94 IN MALAY FORESTS. 



on my clothes while the crew and the servants 

 bestirred themselves lighting lamps and setting a 

 fire. Breakfast was soon prepared, and at about a 

 quarter to four we were ready to start. The night 

 was pitchy black, the sky weighted with heavy 

 clouds, and the air full of the smell of rain. By 

 the light of a lamp we lowered ourselves from the 

 house-boat into a little dug-out that lay alongside. 

 It was an unstable little craft at any time, but the 

 darkness seemed to make it more perilously sensitive 

 than ever to the slightest motion of an occupant. 

 Hurricane lamp and rifle were placed in front of 

 me, the Malays took the bow and stern, and then, 

 with barely an inch of free-board, we pushed out 

 into the full current of the broad, black, swiftly- 

 flowing river. The stream swept us away, and the 

 darkness swallowed up the house-boat. The Malays 

 kept the dug-out in a diagonal line across the river, 

 ever aiming at unseen points, below which we were 

 ever drifting, and at last, after hard and long 

 paddling, we made the farther bank. We landed 

 safely, and then by the light of the lamp had to 

 make our way along a path through the forest. 

 Everything was very still in the darkness. Occa- 

 sionally we disturbed some small bird that broke 

 into frightened twitterings, and then after a sleepy 

 chirp or two fell asleep again. Sometimes a cicada 

 awoke to utter one sudden piercing shrill, to be 

 followed by as sudden a silence ; and now and again 

 some brown thing would scuttle from under foot. 

 After half a mile, made long and slow by the dif- 

 ficulties of the darkness, we emerged upon an open 



