species of palm. From the same tree, palm-wine and sugar are made, and
the common thatch for houses formed of the leaves lasts six or seven
years without removal. Close to the town I noticed the foundation of
a ruined house below high-water mark, indicating recent subsidence.
Earthquakes are not severe here, and are so infrequent and harmless that
the chief houses are built of stone.
The inhabitants of Coupang consist of Malays, Chinese, and Dutch,
besides the natives, so that there are many strange and complicated
mixtures among the population. There is one resident English merchant,
and whalers as well as Australian ships often come here for stores and
water. The native Timorese preponderate, and a very little examination
serves to show that they have nothing in common with Malays, but are
much more closely allied to the true Papuans of the Aru Islands and New
Guinea. They are tall, have pronounced features, large somewhat aquiline
noses, and frizzly hair, and are generally of a dusky brown colour. The
way in which the women talk to each other and to the men, their loud
voices and laughter, and general character of self-assertion, would
enable an experienced observer to decide, even without seeing them, that
they were not Malays.
Mr. Arndt, a German and the Government doctor, invited me to stay at
his house while in Coupang, and I gladly accepted his offer, as I only
intended making a short visit. We at first began speaking French, but
he got on so badly that we soon passed insensibly into Malay; and
we afterwards held long discussions on literary, scientific, and
philosophical questions in that semi-barbarous language, whose
deficiencies we made up by the free use of French or Latin words.
After a few walks in the neighbourhood of the town, I found such a
poverty of insects and birds that I determined to go for a few days to
the island of Semao at the western extremity of Timor, where I heard
that there was forest country with birds not found at Coupang. With some
difficulty I obtained a large dugout boat with outriggers, to take me
over a distance of about twenty miles. I found the country pretty well
wooded, but covered with shrubs and thorny bushes rather than
forest trees, and everywhere excessively parched and dried up by the
long-continued dry season. I stayed at the village of Oeassa, remarkable
for its soap springs. One of these is in the middle of the village,
bubbling out from a little cone of mud to which the ground rises all
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