208 ITS SCENERY. 



trees at intervals, and others arching over the 

 stream, their branches nearly touching the water. 

 Gigantic chmbers hung down in long festoons 

 passing from branch to branch, and the more aged 

 trunks supported clumps of ferns and parasitical 

 plants. Here and there an areca palm shot up its 

 slender stem surmounted by a cluster of pale-green 

 feathery leaves, or the attention was arrested for a 

 moment by a magnificent pandanus— its trunk 

 raised high above the ground by the enormous 

 supporting root-hke shoots,— or some graceful tree- 

 fern with dark widely-spreading foliage exceeding 

 in delicacy the finest lace. 



Meanwhile the creek had slightly narrowed, the 

 dead trees in the water became more frequent and 

 troublesome, and the thickets on the banks encroached 

 more and more upon the channel so as not to allow 

 room for the oars to pass, obliging the men to use 

 them as poles. At every turn in the windings of 

 the stream (still too brackish to be fit to drink) some 

 beautiful glimpse of jungle scenery presented itself 

 as we passed upwards— long vistas and stray bursts 

 of sunshine alternating with the gloomy shadows of 

 the surrounding woods. A deep silence pervaded 

 the banks of this water never before visited by 

 civiHzed man, its monotony broken only by the 

 occasional brief word of command, the splash of 

 the oars, or the shrill notes of some passing flights 

 of parrots. The river, for now it might fairly he 

 called onej retained the same character until we had 



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