The Gardens of the Sun / A naturalist's journal on the mountains and in the forests and swamps of Borneo and the Sulu Archipelago

by F. W. Burbidge

A curious custom of the Dusun is to entrap and eat the common field rats, wild cats, &c., of the country. Beside all the little paths through the forest, near Kina Balu, wooden rat-traps (see Fig.) are set in the herbage through which the animals have made their tracks. A form of this trap, slightly modified, is hung on the branches of trees for the capture of squirrels and other fruit-eating rodents. I asked Kurow how long the Dusun had eaten rats? His reply was that, “Once upon a time,” a horde of rats, far more than ever followed the ‘Pied Piper,’ I should judge by his adjectives, came and ate up all the rice and kaladi. A conference was held by the then reigning chief in the head house, and his advice was of the stern, practical kind. “Talking is of no use,” said he; “the rats have eaten all our rice: we have no other food left to us; ergo, we must eat up the rats!” “And so it was, and is to this day,” said Kurow; but I fancied I could see a sly twinkle in his bright eyes—just the same merry twinkle one expects to see in anyone’s face, after having related a palpably improbable story with all due solemnity!

We pass several very pretty little rills, at which drinking or washing was facilitated by spouts, made of the leaf-stalk of the sago palm, and placed so as to conduct the cool sparkling water on a level with one’s face. Flourishing rice and kaladi fields became more plentiful; and the tree ferns, which we had first sighted after leaving Si Nilau, now became more numerous. Just ere we reached Kalawat, we noticed some splendid specimens in the jungle; and now and then even out in the clearings their great crowns of fresh green plumose fronds being fully exposed to the sun, and in some cases borne aloft on slender black trunks, 20 feet or more in height. At the village of Kalawat the houses are in one place backed by an immense grove of these feathery plumed tall tree ferns, above which the white stemmed betel-nut palm towers aloft, its dark green foliage and pendent clusters of bright orange fruit standing out clear and bright against the cool blue sky.

At Kalawat we rested awhile. The straggling dwellings were built on piles over the muddy ground, and a few ill-fed black pigs were rooting up turf in all directions in quest of food. Here, for the first time, along this route, we were pleased to see tame bees hived in sections of hollow tree trunks, about two feet in length, the top and bottom being stopped up, and a hole burnt in the centre as an entrance for the busy workers. In one or two cases separate little huts were erected especially for the bees, but as a rule the hives were placed on a board beneath the overhanging eaves of the houses. The kind of bee kept is very small, much smaller than that common in England, and I was struck at the peculiar manner in which they wriggled their bodies simultaneously as they congregated in groups on the hive near the entrance. These tame bees, as well as their wild brethren, who nest in the tall forest trees, make but little honey in proportion to that of our northern kinds, and are especially kept for the wax they yield, this being used occasionally by the natives in the form of rude candles, and it is also an article of export from Borneo.

Being in advance of our followers we waited here an hour. It is a singular trait of the Borneans to show no curiosity when strangers pass through their villages. We sat here on a rock for some considerable time, and yet, not even the children came out to look at us. Two men sitting outside on a verandah, basket-making, and an old woman, were all the inhabitants we saw, but doubtless many a pair of bright eyes watched us secretly through the cracks of the bamboo houses. As it came on to rain, however, we entered one of the houses, in which were seven or eight young men and several women. We tried to get some fruit here, but the langsat were not ripe, and cocoa-nuts were scarce owing to the flowering stems being cut off and the exuding sap collected in a bamboo vessel to be made into toddy, a drink of which the hill villagers are very fond. At last a couple of young nuts were forthcoming, and a dash of brandy in each gave us a most refreshing draught. As the rain ceased, we decided to proceed to Bungol, the next village along our route. To this one of our guides, Pangeran Raman of Labuan,—an artful old sweep—loudly objected, urging that the Tawaran would be flooded—that we should not reach Bungol at all that night, as it would be dark long ere we could do so—adding, that there was no intervening resting-place. I was used to these excuses, and determined to go on, to which Mr. Veitch also agreed. Our guides, who had come here from Si Nilau, refused to go further, nor would any of the Kalawat people go to Bungol with us as guides, but at last one of them pointed out the right road for us to take, and I and Mr. Veitch set out along the rocky path alone. We rested on the hill above the village, and then Pangeran Raman and our two servants, or “boys,” joined us, and said the men refused to come on. This did not deter us, and we plunged down the hill-path and through one or two clearings, in which sweet potatoes, maize, and tobacco grew luxuriantly. Then down a greasy clay path, embowered with bamboos, tall canes and jungle, until at last the Tawaran was reached in the valley below, rushing and boiling among the smooth boulders in its bed.

We sat on the banks of the stream to rest. Here a pretty little palm about a yard high formed strong tufts and patches, its roots being laved by the stream below. Its pinnate leaves were graceful, and had a distinct grassy appearance. Draping trees close by the river we also found a species of vanilla in bloom. It had large waxy flowers of a creamy white colour, the lip having a five-lobed hairy crest of a dark purple-brown colour. As many as twenty buds were counted in a cluster, but the flowers expanded one at a time. We crossed the river, which nowhere exceeded our knees in height, and pushed on up the next hill. The mist was gathering thick and white in the valleys, and it began to rain in torrents. In a very few minutes the path up the hill-side became a brook, and the rain beat in our faces so that we could scarcely see our way. Added to this inconvenience was the thought that we might not be in the right track, and of this our worthy “guide,” Pangeran Raman, could tell us nothing. He was a very good fair-weather traveller, and the biggest man in our party when all was well around a good camp fire! At a pinch, when most wanted, he was perfectly useless—indeed, in the way. I am afraid I did not pity him as he stood shivering in the cold, and begging piteously of us to return to a miserable little hut beside the river for the night. This was out of the question, as we had not a dry thread on us and no food, so I pushed up the hill to reconnoitre. Just at the top I met a Dusun man who had come from Bungol, and who was going to Kalawat, and when Mr. Veitch and the old Pangeran came up, we induced the native to return with us to Bungol. We now felt more at ease, and splashed down the hill-side merrily, and after crossing the Tawaran four times, in one place nearly to our necks, we reached the cocoanut-crested hill on which the village of Bungol stands. Our “boys” had lagged behind and only reached the houses just before night-fall, having been mainly guided by the accidental discharge of our guns, which we had let off in order to dry them soon after our arrival. Our guide had brought us to his own house, and we soon had a good fire, and took off our wet clothes, after which we sat by the fire clad in native sarongs which our host lent us. We soon wrung out our clothes, and hung them on a beam over the blazing fire to dry, and then came the question of dinner. At last we procured a fowl and a bowl of rice, and my Chinese “boy,” Kimjeck, who was a good cook, soon had these on the fire.

After it was dark we heard shouting, and soon after six of our men who carried the food, clothes, and sleeping gear came in, being afraid, as they said, that we should want food. We were soon all as jolly as sandboys. The fowl was cut up and boiled with a tin of julienne soup and three or four chilies, and this and a nice white bowl of steaming rice formed a dish which to us, tired and hungry as we were, seemed “fit for a king.” A cup of chocolate and a cigar followed by way of dessert, and all our troubles for the time being vanished in smoke! We paid our guide a fathom of grey shirting, and gave him a looking-glass for our night’s lodging. The fowl and a couple of cocoanuts also were paid for with a fathom of shirting, and everybody was thus easily satisfied.

Having only a sleeping-rug each, we found it rather chilly, and I could not sleep well. I rose about 11 o’clock, however, and made up a good fire, and then lay down beside it and slept well until daybreak. We had breakfasted in the morning and were outside ready to start, when our laggards of yesterday came in, and they looked sheepish and crestfallen when they found that we were really about to start on and had not intended to have awaited their coming. Two Dusun men now accompanied us as guides, and after crossing the Tawaran several times, we mounted the hill to the left, crossing the ridge and descending towards Koung. The way to the village was down rocky gutters seemingly worn by heavy rains, and the hill-side paths in the kaladi gardens were very bad to traverse, and we were thoroughly tired out ere we reached the grassy flat on which Koung is built, indeed, this was the most toilsome day’s work we had hitherto had, although, perhaps, our long tramp yesterday had something to do with its being so.

We found the Koung people peaceably inclined, although we did not forget that it was here that Mr. Low and St. John had some difficulty with the natives the first time they came this way. We slept well, and in the morning after breakfast we retraced our steps by the river to examine a scarlet flower which we had seen from the opposite bank yesterday. It turned out to be Bauhinia Kochiana, or an allied species. Mr. Veitch shot a fine white-headed hawk, which was on the look out for a breakfast of fresh fish from the river. We also secured several other birds we had not before seen. The red-fruited Rubus rosæfolius was very pretty here among the rocks, and we observed one or two orchids of interest on the trees overhanging the stream. The river is very pretty as it passes the village, and as the water comes from the hills above, it is deliciously clear and cool, quite a luxury, in fact, either for drinking or bathing. We enjoyed our morning ramble, and on returning to the house wherein we had slept we found all the men ready to start for Kiau. On our crossing the ford at the end of the village we met a large party of natives laden with baskets of tobacco and a little beeswax, going on a trading expedition. There were some women among them, who, of course, carried the heaviest loads. Several of the men were tattooed on the breast and arms, and all were armed with brass-handled parongs and slender-shafted spears. They showed no surprise at seeing us, and passed on apparently unconcerned as to our object. Our way now lay up the valley, first on the right and then on the left of the river, but there was no great difficulty in crossing, the water being rarely as high as the hips. We passed huts here and there, and irrigated patches of rice. Maize and sweet potatoes grew around the houses, and almost all had a clump of big-leaved bananas near the door. The rice land was irrigated by a ditch cut from the river, a little dam being made so as to direct the water into it as required. We noticed several fish-traps set in the river to-day. These are made of a bamboo stem six feet long, split lengthwise and made into a long basket-like shape with rattans, so that it is wide at top and narrow at the other end. In order to set them effectively, an oblique dam of stones and earth is made so as to direct a large body of water through an aperture, and in this the basket is placed. A fish once washed into it has no chance of escape, and large quantities are caught at times, especially after the river is freshened by rains. Occasionally we saw men or women working on the rice-land, and I was very much struck at the care taken in planting and cultivating the crop, not a weed being anywhere visible in the rice-patches. The planting was extremely regular, each tuft or stool being about eight inches from its neighbours, so that all obtained their due amount of earth, light, and air, a lesson indeed for some of our own cultivators of cereals here at home.

We passed immense clumps of bamboo, the feathery wands rising in masses to a height of fifty or sixty feet. From one of these clumps our men secured some of the young crowns, which are white and tender, and by no means despisable as a vegetable when boiled with salt. At Bawang I had noticed them eating boiled fern-tops with their rice, and on asking for a little I was surprised at its delicate spinach-like flavour. We met a boy at one of the crossings with a basket of fine langsat fruit, some of which we purchased, giving him a Chinese looking-glass in exchange.

At length, crossing the river for the last time, we rested in the shade of a huge sandstone rock for a luncheon of cold rice and fruit. Our path then lay to the left through low jungle, and on one or two of the old remaining trees we noticed masses of Grammatophyllum speciosum with stems eight feet in length—each plant a good cartload, and evidently in the most luxuriant health, with foliage fresh and green, although fully exposed to the hot sun. Cœlogynes were plentiful on the lower trees and rocks by the river. One sandstone boulder was entirely covered with Davallia ciliata, and some fine tall grasses grew among the pebbles of the old river bed. The rocks bordering the river are of sandstone, and yet at Koung and along our route to-day we continually met with boulders of granite sometimes in the present river bed, sometimes on the old dry bed, and sometimes, as on the green Koung, immense pieces, a hundred tons weight, lie isolated on the plain. Half an hour’s walk from our resting-place by the river brought us to the clearings and the hill or dry rice-fields of the Kiau villagers. The crop was ripening fast, and the whole hill-side, as well as the one opposite beyond the river, looked very flourishing. Here and there were green patches of kaladi, and around the field-huts of bamboo, cucumbers clustered, and sweet potatoes, maize, and occasionally bananas, looked prosperous. We followed a narrow footpath through the rice, which was kept from injury by a little fence of bamboo, and in places the earth was prevented from washing down by a few large stones laid in line. We reached the village about two o’clock, the journey from Koung having taken us about five hours. The people here did seem to feel more interest than ordinary, and we soon had a tolerably good audience around us. One by one our followers came in, and we soon availed ourselves of the comfort of a rub over with a towel and dry clothes, after which we arranged the various plants collected during the day, and continued our journals. “Bongsur” brought in a fine brown owl and a pretty scarlet bird with black wing-tips, neither of which we had seen before. For dinner we had boiled fowl and rice, followed by coffee and a cigarette of native tobacco wrapped in maize-husk. We lay on our mats and rugs at one end of the large public room, all our men being cooking and jabbering away to their hearts’ content, the Babel of sounds, partly Malay and partly Dusun, being deafening. Tobacco was brought in for sale soon after our arrival, and one man brought a fowl, but as he asked double its value we refused to buy it.