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heat is terrible, but the coast seems singularly healthy, and the climate is more 

 like that of Northern Australia than of the Indian Archipelago. 



" Till I came to Sumba, no European had ever visited the interior. Learning 

 from the natives that a well-wooded and watered tract existed inland, I pushed 

 across forty miles of a desolate coral wilderness and reached a wholly different 

 country. . . . The interior of the island is a great plateau, somewhat hollowed out 

 in the middle by the river Kambera, which rises in the forests round Lewa west 

 of Mandas. flows eastward, and near Mandas is a considerable river in deep 

 jungle, difficult to ford, haunted by crocodiles, and much larger in volume than 

 at its mouth, seventy or eighty miles below. Indeed most rivers of Northern 

 Sumba tend to disappear on approaching the coast. The table-land is flat in 

 general outline, but deeply cut by an infinity of exceedingly steep ravines, each 

 with a clear swift stream. Flat or steep it is everywhere the richest possible 

 meadow-land. The forests lie in great masses, and, except at Tabundung and 

 one or two other exceptional places, they are wholly trackless, and serve as the 

 boundaries of hostile tribes. West of Mandas the country appears to descend 

 steeply into the Indian Ocean. This slope was described to me as covered with 

 high forest, with a heavy rainfall and a coast so stormy as to be inaccessible 

 during the greater part of the year. The height of the table-land of the Kambera 

 is usually about 1500 to 2000 feet. The hill at Pada Dalung must be about 2500 

 feet above the sea. The climate of this region is delicious. South-east and 

 north-west the country rises, and by its upward trend conceals whatever high 

 mountains may be in that direction. The great isolated massif of Tabundung, 

 covered with high forest, lies south of Pada Dalung, and must be about 4000 feet 

 high. East of this is the unknown tana maringu (cold country) of Masu, which 

 lies back of Melolo, and is sacred ground. . . . West of Pada Dalung the country 

 rises again, and beyond Lewa Paku and the sources of the Kambera lies another 

 ' cold country,' probably of considerable height and extent. West of Perwatana 

 and Anakala, on the border of this region, which is called by the general name 

 of WayeVa, lies a great forest, and then comes Kodi, beyond which the land 

 sinks precipitously into the sea near Gaura or Garu. 



" A volcano has been said to exist near Tarimbang on the south-western coast, 

 but some people of that state told me this was quite untrue. However, the 

 mountain of Tabundung, which I did not succeed in reaching, may possibly be 

 of volcanic origin. This district, though rather out of the way, seems to be the 

 best accessible collecting-ground on the island. 



" The upland forests of Sumba are less luxuriant than in Java or Sumatra, 

 and are singularly free from thorns and underbrush, but many of the trees reach 

 the height of a hundred feet, and some of the figs are of enormous girth. The 

 only bamboos on the island occur in the dry valleys near the coast. Palms, except 

 the loutar or palmyra, and a few arecas, are exceedingly scarce. The Endinese, 

 who import cocoanuts, always destroy the germ of each nut, which perhaps 

 accounts for the absence of this useful tree. 



" Of the animals of Sumba I can say but little. The natives think there are 

 three kinds of monkeys, but I saw only the Macacus cynomolgus, which is very 

 common and tame. A deer like the Cervus muntjac is said to be common, as well 

 as another with large branching horns, which they call by the Malay name of rusa. 

 Wild pigs abound and a wild cat. Among birds cockatoos are so numerous that I 

 have seen the trees white with them ! 



