to water, and the whole box is neat, strong, and well
finished. They are made from a few inches to two or
three feet long, and being much esteemed by the Malays
as clothes-boxes, are a regular article of export from Aru.
The natives use the smaller ones for tobacco or betel-nut,
but seldom have clothes enough to require the larger ones,
which are only made for sale.
Among the domestic animals which may generally be
seen in native houses, are gaudy parrots, green, red, and
blue, a few domestic fowls, which have baskets hung for
them to lay in under the eaves, and who sleep on the
ridge, and several half-starved wolfish-looking dogs. Instead
of rats and mice there are curious little marsupial
animals about the same size, which run about at night and
nibble anything eatable that may be left uncovered. Four
or five different kinds of ants attack everything not
isolated by water, and one kind even swims across th a t;
great spiders lurk in baskets and boxes, or hide in the folds
of my mosquito curtain; centipedes and millepedes are
found everywhere. I have caught them under my pillow
and on my head; while in every box, and under every
board which has lain for some days undisturbed, little
scorpions are sure to be found snugly ensconced, with their
formidable tails quickly turned up ready for attack or
defence. Such companions seem very alarming and dangerous,
but all combined are not so bad as the irritation
of mosquitoes, or of the insect pests often found at
home. These latter are a constant and unceasing source
of torment and disgust, whereas you may live a long time
among scorpions, spiders, and centipedes, ugly and venomous
though they are, and get no harm from them. After
living twelve years in the tropics, I have never yet been
bitten or stung by either.
The lean and hungry dogs before mentioned were my
greatest enemies, and kept me constantly on the watch.
If my boys left the bird they were skinning for an instant,
it was sure to be carried off. Everything eatable had to
be hung up to the roof, to be out of their reach. All
had just finished skinning a fine King Bird of Paradise
one day, when he dropped the skin. Before he could
stoop to pick it up, one of this famished race had seized
upon it, and he only succeeded in rescuing it from its
fangs after it was torn to tatters. Two skins of the large
Paradisea, which were quite dry and ready to pack away,
were incautiously left on my table for.the night, wrapped
up in paper. The next morning they were gone, and only
a few scattered feathers, indicated their fate. My hanging
shelf was out of their reach; but having stupidly left a
box which served as a step, a full-plumaged Paradise bird
was next morning missing; and a dog below the house was
to be seen still mumbling over the fragments, with the fine
golden plumes all trampled in the mud. Every night, a§
S 2