plains of a sandy nature form the margins of the lakes.
The little town of Hambantotte, with a good harbor for small craft, is
about twenty miles distant, to which there is a good cart road.

The water of these lakes is a perfect brine. In the dry season the
evaporation, of course, increases the strength until the water can no
longer retain the amount of salt in solution it therefore precipitates
and crystalizes at the bottom in various degrees of thickness,
according to the strength of the brine.

Thus, as the water recedes from the banks by evaporation and the lake
decreases in size, it leaves a beach, not of shingles, but of pure salt
in crystallized cubes, to the depth of several inches, and sometimes to
half a foot or more. The bottom of the lake is equally coated with
this thick deposit.

These lakes are protected by watchers, who live upon the margin
throughout the year. Were it not for this precaution, immense
quantities of salt would be stolen. In the month of August the weather
is generally most favorable for the collection, at which time the
assistant agent for the district usually gives a few days'
superintendence.

The salt upon the shore being first collected, the natives wade into
the lake and gather the deposit from the bottom, which they bring to
the shore in baskets; it is then made up into vast piles, which are
subsequently thatched over with cajans (the plaited leaf of the
cocoanut). In this state it remains until an opportunity offers for
carting it to the government salt stores.

This must strike the reader as being a rude method of collecting what
Nature so liberally produces. The waste is necessarily enormous, as
the natives cannot gather the salt at a greater depth than three feet;
hence the greater proportion of the annual produce of the lake remains
ungathered. The supply at present afforded might be trebled with very
little trouble or expense.

If a stick is inserted in the mud, so that one end stands above water,
the salt crystallizes upon it in a large lump of several pounds'
weight. This is of a better quality than that which is gathered from
the bottom, being free from sand or other impurities. Innumerable
samples of this may be seen upon the stakes which the natives have
stuck in the bottom to mark the line of their day's work. These, not
being removed, amass a collection of salt as described.

Were the government anxious to increase the produce of these natural
reser