A VISIT TO SELANGOK. 125 



to crocodiles. I shot five with my rifle, and five more were 

 caught for me by Malays and Chinamen by means of the well- 

 known rattan and bark-rope, with a stick tied in the middle 

 cross-wise at the end of the rope and sharpened at both ends. 

 The largest crocodile I obtained (crocodilus porosus) was 12 

 feet in length and weighed 415 pounds. Two others were 11 

 feet, and another 10J feet in length, and of the ten specimens 

 I prepared 4 skeletons, 4 skins, and 1 skull. 



Along this part of the coast the shore is very low, and 

 near the shore the sea is very shallow. For many years the 

 sea has been gradually eating away the shore-line, and under- 

 mining the cocoannt trees which grow close along the beach, 

 until now the beach is thickly strewn with fallen trunks. At 

 ebb tide the water recedes from the beach and leaves bare a 

 great mud flat, nearly a mile wide, which is so soft and miry 

 that it is almost impossible to effect a landing from the sea at 

 that time. 



Back from the beach for an unknown number of miles 

 extends a swampy wilderness inhabited nt present only by 

 wild beasts. Along the banks of the Sungei Bulu, I saw 

 where the high grass had been trampled down quite recently 

 by what must have been a large herd of wild elephants, and I 

 was told by the natives that wild cattle were plentiful in some 

 parts of the adjacent forest. 



\Vhile at Jerom I made daily trips to the Sungei Bulu for 

 crocodiles and whatever else I could find on the mud flats at 

 the mouth, which were always several feet above water when 

 the tide was out. In this vicinity I noticed a goodly number 

 of water-birds, notably a few pelicans, two species of ibis, a 

 small white egret, the stone plover, a booby, two terns, snipe, 

 sandpiper, &c. I often saw troops of the common kra (maca- 

 cus cynomolgns) wading about in the mud under the man- 

 groves, looking for food, and I easily shot several specimens. 

 We once surprised a fine kra zaya (kydrooannes salvator, 

 found also in Ceylon) on one of the mud banks, and my boy 

 immediately jumped out of the boat and gave chase. The mud 

 came quite to his knees and his progress was necessarily slow, 

 but the iguana fared even worse, a id after an exciting chase 

 of about 100 yards (time about 20 minutes ! ) the reptile was 

 overhauled and killed with a stick. It was a fine large speci- 

 men, measuring 6 feet 2 inches, 



