Travel Reference
In-Depth Information
paths and bridges, and cultivate much mountain land, and thus give a more pleasing and civ-
ilized aspect to the country than where the people move about only in boats, and confine
their cultivation to the banks of the streams.
After some trouble I hired a boat from a Malay trader, and found three Dyaks who had
been several times with Malays to Saráwak, and thought they could manage it very well.
They turned out very awkward, constantly running aground, striking against rocks, and los-
ing their balance so as almost to upset themselves and the boat; offering a striking contrast
to the skill of the Sea Dyaks. At length we came to a really dangerous rapid where boats
were often swamped, and my men were afraid to pass it. Some Malays with a boat-load of
rice here overtook us, and after safely passing down kindly sent back one of their men to as-
sist me. As it was, my Dyaks lost their balance in the critical part of the passage, and had
they been alone would certainly have upset the boat. The river now became exceedingly pic-
turesque, the ground on each side being partially cleared for rice-fields, affording a good
view of the country. Numerous little granaries were built high up in trees overhanging the
river, and having a bamboo bridge sloping up to them from the bank; and here and there
bamboo suspension bridges crossed the stream, where overhanging trees favoured their con-
struction.
I slept that night in the village of the Sebungow Dyaks, and the next day reached
Saráwak, passing through a most beautiful country, where limestone mountains with their
fantastic forms and white precipices shot up on every side, draped and festooned with a lux-
uriant vegetation. The banks of the Saráwak River are everywhere covered with fruit trees,
which supply the Dyaks with a great deal of their food. The Mangosteen, Lansat, Rambutan,
Jack, Jambou, and Blimbing, are all abundant; but most abundant and most esteemed is the
Durian, a fruit about which very little is known in England, but which both by natives and
Europeans in the Malay Archipelago is reckoned superior to all others. The old traveller
Linschott, * writing in 1599, says:— 'It is of such an excellent taste that it surpasses in fla-
vour all the other fruits of the world, according to those who have tasted it.' And Doctor
Paludanus adds:— 'This fruit is of a hot and humid nature. To those not used to it, it seems
at first to smell like rotten onions, but immediately they have tasted it they prefer it to all
other food. The natives give it honourable titles, exalt it, and make verses on it.' When
brought into a house the smell is often so offensive that some persons can never bear to taste
it. This was my own case when I first tried it in Malacca, but in Borneo I found a ripe fruit
on the ground, and, eating it out of doors, I at once became a confirmed Durian eater.
The Durian grows on a large and lofty forest tree, somewhat resembling an elm in its gen-
eral character, but with a more smooth and scaly bark. The fruit is round or slightly oval,
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