Seventeen years among the Sea Dyaks of Borneo; a ... - Sabrizain.org

SOME PERSONAL EXPERIENCES 249
boatmen, walked along the beach to the Government Fort
there. The clerk in charge, Ah Fook Cheyne, kindly
supplied me with food and with sleeping things for
the night. I sent some Malays to look after my
boat, which they managed to bring to Kabong the
next day.
Whenever I have had to travel on foot I have always
had with me Dyaks who knew the country, so there has
been no danger of my losing my way. But it is remark-
able how easily one can get lost in the jungle. I have
sometimes gone off the path for no great distance, and
have had some difficulty in rinding my way back. At
Banting one afternoon I was accompanied by two schoolboys,
and we went into the lowland jungle near the
Mission Hill after some wood-pigeon. We followed the
birds from one wild fig-tree to another, and managed to
shoot a few, and then we tried to find our way back.
After wandering about for some twenty minutes we came
to a spot where a tree had been cut down, and a length of
the trunk used evidently for a Dyak coffin. As someone
had been buried a few days ago in the cemetery round the
church, we guessed we could not be far from Banting Hill,
on which the Mission House and Church stood. We tried
to follow what we thought was the track made by the
people who had cut the tree down, but after wandering
about for over half an hour, we found ourselves in the
same spot again.
We could see the sun through the trees, and one of the
boys with me said :
" When we sit on the seat on the brow of the hill facing
the river we see the sun setting in front of us, so if we walk
in the direction of the sun we are sure to come to some
part of Banting Hill."