A8 EXPEDITION INTO INTERIOR OF SUMATRA. 
the coolies, we were accompanied by the two guides who had 
conducted the exploring parties, and by the Touankou of 
Dourian Taroung, an intelligent chief, with two of his followers. 
Kach skouls carried 8 chapaks (4-3 kil.) of rice, whilst the 
two guides and the chiet’s followers carried between them 
AO chupaks. Besides rice, each had to carry a part of the 
baggage necessary for such a long stay in the junele: firstly, 
our camp-beds, aud klambous, or mosquito curtains, articles not 
less indispensable than a change of clothes in case of rain; 
some simple cooking utensils, and some tinned provisions, to 
afford a change in our principal diet, viz., rice; these 
constituted our equipment, together with the other part of 
our baggage, consisting of instruments for making geo- 
eraphical and atmospheric observations, whilst those neces- 
sary for the collection of plants and animals were not wanting, 
and finally 2 chairs and some guns and ammunition completed 
the whole. Hvery portion of our baggage was carefully wrapped 
up in tarpaulins, which, fastened together, served as a roof for 
our shelter at night. Clad in the simple dress suitable for a 
wandering life in fnOee wild regions, we set out, and our 
first task was to clear a path with our wood-knives for the 
koulis. 'Lhese carriers, he in Sumatra, are accustomed to 
carrying their burdens on their heads, would never have been 
able to get along in the small space sufficient for persons not 
laden, and would have been liable every moment to get caught 
in the hanes and thorny branches spreading out in every 
direction overhead, if the euides had not formed a regular 
bed, so to speak, for the long line of koulis following 
them. We-were soon obliged “to quit the path on ae- 
count of the unfavourable nature of the eround, and 
to continue our march aloi ag the bed of a river, a change 
which considerably diminish red our speed and compelled 
our koulis to drop a lone distance behind. When we 
left the water to take again to dry land, our first care, while 
waiting for the houwlis to rejoin us, was to look around to 
see it there was anything worth carrying off. We perceived 
an object which we were farfrom expecting to find in such a 
place, namely a humanskull, which pr ‘ojecting out of the water 
was gazing if us with hollow or bjts. Approaching, we dis- 
covered the thigh bones belong ae to the same individual, 
