THE TAWARAN AND PUTATAN RIVERS. 269 



comparative cleanliness of the bulk of the houses. Instead 

 of the objectionable split nibong, the floors are made of 

 beaten out bamboo, the walls, of the same material, neatly 

 plaited, chess-board pattern. There are regular sleeping 

 compartments, and a fine broad verandah runs from end to 

 end of the house along the front of it. Our beds were 

 arranged in the main body of the house, a fine lofty, airy 

 apartment where dirt and mosquitoes were equally conspicu- 

 ous by their absence. We noticed as a curious fact in these 

 Dusuns, that they made use, in talking, of the letter Z, which 

 would seem to point to their affinity to the Milanaus of 

 Sarawak. 



An early start on the ensuing morning brought us, after a 

 seven-mile tramp, among the foot-hills of the coast range. 

 We were here some twelve miles, or more, inland. On our 

 way we passed the debouchure of the river Sugut, which 

 joins the Putatan on its proper left bank, and further up, on 

 the opposite side, the confluence of the Pagunan river, which 

 is the true Putatan, the river bearing that name from this 

 point, which we followed up, being in reality only a small 

 tributary stream flowing from S.E. Pursuing our way up 

 the valley of the latter, we reached our destination, a house 

 at the foot of the hills, tenanted by an old Chinaman and his 

 Dusun wife and daughter. We were here beyond the limits 

 of the highly cultivated Putatan valley, and in a lovely coun- 

 try, at the point where the district of the Dusuns of the 

 plain, marches with that of the Orang Tag as, or Hill 

 Dusuns. The Putatan valley is, without exception, the finest 

 and most highly cultivated district in North Borneo. With- 

 out visiting it, it would be difficult for any one, accustomed 

 only to such cultivation, or the lack of it, as is met with in 

 other parts of North Borneo, to realize that, side by side 

 with such districts, there exists one in which rice cultivation 

 has been carried to the highest pitch of perfection, where every 

 foot of soil is tilled, where substantial, and in many cases orna- 

 mental, land-marks of wood and stone have been erected all over 

 the face of the country, and where the price of land ranges from 

 $40 an acre or thereabouts. This country must be the gra- 

 nary of Brunei. The acreage of paddy is immense. One 



