HUMAN TREE-DWELLERS 117 



dragging ourselves for hours, ankle-deep in mud, 

 along stretches of swamp, where the rhino feed 

 appeared particularly tempting (although rhino 

 generally feed early in the morning and at dusk) , 

 or, crouched until walking was all but impossible, 

 sneaking into every more than usually dense bit of 

 cover which suggested a pool or a rhino bed. It 

 was wet, cheerless work ; and what gets wet in that 

 jungle stays wet. Except for the water you have 

 wrung out of them, the soaked clothes you hang 

 at night on a bamboo stake driven deep into the 

 mud are equally as soaked when you try to put 

 them on again in the morning bright-light. 



My men did not appear to take much interest 

 in the search for rhino; indeed, they pursued the 

 journey with great reluctance, for at best the 

 Malay is not a hunter; stalking game does not 

 appeal to him. He never, by choice, hunts in the 

 rainy season, but takes the more sensible method 

 of sitting up over an animal's drinking hole in 

 the dry period, or over a bait. Besides, they stand 

 much in awe of the rhino, which they rarely hunt, 

 notwithstanding its blood and horn being worth 

 almost their weight in gold at the Chinese chem- 

 ists', who use them in mystical medical concoc- 

 tions. Once we found plain tracks that in due 

 course led down the mountain to a rushing, roaring 

 stream, which we could not cross, although the 



