250 THE ARU ISLANDS. [chap. xxxi. 



shallow pools connected by the smallest possible thread of 

 trickling water. If there were a dry season like that of 

 Macassar, the Aru Islands would be uninhabitable, as there 

 is no part of them much above a hundred feet high ; and 

 the whole being a mass of porous coralline rock, allows 

 the surface water rapidly to escape. The only dry season 

 they have is for a month or two about September or 

 October, and there is then an excessive scarcity of water, 

 so that sometimes hundreds of birds and other animals die 

 of drought. The natives then remove to houses near the 

 sources of the small streams, where, in the shady depths of 

 the forest, a small quantity of water still remains. Even 

 then many of them have to go miles for their water, which 

 they keep in large bamboos and use very sparingly. They 

 assure me that they catch and kill game of all kinds, 

 by watching at the water holes or setting snares around 

 them. That would be the time for me to make my collec- 

 tions ; but the want of water would be a terrible annoy- 

 ance, and the impossibility of getting away before another 

 whole year had passed made it out of the question. 



Ever since leaving Dobbo I bad suffered terribly from 

 insects, who seemed here bent upon revenging my long- 

 continued persecution of their race. At our first stopping- 

 place sand-flies were very abundant at night, penetrating to 

 every part of the body, and producing a more lasting irri- 

 tation than mosquitoes. My feet and ankles especially 



