NATIVE LIFE IN BRITISH BORNEO. 247 



caves bring to the North Borneo Government a yearly rental of 

 $9,000. One of the vaults in the caves is estimated to be nine 

 hundred feet high. An idea of their population may be got from 

 the statement that a steady column of the swifts (Callocalia) in- 

 habiting them has been timed by the watch to fly for three quar- 

 ters of an hour from one of the apertures. Passing Bod Lagit — 

 "which means the hill to the skies, a legend recording that it 

 formerly reached to the heavens, but, owing to the wickedness of 

 its inhabitants, had subsided to its present height of four hundred 

 feet " — and a hill of limestone called Chuko Besar, which con- 

 tains some small caves and yields a few hundred bird's-nests each 

 year, the explorers visited one of the owners of the Batu Timbang 

 caves, of which two native rajahs share the proceeds in alternate 

 years. They are situated on the river Quamute, a branch of the 

 Kinabatangare, and are difficult of access on account of rapids. 

 Some of the bird's-nests are of the best white description, but the 

 larger proportion are gray and mixed with feathers. Still further 

 up — three hours' climb from the Melikop branch, and eighteen 

 hundred and ten feet above the sea-level — are the Obang-Obang 

 limestone caves, which had not hitherto been visited by Euro- 

 peans. The first cave reached after a three hours' climb, the last 

 half -hour of it over slippery, moss-grown, limestone bowlders, 

 is the most valuable, but can be approached only by experts in 

 climbing. The entrance is a small hole, four feet by four feet, and 

 is closed by a wooden grating so as to attract attention to the 

 spot, as otherwise the unwary traveler might suddenly be pre- 

 cipitated to the depths below. Every two months this doorway 

 is opened, and the climbers let themselves down into the caves by 

 means of rattans, and gather all nests, large and small. This 

 makes six seasons per annum. The same periods are observed in 

 the collections at the Senobang caves in the Ulu Penungah. " The 

 seasons at Gomanton, Batu Timbang, Madai, and Segalong num- 

 ber two or three during the twelve months, and these are too few, 

 according to the Tungara tribe. They maintain that, by collecting 

 them frequently — say six times per annum — they procure white 

 nests in first-rate order, though some of these nests are young and 

 but half formed, and that the Sulu traders give them a higher 

 price in consequence. I noticed a great scarcity in swifts and a 

 great preponderance of bats, which might be attributed to the too 

 frequent collection of nests, which prevents the swifts from breed- 

 ing. The Obang-Obang Mountain runs north and south, and is 

 half a mile in length. There are seven entrances to the vaults 

 from the top of the range, all situated close to each other. Five 

 of these vaults do not contain any bird's-nests, there being no 

 swifts, only bats dwelling there." The only chamber that can be 

 entered by any one who is not an adept at climbing on rattans to 



