AN ACCOUNT OF A JOURNEY ACROSS THE MALAY PENINSULA. 33 



offered great obstruction to our passage. Before entering 

 this footpath we noticed by the wayside a small clearing 

 covered with green grass and where probably had stood a rest- 

 house for travellers. After leaving the houses on the coast 

 we passed but one human habitation, some six miles inland — 

 the house of one of those men that live by the produce of the 

 jungle. Darkness w T as beginning to fall w T hen we emerged 

 from the ill-marked footpath on to a deeply rutted dray-path 

 that wound up the slopes of Khow Maun, and by the side of 

 this path we spread our kajangs, and spent the night. 



MOUNG SEE said the path before us was now free from all 

 obstruction, but as he had made the same statement every 

 morning for the last four days, and as we had found it utterly 

 false — for it had cost us an immense amount of labour to bring 

 the elephant that distance, owing to the obstruction offered by 

 the numerous low branches across the road — I went in front to 

 inspect the path, and at the shoulder of the hill found that it 

 was completely obliterated by the jungle. On the slope of 

 the hill the rains kept the road scoured, so that vegetation 

 could not spring up on it, but on the shoulder of the hill, the 

 soil being left at peace, was soon seized and grown over. 

 Sending the elephant and all superfluous baggage back, and 

 taking a waterproof coat, a blanket, a gun, rice and fish for 

 five days, as well as other things necessary for my business at 

 Mergui, NUAN, MOUNG See and I set out together. 



On the side of Khow Maun, along this dray-path, are many 

 shallow trenches running round the hill as if at one time an 

 army had encamped there. Just on the shoulder of the hill, a 

 few large spreading trees shelter a considerable expanse of 

 sward, whereon at one time stood a temple — a rest-house for 

 the overland travellers. Near by, in a ravine a little lower 

 down, is a well with excellent clear water, for all the streams 

 were dry, and we had been drinking from the buffalo pools, 

 which the natives held drinkable if there was no marked odour, 

 so that this water was very welcome. The country here is 

 granitic, full of deep narrow ravines, and here and there we 

 saw the deep cuttings that had been made to carry the old 

 road through them. 



