“Bird-life generally was dozing—the birds were enjoying their noontide siesta in the shady trees. The handsome Bornean pheasants, the ‘Argus,’ the ‘Fireback,’ and the ‘Bulwer’ with its pure snowy tail of blackcock-like shape, were alike unseen and unheard. Now and then the deep rich and mellow whistle of the ‘Mino’ bird or Javanese ‘Grackle’ reached us, and a whole colony of large blue, and of pretty little greyish green, yellow-winged pigeons—Carpophagi—were surprised on a fig tree in fruit as the canoe shot around a sudden bend in the stream. Of the seven or eight species of hornbills known to inhabit these groves we saw not one—indeed our view of the birds would have been but meagre but for the apparition of a black darter with only its head or neck above the water, in which attitude its resemblance to a snake is well nigh perfect. A few kingfishers braved the sun and flitted alongside the nipa leaves, or flew rapidly across stream like clusters of jewels endowed with life and motion. Scarcely a sound disturbed the quietude and beauty of such a tropical scene, except that now and then for no very apparent reason the boatmen made a spurt with their paddles, any little extra exertion in this way being often accompanied by a plaintive song in chorus—melody in perfect keeping with a wildly natural albeit lovely spot. At one well-remembered bend of the glassy stream the men had been directed to stop awhile, and a few dexterous strokes of the paddle on the part of a handsome young Kadyan man named ‘Moumein,’ who acted as steersman, sent the canoe beneath the arching nipa plumes to a bare spot where it was possible to land. The wet branches of a low mossy tree were covered with the elegant little Davallia parvula, among which grew a cirrhopetalum only about two inches in height, and bearing little purple flowers in semi-circular whorl-like tufts at the apices of tiny scapes. On sandstone rocks near at hand the handsome Dipteris Horsfieldii was abundant, its stout rhizomes creeping over the nearly bare wet rock, and adhering so firmly by its tiny rootlets that it was difficult to displace.[1] Above one’s head grew the great glossy green umbrella-like fronds, borne aloft on stipes varying from two to eight feet in length. Truly a noble fern—alas! how difficult to cultivate. At the time I lived in the locality in which it is found in the utmost luxuriance, I read of the plant being exhibited in London and elsewhere, but each successive report of it unfortunately recorded its decadence. This and the glorious Matonia pectinata—also Bornean, although first found together with our old friends Cypripedium barbatum, Nepenthes sanguinea, and Rhododendron jasminiflorum, on Mount Ophir, in Malacca—are two of the most noble of all ferns, rivalling the palms indeed in stately beauty and substance of frond-tissue. How unfortunate, then, is it that both so persistently resist the efforts alike of collectors and cultivators. As one of the two travellers before-mentioned I had previously visited the spot where we had now landed, and after a long walk through the tall forests, which are carpeted in moist places and near streams by lovely steel-blue aspleniums and lindsayas, and also by the freshest and most luxuriant of selaginellas, had, after ascending a sloping and rather dry hill-side, come upon a plant which I saw at a glance was zingiberaceous, but it was so distinct in port and flower to anything that I had previously seen that I sent roots of it to Chelsea, and a few of these fortunately survived. Its fate was not known to us at the time we again visited the spot, and so the object in again running the canoe among the nipa plumes at this place was to obtain a fresh supply. I shall long remember this second journey to collect Burbidgea nitida, since I was ill with fever at the time, and on Mr. Peter Veitch devolved the duty of a long tramp through the tall forest; past numerous felled gutta-yielding trees (Isonandra sp.?), and up the hill slope beyond, until just below the rocky summit, this plant is found at a place called the ‘Devil’s House’ (‘Satan punya ruma’) where are some dark deep holes in the face of perpendicular rocks, frequented by the swallows which build the edible nests so highly valued by the rich Chinese. The burbidgea grows on low wet sandstone boulders, on which their rhizomes and roots form a perfect mat, and among the plants as thus elevated decayed leaves and other forest débris is blown by winds or washed by rains. Although growing in rich shady forest, and subjected to a heavy rainfall, and high, albeit fresh and often windy atmosphere, the plants rarely exceed a yard in height. To this place Mr. Veitch went with a body of trusty natives, and many bundles of the plants were brought back, some of them fine masses of twenty or thirty stems, each having recently borne a large cluster of its rich, orange-coloured flowers.
“While Mr. Veitch was away, my Chinese boy, ‘Kimjeck,’ got out the cooking utensils to prepare dinner on the shore, and the men who stayed behind amused themselves by looking for flowers (‘cheri bunga’) in the low forest and on the sandstone rock near our landing-place. I had to lie in the boat beneath the awning, feeling very sick, and with a splitting headache—feverish symptoms which all travellers in tropical forests alike must suffer. I was just dozing off to sleep when I heard much yelling, and my boy, who had joined the men, returned down the jungle path at full speed, shouting ‘Ular! Ular! Tuan! Sayah mow etu snapang lakas skali!’ ‘Trima kasi!’ he ejaculated, as he snatched my gun and disappeared with the agility of a young goat. The gist of the matter was, he had seen a snake and was off to shoot it. After listening for ten minutes to the most deafening shouts and yells, mingled with many ejaculations of advice and caution, and the reports of both barrels echoing through the forest, I was rather disappointed to see them return with a small snake, not larger than the English viper. On my expressing my surprise, and observing that, by the noise, I thought it was a snake big enough to swallow a buffalo, the men all agreed that what it lacked in size was amply compensated for by its fatal bite—or, as they expressed it, ‘if that snake bit a man he need not trouble about food any more, as he would have no time to pray.’
“The Muruts have a great love for gong music; and now and then a cheap German gun, or old Tower musket, is obtained from Chinese traders. Spears, blow-pipes, krisses or parongs (swords), and their ghastly baskets of human skulls, form their only accumulated wealth. These heads are used to ornament their dwellings at their periodical seasons of feasting, and when illuminated by the flickering glare of ‘dammar’ gum torches the effect is melodramatic in the extreme. It was rather difficult to make any use of these Muruts as collectors—they showed no powers of discrimination whatever, while the Kadyans, on the other hand—who are also aboriginals, but have mixed much with the dominant Malays, by whom they were years ago converted to the faith of Islam—showed great aptitude, and were of real service; and I shall long retain pleasant memories of some of the Kadyan villagers, especially ‘Moumein,’ of Meringit, who received me into the little village he had founded with every demonstration of friendship, and rendered me much intelligent assistance for many weeks. Of Malays generally one may say that they live by lying and thieving in one form or another, but the aboriginal races of Borneo, like the Papuans whom Goldie met inland in New Guinea, are gentle and hospitable to peaceably disposed strangers, and it will be a great pity to see them exterminated in the way their prototypes, the Incas of Peru, and the Red Men of the West, have been.”
[1] On mountains in Borneo above 7000 feet a form of Dipteris Horsfieldii grows freely among dacrydiums, droseras, dianella, dawsonia superba, a tiny umbellifer, and other Australian types. It is dwarf, rarely above two feet high, with glaucous leathery and brittle fronds, almost silvery below. [↑]
CHAPTER VII.
BEAUTIFUL BORNEO.
Borneo—Wild animals—the Malays—Poetry—Romances—Dewa Indra—Native government—Pile dwellings—Intermarriage—Language—Clothing—Courtship—Marriage—Inland tribes—Land culture—Native villages—Food products—Textile fabrics—Bark cloth—Native women—Climate—Native produce—Kayan weapon—Rivers—Gambling—Opium smoking.
Borneo, the beautiful—the “garden of the sun”—is the third largest island in the world, and boasts a much larger area than that occupied by the British Isles. The equator divides it, and the climate is, perhaps, that most suitable for vegetation of any other, being uniformly hot and humid all the year round. There are no volcanoes, the tiger is unknown, and it is the only habitat of the wild elephant in the Malay Archipelago. It is also remarkable as being the home of the wild man of the forests, or the “orang utan” of the Malays. Alligators abound in the rivers, and are the most dangerous of the wild animals. Snakes exist plentifully, and in great variety, but death from snake-bites is very rare. The two-horned rhinoceros, wild cattle, pigs in abundance, and several species of deer are known.