16 GUNONG TAHAN AND GUNO NG RI/M. — 
Rambutan and found nothing whatever ready. I then had to 
make my own arrangements, and having heard, fortunately, that 
e'ephants could go but a short part of the way, looked out for a 
suide and men only. Five days later a heavy fee had secured a 
guide, who lett his work to accommodate me, and six Malays to 
carry baggage, including a small tent. Hverything was ready by 8 
a.m. and having already committed one foolish mistake by putting 
my trust in a Penghulu, I proceeded to make another by allowing 
the six men to go by a so-called short cut over a hill, while Midin, 
the guide, and myself, with a Chinese boy and a Malay employee, 
took the regular route up the Kinta River. We were to camp that 
night near Kuala Termin, a short march but a recognized halting- 
place, like the first camp on the way to Tahan. Never shall I 
forget that day. The detiils would be painful to relate : suffice it to 
say that after waiting four hours for the men to emerge from their 
’ short-cut,” I found them cooking rice by the side of the Kinta 
River, and, of course, complaining about the weight of the baggage. 
The rice was not eaten. After this experience I displayed a 
fondness for the society of these Malays that surprised them, and 
they were always in front of me until the last day of the descent. 
One of these gentlemen appears in Fig. 1 of Plate [V. The size of 
the bundle he is carrying is worth nothing. He was an ex-police man, 
I was not surprised to hear it. 
The camp near Kuala Termin was only about 700 feet ahove 
Tanjong Rambutan and situated on the right bank of the Kinta 
River. Midin was expecting some Senoi men to join us there and 
had asked me to bring tobacco and rice to give to them as pay. 
The Senoi, five of them, were there on our arrival, and helped them- 
selves liberally to the articles mentioned and then went home. The 
necessity of six Malays and five Senoi had not dawned on me when 
this happened, but nevertheless the conduct of these men, whom we 
never saw again, and could not trace to their houses, seemed repre- 
hensible. However, by the following morning Midin had caught 
three others, and we set out up the Termin a party of thirteen. 
The Malays, as usual, when Senoi men are with them, made the 
latter carry the greater part of the baggage. It was as well, because 
if I had had-the Malays only we would never have arrived at the 
top. . 
On the second day we passed by a Chinese tin-stealers’ kongsi, 
and then rose to 2,900 feet above Tanjong Rambutan, camping by 
the Batu Salik, a huge mass of granite with a small gully close by 
wherein is the cross erected in memory of J. A. A. Williams, who 
had ascended the mountain and died from fever on that spot in 
1892. _The march to Batu Salik was another short march, and on 
the following day I had the prospect of getting the men up the 
remaining four thousand odd feet in one march. It does not sound 
difficult of accomplishment, but anyone who had seen my Malays ~ 
would have understood my anxiety. . We started at 8 a.m. and I 
arranged that the men were to climb five hundred feet at a time 
Jour. Straits Branch 
