280 



CROCODILE SHOOTING. 



THE vast dense forest that covers the length and 

 breadth of the Malay Peninsula generally changes 

 its character before it reaches the coast-line. In 

 places, it is true, one may find a rocky headland 

 covered with heavy timber running out to sea until 

 the waves break at its feet ; but for the most part, 

 on the east coast the forest is cut off from the sea 

 by an open foreshore of rank wind-swept grass, be- 

 tween which and a shallow sandy beach grows a 

 narrow fringe of casuarina trees, through which the 

 sea - wind whispers, sighs, and murmurs day and 

 night ; while on the west coast, where the land falls to 

 the sea level, a mangrove forest growing on alluvial 

 mud takes the place of the trees of the interior. 



On part of the Perak coast the mangrove forest 

 is intersected by channels formed by joint actions 

 of the rise and fall of the tide and of the currents 

 of the inland streams. The effect of these channels 

 is to cut the forest up into numerous islands of 

 varying size, and a launch can make its journey 

 by these back ways from end to end of the forest 

 without being seen from the sea. In the old days 

 before British protection, many were the exciting 



