a village on the north-western shore of the lake of the same name. The
inhabitants, particularly the women, struck me by their ugliness
and want of cleanliness. Although they lived close to the lake, and
drew their daily drinking water from it, they never appeared to use
it for the purpose of washing. The streets of the village also were
dirty and neglected; a circumstance explained, perhaps, by the fact
of the priest being a native.

[The lake.] Towards the end of the rainy season, in November, the
lake extends far more widely than it does in the dry, and overflows
its shallow banks, especially to the south-west. A great number of
water-plants grow on its borders; amongst which I particularly noticed
a delicate seaweed [96], as fine as horse hair, but intertwined in such
close and endless ramifications that it forms a flooring strong enough
to support the largest waterfowl. I saw hundreds of them hopping about
and eating the shell fish and prawns, which swarmed amidst the meshes
of the net-like seaweed and fell an easy prey to their feathered
enemies. The natives, too, were in the habit of catching immense
quantities of the prawns with nets made for the purpose. Some they
ate fresh; and some they kept till they were putrid, like old cheese,
and then used them as a relish to swallow with their rice. These
small shell-fish are not limited to the Lake of Batu. They are caught
in shoals in both the salt and the fresh waters of the Philippine
and Indian archipelagos, and, when salted and dried by the natives,
form an important article of food, eaten either in soup or as a kind
of potted paste. They are found in every market, and are largely
exported to China. I was unable to shoot any of the waterfowl, for
the tangles of the seaweed prevented my boat from getting near them.

[A neglected product.] When I revisited the same lake in February,