m THE EASTSm ABCEIPEIAQO, 175 



sea, led me across as pretty and picturesque a piece of country 

 as one could wish to travel tli rough, windiuf; nmnd the head of 

 deep gleiis, with occasional gorges to riglit and left which have 

 left only three feet of ridge- path between them, and along the 

 face of forest-elad precipices, hunilreds of feet deep below 

 which flowed hidden streams whose murmur bubbled up from 

 among the trees as a pleasant music. In descending from the 

 plateau I found at about 2rjO0 feet, growing in sandy soil where 

 it seems best to flourish, several stems of the giant arum 

 {AmorpJwphallm titanum) one of the largest known herbs. The 

 biggest of these specimens measured seventeen feet in height. 



Descending from the northern face of the plateaii, I was met 

 by the chief and under-chiefe of the marga, at some distance 

 from the village of Sukau, where I was to spend the night; 

 and at the boundary of the village I was greeted by a crowd 

 of the inhabitants and a band consisting of three youths — one ' 

 in the middle fingered a Ante which he had newly cut from a 

 bamboo, the two others each beat ^ snuill bronze gong both ' 

 of them cracked, which they carried in one hand susjiended 

 before them by a cord, tinkling it with a short twig in the 

 other — who played me to the Bahii to the notes perhaps (tf 

 their margal anthem- Providentially the stateliness of the 

 occasion made conversation wit of |>lace, otherwise, had it been 

 necessary to open my compressed lips, I would have shocked the 

 fathers of the people by the heartiness of my mirth, for never have 

 I taken part in so ludicrous a procession with so solemn a 

 countenance. Consider its composition : the musical advance- 

 guard as 1 have described ; the central figure under a hat as big 

 as an nmbrella, in garments the worse of repeated cooflicts with 

 the thorns and thickets of the forest, seated on a small steed 

 caparisoned in a bridle with more knotted cords than leather 

 in its eomp<]sition and in a saddle that required every artful 

 device to keep it from falling to pieces, his long, great-booted 

 legs almost trailing on the ground ; alongside on either hand 

 the mute chiefs in duly solemn countenances, followed by a 

 rear-guard of coolies with baggage, and the general crowd 

 of men, women and children— and who would not have desired 

 to relieve his twitching pent-up risorlns muscles ? 



Next morning I continued my way towards the Lake Eanau, 

 and at the marches of the Kroe and Palembang Eesidencies, 



