162 A NATURALIST'S WANDElilNOS 



difficult one than I had anticipated. I could find nobody to 

 accompany me who had ever traversed the road before, or 

 who could give me the least information as to the distance 

 between their own last village and Batu-brah, the nearest in 

 the Kroe district. The road at its commencement lay along 

 the triangular plain occupying the cleft where the Barisau 

 Mountains branch to form the eastern and western boundaries 

 of the bay. Eeaching in the afternoon the village of Sangi, 

 at the confluence of the Samung with the Semangka, I en- 

 camped for the night in its Balai. 



Next morning, crossing the Samung in small prahus, accom- 

 panied by twenty-five porters I proceeded along the eastern 

 bank of the Semangka. As its stream, where at length the 

 path crossed to the opposite side, was running with a very swift 

 current and was nearly six feet deep, a difficult obstacle was 

 presented to our progress. An hour was lost in building a raft, 

 and a second in transporting the baggage. As the last pack- 

 ages, luckily for us, were being brought over rain began to fall, 

 and within an hour of its commencement it would have been 

 impossible to have crossed. The river runs between hills 

 which for fifty miles rise very abruptly from its banks, and aug- 

 mented by contributory streams rushing down steep, boulder- 

 studded slopes, it swells with great suddenness. Over these 

 violent side-torrents every bundle had to be transported by 

 many carriers, each holding it by one hand, and steadying 

 himself by grasping his neighbour with the other. In this 

 operation several narrow escapes occurred; for, once losing 

 foothold, no human aid could have prevented one from being 

 swept into the main stream, boiling and roaring past in some 

 places 150 feet below us, and often thirty yards in breadth. 



The track was of the worst character possible, being ob- 

 structed by fallen trees and huge blocks of stone, and in many 

 places obliterated by landslips, and often, where the distance 

 between the trees was not sufficiently wide to admit between 

 them the larger packages, a halt had to be made for the 

 obstructing stems to be felled. Our intended halt for the 

 night was a forest hut ; but none of my convoy knew where or 

 how far distant it was, if it existed at all. As the day wore on 

 I became very anxious, for tigers abounded, and we had been 

 crossing and following the fresh tracks of a herd of elephants 



