Sun-birds Enliven the Scenery. 
345 
find an advocate in any European. While making these reflections I was 
startled by the wild screams of several children who up to now had been 
squatting at play in front of the entrance of the next house. Immediately 
above them a large snake was just creeping out of the thickly-thatched 
palm-frond roof, but an arrow, let fly by an Indian, prevented its escape 
into the savannah : it was the harmless and very beautifully marked 
Tiger-snake ( Coluber pantherinus Daud.), the only specimen that I saw 
during the whole course of my journey. 
935. Peeping into one of the remaining small houses that stood by 
itself apart, I was led to believe that it must be the laboratory of the 
poison-maker. Large pots, funnels made of husks of palm-blossom, 
roundly hollowed'out logs that probably served as mortars, heaps of 
dried bark and bundles of two to three foot long pieces of wood were all 
indications that my supposition was correct. 
936. When the old poisonimaker saw my “trade,” he promised to 
boil the poison in my presence when we got back if I would give Mm some 
knives in return. 
937. With earliest dawn we took our departure for Ilamikipang. 
After crossing the one-hour wide dense forest border stretching from the 
base of the mountain into the savannah, we reached the forest itself. 
This consisted for the most part of palms, Musaceae , Zingiberaceae, 
Aroideae, ferns and razor-grasses. Here also the guide showed me still 
on the bushes the spots where he had lopped the twigs off with his knife 
when accompanying my brother on the ascent of the mountain five years 
before. 
938. The rocky bed of a small torrent was our path : another would 
have been impossible, because the confusion of rock and rubble was such 
as if they seemed to have made a regular home for themselves. Boulder 
towered on top of boulder, the one always greater and more massive than 
the other: indeed, some which we ourselves had to get round in the river 
bed were at least 50 feet high. 
939. These rocks unexpectedly presented quite a pleasing prospect 
because a number of glorious sun-birds ( Eurypyga Hellas), which had 
chosen them as hunting grounds for flies and other insects, were to be 
seen coquettishly strutting about, while the little torrent was now 
lightly rippling on its way, and now again gushing in wild delight over 
the smaller or larger boulders as it hurried down to the more tranquil 
plain. It almost babbled over the smooth level of the granite slab on 
which we stood, then suddenly vanished and just as quickly sparkled out 
again in places where it was least expected. These innumerable cascades 
and miniature waterfalls, this everlasting rippling, swishing and 
splashing of the falling waters, enhanced the weirdness of the scenery 
to such a degree that the difficulties of the climb, every step of which 
proved a source of danger owing to the slippery surface to be traversed, 
remained quite unnoticed by me. But with what ease and how nimbly 
did my companions surmount these obstacles! They climbed the 
boulders as if their feet stepped on stairs. I often had to stop in 
surprise for, on seeing my companions disappear with such rapidity 
behind and between the rocks, and emerge again just as suddenly on 
their tops, I could not but believe that mountain-sprites were disporting 
