260 TWO YEARS I"N" TIIE JUNGLE. 



ably with very pleasant company. Among the guests were Mr 

 Samuel Haughton, an Assistant Government Agent at Mullaitivu, 

 on the north coast, where crocodiles abound and animal life in gen- 

 eral is also abundant. On the strength of information obtained 

 from him I determined to go to Mullaitivu at once for a short 

 stay. 



The next day I finished packing up everything I had collected 

 in Jaffna, and arranged for its storage until my retiu-n, or further 

 orders. I was ad\'ised to go to Mullaitivu by sea from Point Pe- 

 dro, the extreme northern point of Ceylon, twenty-one miles from 

 Jaffna. Accordingly I loaded a bandy with my regular impedi- 

 menta, and started it off early in the morning with Henrique as a 

 conductor, while I remained and took the Royal Mail Coach at 4 

 P.M. The coach was rather ci'owded. My fellow passengers were 

 "educated natives," rather interesting animals of the "government 

 clerk " type, but they elbowed my ribs, questioned, cross-examined, 

 and talked at me until I was tired and out of patience. For five 

 miles two of them compared notes on the prospects of the petitions 

 they had sent in for certain appointments and promotions. One 

 of them started to read aloud a copy of his, but it covered so many 

 foolscap pages that his friend weakened long before he had finished 

 and abruptl;y choked him off. The composition stamped the writer 

 as an " amoosin' cuss," and I regret that I cannot produce a copy 

 of it. The petition laid great stress on the winter's two years of 

 service as a scribe in Mullaitivu, and gave a harrowing account of 

 how he was afflicted with fever, and how his wife "was also knocked 

 down." 



The country lying between Jaffna and the northern coast is flat 

 and sterile, and not particularly interesting in any way. The rank 

 vegetation and general tropical luxuriance one sees elsewhere in 

 Ceylon is conspicuous by its absence, and on the contrary the 

 country is rather open. What jungle there is, is low and scrubby, 

 and the face of nature had the diy and thirsty look so characteris- 

 tic of the plains of India in the dry season. 



We changed horses every four miles and reached Point Pedro 

 about 8 P.M. The Adllage is small, very prettily situated in an ex- 

 tensive grove of pnlmyra and cocoa palms, but almost totally barren 

 of food fit for a white man. There is no harbor, but there is here a 

 break in the coral reef which permits boats to land. This fringing 

 reef, composed chiefly of madrepores, lies close along the shore, and 

 I am told extends for miles without another gap. The coral looks 



