226 PREPARING LAND FOR 



may be enabled to buy little luxuries for himself, and 

 brass wire, &c., for his daughters and children, from 

 the Malays, who always come to the villages to trade 

 when the harvest has been gathered in. Having 

 felled as much forest as he thinks sufficient for his 

 purpose, which considering the only instrument they 

 employ is the ' biliong,' or small chopper of theMalays 

 is accomplished with astonishing quickness, the fallen 

 giants of the jungle are allowed to remain prostrate, 

 until a succession of dry days has so parched them, 

 that, being set on fire in several places on the wind- 

 ward side of the field when a fresh breeze is blowing, 

 sthe whole is, in a few hours, consumed with a flame, 

 and smoke, and crackling noise, which, at a distance, 

 is awfully beautiful, and the sublime appearance of 

 which, when many farms are thus burning together, 

 can scarcely be conceived : the heavy dark cloud which 

 hangs over the country, caused by the smoke, for 

 many miles previously to the ascent of the flames, has 

 frequently been mistaken for one of the thunder 

 clouds which are seen to gather, of this solid and 

 black appearance, only in tropical countries. So great 

 is the resemblance, that persons accustomed to the 

 appearance have frequently remained undeceived, until 

 a gust of wind carried the bright flames high above 

 the intervening jungle, and displayed to the spectator 

 a scene of the most majestic beauty, which certainly 

 equals, and probably surpasses, the burning of the 

 grass on the plains of North America. 



