Farther up the river, we passed another small settlement of recent growth, called Song, where a small Fort stands on the top of one of the little hills shelving into the river. Along the road, lining the bank, stood a row of Chinese houses, and a footpath, made of wooden planks and supported on poles, was crowded with Dyaks and Chinamen. The banks were covered with bundles of rattans, brought from the interior. Mats, baskets, cordage for ships, flooring for houses, etc., are usually made of rattans. The Tanjong people are about the best basket-makers of the country, and the wild Punans make the best mats. At this spot, where the trade in rattans is active, we saw up-river Dyaks hurrying up the steep banks with loads of rattan and gutta-percha, on their way to sell them to Chinamen. A great many boats, full of produce, were anchored to the banks, waiting their turn to be unloaded. The little Bazaar was crowded with almost naked people, for they only wore waistcloths. Even the Chinamen, with their pigtails twisted round their heads, had nothing on but cotton drawers. No women were to be seen, and the men looked like long brown-legged spiders, jumping or clambering in and out of the water. Having passed this spot of activity in a desert of leaves and water, reach after reach was rounded, where we met with no other company but that of hawks flying rather low overhead, of brown moths so large that I mistook them for birds, and of butterflies, blue, yellow, and white, appearing here and there over the mud-banks in clusters of delicate colours. About six in the evening we reached Kapit. The Fort stands on a hill, and steps cut out in the sharp, steep banks lead up to its front door. It stands some forty feet above the level of ordinary tides, but in the rainy season, when heavier freshets than those in the fine season collect up river, the water has been known to reach several feet above the flooring of the Fort. As the anchor was dropped near the wooden wharf, a crowd of Chinamen, Dyaks, Tanjongs, and Kayans, rushed from the Bazaar and helped to carry our luggage. We had brought our Chinese cook with us, and he struggled up the bank with cages full of cocks and hens which he had brought from Sibu. Some of the people carried my dressing-bag and rugs, Mr. Bampfylde’s, Dr. Langmore’s, and Bertram’s portmanteaux were seized and borne to the Fort by Kayans with their hair streaming over their shoulders. All these people talked at once, ordered one another about, exclaiming, screaming, and hustling in the most good-humoured and merry fashion.