it was a bad collecting ground generally. The only steed
I could obtain was a large black bull, which I hired for a
bundle of tobacco. He was all right when I had fairly
mounted, but whenever I got off to shoot at a bird, or
gather plants, he became exceedingly restive, and the
only way to mount him again was to put the rope (by
which I steered him, and which was fastened to a twisted
ring of rattan cane in his nose) round the trunk or branch
of a tree, and then to pull his nose up to it by sheer
force, holding it firmly with one hand while I sprang on
his back. The few country people I met appeared
rather surprised, but I expect the bull was well known,
and so that served as a passport to me. Near the houses
on the shore a bushy euphorbia, with candelabra-like
branches, and a clump of yuccas were seen, both doubtless
introductions. I returned about three o’clock. After
dinner I and Captain Cowie visited one or two of the
traders’ houses, which resemble those of Sulu in internal
arrangement, large beds or platforms occupying the principal
apartment, covered with fine mats and pillows, the
valuables in boxes being piled up behind. In the morning
we bore away for Sandakan, which we reached ere
daybreak the next day. The steam-ship America was in
the bay, having Baron de Overbeck on board. We
stayed here one day for cargo of trepang, rattan, pearl-
shell, and birds’-nests. These edible swallows’-nests are
highly valued by the rich Chinese, and it is from a cave
on the face of the sandstone rock on Pulo Bahalatolois,
at the mouth of this bay, that the finest white nests are
obtained. These rocks rise nearly perpendicularly from
the sea, and to reach the entrance to the cave a man has
to descend a distance of a hundred or more feet with the
aid of a rattan rope tied to a tree on the slope above. It
is dangerous work, as the least slip, and the man would
be dashed to pieces on the rock-strewn shore below.
The nests thus obtained fetch as much as eighteen
dollars per catty, a weight equalling 1J. lb. English. The
finest birds’-nests are clean and white, as if made ^ of
isinglass; the worst resemble dirty glue, to which
feathers and other impurities are attached, and between
these extremes there are all sorts of intermediate qualities.
These nests are obtained in rocky caves throughout
Borneo, Java, and Sumatra, but nowhere are they
obtainable finer in quality than here, at Sandakan Head.
Large quantities of small or seed pearls are obtained
here, also Bornean camphor, the produce of Dryobalanops
camphora, a large tree often one hundred to a hundred
and fifty feet in height. As a product, it is quite .distinct
from the common camphor of commerce, which is
obtained from Laurus camphora by the Chinese of Hong
Kong, who send nearly all of it to our markets, while
they, in their turn, highly esteem the Bornean produce,
and pay high prices for it. It is obtained in the form of
tears and crystallised lumps from the trunk of the tree,
and in general appearance is so like the finer kinds of
« dammar ” gum, that this latter is often used by the
collectors as an adulterant. The Chinese traders, however,
are rarely imposed upon. The camphor, in its
pure state, resembles solidified spirit, and being extremely
volatile, it burns with a clear light flame. To detect
adulteration, the Chinese are said to spread a little on a
white cloth and set it on fire; the pure camphor burns
cleanly, and does not soil the cloth, whereas the dammar,
if such is mixed with it, melts and sets the cloth on fire.
The people from the Teutong river, and the Kayans
on the Baram, collect large quantities of camphor and
caoutchouc, and prahus with a cargo of these products,
worth from one to two thousand dollars, visit Labuan,