Travel Reference
In-Depth Information
At length I found one with the floor raised about a foot, and succeeded in making a bargain
with the owner to turn out immediately, so that by night I had installed myself comfortably.
The chairs and tables were left for me; and as the whole of the remaining furniture in the
house consisted of a little crockery and a few clothes-boxes, it was not much trouble for the
owners to move into the house of some relatives, and thus obtain a few silver rupees very
easily. Every foot of ground between the houses throughout the village is crammed with
fruit trees, so that the sun and air have no chance of penetrating. This must be very cool and
pleasant in the dry season, but makes it damp and unhealthy at other times of the year. Un-
fortunately I had come two months too soon, for the rains were not yet over, and mud and
water were the prominent features of the country.
About a mile behind and to the east of the village the hills commence, but they are very
barren, being covered with scanty coarse grass and scattered trees of the Melaleuca cajuputi,
from the leaves of which the celebrated cajeput oil is made. Such districts are absolutely
destitute of interest for the zoologist. A few miles further on rose higher mountains, appar-
ently well covered with forest, but they were entirely uninhabited and trackless, and practic-
ally inaccessible to a traveller with limited time and means. It became evident, therefore,
that I must leave Cajeli for some better collecting ground, and finding a man who was going
a few miles eastward to a village on the coast where he said there were hills and forest, I
sent my boy Ali with him to explore and report on the capabilities of the district. At the
same time I arranged to go myself on a little excursion up a river which flows into the bay
about five miles north of the town, to a village of the Alfuros, or indigenes, where I thought
I might perhaps find a good collecting ground.
The Rajah of Cajeli, a good-tempered old man, offered to accompany me, as the village
was under his government; and we started one morning early, in a long narrow boat with
eight rowers. In about two hours we entered the river, and commenced our inland journey
against a very powerful current. The stream was about a hundred yards wide, and was gen-
erally bordered with high grass, and occasionally bushes and palm-trees. The country round
was flat and more or less swampy, with scattered trees and shrubs. At every bend we
crossed the river to avoid the strength of the current, and arrived at our landing-place about
four o'clock, in a torrent of rain. Here we waited for an hour, crouching under a leaky mat
till the Alfuros arrived who had been sent for from the village to carry my baggage, when
we set off along a path of whose extreme muddiness I had been warned before starting.
I turned up my trousers as high as possible, grasped a stout stick to prevent awkward
falls, and then boldly plunged into the first mud-hole, which was immediately succeeded by
another and another. The mud or mud and water was knee-deep, with little intervals of
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