CHAPTER XIII. TIMOR.
(COUPANG, 1857-1869. DELLI, 1861.)
THE island of Timor is about three hundred miles long and sixty wide, and
seems to form the termination of the great range of volcanic islands which
begins with Sumatra more than two thousand miles to the west. It differs
however very remarkably from all the other islands of the chain in not
possessing any active volcanoes, with the one exception of Timor Peak near the
centre of the island, which was formerly active, but was blown up during an
eruption in 1638 and has since been quiescent. In no other part of Timor do there
appear to be any recent igneous rocks, so that it can hardly be classed as a
volcanic island. Indeed its position is just outside of the great volcanic belt,
which extends from Flores through Ombay and Wetter to Banda.
I first visited Timor in 1857, staying a day at Coupang, the chief Dutch town
at the west end of the island; and again in May 1859, when I stayed a fortnight in
the same neighbourhood. In the spring of 1861 I spent four months at Delli, the
capital of the Portuguese possessions in the eastern part of the island.
The whole neighbourhood of Coupang appears to have been elevated at a
recent epoch, consisting of a rugged surface of coral rock, which rises in a
vertical wall between the beach and the town, whose low, white, red-tiled houses
give it an appearance very similar to other Dutch settlements in the East. The
vegetation is everywhere scanty and scrubby. Plants of the families
Apocynaceae and Euphorbiaceae, abound; but there is nothing that can be called
a forest, and the whole country has a parched and desolate appearance,
contrasting strongly with the lofty forest trees and perennial verdure of the
Moluccas or of Singapore. The most conspicuous feature of the vegetation was
the abundance of fine fan-leaved palms (Borassus flabelliformis), from the
leaves of which are constructed the strong and durable water-buckets in general
use, and which are much superior to those formed from any other species of
palm. From the same tree, palm-wine and sugar are made, and the common
thatch for houses formed of the leaves lasts six or seven years without removal.
Close to the town I noticed the foundation of a ruined house below high-water
mark, indicating recent subsidence. Earthquakes are not severe here, and are so