dollars per picul, and the dried article fetches ten or
twelve cents per gantang. Their encampment of yellow
palm-leaf mats and hamboo poles formed a pretty rural
scene beneath the tall trees which overhung the yellow
sands, and the dusky limbs and faces, and the bright-
coloured “ sarongs ” worn by the women of the party,
added much to the picturesque view as seen beneath a
blue and cloudless sky. I and Mr. A. Cook visited the
oil springs, which are situated in a shady glade in the
forest two or three miles from the coal-mines. All the
evidence of the old borings we saw was an old door and
a rude trough, into which the oil-surfaced water rises as
it wells up slowly from the rocks below. No use is now
made of this oil, except by the Kadyans and other
natives, who utilise it now and then in the manufacture
of torches. The odour of the oil is distinctly perceptible
near the spring, and the oil itself covers the surface of
the little stream as it flows seawards. Before the spring
was reached we passed through an open clearing of a
hundred of acres or more covered with grass, on which a
few milch cattle belonging to some of the Kling residents
were grazing. We were surprised in one place to come
across an old garden, of several acres in extent, containing
mango, banana, and other fruit trees, with here and
there native huts, houses, and rice-barns all going to
decay. A Kadyan, who overtook us just before we
entered the forest, told us it was an old village belonging
to his tribe, adding that they had abandoned it after their
headman had died there. It is by no means unusual to
find localities abandoned in this way in Borneo owing to
the death of the principal man in the village, and when
the rotten old palm-thatched houses have been eaten up
by the luxuriant jungle which springs up around, the
fruit-trees prosper and serve to mark the localities of
former villages long after they themselves have vanished
for ever.
Here, as elsewhere in warm climates, the mosquito is
of all animals the smallest and most troublesome to the
weary traveller. Large moths flutter about the ceilings,
especially on cold wet nights, and insect life of many
kinds is attracted to the lamplight. In every house there
is a colony of lively little drab-coloured lizards. They
run very nimbly up the sides of the room and on the
ceiling, keeping a sharp look-out the while for their
supper of moths and flies. The Malays have a proverb,
<£ That even a lizard gives the fly time to pray.” This
has been derived from the peculiar manner in which this
tiny Saurian “ goes for ” its quarry. On seeing a fly it
darts at it swiftly, but when within an inch or two off it
suddenly stops itself and pauses several seconds ere the
fatal spring is made and the fly seized. Now and then
the lizards lose their hold of the ceiling and come on the
table with a “ flop,” but this is a rare occurrence. One
of the most common and interesting of the domestic
insects is the “ mason wasp,” a large yellow species
which constructs a series of mud cells or a gallery of
earth against the woodwork of the verandah or roof. In
each cell, as completed, an egg is deposited, and ere
closing up the cavity it is stuffed full of green caterpillars,
which are then sealed up alive to serve as food for her
larva when hatched out. The big black carpenter bees
are also often seen examining the woodwork of the house
or verandah, and on finding a piece in suitable condition
they bore a clean hole into it in which to deposit their
eggs. These two insects are highly interesting—a mason
and a carpenter—and both do “ worke moste excellently
well.” Native houses and gardens are dotted pretty
freely about the island, and there are some interesting