according to
the size of the boat, walled in on each side with the same material,
the better to exclude the fierce rays of the sun. Herein sits, or
rather lies, the traveller, the lowness of the awning (which is
removable) precluding any other position. Boxed up in this manner, but
little can be seen of the surrounding country, but as in Sarawak one
river is so precisely alike another this is no great loss. In the
interior, however, the scenery improves, and is much finer, as I shall
presently show.

A short journey in this style is pleasant enough, but when the unhappy
traveller has to live, and cook, &c., for days together in one of
these craft it becomes very irksome and trying to the temper.
Moreover, the smell from the remnants of the crew's meals, such as
stale fish and decayed fruit and vegetables--which they will not take
the trouble to throw overboard, but invariably drop under the
"lanties" or bamboo deck--is well-nigh insupportable.

We left Kuching on the 4th of June for Matang, intending to make the
ascent of Sorapi, the highest peak of the Matang range. The tide not
serving further, Santubong was to be our resting-place that night, and
we were to proceed on our journey early the following morning. Matang,
though only eight miles from Kuching in a straight line, is fully
thirty by river, the stream which runs past the landing-place at
Matang having its outlet at Santubong. It was once intended by the
Sarawak Government to make a road from Kuching to the mountain, but on
being surveyed the intermediate country was found to contain a deep
swamp four miles across, so the project was abandoned.

Our craft on this occasion was pulled by a crew of six men, and,
though small, was, thanks to Mr. H. (who accompanied us), replete with
every comfort. On our way down river, H. pointed us out his crew with
pride as being all prisoners, who, although he never took a gaoler
with him, had never once taken advantage of him for three years,
during which time he had made several trips.

Three of these men were in for murder, and H.'s own body-servant, who
cooked our meals, waited on us. He was working out a sentence of
fifteen years for the murder of a Chinaman, whose head he had one day
conceived a desire to possess, which desire he had promptly gratified!
This man was a "Kayan," a tribe inhabiting the interior of Borneo, of
whom more anon.

By six o'clock that evening we were at Santubong, and cast anchor a
short dis