such a solitary place and with such bad neighbours.
My house was surrounded by a kind of straggling hedge of roses,
jessamines, and other flowers, and every morning one of the women
gathered a basketful of the blossoms for Mr. Mesman's family. I
generally took a couple for my own breakfast table, and the supply never
failed during my stay, and I suppose never does. Almost every Sunday Mr.
M. made a shooting excursion with his eldest son, a lad of fifteen, and
I generally accompanied him; for though the Dutch are Protestants,
they do not observe Sunday in the rigid manner practised in England and
English colonies. The Governor of the place has his public reception
every Sunday evening, when card-playing is the regular amusement.
On December 13th I went on board a prau bound for the Aru Islands, a
journey which will be described in the latter part of this work.
On my return, after a seven months' absence, I visited another district
to the north of Macassar, which will form the subject of the next
CHAPTER.
CHAPTER XVI. CELEBES.
(MACASSAR, JULY TO NOVEMBER, 1857.)
I REACHED Macassar again on the 11th of July, and established myself in
my old quarters at Mamajam, to sort, arrange, clean, and pack up my Aru
collections. This occupied me a month; and having shipped them off for
Singapore, had my guns repaired, and received a new one from England,
together with a stock of pins, arsenic, and other collecting requisites.
I began to feel eager for work again, and had to consider where I should
spend my time until the end of the year; I had left Macassar seven
months before, a flooded marsh being ploughed up for the rice-sowing.
The rains had continued for five months, yet now all the rice was cut,
and dry and dusty stubble covered the country just as when I had first
arrived there.
194