has a Bamboo sheath. His favourite pipe is a huge hubble-bubble, which he will
construct in a few minutes by inserting a small piece of Bamboo for a bowl
obliquely into a large cylinder about six inches from the bottom containing
water, through which the smoke passes to a long slender Bamboo tube. There are
many other small matters for which Bamboo is daily used, but enough has now
been mentioned to show its value. In other parts of the Archipelago I have
myself seen it applied to many new uses, and it is probable that my limited
means of observation did not make me acquainted with one-half the ways in
which it is serviceable to the Dyaks of Sarawak.
While upon the subject of plants I may here mention a few of the more
striking vegetable productions of Borneo. The wonderful Pitcher-plants, forming
the genus Nepenthes of botanists, here reach their greatest development. Every
mountain-top abounds with them, running along the ground, or climbing over
shrubs and stunted trees; their elegant pitchers hanging in every direction. Some
of these are long and slender, resembling in form the beautiful Philippine lace-
sponge (Euplectella), which has now become so common; others are broad and
short. Their colours are green, variously tinted and mottled with red or purple.
The finest yet known were obtained on the summit of Kini-balou, in North-west
Borneo. One of the broad sort, Nepenthes rajah, will hold two quarts of water in
its pitcher. Another, Nepenthes Edwardsiania, has a narrow pitcher twenty
inches long; while the plant itself grows to a length of twenty feet.
Ferns are abundant, but are not so varied as on the volcanic mountains of
Java; and Tree-ferns are neither so plentiful nor so large as on that island. They
grow, however, quite down to the level of the sea, and are generally slender and
graceful plants from eight to fifteen feet high. Without devoting much time to
the search I collected fifty species of Ferns in Borneo, and I have no doubt a
good botanist would have obtained twice the number. The interesting group of
Orchids is very abundant, but, as is generally the case, nine-tenths of the species
have small and inconspicuous flowers. Among the exceptions are the fine
Coelogynes, whose large clusters of yellow flowers ornament the gloomiest
forests, and that most extraordinary plant, Vanda Lowii, which last is
particularly abundant near some hot springs at the foot of the Penin-jauh
Mountain. It grows on the lower branches of trees, and its strange pendant
flower-spires often hang down so as almost to reach the ground. These are
generally six or eight feet long, bearing large and handsome flowers three inches
across, and varying in colour from orange to red, with deep purple-red spots. I
measured one spike, which reached the extraordinary length of nine feet eight
inches, and bore thirty-six flowers, spirally arranged upon a slender thread-like