134 BOURU. [chap. XXVI. 



insect and bird labels, all of which were unsolved mysteries 

 to the native mind. 



Most of the people here had never seen a pin, and 

 the better informed took a pride in teaching their more 

 ignorant companions the peculiarities and uses of that 

 strange European production — a needle with a head, but 

 no eye 1 Even paper, which we throw away hourly as 

 rubbish, was to them a curiosity ; and T often saw them 

 picking up little scraps which had been swept out of 

 the house, and carefully putting them away in their betel- 

 pouch. Then when I took my morning coffee and evening 

 tea, how many were the strange things displayed to them! 

 Teapot, teacups, teaspoons, were all more or less curious in 

 their eyes ; tea, sugar, biscuit, and butter, were articles of 

 human consumption seen by many of them for tlie first 

 time. One asks if that whitish powder is " gula passir " 

 (sand-sugar), so called to distinguish it from the coarse 

 lump palm-sugar or molasses of native manufacture ; and 

 the biscuit is considered a sort of European sago-cake, 

 which the inhabitants of those remote regions are obliged 

 to, use in the absence of the genuine article. My pursuits 

 were of course utterly beyond their comprehension. They 

 continually asked me what white people did with the birds 

 and insects I took so much care to preserve. If I only 

 kept what was beautiful, they might perhaps comprehend 

 it ; but to see ants and flies and small ugly insects put 



