of Indians finding their way through trackless forests to definite points; they may
never have passed straight between the two particular points before, but they are
well acquainted with the vicinity of both, and have such a general knowledge of
the whole country, its water system, its soil and its vegetation, that as they
approach the point they are to reach, many easily-recognised indications enable
them to hit upon it with certainty.
The chief feature of this forest was the abundance of rattan palms hanging
from the trees, and turning and twisting about on the ground, often in
inextricable confusion. One wonders at first how they can get into such queer
shapes; but it is evidently caused by the decay and fall of the trees up which they
have first climbed, after which they grow along the ground until they meet with
another trunk up which to ascend. A tangled mass of twisted living rattan, is
therefore, a sign that at some former period a large tree has fallen there, though
there may be not the slightest vestige of it left. The rattan seems to have
unlimited powers of growth, and a single plant may mount up several trees in
succession, and thus reach the enormous length they are said sometimes to
attain. They much improve the appearance of a forest as seen from the coast; for
they vary the otherwise monotonous tree-tops with feathery crowns of leaves
rising clear above them, and each terminated by an erect leafy spike like a
lightning-conductor.
The other most interesting object in the forest was a beautiful palm, whose
perfectly smooth and cylindrical stem rises erect to more than a hundred feet
high, with a thickness of only eight or ten inches; while the fan-shaped leaves
which compose its crown, are almost complete circles of six or eight feet
diameter, borne aloft on long and slender petioles, and beautifully toothed round
the edge by the extremities of the leaflets, which are separated only for a few
inches from the circumference. It is probably the Livistona rotundifolia of
botanists, and is the most complete and beautiful fan-leaf I have ever seen,
serving admirably for folding into water-buckets and impromptu baskets, as well
as for thatching and other purposes.
A few days afterwards I returned to Menado on horse-back, sending my
baggage around by sea; and had just time to pack up all my collections to go by
the next mail steamer to Amboyna. I will now devote a few pages to an account
of the chief peculiarities of the Zoology of Celebes, and its relation to that of the
surrounding countries.