ination to reside at Newera Ellia, I hoped to be able to
carry out some of those visionary plans for its improvement which I
have before suggested; and I trusted to be enabled to effect such a
change in the rough face of Nature in that locality as to render a
residence at Newera Ellia something approaching to a country life in
England, with the advantage of the whole of Ceylon for my manor, and no
expense of gamekeepers.

To carry out these ideas it was necessary to set to work; and I
determined to make a regular settlement at Newera Ellia, sanguinely
looking forward to establishing a little English village around my own
residence.

Accordingly, I purchased an extensive tract of land from the
government, at twenty shillings per acre. I engaged an excellent
bailiff, who, with his wife and daughter, with nine other emigrants,
including a blacksmith, were to sail for my intended settlement in
Ceylon.

I purchased farming implements of the most improved descriptions, seeds
of all kinds, saw-mills, etc., etc., and the following stock: A
half-bred bull (Durham and Hereford), a well-bred Durham cow, three
rams (a Southdown, Leicester and Cotswold), and a thorough-bred entire
horse by Charles XII.; also a small pack of foxhounds and a favorite
greyhound ("Bran").

My brother had determined to accompany me; and with emigrants, stock,
machinery, hounds, and our respective families, the good ship "Earl of
Hardwick," belonging to Messrs. Green & Co., sailed from London in
September, 1848. I had previously left England by the overland mail of
August to make arrangements at Newera Ellia for the reception of the
whole party.

I had as much difficulty in making up my mind to the proper spot for
the settlement as Noah's dove experienced in its flight from the ark.
However, I wandered over the neighboring plains and jungles of Newera
Ellia, and at length I stuck my walking-stick into the ground where the
gentle undulations of the country would allow the use of the plough.
Here, then, was to be the settlement.

I had chosen the spot at the eastern extremity of the Newera Ellia
plain, on the verge of the sudden descent toward Badulla. This position
was two miles and a half from Newera Ellia, and was far more agreeable
and better adapted for a settlement, the land being comparatively level
and not shut in by mountains.

It was in the dreary month of October, when the south-west monsoon
howls in all its fury across the mountains