TO THE HILLS
To the hills—Rice-fields—The railway—Kitool and talipot palms—Olas—
Bread-fruit—Jak—Papaw—Kapok—Road-making—Major Skinner—Gampola—The
Delta—Rambodda Pass—Pallagolla.
Soon after our return we spent an interesting forenoon at Cotta, about
six miles from Colombo, a very pretty place, where the river broadens so
as to form a clear calm lake, embosomed in groves of cocoa-palms. Cotta
has the double interest of having been the residence of the Singhalese
kings at the time when the Portuguese first came to bring misery,
discord, and war, and the modern and most peaceful interest of having
been a very important station of the Church Missionary Society, almost
ever since it first commenced work in Ceylon in 1818. A printing-press
was then established here, which has been to the Singhalese all that the
American press at Jaffna has been to the Tamils. (See concluding
chapter.)
A very important branch of the work here is the Training Institution for
Native Students of Divinity and Schoolmasters. The fact that (although
selected from the most promising pupils in all parts of the Isle) these
at present only number respectively five and four, speaks volumes for
the difficulty of filling these important posts.
Another very important feature is the boarding-school, open to any
Singhalese girl of good character, irrespective of caste or religion. It
has been open about sixteen years, during which time about 250 girls
have been trained, some remaining for ten years. A considerable number
become Christians and teachers in the schools. The same may be said of
the English school for boys, which has an average attendance of ninety,
of whom nearly half are Buddhists, all of whom, however, voluntarily
attend the Scripture classes.
Troops of pretty, happy-looking children, boys and girls, from the
various schools had assembled to greet the Bishop; and in the crowded
church were no less than fifty-three candidates for confirmation, all
Singhalese and Burghers.
Early on the following morning we started for the hills, travelling by
the beautiful railway, which is certainly one of the loveliest lines of
rail I know of. Part of it reminded me of that through the Bombay
Ghauts. But, ere reaching the mountain district, we traversed a wide
expanse of swampy paddy-fields, most refreshing to the eyes, the
intensely vivid green of the young rice-crops far exceeding that of our
own wheat-fields.
It is a cultivation involving much toil, and singularly unpleasant to
those engaged in it, as from first to last it is all in mud. To begin
with that on level ground, each tiny field must be scooped out so as to
form a small lakelet several feet deep, the mud thus obtained forming an
embankment which retains the water, so that the rice may never be dry
till it is fully ripe. These embankments form the footpaths by which the
people travel from field to field.
On hillsides the toil is of a different sort. There it consists in
building up terraces, tier above tier, for many hundred feet, so as to
produce a succession of tiny lakes, curving with the formation of the
ground, each supported in front by a solid embankment, which in some
cases is five or six feet in depth. These are constructed with least
trouble in glens and valleys where the ground forms an angle, and where
a stream flows naturally; but I have seen steep hillsides so terraced as
to present a most singular effect of small lakes, fed by rivulets
carefully led to the summit from some distant source.
By this contrivance all available water is distributed and stored during
the dry season, and when the rains come, the superfluous water flows
from one tier of tank-like terraces to the next without washing away the
soil. Thus, thanks to the patient industry of the husbandmen, almost
precipitous hillsides are green with waving rice-crops. At all times the
contrivances for irrigation are suggestive of infinite pains, small
water-courses being led by aqueducts of mud and stone or bamboo to carry
tiny rivers of life through miles of jungle, from the cool hills to the
parched plains below. The cultivation of the steep hillsides is exactly
the same as in the Himalayas, and the narrow fields are ploughed with
the same antediluvian hand-implements.
The cultivation of the plains is less toilsome. When the ground has been
thoroughly saturated, the water is turned off, and the soil is stirred
to a depth of about eighteen inches by a very primitive plough drawn by
two buffaloes. Then the water is turned on again, and on the flat ground
herds of buffaloes are allowed to wade at will and wallow in the mud,
till it becomes so fluid as to sink to a perfect level. The buffaloes
thus incrusted with mud are truly disgusting-looking objects, and
present a most curious contrast to the long-legged, pure white
paddy-birds which stalk after them as inseparable companions.
The rice (which has been previously well soaked) is now scattered on the
level surface—most literally casting bread upon the waters, to be found
after many days. In about a fortnight the black mud is carpeted to a
depth of four inches with the loveliest green. The water is run off and
on alternately till just before the grain is ripe, when the ground is
allowed to dry, preparatory to harvest.
Where water does not fail, these fields yield two crops annually—the
_maha_, or great crop, sown in spring and reaped in early autumn; the
second, called _yalla_, sown about July and reaped in December. Hence,
about the month of September, there may be harvesting of ripe grain and
treading-out of corn by unmuzzled oxen or buffaloes in some fields,
while others are being ploughed by buffaloes or just appearing in sheets
of fresh young green. The exact dates are regulated by the somewhat
uncertain coming of the monsoons (in Biblical language, ‘the former and
latter rains’), due in the southern provinces in May and November.
Simple and idyllic as this primitive farming seems to the casual
observer, these verdant fields are sometimes the occasion of wearisome
lawsuits; for, as according to Singhalese custom all property is equally
divided among a man’s heirs, and then again subdivided, it follows that
a score of owners may share in the cultivation of a small paddy-field,
and in the division of its crop.
Other fields are the common property of a whole village, and the produce
has to be divided in certain proportions among the villagers, from the
owner of the buffaloes employed to plough and trample the land, down to
the dhoby who does the village washing. I may add that the word ‘paddy’
means unhusked rice, of which two bushels yield one of cleaned rice.
Leaving the level plain, we gradually ascended—upward, still upward, all
the way, wending round sharp curves and by many zigzags, so that we
could sometimes see both the last carriage of the train and the engines!
The carriages are provided with broad white roofs and Venetian shutters
as some protection against the sun. The engines are all of the most
powerful construction, as well they may be, seeing that for upwards of
twelve miles, while rounding the flank of Allagalla, a grand craggy
mountain, the uniform gradient is 1 in 45. By the time we reached the
summit of Kadugannawa Pass, about sixty miles from Colombo, we had
ascended 1,700 feet. In front of each engine is a ‘cow-catcher,’
intended to sweep off any inquisitive animals which may rashly wander on
to the line. Unfortunately even this is not always effectual, and the
carelessness of owners of cattle in allowing their animals to stray upon
the railway is incredible. The railway report for 1890 shows that 129
bullocks and cows were run over by trains during the year, besides
occasional buffaloes. Last May a herd of these were run into near
Polgahawela station, and though some were swept aside, one was run over,
causing the wheels to run off the rails. Fortunately the train was
stopped ere grave damage was done.
It is a single broad-gauge line, and in truth, when we see what
frightful engineering difficulties had to be overcome in its
construction, the succession of tunnels (one of which, through
Moragalla, is 365 feet in length), and the skirting of precipitous
crags, we can understand something of the causes which limited its
width.
Worse even than the stubborn rocks of the mountains in the central
province was the awful malaria, which in those days was so prevalent in
some of the low-lying inland districts, that it was almost certain death
to sleep in them. The coolies who worked on the line died by hundreds;
and in the tract lying between Mirigama and the Dekanda valley, so many
perished that at last there literally was not found room for their
burial within easy distance of the line. As the only possibility of
keeping them alive, it was found necessary to take them all back to
Colombo every night, a distance of about fifty miles. Of the Europeans
in charge of the works, one after another succumbed, and had to be
shipped off from Ceylon with health shattered by the deadly fever.[49]
-----
Footnote 49:
Possibly some of the many victims of jungle fever in other lands may
be disposed to try the simple remedy described in a letter to the
editor of the _Ceylon Observer_ . The writer states that his stalwart
brother had, from repeated attacks of Indian jungle fever, dwindled to
a mere skeleton, when a _fakir_ came to his tent and offered to
permanently cure him.
His _materia medica_ were of the simplest, consisting only of a flat
piece of iron and a bottle of sugar-cane vinegar. The former was made
red-hot, and the vinegar was poured over it, the patient inhaling the
fumes. This operation was repeated only a second time, and from that
day forward, in the thirteen years up to date of the letter, the
sufferer never had a return of fever, and quite recovered his health.
-----
Now, doubtless owing to improved drainings, and to the wholesale
cleaning of the jungle to make room for divers forms of cultivation, the
pestilential malaria is a story of the past; and of the dense
impenetrable forest which fifty years ago clothed the steep Kadugannawa
Pass only a few trees remain, and there is nothing whatever to suggest
to the luxurious traveller what pains and perils were endured, and how
many lives were sacrificed, ere this splendid line was opened even thus
far. Indeed, on one’s first journey, there is no time for any
impressions save those of wonder and admiration at the rapidly changing
panorama of most beautiful scenery.
Even when gliding along the face of sheer crags, looking down on the
valley a thousand feet below, one scarcely realises the situation. For
myself, frequently passing and repassing up and down this line, and
living for happy weeks in its neighbourhood, always pencil in hand, I
learnt to realise something of what must have been the dangers involved
in constructing such portions as ‘The Bear’s Mouth,’ ‘Sensation Rock,’
and the half-tunnel gallery along the face of the Meeangalla precipice.
And yet all these are said to be plain sailing as compared with the
difficulties which are now being successfully overcome by the engineers
of the extension to Haputale, which is opening up much of the grandest
scenery in the isle; so that almost ere these pages are published, the
most easy-going tourist will be able, without the smallest exertion, to
see whole districts which hitherto have been inaccessible even to old
residents. And not in this direction only, but north, south, east, and
west, the necessity of railway extension is being recognised; and in a
very few years, so far as any difficulty is concerned, travelling to any
corner of Ceylon will be as matter-of-fact as a journey from London to
Edinburgh.
The railway system in Ceylon is entirely in the hands of Government, and
it is urged by those who plead for extension, that opening up the
country will certainly lead to great increase of traffic and consequent
revenue. With the exception of that between Kandy and Matala, the lines
hitherto constructed are said to be about the best paying in the world.
As to the stations, so much care is bestowed on their gardens that each
is a thing of beauty, embowered in luxuriant climbing plants, and all
manner of fragrant and brilliant flowers. All names are written up in
English, Tamil, and Singhalese, in their respective characters, so that
all travellers may read, every man in his own tongue, unperplexed by the
hateful advertisements which disfigure our British stations.
At each, pretty Singhalese children offer for sale baskets of tempting
fruit, and cool refreshing young cocoa-nuts which they cut open, and
hand all ready to the thirsty traveller. Fortunately for sight-seers,
the rate of travel is not excessive, twenty-eight miles an hour being
the utmost speed on the very best bit of level, while on the steep
incline twelve miles an hour is the regulation limit, and at one point
rather less.
There is so much to see on either side, that eyes and mind must be
constantly on duty, whether looking right up to the mountains overhead,
or down to the grand valley outspread far, far below, all clothed with
richest vegetation, every variety of palm mingling with endless
varieties of hardwood, while the little terraced rice-fields on the
slopes of the hills, and those on the flat expanse below, either present
sheets of the most dazzling green or seem like a mosaic of innumerable
tiny lakes. And on every side of this great valley rise hills of every
variety of form—a billowy sea of mountain-ranges, all glorified by
ever-changing effects of light and shadow, veiling mist or sweeping
storm, followed by that ‘clear shining after rain,’ which daily reveals
new beauties in mountain regions.
To me that scene recalls endless pleasant memories of happy days and
weeks spent in exploring many a lovely corner in that vast panorama—
memories of the cordial hospitality which gave me welcome to nest-like
homes on many a hill and valley, and of one in particular, to which I
was welcomed again and again, perched at the base of the mighty crag
which crowns Allagalla Peak—which is a beautiful isolated mountain,
3,394 feet in height—from the summit of which, it is said, the Kandyan
monarchs were wont to precipitate persons accused of high treason.
That home was in a sheltered nook embosomed in fruit-trees, and
overlooking such a magnificent view as we may sometimes obtain for a few
moments by climbing some mighty Alp, but which few homes can claim as
their perpetual outlook.
Thence far below us, and yet far above the valley, we could discern two
narrow lines, and we knew that the lower one was the cart-road and the
upper one the railroad, and suddenly a double puff of steam would rise,
and there, darting from a tunnel, was a long train with an engine at
either end, labouring on its tortuous up-hill course, winding round the
steep hillside. It was so far below us that it seemed like a fairy’s
toy, and yet it gave us a sense of touch with our fellow-creatures which
in so isolated an eyrie was rather pleasant.
As we gradually ascended from the sea-level we observed a very marked
change in the character of the vegetation, one of the most conspicuous
trees being covered with bunches of white blossom, which in the distance
resemble our own white lilac; the young leaves being pure white, and all
silvery on the under side, so that, when swaying in the breeze, the tree
contrasts prettily with its neighbours. I believe it is a croton, though
utterly unlike the very gorgeously coloured members of that family. This
is called by the Singhalese _kekuna_, and from its nuts they used to
extract an oil for lamps. In Fiji, where we found the identical tree and
much of the identical vegetation, these are known as candle-nuts, and I
have seen them strung on the rib of a palm-leaf to act as candles, and
very dull was the light they gave!
A far more showy tree is the Moratuwa (_Lagerstrœmia regina_), which
flourishes near streams, growing to a height of from forty to fifty
feet, and bears splendid upright spikes, two or three feet in length, of
exquisite blossoms, varying from a delicate rose-colour to rich purple.
Think of the most beautiful horse-chestnut you ever saw, and magnify and
glorify its wealth of blossom, and you can perhaps form some idea of
this beautiful tree. It flowers on Allagalla in the month of April. (I
am told that these trees are in their glory in the Bintenna district,
near Mahaoya village, where the whole western side of the Mahaoya river
presents a blaze of rosy purple, and stretching along the river-bed of
yellow sand, relieved by a background of dark green, a gorgeous scene in
the bright morning light.)
And trees here rarely stand naked and alone, as in England; they are
generally enriched by graceful parasites, ferns, or perhaps orchids,
clothe stem and boughs, and a great variety of lianas climb to the very
summit of the tallest trees, and droop thence in long trails or festoons
of delicate greenery, connecting a whole group of trees with their
verdant veiling, often starred with white or blue convolvulus.
Near the sea, and indeed so far inland as the saturated sea breeze
carries the salt spray, the vegetation is often so encrusted with salt,
that the young leaves seem partially blighted; but only in gales of
unusual violence is the brine carried so far as this, and it would be
difficult to conceive foliage richer and more beautiful than that
through which we were now passing. It seemed as though Mother Nature
must have taxed all her inventive powers to devise an infinite variety
of graceful forms. I noticed this especially in the matter of palms,
which are at all times peculiarly fascinating, but on some isles only
one or two flourish, and from their multitude they become monotonous.
But here the eye can never weary, so amazing is the diversity of form
and colour presented to it in ever-changing combination of strangely
dissimilar palms, tree-ferns, and all manner of hardwood, bearing large
leaves or small, leathery or woolly, in endless variety.
Though we had left the seaboard (the special region of the brine-loving
cocoa-palm), there were still enough of those graceful bending stems and
long waving fronds to contrast with the picturesque clumps of stiff
fan-leaved palmyra-palms (with rough dark stems upright as pillars,
crowned by capitals of glossy green), and with the slender silvery
areca, so slender that a stem seventy or eighty feet high does not
exceed five or six in diameter.
The latter flourishes at any altitude from the sea-level up to about
3,000 feet, and is sometimes planted to mark estate boundaries, and
sometimes as an avenue.
Totally different from these or from any other member of the beautiful
clan palm, and to me most attractive of all, was the kitool or jaggery
palm (_Caryota urens_). Its leaves are just like gigantic fronds of the
lovely maiden-hair fern of our hothouses. It is the richest and most
beautiful foliage that can be imagined, and its mode of flowering is
very remarkable. Till the last year of its life, by which time it has
attained a height of fifty or sixty feet, it bears leaves only, then
from the axil of the topmost leaf it throws out a large cluster of
flowers, and as this fades, another and another cluster flowers all the
way down the tree, alternately male and female, until the lowest
leaf-axil is reached, and the mass of fruitage is such that the
exhausted tree then dies.
The fruit is as unique as the leaf, for instead of bearing about a
hundred large nuts in clusters like other palms, it produces an
innumerable multitude of juicy berries about the size of grapes, growing
in festoons several feet in length, like heavy drapery.
Under the impression that the natives eat these sweet berries, I was one
day tempted to taste them; but the rash experiment was immediately
followed by a burning pain in my lips, which continued unabated for some
hours, notwithstanding the application of oil, water, lime-juice,
everything we could think of. It was rather alarming, although I knew it
could not be poison, inasmuch as the natives manufacture both sugar and
palm-wine from the saccharine sap, obtained by bruising the undeveloped
blossom, and this coarse brown jaggery-sugar is rather a pleasant
sweetmeat.
A good tree sometimes yields a hundred pints of this sweet sap or toddy
in twenty-four hours. When the tree dies, good sago is obtained from its
pith: and its hard black timber is valuable for house-building, and
also, from its being tough and pliable, is generally used for making the
pingoes or yokes, six or eight feet in length, which are balanced on the
shoulder and used for carrying loads slung from either end, the elastic
spring of the pingo greatly lessening the dead weight thus carried. The
leaf-stalks yield a black fibre, from which are prepared fine lines for
fishing and ropes stout enough to bind elephants.
But the PALM of PALMS, of which I now for the first time saw a
considerable number, each in solitary grandeur, is the talipot,[50] or
great fan-palm, the stately monarch of the palm kingdom, whose grand
green crown far overtops all its fellows. For the first thirty years of
its life it grows only magnificent fan-shaped leaves like those of the
palmyra, but much larger.
-----
Footnote 50:
_Corypha umbraculifera._
-----
If there be any truth in the legend which affirms Ceylon to have been
the Paradise of our first parents, it must be confessed that Eve showed
a truly feminine love of sewing in her selection of foliage, as a single
leaf of the talipot palm would have been amply sufficient for train and
mantle—being on an average eighteen feet in length (sometimes very much
larger), and all ready folded into plaits like those of a lady’s dress.
The natives turn these leaves to a thousand uses, domestic and literary.
When on a journey (and especially pilgrims bound for sacred shrines in
the wilds) each carries a portion of one of these great leaves, tightly
folded into a long narrow form, like a gigantic closed fan. This serves
as a sun-shade or rain-cloak by day, and at night several friends
contribute every man his palm-leaf—three or four of these, with the
pointed end upwards, forming a very fair bell-shaped tent; and very
picturesque a few groups of these look when pitched in some forest glade
round their camp-fires.
In old days the exact grade of every great Singhalese or Kandyan noble
was shown by the number of such sun-shades which he was entitled to have
carried before him; and on state occasions a richly ornamented leaf,
inlaid with pieces of glittering talc, and folded like a huge fan,
formed the ceremonial canopy which was held above his head by one or
more attendants.[51]
-----
Footnote 51:
I embodied many curious details regarding the honorific use of the
sun-shade in all ages and all countries in a paper on ‘Pagodas,
Umbrellas, and Aurioles,’ which appeared in the _English Illustrated
Magazine_ for June and July 1888.
-----
The leaves attain their largest size when the tree is about twenty years
of age, at which time they sometimes measure twenty-five feet from the
base of the leaf-stalk to the outer edge of the fan. As the tree grows
older, the leaves are smaller—the strength of the tree being absorbed in
preparation for its gigantic final effort of blossom and fruition.
After the first ten years a visible trunk begins to form, and for
perhaps thirty years more it grows steadily, till the grand white stem
towers, straight as a mast, to a height of upwards of a hundred feet,
sustaining the magnificent crown of gigantic leaves. Like most of the
palm family, the stem bears ring-marks where the annual leaves have
gripped it.
The tree attains maturity at about forty years of age, when it slowly
develops one huge bud fully four feet high. In course of time the
expanding blossom bursts its prison, and develops into an enormous spike
of hermaphrodite flowers taking about three months to perfect a majestic
pyramid of snowy plumes composed of multitudinous small cream-coloured
flowers, something like those of the yucca, and of an almost
overpowering scent. These form one splendid mass of blossom, rising from
the heart of the leafy crown to a height of from twenty to twenty-five
feet, towering far above the surrounding foliage. This stupendous
cluster throws out lateral branches, of which the lower tier sometimes
measures twenty feet—the base of the pyramid thus having a diameter of
forty feet! It is a glorious object, and is visible from an immense
distance, as this palm so often grows among flat surroundings, such as
rice-fields.
But the tree, which for well-nigh half a century has been accumulating
strength for this one supreme effort, never recovers the exhaustion of
such tremendous exertion. Its latest energies are lavished on the
ripening of its one crop of innumerable, but I believe useless, nuts,
each about the size of a small apple. Then, having fulfilled its mission
right nobly, and borne down by the weight of its crop, the noble tree
sickens, its leaves wither, the soft upper end of the stem decays; then
the roots likewise decay, and within a year of the date when the great
blossom-spike first began to appear, the dead tree falls prostrate—
leaving its crown of precious leaves as a last legacy to its owner.
(Though indigenous to Ceylon and the adjacent coast of Malabar, this
palm is nowhere found wild.)
Strange to say, the talipot is of a gregarious habit as regards
flowering. Some years many are in blossom, and a noble sight they
present. I believe I was peculiarly fortunate in the number which I saw
simultaneously between Kandy and Colombo. Then for perhaps eight or ten
years there are very few. If cut while the tree is still young, it
yields a white pith, of which the natives make cakes; but naturally so
precious a tree is not sacrificed needlessly.
The leaves, when carefully prepared, are the equivalent of our vellum.
The most precious ancient manuscripts were all inscribed with a
sharp-pointed metal style on long narrow strips of talipot-leaf; a
number of these being strung together form a volume. These are carefully
tied up between two long narrow covers, which may be only painted wooden
boards, but, in the case of old temple books, are sometimes highly
ornamented and even enriched with precious gems. In some cases these
covers are of embossed gold or silver. There are very fine specimens in
the Temple Library at Kandy.
The preparation of the _olas_ or ‘vellum’ strips is done by the junior
priests and students in Buddhist monasteries. Tender young leaves are
selected, and the ribs having been removed, the leaf is cut into strips,
which are boiled in spring-water and then slowly dried in the shade, and
finally in the sun, after which they are again damped, and each is
individually polished by being drawn backwards and forwards for about
twenty minutes over the smooth stem of an areca palm, which for
convenience’ sake is tied horizontally between two trees. The olas,
which are now of a delicate straw colour, are then rolled up, and kept
in store ready for use.
For ordinary books and letters, the olas are prepared from the leaves of
the far more abundant palmyra-palm. Even in these days, when foreign
manufactured paper is so cheap and abundant, the palm-leaf happily still
continues in favour—even the narrow fronds of the cocoa-palm affording a
never-failing supply of ready-made writing materials, the hard mid-rib
acting as a pen when no sharper implement is at hand. I may add that
Singhalese writing is very neat and small, and it is wonderful to see
what straight lines are produced by writers who have no support for the
strip except their own left hand.
In marked contrast with these stately fan-palms, and with the light
waving plumes of the cocoas, are the bread-fruit trees, with their
masses of dark-green foliage and large pale-green fruit nestling beneath
separate crowns of splendid glossy leaves, deeply indented. I have
measured a good many of these leaves, and found some on young trees
which actually measured 3 feet 2 inches by 2 feet 4 inches, while others
on older trees averaged 21 to 25 inches in length. Each of these great
leaves act as a mirror to reflect the light, so that the bread-fruit
tree casts no great depth of shadow (_Artocarpus incisa_).
Of course everyone who sees a bread-fruit tree for the first time longs
to taste the natural hot buttered rolls of his childhood’s fancy; but I
fear the result is generally disappointing. Personally I have had
abundant opportunities of tasting it in all its preparations, and I
cannot say I greatly appreciate any of them, whether boiled or baked, as
in Fiji and Tahiti, or made into glutinous _poi_ in Hawaii. From the
fact that this grand tree is not even named by so accurate an observer
as Sir James Emerson Tennent, I assume that, common as it now is, it
must be one of the many importations of the last half-century; for
Ceylon, like New Zealand, has proved so good a stepmother to all manner
of trees and flowers, that it is only by reference to the earliest
botanists that we can trace what plants are really indigenous.
Among these, I think, we may rank a first cousin of the bread-fruit
tree—namely, the jak (_Artocarpus integrifolia_)—a large tree with less
attractive foliage, which, however, casts a deeper shadow (a valuable
consideration beneath a tropical noonday sun). It produces the largest
of all edible fruits, one tree bearing perhaps a hundred, some weighing
as much as sixty pounds; and its extraordinary peculiarity lies in the
manner in which it carries them, hanging by short thick stalks, not only
from the actual trunk of the tree and the thickest part of the boughs,
but sometimes even from the roots!
They are enclosed in a rough green skin, and, when ripe, the interior of
the fruit is a thick yellow substance, which is eaten raw, and in which
are embedded a number of kernels, each the size of a large filbert-nut.
These, if the fruit is gathered unripe, are either roasted or used as a
vegetable curry, much appreciated by the natives, though not in favour
with Europeans. The wood of the jak-tree is highly valued by carpenters
for making furniture, and a strong bird-lime is prepared from its milky
juice—not sap, the two being totally distinct, as in indiarubber trees.
This milk is used as a varnish for the very gaudily painted pottery-ware
peculiar to Kandy, on which temple processions or scenes in Buddhist
mythology are depicted in the crudest and most brilliant colours. Some
vases are simply covered with patterns. The effect is peculiar, but by
no means artistic.
Next perhaps comes a wide-spreading indiarubber tree, with dark thick
leathery leaves and strangely twisted snake-like roots, and then a
glimpse of brown-thatched huts and blue smoke, half hidden by orange and
lemon, lime or shaddock trees, tall maize or sugar-cane, or flowering
hibiscus, with here and there the slender stem of a papaw,[52] fifteen
to twenty feet in height, supporting a crown of very large beautifully
cut-out leaves, beneath which hang bunches of fruit like small green
melons, with yellow flesh, which are either cooked or eaten raw with
pepper and salt. The seeds have a hot pungent taste.
-----
Footnote 52:
_Carica papaya._
-----
The fruit is considered useful as an aid to digestion, and an excellent
vegetable pepsine can be prepared from the green fruit by mixing its
milky, rather acid, juice with alcohol. The combination precipitates
papaïn, which is then dried in the sun or on a hot plate, and powdered,
and must be kept in well-stoppered bottles, ready for use in cases of
dyspepsia. It is said to be superior to the ordinary animal pepsine, and
has proved a valuable remedy in the treatment of tapeworm.
The stem of the papaw is covered with a pretty diamond-shaped pattern,
and the general appearance of the plant is that of a very tall umbrella.
It has one very curious property—namely, that tough fresh meat hung up
under the shadow of its crown of leaves becomes tender in a very few
hours. Of course it must also be closely wrapped in leaves to protect it
from flies.
As we journey onward we pass clumps of graceful golden-stemmed bamboos,
elegant acacias, feathery tamarind-trees, which, strange to say,
notwithstanding the delicacy of their foliage, are found to cast the
coolest of all shade; thorny coral-trees,[53] which, ere the leaves
appear, are covered with scarlet pea-shaped blossoms; and tall perfectly
upright cotton-trees,[54] called by the Singhalese Katu-Imbul.
-----
Footnote 53:
_Erythrina indica._
Footnote 54:
_Bombax malabaricum._
-----
These throw out stiff lateral branches in groups of three, about six
feet apart, from a vividly green stem. The branches, like those of the
coral-tree, are loaded with cup-shaped crimson blossoms ere any leaves
develop, and afterwards bear large green pods, containing black seeds
embedded in silky white cotton, which floats away like snowflakes in the
sunny breeze. This silky down is called _imbul-pulun_ or simply _pulun_,
a name curiously resembling that of _pulu_, which is the Hawaiian name
for the silky brown fluff collected from certain tree-ferns, and used
for stuffing the softest of mattresses and pillows.[55]
-----
Footnote 55:
See ‘Fire-Fountains of Hawaii.’ By C. F. Gordon Cumming. Published by
William Blackwood & Sons.
-----
Owing to the trouble of separating this cotton or _pulun_ from the
seeds, it has hitherto been collected in a very desultory way, and is
only used for stuffing cushions, the fibre being so short and brittle
that no means of spinning it has yet been discovered. Latterly, however,
a considerable demand for it has arisen, chiefly in Australia, for
stuffing mattresses, and under the Malay name of _kapok_ a considerable
amount has been exported, but so carelessly has it hitherto been
prepared (with the seeds and cores left to form hard lumps, and the
whole, moreover, compressed into a solid mass by hydraulic pressure in
order to economise freight, thereby breaking the spring of the fibre and
destroying its elasticity) that Ceylon _kapok_ has acquired a bad
reputation as compared with the carefully cleaned and lightly packed
bales of the same fibre exported from Java.
However, as wise men profit by experience, there seems no reason why one
bad start should be allowed to injure this trade. Personally I can speak
of the charm of this flossy fibre, having always travelled with a pillow
stuffed with some collected and cleaned by myself, with the aid of a
pretty Singhalese girl, and certainly no eider-down could excel its
softness. But I am bound to confess that the separation of the fibre
from the seeds was very tedious work, even with the help of the
deft-fingered brown maiden, and it is satisfactory to learn that a
‘cotton gin,’ which is said to answer well, has recently been adapted to
this purpose.
It is hoped that some method may also be devised for turning to account
the strong fibrous stem, for the plant is so very accommodating that it
flourishes almost without cultivation, and at any level, from the
sea-coast up to 4,000 or 5,000 feet. In Java its abundance is partly
accounted for by the fact that its perfectly straight stems, fifty or
sixty feet in height, led to their use in every direction as telegraph
posts. These kindly put out roots, and became flourishing trees; at the
same time waste lands near the villages had been planted with cuttings
or sown with _kapok_ seed to keep up the supply of tall posts, and so
Java is now rich in the silky fibre which has become so remunerative.
I grieve that the attempt to describe what is so infinitely varied to
the eye must necessarily be somewhat monotonous to the reader, so I must
ask each to try in imagination to fill in the picturesque groups of
human beings, brightly dressed Tamil or Singhalese men, women, and
children, birds and animals, which gave life to every scene.
At the summit of the steep Kadugannawa Pass there is a monument to
Captain Dawson, R.E., who had charge of the construction of the original
road up the Pass, which, for forty years before the railway was
completed, was the only means of access to the mountain districts from
the north and west. Captain Dawson died in 1829.
To travellers and other folk to whom time is precious, the railway seems
so vast an improvement on ‘the old carriage-road,’ that it is difficult
to realise the amazing change which was effected by its creation only
about sixty years ago (A.D. 1822). Prior to that time there were only
two roads even in the Maritime Provinces, and those so bad as scarcely
to be worthy of the name. Along these, travellers were carried in
palanquins, with a retinue of heavily-laden baggage coolies. As to the
Central Province, it was altogether inaccessible to any but
hill-climbers.
Kandy itself, the mountain capital, to which the railway now carries us
from Colombo in four hours of luxurious travel (by a route which is one
of the great triumphs of railway engineering) could then only be
approached with infinite toil by steep, rugged, narrow jungle-paths, in
many places dangerous for riders, and quite impossible for vehicles of
any description.
By these all stores of every description, whether for peace or war, were
carried on the backs of weary men, and the transport of big guns was a
matter to tax the ingenuity of the artillery. It was hard enough for the
men to drag the guns through deep sand along the coast, but the toil of
getting them up mountain passes was indescribable. When Colonel Skinner,
R.A. (father of Major Skinner, ‘the road-maker of Ceylon’), had to bring
up his battery of heavy guns for the taking of Kandy, the only way in
which this could be effected was by ‘parbuckling the guns up from tree
to tree!’
The worthy son of this distinguished father commenced his road-making
service in this very pass, so I cannot refrain from some reference
thereto, especially as I travelled over many and many a mile of his
broad highways.
He is one of the noble Britons who have done magnificent work for their
country, but who would assuredly have been rejected at the outset had
competitive examinations been the passport to enter her service. For in
his delightful autobiography[56] Thomas Skinner tells us that when, in
A.D. 1818, at the ripe age of fourteen, he was sent out from a quiet
vicarage in Dorsetshire to join his father, who was then stationed at
Trincomalee, he was as ignorant as a boy of his age could well be, and
his father could hardly be persuaded not to send him back to England to
school.
-----
Footnote 56:
‘Fifty Years in Ceylon.’ By Major Thomas Skinner. W. H. Allen & Co.
-----
Fortunately what proved to be wiser counsels prevailed, and on the
recommendation of two naval officers, Sir Robert Brownrigg, the
Governor, appointed him to be second lieutenant in the Ceylon Rifles,
with orders at once to march detachments of the 19th, 83rd, and Ceylon
Rifles across the Isle from Trincomalee to Colombo _viâ_ Kandy, by the
difficult jungle-paths, which were then the sole means of crossing the
Island.
In the farewell address of the native chiefs to Major Skinner, just
fifty years later, their spokesman, Mr. James Alwis, recalled how at
that time, when there were no roads in the interior of Ceylon, the march
from Colombo to Kandy occupied _about six weeks_, crossing malarious
swamps and feverish jungle, toiling up steep ravines, climbing over
rocks, or skirting precipices. (Thinking of that journey, now so
pleasantly accomplished _in four hours_, my first impression was that
the word weeks must surely be a misprint for days; but I am told that
this is not the case, the route then followed being so circuitous, and
the daily marches necessarily short. After the cart-road was made, the
journey was accomplished in five days, which was the average prior to
1867, when the railway was opened.)
As the distance from Kandy to Trincomalee is much greater, Tom Skinner’s
first military duty must have been a very serious undertaking, though he
accepted it quite as a matter of course, and does not deem it worthy of
a comment, beyond remarking that the appearance of such a very small
boy, dressed in his schoolboy jacket, at the head of his men, caused
some amusement among the officers at Kandy. No wonder that, on his
reporting himself at Colombo, his astonished commanding officer could
scarcely believe his eyes when he beheld the stripling who had performed
this duty.
From that time nothing came amiss to the lad. His very first experience
of sport, at a time when he had never even seen a tame elephant, was
starting off alone to meet a huge solitary elephant, with remarkably
fine tusks. (Barely 4 per cent. of the Ceylon elephants possess tusks at
all, and not one in two hundred are of any size.) His terrified sergeant
hastened to the rescue, but by extraordinary good fortune the boy shot
the giant dead, with a single shot from a flint-and-steel musket, as it
was rushing headlong at him—a feat which delighted his men all the more
from the magnificent unconcern with which their _tuan kilchel_, ‘little
officer,’ treated the whole matter!
Before he had been a year in the island, the lad had passed through more
remarkable experiences than befall many men in the course of a lifetime—
such as finding himself left in sole charge of troops cut off from all
commissariat supplies, and also sole European in a district where
small-pox had appeared and was raging (the first time it had visited
Ceylon). He organised foraging parties, and established a small-pox
hospital under his own care—all with such courtesy and wisdom as won the
hearts of all the people.
Happily his superiors, both civil and military, were not slow to note
the young officer’s remarkable genius for work. When about sixteen, he
was appointed by the Governor, Sir Edward Barnes, to make eleven miles
of the great road up the Kadugannawa Pass, by which the hitherto almost
inaccessible Kandyan provinces were to be opened up. This was work of
which he was totally ignorant. His sole direction was to maintain a
gradient of one in twenty, and what that meant he had no idea. So when
he found himself among enormous boulders and perpendicular precipices,
in charge of two hundred untutored Kandyan villagers, he was at first
thoroughly perplexed; but earnest resolution and untiring zeal inspired
him with a sort of instinct what to do then, as in many a subsequent
difficulty.
The making of that first road forms a very important era in the history
of Ceylon. With such energy was its construction carried on, that within
twelve months of the date of the order for surveying and tracing it
through a densely wooded mountainous country, the first eighty-four
miles between Colombo and Kandy was so far completed that the supplies
for the troops could be conveyed thither on wheels. Rapidly as these and
other roads were surveyed and constructed, more recent engineers have
had no fault to find. It was splendid work, well and quickly done.
The men employed were—_first_, a noble force of Pioneers; _secondly_,
such of the native troops as could be spared, and who were fit for such
work; and _thirdly_, the gratuitous labour of the people, who by their
own laws were compelled to render service to the State when required to
do so.
This system of _Rajah-Karia_, as it was called, and which under the
British was soon abolished, proved invaluable in those early days, when
used in moderation by such a Governor as Sir Edward Barnes, whose wisdom
and justice were revered by high and low. So greatly was he esteemed
that when, seventeen years after he left the Island, a statue of him was
erected in Colombo, so many of the natives came from the interior to lay
offerings of flowers, rice, and money at the base of the pedestal (as is
customary at their shrines), that it was found necessary to surround the
statue with a railing to prevent its being treated as an idol!
The Pioneer Corps here referred to is a semi-military force of about
4,000 men of the very best class of Malabar labourers. They were raised
by Major Skinner in order that he might always have trained workmen on
whom he could rely for steady continuous work in the making of roads,
bridges, and canals; and they continue to be kept up as a valuable
permanent corps, employed by the Department of Public Works.
During the whole fifty years of Major Skinner’s public service, the
story of his life is more interesting than any romance, illustrating, as
it does, what could be accomplished by an unassuming man, brimful of
pluck, energy, self-reliance, self-help, and quiet determination never
to refuse any work that came in his way, and never to fail in anything
he undertook, from conquering veteran players at chess to creating a
network of first-class roads all over the Isle, discovering and opening
up the long-forgotten ruined cities, restoring the ruined canal system
of the Maritime Provinces, and finally securing an enormous reduction on
the estimates and actual cost of the railway which was to supplant so
much of his road work.
With him, to discover a difficulty was the sure preliminary to
conquering it; and to such a nature there was keen delight in the
knowledge that his work lay either in breaking perfectly new ground, or
else in restoring long-neglected works, and this in an island as large
as Ireland.
He tells us how invaluable to him in his road-making were the tracks of
the herds of wild elephants, so judiciously were they invariably
selected, and so well trodden. ‘The top of every ridge,’ he says, ‘had
its broad road along which one could drive a carriage, while from range
to range one was always sure to find a cross-road which invariably led
to the easiest crossing of the river in the valley.’
That preliminary survey and much of his subsequent work involved an
amount of exposure, hardship, and actual privation of which the present
generation can form no conception. Fever and dysentery were the almost
inevitable results of life under such conditions.
For six or seven months in each year he was hard at work, often in most
unhealthy, malarious districts, and never under shelter from 4 A.M. till
7 or 8 P.M. And his only tent consisted of five sheets of talipot-palm
leaf, stitched together with its own fibre. Each leaf being about six
feet by four, three leaves formed two sides and one end, and the other
two the roof. Along the top was a small ridge-cap of the same material,
and the door always stood open. Within this leaf-tent stood his
camp-bed, table, and chair; and as one set of leaves, value a trifle
over a shilling, lasted him for a whole season, he reckoned that his
quarters were not expensive!
At one time, when he was surveying in the wilderness of the Peak (which
was then an unbroken expanse of about 500 square miles of splendid
forest), his only food during two months consisted—with the exception of
rice and of some wild forest roots—of five miserable chickens, three of
which had died from wet and cold on their ascent of the Holy Mount, and
so small a quantity of salt fish, that he could only allow himself about
one square inch for each meal. He was always a model of temperance in
all things, to which he attributed much of his amazing gift of health
under most adverse circumstances.
His own account of his life at this time is of such interest to many who
would fain emulate his powers as a mountaineer, that I am tempted to
quote it in full. He says: ‘On beginning my season’s work I found it
necessary to discipline myself as to the amount of liquid I took; and
for ten days I suffered terribly, as the exposure to the sun, with the
great amount of work I had to go through, caused the most profuse
perspirations, and an almost irresistible longing to put my head into
every mountain brook I crossed, to quench my burning thirst. I sometimes
assuaged it for a time by putting a bit of areca-nut in my mouth, its
stringency giving me temporary relief; but by persevering in this course
of abstinence for a few days, I found life became more bearable.
‘My allowance of liquid during the day was a small cup of coffee before
I started in the morning; breakfast during these two months consisted
only of a bit of cake made of rice-flour and water, a biscuit or two,
and a cup of cold tea which I carried in a small bottle. In the evening
my dinner was boiled rice and a small bit of salt fish, or sometimes
some jungle roots made into a curry, a glass of sherry mixed with an
equal quantity of water; and after dinner, a cup of coffee with my
cigar.
‘All the liquid I took during the day did not exceed one imperial pint;
this _régime_ brought me into such splendid working condition, that I
could outrun anyone. One very active headman begged me to give him an
opportunity of racing me up the cone of Adam’s Peak. We started, and he
went off at a great pace, and was out of sight in a few minutes, but
three-quarters of a mile was sufficient to blow him. I passed him, and
was on the summit forty minutes before him. In like manner I could leave
all the athletes of a village behind me.’
His working staff at that time consisted of African soldiers, considered
the hardiest men in the British army. He says he often longed for a
taste of their savoury meals, but resisted the temptation, fearing lest
their provisions might run short. They were on full rations of salt beef
or pork, rice, curry stuffs, and arrack, and were allowed two days in
camp for each day on field-work with their leader (who was out hard at
work every day), yet by the time they reached Nuwara Eliya every man
except himself was laid up.
Before the close of the season, however, he suffered severely from sore
legs, resulting from poverty of blood, consequent on deficient animal
food. But the habit then acquired of limiting his allowance of fluid
continued a lasting advantage, as to the end of his life he says he
never knew what thirst meant.
This seems a long digression, but seeing how enormously I as a mere
traveller have benefited by Major Skinner’s labours, it would be the
height of ingratitude not to add my small chirp of thanks to the chorus
which is his due.
When he finally left the island in 1867, his fifty years of incessant
work was thus summarised in the _Ceylon Observer_ : ‘He has survived to
see a magnificent network of roads spread over the country, from the
sea-level to the passes of our highest mountain ranges; and instead of
dangerous fords and ferries, where property often suffered and life was
too frequently sacrificed, he has lived to see every principal stream in
Ceylon substantially bridged, or about to be spanned by structures of
stone or iron. Whereas before his time there were, strictly speaking,
“no roads in the island,” Ceylon, with an area of 25,000 miles, can now
count nearly 3,000 miles of made roads, one-fifth of which consist of
first-class metalled roads, and another fifth of excellent gravelled
highways.‘
Add to all this the restoration of inland navigation—that canal system
by which we travelled so pleasantly to Puttalam and Kalpitiya—and the
impetus given to many another public work, and we have the bare outline
of such a life of unselfish usefulness to his fellow-men as few have
been privileged to show.
When we reached the high pass of Kadugannawa, we were on the watershed
which divides the tributaries of the Kelani-ganga and Maha-Oya on the
west coast from those of the Maha-velli-ganga, which, after a
north-easterly course of about 130 miles, enters the sea near
Trincomalee.
Descending to Peradeniya Station, we found ourselves on the brink of
that broad still river—the Maha-velli-ganga or Great Sandy river—all
fringed with beautiful tufts of feathery bamboo. The old road of which I
have just spoken crosses the river by a noble bridge entirely built of
satin-wood, constructed in 1832 without the use of a single nail or
bolt, and still, to all appearance, as sound as ever. It spans the river
with a single arch 205 feet wide, which, when the stream is in its
normal condition, stands 70 feet above the water, but in time of flood
scarcely clears it by 10 feet.
The railway crosses the stream very near the road-bridge, and a five
miles’ run would have taken us to Kandy, the mountain capital, 1,600
feet above the sea; but that pleasure was reserved for later, after I
had visited Nuwara Eliya, ‘the City of the Open Plain,’ which is the
Island sanatorium, and the third Government station—_i.e._ the third
place where the Governor has an official residence. So, instead of going
north, we turned due south, following the course of the beautiful river
to Gampola, which was then the terminus. Now, the railway carries
passengers by a much more circuitous route, and easier gradient, right
up to Nanu-Oya, which is only five miles from Nuwara Eliya, and 5,600
feet above the sea, a considerable rise in a run of 130 miles from
Colombo. Nuwara Eliya itself is 6,222 feet above the sea. So now the
admirably engineered road by which we travelled is comparatively
forsaken.
[Illustration:
VALLEY OF THE MAHAVELLI GANGA.
(Showing the Railway and Satinwood Bridges at Peradeniya, Allegalla
Peak, Terraced Rice Fields.—Foreground, Coffee and a Talipot Palm.)
]
The whole route was beautiful, and to me a delightful novelty was the
luxuriance of the fragrant datura with its large white trumpet-shaped
blossoms, each 10 or 12 inches in length, of which we think so much if
we see a dozen on a greenhouse shrub. Here there were great masses of it
growing as freely as our own yellow broom, and 12 or 15 feet in height.
Colonists call it the fever-plant, believing that it produces fever, and
so object to its growth near houses, or keep it closely trimmed as a
garden hedge. What it does produce is a dangerous drug, which
occasionally figures in cases of poisoning. In various instances robbers
have induced the family cook, or some other person having access to the
kitchen, to drop a few pills made of datura-juice into the soup or
coffee, and sometimes, to ‘mak sikker,’ into every course, so that no
one can escape scot-free.
All along the river the vegetation is a dream of beauty. Tall cocoa,
areca, and beautiful kitool palms tower above a rich undergrowth of
broad-leaved plantains, ferns, and gay caladiums, or the blue-green of
the handsome castor-oil plant,[57] while in some reaches, the gigantic
plumes of the ever-graceful bamboo overhang the water. Then perhaps we
pass a stretch of vividly green paddy-fields, divided by low terraces of
red soil, following every natural curve of the land; so that is never a
stiff straight line such as bounds our British fields. And all this,
with the reflections in the still river, are only the foreground to a
panorama of beautiful hills.
-----
Footnote 57:
_Palma Christi._
-----
At Gampola a carriage was waiting to take us up-country, but by some
mistake no coolies were forthcoming to carry our baggage, none of which
overtook us till the following day! We halted at Pussilawa, and ere
night reached ‘The Delta,’ a charming home with a lovely garden, which
in that month of March (bleak March in Britain) was fragrant with the
mingled perfume of roses and jasmines, gardenias, honeysuckle,
heliotropes, salvias, mignonette, violets, lilies and pinks, myrtles,
magnolias, oleanders, and loquat; and gay, moreover, with luxuriant
convolvuli, fuchsias, and bignonias, brilliantly variegated caladium
leaves, fantastic crotons, and beautiful climbing passion-flowers and
tacsonias, covered with large crimson stars. Add to these many vividly
green parrakeets and other birds of bright plumage, and gay butterflies,
and perhaps you can realise something of the charm of that garden.
How enchanting was the peace of the following day, resting on dry green
turf beneath the cool shade of large orange-trees, laden with green and
golden fruit and fragrant blossom, the grass around us strewn with
delicious ripe fruit and snowy petals; while beyond the foreground of
luxuriant garden-flowers lay undulating hills all clothed with the
glossy green of flourishing coffee estates, right up to Peacock Hill,
whose broad blue shadows looked temptingly cool contrasted with the hot
haze which veiled the low country we had just left!
In this sweet home we halted for three days to enable the Bishop to hold
Sunday services at Pussilawa and meet a number of the planters.
Then once more we took the road, gradually rising up the Kotmalee
valley, till we reached the foot of the Rambodda Pass, where we found
shelter in a comfortable rest-house. Here the ascent commences in real
earnest, the rise in the remaining fourteen miles being 3,000 feet. The
road enters the gorge between two picturesque waterfalls, about a
hundred feet in height, one on either hand, their cool white spray being
a vision of delight in the scorching heat of noon. Oddly enough, in
rainy weather, one of these comes down in turbulent red flood, laden
with soil from the hills, while the other remains clear and sparkling.
One is the Puna-ella, and the other the Garunda ella, and both flow down
to join the Maha-velli-ganga. Below the bridge the rocks are curiously
water-worn into pot-holes of all sizes, like those in the bed of the
Findhorn, which we suppose to be produced by the ceaseless whirling
round of shingle.
The road winds up the pass by a succession of steep zigzags at a
gradient of about one in fourteen—very trying for the teams of strong
handsome white oxen, which drag up large covered bullock-carts, heavily
laden with all luxuries and necessaries of life for Nuwara Eliya—or,
rather, did so before the completion of the railway to Nanuoya. Formerly
this pass was beautifully wooded, and indeed the whole road to Nuwara
Eliya lay through dense forest, all of which has long since been felled
and burnt to make room for the very monotonous little coffee-bushes, now
almost replaced by the equally monotonous tea-bushes. I say ‘almost,’
because, taught by dire experience, wise planters no longer carry all
their eggs in one basket, so that the cultivation is varied by that of
the very ornamental cacao or chocolate trees and other products.
A little above the head of the pass, at a point where the road winds so
as to form a huge letter =S=, stands Pallagolla, a very small bungalow
which the Bishop had rented for a couple of months. Here we found
Valentine, his excellent Singhalese servant, hard at work making all
cosy—a task in which we all lent a hand with some success.
A tiny streamlet flowing through the big family bath assured an ample
supply of fresh water, and tempted me out to trace its course. The clear
crystal waters glanced so joyously in the bright sunshine as they sped
downward to the valley, strewn with snowy petals of fragrant
coffee-blossom, that they enticed me farther and farther, till I came to
a level patch of tempting green, where the babbling of the stream was
hushed; and here, to my delight, I recognised in the luxuriant weed the
familiar watercress, dear through association with so many a sparkling
stream and quiet pool in the old mother country.
I confess that to me the charm of watercresses has been rudely shaken
ever since discovering that those I had gathered in one of the sweetest
districts of Perthshire were swarming with minute leeches which could
scarcely be dislodged even when soaked in salt and water. But that
source of danger had not then suggested itself, so I feasted undismayed,
and gathered as many as it was possible to carry back.
Then noting a prominent point from which to obtain a good view of the
valley, I made my way thither, and of course found it was much farther
and steeper than I had imagined; but once there, the glory of
sunset-colouring was such that I was in no hurry to descend, seeing a
path near me, and never doubting that it would lead me straight home.
This, you see, was my first evening alone in the coffee country, and
little did I dream of the labyrinth of zigzag foot-tracks which
checkered those steep hillsides.
I soon realised that the path I had struck was leading me quite astray,
and the next I tried was evidently no better. The rapid darkness was
fast closing in, when to my great joy I espied a light far below me,
and, nothing doubting, made that my guiding star. But a few moments
later another and another light appeared, and soon glimmering lights
surrounded me on every side, a good many seeming stationary, and many
more flashing to and fro in a most bewildering manner. (I never now hear
the words of ‘Lead, kindly Light,’ without a vivid recollection of that
evening, when earth’s many lights proved so perplexing.)
Of course I quickly realised that the flashing lights were fire-beetles,
and most of the stationary ones glow-worms, including, however, sundry
coolies’ houses, and my own particular beacon. At last I succeeded in
reaching a coolie’s house, and hopefully inquired for ‘Pallagolla?’
‘Bishop’s bungalow?’ without eliciting the faintest glimmer of
understanding. I had still to learn that the Tamil coolies have names of
their own for every estate, and the names by which they are known to
Europeans convey no meaning whatever to them. Happily I very soon
afterwards struck the high-road at the head of the big 𝗦, and that
little anxiety was at an end.
Two days later I proceeded up the valley to Nuwara Eliya, first on a
visit to the Governor,[58] and afterwards to several other friends, so
that the pleasant weeks slipped rapidly by ere I returned to this little
nest in the coffee.
-----
Footnote 58:
Sir William Gregory.
-----