June 14 , 1858 .] 
CRESPIGNY’S NOTES ON BORNEO. 
345 
erected by tbe Dusuns among the mountains were not so imper- 
vious to rain as they might have been. 
On October 16th I set out, in spite of the rain, on another expe- 
dition to the southward, with the intention of reaching, if possible, 
the Lake of Kinibalu ; but, although it was only five days’ walk, I 
found on the third day that the river was so swollen that the fords 
were impassable, and this, with the fact that three of my men were 
taken ill with diarrhoea, determined me to put off my visit, until a 
more favourable season, and content myself with gaining as much 
information as I could of the country in the vicinity. The name 
of the village where I was then stopping is Marak Parak, which 
contains about 300 inhabitants. It was with a sad heart that I 
turned my face again northwards towards Bongan, which place I 
reached in a few days, and on the 15th of November left the river 
and returned to Labuan. 
Having given as succinctly as possible an outline of my excur- 
sion, I now proceed to give you the information I gathered of the 
country, and its inhabitants. 
Geographically the two ranges of hills which enclose Maludu 
Bay enclose also a tract of country extending 23 miles to the south- 
ward and 19 or 20 in a longitudinal direction. This is an alluvial 
district of about 450 square miles, the soil a red earth, composed of 
detritus of sandstone with decomposed vegetable matter, very favour- 
able to the growth of palms. The Dusuns have a tradition of a time 
when the sea washed the foot of the mountains at Limbong Batu, 
where the delta of the Bongan may be said to have its apex. Into 
Maludu Bay flow no less than 15 rivers, of which the principal are, 
the Binkoka on the east, inhabited by Bajaus, where there is coal ; the 
Sugud, inhabited by Sulus ; the Bongan, the only one of any length, 
by Malays ; the Maludu, by Malays ; and the Tamiaru, exclusively 
by Dusuns. The banks of the other rivers are inhabited by Dusuns 
or Bajaus. The hills, which, rising at the extremity of each cape, 
gradually, as they approach the apex of the delta, gain an altitude 
of about 2500 feet, are composed of sandstone and shale, the ridges 
about 12 feet wide, the sides inclining at an angle of about 45°, in 
many cases very precipitous spurs of the mountains running out 
in all directions. From a height their appearance resembles the 
wash of the sea when the wind is against the tide, on a more ex- 
tensive scale — ridge rising above ridge, spurs of mountains fouling 
each other, the whole a heap of confusion. In the delta are two 
small lakes, one in the neighbourhood of Bongan, two fathoms 
deep, two miles long, and fifty or sixty, occasionally a hundred, 
yards broad when the rains have been unusually heavy. The other 
