AYAR BANGIS AND NATAL. 453 



cape, for tlie most expert swimmer could not possibly 

 have saved himself in such a frightful surf. I coolly 

 concluded that that would l^e the last of my dan- 

 gers and resigned myself to my fate. Soon, however, 

 the horizon became somewhat clearer, and, better 

 than all, our anchor had evidently stnick into good 

 holding-ground and was keeping us fi-om drifting. 

 In an hour more the tempest was over, though the 

 heavy swell continued to roll in as before. In the 

 morning we found ourselves not far from Ayar Ban- 

 gis, and put in there while our crew mended the 

 sails. This is the port to which the coffee raised in 

 the valley of Kau, in the interior, is brought down, to 

 be hence shipped in praus to Padang, where it is 

 placed in the government storehouse and sold at auc- 

 tion four times a year, viz., in March, June, Septem- 

 ber, and December. Natal, about twenty-five miles 

 noi-th of here, is the chief port to which is brought 

 the valuable coffee raised in the fertile valley of Man- 

 deling, of which Fort Elout is the capital. All this 

 part of Sumatra abounds in very valuable timber, 

 and the Resident here showed us some magnificent 

 logs which his natives are sawing into planks. If 

 we had such timber in our country we would use it 

 for the nicest kinds of veneering. 



As the stoi'm continued, we remained for a day 

 among the islands off Ayar Bangis. They are mostly 

 low, and nearly all composed of coral rock. The 

 natives live on fish and the cocoa-nuts which they 

 raise in gi'eat numbers on these low coral islands. 



The chief value of the cocoa-nuts here, as in the 

 eastern part of the archipelago, is for the oil tliey 



