Ch. IV.] CHAEACTEE OF THE COAST. 59 



upon whicli people could be seen walking, or sometimes 

 sitting in groups to watch us ; nets hangiQg up, with here 

 and there a long, low hut; and after dark, a number of 

 lights, having all the appearance of a row of gas lamps. 

 Along all this low coast a singular aerial misty effect was 

 observable, which appeared to arise from a lagoon behind the 

 sandy beach. Everything seemed enlarged ; men, passing 

 by, seemed " as trees walking ; " little villages appeared like 

 large towns of stone houses, until we approached nearer, 

 when they dwindled down to mere collections of huts. It 

 was a kind of mirage arising from irregular refraction. In 

 Gilim Bay 30 junks lay at anchor. 



The only place where hills approach tliis coast is in 

 lat. 24° 15', where long sloping shores, highly cultivated, 

 thickly populated, and dotted with numerous villages, skirt 

 the ranges of high hills rising about two or three miles 

 inland, which are often intersected by horizontal valleys of 

 denudation, affording long and pretty vistas ; the lofty 

 moimtains of the Morrison range affording a picturesque 

 background to the whole. As we were passing this part of 

 the coast towards evening, the cabin table became covered 

 with small water-boatmen (Notonectae, of the restricted genus 

 Corixa), freshwater insects, which must either have made an 

 unwonted flight out to sea, or have been washed off the 

 land by the embouchure of some river which here joined the 

 channel. They flew about the cabin and round the lamp 

 like moths, and having placed some in a basin of salt water 

 which happened to be upon the table, they swam merrily ; 

 but they were aU dead in the morning. It had been a 

 beautiful calm day, but in the evening a breeze sprung up 

 along the coast. 



At early morning on May 18th we were off the harbour of 



