“Above the square space and in the hole arranged for it they placed the nozzle of the bellows. This nozzle, called boetoeng, was made of baked clay and reached half over the centre of the kakat. They then filled the oven about three-quarters full of charcoal, over which they spread the ore, previously roasted over large wood fires until it had acquired a red color. The charcoal above the kakat was now ignited and the alier closed with a layer of wet clay. The bamboo tube of the bellows was next introduced and the fire kindled by first blowing it gently and gradually increasing till the highest possible temperature was attained.” “You mentioned a bamboo tube just now; surely those bellows were of European make,” La Cueille asked. “No native could manufacture such an article?” “Spoken like a European,” Johannes said somewhat bitterly. “These bellows were decidedly not of European make. Listen and I will try to explain their construction: In a straight wooden cylinder, usually made of a hollowed-out tree of about ten inch diameter and two and a half yards long, there moved a piston, the disk of which in order to secure perfect exclusion of air was pasted over with feathers and a kind of varnish composed of oil and rosin. The bamboo tube in question, called passiong, was fixed underneath the cylinder and the air was forced through this. The rod of the piston, eight to ten yards long, was fixed to a long bamboo, which being placed horizontally considerably lessened the labor of working it. This kind of bellows was called bapoetang, and the workmen in order to obtain the required temperature made from forty to fifty pulls a minute. “When the oven was filled the fire was kept up, a fresh supply of ore being thrown in from above as the contents decreased by combustion. But in order to supply the necessary fuel at the same time, they added ten parts of charcoal to one of fresh ore. They opened the alier hourly for the removal of the slag, but instantly closed it again with wet clay.