1884.] BIRDS'-NEST CAVES OF BORNEO. 537 



how short a distance in a direct line, only some 20 miles, I had 

 actually come from Elopura : it had taken some 13^ hours' continuous 

 travelling by launch, boat, and walking to reach this point. On the 

 highest part the Malays have built a house, into which I was invited, 

 and inspected a quantity of very fine white nests, gathered from a 

 small opening close by, which is however 116 fathoms deep, and 

 is connected, as I afterwards found, with Simud Putih. 



I then commenced to descend by another track, and found it much 

 easier work than going up. About 200 feet below the summit a 

 large opening is reached ; this looks exactly like a railway-tunnel. 

 Lighting candles and attaching them to the lower part of the staves 

 each of the party carried, the gloomy portal was entered, and daylight 

 was soon lost sight of, the path becoming steeper and more slippery 

 the further it descended. About 500 feet below the entrance it 

 became unpleasantly warm and the atmosphere stifling, the guano 

 giving out a most disagreeable smell. I was here shown a small 

 beam of light from the small opening at the top of the rock, 696 feet 

 above. The footing became here very precarious, single poles being 

 laid on the surface of the soft guano, upon which I found considerable 

 difficulty in balancing myself. The guano exists in enormous 

 quantities in this cave ; a fifteen-feet pole, thrust down into it, does 

 uot touch the bottom. Just when matters were getting unbearable 

 the cave turns to the right, and the path commences to ascend, and 

 I was very glad to find Simud Putih had been reached : after a 

 slippery climb I merged into daylight, very much dazzled. All the 

 root of the dark parts of the cave was occupied by the nests of the 

 Swifts, the birds keeping up an intermittent twittering, sounding, from 

 the immense quantity assembled, like surf breaking on a rocky shore. 

 In this cave I saw the nest-gatherers at work getting in their crop. 

 A thin rattan ladder was fixed to the end of a long pole and wedged 

 against the rock ; two men were on t!ie ladder — one carried a long 

 four-pronged spear, a lighted candle being fixed to it a few inches 

 below the prongs. By the aid of this light a suitable nest is found 

 and transfixed with the prongs ; a slight twist detaches the nest un- 

 broken from the rock ; the sjiear is then withdrawn until the head is 

 within reach of the second man, who takes the nest off the prongs 

 and places it in a pouch carried at the waist. The nests of best 

 quality are bound up into packets with strips of rattan, the inferior 

 being simply threaded together ; the best packets generally weigh 

 one catty (Ij lb.), averaging forty nests, and are sold at $9 each — 

 the annual value of the nests gathered being about $25,000. These 

 caves have beeu worked for seven generations without any diminution 

 in the quantity : three crops ai-e taken during the year, and unless a 

 considerable number of black nests is gathered, the supply of white 

 nests falls off. Accidents to the men employed very rarely occur, 

 notwithstanding the dangerous nature of their occupation. There is 

 also an almost inexhaustible supply of guano in these caves; and the 

 number of bats and birds in them is so enormous that if proper care 

 is taken not to disturb them, a regular quantity may be taken out 

 yearly without fear of exhausting the supply. These caves are 



