eshness. From the edge of the sombre jungle the azure bay, set in the
dark frame of forest and gilded with sunset light, resembles a Scotch
loch at midsummer, and the poignant counterpart brings a sigh to the
lips of my companion, exiled for years from his Highland home. A long
slow river, navigable for native craft, widens into an estuary as it
approaches the sea, through the shadowy and impenetrable mazes of the
virgin woods traversed by the winding waterway. The Dyaks and other
wild aborigines of Borneo still haunt the forest depths, though the
fringe of civilisation drives them further inland, and some of the
local Sultans begin to fraternise with the settlers, who alone can
develope the riches of the extensive island. At present the northern
territory of Sarawak, successfully governed by an alien race, finds no
adequate counterpart on the island, though coast towns, springing up at
wide intervals, open small districts to the enterprise of the European
world. Balik-Papan, rising tier above tier on the dark hillside, and
brilliant with a multitude of flashing lights, looks picturesque as
Naples itself, when we steam away in the gathering gloom, and the
dazzling illumination, reflected in the tranquil sea, appears a
miraculous transfiguration. Oil tanks and warehouses, refineries and
factories, vanish under the veil of night, and only a fairy vision of
unearthly brightness remains as a final recollection of our brief visit
to Borneo.

THE MOLUCCAS.

TERNATE, BATJAN, AND BOEROE.

The Birds of Paradise (known by the Malay as _Manuk Devata_, "birds of
God") were traditionally represented as lured from their celestial home
by the spicy perfume of these enchanted isles, from whence perpetual
incense steals across the sea, and rises heavenward with intoxicating
fragrance. A Dutch naturalist in 1598 says, "These birds of the sun
live in air, and never alight until they die, having neither feet nor
wings, but fall senseless with the fragrance of the nutmeg." Linnaeus
asserts that "they feed on the nectar of flowers, and show an equal
variety of colour, blue and yellow, orange and green, red and violet."
Portuguese naturalists also represent the _passaros de sol_ as
footless, their mode of flight concealing the extremities. Birds of
Paradise were articles of tribute from native chiefs, and a sacred
character belonged to the feathered tribe, wheeling between earth and
sky above the spicy groves of the alluring