72 A NATUBALIST IN CELEBES ch.iv 



These ants ran up my arms, down my neck, up my 

 trousers, and in a short space of time no part of my body 

 was free from their sharp painful nips. An hour spent in 

 collecting orchids in the swamps made me as angry and 

 uncomfortable as two or three hours of ordinary forest 

 work, and the irritating thing about it was that Manuel, 

 who, no wonder, refused to help me in it, would stand aside 

 and grow gradually more cheerful and amused as my pains 

 and aches increased. By the time the rains commenced 

 I had a tolerably large collection of orchid bulbs to send 

 home, but they were neglected when I fell ill in December, 

 and had finally to be thrown away, as they had become 

 quite useless for transport to Europe. 



The plantations of Tahsse were mainly, as I have said 

 above, plantations of coco-nut palms. 



Coffee and cocoa had been tried, but, with the exception 

 of one or two small patches at the foot of the hills, the soil 

 was not sufficiently favourable to raise a paying crop. 



The first process necessary for the formation of a coco- 

 nut plantation is the destruction of the primitive forest. 

 Strips of forest are selected, about two or three hundred 

 yards broad, stretching from the crest of the hill to the sea- 

 shore. The wild trees are then ringed by the coohes, with 

 a kind of hatchet knife, and when the leaves are withered, 

 and a favourable breeze is blowing, the forest is fired. The 

 dried trees burn for about a week, the subterranean roots 

 sometimes remaining glowing for months after the fire is 

 apparently extinguished. The strip thus cleared in the 

 dry season is left until the end of the rains, and then the 

 young coco-nuts are planted. 



The coco-nuts are imported from the mainland or from 

 Sangir in the autumn ; a small piece of the outer husk is 

 chopped off with a hatchet to allow the plumule to protrude, 

 and then they are arranged in rows under the opzichter's 



