In The Untouched
Virgin Forest, The Insects Which Frequent Such Situations Are
Scattered Over An Immense Extent Of Country, At
Spots where trees
have fallen through decay and old age, or have succumbed to the
fury of the tempest; and
Twenty square miles of country may not
contain so many fallen and decayed trees as are to be found in
any small clearing. The quantity and the variety of beetles and
of many other insects that can be collected at a given time in
any tropical locality, will depend, first upon the immediate
vicinity of a great extent of virgin forest, and secondly upon
the quantity of trees that for some months past have been, and
which are still being cut down, and left to dry and decay upon
the ground.
Now, during my whole twelve years' collecting in the western and
eastern tropics, I never enjoyed such advantages in this respect
as at the Simunjon coalworks. For several months from twenty to
fifty Chinamen and Dyaks were employed almost exclusively in
clearing a large space in the forest, and in making a wide
opening for a railroad to the Sadong River, two miles distant.
Besides this, sawpits were established at various points in the
jungle, and large trees were felled to be cut up into beams and
planks. For hundreds of miles in every direction a magnificent
forest extended over plain and mountain, rock and morass, and I
arrived at the spot just as the rains began to diminish and the
daily sunshine to increase; a time which I have always found the
most favourable season for collecting.
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