philosophic
Hollander accepts these horrors of the tropics with undisturbed
composure, but happily for the peace of the English passenger, the
Malay "room-boy" welcomes a new idea, and becomes gradually inspired
with the ardour of the chase. Ominous clouds darken over the Bay of
Tomini as we embark once more on the rolling waters, having completed
the circuit of the vast island, possessing a coast-line of 2,500 miles.
Blue peaks and waving palms recede into the mists of falling night. We
are once more afloat on a sleeping sea, the restful monotony of wind
and wave enabling indelible impressions of each varying scene to sink
deeply into mind and memory, and preventing the too rapid succession of
travelling experiences.

A GLIMPSE OF BORNEO.

An element of uncertainty attends the cruise among the Malayan islands,
through sudden orders to include strange ports of call in the programme
of the route. During the stay at Makassar, a cable from Batavia
necessitates a flying visit to Borneo, and though the detour was made
from the western coast of Celebes, the great sister island demands a
special notice. In steaming thither through the radiant glory of an
Equatorial sunset, strange atmospheric effects denote fresh variations
of climate and temperature. The rounded horizon, which suggests the rim
of the terrestrial globe, seems within a stone's throw of the ship, and
as the crimson sun sinks below the sharply-defined curve outlined by
the sea, a glowing hearth of smouldering embers appears burning on the
edge of the water. The eastern sky blooms into vivid pink from the
reflection of this fiery incandescence, which fades only to give place
to the leaping brightness of phosphorescent waves, and the nightly
pageant of tropical skies ablaze with lambent flames of summer
lightning. Morning reveals the dark forests of mysterious Borneo,
rolling back to the misty blue of a mountain background. The pathless
jungles of teak and iron wood, inextricably tangled by ropes of liana
or ladders of rattan, latticed with creepers and wreathed with
clambering fern, make an impenetrable barrier between the settlements
of the coast and the unknown interior, where barbarism still reigns
triumphant, and "head-hunting" remains the traditional sport.
Insurmountable difficulties of transit and progress are reported, even
by the few enthusiastic botanists, who merely penetrate the outworks of
Nature's stronghold in search of rare orchids, worth