THE TAWARAN AND PUTATAN RIVERS. 265 



its confluence with the main river. The Sungei Damit is a 

 deep, sluggish stream shut in by high muddy banks. Here we 

 halted at the house of the Datus Bandara and Tumonggong — a 

 large, long structure of the ordinary Dusun barn-like type. A 

 sago extracting apparatus was set up on the river bank here, 

 in which product a moderate trade exists there. I had, enroute, 

 noticed cocoa-nut and areca palms, bananas, kelidi, and 

 paddy in profusion. The eountry is in fact very prosperoas, 

 iu despite of the ravages of the memorable flood of January, 

 1883, which was very destructive in the Tawaran district. 

 From the Datu Tumonggong's conversation, it appeared that a 

 tamu, or market, was held at a place two days' journey up 

 the Sungei Damit, to which the people of Kiau — the village on 

 the flanks of Kina Balu, visited by Messrs. Burbidge and 

 Spenser St. John at different times — -came down to trade. 

 The route was, however, at present closed, owing to a blood- 

 feud. 



Returning in the afternoon to Ibtj's house, we started, after 

 a light repast, for Tempeluri, a village some distance up the 

 Tawaran, reaching the house of a Datu Massudi at about 3 

 p.m. The Tawaran is here a fine rapid stream, bordered on its 

 true right bank by wooded hills, and on its left by level ground 

 well planted with cocoa-nuts, with paddy fields beyond, bound- 

 ed by hills in the back-ground. The height of the river ren- 

 dering it impossible for us to proceed to Bawang or Lokob, 

 we returned to our head-quarters in Ibu's house at the foot of 

 the hill of Tagerangan, after a tramp of altogether some 15 

 miles or more. In the evening a native of Kiau, named 

 Bungaran, arrived. This man, in the course of conversation, 

 declared that no man had ever yet reached the true summit of 

 Kina Balu, which, he asserted, is inaccessible from every 

 side when once a certain elevation has been reached, the re- 

 mainder of the ascent being sheer precipice. He added that 

 there is a Dusun legend to the effect that a deep lake exists 

 on the top. This is probably only a deduction on their part, 

 drawn from the existence of perennial cataracts dashing duwn 

 the topmost precipices, which form a magnificent feature in 

 the landscape on the Tawaran. 



The climate in the Tawaran valley is superb. At 5 a. m 



