78 VOYAGE FROM INDIA TO SIAM AND MALACCA 



one was much more liquid. 



He told me moreover that on the coast of Padri, in Suma- 

 tra, g-old was hewn from the steep mountains by means of small 

 instruments, and that there were often medium sized grains to 

 be found, rarer real nuggets. He showed me one nugget which 

 was of the weight of eighteen Spanish Dollars. The mountain 

 range where this gold was found was called Laboh, and lay 

 about three days' journey inland. The people living near there 

 were mostly uncivilised, and at times pay for opium with equal 

 weights of gold. 



21. — Early in the morning I made preparations to go to 

 Tarnah in the afternoon, and then I went for a short time to 

 Pullu Jambu. I lost my way a little and found a kind of grass 

 climbing on the trees. The leaves and stem were so completely 

 like those of the bamboo, that I first thought it to be this kind, 

 specially as it also crept along on the ground and grew erect in 

 other places. I did not see one among many hundreds bigger 

 than my little finger. I also saw a Panicle, the blossoms of which 

 however had all dropped, but eventually I found many ends of 

 this plant hanging down from the trees. The stalk was joined 

 and rough on the surface. Inside it was woody, and hollow in 

 the middle. The joints were about one foot long, and near the 

 end several branches grew out of the points; there were only 

 a few leaves at the end of these branches. 



I found another tree resembling the rotan, with a fascicle 

 of fruits, the spadices of which were bright red. The fruits 

 were oval, oblong, smooth, ressile and fltshy inside; they were 

 of a beautiful blood red colour, and were twice as big as the 

 ordinary sized quills. The fleshy part encloses the kernel with a 

 layer of prickly stiff fibres, which were rather loose at the top 

 part. The kernel consisted of an oblong nut, which was exact- 

 ly like an nut when cut, and contained some red juice, which 

 dyes the linen red when brought in contact with it. Soon after 

 one of my people brought me the male blossom, which had 

 the spathe; it was oblong, bicarinate, membranaceous, white, 

 simple. The blossoms were sessile on the beautiful carmine-red 

 spadi and consisted, like those of the Betelnut, of three semi- 

 orbicular sepals. The corolla consisted of three oblong petals; 

 this blossom was bright red in all its parts. The stamens of 

 this blossom were not quite distinguishable because it was still 



