Next day we hoped to reach Kiau, the village from which Mr. Low started for the mountain in the spring of 1851. There was an apparent hitch about getting from that place; but we thought perhaps the reports arose from tribal jealousy. At four P.M., Koung: barometer, 28·678°; thermometer, 77·5°; unattached, 78·3°. So that this village must be about 1,500 feet above the level of the sea: a very rapid rise for the stream in so short a distance. The sandstone hill we crossed to-day had the same characteristics as those I had observed up the Sakarang, Batang Lupar, and near the capital--all being very steep, with narrow ridges, and buttresses occasionally springing from their sides: on the one we crossed to-day was a quantity of red shale. Near our last night’s resting-place, I noticed, for the first time on this river, some sago palms; they have again shown themselves to-day, and there are a few round the village, but neither these trees nor cocoa-nut nor areca palms are plentiful. At every village I made inquiries about cotton, and, like the men with tails, it was always grown a little farther off; only we know cotton must be grown somewhere in this neighbourhood, as at the very moment I was writing my journal I saw an old woman engaged spinning yarn from native material. The Lanuns also furnish a cloth which is highly prized among every class of inhabitants in Borneo; it is a sort of checked black cloth, with narrow lines of white running through it, and glazed on one size. This was formerly made entirely of native yarn; but I am afraid this industry will soon decline, as connoisseurs are already beginning to discover that the Lanun women, finding English yarn so cheap, are using it in preference, though it renders the article much less durable. It is also worthy of notice that this cloth is dyed from indigo grown on the spot. These Ida’an purchase their supplies of cotton of the Inserban and Tuhan Ida’an who live on the road to the lake, while the Bajus obtain theirs from the Lobas near Maludu Bay. I saw one plant growing near the hut where we rested last night; it was about ten feet high, and covered with flowers. They told us at Koung that the Ida’an were at war; but though they may have quarrels, they must be trifling, as we met every day women and children by themselves at considerable distances from their houses. Besides, parties of a dozen men and boys of the supposed enemies passed us on their way to Tampasuk to trade, and in none of their villages did we notice heads.