Furness.] diZ [Dec. 18, 



snakes, fish, scorpions, and animals in jars of alcohol ; dried turtles, 

 skulls of wild pigs and of rhinoceroses on the tables and chairs ; orna- 

 mented war shields and sun hats of the natives decorating the walls. The 

 house stands in a clearing on a blutf about forty or fifty feet above the 

 Baram river (pronounced Berrem), which at this point is about 250 

 yards wide, fairly clear and sleepily sluggish when not disturbed by 

 freshets. 



An inspiriting shout from below, and the rhythmical click of the pad- 

 dles on the sides of the boats proclaimed to us that the Father of the 

 Moon (which is the signification of Tamabulan) and his men had come 

 up from the landing at the Bazaar and were waiting for us by the river 

 bank below Mr. Hose's house. Our store of provisions and the few articles 

 for trading and for ingratiating ourselves with the natives, such as three 

 or four bolts of cotton cloth, sixty pounds of Java tobacco, some bars 

 of steel, etc., were soon carried down to the canoe and stored away, and 

 in the sixty -foot dug-out canoe we were given the vacant space amid- 

 ships about seven feet long by five feet wide, wherein to spread our 

 mats and make our abode till the end of the trip. The black hard-wood 

 paddles glistened in the sunlight for a moment and then sent the water 

 gurgling and eddying along the sides of the boat as the six men in front 

 of us and the four in the stern, abaft Tamabulan and his goods and 

 chattels, gave a shout and pulled out into the stream. There are doubt- 

 less quite a number of Europeans who have made trips into the interior 

 of Borneo, without reckoning the Residents of the Dutch and English 

 companies, but I am sui-e that no American, and probably no European, 

 has gone further therein than Dr. Hiller and myself or under similar 

 circumstances. We went up the river as the guests of the Chief to be 

 present at the ceremonies and feasting to be given in honor of the Nam- 

 ing of his only son and heir, and during our five weeks there, we livetl 

 intimately enough with these jungle-people to get thoroughly into their 

 life and understand their trials and sympathize with them in their joys 

 and sorrows. 



Our canoe, as I mentioned before, was about sixty feet long and about 

 five feet wide amid-ships, hewn out of a single log, but deepened con- 

 siderably by the addition of planks along the sides bound on with rotans 

 and caulked, thus giving about six inches additional free board. The 

 men while paddling sit cross-legged on a flooring of bamboo strips 

 tied together and placed over thwarts about two-thirds up the side 

 of the boat. They seem to be able to keep up an almost mechanical 

 stroke from daylight till dark without showing the least fatigue, aud 

 this, too, on two meals a day, consisting mainly of rice and a little dried 

 fish. 



Toward dusk of the first day we halted at a sloping sand bank en- 

 closed on three sides by a thick hedge of wild sugar-cane, full of myste- 

 rious rustlings, and stretching far over the Ioav ground to the beginning 

 of the jungle. The other boats of our party, numbering eight, were 



