o91. REPORT 1900. 



and I have much pleasure in recording the extreme hospitality and 

 enlightened help which the expedition consequently received from the local 

 authorities, in some cases, perhaps, under rather difficult circumstances. 

 The warmest thanks of those interested in the expedition are due to 

 H. E. Phya Sukhum, the High Commissioner for the Ligor Circle of the 

 Siamese-Malay States ; to Luang Phrom and Kun Rat, the special com- 

 missioners attached to the expedition as escort ; to the Commissioners and 

 Rajas of Patalung, Singora, Patani, Raman, Jala, Jering, Nawng Chik, 

 Ligeh, Teluban, and Kelantan, the Sultan of Kelantan, the Sultan of 

 Trengganu, and the Sultan and Raja Muda of Kedah. 



We reached Singora on March 27, 1899, and were most hospitably 

 entertained in his own house by the High Commissioner, H. E. Phya 

 Sukhum. Next day we proceeded up the Inland Sea. This is a very 

 shallow lake, or, perhaps, rather chain of lakes, part of which is salt and 

 part fresh water. It measures, roughly speaking, some sixty miles in 

 length, and in the broadest part is not less than twenty miles wide. Some 

 dredging was done here by Messrs. Evans and Annandale, and the Bird's 

 Nest Islands were visited, observations made, and photographs taken of 

 the curious cave-dwellings of the island guards. 



At Lampam (Lumpumm) a short stay was made by Messrs. Evans 

 and ''^aughan, Mr. Annandale and myself proceeding into the interior to 

 try to meet with a small Sakei (jungle) tribe of Pangans who were 

 reported to have been seen in the vicinity, and to photograph some of the 

 Siamese tree-graves, which method of burial, in accordance with instruc- 

 tions from Bankok, is fast becoming obsolete. A forced march Ijy 

 night on elephants brought us to the spot too late to overtake the 

 wild men, who had moved away, no one could say whither, the night 

 before our arrival. Mr. Annandale was able, however, to photograph 

 their late dwelling-place, which consisted of a cave under a projecting 

 rock, near the summit of a lofty hill. He also took photographs of the 

 tree-graves. These are usually cigar-shaped wrappers, or rather ' shells ' 

 made of laths, and suspended horizontally at a height of 6 to 8 feet 

 from the ground between two tree-trunks, branches, or posts. The corpse 

 is exposed in one of these shells (the heels being generally left higher than 

 the head), and allowed to decay till the bones are clean, after which the 

 bones should be collected and burnt. Box-like receptacles on posts 

 (as among the Madangs of Borneo) are occasionally substituted for the 

 wrappers. On this journey some strange articles of diet were served up 

 to us, among them being red ants, toads, bee-grubs, and a species of 

 cicada. The manner in which the latter are caught is peculiar. Two or 

 three natives gather at night round a brightly burning wood tire, one of 

 them holding a lighted torch. The others clap their hands at regular 

 intervals, and the cicada;, attracted by the noise and guided by the light, 

 ily down and settle upon the people as they stand by the tire. In the 

 ' wat ' (Siamese temple) at Ban Nah Mr. Annandale noticed that one of the 

 small tigures of Buddha which had been deposited in the temple as an 

 offering, contained a fossil shell, and this clue, carefully followed up, led 

 to the discovery of the quarry from which the fossil had been taken. The 

 formation is of the Cretaceous age, and a number of specimens showing 

 fossiliferous traces were secured here , well-authenticated finds of fossils 

 in the Malay Peninsula have been of the rarest possible occurrence. 



On this same journey a couple of young leopard- or panther-cubs were 

 picked out of their nest in a hollow tree by the roadside, and it being. 



