72 
SURVEY OF THE 1NTERTROPICAL 
isis. shallow well containing fresh water, which they 
April 7. had evidently taken the opportunity of our ab- 
sence to drink at. Upon further search we found 
their encampment ; it consisted of three or four 
dwellings of a very different description from any 
that we had before, or have since seen : they 
were of a conical shape, not more than three feet 
high, and not larger than would conveniently 
contain one person ; they were built of sticks, 
stuck in the ground, and being united at the top, 
supported a roof of bark, which was again 
covered with sand, so that the hut looked more 
like a sand-hillock than the abode of a human 
creature : the opening was at one side, and 
about eighteen inches in diameter ; but even this 
could be reduced when they were inside, by heap- 
ing the sand up before it. In one of the huts 
were found several strips of bamboo, and some 
fishing-nets, rudely made of the fibres of the 
bark of trees. 
Mr. Cunningham took the advantage of a good 
spot of soil in the vicinity of our wooding-place, 
to sow every sort of seed that we possessed, ©fe:, 
peach, apricot, loquat, (a Chinese fruit), lemon, 
seventeen sorts of culinary seeds, tobacco, roses, 
and a variety of other European plants ; and in 
addition to these, the cocoa-nut was planted, 
which we had found upon the beach of South- 
