The bottom
was formed of the trunk of an extremely narrow tree, slightly
hollowed out, and the sides of the planks are kept in their places
by side and cross supports. These craft rose hardly a foot and a
half out of the water, and their greatest breadth did not average
quite a foot. There was a small piece of plank laid across as a
seat, but the rower was obliged to cross his knees from want of room
to sit with them apart.
The road, as I before mentioned, lay for the most part through
forests of cocoa-trees, where the soil was very sandy and completely
free from creepers and underwood; but near trees that did not bear
fruit, the soil was rich, and both that and the trees covered with
creepers in wild luxuriance. There were very few orchids.
We crossed four rivers, the Tindurch, Bentock, Cattura, and Pandura,
two by means of boats, two by handsome wooden bridges.
The cinnamon plantations commenced about ten miles from Colombo; and
on this side of the town are all the country-houses of the
Europeans. They are very simple, shaded with cocoa-trees and
surrounded with stone walls. At 3 o'clock in the afternoon, we
drove over two draw-bridges and through two fortified gateways into
the town, which is far more pleasantly situated than Pointe de
Galle, on account of its nearer proximity to the beautiful mountain
ranges.
I only stopped a night here, and on the following morning again
resumed my journey in the mail to the town of Candy, which is
distant seventy-two miles.
We left on the 20th of October, at 5 o'clock in the morning.
Colombo is a very extensive town. We drove through a succession of
long, broad streets of handsome houses, all of which latter were
surrounded by verandahs and colonnades. I was very much startled at
the number of persons lying stretched out at full length under these
verandahs, and covered with white clothes. I at first mistook them
for corpses, but I soon perceived that their number was too great to
warrant that supposition, and I then discovered that they were only
asleep. Many, too, began to move and throw off their winding-
sheets. I was informed that the natives prefer sleeping in this
manner before the houses to sleeping inside of them.
The Calanyganga, an important river, is traversed by a long floating
bridge; the road then branches off more and more from the sea-coast,
and the character of the scenery changes. The traveller now meets
with large plains covered with fine plantations of rice, the green
and juicy appearance of which reminded me of our own young wheat
when it first shoots up in spring.
