Jan. 13, 1876] 



NATURE 



209 



tance from our track was 00031, or 286,000 miles, but the 

 earth at the time was in another part of her orbit and far \ 

 away from the comet, which indeed never approached 

 our globe within o'\i of the earth's mean distance from 

 the sun. To have brought the two bodies into their 

 closest possible proximity in 1680, it would have been . 

 necessary that the comet should have arrived at perihe- 1 

 lion at midnip:ht on the 18th of Januar>-, 1681, in which ' 

 case they would have met on the night of December 22. ' 



No comet is yet certainly known to have been situate 

 nearer to the earth than 1,390,000 miles, which was the 

 distance of Lexell's comet of 1770, on July i, at 5 P.M. . 

 G.M.T. 1 



AN EXPLORING EXPEDITION TO THE 

 INTERIOR OF SUMATRA 



ONLY a short time ago the Geographical Society of 

 Amsterdam took the first preliminary' steps towards 

 the realisation of a long-cherished idea, — the exploration 

 of those parts of Sumatra which have hitherto been indi- 

 cated by white patches on our maps of that island, even 



though they form part of the colonial territory. These 

 regions are bounded to the south by the residencies of 

 Palembang and Bencoolen, to the east by the Straits of 

 Banka and the Sea of Riouw, and to the west by the 

 highlands of Padang and the chain of volcanic moun- 

 tains which traverses the island in its whole length, running 

 parallel to the coast. All the above-named districts are 

 tolerably well known, the native kingdoms of Reteh, 

 Indragiri, and Kwantan, situated farther north, perhaps 

 excepted. It is this white patch, better known under the 

 name of the Djambi territory, which the expedition will 

 choose for the special object of its researches. 



For more than one reason this and no other part of 

 the interesting island has been chosen. In the north 

 the war with Atchin is for the present an impediment 

 to a peaceful party of explorers, although a better ac- 

 quaintance with those tribes of the Malayan race known 

 as the Battaks would be highly interesting from a lin- 

 guistic and ethnological point of view. This having to 

 be given up, the question of the navigability of the 

 Djambi River, which might, moreover, prove of so much 

 importance on commercial groimds, induced the Geo- 



graphical Society definitely to fix its choice on the indi- 

 cated parts, rather than on Indragiri, Reteh, or any of the 

 above-named districts. 



The only European who has ever visited the domains 

 of the Sultan of Djambi, and has left any official documents 

 about the state of things as he foimd them, was the 

 Palembang resident van Ophuyzen, who, in 1 869, travelled 

 a good way up the Djambi River, with the Government 

 steamer Bcni. Unfortunately, he was obliged to return 

 sooner than he wished, for reasons dictated neither by 

 he hostility of the population, nor by the barrenness of the 

 ountry ; on the contrary^, he has reported very favour- 

 bly on both these points. He had, moreover, occasion 

 -J notice the existence of several important tributary 

 rivers, and as far as his survey extended he found the 

 Djambi itself everywhere navigable. His reports to the 

 Government at Batavia have formed a valuable basis 

 upon which the Geographical Society has drawn up its 

 projects for the present expedition. 



The body of explorers will begin by separating into two 

 parties, one of which wiU ascend the river in a steamer 

 which it is expected Government will place at their dis- 

 posal, the other party starting from Padang and passing the 



mountain chain above-mentioned somewhere between the 



volcanoes of Talang and Indrapoora, will try to follow 



the course of one or more of the Djambi tributaries — 



more especially the Batang Hari — from its source up to 



. the point where they will meet the steamer with the 



I rest of the explorers, who will have in the meantime 



I ascended the river as far as possible. 



This junction having been effected, the next task wiU be 

 i the detailed survey of the different courses of the Sangit, 

 I the Teboo, the Tabir, and the Tembesi, the party all the 

 ; while slowly advancing towards those mysterious vaUeys 

 I in the interior of Korintji, Assei, &a, which have aflForded 

 : so much matter for speculation, and about the beauty and 

 \ fertility of which most wonderful accounts have long been 

 j circulated. For the only reliable data we possess, we are 

 indebted to natives who have travelled to the coast for 

 j commercial purposes, information which cannot but be 

 i very imperfect. Unacquainted with the disposition of the 

 inhabitants towards European intruders, our travellers wiU 

 have to feel their way, using the utmost circumspection not 

 to rouse the distrust of the population, which would un- 

 doubtedly be the case if Government was directly asso- 

 ciated with the expedition. The natives would not fail to 



