IN BORNEAN FORESTS [chap. 



habitations. The gigantic bamboo mentioned above may therefore 

 have been introduced from Java, probably with other cultivated 

 plants, at the period when the benefits of the Hindu- Javanese 

 civilisation was extended also to the people of Borneo. 



On Gunong Wa I noticed an ingenious way of utilising bamboos 

 in the construction of huts or temporary shelters in the jungle. The 

 big stems split in halves were not only used for the sides of the house, 

 but a very efficient roof was made by laying them alternately with 

 the convex and with the concave side upwards, with the edges over- 

 lapping. 1 Our tiled roofs have the same arrangement. Is it pos- 

 sible that they have originated from similar constructions in bamboo 

 used by our remote ancestors ? 



(t)n the top of Gunong Wa I was not able to collect many plants ; 

 most were trees and out of blossom. I noted, however, several 

 species of Quercus, and some very large specimens of Podocarpus 

 cupressina, R.B.\ and the Eugeissonia, which I had already found 

 on Mattang ; it-appears to love sandstone hills. But the best find 

 I made on this excursion was a. new J oinvillea (J. Bomeensis, Becc), 

 a plant which possesses the attributes both of the grasses and of the 

 palms, with a stem of the size of a slender reed six or eight feet high, 

 and with elongated and folded leaves. Of the genus Joinvillea 

 only two others are known besides this species, one from the Sand- 

 wich Islands, the other from Fiji. All three are very similar, but 

 the Bornean one is more akin to that from Fiji, from which it only 

 differs in minute characters of the flower. The discovery of this 

 plant on Gunong Wa is very singular on account of the enormous 

 distance which separates it from the allied species. It is not un- 

 likely that the Joinvilleas were formerly plants of far wider diffusion, 

 and that some special cause has destroyed them in intermediate 

 localities. 



One of the more important additions to my collection on this 

 occasion was also a new species of parasitical plant, a Balanophora, 

 with the aspect of a mushroom, which I have named B. reflexa. 



I had decided to go back to Pankalan Ampat on November 

 20th, but the Orang Kaya (headman of the village) invited me 

 to stay, for on that day one of the great annual fetes of the Dyaks 

 was to be solemnised in the village. 



From early dawn preparations for a grand banquet had been 

 going on on the platform which projected from the covered part 

 of one of the biggest houses. On one side of this platform about 

 a dozen gongs hung from a horizontal pole. This was the orchestra, 

 whose harmony was to enliven the banquet. On large banana 

 leaves, which acted as tablecloths, were placed the dishes, consist- 



1 The roofs of the huts of the Kachin in Tenasserim are made in precisely 

 the same way (cf. Fed, Op. tit., p. 382). 



I2S 



