mes more.

"On the south side of the tongue of land, which projects
north of the mouth of the Kalias, were found two Malay
villages, whose inhabitants appeared to view our passage up
the river with curious glances. A crowd of half or wholly
naked children began a race along the shore, as soon as
they set eyes upon the fast steam launch, probably in order
to keep us in sight as long as possible. We now had deep
water and steamed up the river without delay. The
longed-for visit to some of the Malay villages we thus
reserved till our return.

"We steamed about ten or twelve English miles up one of the
many winding river arms, when the limited depth compelled
us to turn. The vegetation on the mainland, as on the
shores of the islands lying near the river-mouth, was
everywhere so close that it was nearly impossible to find a
place where we could land; everywhere there was the
impenetrable primeval forest. Next the mouth of the river
this consisted of tall, shady broad-leaved trees, which all
had dark green, lustrous, large leaves. Some were in
flower, others bore fruit. The greater number consisted of
fig trees, whose numerous air-roots twining close on each
other formed an impenetrable fence at the river bank. These
air-root-bearing trees play an important _role_ in
increasing the area of the land and diminishing that of the
water. They send their strong air-roots from the branches
and stem far out into the water, and when the roots have
reached the bottom, and pushed their way into the mud, they
make, by the close basket-work they form, an excellent
binding medium for all the new mud which the river carries
with it from the higher ground in the interior. It has
struck me that the air-root-bearing trees form one of the
most important means for the rapid increase of the alluvial
land on Borneo. Farther up the river there commenced large
stretches of a species of palm, which with its somewhat
lighter green and its long sheath-formed leaves was sharply
distinguished from the rest of the forest. Sometimes the
banks on one side were covered with palms only, on the
other with fig-trees only. The palm jungles were not so
impenetrable as the fig-tree thickets, the latter preferred
the more swampy hollows, while the palms on the other hand
grew on the more sandy and