FASCICULI MALATENSES 
xxviii 
discovery in an accessible position of a flowering shrub which attracted enormous 
numbers of beetles and other insects not elsewhere obtained, and, secondly, 
the arrival of the High Commissioner with a large train of elephants, which 
were followed or accompanied by some interesting beetles of the genus Helmopris. 
The situation of the house in which we stayed, in an open space surrounded by 
orchards, proved attractive to moths, of which large numbers were taken round 
our lamp in the evenings. Several species of Diptera belonging to the family 
Celyphtdae were collected, together with a Phytophagous beetle which some of 
them resembled very closely, as well as a number of ant-like spiders {Attidae\ 
in some cases with their specific * models/ 
On each occasion we came to Biserat by boat from Patani—a dull and 
tiresome two days’ journey, for the boat, a large flat-bottomed punt with a 
low-roofed cabin amidships, a small kitchen behind and a sloping platform for 
the polers in front, kept constantly sticking on a snag or sand bank. The 
river is so shallow and the currents are so variable that no steersman can know 
it intimately from one month to the next. The country on both banks is 
tame, covered with a succession of Malay and Siamese villages, which are 
separated from one another by patches of secondary growth and clumps of 
bamboo. The only interesting feature of the journey is the Sungei Bharu or 
* New River/ a canal cut across a bend of the river by a late raja of Patani, 
who wished at one stroke to shorten the journey from the interior to his 
capital, to bring more water into the river which reached the sea through his 
territory, and to deprive the governor of Nawngchik of the revenue accruing 
to him through the passage of goods through his state. All of this the canal 
has performed satisfactorily, 1 and it is a good instance of what can be affected in 
engineering by sheer force of numbers of workmen, though, of course, no great 
difficulty had to be surmounted in its construction. It is about six miles long, 
broad enough for two house-boats to pass one another with some difficulty, 
and very fairly straight. 
Bayu. A village of indigenous Siamese about two miles from Biserat, 
from which it is separated by a stretch of level ground and then by Bukit 
Bayu, The village is surrounded with large orchards, especially of durian 
trees, which prove most attractive to the giant squirrel, Ratufa bicohr , when 
in fruit. It is separated from a considerable Buddhist monastery by a winding 
lake which occupies the hollow at the base of the cliff, immediately below 
which the monastery buildings have been erected. The monks have charge 
of a cave a little above their residence in which, about a century ago, a Chinese 
governor of Senggora on tour through the Seven Provinces caused a colossal 
recumbent statue of Buddha to be built. Since then many cither figures of 
i. But the Siamese did not permit him to levy toll* at both end* of the canal, as he wished to do. 
