BOATS. 217 



without timbers of any sort, the planks being merely 

 sewn one to the other, or rather tied by rattans, 

 through holes about eighteen inches apart, and, thus 

 supporting each other, they are caulked with the soft 

 bark of a tree of the tribe Myrtaceae, and payed with 

 the preparation of dammar and oils, as used by the 

 Malays for their trading prows. They are fancifully 

 painted, and sometimes decorated with a dragon, 

 or some other monstrous figure-head ; and painted on 

 a board at the stern are frequently human figures in 

 indelicate positions. 



They are steered sometimes with a rudder, but 

 more frequently by paddles, and from the assistance 

 the men paddling are enabled to give, they turn 

 as on a pivot, and consequently lose so little time in 

 this evolution, that before an English boat could 

 accomplish it, they would be far a-head, being con- 

 siderable gainers by the manoeuvre. Formerly they 

 had no protection for the men paddling the boat 

 excepting from the weather, which was afforded them 

 by mats, called 'kajangs,' made of the unexpanded 

 leaves of the nipah palm sewn together and dried in 

 the sun. These were of sufficient length to reach 

 across the boat, and were so light that they were of 

 no inconvenience, but having recently feared to meet 

 the war-boats of Sarawak, and the gun-boats of the 

 English cruisers, they have added two heavy planks 

 of wood along the side of each boat above the heads 

 of the rowers, which they suppose to be grape-proof. 



