m TIMOR. 



461 



I retained the porters and horaea to coEvey me next day to 

 Siiliikl, tm the nther side of the valley r»f the ^lakalaha, where 

 I had armiiged to go, not without great disappointment; for 

 every day then would be taking me farther from Kabalaki 

 in the Mauufahi kingdom, which I had wistfully gazed at 

 so long, and whose summit must support a flora the most 

 interesting of all Eastern Timor. My Hindu guide, however, 

 refused tho Tespousibility of conducting me thither, nut only 

 because of the Lamkito robbers who skulk in the long grasa 

 at its base to pick off and rob all pissers by, but also because 

 war was on the eve of breaking out betv^een the two king- 

 doms, which would prevent any Bibipufu man from accom- 

 panying us. 



In leaving Bibi^ncu I made a detour from the shortest 

 way, attended by a Idgh official of the kingdom, to the bed 

 of the Makalaha, which was reached by a steep winding 

 descent of lOOQ feot, as I was very anxious to see the weekly 

 market of t'he district, which was held under the Casuarina 

 trees there. 



As soon as my apprtmch was observed a loud screaming 

 from the women and children spread an alarm resulting in a 

 stampede of the entire concourse. The officer accompanying 

 me dashed among them, shouting and reassuring them that I 

 was only passing by, and was in no way going to meddle with 

 them, ateantimo I had sat down under the shade to place 

 in paper the plants I had gathered on the way down, with* 

 out lifting my eyes toward them, and as quite unconscious 

 of their presence there. By slow degrees, first one, then 

 another and anotiier, enticed like so many monkeys by 

 curiosity, crept in about to see the, to them, «trange perform- 

 ance, and as I differed little from an ordinary human being 

 they forgot their fright, and in a little while the market was 

 proceeding in its accustomed way, through which I then 

 strolled quietly with open and interested eyes. 



There were between two and three hundred people congre- 

 gated—a wild and savage-like crowd. The men were dressed 

 in little more tiian the ordinary T-bandage or hahpoUM of 

 native make, about their loins ; some, but not all, of them 

 had a kerchief girt about the head, while their hair was 

 twisted into a knot ou tlie top m" back of the head, or combed 



