meg, with its peach-like fruit; here the cinnamon, a tree whose
foliage embraces the most delicate gradations of colour, from olive
green to softest pink; there an aromatic gum tree, the dark-leaved
coffee tree, the invaluable bread fruit, and scores of others beyond my
botanical ken.

The houses, examined in detail, are not by any means the captivating
objects we took them to be from the ship; and they certainly don't
improve on a closer acquaintance. The air in the vicinity is thick and
heavy, with a rancid odour of cocoanut oil, emanating from the hair and
bodies of the local humanity. Their dwellings are constructed of humble
enough materials, in all conscience; for of the four sides, three are of
mud, the fourth being left open for the purposes usually supplied by
doors, windows, and chimneys amongst ourselves. A sort of blind of
cocoanut-fibre covers this aperture to about half way, so that one can
easily see what is going on within. Near the door reclines an indolent,
almost nude man, in the most convenient attitude for sleep; in the far
corner his wife or slave--for the names are synonymous--toiling and
moiling at a stone mill--a gaunt, angular, ugly woman, with great rings
in her nose and ears, and on her wrists and ankles. Perfectly nude
children and mangy-looking curs have all the rest of the apartment to
themselves; and from the way in which they are enjoying their gambols,
one may judge that for them life is not an unpleasant thing on the
whole. The number of brown imps scattered about the streets, threatening
to upset your every movement, speaks highly of the prolificness of
Singalese matrons; and if a numerous progeny is a desirable thing, then
these mammas ought to consider themselves blessed amongst women. Their
general aspect, though, conveys the opposite impression.

Everybody is addicted to the vice of chewing the betel-nut, a proceeding
which has the effect of dyeing the teeth and lips a brilliant crimson,
and gives to this people the appearance of an universal bleeding at the
mouth.

Having completed a hasty perambulation of the town we drive boldly into
the undergrowth to where a strange-looking building lies half-buried in
the foliage. It proves to be a Buddhist temple, an octagonal-shaped
structure with a bell-like roof. As we enter within its precincts, boy
priests are particularly careful to obliterate the marks of our
_heathen_ feet on their beautiful floor of golden sand. Inside are
eight