The
Hadji gave us a rough hut with a flooring of split bamboo and kept us
provided with chickens. All this no doubt was in his estimation part
of the necessary steps to securing that much-desired Panglima-ship.
The two days we were here, people kept flocking into the village,
most of the men carrying long steel-pointed spears, in many cases
beautifully mounted with engraved silver: others carried long "parangs"
and "krises" in rough wooden sheaths, but the handles were often of
carved ivory and silver.
After some breakfast we started off to see the near lower cave, which
was one of the smaller ones. We followed a very pretty ferny track
by the side of a rocky stream for a short distance, the forest being
partially cleared and open, with large boulders scattered around. The
sky overhead was thick with swallows, in fact one could almost say
the air was black with them. These of course were the birds that make
the nests. The mouth of the cave partly prepared me for what I was to
see. I had expected a small entrance, but here it was, I should say,
sixty feet in height and of great width, the entrance being partly
overhung with a curtain of luxuriant creepers. The smell of guano
had been strong before, but here it was overpowering.
Extending inside the cave for about one hundred yards was a small
village of native huts used chiefly by the guards or watchers of
these caves. Compared with the vastness of the interior of the cave
- I believe about four hundred and eighty feet in height - one
could almost imagine that one was looking at the small model of a
village. A small stream ran out of a large hill of guano, and if you
left the track you sank over your knees in guano. The vastness of the
interior of this cave impressed me beyond words. It was stupendous,
and to describe it properly would take a better pen than mine. One
could actually see the very roof overhead, as there were two or
three openings near the top (reminding one of windows high up in
a cathedral) through which broad shafts of light forced their way,
making some old hanging rattan ladders high up appear like silvery
spider webs. Of course there were recesses overhead where the light
could not penetrate, and these were the homes of millions of small
bats, of which more presently. As for the birds themselves, this
was one of their nesting seasons, and the cave was full of myriads
of them. The twittering they made resembled the whisperings of a
multitude. The majority of them kept near the roof, and as they
flew to and fro through the shafts of light they presented a most
curious effect and looked like swarms of gnats; lower down they
resembled silvery butterflies.
