364 Voyage of the Novara. 



country magnificent and charming. We seemed as though 

 driving through a park inhabited by thousands of men, and 

 planted with cocoa-nut palms — amidst which occasionally the 

 white dome of a Buddhist temple, or the minarets of a 

 Mahometan mosque, shooting up above the summits of the 

 palms, imparted an aspect of life to the landscape — while 

 in the gay bazaars that fringed the road, the few necessaries 

 of Ufe required by the exceedingly frugal natives were 

 exposed for sale, temptingly arranged on palm or plantain 

 leaves. The whole south-western coast district is so populous 

 that the huts of the natives were continually in sight, right 

 and left, under the forest shade, and the scenery in con- 

 sequence seemed as full of life and careless enjoyment as 

 though the people had nothing else to do but walk about 

 imder palm-trees. This impression was the more strength- 

 ened, that we rarely perceived a man with anything else 

 in his hand than a Talipot leaf, or a Chinese parasol, to 

 protect himself against the burning rays of the sun, which 

 shone almost directly overhead. Of the women, on whom 

 for the most part fall all the troubles and hardships of life 

 among the Cingalese, we only saw a few carrying to the city 

 heavy baskets balanced on their heads. 



The luxuriant, widely-extending cocoa-nut forests, which 

 on the south and west sides of the island stretch down to the 

 sea-shore (whereas on the eastern coast they are altogether 

 absent), seem independently of the necessity of paying all due 

 care to the maintenance of one of the necessaries of life, 



