AV TIMOR. 



453 



ma^ificent view lay before m of an inmciiflo tj^ct of country 

 between both seas, riven und ploughed up in the must gigantie 

 manner, not an acre of level land being visible anywhere save 

 by the margin of the seas, and in which every isolated peak 

 and erug was capped by a dwelling. Having halted a short 

 time to survey the scene, I observed tJiat the sky was becoming 

 overcast, and gave orders to the men to move on briskly in 

 advance, as I feared it would rain. My boy turned sharply 

 and besought me, Ob, master, do not Siiy that word ! " (for 

 rain) ; " these mouuUiius are not good, and if you say that 

 word here, we shall certainly be overtaken in a storm," The 

 incident recalled to nie a like dread of certain mountiiin-tops 

 exhibited by the natives in Buru. 



Hence our course lay almost dne south right over the peak 

 of Taliaolat — rising up to 60U0 feet; but its impracticable 

 crags necessitated our making a descent of "2000 feet by a 

 spiiid track round half its girth, in the face of an almost 

 perpendicular slope, from which radiated many deep and in- 

 accessible ravines, clothed, 1 could perceive, witli a dense and 

 interesting vegetation of LauHnimt Ericacem and numerous 

 small epidendric orchids and Lyeopods. 



Where the spur of Tahaolat commenced to rise towards 

 Mount Ailor — 4200 feet — I rode close past a pond full of d ticks 

 of the species Tadorna rajah, whose very tameness and utter 

 disregard of us might have told me, even if I had not been 

 carefaJIy warned, that they were on LnU ground, where I dare 

 not shoot ; even the scarlet ahjm covering the surface of the 

 water, it was sacrilege to touch. A lung and gradual descent 

 brought us at lust to the Rajah*s of Bibi^n^u, where we were 

 assigned a guarda on a windy bluff at 3200 feet above the sea, 

 commanding a view uf the whule country along the southern 

 coast from beyond Cape Luca in the east to far past Alias in 

 the west, its low littoral grooved by broud blue-black river-beds 

 margined with c^isuariuas. Within the neighWuring kingdom 

 of Manufahi the Peak of Kabalaki, with its rugged battle- 

 ments and beetling crags, reared its majestic summit over 

 10,000 feet into the air. The whole region was hewed up into 

 narrower and more precipitous valleys than any I had yet 

 traversed — features awesome and im|)osing, but with little to 

 commend them to a kindly place in the affections. 



