SCENERY AT NEWERA-ELLIA.--ASCENT OF ADAM'S PEAK.
Here is the letter referred to in the last chapter:
"We have had a delightful experience since we left Kandy, and should
have been very sorry to miss the journey to Newera-Ellia. The road winds
in a zigzag among the hills, and sometimes we could look down hundreds
of feet upon the torrents that foamed along through the valleys. For
several miles the route follows the Mahavilla-Ganga, which is the
largest river in Ceylon, and goes into the sea near Trincomalee;
wherever the road crosses the river it does so on a substantial bridge,
and at one place there is a suspension-bridge so high up that it made us
dizzy to look over the side.
[Illustration: A TROPICAL FERN.]
"They tell us that twenty years ago the country was prettier than it now
is, because the hills were then covered with dense forests of tropical
trees and ferns, which have been cleared off to make room for coffee
plantations. There is one charming valley called Kotmalee, which has a
range of mountains on the south-east side, some of them several thousand
feet high, and the Mahavilla-Ganga winds through it, sometimes
presenting a smooth surface, and again broken into foam by the rapidity
of its current over the rocks. At the end of the valley the mountains
rise quite sharply, and we had a hard climb of fifteen miles to get from
there to Newera-Ellia. The road ascends one foot in every fourteen, and
you can readily understand that the horses had no easy work to drag the
wagon up this steep incline.
"Here we are, 112 miles from Colombo, and 6240 feet above the level of
the sea. We are on an undulating plain three miles long by one wide, and
the ground is covered with rich grasses and with lots of flowers in
blossom; the mountains rise around us, but there are not a great many of
them, as we are nearly up to the height of most of the mountains of
Ceylon.
"Newera-Ellia is a sort of Saratoga for the inhabitants of Ceylon, or
rather for the foreign portion of them. People come up here as often as
they can to escape the heat of the coast, and even the inhabitants of
Kandy do not despise the place. The change is something like magic; in
Colombo the heat and dampness are oppressive, but up here you need a
fire and blankets to keep comfortable, and in the winter the ground in
the morning is white with frost. Roses and other flowers of the
temperate zone grow here, and the blackbird and robin have been
imported, and get along finely. Even a day or two of this atmosphere has
a wonderful effect upon the visitor from Colombo, and some who cannot
afford a longer time run up here on Saturday, return Monday, and find
themselves vastly benefited.
"We are so high up that the air is rarefied, but we have no difficulty
in breathing. Many of the invalids, however, find it hard work to get
their breath, and some have been compelled to go away very soon after
their arrival, on account of the injury to their lungs. There is quite a
town here, with church, hotel, reading-room, and other public resorts,
and in some seasons of the year the place is crowded so that a stranger
cannot get in. The temperature is about 53° in the morning, 70° to 75°
at noon, and 60° at sunset, and it gets very cold in the night, with
frost on the ground from December to March. All the English vegetables
and flowers grow here, and so do strawberries and other bush fruits, but
peaches will not ripen, and the cherry-trees turn to evergreens, and
will not even blossom.
[Illustration: WAITING FOR THE RACES.]
"The Government has built a sanitarium for the officers and soldiers of
the troops serving in Ceylon, and there is always a detachment stationed
here. They have a race-track also, and on frequent occasions they get up
some exciting matches. Everybody goes--natives and all--and it must be
an interesting sight to see the different races at the races.
[N.B.--This joke was intended by Frank, who made it.] The natives are
very fond of watching the horses go round the track, and sometimes they
follow the example of the English, and make bets on the result.
"They have a band of music, and it plays every other day in front of the
regimental barracks; and there is a club where they have balls and
receptions: they keep hounds for hunting elk and other large game, and
another pack for hunting hares. Altogether they manage to have a good
time, and any one who can possibly spare a couple of days to visit
Newera-Ellia ought to come here.
"But there are drawbacks to the fun, and it is only fair that we should
tell you about them. There are insects of various kinds to trouble you,
and the worst of them is the land-leech. He does not live in the water
like the ordinary leech, but grows on the trees and bushes, and crawls
on the ground; he can drop on you from the trees when you pass beneath
them, and he can climb up your body and get inside your clothes. When
empty they are not much larger than a needle, but when filled with blood
they are as large as a goose-quill, and about two inches long. You can
hardly see the young ones, as they are little thicker than hairs; but
let them once get fastened to you, and you feel them. So bad are they in
some places that they drive people out of houses, and they have attacked
persons travelling in carriages by dropping on them from the trees as
they passed beneath.
"If your blood is in a bad condition, their bites are apt to cause sores
which are difficult to heal. In the last war the English had with the
natives, the leeches caused more deaths than the snakes, and a great
many of the sepoys and coolies employed here died from their bites. We
have been bitten by a few of them, and don't want any more experience of
the kind. It is a good plan to carry a lemon in your pocket, and when
one of these leeches fastens to you, a few drops of lemon-juice will
make him let go. The natives smear their bodies with cocoa-nut oil,
which prevents the leeches taking hold, and this is perhaps the reason
why so much oil is used in Ceylon.
"They have water-leeches in great number, which frequently cause the
deaths of cattle. They enter the nostrils of the poor brutes when the
latter go to drink, and after gorging themselves they fall off and leave
the wound to bleed. Very often it does so till the blood, accumulating
in the throat, suffocates the animal.
"While on this subject, we may as well say that Ceylon is reputed to
contain more than 10,000 kinds of insects, besides several parts of the
island to hear from. The list of all these varieties might possibly be a
little tedious, and so we won't try to give it, but will briefly say
they include pretty nearly everything you can think of in the insect
line. In the morning, and also in the evening, the hum of the wings of
those that can fly is like the noise of machinery in a mill; at noon
they are comparatively still, as the heat seems to shut them up. The
most of them disappear at the end of the monsoons, but they come up
again ready for business in a month or two.
"The white ant, as already mentioned, is one of the most destructive of
these pests, since he will eat nearly all kinds of wood, and there are
persons who say he is fond of knife-blades, needles, and similar things,
and can even get away with a cannon-ball. Closets, where meat and other
things for the table are kept, must have the feet stand in saucers
filled with water, or they will be over-run by these ants; and in some
parts of the island it is the practice to fix the beds in the same way,
to prevent the disturbance of the occupants.
[Illustration: SCORPION.]
[Illustration: CENTIPEDE.]
"There are moths, and beetles, and centipedes, and millipedes, and
scorpions, and dragon-flies, and many other things in great number, and
there is a little thing they call the tic that is about as large as the
head of a pin, and makes trouble enough to be heavier than a cat. He
gets on the skin, and buries himself in it, and you must lift him out
with the point of a knife if you want to be rid of him, as you generally
do. There are bees, and fleas, and caterpillars, and there is a
curiosity they call the guinea-worm, which grows under the skin around a
person's ankles, and gives him lots of trouble. It is like a fine
thread, and grows to be several feet in length; in order to get rid of
it, the flesh must be cut into, and every bit of the worm removed, and
you can readily understand that the operation is not an agreeable one.
"Well, that's enough about these unpleasant things--we'll come back to
other matters.
"There is a dome-shaped mountain on the north-eastern side of the valley
which is called Pedrotallagalla, and is the highest in Ceylon, being
8280 feet above the sea, or nearly 800 feet more than Adam's Peak, the
most famous mountain of the island. We wanted to go to Adam's Peak, but
find we cannot spare the time, and so we must be contented with taking
the story of the journey from others.
"Adam's Peak lies between Newera-Ellia and the sea-coast; in fact, it is
nearer to Colombo, in an air-line, than Kandy is. To go from here, we
should have to cross two or three mountains, and the best way to visit
it from Colombo is to go from that place directly to Ratnapoora, on the
Kaluganga. Ratnapoora is a nice village at the foot of the mountains,
and just as you leave the flat country of the coast; from there the
distance to the summit of the peak, as the crow flies, is about eight
miles: but it is nearly twenty by the roads and paths.
[Illustration: A VIEW IN THE FOOT-HILLS.]
"We will give the story of the ascent of the peak in the words of the
gentleman who told it to us, as near as we can remember them. Here goes:
"'We left Ratnapoora early in the morning on horseback, and rode through
the jungle to Gillemalle, which is a village of a few huts on a little
plain among the thick forests. From here the road winds through hills
and valleys in a jungle so dense that for more than half the way all the
light of the sun is excluded. You can hardly imagine a more up-and-down
road than this, and it is very pretty, as there are many tiny brooks and
larger streams dashing among the rocks, and every turn in the way gives
you a fresh surprise. But the land-leeches spoil a good deal of your
pleasure, as it is impossible to keep them off, and once in a while you
have to stop and remove such as have got beneath your clothes.
[Illustration: NATIVES OF THE FOREST.]
"'You have good reason to know the forest is not desolate, as you
frequently see the tracks of wild elephants, pigs, leopards, and other
game animals, and it is not impossible that you may encounter some of
these denizens of the wood. But if you let them alone they are not
likely to disturb you--and, as they can hear you coming long before you
have a chance of seeing them, they are pretty certain to keep out of
your way.
"'The road rises quite rapidly as you go from Gillemalle, and every
little while you have fine views from the openings in the forest on the
crests or sides of the foot-hills. The plains stretch away below you,
and the hills seem like great mounds of tropical verdure, as they are
covered quite to their summits with trees and smaller vegetation. In
some places the road winds around cliffs so steep that you can roll
stones over their sides, and hear them rattling and crashing for
several minutes in the deep valleys below.
"'The last inhabited spot on the road is Palabaddula, and here you must
leave your horses and proceed on foot, as the path is quite impassable
for saddle animals. You cross a ravine on a narrow foot-bridge, and then
you go on through a thick forest till you come to a level platform or
bit of table-land called Deabetine. A traveller who came here five
hundred years ago says, "There was at Deabetine the mark of Adam's foot,
a statue with the left hand on the knee, and the right hand raised
toward the west, and, lastly, the house that Adam made with his own
hands." The mark of the foot and the statue are still there, but the
house has gone.
"'After leaving Deabetine, the road goes to a large torrent, where it is
the habit of pilgrims to bathe, in order to purify themselves for the
visit to the sacred temple on the summit. A little way beyond the stream
you come to four flights of steps cut in the solid rock; nobody can tell
their age, but they were there eight hundred years ago, and were then so
ancient that their origin was unknown. The way is so steep that the
ascent would be very difficult without these steps.
"'Then you pass another ravine, and then you come to a great rock about
fifty feet high that forms the summit. Here you climb by hanging on to
some iron chains fixed in the solid rock, and I don't see how anybody
ever got up there without them; they have been there a thousand years or
so, and are mentioned by Marco Polo and other ancient writers. Some are
newer than others, and are probably the gifts of rich pilgrims to
replace those that were worn or rusted out.
[Illustration: TEMPLE ON ADAM'S PEAK.]
"'When you stand all panting and exhausted on the summit, you find
yourself on a little terrace surrounded by a low wall, and containing a
temple which is held in place by iron chains that go over its roof. The
temple itself is on a mass of rock at one side of the terrace, and
inside of the temple is the famous _sri-pada_ or footprint.
"'When you examine the footprint you cannot help thinking that Adam, or
Buddha, or whoever stepped there, must have been a person of
extraordinary size, as the print is about five feet long by two and a
half in width. It is apparently a natural indentation in the rock,
extended artificially to represent the shape of the human foot. There
was formerly a cover of solid gold over the footprint, but it was lost
long ago, and the only cover there at present is made of brass.
"'The pilgrimages of three classes of religionists are made to this
temple--by Mohammedans and Malabar Christians in honor of Adam, and by
Buddhists in honor of the founder of their religion. The three are often
mixed together during the month of March, which is the time of the
greatest number of visitors; but in spite of this mingling, and the
opposite views professed by the pilgrims, there is no quarrelling, and
all seem impressed with the solemnity of the place, and the magnificence
of the view from the mountain. The panorama is a very fine one; the
southern half of Ceylon lies before you like a map, and away in the
distance you see the sunlight sparkling on a beach of shining sand,
while beyond it the light plays on the waves of the ever-restless sea.
The rivers wind through the plain like threads of silver in a rich
carpet, and the breezes from the cinnamon groves and the flowers in
perennial bloom bring delicious odors to your nostrils. The man who can
look from the top of Adam's Peak, when the clouds have vanished and the
great picture is spread before him, and not be impressed by the sight,
must be made of something little better than the inanimate earth.
"'On the summit is a spring from which the pilgrims drink; occasionally
leaves are found floating on the water of this spring, and the natives
believe it has a connection with paradise, and that these leaves come
from there. There is also a spring near Deabetine; the leaves that are
found in it are thought to come from a garden that Adam established not
far away, but anybody who tries to find it will never be allowed to
return to his friends.
[Illustration: TROPICAL GROWTH NEAR RATNAPOORA.]
"'There were two of us who made the ascent, accompanied by four local
guides and servants to help us along. When we came back to Ratnapoora
our men said we could return to the sea by the way of Caltura, by
descending the Kalu River, as the current was swift and the journey
would take only a short time. They procured us a boat which consisted
of two hollow logs a few feet apart, and connected by a platform; on
this platform we had a comfortable place to sit, while a couple of
boatmen stood at bow and stern and managed the craft. We had several
narrow escapes from being overturned in the rapids; but all went well,
and we arrived safely at the great road where we took the coach for
Colombo.'"
The letter was finished at a late hour in the evening, and soon after
the closing words had been written the boys were snug in bed. The next
morning they started for the return journey to Colombo; while descending
one of the long hills between Newera-Ellia and the railway-station a
part of the harness of their team gave way, and the coach was overturned
on the very edge of a ravine where a brook rattled along a couple of
hundred feet below. Had they gone two yards farther they would have
tumbled down the whole distance and been dashed to pieces, and it is
fair to believe the entire trio felt that they had had a very narrow
escape. The driver told them that accidents were of rare occurrence, but
he admitted that once in a while they had something of the sort. Of late
years the road has been considerably improved by the authorities, but it
is yet far from being complete.
They reached Colombo on the evening after leaving Newera-Ellia, and
returned to their old quarters in the hotel. In the morning, while the
Doctor was busy with plans for their departure, the boys read and
corrected their letter, and at the suggestion of Frank a postscript was
added, giving a brief account of the return journey, and closing with a
description of the visitors that were just then calling on them.
[Illustration: A MORNING CALLER.]
"Our visitors are very numerous," said the letter, "and their names are
crows. They are all through the room, and they stand on the blinds and
the window-sills, and watch their chances when we are breakfasting to
steal something from our plates. One of them just now came down and
took away a cracker from a plate that was on the table where we are
writing, and it is not unusual for them to seize the bread you have in
your fingers. They are a little shy of strangers, but not much; and as
for the waiters in the hotel, they don't mind them at all. They are
never harmed by anybody, and consequently it is not surprising that they
are so tame.
"There are many insect visitors, but we have grown so accustomed to
their presence that we do not mind them until they actually crawl over
us. They are worse in the evening than by daylight, as the lamps and
candles attract them; they do not wait for an introduction, but make
themselves at home as though everything belonged to them."
[Illustration: EVENING VISITORS.]