MY nOME IN THE POBKST. 



m 



no desiie myself to try the flavor of such questiona- 

 ble meat. A small path, leading a mile through the 

 forest, brought me out on to a large open field or 

 praiiie, covered with a coarse grass as high as a man's 

 shouldera Beyond this was another forest, and 

 there I informed was a settlement of two or 

 tlu^ee houses, the farthest place inland inhabited by 

 any of the coast people or common Malays. Beyond 

 that' point there is not the slightest footpath. All 

 the hills and High mountains, which I could see tow- 

 ard the interior of the island, are covered with one 

 dense, unbroken forest, and only on some of the lower 

 hUls, bordering the bay, ai'e there open areas of 

 gi'asa. What a nice thing it would be to live out 

 there for a week in the midst of that forest I My 

 mind was made up to do it, I returned and ex- 

 plained my plan to the controhiir, and the nest day 

 we set off to hii-e one of the distant huts. The far- 

 thest oue from Kayuli, and exactly the one I wanted, 

 chanced to be unoccupied, for the native who owneil 

 it had found the place so lonely that he had deserted 

 it and taken up his abode in the village. The rent 

 for a week was agi-eed to without much parle}^ng. 

 The owner fin'ther agreed to send his son to bring 

 water and keep house while I and my hunter were 

 away, and to be generally useful, which he inter- 

 preted to mean that he would only do what he could 

 not avoid. Another man was engaged as cook, and 

 my domestic arrangements were complete, for I pur- 

 posed not only to live in a native house, but to con- 

 form entirely to the Malay mdaim. Our eooking- 

 appiiratns consisted of a couple of shallow kcttlesj 



