ke a bees' nest, and a very
interesting sight it was. In the valley where I used to collect insects,
I one day saw three or four Timorese men and boys under a high tree,
and, looking up, saw on a very lofty horizontal branch three large bees'
combs. The tree was straight and smooth-barked and without a branch,
until at seventy or eighty feet from the ground it gave out the limb
which the bees had chosen for their home. As the men were evidently
looking after the bees, I waited to watch their operations. One of them
first produced a long piece of wood apparently the stem of a small
tree or creeper, which he had brought with him, and began splitting it
through in several directions, which showed that it was very tough
and stringy. He then wrapped it in palm-leaves, which were secured
by twisting a slender creeper round them. He then fastened his cloth
tightly round his loins, and producing another cloth wrapped it around
his head, neck, and body, and tied it firmly around his neck, leaving
his face, arms, and legs completely bare. Slung to his girdle he
carried a long thin coil of cord; and while he had been making these
preparations, one of his companions had cut a strong creeper or
bush-rope eight or ten yards long, to one end of which the wood-torch
was fastened, and lighted at the bottom, emitting a steady stream of
smoke. Just above the torch a chopping-knife was fastened by a short
cord.

The bee-hunter now took hold of the bush-rope just above the torch and
passed the other end around the trunk of the tree, holding one end in
each hand. Jerking it up the tree a little above his head he set his
foot against the trunk, and leaning back began walking up it. It was
wonderful to see the skill with which he took advantage of the slightest
irregularities of the bark or obliquity of the stem to aid his ascent,
jerking the stiff creeper a few feet higher when he had found a firm
hold for his bare foot. It almost made me giddy to look at him as he
rapidly got up--thirty, forty, fifty feet above the ground; and I kept
wondering how he could possibly mount the next few feet of straight
smooth trunk. Still, however, he kept on with as much coolness and
apparent certainty as if he were going up a ladder, until he got within
ten or fifteen feet of the bees. Then he stopped a moment, and took care
to swing the torch (which hung just at his feet) a little towards these
dangerous insects, so as to send up the stream of smoke between