OTHER EXPEDITIONS 275 



marked with stakes which are not covered even at 

 high-water mark. So shallow are the waters of this 

 bay that it is possible to walk across it from Trusan 

 mouth to British North Borneo territory and never to 

 be much more than waist-deep. 



I have never seen such curious mirage effects as in 

 this part of the world ; from a small boat the horizon 

 appears to be in the immediate foreground, and it is 

 broken by the little wavelets lipping over sand-banks ; 

 the true horizon is simply invisible, and it would be 

 impossible to have the faintest idea of its position did 

 one not see in the distance islands which appear to be 

 suspended in mid-air. This disappearance of the horizon 

 has an extremely distorting effect on one's vision, and 

 it becomes a matter of great difficulty to judge distance 

 or size accurately : a small steam-launch at a distance of 

 300 yards looks like a great mail-steamer a mile away, 

 and a man wading through the water towards the boat 

 seems a great distance off, and you are astonished that 

 he should reach you so soon. One November morning 

 the Government steam-launch Gazelle dropped me at 

 about a mile from the Trusan mouth, for the tides were 

 neap and it was not possible on a half-tide to get any 

 further inshore. As it was, the small boat which was 

 waiting to transport me and my belongings over the 

 intervening space drew rather too much water, and we 

 had to stop just outside the mouth waiting for the tide 

 to rise and carry us over the bar. The muddy banks 

 were thickly covered with hundreds of Egrets and Little 

 Herons, and they made a very pretty picture in the 

 morning sun, stalking over the mud-flats picking up 

 their daily food. Egrets, I am glad to say, are very 

 strictly preserved in Sarawak, on account of the benefits 



