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After Tommie had gathered some strange water bugs that inhabited the water, we went on to see the Petani Falls. Another short drive along the road brought us to the entrance to the Falls, and we walked through a most beautiful woods - everybody's ideal of tropical forest, with enormous trees, quantities of ferns, little streams cutting across the path, and because of the high altitude no humidity, and a few flowers that one does not look for in the tropics. Here were violets and bamboo growing side by side, and a curious parasitic flower with tiny yellow blossoms and a pale green fruit looped itself from the branches of a jungle giant. I saw a butterfly with brown wings edged with white, and said "Doesn't it look like a bit of fungus?" A few minutes later I saw fungus growing on another log, and said "Doesn't it llok like a butterfly?" Bill found horned flies a ong the path, - the first time we have found them so far from water. The waterfall itself made a sheer drop of 200 feet, falling from the jungle above over a perpendicular wall of rock. The spray blew in our faces as we tried to photograph it, and rainbos danced in the mist a hundred feet below. 

After lunch, we reluctantly turned our backs on Brastagi, and left the gorgeous wind-swept plateau for the lower coast lands. Not before, however, we had picked up a few pieces of Brastagi weaving. The speciality of the place is the white ceremonial scarf, woven by the Bataks, with a border design of bright colors. 

The road to Medan winds down and down from the mountains, goes across a level plateau, and then down again, getting hotter with every minute.

June 18 -

We spent one of our characteristically hectic Medan mornings, going to the Bank, the Steamship Company, the K. P. M., the Consulate, Seng Hap the grocer's, and back to the Hotel for lunch. We had good news in the mail Mr. Browne was holding for us namely that we can have four giraffe from the Port Sudan Zoo in Agusut.

Beirne and Tommie celebrated by buying a tiger skin for Fl.80. Ingle and Marsh of Dolok Merangir were at the Hotel, and very helpful in arranging for us to see the proper officials of the Kerr Steamship Co., which we hope [[strikethrough]] to take [[/strikethrough]] will take us home. Anyone with a cargo of live animals is persona non grata at sea, and we are having great difficulty in getting reservations.

Finally we were off on the long trek to Atjeh. The road leading north from Medan is a beautiful one, wide, smooth, and shaded at first by avenues of teak trees (Which are raised as saplings to build tobacco warehouses), and later by oil palms. The oil palm plantations are very handsome, with their luxuriant leaves, well-kept grass between the trees, ferns growing on the trunks and the general air of an expensive garden. 

We stopped at Tandjang Poera to admire the mosque, which is one of the handsomest ones we have seen, ornamented in color, and accompanied by a stately muezzin tower.

In the evening we reached Kuala Simpang, and stopped at the Boulevard Hotel, which gave us good reistafel, though this is one of the few places we have been [[strikethrough]] wh [[/strikethrough]] ^[[in where the drinking water]]