JAUNTS IN THE JUNGLE. 9 



most difficult business of the twenty-four hours in a 

 jungle expedition consists in summoning sufficient 

 resolution to " turn in." Another jorum of arrack 

 punch, a fresh bottle of Lafitte, or "just one more 

 cigar," however delectable at the time, generally 

 entail an unpleasant re-action in the morning, when 

 the nigger, as in duty bound, awakes you at five A.M., 

 with the information that there is a herd of wild 

 elephants or buffaloes within half a mile of the house, 

 adding, by way of consolation, " plenty savage, 

 master !" 



There are, however, other and more potent causes 

 that keep one under arms during the first night, or 

 at least the greater part of it ; for there being no 

 doors or windows, and the previous tenants, out for 

 the day, not yet being aware of a new occupant, it 

 might be attended with disagreeable results to be 

 caught napping by a bear with a sore head, or an 

 unamiable wild hog wrought into a determination of 

 going its whole self. 



But now for the jungle and its denizens. 



Carrying a double-barrelled gun, and my Malay 

 follower being armed with another, more for the sake 

 of protection than aggression (for the first day shall 

 be devoted to a specimen of the locale of our future 

 exploits), we commence our ascent up the mountain 

 before the sun has shed a ray upon its summit now 

 clambering up huge masses of rock between immense 

 banyan trees, whose branches, growing downwards 



