ch. ii. i Hotels. 15 



reach the hotels the chances are that your shirt and 

 collar are in the state best described as " pulpy ;" and if 

 you are of a sanguine temperament, your face may be 

 said to resemble " the rising sun." Of course you have 

 kept your eyes open as you came along past the rough 

 hedges on the right clothed with red lantanas, the neat 

 police-station on the bank to the left, with those beautiful 

 crimson and buff-flowered hibiscus bushes before the 

 door. Then the rows of Chinese houses and shops, an 

 elaborate Hindoo temple or two of white stone, and then 

 street after street of whitewashed [red tile roofed shops, 

 until you reach the square, where j r ou meet your agent, 

 or to the hotels, nearly all of which are clustered around 

 the tall spire of the cathedral, which you will have seen 

 us the ship steamed slowly into harbour. The chances 

 are you will have been recommended to one or other of 

 the hotels by some knowing friend. 



The Hotel de l'Europe is the principal one ; but at the 

 time I arrived in Singapore the chef -de-cuisine had such a 

 bad name that I was recommended elsewhere. One is 

 sure to be comfortable at any of the first-class houses at 

 prices varying from two to five dollars daily, or less by 

 monthly arrangement. For this sum one may secure a 

 more or less comfortable bedroom or suite simply white- 

 washed, the floor covered with yellow rattan matting, 

 which is both cool and clean. The walls, as a rule, do 

 not boast of anything great in the way of pictorial embel- 

 lishment ; at night, however, lively little insect-eating 

 lizards disport themselves thereon ; and then, too, the 

 hum of the hungry mosquito is heard. In the morning 

 you rise soon after gun-fire (5 a.m.). It is daylight about 

 (1 a.m. ; and after partaking of a cup of tea or coffee, and 

 the inevitable two bits of toast, you have a walk. Every- 

 body nearly seems astir. While dressing, the chances 



