NOTES ON SUMATRA. 163 
pose the wood of one plant only, the commonest species of Rhizophora, 
I believe R. conjugata ; the Malay name is * Kayu Bakau." The wood 
is reddish-white, and splits readily ; it burns well, and makes a very 
hot fire, giving out a peculiar smell, and is preferred to all other woods 
for cooking. "The price at Singapore is one dollar for 1000 billets ; 
these are about two feet long and one and a half to two inches diameter, 
or split to about that size. A considerable quantity of the bark of the 
* Bakau" is taken to China by the return junks, and it is also used by 
the native tanners in Singapore, mixed with gambier, but it makes an 
inferior, spongy leather, absorbing moisture rapidly, and, while new, 
staining of a dirty red colour everything it touches. This island appears 
to abound with a small species of Moschus, the ** Pulandok" of the na- 
tives. "They had a number of them, which had been caught in snares, 
confined in small cages ready to take to Singapore for sale, as well as 
a quantity of small long-tailed parrots of the genus Pa/corius, of which 
I saw large flocks flying about the dead trees, screaming loudly. Among 
other strange articles of trade here I saw a basket full of fat white 
Annelide, as thick as the thumb and about a foot long. They are found 
in the decayed wood of a species of Rhizophora, called ** Tameno," after 
it has lain long in the salt water, and fetch a good price among the 
rich Chinese at Singapore, who consider them a rare delicacy. Besides 
the Sirik leaves which my crew procured here, they got also the unripe 
fruit-spikes of another Piper, which they call * buah chabai," or pepper- 
fruit. It is sold str ung upon threads, and can be dried without losing 
its flavour or pungency, and on that account is valued by the Malays 
for taking to sea in their boats; for the leaves, though very tenacious of 
life when carefully packed in the sheathing leaf-stalks of the mg 
cannot be preserved fresh more than eight or ten days. 
Nothing can exceed the beauty of the singular scenery of these cu- 
rious ipda I counted, several times in the course of the day, - 
more than a hundred islands in sight at once, while at other times we - 
were carried by the current through narrow channels where the trees 
almost met over the boat. The rocks belong to the same peculiar for- 
mation as the greater part of the island of Singapore,—clays, argillaceous 
sandstones, and eonglomerates, chiefly of quartz pebbles, and sometimes 
exceedingly coarse, all intersected by reticulated siliceous veins, more 
or less hard. The clays and sandstones are nearly all ferruginous, some 
very highly so, and often of beautiful red and purple tints; and the 
