Poor CoLLECTiNa Ground. 845 



After much delay, owing to bad weather and the illness of 

 one of my men, I determined to visit Kasserota (formerly the 

 chief village), situated up a small stream, on an island close to 

 the north coast of Batchian, where I was told that many rare 

 birds were found. After my boat was loaded and every thing 

 ready, three days of heavy squalls prevented our starting, and 

 it was not till the 21st of March that we got away. Early 

 next morning we entered the little river, and in about an hour 

 we reached the Sultan's house, which I had obtained permis- 

 sion to use. It was situated on the bank of the river, and sur- 

 rounded by a forest of fruit-trees, among which were some of 

 the very loftiest and most graceful cocoa-nut-palms I have ever 

 seen. It rained nearly all that day, and I could do little but 

 unload and unpack. Toward the afternoon it cleared up, and 

 I attempted to explore in various directions, but found to my 

 disgust that the only path was a perfect mud swamp, along 

 which it was almost impossible to walk, and the surrounding 

 forest so damj) and dai-k as to promise little in the way of in- 

 sects. I found too on inquiry that the people here made no 

 clearings, living entirely on sago, fruit, fish, and game ; and the 

 path only led to a steep rocky mountain equally impracticable 

 and unproductive. The next day I sent my men to this hill, 

 hoping it might produce some good birds ; but they returned 

 with only two common species, and I myself had been able to 

 get nothing, every little track I had attempted to follow lead- 

 ing to a dense sago swamp. I saw that I should waste time 

 by staying here, and determined to leave the following day. 



This is one of those spots so hard for the European natu- 

 ralist to conceive, where with all the riches of a tropical vege- 

 tation, and partly perhaps from the very luxuriance of that 

 vegetation, insects are as scarce as in the most barren parts of 

 Europe, and hardly more conspicuous. In temperate climates 

 there is a tolerable uniformity in the distribution of insects 

 over those parts of a country in which there is a sirailiarity in 

 the vegetation, any deficiency being easily accounted for by the 

 absence of wood or uniformity of surface. The traveller 

 hastily passing through such a country can at once pick out a 

 collecting-ground which will afford him a fair notion of its 

 entomology. Here the case is different. There are certain 

 requisites of a good collecting-ground which can only be as- 



