Travel Reference
In-Depth Information
the Government superintendent of all this part of Ceram, returned from Wahai, on the north
coast, after I had been three weeks at Awaiya, and showed me some fine butterflies he had
obtained on the mountain streams in the interior. He indicated a spot about the centre of the
island where he thought I might advantageously stay a few days. I accordingly visited
Makariki with him the next day, and he instructed the chief of the village to furnish me with
men to carry my baggage, and accompany me on my excursion. As the people of the village
wanted to be at home on Christmas-day, it was necessary to start as soon as possible; so we
agreed that the men should be ready in two days, and I returned to make my arrangements.
I put up the smallest quantity of baggage possible for a six days' trip, and on the morning
of December 18th we left Makariki, with six men carrying my baggage and their own provi-
sions, and a lad from Awaiya, who was accustomed to catch butterflies for me. My two Am-
boyna hunters I left behind to shoot and skin what birds they could while I was away. Quit-
ting the village, we first walked briskly for an hour through a dense tangled undergrowth,
dripping wet from a storm of the previous night, and full of mud holes. After crossing sever-
al small streams we reached one of the largest rivers in Ceram, called Ruatan, which it was
necessary to cross. It was both deep and rapid. The baggage was first taken over, parcel by
parcel, on the men's heads, the water reaching nearly up to their armpits, and then two men
returned to assist me. The water was above my waist, and so strong that I should certainly
have been carried off my feet had I attempted to cross alone; and it was a matter of astonish-
ment to me how the men could give me any assistance, since I found the greatest difficulty
in getting my foot down again when I had once moved it off the bottom. The greater
strength and grasping power of their feet, from going always barefoot, no doubt gave them a
surer footing in the rapid water.
After well wringing out our wet clothes and putting them on, we again proceeded along a
similar narrow forest track as before, choked with rotten leaves and dead trees, and in the
more open parts overgrown with tangled vegetation. Another hour brought us to a smaller
stream flowing in a wide gravelly bed, up which our road lay. Here we stayed half an hour
to breakfast, and then went on, continually crossing the stream, or walking on its stony and
gravelly banks, till about noon, when it became rocky and enclosed by low hills. A little fur-
ther we entered a regular mountain-gorge, and had to clamber over rocks, and every moment
cross and recross the water, or take short cuts through the forest. This was fatiguing work;
and about three in the afternoon, the sky being overcast, and thunder in the mountains indic-
ating an approaching storm, we had to look out for a camping place, and soon after reached
one of Mr. Rosenberg's old ones. The skeleton of his little sleeping-hut remained, and my
men cut leaves and made a hasty roof just as the rain commenced. The baggage was covered
