made a very cosy room, about twelve feet 
 square, at one end of the long haU. 
 
 We bought of the Dyaks enough mats to cover the floor, ar- 
 ranged our boxes to the best advantage to serve as furnitvu'e, and, 
 with a very handy fireplace constructed by Ah Kee, we were com- 
 fortably fixed. One side of the room was entirely open and looked 
 out on the jungle. As soon as we had got fairly settled, all the 
 people of the house came in to pay us a visit. The floor of my 
 room was quite fiUed with half-naked men, women, and children 
 sitting upon their hams and enjoying the novelty of calling upon a 
 "tuan." The men were fine, healthy-looking fellows, the women 
 were mostly rather ill-favored in personal appearance ; and the 
 children were, without exception, very dirty, but all were good- 
 natured and polite. One little girl had ichthyosis and was exceed- 
 ingly repulsive, but, happily, she did not belong to our village, and 
 I soon saw the last of her. 
 
 Keeping Dobah with me, I paid the other Malays and sent 
 them back to Simujan with the large boat, to return for me at the 
 end of a month. Being comfortably settled in a house which was 
 really very clean and habitable, we immediately began to collect. 
 I set Perara at work shooting and skinning birds, while I devoted 
 my attention to mammals in particular, and everything else in gen- 
 eral. I encouraged the Dyaks of the settlement — there were two 
 other villages not far away — to set snares for animals of all kinds. 
 
414 TWO YEARS IN THE JUKGLE. 
 
 and, being at that season without money and very nearly without 
 rice, they bestirred themselves to earn a little money. The people of 
 our village agreed to furnish me with from two to three guides every 
 day for a cash consideration, and they never disappointed me. 
 
 There was a fine young man in our house who was not only 
 willing but anxious to accompany me in my hunting trips, and we 
 fraternized at once. With him for a guide and Dobah to carry 
 game, I set out in the afternoon to look over the ground. 
 
 On one side of our clearing lay a vast and almost impenetrable 
 tract of swamp-forest, choked vsdth a dense, thorny undergrowth 
 growing in the water. On the other side, however, there rose a 
 succession of hiUs, neither too high nor too steep for comfort, cov- 
 ered with fine high forest, while what little undergrowth there was 
 was not of the thorny kind. There were many charming Uttle 
 glens and rocky ravines with small streams of clear, cold water 
 dashing down to where three of them came together and formed the 
 soiirce of the Sibuyau Kiver. It gives one a strange sensation to 
 stand at the very source of a river, where it is a feeble brook which 
 one crosses at a single stride. It is a satisfaction to know all about 
 one river, at least, even though it be a small one, from its mouth, 
 where it loses itself in the sea, up to the very springs in the hills 
 from whence the first cupful of water starts down. 
 
 I was rejoiced at my good fortune in being led — by blind in- 
 stinct, I may say— to such a delightful wilderness. It was the finest 
 hunting-ground I saw anywhere in Sarawak. I was sure that such 
 high ground and fine open forest must be frequented by correspond- 
 ingly fine mammals and birds in great numbers, for it seemed to 
 me just the spot an animal would choose for a home — I would have 
 been content to end my days there, had I been a monkey — and the 
 Dyaks assured me my surmise was correct. 
 
 In order to place before the reader a pen picture of our daily 
 Hfe in the jungle with the Dyaks, what we did, saw, and thought, I 
 venture to transcribe a portion of my much despised but faithfully 
 kept journal. 
 
 " November 1st. — That fine young Dyak accompanies me regu- 
 larly now as a guide, and with him and my faithful little Malay man, 
 Dobah, I went out hunting for orang-utans and Hylobates. We 
 hunted far and wide over the hills, saw a great number of mias 
 nests, but no mias. But we at last became absorbed in trying to 
 kill a gibbon, and it soon developed into genuine sport, about the 
 
A MONTH WITH THE DYAKS. 415 
 
 only real ' sport ' I have yet bad in Borneo, and this is about the 
 character of it. 
 
 " You are going along, we will say, at the heels of your Dyak 
 guide, carrying your rifle in the hope of a shot at big game, while 
 the guide carries your double-barrelled gun. All at once you hear 
 a slight vocal sound and a profound rustling in the thick branches 
 at the top of a tall tree, directly over your head. 
 
 " 'Apa ini?' (What's that?), you ask in a whisper. 
 
 " ' Wah-wah, tuan ! ' (gibbons, sir !), says the guide in the same 
 tone. 
 
 " You take the double-barrel, loaded with No. 1 shot, and peer 
 anxiously upward to catch sight of the animal. Ah ! there he is, 
 on the other side of the tree, and evidently making off. You can- 
 not see his body on account of the leaves, so you steal quickly round 
 and get directly under him to give him a surprise with a charge of 
 shot. But by the time you get around he is apparently no longer 
 there, for you hear a rustling in a tree-top forty yards away, and at 
 last catch a glimpse of his lank, gray body as he swings himself out 
 of sight, without leaving you a second for a shot. Perhaps, though, 
 you blaze away at him, right and left, feel pretty sure you must 
 have stopped him, and watch anxiously while you hurriedly push in 
 fresh cartridges. 
 
 " Ha ! not dead yet, for there he goes as lively as ever, this time 
 sixty yards away. You see him quite plainly this time, and note with 
 astonishment how rapidly he progresses by swinging himself end 
 over end, holding by his hands while he gives his body a long swing 
 toward another branch. His body becomes horizontal, he grasps 
 the branch with his feet, and, letting go with his hands, swings, 
 head downward and backward, until he comes right side again, 
 lets go with his feet and goes flying through the air to the next 
 branch. He grasps that with his hands, swings the other end of 
 himself forward again, and so on. You see that by this revolution- 
 ary method he goes just as well as if he had a head on each end of 
 his body, and that he gets along with astonishing rapidity and di- 
 rectness. 
 
 " This will never do. He is about to get away from you, on fair 
 ground. You take your direction, stoop forward, and dart hurriedly 
 along in the direction the gibbon has taken. 
 
 " You run a hundred yards at your best speed, and stop, ex- 
 pecting to find him directly over your head. Ha ! the branches 
 shake. There he is, fully fifty yards away ! Then you get mad, 
 
416 TWO YEARS IN THE JUNGLE. 
 
 drop your hat, grip your gun firmly, draw yoiir head well down 
 between your shoulders, and, with one eye to the front, go tearing 
 through the underbrush like a wild bull, down the hill at full speed 
 and at the imminent risk of breaking your neck. You dart nimbly 
 through every little opening, and choose a practicable route with 
 surprising quickness of eye, as a monkey does when running through 
 tree-tops. 
 
 " After a hundred and fifty yards, good measure, you stop short, 
 cock your gun, and glare wildly upward to catch sight of your prey 
 as quickly as possible. In three seconds your greedy eyes have 
 scanned every tree-top within gun-shot, and at last you see some 
 branches shaking, a hundred yards away, on the opposite side of a 
 deep ravine ! No use ! he has beaten you in a fair race, and goes 
 on swinging gayly from tree to tree, leaving you to sit down pant- 
 ing like a steam-tug, bathed in perspiration, ^vishing for a drink of 
 water, and puzzled to know whether you ought to laugh or get mad. 
 
 " Then you proceed to comfort yourself by calhng to mind the 
 fact that the trees are very tall, and it is almost impossible 
 to see a gibbon on account of his gray body harmonizing so 
 well in color with the leaves on which the sun shines ; that his 
 hair is fine and close, and his body and limbs so lean that to 
 shoot at one is almost like shooting at a skeleton ; that they never 
 stop running until three or four legs are broken ; and finally, that 
 they fly a great deal faster than you ever had an idea they could 
 anyway. But, all the same, you pronounce it genuine sport and 
 acknowledge that you have met your match. And so you draw off 
 to the nearest stream, throw yourself upon the sand, drink about two 
 quarts of clear, cold water, and proceed to repair damages generally. 
 
 " So far, I have had five just such experiences as the above with 
 wah-wahs, though the most notable occurred to-day. I had two 
 such chases, felt sure of killing at least one, had three snap shots, 
 and not a single gibbon did I get. They are valuable animals, a 
 skin being worth at least $20, to say nothing of the rarity of good 
 ones, and one specimen represents a good day's work — when taken ! 
 To hunt them is the most exciting work I have done for some time, 
 violent exercise to be sure, but good to improve one's wind. The 
 troop we started this morning had at least ten individuals in it, the 
 most of them full grown and large. 
 
 " In the afternoon shot a goat sucker and four black monkeys 
 (Semnopithecus femoralis) ; saw nothing else except one small gib- 
 bon, which I chased, of coiu'se, — for practice ! 
 
A MONTH WITH THE DYAKS. 417 
 
 " Rain at night. Thermometer, 80 degrees F. at 8 p.m. 
 
 " November 2d. — The name of my young Dyak guide is Le 
 Tiac. He is just about my height, build, and age, a stout young 
 fellow, and the only difference between us is that he is a Dyak and 
 I am an Anglo-Saxon — which makes all the difference in the world. 
 
 "We went out in the morning, far and high on the hills, 
 and saw, at first, only some big rhinoceros horn-bills (Buceros rhi- 
 noceros), at which we got no shot. Too many trees for us to see 
 through before they took flight. Heard a troop of wah-wahs cry- 
 ing, stalked up to them with the greatest skill — and did not 
 see even one. Disgusting ! Little Dobah was taken with an at- 
 tack of chills and fever on the way home. 
 
 " When we reached the clearing at noon we noticed how hot it 
 was out in the open, whereas in the jungle it was pleasantly cool, 
 damp, and intensely shady. Had we been hunting in the sunshine 
 all the morning, we would have been done up long before the 
 time we returned. The forest is so shady one does not even think 
 of the sun ; but in the house we felt the heat. Then we took our 
 deliciously cold bath in the stream near the house, changed clothes, 
 and after a modest breakfast lay down with "Chesterfield's Let- 
 ters " for a rest. At such times I always He on the floor near the 
 Old Man, and he takes great delight in teasing me in various ways. 
 He pulls my hair, butts me with his head, sits on my stomach, 
 climbs all over me and wrestles with my bare feet, all in the droll- 
 est and most comical way, as only a mias can. 
 
 " At 3 P.M. we went out again, without Dobah, and, in about an 
 hour, we saw a mias rombi swinging across a deep ravine. I fired 
 two shots and killed it directly. It fell what seemed a great dis- 
 tance, to the bottom of the ravine, and landed in a very pict- 
 uresque spot, just beside a clear gurgling stream, that came tum- 
 bHng down the rocky gorge. This mias. No. 39, female, is not a 
 large one. Le Tiac peeled some strips of bark from a sapling, 
 tied its elbows together behind its back, fixed a broad smooth 
 head-strap, and prepared to carry the animal alone. I proposed to 
 sling it over a pole and help him get away with it, but he preferred 
 to cari'y it alone ; so he backed it and carried it, unassisted, up the 
 steep side of that deep ravine to the top without resting, then 
 down the long ridge and so on home. I can kill ten mias easier 
 than one wah-wah. 
 
 " Thermometer : morning, 80 degrees F. ; noon, 90 ; night, 82. 
 
 " November 3d. — A good score to-day. Just after I had fin- 
 27 
 
418 TWO TEAES IN THE JUNGLE. 
 
 ished measuring the mias killed yesterday, and was preparing to 
 set out for the usual morning's hunt, a troop of gibbons began 
 whistling — their cry sounds like whistling, and is easily imitated — 
 in the jungle close by, in fact within a hundred yards of the house. 
 Le Tiac and I were after them in less than a minute. It so hap- 
 pened that several paths had been cut through the jungle just 
 where the gibbons were, and, by their help, we were soon close to 
 our prey. We saw one or two of them swinging off in the distance, 
 and at last I caught sight of a fine large one, feeding quietly on 
 leaves, within gun-shot. I fired both barrels to make sure of a kill, 
 and, in a minute or so, as I was walking under the tree to see 
 where my wah-wah was, down it came with a heavy " thud " within 
 two feet of me. A little more and it would have fallen on my head. 
 
 "To my surprise it was immediately followed by another, a 
 young one this time, which fell flat on its face on the soft earth a 
 yard further off. We picked it up and found it was very much 
 alive, having only a wound in the neck, and Le Tiac held it while 
 I reloaded and looked for others. The little one set up a terrible 
 cry and kept it up steadily, which created a great commotion 
 amongst the other wah-wahs. They were all running away, but on 
 hearing the cries of the little one, two came back and came as near 
 as they dared, but kept so well concealed that I could not get a 
 shot. Then we carried the little one about and let it cry while we 
 ourselves kept very still. It was, perhaps, a mean thing to do ; but 
 in collecting, necessity knows no law, every wild animal must die 
 some time, and gibbons are too valuable and hard to get for us to 
 let one go through sympathy. Under all other circumstances these 
 animals are exceedingly timid, and flee at the slightest alarm, 
 but this time two of them returned in response to the cries of 
 one of their children in distress. It was a mean thing to do, I 
 know, but when, at last, I got a fair shot at a large wah-wah, of 
 the rescuing party, I disabled him so that he could not get away. 
 He climbed to the topmost branches of the tree he was in, which 
 was about ninety feet high, and I fired at him from below. I was 
 surprised at the shooting it took to collect him. 
 
 " Altogether I fired seven shots with my No. 10 gun, loaded 
 with four drachms of powder and two ounces of No. 1 shot, before 
 he feU, and, to my still greater surprise, I found on examining the 
 body only one bone broken — a tibia. I expected to find the leg 
 and arm-bones mostly smashed to bits. The specimen was a large 
 male, and met its death solely on account of its paternal affection, 
 
A MONTH WITH THE DTAKS. 419 
 
 sympathy, and genuine courage in the face of danger. It measured 
 as follows : length of head and body, 1 foot 7 inches ; entire reach 
 of arms and legs, 5 feet 1 inch ; extent of outstretched arms, 5 feet 
 1 inch ; hand, 6^ x 1 inches ; foot, 6 x 1|- inches ; weight, 10| 
 pounds, 
 
 " The young specimen was about one-third grown, but its brain 
 being affected and its spine injured by the shock, I killed it imme- 
 diately for conscience's sake. Late in the evening, when I went 
 down to the creek to bathe, I took the little mias along to see if he 
 could swim. I gave him a perfectly fair chance, for instead of pitch- 
 ing him plump into the water as we do dogs and puppies I waded 
 with him in my arms out to where the water was waist deep, and 
 then poising him on the surface let him go, much against his will. 
 Did he swim ? Hardly. He turned heels up in an instant and his 
 old head went down as if it had been filled with lead instead of 
 brains. Instead of striking out vigorously with his arms and legs 
 as other animals do, those useful members simply stuck straight 
 out from his body like four sticks and moved slowly and feebly, 
 first one way and then another, as the old feUow sank to the bottom. 
 I waited a moment to see if he would, in any measure, recover him- 
 self, or come to the surface, but he only turned horizontally in the 
 water and remained a foot below the surface, stiff and helpless. I 
 waited until it would have been cruelty to have left him longer, and 
 then, like Pharaoh's daughter, I drew him out. He did not whine 
 or scream, but you should have seen his face. Its expression of in- 
 jured innocence and disgust at the whole business spoke as plainly 
 as words. But he was soon all right and after wiping him dry I 
 put him down upon the pebbly bank while I went in for my bath. 
 The little rascal began slowly climbing up the bushes, in a hstless, 
 indifferent manner, to throw me oft* my guard. By and by I went 
 out to make him come down, but he was already beyond my reach, 
 and instead of obeying me he gazed down upon jne with a superior, 
 patronizing air, and went on climbing higher. Very soon he was 
 twenty feet up, with jungle all around him, and he had evidently 
 made up his mind to go from our gaze like a beautiful dream. It 
 was just sunset, and if not caught within ten minutes he would be 
 a total loss. I shouted for help and the Dyaks came running down 
 with axes and parongs to chop down trees if necessary. But one 
 of the men espied a slanting tree-trunk, and, by its aid, he cHmbed 
 nimbly and silently into the top of the tree containing the mias 
 while we below kept the little rascal's attention directed to our- 
 
420 TWO YEARS IN THE JUNGLE. 
 
 selves. He was not aware of this adroit flank movement until lie 
 looked up and saw the naked Dyak reaching down from above to 
 grab him. The Httle fellow was thoroughly terrified by the mon- 
 strous apparition, and scrambled down in wild haste, until he landed 
 in my arms, and clung to me for protection. The Dyaks enjoyed a 
 hearty laugh at his expense. 
 
 "November -ith. — Had a long, tiresome tramp in the forenoon, 
 over the hills and through the hollows, but saw not a thing worth 
 shooting. Myriads of leeches, however. A Dyak brought me a 
 female argus pheasant in poor plumage. Skeletonized it and ate 
 the flesh for dinner. It was palatable, but neither good nor bad. 
 It had no particular flavor, but was tender, and therefore acceptable. 
 
 " Another Dyak brought a flying dragon {Draco volans), and a 
 beautiful little tarsier {Tarsius spectrum), aHve and unhui't. Although 
 it is a monkey, it jumps like a kangaroo, which it is enabled to do 
 by means of its very long hind legs. The pecuhar stnicture of its 
 cervical vertebrae permits great freedom of movement with the head, 
 which it easily turns in a complete circle, starting with the face 
 turned directly backward. It is a very erratic little creature and 
 bit me as severely as it was able when I took it out of its cage. 
 Wishing to make a drawing of it, I placed it on a pole held almost 
 perpendicular, where it hung for half an hour with its face toward 
 me as still as though conscious of the fact that I was taking its pict- 
 ure. The structirre of its hands is very peculiar. Each long slen- 
 der finger terminates in a flat round disk which acts Hke the sucker 
 of an octopus, and enables the little animal to hold on to a limb by 
 the side pressure of its hands and without gTasping, as all the other 
 monkeys do. The eyes are very large, and of a clear liquid brown 
 color, proclaiming the nocturnal habits of the animal. 
 
 " Dobah still has fever, Perara is complaining, and would Hke to 
 have it also in order to escape work. Ah Kee is a jewel, cheerful 
 and companionable. He has just made me a very creditable sleep- 
 ing suit, pajamas and baju. 
 
 " November 5th. — Three argus pheasants and a jungle cock 
 were brought in, all of which I bought and prepared. Having be- 
 come somewhat acquainted with the inmates of our house, I have 
 commenced to lecture the women on the desu-abihty of bringing 
 their children in contact with clean water at least once a month. 
 They received my lecture as a fine bit of humor on my part, but I 
 think they were ashamed nevertheless. 
 
 "November 6th. — Early in the morning we heard another troop 
 
A MONTH WITH THE DYAKS. 421 
 
 of gibbons whistling in the jungle close by, and in twenty minutes 
 we were xuider them. Shot a fine old couple, male and female, and 
 a young one belonging to the latter. Allowed two other small ones 
 to get away on account of their tender age. 
 
 " November 1th. — Out hunting all the forenoon. Came upon 
 a troop of gibbons, had a fair chance at an old female and let her 
 get away through sheer stupidity ; didn't fire when I had a chance, 
 hoping to get a better one. Saw a number of traps set by the 
 Dyaks to catch argus pheasants and small quadrupeds. In this in- 
 stance a low hedge of green boughs had been built from one ravine 
 to another across a ridge in the most inviting part of the forest. 
 The hedge is a careless affair, about two feet high, but withal so 
 cunningly made that I actually walked into one of the traps with- 
 out seeing it ! At every rod or so a clean gap is left just wide 
 enough for a bird or small mammal to walk through without sus- 
 picion, and while in mid-passage he will suddenly be yanked heaven- 
 ward by a ' twitch-up,' as we boys used to call it. 
 
 " The Dyaks make this very effective little engine of destruction 
 by bending down a stout bush close by the gap in the hedge, 
 previously trimming off all the branches, tying a thin strip of soft 
 bark to the end of the bush and making a noose at the other end 
 of the thong. Then a little platform about a foot square is made 
 with small palm-stems, a trigger is set underneath it to hold down 
 the noose and hold up the platform, then the noose is placed upon 
 the latter and opened as wide as the platform will allow. 
 
 " When the bird, or small beast steps upon the platform it in- 
 stantly falls, the thong is freed, the bush springs up, and the 
 noose is jerked tight around the leg of the victim. Of course the 
 bird is jerked high in the air, sometimes dislocating the leg, and is 
 bound to hang there imtil the traps are visited. The Dyak twitch- 
 up is very effective, but the objections to it are that it punishes 
 the victim cruelly before it dies or is found and killed, and also 
 that the noose, in most cases, chafes off the feathers of the thigh 
 and sometimes even the hair and skin from the legs of mammals. 
 In that particular hedge I counted eleven traps, all veiy neatly 
 constructed. "We also saw a machine called a peti, to kill wild 
 pigs, which made me shudder. Three stout, little, two-inch sap- 
 lings had been selected which grew close beside a jungle path in 
 such a position that when cut off seven feet above ground and tied 
 together at the top they formed a perfect tripod, leaning over the 
 path. A fourth sapling was cut, about five feet of the stem taken, 
 
422 TWO YEARS IN TJPE JUNGLE. 
 
 and one end firmly lashed in with the other three at the upper end 
 of the tripod. Into the free end of the fourth saphng, which was 
 about two feet above the ground, was firmly fixed a piece of hard, 
 well-seasoned bamboo shaped like a dagger, a foot long and point- 
 ing inward. The saphng was sprung out by main force and 
 fastened at the lower end by a string stretched across the path 
 with a trigger attachment. The point is, that when a pig comes 
 tripping gayly along the path on his way to the Dyak's paddy field 
 to see how the crop is getting on, and thinking no guile, snap goes 
 the trigger-spring and he is instantly transfixed by a bayonet of 
 bamboo. How it must hurt ! The worst of it is that occasionally 
 an unsuspicious Dyak comes unawares upon one of these infernal 
 machines, gets the sharp bamboo driven through his thigh, and, 
 usually dies in consequence.* Two more pheasants were brought 
 in. Perara shot a beautiful Cymbirhynchus, and, in spite of its 
 name, he assured me he killed it with one shot. 
 
 "November 8th. — Out all the forenoon with Le Tiac and 
 Dobah, who is well now, thanks to quinine, but saw nothing. On 
 our way home, passed a Dyak house and clearing a mile distant 
 from ours. The house was a small one, four doors, and the 
 dirtiest, most higgledy-piggledy and utterly dejected looking 
 habitation I have seen amongst the Dyaks. The women must read 
 novels to excess ; for the place would do for a picture of the reign 
 of indolence. The way through the clearing to this house was 
 over tree-trunks which sometimes took us fifteen feet from the 
 ground. I am now becoming so accustomed to pole- walking that 
 I look upon a batang as thick as my arm as a very good road. 
 Give us this day our daily bath. How dehciously refreshing is a 
 leisurely dip in the clear, cold water of the shady creek after a 
 five-hours' tramp up hill and down dale ! 
 
 " One of our Dyaks brought in a superb male argus pheasant 
 (Argiis Grayii), which I took supreme pleasure in skinning. 
 What a truly splendid bird ! Such dehcate richness of coloring is 
 not found in any other bird of my acquaintance. In hfe, the 
 feathers have a soft, velvety nap, and at the same time a satin-hke 
 
 * Shortly after the ahove was written a Kalakah Dyak named Bakir, hunt- 
 ing gutta on the upper Sarawak, was killed by a " peti," or pig-trap of the 
 kind described above. The lance entered his groin and passed quite through 
 his body. To the credit of the Sarawak Government it should be stated that 
 these traps are now prohibited under heavy penalty, and the owner of the one 
 which killed Bakir was promptly fined $100, or four years' imprisonment. 
 
A MONTH WITH THE DYAKS. 423 
 
 sheen wliich is not to be found on dry, preserved specimens. The 
 longest wing feathers measured two feet seven inches in length, and 
 the two long tail feathers, three feet two inches. One such bird as 
 this, a creature fit for Paradise, compensates for a thousand petty 
 annoyances. My last lamp chimney broke to-night, of its own ac- 
 cord, which is a calamity indeed, for the lamp is now useless. 
 When my candles are all gone, the evenings will be very long. 
 
 " Saturday, November dth. — Just as I was starting out, a curi- 
 ous porcupine [Atlierura fasciculata) was brought in, which had 
 been caught in a pheasant snare. Most unfortunately, the snare 
 had caught three of the legs and so badly chafed and cut the skin 
 as to greatly damage it. It was a very singular animal, twenty-six 
 inches in total length, of which the tail was nine and a half ; the 
 body was covered with flattened, gray spines an inch and a half 
 long. I left Perara to remove the skin, with strict injunctions to 
 work carefully ; but w^hen we returned, three hours later, he came 
 to me and plaintively said, ' Can't skin that animal, sir ! ' 
 Sure enough, the skin was in ruins, the tail off, and also one leg, 
 and the body torn in many places. On examination I found the 
 skin had no more strength than a sheet of wet writing-paper, so 
 we reconsidered the previous motion and took the complete 
 skeleton, but saved the skin for purposes of identification. Being 
 pretty well tired out, I decided to rest during the afternoon, and 
 the clerk of the weather took advantage of our remaining in-doora 
 and sent down a rain. 
 
 "November 11th. — Le Tiac brought in two more atheruras, and 
 as Perara declared it was impossible to skin them successfully I went 
 to work and skinned both. Both were injured on the legs by the 
 snare, and it required careful work to make skins of them. When- 
 ever Professor Ward wishes to take the conceit out of one of his 
 young taxidermists I will tell him to have one of these wet-paper 
 skins mounted. If I am not mistaken there will be some bad 
 language used by somebody before these skins are mounted ' in the 
 highest style of the art.' 
 
 " I have not seen in this region a snake of any kind until one 
 was brought in to-day. It was only five and a half feet long ; head, 
 underparts, and tail a beautiful vermihon ; two narrow, white 
 stripes along the back, one along the side, and the intervening 
 space bluish black Two more flying dragons came in at the same 
 time. 
 
 " The women of our village have begun to make the children 
 
434 TWO YEARS IN THE JUNGLE. 
 
 wash daily, so every morning they all form a procession and 
 march down to the creek, where they proceed to remove the dirt 
 of the previous day. The first step toward civilization is cleanli- 
 ness ; creeds can come a long ways after. Sent Dobah and Le 
 Tiac to the Sadong to bring me some more Spanish dollars and 
 other useful things. They will return in about six days. 
 
 " November 12th. — Now that Le Tiac is away, Gumbong will 
 be my guide, philosopher, and friend in the jungles. He is a good, 
 active fellow, and knows every inch of the forest. To-day we went 
 out northeast, and at last heard wah-wahs calhng to us. Killed an 
 old male, female, and a young one. 
 
 " In the course of our wandering we came to a small clearing, 
 in the centre of which stood a Dyak village, of ten doors, called 
 Lanchang. We visited it, and found the house is a very roomy 
 one, well built and well kept, roofed with thin boards, and having 
 an extensive platform of poles adjoining the open side for its entire 
 length, level with the floor, evidently intended to accommodate a large 
 crop of paddy. Our arrival was greeted by a chorus of ' ohs ' and 
 ' ah-dos ' from the old men, old women, and children. All the able- 
 bodied men and women had gone into the jungle to collect gutta, rat- 
 tans, dammar gum, honey, and, in short, anything which they could 
 find of any value. One fine young fellow who was just starting 
 out, struck me as being the handsomest Dyak I had ever seen. 
 His name is Ne Siak. He is about twenty-tAvo years of age, 
 tall for a Dyak, finely formed, with a strong and even handsome 
 face, and erect carriage. Ai-ound his middle he'^ore only the 
 customai'y bark-cloth chawat, but a scarf of blu^ cotton-cloth 
 was flung carelessly around his neck fi'om behind, one end of which 
 spread over his left shoulder. A rather faded bandanna was tied 
 turban-wise around his head, with a tuft of hair straying out at the 
 top, while down his neck and upon his shoulders fell a mass of 
 glossy, raven-black hair in the prettiest natural ringlets imaginable. 
 At his side was the usual parong, in its wooden sheath, adorned with 
 a bunch of argus feathers at the lower end, and, slung securely at his 
 back, was a long, cylindrical basket (juah), open at the top, itself a 
 fine specimen of Dyak handiwork. In one hand he carried a stout 
 spear, and the other was free. I looked at him in imdisguised ad- 
 mii'ation, until he stepped nimbly down the ladder at the end of the 
 house and disappeai-ed in the jungle. 
 
 "The children were, as usual, very dirty, and some of the 
 women and older girls were but a shade better. Hanging upon tlie 
 
A MONTH WITH THE DYAKS. 425 
 
 posts of the long hall were an unusual number of antlers from the 
 Busa, and lower jaws of the wild hog. After we had seated ourselves 
 upon the clean mats, we saw hanging directly over our heads a 
 bunch of fifteen human skulls, also trophies of the chase. They 
 were fleshless and bare, often toothless and jawless as well, charred 
 and backened with the smoke of several years. I expressed a de- 
 sire to buy one, but the people of the house were imwilling to ne- 
 gotiate, at least at a reasonable figure. The standard value of a 
 trophy head in the Sarawak Territory is $60, and there are none on 
 the market even at that price." 
 
 r^ 
 
CHAPTER XXXYI. 
 
 A MONTH WITH THE DYAKS— Concluded. 
 
 Leeches. — Model Making. — Poor Shooting-Boots. — Bad Ammunition. — A Big 
 Bnttress. — Wild Honey. — Human-like Emotions of the Baby Orang. — My 
 Guides go on a Strike.— Flying Gibbons. — BoilsandButterllies. — Bear and 
 Muntjac. — Delicious Venison. — Le Tiac's Omen Bird. — Dvak Shiftlessness 
 in Trade. — Gathering Gutta. — Le Tiac Climbs a Tapong Tree. — A Perilous 
 Feat. — Ah Kee gets Lost — A Torch-light Search in the Swamp. — Another 
 Bear. — Return to the Sadong. — The Last Orang. — The Nipa Palm. — A 
 dangerous Squall. — Nesting Habits of the Crocodile. — Farewell to the Sa- 
 dong. 
 
 "November 13th. — Long before daybreak, we lieai-d wali-wahs 
 Trliistling off in the jimgle in two directions. They are evidently 
 early risei-s. We went for one company of them as soon as it was 
 light, Init, although we expected to find them within two hun- 
 dred yai'ds of the house, they were more than a mile awaj', in the 
 swamp. Had three fair shots, failed to bring down anjihing, and 
 retiirned crestfallen, Stm'ted a civet cat and fired at it — also with- 
 out result, .\ftor coffee at the house, we went out again, but got 
 nothing except about twenty leech-bites. Leeches swai-med where 
 we went to-day, and we were badly bitten. There ai*e two kinds — 
 one being the common, short, lead-colored species : and the other 
 twice as long, with a narrow, yellow stripe along each side of its 
 body. The bite of the latter is most painful. 
 
 " Periii-a shot a yellow-necked hornbill and two other birds, one 
 of which proved to be the celebmted Dyak omen bird {Harpacfes 
 rutilus, Vieill), a sub-genus of the trogons, not at all rare on 
 the Sibuyau. The Dyaks at the house noticed it at once, and ex- 
 pressed a desire that we would not kill any more of them, a request 
 to which we readily acceded. 
 
 " To-day I selected and bought a number of ethnological speci- 
 mens of the Dyaks, including spears, pai-ongs, biliongs (axes), bai-k 
 cloth and sundry smaller articles. After considerable encourage- 
 ment and advice I crot Gumbong to work making me a model of a 
 
A MONTH WITH THE DYAKS. 427 
 
 Dyak long-house, to bo a fac-simile of tbo real thing. I am to 
 pay him a dollar for it when it is completed. His only objection 
 to making it was a lack of confidence in his ability to make 
 something entirely new and heretofore unseen. But he cauglit 
 the idea very quickly and wont to work at once. Another Dyak 
 has imdertaken to make for me a model of a prau (large boat), to 
 be likewise complete in every particular. 
 
 "November 14kth. — Killed a gibbon in the morning. Perdition 
 seize all English-made foot-gear ! My ' superior London-made 
 shooting-boots ' (shoes), the best in the market at Singapore, went 
 entirely to pieces to-day, after precisely two-and-a-half months' 
 wear. The soles came oflf bodily. Would they had been immor- 
 tal I The hunting-shoes made for me at Rochester lasted me 
 through fourteen months' constant wear in all sorts of wet and 
 dry weather ; through muddy swamps and over rocks as well. 
 Now I shall be obliged to wear my Sunday (!) shoes to hunt in, 
 and they, being also of the best English make, will probably last 
 me through the month. 
 
 "November 15th. — Shot a half-grown mias. In the afternoon, 
 Perara came running in from the jungle to tell me to come and 
 shoot two mias chappin which he had just seen about a mile 
 from the house. We ran all the way back to the spot, up hill and 
 down, splashing recklessly through mud and water — and of course 
 the mias were both gone. And of course we failed to find them. 
 This is the third time the boys have played that little game on 
 me, and made me nearly drown myself in perspiration. 
 
 "November 16th. — A disgusting day's work. Having nearly ex- 
 hausted my stock of Berdan primers, I loaded all my shells yester- 
 day with Ely's. To-day, in the course of a long jaunt, we found 
 two troops of gibbons, and five cartridges out of nine failed to go 
 ofi". One fine chance after another resulted in the ghastly metallic 
 ' click ' of the hammer, which always chills a hunter's marrow and 
 makes him think unutterable things. In spite of my hard work 
 and good opportunities I killed not even one gibbon, and at last, 
 tired out and disgusted, we started home. But I was doomed to 
 have Tantalus' cup offered me once more. On the way a fine wild 
 hog presented himself at fifty yards and stood still. I quickly 
 drew a bead on his head with ray rifle, pulled the trigger — 'click,' 
 and away went the hog. 
 
 "November 18ih.-^0n going out with Le Tiac and Dobah we 
 found a fine, large porcupine {Hystrix longicauda) caught by a 
 
428 TWO YEARS IN THE JUNGLE. 
 
 hiud foot in a twitcli-np. and held to its death by a slender bark 
 cord, which one nip of its shju-p incisors would easily have severed. 
 Poor, stupid animal. We came upon a large tapang tree which 
 threw out one magnificent buttress fourteen feet long, twelve feet 
 high where it loft the ti'ee, and three feet high at the other end. 
 This curious spiu*-root was a natural plank, two inches in thick- 
 ness, with perfectly straight sides, covered with thin, smooth bai-k. 
 I had often heard and read of these buttxesses, biit not until see- 
 ing one did I at till understand what they are like. As I looked at 
 that immense natiu-al slab, hewn out by the hand of natui-e, I 
 thought of Eobinson Crusoe, and how he would have leaped for 
 joy could he have foimd such ready-grown shelves and tables in 
 his foi'est. With considerable labor, I climbed into the top of a 
 small tree growing fai-ther down the hill, so as to get a good view 
 of the buttresses, and in that uncomfortable position sketched the 
 foundation of the tree, 
 
 *' Perara distinguished himself to-day by killing a gibbon, and 
 jilso a fine flying lemur {C^alcopithccus variegatus). These two 
 specimens, om* porcupine, and a Cynogale BenneUu, which was 
 brought in by one of our Dyaks, gave us work enough for the 
 afternoon. We ate the fiesh of the porcupine, which was good 
 enough, although rather neutral in flavor. As we were obhged to 
 work indoors all the afternoon, it rained half the time. As a 
 general thing, the gnats, moths, mosquitoes, and other insect 
 abominations are so bad at night that it is almost impossible to 
 read or write with jmy degree of comfort. 
 
 " November 19 fh. — A blank day for me. Perara killed a female 
 oraaig with my No. 16 gun and No. 1 shot ! Of course the animal 
 was roosting low. I am feasting now on wild honey, brought yes- 
 terday by a foreign Dyak, who sold me thi'ee quarts of nice strained 
 honey for twenty-five cents. My boys protested against the extor- 
 tion, and decliU'ed I need not pay more thtvn fifteen cents, but I 
 would have been ashamed to buy honey for which a Dy;\k climbed 
 perhaps eighty or ninety feet, at less than eight cents a quai'i 
 Were I to cKmb to the top of a tapang tree for honey it would cost 
 the buyer at least a hundred dolliu-s a quart, if I got any. 
 
 "Hot cakes, butter and honey go well together, or at least my 
 baby orang thinks so. "WTienever Ah Kee begins to set the table 
 — the box, I mean — for a meal, the Old Man is all animation. He 
 rises instantly from his straw, where he has been lying lazily play- 
 ing with his toes or making up faces, and gets as ueai* the table as 
 
A MONTH WITH THE DYAKS. 429 
 
 his line will let him go. By standing as nearly erect as he can, 
 stretching his neck to the utmost, he can just see the dishes on the 
 box, and watch for the plates of food. As the crisis approaches, 
 he grows more and more excited, whining, coaxing, and plead- 
 ing with his eyes for the food which is just beyond his anxious 
 fingers. If I sit down and begin to eat without feeding him, he 
 looks at me reproachfully, his nether lip drops disconsolately, and 
 he whines in an aggrieved tone. If I still refuse to serve him, his 
 whine rises to a shrill, child-like scream, and he throws himself 
 flat upon the floor, kicking and shrieking Hke a spoiled child. 
 This was the most human action I ever saw in ape or monkey. 
 More than once I attempted to discipline the little brute with a 
 small switch to see if I could make him stop screaming, but, true 
 to the impulses of nature, he only screamed the louder. 
 
 " The Old Man evinces a decided Hking for me, and also for Ah 
 Kee ; but is shy of strangers. Whenever a dog makes his appear- 
 ance in our room, or it thunders hard, the little fellow makes straight 
 for me, as fast as he can come, chmbs quickly up my legs and nes- 
 tles in my arms for protection. The Dyaks consider him unusually 
 bright, even for an orang, and several have travelled miles on pur- 
 pose to see him. 
 
 " November 2Qth. — Two argus pheasants and a civet cat ( Viverra 
 tangalunga) were brought in yesterday, and to-day we prepared their 
 skins. Le Tiac finished making a fiddle for me, and when he de- 
 livered it I paid him sixty cents as per agreement. After looking 
 at the money a quarter of an hour, he came to me and said he 
 would rather keep the fiddle, so I gave it back to him, and he re- 
 turned the money. FooUsh fellow. He can make a fiddle any time 
 in a day and a half, but he cannot find a market for another ia 
 ten years, I venture to say. But I shall have that fiddle yet, all 
 the same. 
 
 " When we arrived here, Ah Kee assured me there was not a cent 
 of money nor a measure of rice in the house. Since that, they hava 
 earned enough in various ways in my service to enable them to send 
 off twice, to buy rice ; but now they are getting stomach-proud, 
 and are prepared to kill the goose that lays the golden eggs. For 
 example : the old man, Gumbong, who has hunted with me during 
 the past week, made up his mind last night that thirty cents per 
 day is not enough wages, and he has therefore struck for fifty. Ah 
 Kee lectured him roundly, and I told him to go to the blazes ; but 
 he declared that he would not for less than fifty cents a day. To my 
 
430 TWO YEARS IN THE JUNGLE. 
 
 greater grief, Le Tiac has also struck on the same grounds and there 
 is a coohiess between us. He was somewhat surprised when I told 
 him I should not want him any more. 
 
 " November 21st. — Leaving the Dyaks to amuse themselves in- 
 doors as they saw fit, Dobah and I went out hunting and killed a 
 gibbon with the rifle at rather long range. The way these animals 
 can swing along is something marvellous. To-day I saw one going 
 down hill through the tree-tops where the forest was rather open, 
 and, for fifty yards, he went as straight as though he had been shot 
 out of a cannon. He flew straight along without an instant's pause 
 or hesitation, always turning end over end. Talk about the ' po- 
 etry of motion,' this is poetry set to music. A gibbon seems to pro- 
 gress entirely by the sole act of his will, and without taking the 
 least thought as to the means. 
 
 "November 22d. — Two more argus pheasants in the morning, 
 and rain in the afternoon. 
 
 " November 2Sd. — A boil which has been coming on my elbow 
 has at last arrived in full force, and I am quite demoralized. A ham- 
 mock and a boil do not go well together, especially when the latter 
 is on so salient a point as one's elbow. Spent all last night and 
 to-day in trying to make the thing comfortable. Noticed, very dis- 
 interestedly, a great number of butterflies flitting about the wet 
 ground underneath the house. There were at least a dozen species 
 — all large and briUiantly colored. An entomologist would have a 
 fine time of it among them, and the Dyaks would bring him him- 
 dreds at one cent each. To me they are no temptation. It is im- 
 possible to collect and care for small objects, Hke insects, except at 
 the expense of large and important ones, like mammals. It is so 
 far my policy to shun small things, that I do not even pretend to 
 -shoot and skin small bu-ds. 
 
 "November 2Uh. — The boil and I are more comfortable. Spent 
 the day reading Mamy's * Physical Geography of the Sea ' — one of 
 the most charming books I ever read, deep but clear, like Lake Tahoe. 
 What a pity all writers on scientific subjects have not Maury's won- 
 derful ability to write clearly and to the poini 
 
 "November 25th. — When I started out in the morning, with 
 Dobah, Le Tiac repented and offered to go with me on the terms 
 of our old agreement, so we took him. Started out to make some 
 sketches in the jungle, but took my rifle on general principles, 
 though not expecting to use it. After a long and skilfully con- 
 ducted chase of a troop of gibbons, they finally eluded us altogether. 
 
A MONTH WITH THE DYAKS. 431 
 
 As we were toiling discousolately up a steep bill we heard a sudden 
 rustling and saw the movement of some wild animal in the bushes 
 close to our path. I thought it was a wild pig. An instant later 
 a dark object came shuffling rapidly toward us, growling as it came, 
 and we saw it was a bear. The absurd little beast was actually 
 charging us. When it was within ten paces I gave it a ball exactly 
 between the eyes, which settled it forever. The instant my shot 
 rang out, another and even smaller bear appeared, also above us, 
 and came shuffling down the path, evidently intending to flank us. 
 
 " Le Tiac cried out excitedly, ' Bruong, tuan ! Bruong ! ' where- 
 upon the second bear wheeled about and started back up the hill as 
 fast as he could go. Remembering my bear experience in the Ani- 
 mallais, I determined to stay by my fii-st victim and make sure of that 
 one at least. I fired two snap shots, however, at No. 2 ; but he was 
 so much concealed by low bushes that I missed both times and he 
 got away. The one we had was a full-gro\vn female Halarctos Malay- 
 anus, but it weighed only 60 pounds, — too small to make our 
 grizzly a square meal ! Its total length was 36 inches exclusive of 
 tail (1 inch), and its height at the shoulders was 18 inches. This 
 bear is, I believe, the smallest species known. Its hair is short, 
 very even, smooth, and glossy black everywhere except on the 
 breast, where there is a cream-colored patch shaped like a V. Le 
 Tiac joyfully tied the httle beast into a bundle, took it on his back, 
 supported by a strip of bark over his forehead, and we tmdged on 
 to make our sketches. 
 
 "On reaching the spot where the large argus pheasant was 
 caught in a twitch-up, we all sat down and I began to work. We 
 had sat there very quietly for nearly an hour, when suddenly Dobah 
 exclaimed in a whisper, ' Kejang, tuan ! ' I looked in the direc- 
 tion he pointed, and, siire enough, down below us, a hundred yards 
 or so, was a pretty little muntjac {Cervulus aureus) walking jauntily 
 along the side of the ravine. I fired and it disappeared. My com- 
 panions rushed down the hill and found the little animal lying 
 dead behind a log, shot through the heart. It was a beautiful 
 little buck, with perfect horns. After I finished my sketch, Le 
 Tiac backed the bear, Dobah shouldered the muntjac, and we 
 marched home. 
 
 " The Dyaks are rather demonstrative. As we approached the 
 house on the open side, the inmates quickly espied us, and we were 
 greeted by a deafening chorus of ' ohs ! ' and ' ah-doe, ah-does ! ' 
 as men, women, and children bawled and squealed out their aston- 
 
432 TWO YEAES IN THE JUNGLE. 
 
 ishment and delight. Ah Kee's whole face and head was covered 
 with one vast and all-pervading Chinese smile of delight at our 
 good luck. The secret of all this joy lay in the fact that our game 
 was thoroughly eatable. We gave the Dyaks the flesh of the bear, 
 which they cooked and ate immediately, and kept the muntjac 
 meat for ourselves. Ah Kee boiled down a quantity of it and made 
 the richest and most delicious soup I ever tasted. An epicure who 
 would not gush over the flavor of the muntjac would be im worthy 
 of the name. It certainly surpasses, in exquisite delicacy of 
 
 * game ' flavor, all the other meats I ever tasted. 
 
 " November 26th. — In the jungle during the forenoon, to small 
 purpose, and in the afternoon it rained. Le Tiac started off this 
 morning on a six days' tramp after gutta, but about noon he heard 
 the cry of an omen bird, of the kind called brah-guy, on the right 
 hand, and he was therefore obhged to return and wait two or three 
 days before starting again. He told me that if the bird cries on 
 the right hand or behind one w^ho is starting on a journey, it is a 
 bad sign and he must return at once ; but if it cries on the left 
 hand or in front of him he can go on without fear. If he should 
 go on after hearing the bad omen he would have bad luck — either 
 be taken sick, cut his hand or foot, or perhaps the gutta-percha 
 trees would not run any sap when cut. He declared that only 
 once did he venture to go on after hearing the bad omen, and be- 
 fore he returned he accidentally cut his hand with his parong. 
 
 " The Dyaks generally attach great importance to the omens or 
 signs which they recognize in the appearance or cry of certain 
 birds, quadrupeds, and insects, in connection with the more im- 
 portant undertakings of their lives. In the Kyan country of the 
 upper Eejang, a large head-hunting expedition of over one thou- 
 sand warriors, which had just set out on a grand foray, was instantly 
 turned back and broken up by a Uttle kejang (muntjac) which ran 
 across the line of march in front of the expedition. Newly-married 
 couples are sometimes obliged to separate on account of hearing a 
 
 * deer cry ' within three days after their nuptials, in order to pre- 
 vent the death of one or the other within a year.* Insects often 
 warn warriors of the presence of their enemies, and again assure 
 them that they may rest securely for the night. 
 
 " What a glorious thing it would be for the American farmer's 
 boy if omen birds could be introduced into the United States. He 
 
 ♦ St. John. 
 
A MONTH WITH THE DYAKS. 433 
 
 would certainly hear one cry on the right hand when starting to 
 the field on a ' show day,' and at least twice a week in the autumn 
 months, when the young prairie chickens were flocking around. 
 The lazy school-boy would listen eagerly for them as soon as the 
 strawberries and cherries ripened ; and a little later, in melon time, 
 when the days were awfully hot, he would hear an omen bird call- 
 ing to him from every fence-post on the right as soon as he started 
 off to school. The omen bird would supply a long-felt want, and 
 no true American farmer's boy would be without a flock of them. 
 No other bird would be so safe from harm, or protected with such 
 tender solicitude. Had omen birds been as plentiful as blackbirds 
 on the Iowa prairies, I might have remained a farmer boy much 
 longer than I did ; but without them, life on the farm was unen- 
 durable. 
 
 " A Chinese trader came to the village to-day, to trade rice for 
 gutta-percha, wax, etc. The Dyaks are either very stupid, very 
 lazy and shiftless, or all three together. Instead of taking their 
 gutta down to Kuehing, where they could sell it at 60 cents per 
 cattie (1^ pound), and buy rice at ten to eleven gantongs for a 
 dollar, they loaf around the village until a sharp Chinaman comes 
 along and takes their gutta at 37^ cents per pound, in exchange for 
 rice at five gantongs to the dollar, and cheats them in the weight 
 of both ! 
 
 " Ah Kee took his wooden steelyards and showed me how a 
 Chinaman can cheat in weighing an article. By the insertion of a 
 tiny wooden peg beside the string which holds the weight at the 
 place where the end passes through the beam, it is easy to make an 
 article weigh too much or too little, as the weigher chooses. He 
 assured me most solemnly that Chinese traders nearly always cheat 
 ten per cent, in everything they weigh, when dealing with simple 
 people like the Dyaks. 
 
 " November 27th. — Went with Gumbong to see how he col- 
 lected gutta. A mile from the house he found a gutta tree, about 
 ten inches in diameter, and, after cutting it down, he ringed it 
 neatly all the way along the stem, at intervals of a yard or less. 
 Underneath each ring he put a calabash to catch the milk-white 
 sap which slowly exuded. From this tree and another about the 
 same size, he got about four quarts of sap, which, on being boiled 
 that night for my special benefit, precipitated the gutta at the 
 bottom in a mass like dough. The longer it was boiled, the harder 
 the mass became, and at last it was taken out, placed upon a 
 38 
 
434 TWO YEARS IN THE JUNGLE. 
 
 smooth board, kneaded ^dg•orously with the hands, and afterward 
 trodden with the bare feet of the operator. When it got almost 
 too stiff to work, it was flattened out cai-efully, then rolled up in a 
 wedge-shaped mass, a hole was punched thi-ough the thin end to 
 serve as a handle, and it was declai'ed ready for the trader. I 
 have seen the Dyaks roU up a good-sized wad of poimded bark in 
 the centre of these wedges of crude gutta, in order to get even with 
 the traders who cheat in weight, but I have also seen the sharp 
 trader cut every lump of gutta in two before buying it. If he 
 found bai'k, you may well beheve he did not pay for it at the price 
 of gutta. The crude gutta has a mottled, or mai-bled, light-brown 
 appeai'ance, is heavy and hard, and smooth on the outside. 
 
 " November '2Sth. — To-day Le Tiac announced his intention of 
 climbing a lai'ge tapang tree we saw in the forest a few days ago, 
 and I went along to see it done. His object in chmbing was to 
 secure some bees' nests, which we saw hanging to the imder side 
 of the lai'gest limb. Some torch-wood was taken along with which 
 to make a smoke to protect the climber from the bees. The ti-ee 
 was a grand specimen of its kind, about five feet in diameter at the 
 base, covered with fine-grained, soft, white bai'k, straight as a ship's 
 mast and without the smallest limb or knot for fiilly a hundred and 
 twenty feet up. It towered grandly above its neighbors, and to any 
 one but a Dyak its top was utterly inaccessible. Hanging from the 
 under side of the lai'gest and lowest Hmb, was a good bees" nest, 
 simply a naked, triangiilar piece of white comb, but we could not 
 see any bees flnng around it. 
 
 " A Dyak ' ladder,' by courtesy so called, reached from the 
 gi-ound to the branches, put up the previous year, the Dyaks said, 
 but still strong. It was a very simple contrivance, but one requir- 
 ing a bold man, utterly destitute of nerves, either to put it up or 
 ascend it. It consisted of seven twenty-foot bamboo poles held al- 
 most end to end alongside the ti-unk by shai-p pegs driven into the 
 soft wood about two feet apart, first on one side of the poles and 
 then on the other, to which the bamboo poles were lashed by rat- 
 tans, and held firmly about eight inches from the tree. These pegs 
 served as the rimgs of the ladder. The builder was obhged to let 
 the ends of the poles overlap a few feet in order to build the lad- 
 der with safety to himself. Just imagine yourseK a hundred feet 
 from the gTOund, clinging to a shaky hghtning-rod and hauHng up 
 another section twenty feet long, to put in place and peg fast at the 
 lower end, so that you can climb it and make it fast as you proceed.' 
 
A MONTH WITH THE DYAKS. 435 
 
 " Le Tiac had f ew preparations to make. He wore only his 
 chawat, which he adjusted securely, tucking the ends in tightly so 
 that they would not catch on the pegs and trouble him. At his 
 back was securely fastened a juah (back-basket) to receive the comb 
 if it contained honey. His torch was made up securely, and slung 
 from his neck by a cord, so that it would hang down his back lower 
 than his feet. It was then ignited and waved to and fro, until it 
 smoked freely, and he started up. He threw his weight heavily on 
 the first bamboo to test its strength, and also tried the second, 
 more cautiously ; but they held firmly and on he went. It was Hke 
 climbing a tall factory chimney by the lightning-rod, and a very 
 shaky one at that. It was the most daring feat I ever witnessed, 
 and I regretted that the audience was so small. But the climber did 
 not seem to miss the crowd which his exploit would have attracted 
 in civilized America, He went up, hand and foot, with the most 
 perfect ease and nonchalance, until he had scaled the dizzy height, 
 and seated himself astride the lowest limb to rest a moment and 
 gaze oflf over the top of the jungle. It actually made my head swim 
 to look at him and imagine myself in his place. Taking his torch in 
 one hand, he held it in readiness and crawled out along the bare 
 limb until he was within reach of the coveted prize. He examined 
 it first on one side and then on the other. ' No honey ! ' he shouted 
 down as cheerfully as though his climb was a matter of perfect in- 
 difference. To our exclamations of disgust, he replied with lofty 
 smiles, and leaving the comb untouched he began to descend, and 
 soon reached the ground without accident. 
 
 " I am told that accidents do happen to honey and wax-gather- 
 ers now and then, from a fault in the construction of the ladder, 
 but very rarely. Sometimes a number of bees' nests are found on 
 a single branch, and the climber gets so badly stung as to cause him 
 to fall. Where there is any danger on accovmt of the number of 
 bees, two or three Dyaks go up together to make the attack ; and, 
 while one gathers the comb, the others protect him from the bees 
 with the smoke of their torches. 
 
 " November 28th. — A day of rain, which I spent in the house con- 
 versing with the Dyaks, through the interpretation of Ah Kee. 
 They are a very remarkable people morally, and I have conceived a 
 great admiration for them. The more I see of them, the more I 
 see in them worthy of respect. I regret that I cannot spend several 
 years among them and see all kinds of Dyaks under all kinds of 
 circumstances. 
 
436 TWO YEAES IN THE JUNGLE. 
 
 ''November 29fA. — Last evening, after making my daily entry in 
 this journal, an incident occurred which promised to turn out very 
 seriously. Ah Kee is very fond of hunting, and often takes my gun 
 and goes off hunting by himself. This afternoon, after my dinner 
 was over, he took the big gun and went out. He did not return at 
 the usual time, and, just at sunset, I was standing in the door ex- 
 pecting every moment to see him put in an appearance, when, all 
 at once we heard two reports of his gun coming in quick succession, 
 muffled and faint, and so distant tiiat the sound barely reached our 
 ears. It seemed at least three miies off, and I instantly exclaimed, 
 ' Ah Kee is lost ! ' I told some of the Dyaks to go at once in the 
 direction of the sound and find him if j^ )ssible. Perara and I be- 
 gan firing our guns, and kept it up at intervals all the time. The 
 Dyaks and Dobah went as far as they could before darkness came 
 on, and I heard them calling and calling, but without an answer. 
 I waited to see if Ah Kee would come nearer, or if the men would 
 find him, and, at last, after it had grown pitch dark, we heard an- 
 other muffled 'boom ! ' even fainter and farther away than before, 
 and I saw that if we did not go and find him, he would have to stay 
 all night in the jungle and perhaps longer. 
 
 "Now, under certain circumstances, a night in the jungle is no 
 laughing matter. Ah Kee was in the worst swamp in the country, 
 without a parong or knife, or any means of making a fire, perhaps 
 with all his cartridges expended, wet of course, nothing to eat, and 
 tormented by myriads of mosquitoes and leeches, to say nothing 
 of the fear of poisonous snakes or pythons, or of being attacked in 
 the darkness by a bear or a tiger-cat. We knew that even if he 
 heard our firing, he could not possibly come to us in the pitchy 
 darkness of that tangled, thorny jungle, and if left alone, he was 
 just as apt to go directly away from us as any other way. If not 
 found before to-morrow, he migjit wander where we could not find 
 him, and, all his cartridges being expended, he would be unable to 
 signal to us. Ah Kee was a faithful fellow — perhaps the best ser- 
 vant I have ever had — and he was devoted heart and soul to my 
 wants and my interests regardless of himself. So I decided, in two 
 seconds, that we must find him at once. 
 
 "I called the Dyaks and told them to prepare torches and a 
 good supply of wood, while I put on my hunting gear. Taking 
 my revolver and rifle, with a bag half full of cartridges for each, 
 and a small bottle of gin, we set out. Perara seemed to think it a 
 good joke on Ah Kee, and declared he had often told him not to 
 
A MONTH WITH THE DYAKS. 437 
 
 go far away ; but I quickly silenced him by saying that there was 
 no possibility of his (Perara's) getting lost, for he seldom went out 
 of hearing of the house, and that if he had had pluck to go a little 
 farther now and then, he might have shot something. We took a 
 torch of wood called 'suloe,' which is full of resin and burns 
 brightly, and, with two extra bundles of it, we set out — three 
 Dyaks, Dobah, and I. The big alarm-gong was brought out and 
 loudly beaten, and, taking our departure by its sound, we went in 
 the direction of Ah Kee's last shot. We were soon half-knee deep 
 in water and ooze, but with the aid of the torch we got on reason- 
 ably well. At intervals I fired a shot as we proceeded, and the men 
 kept calling. After going a mile or so we heard a shot far away on 
 our left. We said that must be Ah Kee and we turned that way. 
 After a long time we heard two shots on our right and to the rear. 
 The men all said it was Ah Kee, but I declared it came from the 
 house, and was Perara's gun. No, they were sure that it was Ah 
 Kee, while I persisted that it was Perara, so we came to an unde- 
 cided standstill. They did not want to go on, and so I reluctantly 
 consented to turn back in the direction of the last reports. 
 
 "For several hours we wandered about, firing the rifle and call- 
 ing, but could get no answer, and at last had no idea which way we 
 ourselves were going. If we had only had a compass we could have 
 gone straight from the house in the direction of Ah Kee's last shot ; 
 but alas ! my only compass had been lost some weeks before. At 
 length the torch-wood was nearly exhausted and there was simply 
 nothing to do but go back, get more wood, and start again. For the 
 last time we fired the rifle ; then shouted : ' Ho ! Ah Kee ! ' until 
 the forest rang for a mile on every side, and as the echoes died away 
 we held our breath to listen. Only the soft twitter of the night 
 birds and the chirping of the tree frogs answered us. The brown 
 half-naked Dyaks looked at me and at each other in hopeless per- 
 plexity, but no one had any new plan or thought to suggest. The 
 torch-bearer knocked the ashes from his torch, waved it to and fro 
 imtil it blazed up again, and then, reluctantly enough, we turned 
 our faces homeward. 
 
 " We had gone but a short distance, and I was just planning 
 how we would arouse all the Dyaks in the three villages and o£fer 
 twenty-five dollars in silver (a fortune to a Dyak) as a reward for 
 finding Ah Kee, when we were startled by a deep ' boom ! ' from 
 behind us, which we knew at once was from Ah Kee. Luckily we 
 caught the direction exactly. In less than a minute, two men had 
 
438 TWO YEARS IN THE JUNGLE. 
 
 received hurried directions to hasten to the Louse i^x niore wood 
 and to come after us with all speed, along the track we would cut 
 through the jungle from the spot where we stood in the du-ection 
 of the sliot. The two Dyaks and I then wheeled about and 
 started through the swamp, slashing our way rapidly along, climb- 
 ing over fixllen logs, teju'ing through thickets and stumbling through 
 mire, but keeping the direction very carefully. Every hundred 
 yards we would stop and call : ' Ho-o-Ah Kee-ee ! ' At last we 
 heard a faint, a very faint * 0-o-o-o-ho ! ' 
 
 " 'Hiu-rali, boys! Now we've got him ! ' and with one joyous, 
 simultaneous yell, which woke the echoes fai- and wide through the 
 swamp, we settled down to the task of cixtting oiu' way to him. 
 The water here was nearly knee-deep, and the palms so dense and 
 thorny that we were forced to cut a passage for every step we ad- 
 vanced. It took us a good half hour to get to him fi-om th.e time 
 we heard his first answering call. But we kept calling and he an- 
 swering, so as to keep the right dii-ectiou, until we were within a 
 few yards, when, cutting through a perfect cheval defrise of palms, 
 whose leaves were twelve feet in length and set with thousands of 
 thorns, we saw a black object wading slowly toward us through the 
 water and the darkness — and Ah Kee was foimd ! 
 
 " His wide trousers were rolled about his knees and hung upon 
 him in rags. His ' pig-tail ' was woimd tightly aroimd his head, 
 his body scratched and bleeding, and, taken altogether, he was a 
 forlorn spectacle. He said he had taken ofi' his clothes, because 
 they caught on aU the thorns and hindered him fi-om creeping 
 iilong. He put on his clothes, took a di-ink of gin, and as soon as 
 the supply of wood arrived we started home. I was very glad to 
 find him and he was equally glad to be found. He had two caiw 
 tridges remixiuing, which he proposed to save to defend himself 
 Avith, if attacked by any wild animal. 
 
 " He had fired only four times in all, and the others were Pe- 
 rara's marplot shots. Ah Kee heai-d our filing from the house, 
 and tried, by climbing a tree, to get the direction, but after getting 
 it could not keep it ten minutes. Even when we were filing every 
 five minutes, he went first in one direction then another, then back 
 again, utterly imable to go straight. The forest is so thick that it 
 is almost impossible to judge of dii-ection by soimd. Ah Kee got 
 lost in trying first to shoot a wah-wah, and then in following a horn- 
 bill as it flew from tree to tree. At last we got to the house amid 
 general rejoicing. And what do you suppose was Ah Kee's fii*st act 
 
A MONTH WITH THE DYAKS. 439 
 
 after getting into his dry clothes ? He built a fire and made a nice 
 cup of tea for me ! That act describes his whole character. 
 
 " Navember 30th. — This morning Gumbong and another Dyak 
 brought in the little bear which escaped us the day we killed the 
 other. It was only about haK grown, and they captui-ed it alive. 
 How it did bawl and struggle as it lay on the floor, bound hand 
 and foot. It was a very pretty little specimen, a foot high and 
 twenty-two inches long, with a coat of smooth, fine, inky-black 
 hair. The Dyaks had the good sense to seU him to me, body and 
 soul, for a reasonable price, and his skin was soon added to my 
 collection. Better that, a thousand times, than a life of miserable 
 captivity among the Dyaks. 
 
 " True to his engagement of a month previous, Blou arrived to- 
 day with the lai'ge prau and two other Malays to take me back to 
 the Sadong. He also brought a large packet of letters, which I 
 received most gladly. After all, the greatest pleasure of jungle life 
 is getting letters from home. Sent eight loads down to the boats, 
 and Dobah slept there. 
 
 " The model Dyak house, prau, and the fiddle Le Tiac made 
 and loved, not wisely but too well, were all delivered to-day, to- 
 gether with more bark-cloth, body ornaments, and musical (!) in- 
 struments. The three articles first mentioned were very well made 
 and showed that Dyak mechanical skill is of no mean order when 
 encouraged a little. 
 
 " December Isf. — At peep of day, we were up and off, bag and 
 baggage. Of course the Dyaks assisted us in getting away with 
 our plunder. The men went with us to the river, and the women 
 who remained at the house, were loud in their protestations of re- 
 gret at our departure. They said they would be very lonesome 
 when we were gone. I think each of the women said good-by 
 about fifty times, and as we left the clearing they stood on the 
 ladder and in the door, caUing Malay good-bys to 'Tuan,' 'Ah 
 Kee,' and ' Pleira,' one after another as fast as we would answer 
 them, and then begin again. They kept it up until their voices 
 were lost in the jungle behind us, and then a dog at the house set 
 up a dismal howling, as though he, too, were affected by the univer- 
 sal sorrow. It was awful work getting across the grass swamp, 
 and afterward over the wretched 'batangs,' for the remainder of 
 the distance. The batangs were smaU smooth sapling stems laid 
 end to end over the mud, wet and slippery, so that we occasionally 
 took a sudden slip into the mud and water two feet deep. There 
 
440 TAVO YEAIJS IX THE Jt^NGLE. 
 
 are plenty of saplings about, and, but for tlieir lack of entei-prise, 
 the Pyaks could soon cut enough to lay two or three side by side 
 all along and make a passable road over the mud. But the idea 
 never occurred to them, or if it did, they ay ere too lazy too ciu-ry it 
 out. 
 
 " Without losing a moment's tune, we loaded the boats and 
 started, hoping, by hard paddling, to make the return joiu*ney in 
 two days. On the way down I shot my last oi-aoig, No. 43 — a 
 splendid old male ' ehappin; 4 feet 3 inches in height He was 
 sitting low down in a tree, comfortably humped up with his chin 
 resting on his hand, facing us, not over thirty yards away, and he 
 did not evince the slightest ahu-m at our sxiddeu appeaitmce. I 
 shot him very easily, and when he let go, he fell Hke a bag of meal, 
 sprawling face downwai'd, as mias nearly always fall. 
 
 " The nipa palm givws veiy thickly along the lower Sibxiyau, 
 and at low water, when they are not partly submerged, they are very 
 pretty. Fivm fifteen to twenty finely cut leaves gi-ow from each 
 root, of a dense green color, and very gi-aceful. To the native, 
 the nipa is a gift of the gods, apparently designed to supply them 
 with everything in wliich the jungles are otherwise lacking. From 
 the leaves, the indispensable attap house-roofing is made, cheap, 
 durable, and easily portable, and also kadjangs for boat roofs, so per- 
 fectly adapted to the pui-pose that even the inventive genius of a 
 patent-making American could not produce a better apphance ; the 
 roots when burned }ield salt, fi-om the spadix toddy is extracted, 
 convertible into vineg-ar by one process, arrack by another, and 
 sugar and molasses by another. 
 
 ''Just before reaching the kampong at the mouth of the river, 
 we came to a house where the Malays had lately been making SATup 
 and also sugar. I tasted the former and foimd it dehcious, better 
 than anything of the kind I ever ate, except that made from the 
 sug:\r maple. It was thick, frothy, and clear, with a pecuhar sweet- 
 ness in which there is a veiy perceptible fiavor of salt. I bought 
 two joints of bamboo fiill of it, about a gallon, for twenty cents — 
 certainly not an exorbitant price — bitt alas, I had no buckwheat 
 cakes ! We reached the village at siuiset, and have taken up quar- 
 ters for the night, in a dismal, empty, and dilapidated hut on shore. 
 Have just finished my supper — by courtesy so-oalled. My rations 
 to-day consisted solely of one can of salmon (one poimd") and an- 
 other of green peas (one-h:\lf poimdl washed down with muddy 
 river water. This is my birthday, my third since leaving home. 
 
A MONTH WITH THE DYAKS. 441 
 
 and I sit here in this gloomy hut, flat on the floor, with my 
 blanket spread on the rough poles for a mat, and my ammu- 
 nition-box between my knees for a writing desk, while outside 
 it is pitch dark, the rain is pouring down, and the tide is running 
 swiftly up. The men prefer to sleep in the boat, and I am left 
 alone in my glory. We have had a long, hard day of it, with pre- 
 cious little to eat, and I will abandon this tiresome journal and 
 seek my swinging cradle. 
 
 " December 2cl. — Up at daylight, and Perara and I made short 
 work of skinning and skeletonizing the mias. With a little help 
 from Dobah we finished it in two hours. Then we tumbled into 
 the boats and set off. The Malays are working by the job, hence 
 their willingness to make good time. In the afternoon, as we were 
 about entering the mouth of the Sadong, a violent squall caught us, 
 and we came very near being swamped. We certainly would have 
 been had not the wind ripped off our kadjangs clean and clear so 
 quickly that we were saved from going over. Luckily we did not 
 have the sail up. For a time it looked as if there would be an 
 amateur swimming match in which all who could swim would par- 
 ticipate to see who could get to shore. But we presently found a 
 haven in the mouth of a small creek, which we ran into thankfully 
 enough, but with passengers and cargo thoroughly drenched, and 
 waited until the squall was over. Dined off a pint tin of hare soup, 
 which was short measure and very thin. Beached Simujan at 10 
 P.M. and found my valuable collection and all other belongings in 
 perfect safety, just as I left them." 
 
 The day after my return Lamudin found the nest of a crocodile 
 on the bank of a small creek about four miles below the kampong ; 
 and after shooting at the old female and wounding her, he came 
 to let me know. On visiting the spot with him I found the croco- 
 dile lying dead beside the nest whither she had crawled, mortally 
 wounded, to watch her charge to the last. Her length was nine 
 and a half feet. 
 
 The nest was situated on a clear strip of marshy ground, 
 about fifty yards from the bank of the creek. It was simply a 
 mound of dead grass, grass-roots, and earth, about nine feet in di- 
 ameter on the ground and three feet high. The ground around 
 the nest was covered with water at high tide, and the mound was 
 thrown up to afford the eggs a resting-place above high water 
 mark. We went to work with our hands to dig open the nest, and 
 
442 TWO TEARS IN THE JUNGLE. 
 
 after removing about eight inches of warm sodden grass and earth 
 in a high state of fermentation we came to the eggs. They had 
 evidently all been deposited at the same time, over the top of the 
 half-biiilt mould, for they were disposed in a single layer. There 
 were fifty-five of them — an unusually lai-ge number for a crocodile 
 —and incubation had been in progress about ten days. 
 
 I took thirty-two of the eggs, at three cents each, and the re- 
 mainder were eagerly piu'chased at the same price by the M:ilays 
 of the kampong, who ate them, notvdthstandiug the fact that each 
 egg contained a little embiyo crocodile. I was very anxious to 
 hatch a number of the eggs in order to watch the development 
 of the embryo, and vainly offered five dollai*s for a setting hen or 
 duck to cover the egg-s. I ti'ied to hatch the eggs in warm sand, 
 but my going to Sarawak caused the failui*e of that plan also. I 
 am therefore only able to present a drawing of the embryo as we 
 fii'st found it 
 
 By this time (December 5th), I had eaten up all my provis- 
 ions, spent all my money and allotted time, and having made a 
 rich and valuable collection of what I most desired, I was ready to 
 move on. After dining for the last time with genial 'Mr. "Walters, 
 I engaged passage for my two men and two mif.s, my collection 
 and myself in a Chinese trader's boat bovmd for Kuching. Mi*. 
 Eng Quee gave me at parting a number of valuable ethnological 
 specimens which he had siu-reptitiously gotten together for my 
 benefit. 
 
 I left the little kampong with keen regret, and have ever since 
 looked back upon it longingly. The days I spent on the Sa- 
 dong, the Simujan, at Padaaig Lake and the Sibuyau seem like a 
 strange, dehghtful dream of a sojoui-n in another world, where every 
 face and foim and every object, animate and inanimate, was sti-ange 
 and sti'angely interesting, and with the sweet there mingles no bit- 
 ter. It was a lotus-eater's life that I led for four dehghtful months, 
 free fi'om the aggravations which beset all but jungle life. 
 
 The deep, mellow boom of the big gong in the vei-anda of 
 the government house, on which the policemen struck the hours 
 with measured stroke, and its echo, rolling through the siui-ound- 
 ing forest hke a wave, will always sound in my ears. I love to 
 think that the hours are struck there now just the same. 
 
DYAK WEAPONS, UTENSILS, ETC. 
 
 1. K}'an wai- shield. 
 
 2. Sea Dyak spear. 
 
 3. Sea Dyak fiddle. 
 
 4. Slieath of Parong latok. 
 
 5. Parong latok. (Hill Dyiiks.) 
 (i. Biliong, to use as an adzo. 
 
 7. Biliong, to nse as an axe. 
 
 8. Sumpitan, used by Poonans. 
 
 9. Juah, or back-basket. 
 
 {Draivn from specimens collected by the Author.) 
 
 10. Sirih basket. 
 
 11. Betel knife, tc accompany No. 10. 
 
 12. Chunani box, " " 
 
 13. Sibnyau Dyak nieasni-ing-stick. 
 (Used in setting pig traps.) 
 
 14. Sibnyau Dyak hat. 
 
 15. Model of Sea Dyak boat, with kad- 
 jang roof. 
 
CHAPTER XXXYIL 
 
 THE ABORIGINES OF BORNEO. 
 
 Civilization an Exterminator of Savage Races. — Stability of the Dyaks. — The 
 Survival of the Fittest.— The Typical Dyak.— Four Great Tribes.— 77;<! 
 Kyans. — Their Strength and Distribution. — Tribe Misnamed Milanau. — 
 General Characteristics. — Mechanical Skill. — Modes of Warfare. — Aggres- 
 siveness. — Cannibalism of certain Sub-tribes. — Tattooing. — Ideas of a 
 Future State. — Human Sacrifices. — Houses. — 77w Ilill Dynki*. — Distri- 
 bution. — Takers of Head Trophies. — Fighting Qualities. — Physique. — 
 Dress and Ornaments. — A Curious Corset. — Weapons — Houses. — The 
 Pangah. — Social Life. — Strict Morality without Religion. — Prohibition of 
 Consanguineous Marriages. — Marriage Ceremony. — Honesty. — Disposal of 
 the Dead. — A Relic of Hindooism. — Ideas of a Supremo Being and Future 
 State. — The Mongol Dyaks. — Remains of Former Chinese Influence. — An 
 Advanced Tribe. — Position. — Physique. — Dress. — Houses. — Skill in Agri- 
 culture. — Implements of Husbandry. — Independent but Peaceful. — The 
 Muruts. — Dress and Ornaments. — Houses. — The Kadyans. — Comparative 
 . Estimate of the Four Great Dyak Tribes. 
 
 Savage tribes detei'iorate morally, physically, and numerically, 
 according to the degree in which they are influenced by civihza- 
 tion. Those which yield most readily to the mild blandishments 
 of the missionary, the school-teacher, and the merchant are the 
 first to disappear from the face of the earth. Behind the philan- 
 thropical pioneer of Christian civilization, even though he bears in 
 his hands only the Bible and spelling-book, there lurks a host of 
 modern vices and diseases more deadly than the spears and poi- 
 soned arrows of the savage. To improve a savage race is to weaken 
 it ; to wholly civilize and convert it is to exterminate it altogether. 
 Like the wild beasts of the forest, the children of nature disappear 
 before the grinding progress of civilization.* 
 
 * This has proven true in perhaps more than ninety per cent, of all cases 
 in point. O ;casionally, however, a savage tribe is found possessed of suffi- 
 cient moral strength and tenacity of purpose to withstand tin first great 
 shock of contact with the powerful forces of civilization, and to survive in- 
 definitely thereafter. . Such tribes as are thus fitted by nature to absorb th« 
 
44-f TAvo yi^vKS IX the jungle. 
 
 To tlie otlniologist. aboriginal raoosi lose interest in proportio.n 
 to the extent in wbioli they have adopted modem customs smd 
 ideas. If we exoept the changes in customs necessju-ily brought 
 about by the suppression of the head-hunting luid piittcy, it is Siife 
 to say that the Py:iks of Borneo su-e tcwlay precisely what they 
 were when Europetuis tirst Luided on the island. They have mildly 
 but effectually resisted the best efforts of the missionaries— Protes- 
 tiVQt, Catholic, iuid Mohammedim ivlike — and. being mialterably de- 
 voted to jungle life, there exists between them and the white i^ace 
 a gulf which the latter cannot bridge and the former will not, 
 AVise Pyiiks ! Neither couunerce. education, nor religion can in the 
 least add to theu- happiness, :uid so long as they hold their pres- 
 ent attitude all those inllueuces combined cannot exterminate them. 
 
 By reason of their adherence to all their former ti-sxditions. eiis* 
 toms, and siu-roim dings, except those mentioned above, luid on 
 other accounts as Avell, the PaiiIv ^^l\v the natives pronounced Pyiili) 
 tribes of Borneo swe especijvlly interesting. In some respects they 
 jvre the most ivmarkable people h>-ing, and theii- condition is well 
 worth study. 
 
 As may be inferred fix>m the geogi-aphieal position of Borneo, 
 the Pyaks !U"e descendants of the !\[:vlay it\ce, which has peopled 
 nem-ly all the islands of the MiUay Archipelago with the exception 
 of New Guinea. At present it is impossible for jmy one to offer 
 more th:vii A-:\gue speculations respecting the advent of the aborigi- 
 n:d tribes in lK->rneo, :md than such speculation nothing could be 
 more improtitable. No one can say whence this vast islsmd was 
 originally jHvpled. although thei-e are some fi\cts which seem to in- 
 dicate that the progress of the great Ivyan tribe has been from 
 Kotei northwest\N"^u\l. There ai-e well-<lefined ti-iioes of Hiadoo 
 influence among the Hill D^iiks in the west, and of Chinese influ- 
 ence in the exti"eme north ; but not a single representative of 
 either race exists in Borneo at the present day. except a few late 
 arrivtUs. Rnh the Hiudoos and Chinese of past centuries have 
 either l">eeu completely exterminated by v^mous influences, or swal- 
 lowed up by affiliation vdih the aborigines. The trtices of Hiudoo- 
 ism tuv p;u-ticularly insignificant, consisting mainly of the ide,'* 
 junongst the Hill IH-aks of a Supi-eme Being of some kind named 
 
 virtues of oirilisiition withiHit Ivuig wt'.'ikoiuHi l\v its: vices 5»re not extemii- 
 nsited. but sure sul>st,^iti!Ulr benefitevi. and sx> from streiigtli to stiviigth. It is 
 not oh-irwred th.<»t the evils of oiviliiation iro '.rii^ the missiou.-iry and the teacher 
 —far from it— l>\it it is a sad fsct that thev follow closely after. 
 
THE ABORIGINE!? OF BORNEO. 445 
 
 Jowata ; the prcjiidice against killing" cattle and deer, nnd also of 
 eating their flesh ; and a few rude stone images and utensils. It is 
 cui'ious and worthy of note tliat both these great Oriental races in- 
 vaded Borneo in the spirit of conquest, but both succumbed to 
 savages of mould sviperior to their own — a clear case of the sur- 
 vival of the fittest. 
 
 Although the aboriginal inhabitants of Borneo are divided into 
 eevenU tribes and scores of sub-tribes or clans, they may, with 
 reasonable exceptions, be described as one body, or sub-race, viz., 
 Dyaks. In general terms, a Dyak may be described as a Borueau 
 semi-savage of Malay extraction, of a yellowish brown complexion, 
 straight, glossy -black hair, smooth face, medium stature, and active, 
 warlike disposition. He is usually clad in a bai-k-loin cloth ; but 
 sometimes in a war- jacket of skin or padded cloth. He is ai'med 
 ^vith sword and spear, and possibly the sampitan also ; and 
 lives in the jungle in a long-house set high up on posts. He has 
 no definite religious convictions, but respects his wdfe, and treats 
 both her and his children well. His sustenance is rice, fowls, 
 pigs and fruit gro^vn by himself, aaid wild animals slain in the for- 
 est, supplemented sometimes by the sale of w^ax, gum, rattans, and 
 gutta collected in the jungle ; though these articles are generally 
 exchanged for brass wire, beads, cloth, and other ornaments. He 
 has no written language, makes no pottery, builds no monuments, 
 carves but little and only in wood, works but little in iron, yet 
 builds fine war-boats. His bearing is independent, dignified, re- 
 spectful and frank, and he is honest at all times, save in war. 
 
 While it is perfectly proper to call every aboriginal inhabitant 
 of Borneo a Dyak (for otherwise it would be necessary to coin a 
 name apphcable to all), there are, as has been already intimated, 
 several well-marked tribal divisions, and many sub-tribes or clans, 
 between whom there exist marked ethnological diflerences, and 
 diversity in language and custom. Before proceeding to a more 
 detailed description of the tribe with which I am best acquainted, 
 it is necessary to a proper understanding of the subject that we 
 take a brief survey of the entire Dyak race, or, to be exact, sub- 
 race. 
 
 In my opinion the aboriginal inhabitants of Borneo may best 
 be divided into four great tribes, which should be designated 
 as follows : the Sea Dyaks, Kyans, Hill Dyaks, and Mongol 
 Dyaks. 
 
 The Sea Dyaks are distinguished by their brave and warlike 
 
446 TWO YEARS m THE JUNGLE. 
 
 disposition and love of conquest, their skill in building war-boats 
 and conducting naval operations, which has given to them their 
 name of Orang Laut, or men of the sea ; and also the fact that they 
 never tattoo their bodies or limbs. Inasmuch as the people of 
 this tribe may properly be regarded as the true type of the Dyak 
 race they will be described at some length in the next chapter. 
 Something will first be said, however, respecting the other great 
 tribes. 
 
 The Kyan Tribe. 
 
 The Kyan tribe is numerically the greatest of the four, and it 
 also covers a much gi*eater extent of ten-itory than any other, em- 
 bracing fully one-half of the whole island. Its position is central, 
 extending from the mouth of the Segah Eiver and the lower 
 corner of Kotei across the island to the very sea-coast of Sarawak. 
 The accompanying map shows the extent and outline of the terri- 
 tory occupied by this great tribe, and the positions of its various 
 sub-tribes, or clans, so far as known. We have information of at 
 least eighteen sub-tribes — quite definite information respecting 
 some, though extremely meagre concerning the majority at present, 
 but no one can say how many more sub-tribes that have never even 
 been heai'd of inhabit the unknown intei'ior. The numerical strength 
 of the Kyan tribe is consequently not known ; and, while it is quite 
 futile to blindly conjecture the number of its people, we may 
 safely believe from the facts we already have that it exceeds two 
 hundred and fifty thousand. 
 
 On the north coast of Borneo the name Kyan is appHed only to 
 the people who inhabit the head- waters of the Kejang and the 
 Baram rivers (about fifty villages in all) ; while the tribe as a 
 whole is named after the Milanaus, an insignificant sub-tribe inhab- 
 iting a few miles of sea-coast, a half-civilized offshoot of the 
 true Kyans, who do not practice head-hunting, but according to 
 Kajah Brooke are "exceedingly treacherous." The Milanaus 
 proper are in no sense typical representatives of the sub-tribes 
 usually classed under that name (and even by Kajah Brooke in 
 his " Ten Years in Sarawak," vol. i., p. 7f^) ; therefore, I have 
 adopted the term Kyan as the name of the whole tribe, for the 
 reason that the sub-tribe commonly known by that name is the 
 largest, the most warlike and enterprising, and in every way most 
 fit to be regarded as the type of the whole people. 
 
 Generally speaking, therefore, the Kyan tribe is distinguished 
 
'a. ^ 
 
 <^^ 
 
 ^ 
 
 ^=A 
 
 '^ '^'^ 
 
 A KYAN WARRIOE. 
 
 (i^rom a sketch by H. H. Everett.) 
 
THE ABOllIGIT^ES OF BORNEO. 447 
 
 b}' being the farthest removed from ci\ilization and by the practice 
 of stmdrj' barbarous and sometimes cruel customs ; by tattooing ; 
 by the use of the sampitan, or blow-pipe, and poisoned arrows ; by 
 ■wearing sleeveless jackets made of padded cloth or skins of bear, 
 leopard, monkey, or orang-utan ; by the burial of their dead, es- 
 pecially of their chiefs, in coffins or vaults raised high on posts ; 
 and lastly (and most strangely of all), by their ability to smelt iron 
 ore, and to use both forge and bellows in the manufacture of their 
 weapons, which are of good quality and strangely ornamented. In 
 addition to the above distinguishing characteristics, mention may 
 be made of their war-sliields, of hard wood, ornamented on the 
 front with tufts of hair, sometimes dyed in various colors, taken 
 from the heads of slain enemies. 
 
 For making forays in great force and suddenly attacking de- 
 fenceless villages of real or fancied enemies for the purpose of ob- 
 taining heads, slaves, and plunder, the Kyans proper and various 
 other sub-tribes have always been famous. They have thus ac- 
 quired a great reputation for bravery and enterprise in war, but 
 very few facts have been recorded which really justify it. In their 
 head-hunting forays, the Kyans always went in numbers sufficient 
 either to completely overwhelm the attacked or else to insure a re- 
 treat, in good order, from the enemy's stockade. Rajah Brooke 
 declares with the disgust natural to the leader of an expedition 
 against an enemy who would not stop to fight, " The Kyan war- 
 riors never fought when they could flee." 
 
 With the exception of the check which the Kyans proper ex- 
 perienced when they encountered the finest warriors in Borneo, 
 the Sea Dyaks of Sakarran and Seribas, they have steadily driven 
 all other tribes before them in their progress northward from the 
 interior. The Sibuyau Dyaks were forced to migrate bodily from 
 the head-waters of the Batang Lupar and settle nearer the coast, 
 while the poor Bisayas and Muruts have been driven from one set- 
 tlement to another on the Limbang River, in Borneo proper, until 
 they are greatly weakened and impoverished. The , Kyans often 
 destroyed a whole settlement of Muruts at a single blow. 
 
 One of the Kyan sub-tribes of Kotei, the Trings, some members 
 of which were interviewed by Mr. Carl Bock, has the reputation of 
 being not only head-hunters, but cannibals, nor did either their 
 chief or priestess deny the charge.* The Bugis kapitan who via- 
 
 * Head-Hunters of Borneo, p. 135. 
 
448 TWO YEARS m THE JUNGLE. 
 
 ited the Trings at home stated to Mr. Bock that they live " in large 
 houses several hundred feet long, but extremely dirty inside, of a 
 wretched appearance outside," and literally full of skulls taken in 
 head-hunting expeditions. 
 
 The Kyans proper have on two occasions been publicly accused 
 of cannibalism, once by some Sibaru Dyaks, of the Kapooas, who 
 declared that the Kyans (their allies) on one occasion ate a Malay 
 who was slain in battle ; and once by a Malay noble, named Usup, 
 who declared that in 1855 a few Kyan warriors took portions of 
 the bodies of some executed criminals, which they had helped to 
 capture when alive, roasted, and ate them. Both these instances 
 are given by Mr. St. John.* One or two other tribes in the Dutch 
 Territory have also been accused of exhibiting the same bad taste. 
 
 The people of the Kyan tribe are the only ones in Borneo with 
 whom the practice of tattooing seems to be universal. Of those 
 who live in the north, the Kyans proper, the Kenowits and Paka- 
 tans are known to practise this custom ; while of those in the 
 south, Mr. Bock states that all the Dyak sub-tribes in Kotei tattoo, 
 except those in the Long Bleh district. The Tring women and 
 those of the Baram Kyans tattoo their thighs very elaborately, and 
 the women of Long Wai do the same with their feet and hands. 
 
 The Kyans come the nearest to having a religious belief, or, 
 rather, system of formulated superstitions, of all the Dyaks. The 
 Baram Kyans believe in a future existence, and their heaven and 
 hell are divided into various compartments for the proper accom- 
 modation of all according to the circumstances tmder which they 
 die. They pay much attention to the carving of wooden images and 
 charms, to all of which more or less meaning is attached ; still their 
 ideas of a Supreme Being and a future state are very vague, and 
 they have no religious rites or outward observances, f 
 
 The Trings have a weU-defined belief in a tribal heaven, and a 
 purgatory of toiling and enduring which must be passed through 
 before the heaven can be reached. Yet the Trings practise canni- 
 balism in war, and offer human sacrifices at the tiivahs (death feasts) 
 which are made upon the return of an expedition. Mr. Perelaer 
 describes such an event, held on the Upper Kahajan River by a 
 Kyan clan (of which the Trings are a branch), at which forty 
 slave debtors were put to death by torture, or by flesh wounds in- 
 flicted by the men and boys of the tribe. 
 
 * Life in the Forests of the Far East. 
 f St. John, vol. i., p. 110. 
 
THE ABORIGIlsrES OF BOENEO. 449 
 
 The houses of the Kyans are, in general, very similar to the long- 
 houses of the Sea Dyaks, each of which accommodates a number 
 of famihes, but veiy often a number of these long-houses are 
 grouped together in regular village style. 
 
 Those of the Bai'am Kyans are roofed with shingles, and floored 
 with rough boards instead of poles or slats of the nibong palm, 
 such as are usually employed for this purpose. 
 
 The Kenowits and Milanaus in the Rejang District formerly 
 built their long-houses on posts, from twenty to twenty-five feet 
 high, or even more, in order that they might better resist the at- 
 tacks of the hostile Sea Dyaks of the Sakarran and Seribas. Being 
 unable to chmb into the houses, their assailants directed their at- 
 tack against the hard-wood posts, and worked under their shields 
 while trying to chop them in two. Although the inhabitants above 
 rained down stones, beams, spears, and hot water upon the besieg- 
 ers. Low states that the latter were generally successful.* 
 
 The Pakatans and Poonans, wandering tribes who inhabit the 
 unknown interior, build no houses whatever, and are, to that ex- 
 tent, the least advanced of all the East Indian tribes we are ac- 
 quainted with. Even the open pole platforms of the Jacoons of 
 the IMalay Peninsula show a far gi-eater advancement than the sim- 
 ple mat spread upon the damp earth, but one step removed from 
 the wild beasts' laii-. 
 
 The Hill Dyaks. 
 
 The Hni Dyaks inhabit the extreme western side of Borneo, 
 their eastern boundary being the Sadong Eiver. As their name 
 implies, they Uve away from the sea, usually upon the hills and 
 mountains, and are essentially hill-people. Being indisposed to 
 making pu-atical forays by water in great force, as did the Sea 
 Dyaks in former times, they were usually the victims of their more 
 powerful and rapacious neighbors. Although possessing, perhaps, 
 fully as much courage, man for man, as the Sea Dyaks, they were 
 never so warlike as to make fighting and plundei'ing the chief 
 business of their Hves. The Sarawak officers say that they are far 
 more tractable and easily managed than the Sea Dyaks. 
 
 Although they formerly took the heads of enemies slain in battle 
 and preserved the cleaned skulls in their head-houses, they deny 
 that they ever had that mania for head-collecting which at one time 
 
 * Sarawak, p. 340. 
 
450 TWO YEAES IN THE JUNGLE. 
 
 affected the Sea Dyaks. While it is true that the customs of some 
 of the clans required that, in order to be eligible for marriage, a 
 young warrior should be the possessor of a head taken by himself, 
 in most of the clans of this tribe the taking of a head was not a 
 preliminary necessary to marriage. The Hill Dyaks also claim 
 that it has always been contrary to their customs to take the heads 
 of white men or Malays unless slain in battle, or even of strangers 
 from other tribes who were visiting theii* country. 
 
 But notwithstanding thek natm-al ability and present peaceful 
 habits, the Hill Dyaks have been, in their day, warriors of no 
 mean kind. In 1840 Sir James Brooke states * that the Sentah 
 clan embraced about one thousand warriors, and their head-house 
 contained about one thousand heads. In the pangaJi, or head-house, 
 of the village of Peninjau, on Serambo mountain, I counted forty- 
 two skulls, or very nearly one for every two fighting men in the vil- 
 lage, and Mr. O. H. St. John informed me that there were quite as 
 many in the other two villages of that mountain, Serambo and 
 Bombok. 
 
 I did not see many Hill Dyaks, and altogether, representatives 
 of but three clans — the Serambo, Sentah, and Sow. They were so 
 similar in both physique and physiognomy as- to render it quite im- 
 possible for a stranger to detect any other than purely individual 
 differences between them. They were, I should say, more strongly 
 built than the Sea Dyaks, and a httle shorter in statiire also, all 
 being decidedly below medium height — five feet, six inches. As a 
 rule both the men and women were well made and muscular, their 
 forms denoting activity and strength in an equal degree. All have 
 that independent and dignified bearing so characteristic of both 
 the Hill and Sea Dyaks, which, resting on a clear conscience and 
 a foundation of good principles, goes far to make the Dyak the 
 equal of the European. 
 
 Most of the men wore cloth jackets in addition to the bark-cloth 
 chawat, and a head-dress of either one or the other of the materials 
 just mentioned. The women wore only the bedang, or half -petti- 
 coat, reaching from hip to knee, but their waists were encircled by 
 hoops of No. 6 brass wire, which lay, one upon another, from the 
 hips upward, in an unbroken coU half way up their plump breasts, 
 which were conspicuous above the upper coil. In the village of 
 Peninjau, on Serambo mountain, I saw a really good-looking girl, 
 
 * Mundj's Narrative. 
 
THE ABORIGINES OF BORNEO. 451 
 
 who wore a remarkable waist ornament, totally unlike anything 1 
 had before seen or heard of. It was neither more nor less than a 
 tightly-fitting cylinder, or corset, composed entirely of brass wire of 
 large size. One wire hoop was fitted around her waist at the hips, 
 and another half way up her breast, between which were fastened, 
 perpendicularly, brass wires of the same size and equal length, set 
 as closely together as possible without overlaying. This curious 
 girdle of brass was ten inches in width, and, unHke the corset of 
 modern civilization, had no provision for the breasts, which strayed 
 out in a most lawless manner over the top. The girdle fitted so 
 tightly and with such rigidity that I was impelled to ask my com- 
 panion, Mr. O. H. St. John, how it was removed at the approach 
 of that interesting period in womanhood to which every Dyak 
 woman looks forward with eager interest. He stated that when 
 pregnancy rendered the removal of the corset imperative the old 
 women of the village would tie the girl's hands together, pull them 
 above her head to the utmost stretch of her arms, make them fast 
 to a beam, and then work the girdle off over her head. 
 
 In addition to this brass-wire corset, this same young woman 
 wore on each arm about fifteen nicely polished brass rings, or 
 bracelets, which, altogether, reached from her wrist nearly to her 
 elbow, like a long, close-fittting cuff of brass wu'e. Her entire out- 
 fit of wire was quite clean and highly poUshed, and in sharp con- 
 trast with her dark skin, the general effect was quite pleasing. 
 
 The Hill Dyak women sometimes wear a loosely-fitting jacket 
 of bright cloth, but are usually seen without it. The ornaments of 
 the men are armlets of plaited rattan, necklaces of beads, and some- 
 times, as I was told, of leopard's teeth, although I saw none of the 
 latter. Neither men nor women ever tattoo in the least, and their 
 skin is of a yellowish-brown color. 
 
 The weapons of the men consist solely of the spear and parong 
 latok, the latter being a heavy sword of the toughest steel, very 
 thick at the back, and with an edge like a razor, gotten up for the 
 express purpose of spHtting a head open, or cutting it off altogether, 
 at a single blow. For a European, it is an awkward weapon to use, 
 the hilt being very small and set on the blade at an obtuse angle, 
 in order to give greater force to the swing of the weapon. The 
 parong latok in my possession measures as follows : length of 
 blade, 21 inches ; breadth at widest part, 2 inches ; thickness at 
 back, ^ inch at the point to f at the hilt ; length of hilt, 8^ inches ; 
 weight, 2\ lbs. The sheath is of wood, stained dark red, and is 
 
452 TWO YEAES m THE JUNGLE. 
 
 fastened to the body by a cord made of blue cotton cloth. Tliia 
 weapon and its sheath are figured in the group of weapons and 
 utensils given elsewhere, Nos. 5 and 4 respectively. 
 
 The villages of the Hill Dyaks are composed of a number of 
 houses of good size, elevated on posts of course, and each inhabited 
 by several families, instead of the one continuous structm'e, or long- 
 house, pecuHar to the Sea Dyaks, The departure from the typical 
 long-house is rendered necessary by the fact that their villages are 
 usually on mountains or hills where the surface is too rugged and 
 broken to accommodate one continuous structure several hundred 
 feet long by forty or fifty wide. Each Hill Dyak village contains 
 a pangah, or head-house, a cu'cular structure with a steep and 
 high conical roof. That at Peninjau was about fifty feet in diam- 
 eter, with a fireplace in the centre, and a broad bench running all 
 the way around the room next to the wall, directly above which 
 the skidls which had been taken by the community had been sus- 
 pended in a row. Here and there a square section was cut in the 
 roof and fixed so as to be pushed out at the bottom and propped 
 open to admit light and air. The pangah is the purgatory to which 
 the boys of the village are sent to lodge from the time they arrive 
 at puberty until they mai-ry. All strangers are lodged in it, and 
 councils are held there also, 
 
 I do not know much of the social life of the Hill Dyaks ex- 
 cept what was told me by Mr. St, John and the late A, K, Haugh- 
 ton, Esq. ; but I consider their testimony of higher value than even 
 the personal observations of a stranger and brief sojourner, and 
 therefore I give it unhesitatingly. 
 
 The people of this tribe are morally the most highly developed 
 of any in the island of Borneo, if not in the whole archipelago, 
 which, in view of the extent of the influence Hindooism formerly 
 exerted over them, is all the more surprising. Although they are, 
 as a tribe, wholly without religion or any of its restraining influ- 
 ences, theu- moral principles would put to the blush the children of 
 Israel in theu* best days. It is claimed that adultery is an uncom- 
 mon crime (except in the case of the people of Peninjau and 
 Serambo) among them, and there are several large villages in 
 which the oldest men do not remember a single offence of the kind. 
 Under no circumstances does a Dyak woman attempt to produce 
 an abortion, the common and unpreventable crime of civilization 
 in its highest state. But one wife is allowed, except in rare in- 
 stances, where a chief is permitted two. 
 
THE ABOEIGINES OF BORTSTEO. 453 
 
 The customs of the Dyaks absolutely prohibit consanguineous 
 marriages, even the marriage of cousins constituting a rank of- 
 fence, for which the offenders are heavily fined, and socially dis- 
 graced as well. Marriages could be contracted in this country or 
 in Europe with honor and eclat which would not be permitted for 
 a moment among the aborigines of Borneo in their native jungle. 
 I have already alluded to the custom of banishing the unman ied 
 men and boys of the village to the pangah for the protection of the 
 famines. 
 
 And yet the marriage ceremony is devoid of any solemn vows 
 and protestations, certainly destitute of even a spark of religious 
 sentiment, and so simple and absurd as to seem little more than 
 child's play. Indeed, it is so little thought of that it might almost 
 be said a couple may go through with almost any ceremony they 
 please so long as their intention is made public. In some villages 
 a fowl is shaken a certain number of times over the heads of the 
 pair to be wed ; in others the bride and groom each take a fowl, 
 pass it in front of them seven times, then cut the throats of both, 
 cook them and eat them. Sometimes a marriage is celebrated by 
 an exchange of bracelets in public ; and again by the contracting 
 parties eating a meal of rice, honey and salt together. Like honest 
 people, it is the intention of the other that each participant in a 
 marriage rehes upon ; and the ceremony merely serves to mark 
 publicly the beginning of their marital relation. 
 
 Marriage usually takes place when a girl reaches the age of six- 
 teen, and she is always allowed to engineer her own matrimonial 
 schemes, and choose her partner without let or hindrance. Di- 
 vorce is not uncommon, but scandal, lying, and wholesale vituper- 
 ation are not resorted to to accomplish it. If a pair does not 
 live happily together, by reason of laziness on the part of one, 
 or bad temper on the part of the other, the dissatisfied party 
 leaves the other, and, after a fine is paid over by the dissatis- 
 fied party to the original offender, both are free and at liberty to 
 marry again. Separations to which both are opposed sometimes 
 take place soon after the marriage, in obedience to certain recog- 
 nized signs, such as the barking of a deer, which foretells the death 
 of one of the parties if they do not separate. In all his social re- 
 lations the Dyak is a philosopher, free from gnawing jealousy and 
 yearning for seclusive and perpetual possession. If one wife leaves 
 him he girds up his loins literally and coolly seeks another and a 
 better one. Although he greatly enjoys his wife's society and co- 
 
454 TWO YEARS IN THE JUNGLE. 
 
 operation in his pursuits on the farm, if she leaves him he does not 
 allow her absence to disturb his serenity. The loss of his children 
 affects him much more, for they are his hope and trust. 
 
 To the other virtues of the Dyak must be added that of strict 
 honesty and profound respect for the rights of property. Whether 
 they steal from each other I cannot say ; I suppose they do some- 
 times, although it must be very seldom. It is positively asserted, 
 however, that they never pilfer from Europeans, nor even Malays 
 and Chinese, from whom they would have a right to take something 
 in remembrance of past oppression and extortion in the one case, 
 and sharp practice with false weights and measures in the other. 
 
 Strangely enough, some of the Hill Dyaks burn their dead, 
 a custom which they have clearly adopted from the Hindoos who 
 flourished in Western Borneo several centuries ago. I believe all 
 the people of this tribe in Sarawak Territory practise cremation ex- 
 cepting those who live on the Sadong. The Sadong Eiver Dyaks 
 bury their dead, and bury with them various articles belonging to 
 the deceased, especially his betel box -with fresh sirih leaves (black 
 pepper), some old clothes of no value, and perhaps his spear. His 
 land is then divided equally among his children, without discrim- 
 ination for or against either sex. 
 
 The Hill Dyaks have no written language, and no social laws 
 save the customs and traditions which have been handed down 
 from their ancestors ; and it must be admitted that these are sur- 
 prisingly well adapted to their condition and necessities. Chief- 
 tainships are hereditary, but their chiefs rule only by the consent 
 of the governed and without the power to oppress. 
 
 The Hill Dyaks have dim ideas regarding a future state and 
 a Supreme Spirit named Tupa or Jowata, both Hindoo names. 
 They beHeve the good Dyaks go to a place under the earth, 
 called Sabyan, where they are happy, and that the bad go to an- 
 other place, also called Sabyan, where they are not happy. A few 
 believe that sometimes their ancestors take the form of deer after 
 death, for which reason, like the Hindoos from whom the idea was 
 probably derived, they will neither kill deer nor eat of their flesh. 
 
 Some beheve that certain of their warriors become " wood- 
 spirits," or wood-devils (antus), after death, and remain on earth to 
 plague such of their survivors as have offended or injured them. 
 They have no religious ceremonies or observances whatever, nor 
 any conception of a God who controls the destinies of men for 
 good or ill. In these people we see morality divorced from any 
 
THE ABORIGINES OF BOENEO. 455 
 
 form of religion, a state of things which we are often told is impos- 
 sible. In this condition they are happy and prosperous, which, 
 after all, is the great end of human existence. 
 
 The Mongol Dyaks. 
 
 The Mongol Dyaks, whom I regard as the fourth division of the 
 Dyak tribes, are composed of the Ida'ans, or Dusuns, who inhabit 
 the northeastern portion of the island ; the Kadyans, who inhabit 
 the hills in the vicinity of Brunei, the capital of Borneo proper ; 
 and the Muruts and Bisayas, who are the sole inhabitants of a long 
 strip of territory lying between the country of the Baram Kyans 
 on the south and the Ida'ans on the north, and stretching from 
 near the coast of Borneo proper perhaps three-fourths of the dis- 
 tance across the island. While it is certain that future explora- 
 tions of the interior of Sabah will add to the above several clans 
 now wholly unknown to us, it will be noticed that the Bajus and 
 Lanuns of the north coast are excluded from the Mongol Dyak 
 tribe. The former are Sea Gipsies, of mixed breed, and no partic- 
 ular nationality, while the Lanuns, formerly the most famous pi- 
 rates in the East Indies, came to the north coast of Borneo from 
 Mindanau, one of the most southern islands of the Philippine group. 
 
 For the most definite and reliable information attainable con- 
 cerning these sub-tribes we are indebted to Mr. Spencer St. John's 
 admirable work, " Life in the Forests of the Far East," from which 
 the following facts are drawn. 
 
 The Ida'ans are the farthest advanced toward civilization of all 
 the aboriginal sub-tribes in Borneo, and from the fact that the 
 language of the other three sub-tribes is nearly identical with theirs, 
 and that they have all been greatly influenced by contact with the 
 Chinese in former years, which influence still affects them, I con- 
 sider it both convenient and desu-able to group them together 
 under the title of Mongol Dyaks. The Ida'ans, who number about 
 forty thousand souls, and constitute perhaps more than four-fifths 
 of the proposed tribal group, certainly differ veiy strikingly in 
 many respects from the other Dyak tribes ; while the three sub- 
 tribes which we associate with the Ida'ans, certainly resemble them 
 more than they do any others. 
 
 The Muruts and Bisayas are, in many respects, similar to the 
 Sea Dyaks, and it is highly probable that they once belonged to 
 that tribe ; but, by the onward march of the warlike and aggres- 
 
-trU) TWO YEAKJi I^f THK JINGLK. 
 
 sive Kynns, thpy booaino soparntod from the main body, over since 
 which time, even down to the present day, their implacv^ble enemies 
 have steadily driven them northward stop l\v step, nntil fuially. 
 perliaps oven as early as the end of tlio present century, their north- 
 ern luniTulary will reach the coiiiitry of the Ida'ans, iuid the three 
 sub-tribes will become more closely related than now. 
 
 The Ida'ans (or Pusuus). according to St, John.* are essentially 
 the s^ime in appearance as the Pyak of Sarawali. the Kyan. the 
 Murut and Bisaya. Some of the men tattoo slightly, but in an en- 
 tirely different fashion from the K}-ans. They are clear-skinned 
 and have good-ten\pered countenances. The women, although not 
 good-looking, are not ugly. All tlie girls and yo\ing women wear 
 a piece of cloth to conceal their boson\s : their petticoats also are 
 longer than usual, and the young girls (of Ginambur) had the front 
 of the head shaved like Chinese girls. Near the sea-coast, the men 
 wear jackets and trousers, but as the traveller advances into the in- 
 terior, the amomit of clothing g^■:^dually lessens ; cloth gai-meuts 
 being seen on a few only at the foot of Iviua Balu, beyond which the 
 people are said to wear nothing but bark-cloth. 
 
 The houses of the Ida'ans on the Tampasnk Eiver, Mr. St. Jolm 
 deolai"es to bo the best he ever saw among the Bornesm aborigines. 
 Some were " boarded with finely- worked planks : " the dooi-s were 
 strong and excellently made ; and the flooring of bamboos beaten 
 oxit, which in one house at least was very neat and fi-ee fivm all 
 dirt. "While some have adopted the Chinese custom of a sepantte 
 house for each fsvmily, others occupy the usual long-house so com- 
 mon among the Sea P^^iiks, \vith the open hall and a sepai*ate room 
 for each family. 
 
 The Ida'ans aro o>st -itiivlly agi-iculturists, in which pursuit they 
 are so ftU' advanced as to use the plough, which is very simple and 
 made entirely of wood, and also an equally rude harrow. Tliey 
 raise rice, sweet potatoes, yams, maii:e. sugtir-cane. tobacco, and 
 cotton. " Simple as this agricultvu'e is," says St. John. *■ it is su- 
 perior to an^-thing that exists to the southwaivl of Brunei, and it 
 wotild bo ctirioits if we could investig-ate the causes that have ren- 
 dered this su\all portion of Borneo, between the capital and Malludu 
 R'iy, so stiperior in agiiculture to the i-est. I think it is ob"\"iously 
 a i-emuant of Chinese civilization." ... •■ The Ida'ans also use 
 a species of sledge made of bamboos and drawn by buffaloes to 
 
 * VoL i., p. 87t> et ?^. 
 
THE ABORIGINES OF BOENEO. 457 
 
 take their heavy goods to market. The gardens on the Tarawan 
 are well kept and neatly fenced in." 
 
 "None of the Ida'ans pay any tribute to any one, and no one 
 dares to oppress them. Each village is a separate government, and 
 almost each house independent. They have no established chiefs, 
 but follovsr the counsels of the old men to whom they are related. 
 They have no regular wars . . . and their feuds are but petty 
 quarrels. Although every man goes armed, perfect security exists, 
 as was proven by the troops of girls working in the fields without 
 protection." 
 
 The only case of pilfering from a white man by a Dyak oc- 
 curred to Mr. St. John, when among the Ida'ans, which may also 
 be set down as due to the results of Chinese influence and example 
 in former times. 
 
 The Muruts and Bisayas are numerically weakened and greatly 
 impoverished by reason of the oft-repeated and usually successful 
 attacks made upon them by the Kyans of Baram. They are 
 steadily driven from one locality to another, and live in constant 
 fear of further raids, for, be it remembered, they are far beyond 
 the beneficent influence of Rajah Brooke's government. 
 
 "Orang Murut" means literally " moimtain man," and those 
 visited by St. John, who live in the mountain above the source of 
 the Limbang River, he thus describes : 
 
 The men wear bear-skin jackets, and head-dresses of bark or- 
 namented vnth. cowries. Heavy necklaces of beads are worn by 
 the men as well as the women, with many rings of lead worn in the 
 rim of the ear. Some young girls have petticoats composed en- 
 tirely of beads on a ground work of cloth or bark. The girls of 
 this tribe also twist a couple of fathoms of brass wire in circles 
 around their necks, which rise from the shoulders to the chin like 
 a small hoop-skirt. 
 
 The Limbang Muruts live in long houses, one of which con- 
 tained fifty doors, and the long hall was closed in and filled with 
 fireplaces. 
 
 The Kadyans, who are few in number and live only about 
 Brunei, are the only clan of the aborigines who have taken kindly 
 to the haunts of civilization and choose to dwell near the city, and 
 many even within it. Although like the Ida'ans, they learned their 
 agriculture from the Chinese during the present century, the influ- 
 ence of the Malays has been sufficient to convert them nearly all to 
 Mohammedanism. 
 
458 TWO YEARS IN THE JUNGLE. 
 
 Before turning our attention to the Sea' Dyaks, the varioua 
 tribes may be placed before the reader in a summarized form in 
 the following manner, to show their comparative rank as viewed 
 from different standpoints : 
 
 Morally. Mentally. Physically. 
 
 1st. HiU Dyaks Sea Dyaks Sea Dyaks 
 
 2d. Sea Dyaks Hill Dyaks Kyans 
 
 3d. Mongol Dyaks Kyans Hill Dyaks 
 
 4:th. Kyans Mongol Dyaks Mongol Dyaka 
 
CHAPTER XXXVIIL 
 
 THE SEA DYAKS. 
 
 Habitat. — Number. — Sub-tribes. — Their Physique. — Sea Dyak Women, — Theif 
 Dress and Ornaments. — The Men. — Their Weapons. — War Boats. — Fight- 
 ing Qualities. — Head-taking and Head-hunting. — A Mania for Murder. 
 — Houses and House-life of the Sea Dyaks. — Communal Harmony. — 
 Daily Occupations. — Amusements. — Music -making. — Feasts. — Gentle- 
 manly Drunkenness. — High Social Position of Women. — The Doctrine of 
 Fair Play. — Strict Observance of the Rights of Property. — A Race of Debt- 
 Payers. — Morality without Religion. — Infrequency of Crime. — Dyak Dis- 
 eases. — Mode of Burial. — The Future of the Race. — Can Christianity 
 Benefit the Dyaks ? 
 
 The tribe of Sea Dyaks lias always been celebrated for the bravery 
 and enterprise of its waiTiors, their independence and resistance of 
 oppression in all forms, and their success in maintaining both of- 
 fensive and defensive sub-tribal alliances. In Sarawak they occupy 
 all the territory between the Sadong and Rejang Rivers and all the 
 tributaries of the latter up to the Kanowit River which is the boun- 
 dary of the Kyan country. The largest and most powerful clans 
 reside on the Batang Lupar and its tributaries, and the Seribas. 
 The main body of one large clan, the Sibuyau, inhabits the Lundu 
 River and its tributaries in the western extremity of Sarawak, where 
 they emigrated from the Sibuyau River to escape the aggressions 
 of the people of Sakarran and Seribas. Southward, the clans of 
 this tribe extend to the Kapooas Eiver in the Dutch Territory and 
 beyond it to limits not yet clearly defined. 
 
 In Sarawak there are seven sub-tribes of Sea Dyaks, viz. : the 
 Seribas, Sakarran, Ballow, Sibuyau, Undup, Batang Ayer, and La- 
 manak. The Sarawak Government estimates the total population 
 at ninety thousand (1879). 
 
 The Sakarran and Seribas clans are the largest, and also the 
 richest in gold and silver ornaments, jars, gongs, brass guns, and 
 such other goods as help to constitute Dyak wealth. 
 
 In physique, the Sea Dyaks, like the Hill Dyaks, are belcw 
 
460 TWO YEARS IN THE JUNGLE. 
 
 medium stature, the tallest Sibuyau man that I saw being barel;y 
 five feet four and a half inches while the majority were under five 
 feet three. The men are well proportioned but sparely built, and 
 not, as a rule, what woiild be called muscular. Their form denotes 
 activity, speed, and endurance, rather than great strength ; precisely 
 the qualities most required by a denizen of the jungle. "WTiUe this 
 is true of the men in general, it is by no means uncommon to meet 
 thick-set and muscular individuals ; almost the first Dyak I saw, 
 Dundang, was a fleshy native Hercules. Their movements are 
 easy and graceful, their carriage always erect ; and in manner 
 they are independent and dignified, though natm-ally polite and 
 respectful. They have neither the insolence of the African, the 
 fawning obsequiousness of the Hindoo nor the hypocritical for- 
 mality of the Anglo-Saxon. The Dyak, in spite of his occasional 
 dirt, is my beau ideal of a man in more respects than one, but 
 nothing commends him to me more strongly than his simple hon- 
 esty and manly independence. 
 
 The color of a typical Sea Dyak is dark-brown with a strong 
 tinge of yellow ; his hair is jet-black and falls in graceful, flowing 
 locks upon his shoulders instead of being perfectly straight and 
 characterless like that of the Malays. His costume consists of the 
 chawat, a piece of cotton or bark-cloth about five feet long wound 
 tightly around the waist and drawn between the legs with one end 
 hanging down apron-wise in front and the other behind. He also 
 wears a sort of turban of red cotton cloth, or perhaps a bandanna 
 or bark-cloth, or he may wear nothing at all on his head. As has 
 already been mentioned, some of the Sibuyaus wear a small coffin- 
 shaped mat depending behind from the chawat, and reaching from 
 the small of the back half way down the thigh, evidently to be 
 used as a seat. I have been told that many of the Sea Dyak men 
 wear sleeveless jackets of red cotton cloth padded with cotton, when 
 going to war, but the few I saw worn in the piping times of peace 
 were very common-looking garments of dingy white, or coarse 
 brown cloth, the latter of native manufacture. 
 
 The Sea Dyak women, or at least those of the Sibuyau tribe, are 
 much hghter in color than the men, the yellow tint predominating. 
 As a rule they are not handsome, but I saw among them a few who 
 were decidedly good-looking, if not even pretty. I particularly 
 remember two girls that I saw in Dundang's village, near Simujan, 
 one of whom was his sister. Both were exceedingly comely girls, 
 whose good features, and plump, well-moulded figtires would do 
 
--^^~^ 
 
 A SEA DYAK (Seeibas Clan). 
 
 {Fru?n aportrail sketch by U. B. Everett.) 
 
xV SEA DYAK BELLE. 
 
 (From a phuto(/ra/i/i.) 
 
THE SEA BYAKS. 461 
 
 no discredit to a Venus de Medici. As a rule I fear I do not 
 appreciate the beauties of dark-skinned women, and I never yet saw 
 one who would justify even a mild form of emotional description, 
 to say nothing of the stereotyped raving in which the English lan- 
 guage is often pumped dry of adjectives with which to convey a 
 faint idea of a beautiful creature. For once, however, I was glad 
 that the Dyak women are partial to " full dress," and I looked at 
 those two forest belles with undisguised but respectful admiration. 
 I remember another young woman, in a foul-smelling village near 
 Padang Lake, whose face was precisely like that of Raphael's Sis^ 
 tine Madonna, except that it was brownish yellow. Her extremely 
 pensive and half sad expression fastened my attention instantly. 
 She had a pretty oval face of a very different outline from the typi- 
 cal Dyak woman, and her whole expression was strangely peculiar 
 for a native. I imagine it was caused by love-sickness. 
 
 But the Sea Dyak women in general are by no means bad-look- 
 ing. Their faces are bright, intelligent, and interesting, and I dare 
 say others would call many of them pretty. As a rule they are 
 handsomer than the men. Some that I saw were so clear-skinned 
 and light as to be really a dark yellow, but sufficiently warmed 
 with brown to make it healthy-looking, and far from disagreeable. 
 Their eyes are always jet-black and sparkling, and their hair, which 
 is abundant, well-kept, and drawn straight back without parting, 
 is likewise glossy and black as a raven's wing. Their teeth, alas | 
 are also black from chewing betel, which likewise reddens their 
 lips for the time being. Their busts, which are always exposed, are 
 generally plump and well-formed until old age mars all such beauty 
 and leaves the skin hanging from the shrunken sides in hundreds 
 of wrinkles and folds. The girls marry at sixteen and are old 
 women at thirty. 
 
 Ordinarily a Dyak woman's sole article of wearing apparel is the 
 bedang, or petticoat fastened at the waist by being tucked over and 
 under a belt of rattans dyed black, and falls within about three 
 inches of the knee. This garment is usually of native cotton cloth, 
 and sometimes very prettily figured. The women living around 
 Padang Lake, and a few on the Simujan, have jackets of red or 
 brown cotton cloth with sleeves, which they always wear when at 
 work in the fields ; also wide conical hats, of Malay pattern, made 
 very pretty with fine rattan splints dyed in various colors. Both 
 hat and jacket are always worn when they go visiting, or trading 
 down the river to Simujan. The picture which I remember most 
 
462 TWO YEARS IN THE JUNGLE. 
 
 vividly in connection with my last trip down the Simujan, was 
 Noonsong sitting in the stem of Hakka's prau, paddling and steer- 
 ing for him, clad in a jacket of turkey red, and a gorgeous Malay 
 hat, similar to the one she made for me, her long black hair stream- 
 ing down her back, the water flying from her paddle and the rain 
 pouring down upon us all. 
 
 The ornaments of the Sea Dyak women consist of many coils of 
 thick brass wire, sometimes loose and sometimes fitting tightly, 
 occasionally brass spiral, worn round the waist when thej' are rich 
 enough to afford it, and coils of spHt rattan, dyed dark red or black 
 when the brass is beyond their purchase. Loose rings and coils of 
 the same material are sometimes hung around the neck also, and 
 half cover the breast. Beads I never saw worn on the neck. They 
 also wear coils of brass wire, or else large hollow bracelets of silver, 
 on their arms from the wrist upward, when they can afford it, Mr, 
 Haughton informed me that ornaments of gold and silver were 
 quite common among the people of Sakarran and Seribas, the 
 result of their piratical habits in former times. The only orna- 
 ments I saw worn on the lower limbs, were leglets of rattan and 
 sometimes brass wire, worn immediately below the knee, varying in 
 number from one to five. Some of the women wore a large orna- 
 ment like a silver rosette on the lobe of each ear, beaten hollow on 
 the inside and held by being riveted thi'ough the flesh. I was told 
 that these are made of gold when the wearer's husband is rich 
 enough to afford it. 
 
 The men of Sibuyau wore very neatly-made armlets and leglets 
 of braided rattan, some extremely narrow and others half an inch 
 wide. The men of Sakarran and Seribas wear a number of brass 
 or copper rings of different sizes in the rim of each ear one above 
 another, the largest below, the smallest at the top, and often three 
 or four together, two or three inches in diameter, in the lobe of the 
 ear. With the men of these two clans, this custom is so universal 
 that they are everywhere recognized by it. In former times the Hill 
 Dyaks used to say, " Beware of the men with many rings in their 
 ears ; they are always bad men." I have never seen a specimen of 
 the head-dress worn by the Sea Dyaks when on the war-path, but 
 Mr. Haughton described it to me as a three-inch-wide baud of cloth 
 or bark-cloth with cowries sewn upon it, worn tightly around the 
 head from which there stand up from six to a dozen of the wide, 
 black-banded tail feathers of the rhinoceros hombiU, 
 
 The weapons of the Sea Dyaks are really insignificant in com« 
 
THE SEA DYAKS. 463 
 
 parison with the warlike, and once piratical propensities of the 
 people. Their arms are neither numerous in kind nor elaborate in 
 design, and it is surprising that such redoubtable wairriors have not 
 developed weapons of better fashion, more elaborate ornamentation, 
 and greater variety. In the matter of both weapons and shields of 
 all kinds, the Kyans far surpass both the Hill and the Sea Dyaks. 
 The arms of the latter consist ordinarily of a common parong or 
 chopper, in shape, size, and weight closely resembling a farmer's 
 corn-knife. It is not so heavy as the parong latok, nor so long ; but 
 in good hands it is enough. Like the latter weapon it is carried in 
 a wooden sheath on the left side. Those to be seen now among 
 the Sea Dyaks are very rough, common-looking instruments, not 
 worth keeping as curiosities, and their sole use now is in the never- 
 ending, but wholly bloodless, conflict which the Dyak wages with 
 the jungle. 
 
 As before stated, the Sea Dyaks never use the sampitan and 
 poisoned arrows. Their spears are as cheap-looking and destitute 
 of all ornament as theu' parongs, being simply a piece of steel ham- 
 mered into a rough-looking blade, 8^ inches long by 1^ wide ; set 
 into a stout handle of rattan five feet long. 
 
 I did not see any genuine war boats, and for a full description 
 of them I must refer the reader to Low's " Sarawak," p. 216. It is 
 there stated that "their war-boats, which are called 'bankongs,' 
 are generally of great length, frequently as much as seventy feet. 
 They are built very high abaft, and high forward, . . . from a flat 
 keel, without timbers of any sort, the planks being merely sewn one 
 to the other, or rather tied by rattans, through holes about eighteen 
 inches apart, calked with the soft bai-k of a tree of the tribe Myrta- 
 
 ce<B, and payed with a preparation of dammar and oils 
 
 They are sometimes steered with a rudder, but more frequently by 
 paddles, and from the assistance the men paddling them are able 
 to give, they turn as on a pivot." The planks from which these 
 boats are made are all hewn out, Crusoe fashion, with "biliongs," 
 two only being obtained from a large tree and that only with infi- 
 nite labor, it being very necessary that all the planks should be of 
 the same length as the "bankong." "These boats, according to 
 their size, carry crews of from thirty to ninety men, . . and I 
 should think it probable that no boats in the world could equal 
 them in speed."* 
 
 . . * Written in 1847. 
 
464 TWO YEAES IN THE JUNGLE. 
 
 Every Sea Dyak prau or large boat above the size of a small 
 sampan, or dug-out canoe, is provided witli a tight roof of kadjanga 
 supported upon and lashed to a skeleton frame-work of poles. The 
 hull is decked over from stem to stern with an open frame-work of 
 slats of the nibong palm, or of poles, except that an opening is left 
 amidships, whereby to bale out the craft when it leaks. All the 
 praus, or nearly all, are made on the same plan as the bankongs, 
 of planks sewn together with rattans. 
 
 Thanks to the benign influence of Rajah Brooke's government, 
 my knowledge of the Dyaks as warriors was obtained wholly 
 at second hand, chiefly from the writings of Sir James and his suc- 
 cessor. From the first, it has been the leading principle of both 
 to maintain peace in Sarawak, peaceably, if possible, but if not, to 
 fight for it. The Sibuyau clan has always been the staunch ally of 
 the government in its efiforts to subdue, first the hostile and pirati- 
 cal sea tribes, and lastly the Kyans. The powerful and war- 
 like clans of Sakarran and Seribas maintained a close offensive and 
 defensive alliance, and were openly hostile toward aU their neigh- 
 bors. For many years their power remained unbroken and they 
 successfully made one piratical foray after another against the Si- 
 buyaus, Ballows, TJndups, and the Hill Dyaks in general. The 
 latter people, being badly scattered and apparently incapable of 
 forming strong defensive alliances, suffered terribly and thousands 
 of them were killed and beheaded, while thousands more (women 
 and children) were made the hfe-long slaves of their fierce captors. 
 
 But the advent of Sir James Brooke and the forces he was able 
 to enlist in the cause he had espoused, ushered in the dawn of a 
 new era. The pirates of Sakarran and Seribas were attacked again 
 and again by Captain Keppel and the forces of the Dido and 
 Phlegethon, aided by Sir James and his fleet of Dyak warriors, and, 
 after repeated and well merited thrashings, finally submitted. 
 
 This left but one hostile tribe in the territory, the Kyans, which 
 submitted in 1863, since which time Sarawak has been quiet, save 
 now and then when some act of insolence or crime rendered it nec- 
 essary to discipline some particular chief by means of a small ex- 
 pedition. At present, life and property are as secure in Sarawak 
 as in any country in the world. 
 
 The Dyak modes of warfare most preferred are precisely the 
 same as those of the best trained warriors of Europe and America, 
 viz., either to attack in overwhelming force and crush with num- 
 bers, or to take the enemy by siu-prise and therefore at a great 
 
THE SEA DYAKS. 465 
 
 disadvantage. Dyak fighting was usually done at close quarters ; 
 and the courage and dash of the combatants has often excited the 
 admiration of trained European fighting men. In foi-mer times 
 the villages were mostly fortified by stockades of thick planks or 
 posts set up high all around them, while some were built on bilian 
 posts from twenty to thirty feet high, to be more safe from attack. 
 
 From time immemorial, it has been the custom of Sea Dyaks, 
 Hill Dyaks, and Kyans to cut off the heads of slain enemies and 
 keep the cleaned skulls as trophies. Formerly each warrior kept 
 his own trophies, and, in many clans, a Dyak girl would scorn a 
 suitor who had not taken a head. A warrior's grief at the death of 
 his wife or child could only be assuaged with a fresh head, taken 
 by himself, of course, and the death of a chief often involved a 
 regular head-hunting expedition. When a renowned warrior died 
 it was supposed that he could not rest quietly in his grave until a 
 head had been taken in his name. 
 
 After a time, however, the custom of head-hunting incidental 
 to war degenerated into a murderous craze for making collections 
 of human skulls, regardless of the circumstances attending their 
 acquisition. It is charged that the Malays are mainly responsible 
 for this result, on the ground that they encouraged tlie powerful 
 tribes to attack the weaker ones, for the sake of getting as many 
 heads as possible, while the Malays, who aided and abetted the 
 pirates, took the plunder and slaves as their share of the spoil. 
 The heads were no longer regarded as trophies of individual valor 
 in the field, but all became the property of the clan as a whole, and 
 the end sought by each was to have its collection of heads surpass 
 those of its neighbors in point of number. Often all the adults of 
 a village, both women and men were swept into the vortex, the 
 children only being spared to keep as slaves. 
 
 I think Sir James Brooke showed a greater depth of wisdom in 
 his treatment of the Sarawak natives than any one else who has ever 
 occupied a similar position. For example, instead of preaching 
 and making laws from the very first against all head-taking, and 
 thereby incurring the hostility of the Dyaks, he taught them that 
 a head trophy was an emblem of cowardice unless taken in fair 
 fight ; that to cut off the head of a defenceless and inoffensive per- 
 son was a wicked murder, such as no true warrior could be guilty 
 of without disgrace. This principle once admitted, it was an easy 
 task to teach them the folly and crime of warring for heads alone, 
 and to put a stop to the petty wars altogether. With due consist- 
 30 
 
466 TWO YEAES IN THE JUNGLE. 
 
 ency however, wlien the wild warriors of the jimgle gathered by 
 thousands to support the Kajah during the Chinese insurrection in 
 1857, he gave them permission to cut off the head of every man found 
 wearing a queue. Since that time the heads taken in Sarawak 
 have been few and far between, and the takers have, in nearly every 
 case, been treated as ordinary murderers. 
 
 The dwellings of the Sea Dyaks are all constructed on precisely 
 the same plan as the one described in a previous chapter (page 
 B55), except that, where a village is very large, a number of smaller 
 long houses are built instead of a single continuous structure of 
 enormous length. I have never seen a house longer than that al- 
 ready described, which was one hundred and ninety feet, but one 
 of the Sibuyau long-houses on the Lundu River is six hundred feet 
 in length and contains rooms for as many as fifty families. 
 
 Another house of the same tribe situated on a httle creek below 
 Simujan was described by Sir James Brooke as being 257 yards, or 
 771 feet in length ! 
 
 Most of the Sibuyau village-houses are raised about eight feet 
 above the ground ; but some are twelve ; and others again only 
 four or five. Externally, they are all weather-beaten, gray, and 
 wholly unpicturesque-looking structures, but sometimes are very 
 prettily surrounded by banana and cocoanut trees. 
 
 Within, they are clean enough, because aU the dirt and litter 
 falls of itself through the slatted floor ; but the ground underneath 
 is usually covered with htter, perpetually wet and mouldy from the 
 water thrown down through the floor above and, being the favorite 
 resort of the pigs of the village, often smells horribly. Sometimes 
 the pigs are kept in a sty underneath the long-house. As a mat- 
 ter of course, the old villages are the most foul smelling, and the 
 European traveller should quarter in a new house whenever pos- 
 sible. 
 
 The house in which I spent a fortnight at Padang Lake con- 
 tained four rooms, and was built in about four weeks by Hakka 
 and another Dyak. All the materials came fi'om the adjoining 
 jungle, except the three hundred and fifty attaps composing the 
 roof, which were made on the Sebangan River, below Simujan, and 
 cost 72 cts. per hundred. The enth-e house was valued at $40. 
 
 I believe the Sea Dyaks are the only people in the world whose 
 villages consist of a single structure under one immense roof, the 
 greater portion of which is owned in common. No greater prool 
 of their peaceful domestic and social habits could be desired than 
 
THE SEA DYAKS. 467 
 
 the fact that from five to fifty families, according to the size of the 
 long-house, can live under one roof without coming to blows. 
 
 Fancy twenty Anglo-Saxon women living with theii* husbands 
 and children in twenty rooms, along one side of a vast open hall 
 which serves as work-room and play-room for all. The amount of 
 quarreUing, slandering, back-biting, child-slapping, and child-fight- 
 ing which would take place would be fearful to contemplate. And 
 yet among the Dyaks I never saw or heard anything like high 
 words, much less a regular quarrel, between either children or 
 adults. The people with whom I lived at Padang Lake and on the 
 Sibuyau were always Hght-hearted, and generally even merry. It 
 was truly refreshing to see people so universally happy and con- 
 tented. 
 
 They always rise early in the morning, or at about six o'clock ; 
 each family kindles a fire in its own private room, and boils the 
 morning meal of rice or vegetables in an eai'then pot or joint of 
 bamboo. If they are lucky enough to have on hand the flesh of 
 any animal, that also is boiled or roasted and forms a portion of the 
 meal. When eating, they squat upon a mat in the centre of the 
 room around the vessels containing the food, and all eat with 
 their fingers. The drinking-water is contained in a five-foot sec- 
 tion of bamboo which stands in a corner of the room. After eat- 
 ing, the Dyak takes a drink, rinses his mouth, takes down his pa- 
 rong, juah, and tambuk and prepares to set out. If he intends 
 to go into the jungle to search for gutta, honey, dammar gum, or 
 rattans, or to hunt or snare game, he takes with him also his spear, 
 biliong (axe), and his dogs, if he has any. If his day's work hes in 
 his field he takes with him his wife and older children to help plant 
 or reap the paddi, or clear the ground, as the case may be. 
 
 Late in the afternoon he returns, his basket laden either with 
 rice, bananas or other fruit, or such jungle products as he has been 
 able to secure. By the time supper is eaten it is night, and time 
 to light the smoky dammar torches, by the flickering light of which 
 both men and women make mats and baskets, boil gutta, make new 
 paddles or biliong handles, and work busily until bedtime. If there 
 are visitors, work is partly suspended in order that the evening 
 may be spent in giving and receiving the news. 
 
 About nine o'clock, the young and unmarried men and strangers 
 climb up the ladder into the loft over the long hall, and, after stretch- 
 ing their limbs upon their mats. He there singing and chattering 
 until they fall asleep. 
 
468 TWO YEARS IN THE JUNGLE. 
 
 The married couples and their small children and girls retire 
 to their rooms, and spread their mats upon the floor, being usually 
 provided with dingy cotton-cloth curtains as a protection against 
 the mosquitoes. The walls ai-e thin and slight, but I never heard 
 issuing from within them any sounds of curtain-lecturing, bicker- 
 ing, or worse still, wife-beating, such as came to my ears in the 
 hotels at Calcutta, Colombo, and Demerara. I have often won- 
 dered what would happen if a Dyak should go to beating his wife 
 and she to screaming. I am sure his neighbors would interfere 
 vigorously. 
 
 It is not surprising that the Dyaks generally are fond of amuse- 
 ments, although they have no games of chance or mental skilL 
 The people of Muka have great sport swinging with a long rattan 
 attached to a high derrick and guyed to keep it from swaying to 
 and fro. A ladder is planted a short distance off from which to 
 start, and ten or a dozen men often swing together, the outsiders 
 clinging to the arms and legs of the others.* The children of the 
 Hill Dyaks at S'Impio play with peg-tops precisely as do those of 
 England, spinning them, and throwing one spinning top at another 
 to knock it out of place.f The Ballow Dyaks play prisoner's base 
 and international " tug-of-war " in the most approved style, and 
 the Sakarrans ai'e much given to such athletic sports as wrestling, 
 sham-fighting, jumping, running, and swinging.^ The Kennowits 
 are good at dancing in time to music, and entertain the visitor 
 with a "mias dance," "deer dance," regular war dance, all in cos- 
 tume, and, most interesting of all, a weU-acted pantomimic repre- 
 sentation of the various events in a head-hunting expedition, the 
 start, the journey, the surprise, the fight, head-taking, defeat, re- 
 treat, etc. § 
 
 Mr. A. R Wallace describes his attempt to initiate some Dyak 
 children into the mysteries of cat's cradle, but he succeeded so 
 poorly that, out of compassion, the children took the string and 
 showed him the proper way to do it. 
 
 The only amusements I saw among the Sibuyaus were of a 
 musical character. The people of Gumbong's village, with whom 
 I lived at the head of the Sibuyau, were decidedly musical, and 
 scarcely an evening passed without a performance of some kind. 
 
 * Rajah Brooke, " Ten Years in Sarawak." j- Hugh Low, "Sarawak." 
 
 X Spenser St. John, " Life in the Forests of the Far East." 
 § Frederick Boyle, " Adventures Among the Dyaks.'' 
 
THE SEA DYAKS. 469 
 
 Le Tiac was the fiddler of the crowd, but, while his instrument 
 was by long odds the most elaborate and pretentious, the sounds 
 it produced were by no means so pleasing as the clarionet-like 
 notes of the numerous reeds, made Hke a shepherd's pipe, which 
 the men, women, and children were so fond of playing upon in 
 concert. The women had still another instrument, made of a piece 
 of bamboo like a large organ-reed, the tongue of which was made 
 to vibrate sharply by jerking a string attached to one end. The 
 instrument was held aU the while firmly against the teeth and the 
 operator breathed forcibly upon the vibrating tongue of the in- 
 strument, thereby producing a few harp-like notes. It was a diffi- 
 cult instrument to play upon, but one evening, during the course 
 of a very merry concert given by several of the women in my apart- 
 ment, I wrestled with ye Dyak hai-p until I threw it, and succeeded 
 in playing upon it as well as the others, to their great satisfaction 
 and amusement. After that the greatest difficulty was to keep 
 from laughing while we all played together. 
 
 Dyak Harp. 
 
 Upon great occasions, such as the gathering of the harvest, the 
 marriage of a person of note in the tribe, or the visit of some 
 European of distinction, the Eajah for instance, the Dyaks gather 
 for a grand feast. Pigs are kiUed and cooked, rice, fruits, and 
 vegetables are provided and also a Hberal supply of tuak, or palm 
 toddy, upon which all the men are expected to get drunk. The 
 company feeds to the fullest possible extent and then the dancing 
 and drinking begin. It is upon these occasions only that the 
 Dyaks diink liquor and get drunk, and after the women take from 
 the men all their weapons to prevent accidents they go to work de- 
 liberately to make their husbands, lovers, and friends of the male 
 sex roaring drunk. A Dyak girl considers it the grandest fun in 
 the world to coax a redoubtable warrior into drinking until he is 
 imable to stand. 
 
 I never saw a Dyak feast, nor an intoxicated Dyak, nor even a 
 drop of the tuak which lays the warriors low at their feasts. 
 In this connection, I feel in duty bound to quote Mr. Frederick 
 Boyle's observations and reflections upon a feast in which he par- 
 ticipated among the Seribas Dyaks. 
 
470 TWO YEARS IN THE JUNGLE. 
 
 " In England such a scene of drunkenness and uncouth merri-. 
 ment would necessarily be coarse and disgusting to the last degree, 
 but among these savages it is not so. We did not see a single act 
 of impropriety even among the most reckless of the revellers, and 
 the brutality inseparable from a * heavy wine ' at Oxford or Cam- 
 bridge was utterly absent. "We were assured that during the 
 whole festivity decorum would be maintained as strictly as it was 
 in our presence, nor would any Dyak dream of violating the laws 
 of decency and good temper. Whether this be owing to the na- 
 tional character, or the quality of the liquor I cannot judge, inas- 
 much as it was impossible for us to swallow enough of the latter 
 to decide ; but I am inclined to think that barbarous manhood and 
 savage modesty were the principal causes of public decency. Thus 
 it happened that a scene which, according to all precedent, should 
 have been disgusting, turned out to be pleasantly amusing."* 
 
 So it seems the Dyak is a gentleman, even when drunk. 
 
 This reminds me to speak of woman's social position among 
 the Sea Dyaks. From the cradle to the grave, she is considered 
 man's equal, except in fighting and hunting. Her opinion is en- 
 titled to serious consideration, and her advice is always asked in all 
 matters of importance. In speaking of the women of the Lingga 
 Dyaks, the present Rajah Brooke remarks : "I soon learned that 
 great power and influence is attached to their opinions on matters 
 in general, and that to stand well with them was more than half of 
 any Dyak battle, "f 
 
 One great secret of the pleasant domestic and social Hfe of the 
 Dyaks lies in the fact that parents think too much of their children 
 to make them marry against their wiU, or from mercenary motives. 
 
 The Sibuyaus believe in strict chastity, both before and after 
 marriage, and lapses from virtue are considered highly shameful. 
 Strangely enough, these simple-minded savages, without written 
 law and wholly without religion, hold that in cases of unchastity, or 
 infidelity to the marriage relation, the man in the case is equally 
 guilty with the woman. Both stand on precisely the same footing 
 toward the remainder of the community, and the disgrace and pun- 
 ishment are shared equally by both participants in the crime. 
 
 How very diflferent is this from the improved customs of Chris- 
 tian lands. We say that what is folly in a man becomes crime in 
 
 * Adventures among tlie Dyaks, p. 248. 
 . f Ten Years in Sarawak, I. , 129. 
 
THE SEA DYAKS. 471 
 
 a woman. A man may be as " fast " as he pleases, or, as his means 
 ■will let him, so long as he preserves the veneering on his charac- 
 ter. He may be guilty of open harlotry, or ruin an innocent girl 
 every year or two, and he will still be smilingly welcomed in polite 
 society. He goes his way securely, proudly, is highly spoken of by 
 both men and women, and if he is only rich, is fawned upon as 
 much as ever. How is it with the woman in the case ? One single 
 step aside from the path of virtue, one httle stumble, and no matter 
 what the temptation or the palhating circumstances, no matter how 
 atrocious the betrayal, she goes down. Into the mire she goes, 
 howled at and spat upon by her sisters, forsaken instantly by the 
 whole world, and literally sent to hell. What is there on earth 
 to-day more deplorably and hopelessly faulty than the social laws 
 of the " highest civihzation the world has ever seen?" Even the 
 unlettered savages of the jungle have a better state of society 
 than we. 
 
 I have already mentioned the sacredness of the rights of prop- 
 erty amongst the Dyaks, but the actual and universal observance 
 of these rights by any class of people in this thievish world is so 
 phenomenal I feel that I have a right to allude to the subject 
 again. In civilized countries, and almost all others except Borneo, 
 every man is not treated precisely as a thief, yet at the same time he 
 who has stealable property is careful not to put temptation in the 
 way of a stranger. Generally speaking, I believe that out of every 
 twenty persons there will always be found one who would steal if 
 he had a chance to get something he very much wanted and could 
 take without detection. 
 
 Making debts beyond one's power to pay, is a very popular 
 form of steaUng by wholesale, for the encouragement of which we 
 have several thousand laws which furnish ample protection to the 
 perpetrators. Half our bankrupt merchants are ruined by " bad 
 debts," made by people who prefer that method of getting a man's 
 goods to simple burglary. 
 
 Once more I assert, with the certainty of being disbelieved, 
 that the Dyaks actually do not steal. I have an account of one 
 who did once steal some gutta from a companion, but he is dead 
 now — hanged, "in the usual manner." 
 
 Where else but among the Dyaks will a traveller dare to trust 
 a cart-load of boxes and packages, none of them securely fastened, 
 all filled with scores of trifles, any one of Which would be dear to a 
 native's heart, in the centre of a village of fifty strange natives with 
 
472 TWO YEARS IN THE JUNGLE. 
 
 no one to watch for thieves ? You can do this among the Dyaks, 
 and lose not one cent's worth. Even the empty tin cans and 
 boxes I threw out of the house were brought to me and shown be- 
 fore they were appropriated. And yet, had the Dyaks been "West 
 Indian negroes, or even Hke some white men I have known, they 
 would have stolen half my goods in perfect safety to themselves. 
 
 I have never heard of a single instance of theft from any 
 European, Malay, or Chinaman, committed by a Sea or Hill Dyak. 
 
 Their most wonderful trait, however, is their faithfulness in 
 paying their debts. If the people of the village want goods, a 
 trader will give them his whole cargo, if he can get them to accept 
 it, in exchange for jungle produce to he collected. The day for 
 full settlement is named by the head man, and by that day the 
 debts are all paid. What a glorious country for an honest mer- 
 chant to start business in ! 
 
 Like their neighbors of the hills, the Sea Dyaks are without 
 priests and creeds or even the faintest notion of religious observ- 
 ances. Their moral laws are the product of their own evolution, 
 for we see in them no reflection of the religious customs of any of 
 the people who have thus far come in contact with them, either 
 Hindoos, Javanese, Chinese, Malays or Europeans.* Savage nations 
 usually acquire aU the vices, and but very few of the virtues, of 
 the civilization which touches them, but so far the Dyaks of North- 
 em Borneo have gone through the fire unscathed. They are yet 
 free from the grovelling idolatry and abominable religious fanati- 
 cism of the Hindoos, the sordid avarice of the Chinese, the deceit, 
 treachery, and licentiousness of the Malays, and the brandy-and- 
 sodaism of the Europeans. 
 
 The Sea Dyaks believe there is a Supreme Spirit whom they 
 call Battara, and sometimes Jawata (both of which are Hindoo 
 names), and that the dead go to Sabyan, which is below the earth. 
 They revere the memory of a party named Biadum, who was 
 formerly a great chief among them, and at harvest time they 
 make offerings in his memory, quite after our custom of firing off 
 
 * In asserting that the Dyaks have no religion I attach to that word the 
 meaning which is most generally recognized, viz , a system of faith and wor- 
 ship, and obedience to the laws of a Supreme Being. Although modern an- 
 thropologists have agreed to consider that belief in a Supreme Being of any 
 kind is sufficient to constitute a " religion," it seems to me highly improper to 
 dignify with that name a vague, inconsequent notion which bears no fruit 
 whatever, either in worship, obedience, or even love. 
 
THE SEA DYAKS. 473 
 
 gunpowder on "Washington's birthday. Like most ignorant people, 
 they beUeve in evil spirits who haunt and annoy certain ones among 
 the living, and are superstitious in regard to various omens of good 
 and bad fortune. 
 
 Their crimes can be counted on the fingers of one hand ; and 
 instances of their commission are few and far between. It must be 
 remembered that the frenzy for head collecting, which led to such 
 wholesale murder before the advent of Rajah Brooke, was mainly 
 due to the instigation and encouragement of the reprobate Malays 
 who so nearly ruined the country. 
 
 As might be expected, the Dyaks are subject to but few dis- 
 eases, and those of a simple nature. The most common ailment is 
 called " corrip" (ichthyosis), in which the epidermis of the subject 
 cracks all over the body and the edges roll up into little whitish 
 rolls. The body of a Dyak so affected has a gray appearance, and, 
 although the disease is painless, it is disagreeable to look at and 
 very difficult to cure. Fever and dysentery are both common dis- 
 eases, and also ophthalmia, which is most prevalent during the time 
 of weeding the paddy fields in September and October, at which 
 season whole tribes are sometimes attacked. If taken in time, it 
 yields to very simple remedies ; but many lose their sight from 
 neglecting treatment. 
 
 Insanity is very rare, and also natural deformity of person. So 
 far as I could learn, the Dyaks are entirely free from the long list 
 of unmentionable male and female diseases which appear to have 
 been developed by the human race only at its highest stage of 
 civilization and refinement. It is a singular, though melancholy, 
 fact that savages know nothing of venereal diseases, abortion, in- 
 fanticide, and drunkenness, until they are introduced by the civilized 
 nations of the earth. 
 
 Dyak women in confinement are attended only by the old women 
 of the tribe, and, as might be expected from the absence of the 
 health-destroying clothes, food, drink, medicines, and social cus- 
 toms, which make American women weak, they are usually seen 
 going about their regular occupations on the third or fourth day 
 after child-birth. 
 
 A favorite Dyak remedy for a cut, bruise, or sprain, is to ex- 
 pectorate a quantity of betel juice upon the part afflicted, which 
 quickly imparts to it a disgusting yellow-jaundice appearance. 
 
 Unlike the Hill Dyaks, the people of the Sea tribe always 
 bury their dead. I did not have an opportunity to witness an in- 
 
474 TWO YEAES IN THE JUNGLE. 
 
 terment or even to see a burial ground, but Mr. Eng Quee told me 
 that the Sibuyaus bury their dead in coffins when they can make 
 them, otherwise without. They put vessels of food beside the 
 grave, and also such of the ornaments of the deceased as are not 
 valuable enough to be carried off by strangers. They formerly 
 buried with their dead many valuable ornaments of gold and sUver, 
 but these tempted the low-class Malays to rob the graves, and of 
 late years the custom has been discontinued altogether. The 
 Dyaks select retired spots for burial grounds, never visit them 
 except when really necessary, are averse to taking strangers to see 
 them, and also to talking about their burial customs. They erect 
 no monuments whatever to mark the resting place of their dead, 
 and make their interments very quietly. 
 
 Thus ends our brief survey of the Hill and Sea Dyaks, and 
 what does it teach us ? In these strange children of nature we see 
 all the cardinal virtues without a ray of religion, morality without 
 ministers, the Christian graces without Christ or gospel. They 
 keep no sabbaths, pray no prayers, build no temples, worship 
 nothing and nobody, and acknowledge no higher tribunal than the 
 bar of public opinion on one hand, and the Sarawak government 
 court on the other. 
 
 The Dyak is perhaps the most happy and contented human 
 being under the sun. His wants are few, and his native jungle 
 supplies nearly all of them. Thanks to his state of savagery, he 
 has not developed one-tenth of the diseases which so often make 
 the lives of civilized people a burden. His children do not have 
 scarlet fever, diphtheria, croup, or whooping-cough, nor does he or 
 his wife have consumption, pneumonia, dyspepsia, rheumatism, or 
 gout. But for the rascally Chinaman, who years ago taught him to 
 make toddy from the palm tree, and who even now supplies him 
 with arrack, he might to-day be without the means of getting 
 drunk. As is the case with nearly aU savages who drink intoxicat- 
 ing liquors, this vice is the gift o'l civilization. 
 
 In hospitality, human sympathy, and charity, the Dyaks are not 
 outranked by any people living, so far as I know, and their morals 
 are as much superior to ours as our intelligence is beyond theirs. 
 If happiness is the goal of human existence, they are much nearer 
 it than we. In this instance, at least, the highest civilization has 
 not evolved the most perfect state of society, and to this extent the 
 fundamental theories of theology, of sociology, and human evolu- 
 tion are utterly at fault. Borneo is no field for the missionary, for 
 
THE SEA DYAKS. 475 
 
 no religion can give the Dyak aught that will benefit him, or in- 
 crease the balance of his happiness in the least. 
 
 We have seen that there can be, and there is, morality of a high 
 order without any creed, religion, or education whatever. Is it 
 possible that man reaches his highest moral development in a state 
 of savagery ? Is it, then, really true that as we increase in civihzed 
 intelligence, refinement, and capacity for enjoyment, our capacities 
 and propensities for wickedness and harmful pleasures increase like- 
 wise? If this is the case now with mankind, will it always be so? 
 These are serious questions, and I leave them with the reader. 
 
CHAPTER XXXIX. 
 
 A PLEASURE TRIP UP THE SARAWAK. 
 
 The Fir^y.—'Mr. A. H. Everett. — The Chinese Gold-washings at Bau.— Cavei 
 aad Crevices near Paku. — Walk to Tegora. — The Cinnabar Mines of the 
 Borneo Company. — Romantic Boat Ride down the Staat. — Trip to Serambo 
 Mountain. — Dyak Bridges. — Village of Peninjau. — The Rajah's Cottage. — 
 Magnificent View. — Return to Kuching. — Fare well to Borneo. — Singapore 
 once more. — End of the Expedition. — Retrospect. — Conclusion. 
 
 I RETURNED to Sarawak (Kuching) on the sixth of December, and 
 during the fortnight I spent in packing up my collection and wait- 
 ing for the steamer, my good friend, Mr. Oliver St. John, Inspector 
 of Public Works, treated me to a glorious trip up the Sarawak 
 Eiver. I say " treated me," for without him as a guide, philosopher, 
 and friend, I should not have gone, and, when I reflect now upon 
 the trouble he took and the miles he walked solely on my account, 
 I feel quite as if I had wronged him. 
 
 I had collected until I was tired and sick of specimens, and that 
 trip was made solely for pleasure. Mr. Crocker placed the gov- 
 ernment steam launch Firefly at o\ir disposal for the trip, and one 
 bright afternoon at two o'clock we started up the river with the 
 turning of the tide. A bend of the stream soon hid the town from 
 our view, and after getting clear of the stragghng Malay kampong, 
 we were ready to drink in the successive scenes of the new pano- 
 rama which began to unroll before us. 
 
 Scene first, five miles long — banks low, uncultivated, covered 
 with monotonous mangroves. 
 
 Scene second — the banks have risen and asserted themselves ; 
 they are clear of old jungle and covered with green paddy fields for 
 a quarter of a mile back from the river, where they meet the forest 
 primeval. Here and there are neat-looking houses, nestling in 
 clumps of banana and cocoanut trees, surrounded by neatly-kept 
 vegetable gardens. From the general look of care and thrift, we 
 are led to hazard the opinion that fields, houses, and gardens belong 
 
A PLEASURE TRIP UP THE SARAWAK. 477 
 
 to the Chinese, which proves to be the case. Two or three Chinese 
 shops are passed ; Gunong Matang, the mountain so conspicuous 
 from Kuching, also went by us on the right, with a few other peaks 
 of humbler elevation. 
 
 Eight miles above Kuching, the mountains of the interior rise 
 prominently into view in long ridges with fleecy white clouds cling- 
 ing to their densely wooded sides. Though not so very distant, 
 they were of a deep blue color, and. taken altogether, were to the 
 eye a grateful relief from the everlasting green of the level jungle. 
 
 We took in the scenery until dark and then reluctantly turned 
 from it to the dinner table. The Firefly is a very comfortable little 
 craft, but her passengers must provide their own bill of fare and 
 table furniture. We had plenty of soup, but there was not a spoon 
 on board, so we drank it out of our plates and proceeded to dispose 
 of the remainder of the menu with equal facility. • 
 
 The night was exceedingly dark, and how the steersman man- 
 aged to keep clear of the banks was more than I could see. About 
 twelve mUes up, we came to the confluence of the two branches of 
 the Sarawak River, and took the smaller or western stream, which 
 soon became very narrow, but still remained deep, swift, and murky. 
 About 8 P.M. we reached Busau, twenty-six miles from Kuching, and 
 landed. Here we were at the terminus of the Borneo Company's 
 tram-way system, from which the antimony mined in the vicinity 
 and the quicksilver from Tegora is shipped down the river. Leav- 
 ing our luggage to be pushed after us on a tram-car, we set out in 
 the black darkness and walked on the tram-way four miles to Paku. 
 At the police station we turned off and climbed a steep conical hill 
 until we were out of breath, which brought us to the top, upon 
 which was perched a house, to the comforts of which we were hos- 
 pitably welcomed by Mr. A, Hart Everett, the naturalist. 
 
 It was a great treat to meet an accomplished Malasian naturalist 
 on his native heath, a man who knew Borneo by heart, and was, like 
 myself, almost wholly given over to collecting. I plied the poor 
 man with questions until we were both fairly exhausted and obliged 
 to open some bottles of ale. Mr. Everett was on a mission of much 
 more importance to science than the mere collecting of specimens. 
 
 Under the patronage and support of the British Museum and 
 the Marquis of Tweeddale, then President of the Zoological Society, 
 he had entered upon a thorough and systematic examination of the 
 caves of Borneo, in the hope of finding in the deposits upon their 
 floors fossil remains of the forerunner of the anthropoid apes. It 
 
478 TWO YEARS IN THE JUNGLE. 
 
 was faintly hoped that, even if the cavern deposits did not reveal 
 the missing Hnk, their fossils would at least throw some hght upon 
 the point at which the human race diverged fi-om the catan-hine 
 stock. Here was an evolutionist with his war-paint all on, and his 
 weapons in his hand — pick, shovel, and sieve. Imagine the sensa- 
 tions of a Darwinian actually searching for and finding the link 
 between man and the great apes ! Another Kohinoor would be a 
 mere glass marble in comparison. 
 
 Mr. Everett's methods of search were so thorough and truly 
 searching that not even a bat's tooth escaped the sieves through 
 which the floor deposits of the caves were put. He found the bones 
 of bats in great abundance, all of living species, however, and one 
 skull of Simia Wiannhii in a fossil state, but, I grieve to say, no 
 traces of extinct animals nor even a prehistoric race of men. I 
 should have stated above that another and equally important object 
 with IMr. Everett was to obtain evidence, if any existed, of the occu- 
 pation of Borneo by any primitive race anterior to its being peopled 
 by the descendants of the Malays. 
 
 Unfortunately for science, Mr. Everett's investigations were soon 
 after brought to an untimely end by the death of the Marquis of 
 Tweedale. In order to reach a new field, Mr, Everett accepted a 
 position with the North Borneo Company and went to the Kina 
 Balu district. It is to be hoped that he may soon find the time 
 and means for a thorough scientific exploration of the feira incog- 
 nita lying to the south of Kina Balu — a work which no one is better 
 fitted to accomplish than he. 
 
 "When we started from Kuching I solemnly promised myself not 
 to think " specimen " even once, much less try to collect one, but 
 when Mr. Everett showed me his beautiful specimens of Tupaia, Gym- 
 nura, Galeopiihecus, Atherura, and ten superb specimens of the most 
 wonderful bat I ever saw ( Gheiromelas torquatus), I weakened. When 
 he brought out a huge and quite perfect skull of the Bomean gavial, 
 a species which I had not before encoimtered {Tomistoma schlegellii), 
 I surrendered imconditionally, and my last dollar was swallowed up 
 in the fearfvd vortex of "specimens." Crocodiles always were great 
 pets with me. 
 
 The dawn of the following day disclosed in every dii'ection a 
 fine view of mountain, hill, and dale— so chai-ming a prospect, that I 
 heartily envied Everett his quarters. The Httle house was perched 
 exactly upon the summit of the steep cone, open on all sides to the 
 breeze, with not a tree to break the view. 
 
A PLEASURE TRIP UP THE SARAWAK. 479 
 
 After coffee, with Mr. Everett accompanying tis, we set out and 
 walked four miles northwest to see the Chinese gold- washings at 
 Bau. There was a good path all the way, through the second 
 growth of jungle, and the scenery was highly interesting. 
 
 Bau takes its name from a peak close to the washings, from the 
 northern base of which a remarkable pinnacle rises like a gigantic 
 pillar with the top broken off and its precipitous face smooth and 
 bare. 
 
 There are two Chinese companies working gold at Bau, and we 
 •visited the works of both. Both pursue the same wasteful plan. 
 The gold occurs in very fine particles in a low hill of decomposed 
 porphyry, mixed with a small proportion of blue Hmestone, man- 
 ganese, etc. In appearance it resembles yellow clay. A large reser- 
 voir affords a good head of water, and, as fast as the hill is dug down, 
 the earth is thrown into the sluices, some of which are nearly a mile 
 long, and washed away. Three or four times a year they turn off 
 the water and wash up the residuum by hand. It is a very waste- 
 ful process, and the Chinawomen do a very fair business in washing 
 out the dirt at the lower end of the sluices. 
 
 The two gold companies have separate villages and two sets of 
 shops, both well built and neatly kept. It was here that the Chi- 
 nese insurrection was hatched in 1857, wliich taught the celestials 
 a fearful lesson, one which it will never be necessary to teach them 
 again. I do not suppose any combination of circumstances could 
 now induce the Chinese to get up another row with the govern- 
 ment of Sarawak. Like the people of our Southern States, they 
 now declare that " rebellion must be put down." 
 
 As we passed through the village of the Sap Long Moon Kunsi, 
 on our way back, we found a table of refreshments had been pre- 
 pared for us in a cool veranda. First, last, and all the time, we 
 were helped to tea of the very best quality (so St. John said), 
 strong, bitter, and wholly innocent of either milk or sugar. To me 
 it was about as palatable as soapsuds, but it was nevertheless re- 
 freshing to the inner man, and, without consulting my palate in the 
 least, I emptied my tiny cup several times. Besides the tea, we 
 had sugared peanuts, candied pumpkin, a preserved fig-Hke fruit 
 from China, and big Chinese gooseberries to eat at the finish in 
 lieu of pickles. Strangely enough, none of our hosts could speak 
 Malay, but a very respectful crowd gathered to see the animals 
 feed. At the next village, the above performance was repeated, 
 except that we sat down to tea and fruit instead of tea and sweet- 
 
480 TWO TEAKS IN THE JUNGLE. 
 
 meats. We ate heartily, both by choice and as a matter of cour^ 
 tesy due the company. When hot and thirsty, I can eat a good 
 many mandarin oranges out of politeness to my host. 
 
 We reached Everett's quarters about noon, and in the afternoon 
 St. John and I went to see some caves not far away. Half a mile 
 east of Paku is a rocky gorge between two hills, in one of which 
 Ensunah cave is situated. The cavern extends, like a great irregu- 
 lar timnel, quite through the hill, and is at least four hundred feet 
 from end to end. In some places it is wide and high, like the in- 
 terior of a cathedral, and in others contracted to a mere passage, 
 so narrow that a man weighing two hundred pounds would not be 
 able to get through. The sides of the cave revealed the fact that 
 the whole hill is fuU of cracks and fissures. I was surprised at see- 
 ing long, slender, rope-Hke roots of a dark red color coming down 
 from the trees far above, and winding about through the crevices 
 in a most persistent way. In some parts of the cave, water was 
 dripping down in a copious shower, and the soft limestone floor 
 underneath was quite honeycombed with small round holes which 
 the " little drops of water " had drilled. The earth on the bottom 
 of the cave had all been dug up and examined by the indefatigable 
 Chinese in their never-ending search for new deposits of gold. 
 
 After leaving the cave, we went on higher up the gorge to some 
 of the remarkable well-like crevices which exist in the hills. They 
 are simply holes running down through the limestone, with ragged, 
 uneven sides, very often of no greater diameter than a common 
 well, three or four feet, and sometimes sixty to seventy feet deep. 
 Sometimes gold is found in the loose dLrt at the bottom, and when 
 this is the case they are worked by the Malays. In order to get down 
 one of these holes and up again, the prospector puts sticks across 
 the opening, jamming the ends firmly into the cracks in the sides, 
 thus forming a ladder reaching to the bottom. There is usually 
 a cavern at the bottom of each crevice, and it would seem that the 
 whole hill is a mass of huge rocks, cracked and seamed throughout 
 
 The antimony mine at Bidi was full of water and we did not 
 visit it. With the exception of that one mine, all the rest of the 
 antimony produced is found in surface pockets, many of. which 
 have been found, and quickly emptied, along the line of the tram- 
 way. The Honorable Borneo Company has a monopoly of all the 
 useful minerals of Sarawak except gold, coal, silver, and diamonds ; 
 and all the antimony found by the natives is ptirchased by the com- 
 pany at forty to sixty cents per picul, according to its quality. 
 
A PLEASURE TRIP TTP THE SARAWAK. 481 
 
 On the following morning we rose early and after a good sub- 
 stantial " coffee," Mr. St. John and I set out to walk to Tegora, 
 eleven miles from Paku. There is a good bridle-road and good 
 bridges all the way, and with good company it is a delightful walk. 
 The road is merely a narrow lane through beautiful virgin forest 
 of stately trees and trailing lianas, mossy rocks and acres of pretty 
 ferns. 
 
 Presently we came to the Staat River, a small, shady stream, 
 along the south bank of which the road winds for several miles. 
 Far below us, over its bed of clean white pebbles, flowed the river, 
 clear and cool ; at last, when we came to where the road crosses 
 the stream on a high bridge, a deep shady pool in the bend below 
 looked so inviting to our perspiring bodies that I begged St. John 
 to take a swim with me. Boy-like, we " raced " in undressing to 
 see who should take the water first, and in less than five minutes 
 we plunged into the cool, sweet water, where not a ray of the hot 
 sun could reach us, where the water was deep, and, thank heaven ! 
 free from crocodiles. How delicious it was, and how loth we were 
 to leave that bath " fit for the gods," It was the first really secure 
 and comfortable swim I had enjoyed since Jackson and I went 
 swimming in the Orinoco, when I stepped upon a small sting-ray 
 with the usual result, and he got nipped by a cariba fish. Verily 
 there is little comfort in swimming in tropical rivers, especially 
 within tidal influence, for they are nearly always dirty, and infested 
 by sharks, sting-rays, crocodiles, and other aquatic vermin. 
 
 The last four miles of the road led over a succession of low hOls, 
 and the forest scenery grew even more picturesque and charming. 
 At last we reached the village of Pankalan about a mile from Te- 
 gora, at which there is a police station and court-room, and also a 
 shop kept by a wealthy Chinaman. We halted at the shop and 
 emptied a quart bottle of champagne, a drink by no means to be 
 despised in the jungle. After we had disposed of a "scratch" 
 breakfast evolved for us by the Chinese shopkeeper's domestics, St. 
 John tarried to hold court, over which he presided as magistrate. 
 Had I but understood the Malay language I would gladly have 
 stayed to watch the proceedings, but having no special interpreter, 
 my presence would have been only a hindrance to the court, so I 
 left, and walked on to Tegora. 
 
 On the way to Tegora, where we had been invited to dine and 
 put up for the night, I met Mr. Harvey, a handsome, manly-looking 
 young Englishman, one of the officers in charge of the mines, who 
 31 
 
482 TWO TEAES IN THE JUNGLE. 
 
 introduced himself directly and greeted me very cordially. We met 
 again in the evening at the dinner-table, and he proved to be a very 
 jolly and hospitable host. 
 
 On reaching the mines, I found Mr. H. H. Everett, brother of 
 our Paku naturahst, at the furnaces, weighing out bags of cinnabar 
 dust, and close beside him on the ground stood about sixty flasks 
 of mercury ready for shipment to London. A " flask " is a mallea- 
 ble iron bottle with a screw top, which holds seventy-five pounds of 
 mercury. 
 
 The cinnabar ore comes out of a very steep, double-peaked hill 
 composed of semi-metamorphic rock, rising to an elevation of 
 about one thousand feet above the sea, and six hundred and fifty 
 feet above the level of the adjacent swamp. Mr. Everett, with the 
 most cheerful resignation and truly guide-hke patience, took me 
 into each of the four "levels" that have been mined into the hill, 
 one above another, and gave me all the facts in the case as we pro- 
 ceeded. The lowest level was a new one, and the tunnel had not 
 yet reached the ore. The other three had penetrated quite to the 
 heart of the hill, and on reaching the paying ore it had been mined 
 in every du-ection, forming a great cavern at the end of each tunnel. 
 The miners are all Chinamen who work out the ore and sell it to 
 the Company according to the assay. The ore was then very poor, 
 and although the rock containad only fom* per cent, of mercm-y it 
 was worked as a matter of necessity and at a loss, while all concerned 
 hoped constantly for something better. In one of the levels IVIr. 
 Everett showed me a very rich pocket, which had yielded ore al- 
 most as heavy as mercury, being ninety per cent, pure metal. 
 
 The Tegora mines were opened in 1868. The first ore taken 
 out was stamped, by which process about one-fourth of the metal 
 was lost in the washing. Now it is smelted, and the vapor contain- 
 ing the metal is passed through a flue or shaft about one thousand 
 feet long, which leads off up the steep side of the hill. The mer- 
 cury is gradually condensed upon the sides of the flue, which after 
 a time is cleaned out by men sent into it. The cleaners often 
 get badly saUvated, so much so that they are sometimes utterly 
 helpless from the sores which break out upon different parts of 
 their bodies. We saw two poor fellows who were helpless from 
 salivation ; and Mr. Everett himself was also badly off from an 
 overdose of mercury. 
 
 The officers of the Borneo Company are very comfortably 
 housed close to the mines, and in the evening at dinner we were 
 
A PLEASURE TRIP UP THE SARAWAK. 483 
 
 most hospitably entertained by four of them, Messrs. Everett, Har- 
 vey, Gray and, Beecher. Every one was in good spirits, and we 
 bad a very merry time until a late hour. An Englishman may be 
 rather rigid and formal on his native isle, but take him in the East 
 Indies, especially in the jungles, and he is certainly the jolliest and 
 best of companions. 
 
 On the following day, St. John and I returned to Paku. At 
 Pankalan we took a boat and had a very romantic ride down the 
 Staat, which saved us several miles walking. The river was low and 
 we had to shoot a number of rapids in consequence. The boat was 
 a small one, and at each end stood a Malay with a bamboo pole to 
 guide the frail craft. It was certainly a charming ride. The bed 
 of the stream was sand, pebbles and bowlders, and the banks were 
 shales and limestone. The branches of the trees met far above otit 
 heads, giving us a continuous cool shade instead of the glare and 
 heat of the sun, and in a quiet ecstacy of delight we glided smoothly 
 along with the swift ciUTent, feasting otu* eyes upon the beauties of 
 I'ock and tree, flower, fern, orchid, and mossy bank. 
 
 Often when shooting down the rapids at a great rate, with 
 great bowlders lining our narrow way thickly on either hand, or 
 with a wall of rock rising directly before us at the foot of the incline, 
 it seemed as if the next instant our boat would certainly strike and 
 be smashed into kindling wood. But no ; just at the right mo- 
 ment, the man in the bow would quickly jam the end of his pole 
 into a crevice or against the rocky wall, give a quick, strong 
 shove, and send us swinging off at a shai^p angle down the middle 
 of the channel. The Malays handled the boat as only skilfiil and 
 practised hands could ; and it did not touch a rock even once. 
 
 After several miles of this deHghtf ul voyaging we came to the 
 getting-out place, and, with a sigh to think the ride was over, re- 
 luctantly took to the road and walked the remainder of the way 
 to Paku, which we reached shortly before noon. In the afternoon, 
 while St. John held court, Everett and I strolled out to get some 
 specimens of calc spar, antimony, and limestone, and to talk over 
 all Borneo. 
 
 Our last day was to be devoted to an excursion to Serambo 
 Mountain, whither my good friend St. John had invited me, for I 
 should never have dreamed of asking him to do so much hard 
 climbing on my account. We said good-by to Mr. Everett and 
 set out early for the mountain, which rises about two rmles east of 
 Paku. There is a good Dyak road, or path, all the way, leading 
 
484 TWO YEARS IN THE JUNGLE. 
 
 over hills, througli hollows and across several very interesting Dyak 
 bridges, built across mountain streams, above high water mark, to 
 insure the traveller a crossing in times of flood. Evidently the Hill 
 Dyaks are more averse to floimdering through mud and water than 
 their brethren of the Sea tribe. 
 
 The low foot-bridges are almost precisely like the hay-racks at 
 which the cattle feed in an Illinois farm-yard. They are very in- 
 genious contrivances, and the idea of their construction might often 
 be copied to good advantage by the settlers of our Western States. 
 They are built by planting two rows of long stakes in the ground 
 slanting in opposite directions, so that a small saphng laid in the 
 fork thus formed will be horizontal, and of the proper height for 
 the footway. Each pair of stakes is lashed together at their point 
 of intersection, and the bridge is further strengthened by perpen- 
 dicular posts set imder the footway. A pole is lashed along the top 
 of each row of stakes to serve as a hand-rail. One of the bridges 
 between Paku andSerambo was about a hundred feet long and nine 
 feet high at the middle. 
 
 Sometimes the Dyaks construct very high suspension bridges 
 across streams with high and precipitous banks, by hanging a 
 couple of long bamboo stems with rattans or creepers from the 
 branches of the trees which overhang the chasm. A hand-rail is 
 also constructed, either on one side or both, but even with that, it 
 takes a very steady-headed European to cross without breaking out 
 all over in a cold perspiration. The Dyaks, however, trot across 
 them, carrying heavy loads with the most perfect nonchalance, and 
 the only accidents that occur are by the bamboos becoming rotten 
 and suddenly giving way with a grand crash. 
 
 About an hour from Paku we reached the foot of the mountain 
 and began to climb up the path which leads to the Kajah's cottage 
 and the three villages of Serambo, Bombok, and Peninjau. It was 
 a hard climb. The whole side of the mountain was strewn, or 
 covered, rather, with boulders and angular masses of rock from 
 the size of a Saratoga trunk to a street car, smooth, mossy, and 
 slippery as ice. I think they must have been covered with soft 
 soap that morning for our especial benefit. We were obliged to 
 proceed with the greatest care and circumspection to avoid com- 
 ing down with a wreck of muscle and crush of bones. In some 
 places the rocks are so large and piled together in such rugged 
 confusion that the Dyaks have regular ladders and foot-bridges 
 over them, of notched saplings placed end to end with a hand-rail 
 
DYAKS USING THE BILIONG, OR AXE-ADZE. (Page 379.) 
 
 (_From a sketch by H. H. Evet^ett.) 
 
A PLEASURE TEIP TIP THE SARAWAK. 485 
 
 along one side. My journal for that day pantingly declares, "It 
 was hot work to climb such a steep mountain over such a terrible 
 jumble of slippery stones." 
 
 Near the top we came to Peninjau, a typical village of the Hill 
 Dyaks. Besides the pangah, or head-house, there were fifteen 
 other houses, each of which contained from three to six rooms and 
 accommodated a total population of about five hundred persons, 
 when the returns were all in. The houses stand just wherever 
 they can find standing-room, with no order or regularity whatever, 
 not a sign of anything like a street nor even a good path anywhere. 
 They were of course built along the side of the mountain, usually 
 with the open side up hill, and all were elevated on posts which 
 were from six to eight feet high on the upper side, where they 
 were the shortest. The rank grass growing all through the 
 village and the uncommon stillness which prevailed, gave the vil- 
 lage quite a deserted air, and, sure enough, we found only a few 
 girls and old women in the place, all the rest being away at work 
 on their farms. 
 
 As we passed through the village, two young women came out 
 to look at us, who ^vere in their turn inspected with equal curiosity. 
 Their brass waist ornaments were of an entirely different style 
 from any I had before seen, the thick wire being worn up and 
 down from hips to armpits instead of in rings around the waist. 
 
 These curious corsets were models of rigidity, and closeness of 
 fit, and being brightly polished, gave the yoimg ladies quite a sub- 
 stantial air. What a magnificent protection they must be against 
 the embraces of a too-powerful lover ! 
 
 We entered the head-house, which I have already described in 
 a previous chapter. 
 
 The heads, or rather skulls, hung in a semi-circle around one 
 side of the room, and there were forty-two of them in all, not 
 counting the skuU of a young orang-utan, which probably some 
 enterprising young Dyak, in haste to marry, had, in times past, 
 palmed off upon his unsuspecting lady-love and his brethren, as the 
 head of a fierce young Seribas Dyak. 
 
 The collection as a whole was in very good condition, the speci- 
 mens being moderately clean and not at all smoked. Some had 
 been very carelessly taken, I regret to say, as was shown by the 
 way they had been split open or slashed across with parongs ; and 
 from some, large pieces had been hacked out. One I noticed had a 
 deep slash diagonally across the bridge of the nose, which evi- 
 
486 TWO YEAES IN THE JUNGLE. 
 
 dently ended the earthly troubles of the owner in short ordeE 
 None of the skulls were labelled with locality, date, sex, and specie^ 
 as crania always should be, to be valuable. 
 
 After leaving the pangah we climbed two hundred feet higher, 
 and at last reached the Kajah's cottage, which has been visited by 
 nearly every European who has thus far set foot in Sarawak. The 
 cottage itself is a sort of summer-house, a veritable " lodge in a 
 vast wilderness," a Httle house on posts, with three rooms, a veran- 
 da extending around three sides, and at that time no furniture 
 except a table and two or three chairs. 
 
 But if the cottage is nothing of itself, the location is everything. 
 Back of it is the forest-clad top of Serambo, all about it are flower- 
 ing shrubs, cocoanut trees, and the tops of the trees which have 
 their roots far below in the steep side of the mountain. Through 
 the cocoanut-grove in front we catch a ghmpse of sea and sky, and 
 hasten forward to get beyond the trees. Come with me, quickly, 
 if you would feast your eyes on a most charming view. Fifty 
 yards below the cottage we stand upon a bare rock, the very 
 northernmost point of the summit, nine hundred and fifty feet 
 above the sea, with a clear view to the north, east, and west. It is 
 enchanting. The sun shines brightly, the air is clear, and every 
 object in the vast landscape is defined with unusual clearness of 
 detaiL 
 
 Almost beneath our feet is a wide semi-circle of ferns, then the 
 feathery tops of the bamboos that grow lower down the steep 
 slope, and beyond that a sloping bank of green tree-tops which 
 finally mingle with the fohage of the plain far below. To the left 
 hand (west), and seemingly very near, rises the Semadjoe mountain 
 range, which forms the boundary between Sarawak and the Dutch 
 Territory, with Bau and Matang still nearer at hand toward the 
 northwest. Everett's house at Paku, far below, looks like a little 
 white martin-box on a tiny mound. Toward the north, seemingly 
 at the foot of Serambo, we can trace the winding course of the 
 western branch of the Sarawak Eiver, brown and murky with the 
 mud of recent rains. Beyond the river stretches a wide level plain 
 covered with green jungle, broken only by a few light patches here 
 and there, either farms or second growth jungle, and a few hills 
 that rise high enough to be recognized as such. Far away in front, 
 at the edge of the sea, rises the fine peak of Santubong, with its 
 head thrust up into a fleecy white cloud. The coast hne is clearly 
 defined fi-om the mouth of the Lundu to the Batang Lupar, and 
 
A PLEASURE TRIP UP THE SARAWAK. 487 
 
 beyond it the sea stretches out toward the horizon like a sheet oi 
 frosted silver. 
 
 We can very easily make out the position of Kuching, and trace 
 the windings of the Sarawak for a long distance, but the stream 
 itself is visible in but one or two places. Truly, an enchanting 
 picture in contrast with the monotonous closeness of jungle and 
 river scenery. 
 
 Eeluctantly enough, we quitted Peninjau, the "lookout," and 
 started straight down the mountain, in the direction of Siniwan, at 
 which point the Firefly was to meet us. The descent over those 
 abominably slippery stones was, if anything, more tiresome and 
 difficult than going up. Half way down we met a party of Dyaks 
 coming up. As soon as they heard our voices they quickly dropped 
 their juahs beside the path and bolted into the bushes ; but after 
 we had passed out of sight they returned, chattering and laughing, 
 resumed their loads and went on. 
 
 Shortly before noon, after a very hot walk to the river, we 
 reached the Firefly, and went down to Kuching in about three 
 hours. For my part, I felt thoroughly tired and foot-sore, and ]\Ir. 
 St. John was also quite willing to rest. Otu* feet were badly blis- 
 tered, and a large, angry boil on my left arm, which had kept me 
 company all the way, was a companion with whom I would willingly 
 have parted. 
 
 Thus ended my jungle life in the East Indies. On Decem- 
 ber 18th I embarked in the Rajah Brooke for Singapore, serenely 
 happy with the results of my visit to Sarawak. Never has a coun- 
 try used me better or sent me away fuller handed. I have been 
 treated excellently well by both natives and Europeans, have had 
 very few annoyances, I ought to say none at all, and more joys 
 crowded into four months than are counted in many a lifetime. 
 My only regret is that I have not had a score of fi-iends to enjoy it 
 with me. The coast line sinks into the sea behind us, and the hazy 
 blue mountains fade out against the clouds like a dissolving view. 
 Farewell to Borneo ! 
 
 " Welcome the gleaming sea." 
 
 I remained six weeks in Singapore, making up a large collection 
 of corals and shells, for the variety and abundance of which the 
 place is famous. Previous to that time the season had been unfa- 
 vorable for the successful gathering of marine invertebrates, but 
 now the Malays brought me beautiful shells by the hundred and 
 
488 TWO YEAES IN THE JUNGLE. 
 
 corals by the boat-load. Major Studer, our worthy consul, gave me 
 a large room in the lower part of his house, and the use of a cool, 
 shady court, where I bought, assorted, and packed several hundred 
 specimens of coral of twenty-six species, and more shells than I 
 could spare time to catalogue. 
 
 My friend Syers sent me a very nice collection of Selangore 
 mammals, skins and skeletons, and snakes in alcohol, all of which 
 he had gathered since my visit there. It is a pity that such an 
 ardent hunter and dead shot with a rifle could not have his lines of 
 duty cast in such a country as Southern India, which, in places, 
 actually teems with noble game. Mr. Syers and I planned an ex- 
 pedition to the Animallais for some future year, with Theobald for 
 a companion in the chase, and when we do actually start on the 
 war-path in that direction some of the big game animals had better 
 get their lives insured against accidents. 
 
 My jolly friend Hood, of the Rainbow, put in an appearance 
 during my last days in Singapore, but I felt so down-in-the-mouth 
 at not having sufficient funds left to get me to and through Aus- 
 tralia, that I was but sorry company, I know. It was fated that I 
 should not see Australia ; for a hunting and collecting trip cannot, 
 like the brook, " go on forever." 
 
 Foreseeing that I should have to cross the Pacific in winter, I 
 determined to spare my two baby orangs the miseries of such a 
 voyage, and, after having the Old Man sit for his photograph, I 
 sent them both, under the guardianship of Mr. Vandevorst, to 
 Madras, as a present to my kind friend Theobald. I could not 
 have given him anything that pleased him better. He made a jour- 
 ney of three hundred and fifty miles to meet them ; and they re- 
 ceived him with open arms. Both were presented at court before 
 they left Madras, and I hear were very much comphmented on 
 their deportment and good looks. 
 
 Early in February I turned my face homeward, by way of China 
 and Japan, and reached Rochester safe and well, just two years and 
 nine months from the time of my departure. From first to last I 
 had been remarkably prospered, quite as if the prayers and good 
 wishes of my friends had enlisted the services of a special guardian 
 angel to accompany me at every step, in addition to the one I left 
 behind me, whose charming missives of news, hopeful encourage- 
 ment and unfaltering affection followed me everywhere — one by 
 every mail, without a single break — without which I would have 
 been lonesome indeed. No journey could have been more free 
 
A PLEASUEE lElP UP THE SAEAWAK. 489 
 
 from accidents, for from first to last I did not meet with so much 
 bodily harm as a cut finger, and returned home with health wholly 
 unimpaired. 
 
 Enriched by experiences in foreign lands, wealth which cannot 
 be estimated in dollars and cents, nothing but a desire to have others 
 share with me, through the medium of these pages, the delights of 
 forest and field, river and sea, could have impelled me to the labori- 
 ous task of writing this narrative in hours which should have been 
 devoted to rest and recreation. But if a single reader (always ex- 
 cepting the proof-reader) has followed me thus far, and experienced 
 in sympathy a hundredth part of tlie delight which quickens my 
 blood as I think of the scenes which I have feebly attempted to 
 describe for him, I can say that my labor has not been in vain. 
 
 The rifle and knife hang peacefully upon the wall, theiv labors 
 done. Let me rest my weary pen also. Farewell* 
 
APPENDIX. 
 
 OiTTPiT FOR A Collector, 
 
 For the benefit of inexperienced collectors, I give below an itemized list of 
 tbe various articles which constituted my outfit for field-work in collecting 
 and preserving animal specimens of all kinds. I have only to add that my 
 outfit was complete and compact, contained no useless articles, and I found it 
 perfectly adapted to all my wants. Its total cost was about $370. 
 
 1 Agassiz tank (copper), in wooden box, for alcoholics. 
 1 chest of black walnut, iron bound, which contained all the articles enumer- 
 ated below : 
 
 1 double B. L. smooth-bore gun, 
 
 No. 10, in case. 
 1 Maynard rifle, cal. 40. 
 1 " shot-gun, No. 16. 
 1 Smith & Wesson revolver, cal. 
 
 32. 
 1 belt and cartridge bag. 
 40 pounds shot, assorted sizes. 
 10 pounds Maynard bullets. 
 1,000 Berdan primers. 
 
 12 pounds Orange Ducking powder. 
 30 pounds arsenical soap. 
 15 pounds dry arsenic. 
 1 dozen large skinning knives. 
 
 1 dozen small skinning knives. 
 6 scalpels. 
 
 2 claw hatchets. 
 1 saw. 
 
 1 large skin scraper. 
 1 geological hammer. 
 1 bull's-eye lantern. 
 1 A No. 1 field-glass. 
 
 1 compass. 
 
 2 brushes, for arsenical soap. 
 
 1 blow-pipe and set of egg-drills. 
 1 hydrometer and test-glass. 
 
 1 thermometer. 
 
 2 pairs hunting-shoes. 
 
 2 rubber blankets. 
 1 double woollen blanket. 
 1 Ashanti hammock, 
 3,000 labels, three sizes. 
 
 1 tool-box, size 13 by 7 inches, 
 which contained the following : 
 
 4 skinning knives. 
 
 2 pairs scissors, 
 1 brain hook. 
 
 1 pair long forceps. 
 1 pair short forceps. 
 1 pair cutting pliers. 
 
 1 pair flat pliers. 
 
 2 sets skeleton scrapers. 
 1 small skin scraper. 
 
 1 flat file. 
 
 2 three-cornered files. 
 
 1 cold chisel. 
 
 2 awls. 
 
 1 4-inch saw (for turtles). 
 1 tape measure. 
 1 2-foot rule. 
 1 ivory thimble. 
 1 oil-stone. 
 
 1 spool thread. 
 
 2 dozen labels. 
 
 3 papers glover's needles. 
 
492 TWO YEARS IN THE JUNGLE. 
 
 Recipe fob Making Aksenical Soap. 
 
 Ingredients. 
 
 White soap 3 pounds. 
 
 Powdered arsenic 2 " 
 
 Camphor 5 ounces. 
 
 Subcarbonate of potash 6 " 
 
 Alcohol 8 " 
 
 Directions. — Slice the soap and melt it in a small quantity of water over 
 a slow fire, stirring sufficiently to prevent its burning. When melted, add the 
 potash, and stir in the powdered arsenic, after which add the camphor, pre- 
 viously dissolved in the alcohol. When the mass has been boiled down to the 
 consistency of thick molasses, pour it into an earthen jar to cool and harden. 
 Stir it frequently while cooling to prevent the arsenic settling to the bottom. 
 When cold it should be like lard or butter. For use, mix a small quantity with 
 water until it resembles buttermilk, and apply with a common paint brush. 
 
 How TO Skin a Quadruped, and Prepare the Skin for Mounting. 
 
 (Subject chosen, a Tiger.) 
 
 First measure the animal carefully and record the dimensions on the spot. 
 Then, as with all land mammals, make a straight clean cut from the throat 
 along the under side of the animal quite to the end of the tail. Slit each leg 
 from the centre of the foot, or the "pad," along the hack of the leg to the 
 first joint, or the heel, and stop there. Begin at the incision along the middle 
 of the body, skin down the sides of the animal as far as possible, then detach 
 the legs at hip and shoulder. Skin each leg down to the very ends of the 
 toes, cut all the flesh and tendons from around the leg-bones as cleanly as pos- 
 sible, but leave the leg-bones attached to the skin at the toes, and to each other 
 by their ligaments. Make a slit along the bottom of each toe so that every 
 morsel of flesh may be removed, and ei-ery inch of the skin be laid bare on its 
 inner surface to receive the preservatives. Skin down to the hase of each daw. 
 
 Detach the head from the body at the first cervical vertebra, and, as you 
 proceed with the head, turn the skin over wrong side out and work gradually 
 down to the end of the nose. When you reach the eye, insert a finger in it 
 from the outside to guide the movements of your knife and prevent your cut- 
 ting the edges of the eyelid or corners of the eye. The skin on the inner sur- 
 face of the lips must be cut close along the gums in all cases. After the skin 
 is detached from the skull, the lips must be slit open from the inside until the 
 fold or edge of the lip is reached, and the flesh inside the lip cut away. The 
 lip is now unfolded as it were all the way round, and in mounting the animal 
 the place of the flesh will be supplied with clay or putty and the lip folded 
 again as in life ; hence the importance of preserving the inner skin of the 
 lips. The roots of the whiskers form a large, thick lump on each side of the 
 nostrils, and these must be slit vertically, so as not to cut off the roots of t! ^ose 
 long, stiff hairs. In most of the Felidm the whiskers are set in rows, so that it 
 is easy to slit the flesh between the rows of root-glands until coming down to 
 the skin itself. Rub the alum well into these gashes when preparing the skin. 
 The cartilage of the ear must be skinned out from the inside by simply turn- 
 ing the ear inside out. 
 
APPENDIX. 493 
 
 Carefully scrape all the fat from the inside of the skin and all bits of flesh, 
 and wash off all the blood from both sides, so that the skin shall be thoroughly 
 clean. Now rub the inside of the skin with strong arsenical soap, after which 
 apply powdered alum plentifully to every inch of inner surface. Put on as 
 much alum as the skin will absorb, and on the leg-bones as well as the skin, to 
 make them dry quickly ; then hang the skin over a large pole in a shady place 
 where the wind will strike it. Be careful not to streUh the skin unduly. Keep 
 it well spread out, so that the air will reach every part of it freely. Turn the skin 
 about every other day and expose the hair side. In a few days, if the skin has a 
 fair chance, it will begin to get stiff and hard, and then it should be taken down 
 and folded up neatly, hair inside. Leave it in an open place a little longer, 
 and it will become almost as hard as a board, the best condition possible for it. 
 A skin cured in this way can at any time afterward be softened, and either 
 stuffed with gratifying success, or made into a rug of the most desirable kind. 
 
 The skull must be cleaned by simply cutting and scraping the flesh cleanly 
 from it with a knife, removing the brain with a bent wire or a piece of hoop 
 iron, rubbing the skull with the arsenical soap, and allowing it to dry. Put a 
 large bunch of tow, cotton, or rags between the teeth and around them, and 
 tie the jaws tightly together to prevent the teeth from getting broken or lost. 
 The skull should in all cases accompany a skin which is to be mounted as a 
 museum specimen, or even as a rug with the head stuffed. 
 
 The above directions apply to all carnivorous animals, and, with slight 
 modifications, to all terrestrial mammals except the elephant, rhinoceros, hip- 
 popotamus, and a few others. Arsenical soap is the great protective against 
 the attacks of insects, rats, cats, dogs, and other vermin ; and powdered alum 
 is the best dry preservative for the skins of land quadrupeds, assisted, in cer- 
 tain cases, by salt. Professional collectors should preserve all mammal skins 
 in a bath made of salt and alum dissolved in hot water, icithout di'ying them 
 at aU. I have found that skins so prepared mount so much quicker, easier, 
 and better than if dried, that of late I advise and practise this method exclu- 
 sively. Casual collectors, such as sportsmen and travellers, will on many ac- 
 counts find it less trouble to preserve their specimens in a dry state, after the 
 method described above. 
 
 Loss OF LrPE IN British India by Wild Beasts and Serpents. 
 
 Few persons have an adequate conception of the abundance of dangerous 
 animals in India, and the appalling loss of life they occasion. In spite of 
 zealous sportsmen, liberal rewards, poisons, pitfalls, and all other engines of 
 destruction with which the people make war against teeth, claws, and poisonous 
 fangs, the dangerous beasts still hold their own. In the United States, if a man 
 loses his life by a wild animal, forty million people are informed of it in less 
 than a fortnight. The subjoined tables, compiled from official reports and un- 
 deniably correct, will show either how little is known generally of what ia 
 transpiring in India, or else how little the world cares. With a reasonable 
 allowance of variations, sometimes in one direction and sometimes in another, 
 it may be said that the figures here recorded remain practically the same, year 
 after year. The various governments pay out annually over one hundred 
 thousand rupees in rewards, but instead of bringing about the extermination of 
 
494 
 
 TWO YEAES IN THE JUl^GLE. 
 
 the species destructive to human life it only serves to prevent their increase 
 beyond a certain point. 
 
 Here is a field for the missionaries with a vengeance. I wonder if it has 
 never occurred to them that it would be a good thing to save bodies as well as 
 souls, especially where twenty tJiousand of the former are destroyed every year 
 by wild beasts and snakes. To my mind, the body of the Hindoo seems 
 more deserving of attention just now than his soul. 
 
 Loss OF Life and Property by Wild Beasts in British India dur- 
 ing THE Year 1878. 
 
 
 Number of persons killed by 
 
 Number op cattle killed by 
 
 Political 
 Divisions. 
 
 i 
 
 a 
 3 
 
 i 
 
 be 
 
 22 
 347 
 
 28 
 2 
 167 
 16 
 2 
 138 
 11 
 
 1 
 
 i 
 
 41 
 19 
 149 
 
 65 
 8 
 
 15 
 1 
 2 
 
 § 
 
 pq 
 
 8 
 1 
 37 
 
 16 
 3 
 14 
 
 > 
 1 
 
 10 
 152 
 
 624 
 14 
 32 
 
 w 
 
 5 
 
 2i 
 
 5 
 ■3 
 
 "i 
 1 
 
 105 
 40 
 
 1 
 
 
 to 
 
 1 
 
 2 
 
 io 
 i 
 
 13 
 23 
 
 
 1 
 
 1,991 
 
 713 
 
 2,304 
 
 3,266 
 4,942 
 433 
 99 
 913 
 228 
 174 
 
 38 
 
 45 
 10 
 24 
 
 214 
 
 241 
 
 2 
 
 1 
 
 "i 
 
 52 
 
 1 
 
 8 
 >i 
 W 
 
 171 
 
 31 
 
 2,262 
 
 1S5 
 20 
 52 
 
 190 
 
 228 
 
 90 
 
 3,229 
 
 1,590 
 
 1 
 
 
 
 135 
 
 80 
 
 1,516 
 
 64? 
 
 42 
 234 
 
 13 
 1,482 
 
 67 
 101 
 
 4,317 
 
 5,081 
 
 1 
 
 149 
 221 
 537 
 
 213 
 95 
 15 
 
 120 
 75 
 11 
 
 389 
 
 1,825 
 2,945 
 
 i 
 
 eg 
 
 Madras 
 
 609 
 819 
 
 852 
 
 911 
 
 11,318 
 
 4,219 
 802 
 
 1,233 
 183 
 84 
 488 
 154 
 
 12 
 
 2,678 
 1,707 
 3,483 
 
 960 
 
 31 
 
 1,528 
 
 346 
 
 307 
 1,063 
 
 416 
 
 10 
 
 1,181 
 1,195 
 1,316 
 
 1,729 
 
 2,317 
 
 35 
 
 i;3l3 
 
 82 
 
 1,324 
 
 5 
 
 6,350 
 
 Bombay 
 
 
 3,957 
 11,444 
 
 7,214 
 
 Bengal 
 
 5 
 6 
 
 663 9,944 
 
 317' 3,158 
 16, i50 
 69' 934 
 10 150 
 
 N.-W . Provinces and 
 Oudh 
 
 Punjab 
 
 7,688 
 
 Central Provinces. . 
 British Burma 
 
 15 
 
 2,299 
 
 589 
 
 Mysore and Coorg. . 
 Assam 
 
 15 
 
 "i 
 
 U 
 
 
 7 
 
 64 
 82 
 
 72 
 255 
 100 
 
 12 
 
 4,280 
 2,053 
 
 Hyderabad 
 
 2,681 
 
 Ajmere and Mhair- 
 wara 
 
 
 143 
 
 
 33 
 
 46 
 
 816 
 819 
 
 300 
 200 
 
 94 
 
 85 
 
 845 
 564 
 
 33 
 
 24 
 
 
 
 Total 
 
 1,323 
 1,180 
 
 16,812 
 16,777 
 
 20,256 
 19,695 
 
 13,129 
 16,137 
 
 15,101 
 
 14,488 
 
 590 
 999 
 
 10.497 
 11,934 
 
 48,701 
 
 Total for 1877.,.. 
 
 53,191 
 
 Dangerous Animals Destroyed in British India during the Year 
 
 1878. 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 ^1 
 
 .PoLiTiOAii Divisions. 
 
 •/I- 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 1 
 
 
 -a 
 It 
 
 Hi 
 
 •SB 
 P 
 
 
 1 
 
 t 
 
 ■2 
 
 rf 
 
 i 
 
 £ 
 
 i 
 
 i 
 
 !^'i 
 
 
 a' 
 
 ■^ 
 
 ^ 
 
 m 
 
 1 
 
 ^ 
 
 
 
 S 
 
 ■gi3c 
 
 |.S 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 RS. A.P. 
 
 Madras 
 
 
 185 
 79 
 426 
 
 87 
 
 613 
 
 226 
 
 1,033 
 
 427 
 
 143 
 34 
 227 
 559 
 
 27 
 
 156 
 
 919 
 
 2,589 
 
 128 
 
 1 
 
 431 
 
 343 
 
 5,920 
 415 
 
 1,613 
 491 
 
 86V7'96 
 24.276 
 1,697 
 
 7,016 
 
 941 
 
 4,650 
 
 4,495 
 
 17,854 11 8 
 
 Bombay 
 
 
 7,791 5 6 
 
 Bengal 
 
 
 23,583 7 
 
 N.-w. Provinces and Oudh. . . 
 
 10,938 5 
 
 Punjab 
 
 
 3 
 
 187 
 
 125 
 391 
 
 45 
 157 
 
 1,120 
 219 
 
 4 
 243 
 
 23 
 
 1,783 
 410 
 
 1,320 
 1,197 
 
 4,172 
 
 Central Provinces 
 
 
 14,277 8 
 
 
 
 80 
 36 
 
 65 
 96 
 
 51 
 
 1 
 
 
 "1 
 
 461 
 1,066 
 
 2,214 
 691 
 
 657 
 1,200 
 
 5,100 
 
 Mysore and Coorg 
 
 
 3,541 U 
 
 Assam 
 
 
 375 
 32 
 3 
 
 189 
 54 
 18 
 
 65 
 1 
 
 1 
 3« 
 
 "i 
 
 185 
 
 25 
 
 "■"ee 
 
 815 
 173 
 23 
 
 10,210 12 
 
 
 
 1,676 
 
 AJmere and Mhairwara 
 
 
 44 
 
 Total 
 
 1 
 
 1,493 
 
 3,237 
 
 1,283 
 
 5,067 
 
 1,202 
 
 10,204 
 
 117,958 
 
 22,487 
 
 99,189 12 a 
 
 Total tor 1877 
 
 2 
 
 1,579 
 
 3,559 
 
 1,374 
 
 4,924 
 
 1,417 
 
 9,996 
 
 127,295 
 
 22,851 
 
 103,017 5 6 
 
 
APPENDIX. 
 
 as 
 
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 S 
 
INDEX. 
 
 Acacia concinna, 138 
 
 thorny, 81 
 Actinia, 253 
 Aden, 19 
 
 Adjutant, entire dog in crop of, 68 
 " Adventures among the Dyaks," 468 
 ^tobatis narinari, 255 
 Affection of gibbons for their young, 418 
 African elephant, 219 
 
 tusks of, 235 
 Ailantus Malabaricus, 128 
 Aix sponsa, 300 
 
 Alabaster, mosque built of, 10, 14 
 Alcock, Sir Rutherford, 334 
 Alexandria, 8 
 
 Alir, or crocodUe hook, 305, 848 
 Allahabad, 32 
 
 Alligator, accident to an, 55 
 AUne, S. S., 340 
 Alum, use of, on skins, 44, 193, 213, 367, 
 
 493 
 "American Four-in-Hand in Britain," 
 
 297 
 Amusements of the Dyaks, 468 
 Anabantids, 387 
 
 Animallai Hills, character of forest on, 
 125 
 
 close of work on, 214 
 
 cover for game, 155, 214 
 
 hunter's paradise, 119 
 
 jungle products of, 128 
 
 list of mammals collected on, 316 
 
 name, derivation of, 119 
 
 physical aspect of, 130, 123 
 
 seasons on, 125 
 
 stormy descent from, 215 
 
 tribes on the, 13S 
 Animallai village, 132, 175 
 
 relief camp at, 178 
 Anser Indicus, 34 
 Antelope bezoartica, 76-80 
 Antimonj' in Sarawak, 480 
 Ardivarum ghaut, 133 
 Argus grayii, 422 
 Argus pheasant, 380 
 
 flesh of, 420 
 
 plumage of, 432 
 
 Arnica, tincture, use of, 311 
 Arsenical soap, use of, 43, 165, 209, 36^ 
 493 
 recipe for making, 493 
 Astana, the, at Sarawak, 339 
 Asteria, 253 
 Astreopora, 354 
 Atherura fasciculata, 423, 478 
 Attap roofs, 315 
 Axis deer, 139, 166-168 
 Azadirachta Indica, 81 
 
 Bab-el-Manbeb, Strait of, 19 
 
 Baby elephant, and result of fooling 
 
 around it, 140-141 
 Baby orang-utan, my, 376 
 
 as a bed-fellow, 383 
 
 food in captivity, 382 
 
 human-like passions, 429 
 
 inability to swim, 419 
 
 mode of walking, 381 
 
 personal appearance, 381 
 
 playfulness, 383, 417 
 
 presentation of, to Mr. Theobald, 488 
 
 social habits, 383 
 
 training, 382 
 Badagas, 99 
 
 Bailly, Mr. J. F. D., 317 
 Baker, Sir Samuel, 281 
 Ballow Dyaks, games of, 468 
 Bamboo forest in the Wainaad, 106 
 
 forest on the Animallais, 125 
 
 huts, 130 
 
 huts pulled do\\m by elephants, 198 
 
 suspension bridges, Dyak, 484 
 
 utensils and furniture, 131 
 Bambusa arundinacea, 106, 135 
 Bananas, 315 
 Banyan tree, 83 
 Bankongs, 463-464 
 Baram, Kyans of, 446, 448, 457 
 
 Kyans good houses of, 449 
 Baram River, 334, 446 
 Barito River, 334 
 Barking deer, 171, 268 
 Barriers of Pandanus stems, 411 
 Bassia latifolia, 146 
 
498 
 
 INDEX. 
 
 Bass' pale ale, 185 
 
 Batagur thurgii, 63 
 
 Batang Lupar River, 335, 348, 410, 459 
 
 Batangs, 439 
 
 Bathing at Allahabad, 33 
 
 in the Staat River, 481 
 Bats, 266, 326, 478 
 Battery, a typical sportsman's, 193 
 Bau, 317 
 
 gold washing at, 479 
 Beecher, Mr., 483 
 Bean, Dr. Tarleton H., 386 
 Beans, 315 
 
 Bears, Bomean, 431, 439 
 Bears, Indian black, adventure with, 
 144-146 
 
 cattle killed by, 494 
 
 destroyed, 494 
 
 habits and distribution of, 146 
 
 persons killed by, 494 
 Beasts, wild, destruction of, 494 
 
 loss of cattle by, 494 
 
 loss of human life by, 493-494 
 Beauty, lack of, in native women, 461 
 Bellows, use of, by Kyans, 447 
 Benares, 83 
 
 Benevolence, native, 31 
 Bennett, Mr. G. M., 250, 259 
 Bentotte rest house, 286 
 Betmund, 97 
 Biadum, 472 
 Bibos, see Bos 
 Bidie, Dr. G., 91 
 Bijit monkey, 391 
 Biliong, 379 
 Birds, author's policy in collecting, 3, 430 
 
 Bomean, 379, 417, 432, 429 
 
 "brain-fever," 170 
 
 Dyak mode of snaring, 421 
 
 near Mullaitivu, 267 
 
 of Selangore, 307, 338 
 
 omen, 426, 433 
 
 on the Hoogly, 88 
 
 on the Jumna, 34, 44, 59-63, 68 
 Bird-nesting, 60-61 
 Bisayas, 447, 455, 457 
 Bison, Ijidian, appearance of the, 188 
 
 death of first, 114 
 
 dimensions of, 188 
 
 easUy killed, 189 
 
 first hunt for, 109-110 
 
 herds of, 189 
 
 hunting on the Animallais, 187 
 
 Mr. Morgan's adventure with, 189-191 
 
 preparing akin of, 193-193 
 Bison, American, 188 
 Blachang, 304 
 Black buck, 76-80 
 Blackwood, 125 
 Blow-pipe, see Sumpitan, 
 Boat, model of Dyak, 427 
 Boats, at Etawah, 37 
 
 Dyak, 463-464 
 
 Malay, 359 
 
 masidah, 80 
 Boatmen on the Jumna, 46 
 
 Boatmen on the Jumna, prayers of, 58 
 Boating on the Jumna, 33, 50, 58 
 
 on the Staat, 483 
 Bock, Mr. Carl, 334, 447 
 Bombay, market at, 33 
 
 natives, 34 
 
 street scenes in, 34-25 
 Bonneted macaque, 268 
 Booby, 307 
 
 Borassus flabelliformis, 129, 380 
 Bore in the Sadong, 373, 383 
 Borneo, area, 333 
 
 British North Borneo Company, 334 
 
 character of, 333 
 
 explorations, 334 
 
 forest growth, 352 
 
 impenetrability of interior, 335 
 
 mammals of, 398 
 
 mysteries of the interior, 335 
 
 no field for missionaries, 474 
 
 political divisions, 334 
 
 position of, 333 
 
 Proper, or Brunei, 334 
 Borneo Company, of Sarawak, 339, 472 
 480, 483 
 
 British North, 334 
 Bos Americanus, 18S 
 
 bubalus, 25 
 
 gaurus, 104, 188 
 
 Indicus, 25 
 
 sondaicus, 310 
 Box, remarkable training of, 300 
 Box-turtle, 310 
 
 Boycotting of author by an Irish mob, 3 
 Boj'le, Mr. Frederick, 468-469 
 Brahmin bull, 84 
 Bridge Jumna, at Allahabad, 33 
 Bridges, suspension of the Hill Dyaks, 
 
 484 
 Brass wire ornaments, 450-451, 457, 
 
 485 
 British Museum, 4 
 
 accessibility of collections of, 5 
 
 catalogues of the, 5 
 
 rank of, 5 
 British North Borneo Company, 334 
 British rule in India, 91 
 Broque monkey, 314 
 Brooke, Rajah Charles, 320, 446, 464 
 Brooke, Sir James, 341, 350 
 
 diplomatic wisdom of, 345, 465 
 Buceros bicornis, 139 
 
 rhinoceros, 417 
 Buffalo, Indian, 25 
 
 Toda, 103 
 Bullock bandy, 120 
 
 driving, l3l 
 
 hackery, 35 
 Bungalow, Animallai Forest Dep't, 133 
 
 dak (or dawk), 35 
 
 Mr. Theobald's forest, 134 
 
 travellers', at Kulhutty, 106 
 
 travellers', "at Segor, 106 
 Burial, HUl Dyak mode of, 454 
 
 Kyan, 447 
 
 Sibuyau, 474 
 
IXDEX. 
 
 499 
 
 Burning of the dead, by the Hill Dyaks, 
 454 
 Hindoos, 67 
 Biisau, 477 
 Butea frondosa, 81 
 Butter-fish, 256 
 Butterflies, 430 
 
 Buttresses of the tapang-tree, 428 
 Buxus, 300 
 
 Cabbage, Chinese, 315 
 
 Cabook, 380 
 
 Cairo, old and new, 9-10 
 
 Calamus rotang, 128 
 
 Calcutta, 86 
 
 Calotes nigrilabris, 248 
 
 versicolor, 348 
 Camel, the author rides a, 11 
 Camp, among wild beasts, 304 
 
 at Moochpardi, 183 
 
 at Tellicul, 130-131 
 
 of Major Ross, 70 
 Campbell, Captain E. A., 116 
 Campbell, Mr. Robert, kindness of, to au- 
 thor, 333 
 Camphor-trees, 315 
 Canarium strictum, 128 
 Canis aureus, 63 
 
 pallipes, 76 
 Cannibalism among certain Kyan clans, 
 
 447-448 
 Caranx gallus, 256 
 Carey, 258 
 
 Carnegie, Mr. Andrew, 297 
 Captain Cheena, the, 316, 329 
 Carcharias acutus, 257 
 
 melanopterus, 257 
 Casarca rutila, 34 
 Casuarinas, 353 
 Cathedral Cave, 327 
 Cat's cradle, game of, known to Dyaks, 
 
 468 
 Caves, discovery of, in Selangore, 325-328 
 
 examination of Bornean, 477-478 
 
 visit to, near Paku, 480 
 Centipedes, bite of, 311, 313 
 Cervulus aureus, 171-173, 268, 431 
 Cervus axis, 166-168 
 
 Ceylon, between Colombo and Kandy, 
 237-239 
 
 collection made in, 283 
 
 finest portion of, 281 
 
 richness of Ceylon fauna, 249 
 
 travels in Northern Province of, 251- 
 280 
 
 elephants in, 219-230 
 
 export duty on elephants in, 328 
 
 Observer, article in the, 343 
 Challenger Expedition, collections of, 3 
 Champagne, cheap, 316 
 Charge of a dangerous animal, 139 
 
 of a female elephant, 141 
 Cheiromeles torquatus, 478 
 
 Chelonia mvdas, 258 
 
 virgata, 258 
 Chetties of Colombo, 420 
 Chimpanzee, 399 
 Chinese gold companies, 479 
 
 hospitality, 316, 329, 479 
 
 houses. 275 
 
 industrj', 3^9 
 
 influence on the Dyaks, 444, 473, 474 
 
 insurrection in Sarawak, 466, 479 
 
 merchants of Singapore, 295 
 
 settlers on the Sarawak, 476 
 
 shops, 293, 294 
 
 toddy-making taught the Dyaks by the, 
 474 
 
 traders, tricks of, 433 
 Chittagong, elephant-catching in, 221 
 Chondropterygii, 255 
 Christianity without Christ, 474 
 Church episode in Ceylon, 285 
 Ciconiaalba, 60 
 
 Cinchona, government plantations of, 96 
 Cinnibar mines, at Tegora, 483 
 Civet cat, 429 
 Civilization, effect of, on savage races, 443 
 
 surpassed by semi-savagery, 474 
 
 unjust discrimination of, against wom- 
 en, 470-471 
 Climate, see Weather 
 Climbing, Dyak mode of, 434 
 Cloud scene on the Neilgherries, 104 
 Chypeaster Ghizaensis, 14 
 Coal mine in Sarawak, 351 
 Cobra, snake-eating, 330 
 Cocoanut, groves of, 273, 280, 285, 386 
 
 water of the, 273 
 Cochin, chasing elephants in, 146 
 
 death of a tusker in, 162, 166 
 Coimbatore, 130, 123 
 Collection, Animallai, 216 
 
 Ceylon, 283 
 
 of one day at Colombo, 248 
 
 of one daj' at Simujan, 371 
 Collecting at Colombo, 246-248 
 
 birds at Mullaitivu, 267 
 
 birds, Bornean. 422, 429 
 
 birds in Selangore, 307, 328 
 
 birds on the Jumna, 34, 59-62 
 
 ethnological specimens, 426 
 
 good ground for, 267, 414 
 
 shells and coral, 253-254, 256, 487 
 Collector, outfit for a, 491 
 Colombo, description of, 337-339 
 
 fish-market, 249 
 
 harbor, 239 
 Colonial Secretary of Ceylon, 343 
 Communal harmony of the Dyaks, 467« 
 
 468 
 Confinement, Dyak women in, 473 
 Conjugal felicity of the Dyaks, 468 
 Coonoor Pass, 95 
 Consul, United States, at Bombay 32 
 
 at Singapore, 296-297 
 Conocarpus latifolius, 125 
 Contentment of the Dyaks, 474 
 Coolies, high-priced, 315, 316 
 
500 
 
 INDEX. 
 
 Coral, barrier reef of, at Jeddah, 16 
 
 barrier reef of, at Point Pedro, 260 
 
 barrier reef of, Point de Galle, 378 
 
 buildings of fossil coral at Jeddah, 16 
 
 collecting at Jaffna, 253-254, 256 
 
 collecting at Singapore, 487 
 Corrip, 473 
 Cormorant, lesser, 267 
 Corse, Mr., on height of elephants, 224- 
 
 225 
 Costume, xee Dress, and Ornaments 
 Country, see Scenery, and Landscape 
 Court-house in Sarawak, 340 
 Cremation customs in India, 67 
 
 practised by Hill Dyaks, 454 
 Crevices in limestone hiUs, 480 
 Crimes of the Dyaks, 473 
 Criminal justice in Sarawak, 345 
 Crocker, Mr. W. M., 340, 349, 476 
 Crocodile, cannibalistic habits of, 265 
 
 catching in Sarawak, 348 
 
 catching in Selangore, 305-307 
 
 cutaneous disease of, 265 
 
 difference between alligator and, 54 
 
 eggs of the, 432 
 
 hunting at Mullaitivu, 264, 266 
 
 hunting in Selangore, 305 
 
 hunting on the Jumna, 32, 51-56 
 
 hook and line, 305 
 
 nest of a Bomean, 421 
 Crocodiles at sea, 307 
 
 man-eating, 348 
 
 number of c. killed in Sarawak, 343 
 
 sacred, 51 
 Crocodilians, heads of, 55 
 CrocodiluB 
 
 bombifrons, 51 
 
 bombif rons, walking of, 55 
 
 intermedins, 57 
 
 palustris, 265 
 
 palustris, attitude in walking, 266 
 
 palustris, cannibalistic habits of, 265 
 
 palustris, leprosy of, 265 
 
 porosus, 304-307, 348 
 Cucumbers, 315 
 Cul uluva, 257 
 Cuora Amboinensis, 310 
 "Curios," Ceylon, 288 
 Curran shola, 198, 199 
 Cuttle fish, 252 
 Cymbirhynchus, 422 
 Cynogale Bennettii, 480, 438 
 
 Dak (or dawk) bungalow, 85 
 
 Dalbergia latifolia, 135 
 
 Damensara, 314 
 
 Dances of the Dyaks, 468 
 
 Darkness in the forest, 359, 388 
 
 Darter, 267 
 
 Datu Cape, 336 
 
 Datu Pudeh, 311, 313 
 
 DawBon, Mr. and Mrs. G. A. R., 117, 169 
 
 Debt-making as a safe method of stealing, 
 
 471 
 Debt-paying, faithfulness of Dyaks in, 
 
 472 
 Deer, axis, 166-168, 278 
 
 rib-faced, or barking, 171-172, 268, 431 
 
 spotted, 139, 166-168 
 Dicerobatis eregoodoo, 420 
 Directions, see Skinning and Skeletoniz- 
 ing 
 
 for making arsenical soap, 493 
 Diseases, 120 
 
 of the Dyaks, 373, 473 
 
 introduced by civilization, 473 
 
 of civilization not found among the 
 Dyaks, 474 
 Divorce among the Dyaks, 453 
 Doctor, a Neilgherry, 117 
 
 the right kind of a, 237 
 Doctoring a Dyak, 373 
 
 a fisherman, 311 
 
 poor natives, 91, 175 
 Dohrn, Dr. Anton, 7 
 Domestic life of the Dyaks, 466, 468, 470 
 Doraysawmy, the ' ' Gentleman's God," 
 
 184 
 Douglas, Captain B., 303, 314, 339-330 
 Draco volans, 420 
 Drunkenness in the East Indies, 295 
 
 of the Dyaks at feasts, 470 
 Dress of the Chinese merchants, 295 
 
 Dyaks, 450, 451, 456, 457, 460, 463 
 
 Hindoo women, 24 
 
 Karders, 128 
 
 Malays, 239 
 
 Moormen, 287 
 
 Parsees, 34 
 
 Singhalese, 339 
 
 Todas, 100 
 Drifts of Pandanus, 411 
 Duck, mandarin, 300 
 
 summer, 300 
 Dundang, the Dyak hunter, 351, 379, 393 
 Durian, the, 318 
 
 gatherers disturbed by elephants, 321 
 Durio, zibethinus, 318 
 Dusuns, see Ida'ans, 455-457 
 Dutch Possessions in Borneo, 334 
 Duty on collector's outfits, 343, 344 
 
 methylated spirits, 341 
 
 outfit at Bombay, 31 
 Dwasala elephants, 327 
 Dwellings, see Houses 
 Dyak, absence of religion in the, 445 
 
 accident to a, 373, 393 
 
 at his worst, 373, 4^ 
 
 a typical, 434 
 
 belles, 460 
 
 cheerful disposition of the, 467-468 
 
 daily life of a, 466 
 
 dances, 468 
 
 deportment, 355 358, 393, 413 
 
 diseases, 373, 473 
 
 farms, 355, 387 
 
 head-trophies, see Head-hunting 
 
 hospitality, 364, 439 
 
INDEX. 
 
 501 
 
 Dyak, hut at a farm, S87 
 
 indolence, 423, 440 
 
 omen birds, 436, 432 
 
 omens in general, 433 
 
 pantomime, 393, 468 
 
 snake eaten by a, 388 
 
 stature, 459-460 
 
 tooth-plates, 393 
 
 villages, 355, 373, 410, 434, 448, 449 
 Dyaks, Hill, see Hill Dyaks 
 
 Mongol, see Mongol Dyaks 
 Dyaks of Borneo, ancestry of, 444 
 
 classification, 445 
 
 general description of, 445 
 
 of Sarawak, character of, 435 
 
 decrease of, 343 
 
 demonstrative character of, 431, 439 
 
 former oppression of, 342-343 
 
 present condition of, 344 
 Dyaks, Sea, vide Sea Dyaks 
 Dysentery, 120, 174 
 
 Eak, mutilation of, by Karder women, 
 139 
 
 ornaments of the Dyaks, 457, 462 
 Echini, collecting, at Colombo, 436 
 
 how to clean and preserve, 347 
 Eggs of the gavial, 45 
 
 of the salt-water crocodile, 442 
 
 of the scavenger vulture, 61 
 Egret, 60, 267, 307 
 Ekka, a ride in an, 69 
 Eleotris marmorata, 397 
 Elephant, the Indian, compared with 
 African, 319 
 
 age of, 323 
 
 body, character of, 134 
 
 brain, position of, 133 
 
 brain, difficulty of hitting, 134 
 
 breeding in captivity, 323 
 
 castes of, recognized, 326 
 
 cost of keeping, 232 
 
 death of a tusker, 163, 201, 333 
 
 destruction of, 220, 331 
 
 dimensions of a tusker, 203 
 
 doings of a mad, 333 
 
 dwasala class of, 227 
 
 export duty in Ceylon on, 338 
 
 food of a captive, 331 
 
 geographical distribution of, 318 
 
 gestation, period of, 333 
 
 growth, 223-225 
 
 height of male and female, 324 
 
 hunters hunted by, 147 
 
 in Borneo, 330 
 
 in Ceylon, 219 
 
 in processions, 237 
 
 in Selangore, 310, 334 
 
 in Sumatra, 220 
 
 intelligence of, wonderful, 339 
 
 koomeriah class, 327 
 
 meerga class, 227 
 
 mental capacity of, 229 
 
 mischievousness of, 161-162, 331 
 
 Elephant, the Indian, moral character, 
 329 
 
 "must "in, 232 
 
 prices of, in India and America, 388 
 
 rogue, character of a, 234 
 
 rogue, killed by Mr. Theobald, 124 
 
 sagacity in manoeuvring, 148 
 
 sight, dulness of, 137 
 
 slunning and preserving skin of, 203* 
 203, 205, 209, 213, 314, 217 
 
 skull, form and structure of, 133 
 
 stealthiness in retreating, 148 
 
 swimming power of, 334 
 
 table of growth, 325 
 
 trumpeting, notes sounded in, 136 
 
 tusks of African and Indian, 225 
 
 uses of, in India, 226, 228 
 
 vulnerable points of, 135 
 
 work of, in a timber forest, 230 
 
 young, 140-141, 233 
 Elephant, the African, 319 
 
 mode of hunting, 133 
 Elephant catching, 230 
 
 keddah operations in, 331 
 
 various methods of, 323 
 Elephant hunting, African method of, 13S 
 
 character of, 131 
 
 failures in, 112, 138, 149, 199 
 
 gun for, 137 
 
 Indian method of, 133 
 
 in Selangore, 330-335 
 
 ludicrous adventure in, 334 
 
 success in, 163, 301, 333, 
 
 tables turned in, 149 
 
 under difficulties, 199-201 
 Elephant Pass, 280 
 Elephants, attacking, 138 
 
 first herd of wild. 111 
 
 law protecting, 126 
 
 permit to kUl, 127, 197 
 
 stampede of, 138 
 
 tracking up a herd of, 136 
 Elephas Indicus, see Elephant, the In« 
 dian 
 
 primogenius, 218 
 Elettaria cardamomum, 138 
 Elevation of the Animallais, 125 
 
 of the Neilgherries, 94 
 
 of the Wainaad, 106 
 Emerson, Joseph, 275 
 Emyda Ceylonensis, 248 
 Emys trijuga, 248, 310 
 English institutions, 339 
 Eng Quee, Mr., 350, 354, 369, 384 
 Eonycteris spilla, 326 
 EsacuB recurvirostris, 307 
 Establishment, Ward's Natural Science, 
 
 3, 193, 197, 217 
 Etawah, 35 
 
 population of, 70 
 Ethnological specimens, 426, 439 
 Everett, Mr. A. Hart, 477, 478 
 Everett, Mr. H. H., 483 
 Evolution, theories of social, at fault, 474 
 Exaggeration, sinful tendency to, 33 
 Exterior of Dyak long-house, 355 
 
502 
 
 INDEX. 
 
 . P 
 
 Fakir, S5 
 
 Famine, the Madras, 90, 91, 177 
 
 deaths during the, 180 
 
 end of the, 181 
 
 relief measures during the, 178, 180 
 Farman, Mr., 10, 11 
 Famham, Mr., 23 
 
 " Fast " men of civilized society, 471 
 Feasts, Dyak, 469-470 
 Feat, a foolish, 317 
 Felis Bengalensis, 838 
 
 chaus, 63, 216 
 
 marmorata, 328 
 Felis tigris, see Tiger 
 
 distribution of, 253 
 
 migration of, into Ceylon hindered, 
 253 
 Ferguson, Mr., of the Ceylon Observer, 
 
 343 
 Fever, first attack of, 115 
 
 on the Animallais, 130, 139, 150, 151, 
 174, 194, 336 
 
 permanent cure of, 237 
 
 treatment of, 150 
 Ficus Indica, 83 
 
 religiosa, 83 
 Fiddle, Dyak, 439, 469 
 " Fight in the tree-tops," 375 
 Fighting qualities of the Indian bison, 
 189 
 
 qualities of the orang-utan, 371 
 
 qualities of the saras crane, 60 
 Fire- arms of Dyaks and Malays, 379 
 Fire-flies, 359 
 
 Fire-fly, the steam launch, 476, 477, 487 
 Fish, collecting at Jafiha, 355-258 
 
 jumping, 308 
 
 Sadong River, 385, 387 
 
 Selangore. 308 
 
 the thread, 386 
 Fishing with the tuba plant, 384, 386 
 
 for crocodiles, 304-307, 348 
 Fish-market at Bombay, 33 
 Flowers in Bombay market, 23 
 Flying dragon, 430 
 
 fox, 367 
 
 lemur, 380, 413, 438, 478 
 
 squirrel, 114 
 Food, necessity of appetizing, 372 
 
 scarcity of, 150, 371 
 Forced trade, 343 
 Fort, the, in Colombo, 337 
 
 at Sarawak, 339 
 
 native shops in, 340 
 Fossils Egyptian, from Mokattem Hills, 
 13 
 
 Egyptian, from the Pyramids, 14 
 
 search for, in Bornean cave deposits, 
 477-478 
 Eraser, Mr., 36 
 Fruits of Sarawak, 403 
 
 Selangore, 315, 317 
 Frogs, self-buried, 377 
 Funeral, a Hindoo, 66 
 
 G 
 
 Galeopithecus variegatui, 413, 429, 478 
 
 volans, 380 
 Galle, Point de, 386 
 Galle Face Esplanade, 237 
 Gallus Stanleyii, 379 
 Gambling, 315 
 Games of the Dyaks, 468 
 Gardening, curiosities of, 300 
 Gaur, see Indian bison, 188 
 Gavaeus gaurus, see Bos gaurua 
 Gavial, abundance of, 51, 53 
 
 Bornean species of, 348, 478 
 
 colors of, 55 
 
 habits of, 46, 47 
 
 head of, 54 
 
 difficulties of g. shooting, 48 
 
 geographical distribution of the, 55 
 
 native reverence for, 51 
 
 not destructive of human life, 56 
 
 shooting, 39, 41, 43, 43, 46, 47, 49 
 
 struggle with a wounded, 47 
 
 teeth of, 57 
 
 ticklishness of, 56 
 
 voice of, 41, 56 
 
 wariness of, 40 
 Gavialis Gangeticus, see Gavial 
 Gaya Bay, 334 
 Gazella Bennettii, 73 
 Geese, 75 
 
 Geographical distribution of, black bear, 
 Indian, 146 
 
 elephant, 318 
 
 gavial, 55 
 
 gazelle, 73 
 
 orang-utan, 348, 399 
 
 sasin antelope, 76 
 
 tiger, 154, 353 
 
 wild goat, 76 
 Gertrude, Sarawak schooner, 349 
 Gharry, 35 
 Ghee, 37 
 Gibbon, cry of, 418 
 
 difficult to shoot, 395, 415, 418 
 
 hunting described, 415-416 
 
 incidents in hunting, 418 
 
 measurements of, 419 
 
 mode of progression, 383, 415, 430 
 
 money value of, 419 
 
 paternal affection of, 418 
 
 pet, 383 
 
 place in nature, 399 
 GUI, Dr.Theo. N.,397 
 Goat, Neilgherry wild, 97, 172 
 Goby, 397 
 
 Gold washing in Sarawak, 479 
 Gong, at Simuian Government House, 850, 
 443 
 
 Dyak alarm, 437 
 Goolur tree, 83 
 
 Gordon Cumming, largest tusk taken 
 by, 335 
 
 mode of elephant-bunting, practised 
 by, 133 
 Gorilla, 399 
 
INDEX. 
 
 503 
 
 Gourami, the, 386 
 
 Government aid during famine, 91, 177, 
 180 
 
 house at Simujan, 349, 369 
 
 scientific publications, U. S. , 6 
 Governmental eccentricities in Ceylon, 
 
 284 
 Grace without Gospel, 474 
 Graculus Javanicus, 267 
 Grainboats on the Jumna, 58 
 Graspus strigosus, 247 
 Gray. Mr., 483 
 Grus antigone, 59 
 
 cinerea, 60 
 Guardian angel, the author's, 488 
 Gua Belah, 836 
 
 Lada, 326 
 
 Lambong, 326 
 
 Poondah, 397 
 Gunong Popook, author lost on, 890 
 
 Dyak village at, 364, 366, 390 
 Giinther, Dr., 5 
 
 Gutta percha, mode of gathering, 430 
 Gymnura, 478 
 Gyps Bengalensis, 34 
 
 H 
 
 Hali^tds, albicUla, 34 
 Haly, Dr. A., 250 
 Harbor, Colombo, 239 
 
 Madras destitute of, 89 
 
 New, at Singapore, 292 
 Harp, Dyak, 469 
 Harvey. Mr., 481, 483 
 Haughton, Mr. A. R., 335-336, 895, 453, 
 
 463 
 Haughton, Mr. Samuel, 360, 264 
 Hawk cuckoo, cry of the, 170 
 Head-dress of the Sea Dyaks, 463 
 Head-house of the HUl Dyaks, 450, 452, 
 
 485 
 Head-hunting among the Hill Dyaks, 358, 
 450, 465, 485 
 
 among the Kyans, 447 
 
 among the Sea Dyaks, 357, 435, 465 
 
 among the Trings, 448 
 
 suppression of, in Sarawak, 465 
 
 trophies, value of, 435 
 Hemitragus hylocrius, 97, 173 
 Helarctos Malayanuss, 431, 493 
 Herodias alba, 60, 267 
 
 egrettoides, 88 
 
 garzetta, 267, 307 
 Herpestes griseus, 268 
 Heron, night, 267 
 Hierococcyx varius, 170 
 Hill Dyaks, comparison of, with other 
 tribes. 458 
 
 consanguineous marriages prohibited 
 by, 458 
 
 disposition of the dead, 450 
 
 divorce and separation, 453 
 
 do not steal, 471-472 
 
 dress and ornaments of, 450-451, 485 
 
 Hill Dyaks, games of, 468 
 
 habitat of, 449, 468 
 
 head-house of, 453, 485 
 
 head-hunting customs of, 450 
 
 ideas of a Supreme Being, 444, 454 
 
 marriage customs of, 453—453 
 
 moral principles and practices of, 452, 
 471, 473 
 
 no written language of, 454 
 
 physique of, 450 
 
 raids upon, by Sea Dyaks, 464 
 
 status of, as warriors, 450 
 
 villages of, 485 
 Hindoo influence on the Dyaks, 444, 454 
 473 
 
 religion, 86 
 Hindoo, native, character of, 183 
 
 condition of, 181 
 Hog, Bornean wild, 395 
 
 Indian, 173, 278 
 Holothurians, 353 
 Honey, wild, 428 
 
 Dyak mode of procuring, 434 
 Hood, Mr. J. M., 301, 488 
 Hoogly River, 87-89 
 Hornbill, rhinoceros, 379, 417 
 Horsburgh Light, 336 
 Hospital for animals, 27 
 Hospitality, Dyak, 364, 439 
 Hotel, advantages of a small, 9 
 
 Doughty's, 21 
 
 Grand New, 9 
 
 Rajah's Arms, 340 
 
 Sea View, 345, 396 
 Hotels, drunkenness in, 295-296 
 House, Jacoon, 319 
 
 Malay, at Batu, 317 
 
 Malay, at Jerom, 804 
 
 model of a Dyak, 426 
 Houses, of the Baram Kyans, 449 
 
 of the Hill Dyaks, 485 
 
 of the Ida'ans, 456 
 
 of the Malays, 293, 304, 817, 338 
 
 of the Milanaus, 448 
 
 of the Muruts, 457 
 
 of the Pakatans, 449 
 
 of the Poonans, 449 
 
 of the Sea Dyaks, 355-357, 410, 466 
 
 of the Todas, 103 
 
 of the Trings, 448 
 Howdah-shooting, 154 
 Huddleston, Mr. J. E. L., 216 
 Human sacrifices, 447 
 Hunger, tropical, 273, 388 
 Hunting, axis deer, 166-168 
 
 bison, Indian, 109-110, 113, 187, 189 
 
 black buck, 80 
 
 crocodile, 264-265 
 
 elephant. 111, 131, 183, 138, 146, 161, 19* 
 
 gaur, see Bison 
 
 gavial, 46-48 
 
 gazelle, 73-74 
 
 gibbon, 395, 415-418 
 
 ibex, see Wild Goat 
 
 monkey, 107, 115, 143, 374, 847, 394 
 
504 
 
 INDEX. 
 
 Hunting, peacock, 63 
 
 sasin antelope, 80 
 
 tiger, 154-156 
 
 wild goat, 97, 173 
 
 wild hog, 396 
 Hunuman, 84 
 Hut, Dyak, 887 
 
 Moochpardi, my, 183 
 
 Tellicul, 130 
 
 Toda, 103 
 Hut-building with bamboos, 130, 183 
 Hutchison, Rev. Mr., 180 
 Hyaenas, cattle killed by, 494 
 
 destroyed, 494, 
 
 persons killed by, 494 
 Hydrosaurus salvator, 307 
 Hystrix longicauda, 437 
 
 Ibis, black, 60 
 Ichthyosis, 373, 413, 473 
 Ida'ans, the, dress of, 456 
 
 farthest advanced, 455 
 
 houses of the, 456 
 
 peaceful habits of, 459 
 
 skill of, in agriculture, 456 
 Infanticide among the Todas, 99, 101 
 Infant orang-utan, see Baby Orang-utan. 
 Information, difficulty in obtaining, 33 
 Inia, the, 64 
 
 Insanity among the Dyaks, 473 
 Insects, scarcity of, at Btawah, 81 
 Insurrection, Chinese, in Sarawak, 466, 
 
 479 
 Interior of Dyak Long-house, 356-357 
 
 of Toda hut, 103 
 Intoxicants among the Dyaks, 469-470, 
 
 474 
 Introduction, letters of, 29 
 Inuus rhesus, 84 
 Ivory-hunting in Africa, 319 
 
 Jabibu on the Jumna, 60 
 Jackal, 63 
 
 cry of, 63, 375, 378 
 Jackets worn by Hill Dyak women, 451 
 
 Kyans, 447 
 
 Muruts, 457 
 jRcoons, 319 
 
 houses of, 319, 449 
 
 resemblance of, to Poonans, 319 
 
 skill in use of sumpitan, 320 
 JaflFna, 351 
 
 shallow waters around, 353 
 Jeddah, disturbances in, 17 
 
 gates of, 18 
 Jerom, 303 
 
 people, 313 
 
 quarters at, 304 
 
 shore at, 310 
 JoonooB, Mr. M. C, 888-390 
 
 Journey from Colombo to Galle, 284-286 
 
 C batore to the Animallais, 133 
 
 Jf :ria to Point Pedro, 260 
 
 MuUaitivu *o Jaffna, 378-380 
 
 Ootacamund to Mudumallay, 106-107 
 Jowata, 445 
 Jungle, character of, in Borneo, 351 
 
 character of Malay Peninsula, 314, 317 
 
 character of Northern Ceylon, 374 
 
 definition of, 154 
 
 produce, 424 
 Jungle cat, 63 
 
 cock, 379, i!80 _ _ • 
 
 Jumna River, abundance of gaviala in 
 51 
 
 annual rise and fall of, 53 
 
 bird life along the, 59, 63 
 
 boating on, 50 
 
 character of, 39, 58 
 
 coldness of water of, 53 
 
 filthiness of, 68 
 
 navigation of, 58 
 
 porpoises in, 64 
 
 ravines along the, 71 
 
 turtles, 63 
 Jury system in Sarawak, 345 
 Justice in Sarawak, 345 
 
 K 
 
 Kabra goya, 307 
 Kadjang boat roofs, 354 
 Kadyans, the, 457 
 Kaltura, 385 
 Kandy, 383 
 Kapooas River, 334 
 Karders, 128 
 Katz Brothers, 301 
 Keddah, defence of a, 822 
 
 location and construction of, 331 
 
 tying wild elephants in the, 223, 
 Kenowits, high houses of the, 449 
 
 tattooing practised by, 448 
 Kejang (see Muntjac), 431, 433 
 Keppel, Sir Henry, 343, 345 
 Kimanis River, 334 
 Kina Balu, Mt.,334, 335 
 Klang, River, 303, 315 
 
 town of, 303 
 Koomeriah elephant, 227 
 Kotei, Territory of, 334, 444 
 Krah monkey, 307, 328, 347, 358 
 Krumbang Mountains, 336 
 Kuching (Sarawak), 339 
 
 bazaar, 341 
 
 public buildings, 340 
 
 shipping, 340 
 Kulhutty bungalow, 106 
 Kulungud Forest, 137, 185 
 
 Rajah of, 137, 197 
 Kurumbers, 109 
 Kwala Lumpor, 302, 314, 315 
 Kyan Dyaks, aggressiveness of, 447 
 
 Baram, 446, 448, 449, 457 
 
 burial customs of, 447 
 
INDEX. 
 
 505 
 
 Ryan Dyaks, cannibalism among some 
 clans of the, 447-448 
 comparison of, with other tribes, t. 
 distinguishing characters of, 446-44v 
 houses of, 449 
 
 ideas of a future state held by, 449 
 progress of, 444 
 territory of the, 446 
 warlike habits of the, 447 
 weapons of the, 447, 463 
 
 Labuan Island, 334 
 Lagenoplastes fluvicola, 61 
 Landscape, Bornean, from. Serambo 
 Mountain, 486 
 
 Central Indian, 30 
 
 Egyptian, 13 
 
 from edge of Neilgherry plateau, 103 
 
 in the Ganges delta, 86, 88 
 
 near Etawah, 35 
 
 Neilgherry, 97 
 
 on the Animallai Hills, 133 
 Langur monkey, black, 117, 139 
 
 gray, 107 
 
 protective instinct in the, 115 
 Lanuns, the, 455 
 Laterite, 280 
 Lee, Hedges & Co. , Messrs, 341 
 
 kindness of, to author, 350, 259, 383 
 Leeches, 436 
 Lee Tiac, 417, 439, 434 
 Lemur, flying, 380, 412, 438, 478 
 
 slow-paced, 380, 398 
 Leopards, cattle killed by, 494 
 
 destroyed in one year, 494 
 
 persons killed by, annually, 494 
 Leptoptilus argala, 68 
 Lepus nigricollis, 117, 368 
 
 ruficaudafcus, 76 
 Leys, Mr., 359 
 
 death of, 368 
 ''Life in the Forest of the far East," 
 
 455, 468 
 Life, loss of, in India by wild beasts, 493, 
 
 494 
 Limbang River, 334, 447, 457 
 Limestone hills of Sarawak, caves in, 480 
 Livistona sinensis, 396 
 Lizard, green, 348 
 
 Lobocarcinus Paulo-Wurtemburgensis, 13 
 London, 4 
 
 Longden, Sir James, 244 
 Long-house of Sibuyau Dyaks, 355-357 
 Long Wai Dyaks, tattooing of, 448 
 Loris gracilis, 268 
 Loss of cattle by wild beasts, 494 
 
 human life, 493, 494 
 Lost in the jungle. Ah Kee, 436-438 
 
 the author, 112-113, 390 
 Low, Mr. Hugh, 334, 447, 457 
 Luciocephalus pulcher, 386 
 Lundu River, 459 
 Lupea sanguinolenta, 253 
 Lutra leptouyx, 310 
 
 BI 
 
 Macactjs cynomolgus, 307, 328, 347 
 
 nemestrinus, 314, 353, 380 
 
 pileatus, 268, 274, 379 
 
 radiatus, 216 
 Machan shooting, 154 
 Macaque, pig-tailed, 352, 397 
 Madras famine, 90-91 
 Madras Government, generosity of, to 
 author, 197 
 
 famine record of the, 91, 180 
 Madras Bob, " the original," 293 
 Madrepora, 354, 287 
 
 at Point Pedro, 260 
 
 cytherea, 354, 256 
 Mahakkam River, 334 
 Makota, Pangeran, 342 
 Malacca, strait of, 291 
 
 town of, 301 
 Malay character, 312, 329. 
 
 hospitality, 312 
 
 influence on the Dyaks, 343, 372 
 
 oppression of the Dyaks, 343, 343, 
 
 Peninsula, 391 
 Mammals, collected on the Animallaia, 
 Ust of, 216 
 
 collected near Etawah, 34, 35, 63, 64, 
 70, 73, 73, 74, 76, 77 
 
 measurements of some Indian, 495 
 
 of Borneo, 347, 352, 358, 360, 380, 391, 
 398, 418, 420, 433, 428, 439, 431, 478 
 
 of Ceylon, 266, 268, 274-276, 277, 278, 279 
 
 of Selangore, 310, 314, 320, 326, 328 
 Mandarin duck, 300 
 Man-eating crocodiles, 398 
 Mangifera Indica, 81 
 Mangosteen, 315 
 Mango tree, 81 
 Mangroves, 307 
 Manis Javanica, 347 
 Manis pentadactyla, 268 
 
 flesh of, 271 
 
 form and habits of, 268-269 
 
 muscular power of tail of, 270 
 Manta birostris, 255 
 Market, Bombay grand, 23 
 
 Kwala Lumpor, 316 
 Martin, Dyce & Co., Messrs., kindness ot 
 
 to author, 332 
 Marriage among the Dyaks, 452-453, 461 
 
 destitute of religious sentiment, 453 
 
 of cousins prohibited, 453 
 Masulah boats, 89 
 Matang Peak, 338, 477 
 Matuta victor, 348 
 Maynard rifle, accuracy of, 48, 49, 53, 156 
 
 tiger killed with a, 158 
 
 water-proof quality of, 361 
 Measurements of Indian mammals, 495 
 
 orang-utans, 375, 406 
 Meandrina, 254 
 
 Mecca, visit of two Christians to, 18 
 Meerga elephant, 227 
 Melons, 315 
 Menispermum, 384 
 
506 
 
 INDEX. 
 
 Mental capacity of the elephant, 229 
 
 scale of the Dyak tribes, 458 
 Methylated spirits, exorbitant duty on, 
 
 241 
 Mias {see Orang-utan), 350 
 
 chappin, 374, 375 
 
 kassar, 393 
 
 rombi, 393, 417 
 Mica, 106 
 Milanaus, the, 446 
 
 high houses of, 449 
 Mines, antimony, at Bidi, 480 
 
 cinnabar, at Tegora, 483 
 
 coal, at Simujan, 351 
 
 gold, at Bau, 479 
 
 tin, at Kwala Lumpor, 329 
 Missing link, search for traces of, 478 
 Mob of Irish yahoos beset the author, 3 
 Model government, a, 345 
 Models, 426 
 
 Mohwa tree, fruit of, eaten by bears, 146 
 Money doles, 180 
 Mongol Dyaks, 455-458 
 Monkey temple at Benares, 83-84 
 Monkeys, black langur, 117, 139 
 
 cry of, 142 
 
 flesh of, eaten by Mulcers, 144 
 
 mode of hunting, 143 
 
 size of, 144 
 Monkeys, gray langur, 107, 115 
 
 krah, 358, 380 
 
 near Sarawak, 347 
 
 proboscis, see Proboscis Monkey 
 
 Selangore, 307, 328 
 Moochpardi, 166, 167 
 
 bison around, 187 
 
 return to, 183 
 Moormen of Point de Galle, 287 
 Morality of the Dyaks, 452, 454, 470, 471, 
 
 472 
 Moral equality of men and women, 470 
 
 scale of the Dyak tribes, 458 
 Morgan, General, account of must ele- 
 phant by, 233 
 Morgan, Mr. Rhodes, adventure of, with 
 
 a bison, 189-191 
 
 "battery "of, 192 
 
 trophies collected by, 192 
 Moritabas entrance, 337 
 Mosquitoes, 359, 365 
 Mud, an adventure in, 310 
 
 fish burrows in, 309 
 Muddimund, 98 
 Muda Hassim, Rajah, 342-343 
 MudumaUay. cholera at, 107 
 
 disobliging natives at, 107 
 
 karkhana, 107, 115, 116 
 
 reserved forest, 105 
 Mugger Peer, 51 
 Mulcers, camp of, 206 
 
 character of the, 127 
 
 courage of the, 159 
 
 hunting gang of, 127 
 
 go on strike, 207-208, 210 
 Mummies, various, 13, 14 
 Mund of the Todas, 98, 103 
 
 Mungoos, 268 
 Muntjac, 171, 268, 431 
 Murder of Europeans, 329 
 Muruts, 447, 455 
 
 dress and ornaments of, 457 
 
 persecution of, by Kyans, 457 
 Mus rufescens, 171 
 Museum, Allahabad, 53 
 
 American, of Natural History, 371 
 
 British, 4 
 
 Calcutta, 86 
 
 Ceylon Government, 249 
 
 Comparative Zoology, of, 193, 217, 356 
 
 Derby, at Liverpool, 4 
 
 Egyptian Antiquities, at Boulac, 10 
 
 Madras GSovernment, 91 
 
 Singapore, 298 
 
 United States National, 4, 375, 386 
 
 University, at Rome, 6 
 
 Victoria and Albert, at Bombay, 26 
 Musical instruments of the Dyaks, 428^ 
 
 469, 440 
 Musnigoorie, 106 
 Must in elephants, 232-233 
 Mycteria Australis, 60 
 Mysore, elephants caught in, 221 
 
 N 
 
 Naples, collecting marine specimens ia, f 
 
 zoological station, 7 
 Nasalis larvatus, 347, 358, 394, 395 
 National Museum, U. S., 4, 375, 386 
 Native assistants, 259 
 
 hunters, 369, 376, 378, 379 
 
 hypocrisy, 108 
 
 reverence for crocodiles, 51 
 
 reverence for peacocks, 62 
 Natives of the Etawah district, 64, 66 
 
 gifts from, 65 
 Nedunkenni, 275 
 Neem, 81 
 Negapatam, 235 
 Neilgherry Hills, climate of, 94 
 
 physical aspect of, 96 
 
 wild animals on, 94, 105 
 Neophron percnopterus, 44, 66 
 
 egg and nest of, 60-61 
 Nest of cliff swallow, 61 
 
 crocodile, 441 
 
 orang-utan, 360, 362, 379, 403 
 
 rose-winged paroquet, 62 
 
 white scavenger vulture, 60-61 
 New Harbor, Singapore, 292 
 Nile, delta of, 9 
 
 valley of, 1 3 
 NU-gai, 74-75 
 "Nilgiri Sporting Reminiscences," U'', 
 
 233 
 Nipa fruticans, 337 
 Nipa palm, syrup of, 440 
 
 various products of, 440 
 Nycticebus tardigradus, 380, 387 
 Nycticorax griseus, 267 
 
INDEX. 
 
 507 
 
 Oath of secrecy, the Mulcers', 163 
 
 Objects of the trip, 2 
 
 Obscene image at a shrine, 65 
 
 Ocypode ceratophthalmus, 248 
 
 Old Man, the (see Baby Orang-utan), 381, 
 
 417 
 Omen birds, 426, 432 
 Omens in general, 433 
 Ootacamund, 94, 96 
 Ophiocephalus, 386 
 Ophiophagus elaps, 330, 331 
 Ophthalmia among the Dyaks, 473 
 Orang-utan, attitude of, when sleeping, 
 393, 400 
 
 when drinking, 367 
 
 eyes of, 401 
 
 fierceness of a captive, 300, 368, 372, 
 377 
 
 fighting qualities, 371, 402 
 
 food, 402 
 
 food in captivity, 300, 382 
 
 freedom of lower limbs, 401 
 
 fruitless hunting for, 351-353 
 
 general appearance of, 363, 399, 401 
 
 geographical distribution, 348, 399 
 
 hair, 400 
 
 inability to stand erect, 407 
 
 inability to swim, 419 
 
 incidents in hunting, 360-363, 375, 
 393 
 
 individual peculiarities, 407 
 
 infant (see Baby orang-utan) 367-368, 
 376, 381, 383, 403, 419, 428 
 
 largest, the, 375-376 
 
 Malay name for the, 350 
 
 man compared with an, 375 
 
 maximum size attained by, 404-406 
 
 measurements, 375, 406 
 
 mode of progression, 404 
 
 neats, 360, 362, 403, 414 
 
 " number forty- three," 440 
 
 place in nature, 399, 407 
 
 price of a living, 298 
 
 scarcity of, 350 
 
 seven specimens in two days, 369 
 
 size at birth, 403 
 
 skin, 400 
 
 skinning and skeletonizing, 366-369, 
 374 
 
 solitary habits, 402 
 
 viciousness of newly captured, 368, 372, 
 377 
 
 Whampoa's, Mr., 299 
 Orchids, 397 
 
 Ornaments, personal, of Hill Dyaks, 450- 
 451, 485 
 
 of Muruts, 457 
 
 of Sea Dyaks, 462 
 Osphromenus gourami, 3S6 
 Osaen, Mahommed, 287 
 Ostrich eggs at Aden, 20 
 Otogyps calvus, 34, 44-45 
 Otter, 310 
 Outfit for a collector, 491 
 
 Padang Lake, 363-364, 893-394 
 
 Pakatans, 448, 449 
 
 Paku, 478 
 
 Palaeornis torquatus, 62 
 
 Palms, cocoa, 272, 280, 285, 286 
 
 nipa, 337, 440 
 
 palmyra, 129, 280 
 Pandanus candelabrum, 860, 363, 364, 40a, 
 
 411 
 Papayah, 315 
 Paradoxnrus musanga, 70 
 Parong, common, 463 
 
 latok, 451 
 Parsee, author swindled by a, 20 
 
 dress and appearance, 24 
 Passerita, 387 
 Panadura, 284 
 Pankalan, 481, 493 
 Paulaul of the Todas, 100 
 Paumben Passage, 236, 251-253 
 Pangah, the, 405, 452, 485 
 Peacocks, 62 
 Peepul tree, 82 
 
 Peg tops among the Hill Dyaks, 471, 473 
 Pelecanus rufescens, 307 
 Pengolin, 268-269 
 Peninjau, village of, 485 
 Peons, usefulness of, 66 
 Pera Vera, 156, 186 
 Perelaer, Mr., 448 
 Perim Island, 19 
 
 Periophthalmus Schlosserii, 308-309, 386 
 Permit to kill elephants, application for, 
 196 
 
 grant of a, 127, 197 
 Peti, 431 
 
 Dyak killed by a, 423 
 Petrified forest, excursion to, 10 
 
 character of, 12 
 Pettah, or native quarter of Colombo, 340 
 Peneus, 248 
 
 Penrissen mountains, 337 
 " Physical Geography of the Sea," 430 
 Physical scale of the Dyak tribes, 458 
 Pigs, Dyak traps to kill, 421 
 
 wild, in Sarawak, 173, 395 
 Pike-head, the, 386 
 
 Pilfering by a Dyak, solitary case of, 451 
 PUot service at Calcutta, 89 
 Pineapples, 315 
 
 Piracy, suppression of, 343, 344 
 Plandok, 328, 380 
 Plantain, 315 
 Platanista Gangetica, 64 
 Platalea leucorodia, 75 
 Plotus melanoghaster, 267 
 Plovers, 307 
 Point de Galle, 286 
 
 native dealers at, 387-288 
 Poisoned arrows, 447 
 Polyandry among the Todas, 101 
 Polynemus, 386 
 Polypterus, 13 
 Pompeii, 7 
 
508 
 
 INDEX. 
 
 Pondicherry, 235 
 
 Pontianak, 335 
 
 Point Pedro, 360 
 
 Po Point, 337 
 
 Population of Sarawak Territory, 844 
 
 of Selangore, 330 
 
 of Singapore, 295 
 Porcupines, Bornean, 423, 427 
 Portax, pictus, 74-75 
 Potatoes, sweet, 315 
 Porpoise of the Jumna, 64 
 
 of the Orinoco, 64 
 Porpoise-shooting, difficulty of, 64 
 Praus, Dyak, 464 
 Prawns, 304 
 Precious stones of Ceylon, 287 
 
 imitations of, 287 
 Prejudice against taking life, 27 
 
 against Europeans, 37 
 Prescription which cured author's jungle 
 
 fever, 237 
 Proboscis monkey, habitat, 394 
 
 nose of the, 394 
 
 peculiar cry, 394 
 
 peculiar to Borneo, 398 
 
 price of, alive, 298 
 
 shyness, 394, 411 
 
 wild near Kuching, 347 
 
 very large troops of, 411 
 Protective color of sambur, 170 
 
 instinct in monkeys, 115 
 Provisions for Animallai trip, 120 
 
 for boat trip on Jumna, 37 
 Pterocarpus marsupium, 125 
 Pteromys petaurista, 114 
 Pteropus Edwardsii, 216, 266 
 Punkahs, 87 
 Python, 87 
 
 Quadrupeds, directions for skinning, 
 
 492 
 Quee, Mr. Eng., 350, 354, 369, 384 
 Quicksilver, 483 
 Quinine, action of, as an emetic, 185 
 
 manufacture of, by Madras Gov't, 96 
 
 use of, in fever, 150 
 
 B 
 
 Railway Journey, from Alexandria to 
 Cairo, 9 
 
 Bombav to Allahabad, 30-32 
 
 Colombo to Kandy, 281-283 
 Rhamphobatis ancylostomus, 357-258 
 Rajah Brooke, see Brooke, Rajah Charles 
 Rajah Brooke, steamer, 386 
 Rajah Padang, death of the, 374 
 
 size of the, 375 
 Rajah's Arms Hotel, 340 
 Ramisserama, 251 
 Rats, tree, 171 
 Ravine deer, 172 
 
 incidents in hunting, 73-75 
 Ravines, the Etawah, 71-72 
 
 Rays, 255 
 
 spiny, 256, 310 
 Rejang River, 446 
 Relief camp at Animallai, 178 
 Religion, absence of, in Hill Dyaks, 454 
 
 absence of, in Sea Dyaks, 472 
 
 a definition of, not accepted, 472 
 Remedy, Dyak, 473 
 Rest House, at Bentotte, 286 
 
 at Elephant Pass, 280 
 
 at Jaflha, 253 
 
 at Mullaitivu, 263 
 
 at Pallai, 282 
 Retrospect, 48S-4S9 
 Renipes, 248 
 Rhinobatus djeddensis, 23, 28, 257 
 
 thouini, 255 
 Rhinoceros, price of a live, 298 
 Rhinolophus trifoliatus, 279 
 Rhynchops albicoUis, 37 
 Rifle-pits, shooting gavials from, 46 
 Rilawa monkey, 268, 279 
 Road, typical "metalled," 69 
 Rochester, N. Y. , return to, 488 
 
 start from, 1 
 Rogue elephants, 234 
 
 one killed by Mr. Sanderson, 234 
 
 one killed by Mr. Theobald, 124 
 Romania Point, 386 
 Rome, art versus nature in, 6 
 Ross, Col. A. C, 19 
 Ross, Major J. C, 33, 33, 69 
 
 camp establishment of, 70-71 
 
 hunting with, 71-76, 77-80 
 Ross, Mrs. A. G., 19 
 Ross, Mrs. J. C, 70-71 
 " Round the World," 397 
 Royal Mail Coach, 360, 284-386 
 
 S 
 
 Sabah, 334, 455 
 Sabyan, 454, 473 
 Sacred animals, 85 
 
 bull, 84 
 
 crocodiles, 51 
 
 monkeys, 83-84 
 
 peacocks, 62 
 Sadong River, 334, 349 
 
 bore in the, 372, 383 
 Sailing vessel, Tamil, 261 
 Sakarran Dyaks, 447, 449, 462, 464 
 
 amusements of the, 468 
 Salarius alticus, 247 
 Salvadora Indica, 125 
 Sambur, 97, 103, 110, 168-170, 316, 380 
 
 size and color of the, 169 
 Sambur hunting, 170, 316 
 
 on the Animallais, 168 
 
 on the Neilgherries, 97, 103 
 
 on the Wynaad, 110 
 Sampan, the Malay, 359 
 Sanderson, Mr. G. P., 133 
 
 elephant-catching by, 321 
 
 largest tusk taken by, 235 
 
INDEX. 
 
 509 
 
 Sanderson, Mr. G. P., on height of ele- 
 phants, 224 
 
 on taming elephants, 333 
 
 rogue elephant shot by, 234 
 Sandpiper, 307 
 Santubong, entrance, 337 
 
 Peak, 337 
 Saras crane, 24 
 
 antics of, 59 
 
 cry of, 59 
 
 fighting qualities of, 60 
 Sarawak, town of, 339-341 
 "Sarawak," Hugh Low's book on, 463, 
 
 468 
 Sarawak Government, 345, 422, 464 
 Sarawak River, entrances of, 337 
 
 Malay houses on, 338 
 
 scenery of the. 337, 476-477 
 
 trip up the, 476-477 
 Sarawak Territory, 334 
 
 administration of justice in, 344-345 
 
 area of, 344 
 
 cession of, 344 
 
 commerce of, 336 
 
 flag, 337 
 
 former condition of, 841-343 
 
 forts, 346 
 
 military force, 346 
 
 present condition of, 344-345, 464 - 
 
 revenue, 345 
 Sarawak Valley, view of, 486 
 Sarkidiornis melanonotus, 34, 75 
 Sasin antelope, 76-80 
 Savage races, extermination of, 443 
 Scenery along the coast of Borneo, 336 
 
 of the Colombo & Kandy R. R., 281-383 
 
 of the Coonoor Pass, 95 
 
 oftheHooglyRiver, 88 
 
 of the Jumna River, 39, 71-73 
 
 of the Malacca Strait, 291 
 
 of the Sarawak River, 337, 476-477 
 
 of the Suez Canal, 15-16 
 Scenery, beautiful forest, 397, 412, 481, 
 483 
 
 between Allahabad and Calcutta, 86 
 
 between Bombay and Allahabad, 30-31 
 
 between Colombo and Galle, 284-286 
 
 from Serambo Mountain, 486 
 
 on the Animallais, 133 
 
 on the Neilgherries, 97 
 Sciurus, bicolor, 328 
 
 ephippium, 338 
 
 macrourus, 268, 274 
 
 Malabaricus, 107, 216 
 
 Rafflesii, 338 
 
 tristriatus, 368 
 Screw pines, 360, 363, 363 
 Sea Dyaks, as warriors, 447, 459, 
 
 burial customs of, 473-474 
 
 color of the, 460 
 
 compared with other tribes, 458 
 
 daily life, 467 
 
 distinguishing characters of , 446 
 
 dress and ornaments, 460, 463 
 
 games, 468 
 
 head-dress of, 463 
 
 Sea Dyaks, morality of, 470 
 
 physique, 459-460 
 
 politeness and good behavior, 460, 470 
 
 semi-religious notions of, 472 
 
 stealing unknown among the, 471-473 
 
 sub-tribes of, 459 
 
 territory occupied by, 459 
 
 war boats of, 463 
 
 weapons of, 463-463 
 
 women of the, 460-463 
 Sea Dyak villages, at Gunong Popook, 
 364, 466 
 
 on the Sibuyau, 410, 413, 423, 424 
 
 on the Simujan, 355-357, 373 
 Sea Gypsies, 455 
 Sea View Hotel, 345, 396 
 Search party, 393, 436 
 Selangore, 301 
 
 area of, 330 
 
 elephant hunting in, 320-335 
 
 police force of, 303 
 
 political status of, 339-330 
 
 products of, 315, 330 
 
 Sultan of, 330 
 
 tin mines of, 329 
 Semnopithecus cucuUatus, 117 
 
 abundance of, 142 
 
 cry of, 142 
 Semnopithecus femoralis, 391, 395, 416 
 
 cucoprymnus, 107, 268 
 Sepia oflBcinalis, 353 
 Serambo Mountain, 483 
 
 ascent of, 484 
 
 descent, 487 
 
 view from, 486 
 
 villages on, 450, 484-485 
 Serendib, colonial steamer, 251 
 Seribas Dyaks, bad reputation of, 468 
 
 dress and ornaments, 393, 463 
 
 subjugation of, 464 
 
 typical specimens of, 391-392 
 
 warlike habits of, 447, 449, 459 
 Serpents, cattle killed by, 494 
 
 destruction of, 494 
 
 persons killed by, 494 
 Servants, Chinese, 413 
 
 coolie, 263 
 
 Madrasee, 93, 183-184 
 
 native Christian, 23, 38 
 
 Singhalesev 351, 259 
 Shark-ray, 257-358 
 Shavoogan, 149 
 Shekoabad, 77 
 Shells, 283, 487 
 Shields, Kyan, 447, 463 
 Shipment of collections, from Calcutta, 87 
 
 from Colombo, 383 
 
 from Madras, 317 
 
 from Jafftia, 380 
 Shoes, hunting, 437 
 Shops, native in Sarawak, 341 
 Siamanga syndactyla, 399 
 Sibaru Dyaks, perverted taste of, 448 
 Sibuco River, 334 
 Sibuyau Dyaks, 447, 459, 464 
 
 high morality of, 470 
 
510 
 
 INDEX. 
 
 Sibuyau Dyaks, mu^cal instruments of, 
 
 468-469 
 Sibuyau River. 380, 410, 413, 414 
 Signs in sailors' quarter, 293 
 Simia satyrus, 370, 399 
 
 maximum size of, 405 
 
 specific characters of, 407 
 Simia Wurmbii, 369, 399 
 
 cheek callosities of, 400 
 
 maximum size of, 404 
 
 skin, 400-401 
 
 speciiic characters of, 407 
 Simujan River, 349, 359, 363 
 
 first journey up, 355-364 
 
 second journey, 373-376 
 
 third journey, 387-389 
 Simujan, village of, 349, 378 
 Singapore, approach to, 391-398 
 
 architecture, 294 
 
 arrangement of, 294 
 
 climate, 297-298 
 
 corals, 487 
 
 drunkenness in, 295 
 
 features of interest in, 298 
 
 hotels, 295 
 
 invertebrates, 298 
 
 island of, 297 
 
 market for live animals, 398 
 
 population, 295 
 
 position, 293, 297 
 
 sailors' quarter, 393 
 
 shells, 487 
 
 shops, 293 
 
 society, 395 
 Singhalese natives, 339 
 Sipang, Cape, 336 
 Skeletonizing crocodiles, 43 
 
 elephants, 164-165, 310-311 
 
 orang-utans, 366-367 
 
 seven orangs in one day, 370 
 Skinning a crocodile, directions for, 44 
 
 bison, 193-193 
 
 elephant, 303-305, 209 
 
 orang-utans, 366-367 
 
 quadrupeds, directions for, 493-493 
 
 seven orangs in one day, 370 
 Slave Lake, Colombo, 338 
 Slavery among the Malays, 343 
 Snakes, scarcity of, in the Jungles, 329, 
 
 423 
 Snares, Dyak, for small game, 421 
 Snipe, 307 
 Solar topee, 46 
 
 Source of the Sibuyau River, 414 
 Spears, Dyak, 463 
 Spearing fish in the Sadong, 385 
 Spiny-ray, 256, 310 
 Spoonbills, 75 
 Squall, caught in a, 441 
 Squirrel, 328 
 
 grizzly, 268, 274 
 
 Malabar, 107, 316 
 
 striped, 368 
 Staat River, 481 
 
 romantic ride down the, 483 
 Stalking large game, 186 
 
 Stegostoma tigrinum, 256 
 
 Sterna caspia, 807 
 
 Sternula minuta, 307 
 
 Sting-ray, fisherman wounded by, 311 
 
 St. John, Mr. Oliver H., 450, 451, 4521 
 
 476,483 
 St. John, Mr. Spenser, 334, 434, 448, 455^ 
 
 468 
 Stork, 60 
 
 Street-cars in Bombay, 33, 34 
 Studer, Major A. G., 296-397, 488 
 Studer, Miss, 396 
 Stuflfed fishes, 91 
 Suez canal, 15-16 
 Sultan of Selangore, 330 
 
 of Sulu, 334 
 Sula piscator, 307 
 Sumpitan used by Jacoons, 320 
 
 Poonans and Pakatans, 447 
 Sunderbunds, 88 
 Sungam, camp at, 199 
 Sungei Bulu, 304 
 
 birds, 307 
 
 Chinese village on, 304 
 
 crocodiles in the, 304 
 Supreme Being, Dyak notions of, 444, 448L 
 
 472 
 Sus Indicus, 173 
 
 Suspension bridges of bamboo, 484 
 Swamps of Borneo, 353, 413, 438 
 Swimming power of the elephant, 334 
 Syers, Mr. H. C, 302, 310, 323-335, 328, 
 
 331, 448 
 
 T 
 
 Taj Mehal, 80 
 
 Talei sura, 356 
 
 Tamarind tree, 83 
 
 Tamil natives in Ceylon, 239 
 
 Tapang tree, buttresses of a, 438 
 
 Dyak mode of climbing a, 434 
 Tapir, price of a live, 398 
 Tarsier, the, 398, 420 
 Tarsius spectrum, 420 
 Tatties, 87 
 
 Tattooing among the Dyaks, 446, 468 
 Taxidermists, native, 91, 249 
 Teak forests, 125, 330 
 Teckadee ghaut, 183 
 Tectona grandis, 125 
 Tegora, 477 
 
 cinnabar mines at, 482 
 Telegraph, steamer, 301 
 Tellicul, camp at, 130, 131 
 
 huts at, destroyed by elephants, 160 
 Temperature, see Weather 
 " Ten Years in Sarawak," 446, 468 
 Terai, the, 154 
 Tern, 307 
 Theobald, Mr. A. G. R., 123 
 
 kindness of, to author, 123, 183 
 
 " Old Man," sent to, 488 
 
 permit to shoot elephants seonred by, 
 137 
 
 Poonasy rogue elephant shot by, 134 
 
INDEX. 
 
 511 
 
 Theobald, Mr. A. G. R., sickness of, 174, 
 183 
 
 trophies in bungalow of, 124 
 Thespesia populnea, 237 
 " Thirteen Years Among the Wild Beasts 
 
 of India," 133, 224, 226-227 
 Thorns, 396 
 Tiger, death of an immense, 158 
 
 difficulty in preserving skin of, 160 
 
 dimensions and weight of, 159 
 
 not found in Ceylon, 252 
 
 prowling near camp, 205 
 
 tracking up a large, 157 
 Tiger hunting, from a maohan, 154 
 
 on foot, 155 
 
 with elephants, 154 
 Tigers, cattle killed by, 494 
 
 cattle-killing, 152 
 
 destruction of, annually, 494 
 
 game killing, 152 
 
 loss of life by, 154, 494 
 
 man-eating, 152 
 
 on the Animallais, 214 
 
 price of, alive, 298 
 
 reward for killtng, 155 
 Tiger shark, 256 
 
 Tin mines at Kwala Lumpor, 329 
 Tippecadu, 106 
 Toda buffalo, 103 
 Todas, appearance of, 100 
 
 census of, 101 
 
 dress of, 100 
 
 habitations of the, 102 
 
 infanticide among the, 100 
 
 mund of the, 103 
 
 negative character of the, 98, 99 
 
 phenomenal laziness of, 101 
 
 polyandry among the, 101 
 
 supposed ancestry of, 102 
 Tomb of Eve, 17 
 
 Tomistoma Schlegellii, 55, 348, 478 
 Toonacadavoo, forest camp at, 123 
 Tortoise, 310 
 
 Trackers, skilfulness of, 109 
 Tracking elephants, 136, 198, 321 
 Traders, tricks of Chinese, 433 
 Tragulus kanchil, 328 
 
 napu, 328, 380 
 Tree cat, 70 
 Tree climbing perch, 397 
 
 snake, 381 
 
 tapang, 428, 434 
 Trees of Northwest Provinces, 81, 88 
 Tring Dyaks, cannibalistic habits of, 
 447 
 
 human sacrifices offered by, 448 
 
 semi-reUgious notions of, 448 
 Trinidad, astuteness of custom-house of- 
 
 cers at. 244 
 Trionyx Gangeticus, 63 
 Troglodites gorilla, 399 
 
 niger, 399 
 Tropical hunger, 272, 388 
 Trygon sephen, 256 
 
 uamak, 255 
 
 wolga, 257 
 
 Tuba fishing, 384 
 
 " Tug-of-war " among the Dyaks, 468 
 
 Tulip trees, 237 
 
 Turney, Mr. C. H. A., 330 
 
 Tupaia, 478 
 
 Tupa, 454 
 
 Tushes of elephants, 219, 235 
 
 Turtles, 258 
 
 in the Jumna, 63 
 Tweedale, Marquis of, 477 
 
 U 
 
 Ulcers, 174, 194 
 Unchastity, penalties for, 470 
 Urogymnus asperrimus, 256, 310 
 Ursus labiatus, 146 
 
 Vampibes, 288 
 
 Vandevorst, Mr. J. W., 297, 488 
 Vateria Indica, 128 
 Vegetables of Sarawak, 341 
 
 Selangore, 315 
 Venereal diseases, 473 
 Venezuela, courtesy of, to naturalists, 344 
 Vera, Pera, 186, 205 
 Vesuvius, 7 
 Victoria regia, 300 
 
 View, (see Landscape, and Scenery) from 
 the Colombo clock tower, 238 
 
 from the Neilgherries, 104 
 
 from the Sea View Hotel, 245 
 
 from the top of Serambo, Mountain, 48fi 
 Villages, author's quarters in Dyak, 364, 
 410, 413 
 
 of the Hill Dyaks, 452, 485 
 
 of the Kenowits, 449 
 
 of the Kyans, 449 
 
 of Lanchang, 424 
 
 of the Milanaus, 444 
 
 of the Sea Dyaks, 355, 357, 410, 466 
 Viverm, 328 
 
 tangaiunga, 429 
 Von Gaffron, Herr, 334 
 Voyage from Aden to Bombay, 20 
 
 Calcutta to Madras, 87-89 
 
 Colombo to Jaffna, 251-252 
 
 Madras to Colombo, 235-236 
 
 Point Pedro to MuUaitivu, 261-263 
 
 Port Said to Aden, 15-19 
 Vulnerable points of orocodile, 40 
 
 of elephant, 135 
 Vulture, king, 34, 44, 45 
 
 white scavenger, 44, 60, 61 
 
 W 
 
 Wading after orang-utans, 361, 362, 36S 
 
 Wah-wah, see Gibbon 
 
 Wainaad forest, 105 
 
 WaUace, Mr. A. R., 334, 404-405, 468 
 
512 
 
 INDEX. 
 
 Wallago leefii, 385 
 
 Walters, Mr. William, 351 
 
 Wanderoo monkey, of Ceylon, 268, 274, 
 
 277. 280 
 War boats of the Sea Dyaks, 463-4(54 
 Ward, Professor Henry A., 2, 18, 32, 174 
 
 192, 194, 197, 203, 241, 248, 272, 283 
 Ward's Natural Science Establishment. 
 
 3, 217 
 Waxfare, Dyak modes of, 447, 449, 464 
 Weapons for a collector, 491 
 
 of a typical sportsman, 198 
 
 of the Hill Dyaks, 451 
 
 of the Sea Dyaks, 463 
 Weather in Borneo, 417 
 
 in Calcutta, 87 
 
 in Ceylon, 267 
 
 in Madras, 90 
 
 in Singapore, 297 
 
 on the Animallai Hills, 125, 139, 160. 
 186, 214 ' . . . 
 
 on the Jumna River, 50 
 
 on the Neilgherry plateau, 94 
 Wedderburn, Mr. A., 196, 197, 217, 221 
 Whampoa, Hon. H. A. K., 298-300 
 
 White, Dr., cure of fever by, 237 
 Wife-beating an amusement of civilizfe 
 
 tion, 46S 
 Wild cattle, 310 
 Wolf, Indian, 76 
 Wolves, cattle killed by, 494 
 
 destroyed, 494 
 
 persons killed by, 494 
 Women, Sea Dyak, chastity of, 47(1 
 
 dress of, 461 
 
 form and features of, 460-461 
 
 ornaments of, 462 
 
 social position of, 470 
 Women, ugliness of native, 65 
 Wood-devUs of the Dyaks, 4S4 
 
 Yengtse, steamer, S90 
 
 Zbbu, S5 
 
By W. T. HORNADAY 
 
 CAMP-FIRES ON DESERT 
 AND LAVA 
 
 Copiously Illustrated from Photographs 
 
 (Eight illustrations in colors taken by Dr. D. T. MacDougal and John M. Phillips 
 
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BOOKS BY W. T. HORNADAY 
 
 PUBLISHED BY CHARLES SCRIBNER'S SONS 
 
 The American 
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 Two Years in the Jungle 
 
 The Experiences of a Hunter and Naturalist in 
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BY W. T. HORNADAY 
 
 Taxidermy and 
 Zoological Collecting 
 
 Illustrated. 8vo. $2.50 net 
 
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