they would not only sell but willingly give us anything
we might take a fancy to.

[Illustration: FORDING THE STREAM FOR MADAI]

In the course of our descent from the cave we came across ten or a
dozen bilian-wood coffins, which were excavated in this spot about
fifty years ago. They were of the plainest possible make, and were
evidently rapidly falling to pieces. It is thought that further
excavations will lead to the discovery of finer and older coffins, for
it is almost certain that wherever these caves exist they have been
extensively used at one time as primitive burial-places.

Arrived at last by the side of a clear running stream, we were glad to
take the opportunity of performing some much-needed ablutions, and to
rest for a while. How tired we all felt I need not attempt to say. It
required, indeed, a great effort of the will to take a few photographs
and to carefully pack the birds' eggs and nests which we had
collected, before resuming our journey.

We were all sorry when it was time to leave our pleasant halting-place
at Madai and start on our homeward way. The path through the jungle
was, however, delightfully shady, and was altogether easier than our
upward course. The last view of the cave, looking back from the little
hill facing it, just before entering the jungle, will always remain in
my mind, though I saw it somewhat hazily through the gauze veil in
which my head was wrapped up, in order to protect me from the hornets,
which had already stung several of our party severely.

I have before now been in tropical forests and jungles, and they
always produce the same awe-inspiring, and indeed depressing effect.
The almost solid green walls on either side of the narrow track; the
awful stillness which prevails, only occasionally broken, or rendered
more intense, by the shrill note of a bird, the cry, or rather pitiful
wail, of a monkey, the crashing of some larger creature through the
dense undergrowth, as well as the profound solitude, will easily
account for these feelings. Having overcome my first sensation of
nervousness, caused by constant slips and slides on the part of my
bearers, I had an excellent opportunity for contemplation until, in
little less than two hours after leaving our last halting-place, we
reached a spot close to where we had landed.

[Illustration: Sulus at Silam]

It was delightful to find that in our absence a charming little house
had, by a piece of kind forethought, been