494 TllK XoIiTHEKX FORESTS. [Part IX. 



lucrative perhaps than the wild existence of tlie lum- 

 berers of North America, but infinitely more enjoyable 

 and exciting. The timber-cutters of Ceylon obtain a 

 hcence fi'om the government agent, and having formed 

 themselves into companies, betake themselves at the 

 proper season to those parts of the forest where ebony 

 and cabinet woods are known to abomid in sufficiently 

 close proximity to water to ensm^e tliek easy transport 

 when felled. In onr morning and evening rides through 

 the woods, before and after sunset, we frequently came 

 upon these wandering parties, each with a bidlock-cart 

 to cany their axes, cooking utensils, and rice ; and fol- 

 lowed by hired assistants. They were either setting out 

 on an exciu"sion of two or three months into the interior, 

 or returning after having felled the intended quantity of 

 timber, leaving it to be floated do^vn the rivers, and 

 brought round by sea to Trincomalie. There was always 

 an air of gaiety and recklessness about all the parties I 

 met, very characteristic of their um^estrained and roving 

 habits. The warmth of the chmate renders them in- 

 different to clothing ; they cook and eat beneath the 

 shade of the forest ; sleep under the open sky, mth a 

 watclifire to keep off the wild animals ; and by sunrise 

 then' axes are echoing through tlie solitary woods. 



Ebony is the most important of the trees which they 

 are in the habit of felling, as well as the one involving 

 the greatest amount of labour, from the hardness and 

 weight of the timber, ^vliicli is so dense and heavy, that, 

 to permit of then' moving it at all, they are obhged to 

 cut it into very short logs. The densely black portion, 

 which is an article of commerce, occupies the centre 

 of the tree ; and in order to reach it, the whiter 

 wood that surrounds it is carefully cut away. Tlie 

 Arabs were so ^\"ell aware of this pecidiarity in ebony, 

 that Albvrouni, in his treatise on Lidia\ calls it the 



' ALBYKorxi.iu \lEiy.\Tv'sFrai/?u. 

 Araln'S, vol. i. p. Il'4. Ebony \va.< so 



savs Pompey liad it earned in his 

 triunipli al'ter tlip defeat of ^lithri- 



])rized l)y tlu' iloniaus, that Pi.ixY dates. — Xut. Ilisf. lib. xii. eap. ix 



