396 TWO TEAKS IN THE JUNGLE. 



The accounts I Lad bad of the wild pig made me very anxious 

 to secure at least one large specimen. But, although they were so 

 abundant in the jungle about us as to seriously threaten the rice 

 field, I did not even get sight of one in my first week's hunting on 

 Gunong Popook, so I determined to try for them in the swamps. 

 The oldest Dyak in the village, who was therefore an experienced 

 hunter, offered to guide me to the most likely spots, and, with a 

 stout, active lad, named Munkah, to accompany us, early one bright 

 morning we set out. 



For several hours we toiled through the swamp, wading through 

 water and thin mud of various depths from ankle to hip, and finally 

 crossed it and came to high ground, at the edge of which we ex- 

 pected to find Avild pigs feeding on the fallen fruit of a tree the 

 Dyaks called ejoke. But the pigs were not there. Then we took 

 to the high ground, and for some hours longer we tramped up and 

 down a succession of the steepest of hills, covered with the thorniest 

 kind of jungle. Thonis, did I say? Well, I meant fish-hooks, 

 needles, pins, tacks, and porcupine quills. 



Magnificent spreading palms [Livistona sinensis) grew thickly 

 everywhere ; veiy beautiful to the eye their long, slender stems 

 were, but always set with rows of stout and sharp thorns, curved 

 just the wrong way for comfort, and always ready to catch a pass- 

 ing victim. The branches of a worthless climbing rattan ( Calamus) 

 were particularly cruel. This sjjecies is very abundant, climbing 

 over the underbrush and sending out many long, slender branches 

 which droop like those of the weeping willow. The end of each 

 is leafless for about two feet from the tip, and the slender, sup- 

 ple stem resolves itself into a long row of animated trout-hooks. 

 The way those threadlike stems will reach out to seize a victim 

 and then hang on, is enough to make one believe them an invention 

 of the devil. One will catch you suddenly by the ear and hold 

 you very still, while another flies back from the man ahead of you 

 and rakes you across the cheek like a fine saw, cutting a neat little 

 gash as it goes. Again, one will spring suddenly and lay hold of 

 your neck with a score of needlelike points, while others fasten 

 themselves in your clothes, or upon your bare hands. 



If anathemas could kill, I would take bell and candle and so 

 curse every thorn-bearing plant of the tropics, that beside my 

 anathema the curse of the Catholic Church on Victor-Emmanuel 

 would read hke a blessing. In all the vegetable kingdom, there is 

 nothing so useless and wholly objectionable as a thorn, especially the 



