us to try to trade. The shells, being bought and sold by weight,
are handled rather roughly; but it was in vain that I endeavoured to
persuade them by signs not to throw them about so carelessly at the
risk of breaking their delicate edges. I did at last, however, succeed
in getting some good specimens, finer than any we had yet met with. In
the same shop were also some Bajans, or sea-gipsies, whose
stock-in-trade consisted of a miscellaneous collection, including
dried trepang, strings of very uninviting dried fish, smaller
pearl-shells, little skins of animals and birds, and rattan canes in
the rough, but much cheaper and better than those to be bought at
Singapore or elsewhere. The rattan is the stem of a creeping prickly
palm, the scientific name of which is the _calamus_. The _rotan saga_
is the ordinary rattan of commerce, but there are several others of
more or less value.

We walked up to the bungalow along a grassy path with kids and calves
tethered on either side. Alas! their mothers had not yet returned from
the mountains, so that the promised supply of fresh milk and butter to
which we had been looking forward was not forthcoming.

Our friends at the bungalow were up and dressed, and none the worse
for their fatigues of yesterday. Having mutually congratulated each
other on the success of the expedition, we heard how lucky we had been
in escaping the Borneo pest of leeches. It has not been raining much
lately, but in wet weather they are worse than in Ceylon. Not content
with attacking the passing traveller from the ground, they drop down
from every branch or leaf, and generally the first intimation of their
presence is the sight of a thin stream of blood oozing from their
point of attack. If an attempt to pull them off be made, their heads
remain fixed in the flesh and cause festering wounds. The only way of
getting rid of them is to apply a little salt, a bag of which is
always carried by the natives when going on an expedition into the
jungle. Strong tobacco-juice is another remedy.

We had now to return to the boat, and to re-embark in the 'Sunbeam,'
leaving the curios which we had purchased to be sent home by the
earliest possible opportunity. Our friends complimented us with a
salute of nineteen guns; to which we could make but a feeble return,
as our armament only consists of two brass guns for signal purposes.
None the less did we quit the shores of North Borneo with grateful
appreciation of its b