t 
257 
Notes written on a Voyage from Singapore to Banjermassing, in the 
southern extremity of Borneo ; in a letter from James MorLEY, Eso., 
to Sır W. J. HOOKER. 
(Continued from p. 172.) 
Machipora (Banjermassing, S. Borneo), March, 1855. 
When I last wrote to you I gave you an account of my first attempt 
to reach Sumatra, when I was obliged to return to Singapore for a larger 
boat. I started again on the 24th of January with a Bugis prahu, of 
about four tons’ burden, and six men besides my servant. I slept that 
night at a small settlement among the islands, which I have already 
described to you ; and next day, about ten a.M., I got clear of the Archi- 
pelago and sailed down the coast of Sumatra: it is a mere line of low 
trees, and, as far as I could see, when the high water allowed us to ap- 
proach it, of one species only, ZEgiceras majus I believe, called in Malay 
“Api Api.” The natives assured me that for miles along the coast no 
other plant is seen, except in the creeks, where there is a little mixture 
of fresh water. The shore is exceedingly flat, of mud so soft that it is 
hard to say where it ends and the water begins. Though the rise and 
fall of the tide is not more than six feet, the beach dries for some miles 
out, and we were aground at low water, where we could only see the trees 
like a dark line on the horizon; indeed about 150 miles to the south- 
ward the coast has literally never been seen from the sea, even by the 
surveyors who made the charts, from the impossibility of approaching 
it in a boat sufficiently near. Not a break nor a hillock could be seen, — 
nor indeed does one exist on the whole line of coast for fifty miles inland. 
The country can hardly be said to be dry land, and the whole coast is 
notoriously unhealthy, and swarms with tigers and other wild beasts. 
At ten p.m. we anchored just on the equator, off Taryong Daloo, close to — 
which the water is perhaps deeper, and there is probably a reef of coral, 
as the sea made a great noise all night. 
25th. We had no wind this morning, but it being high water we - 
pulled along close under the Api Api jungle. The number of birds - 
here is astonishing: there were flocks of sandpipers and plovers, which — 
must have consisted of hundreds of thousands of individuals, looking 
at a distance like large clouds, and completely whitening the jungle - 
where they perched. Of herons I counted nine species ; all around 
us were fishing innumerable terns, of two species; knee-deep in the 
water, close under the bushes, stood long rows of tall black and white _ 
VOL. VII. 2L 
