TRAVELLING IN MADAGASCAR 229 



day's journey. All sorts of excuses would be made, or no 

 reason at all be given, especially if the journey was to be 

 through a part of the island not often traversed. The bearers 

 were easily hired, but not so easily secured. One man not turn- 

 ing up, another would go to seek for him, and he, in turn, 

 would have to be hunted for by his companions. 



Travelling in Madagascar, at least by the main lines of road, 

 is fast losing its former characteristics. Along the easy gradi- 

 ents, the bridged streams, and the embankment-crossed swamps 

 traversed now by good highroads, one is apt to forget how our 

 bearers used to climb up steep and rugged ascents, ford rivers, 

 sometimes up to their necks in rushing waters, and flounder 

 through morasses. In fact, the bearers are becoming somewhat 

 demoralised by these easy and smooth roads, and we now need 

 to take a ride " across country " to realise what our early ex- 

 periences here were. 1 Mr Street and I, however, managed to 

 get a number of men, about fifty in all, to start with us ; and 

 as we were not at all sure of finding native huts to stay in all 

 through our route, we took a tent with us, as well as provisions 

 and clothes, and books to give away to the people who could 

 read them. Towards the end of May we left the capital for 

 our southern journey. 



One more word of preface to this chapter. Like the tour 

 around the Antsihanaka province, already described, this 

 journey was, first of all, a missionary one ; and although I shall 

 not trouble my readers with details of this kind, it must be 

 understood that my companions and I took every opportunity 

 we had of speaking, not only to congregations, but also to any 

 small gathering of people we came across, of the great and glad 

 truths of the Gospel, of which we were the messengers. 



I shall not describe here the route between Antananarivo and 

 Fianarants6a : the elevated tract of bare tableland, more than 

 six thousand feet above the sea ; the cultivated valleys of the 

 three or four chief rivers ; the green pleasant basins of Ambd- 

 sita and Ambohinamboarina ; the enormous rocks of Angavo, 

 and the belt of grey-lichened forest above Nandihizana. There 

 were, however, three points which struck me in the Be'tsile'o pro- 

 vince as being very different from what we see in Imerina. First, 

 was the much bolder and grander scenery ; the mountains are 

 higher in the south, and the gneiss and granite rocks rise up in 



