126 A VISIT TO BELANGOfc. 



At the mouth of the Sungei Bulu there is a temporary 

 Chinese village inhabited by about forty Chinamen engaged in 

 catching* prawns on the flats and making them into blachang. 

 The village is dirty beyond description, and smells even worse, 

 if possible, than the market for dried fish in Singapore. 



While at Jerom, a fine otter {Intra Uptonyx?) was 

 brought to me by a Malay, and a Chinese fisherman caught a 

 a spiny-backed, ray (urogymnus asperrimusj, the largest 

 specimen I ever saw of that species; the body measuring 3 feet 

 in length. I noticed a number of old skins of the same ray 

 lying about the village, all of which were of large size, so it 

 seems this species must be quite common on this coast. 



After spending a fortnight at Jerom very profitably I re- 

 turned to Klang and prepared to 'make a trip into the interior 

 in quest of large mammals. To my intense satisfaction, Mr. 

 Sy-ers obtained fourteen days' leave of absence and prepared to 

 accompany me. Our main object was to find rhinoceros, and, if 

 possible, kill one or two for their skins and skeletons. 



We left Klang on the evening of June 26bh, and proceeded 

 up the river 18 miles by boat to Damasara, arriving there the 

 same night. Early the next morning we set. out for Kwala, 

 Lumpor, a large town 17 miles to the East of Damasara, in 

 the centre of the tin-mining district. A good carriage road is 

 being constructed from Damasara to Kwala Lumpor, but at 

 that time was completed for only about 12 miles, so that the 

 remainder of the journey, which lay through dense forest and 

 over very uneven and hilly ground, our baggage had to be 

 carried by coolies. Fortunately for us, Captain Douglas had 

 very kindly arranged that our baggage should be carried by 

 Government coolies, or we should have been entirely at the 

 mercy of the natives, who would probably have charged us 15 

 to 20 cents per kati for the trip, as they often do. The road, 

 now nearly completed, will undoubtedly be of the greatest im- 

 portance both in developing the adjacent country and insuring 

 the preservation of order. The Malays of the interior can no 

 longer feel secure from the Klang Government, because of the 

 former difficulty of conducting military operations against 

 them, for, in my opinion, the making of good roads is the sub- 

 jugation of Malays. The Damasara road is cut through the 

 densest high forest I have seen in this part of the world, the 

 trees being, as a rule, very lofty, of good diameter, and standing 

 thickly together. The undergrowth is also very dense, com- 



