hich Madame Behu, like a good housewife, had given us; but, instead
of imitating the Chinese, and sacrificing them to the gods, we were
wicked enough to devour them ravenously ourselves.

When we had satisfied our hunger, we skinned the serpent and then
made a present of it to the Chinese; but they gave us to understand
that they would not touch it, at which I was greatly surprised,
since they will generally eat anything. I was afterwards convinced
that this was all pretence, for on returning some hours later from
our hunting excursion and going into one of their huts, we found
them all seated round a large dish in which were pieces of roast
meat of the peculiar round shape of the serpent. They wanted to
hide the dish in a great hurry, but I entered very quickly and gave
them some money to be allowed to taste it. I found the flesh
particularly tender and delicate, even more tender than that of a
chicken.

But I have quite forgotten to describe our hunting excursion. We
asked the labourers if they could not put us on the track of a
tiger; they described to us a part of the wood where one was
reported to have taken up his abode a few days previously, and we
immediately set off. We had great difficulty in forcing our way
through the forest, having, at every instant, to clamber over
prostrate trees, creep through brambles or cross over swamps, but we
had, at all events, the satisfaction of progressing, which we
certainly should not have had in the forests of Brazil, where such
an undertaking would have been impracticable. It is true that there
were creepers and orchids, but not in such numbers as in Brazil, and
the trees, too, stand far wider apart. We saw some splendid
specimens, towering to a height of above a hundred feet. The
objects which interested us most were the ebony and kolim trees.
The timber of the first is of two kinds, a layer of brownish-yellow
surrounding the inner stem, which composes that portion especially
known as ebony.

The kolim-tree diffuses an excessively strong odour, similar to that
of onions, indicating its site at some distance off. The fruit
tastes extremely like onions, and is very often used by the common
people, but its odour and taste are too strong for Europeans. I
merely just touched a piece of fresh rind, and my hands smelt of it
the next morning.

We beat about the forest for some hours without meeting the game of
which we were in search. We once thought that we had fo