CEYLON COCOA ESTATE 61 



and what with the crisp air, the rush of water, 

 and the English flowers, one could almost 

 imagine oneself in some remote Highland 

 shooting lodge. Inside, the bungalow was 

 very homelike and cosy. Carpets, piano, 

 harmonium, lovely china, glass, and silver, and 

 above all, loads of books and magazines, left 

 one nothing to wish for. It was a perpetual 

 mystery to me how all these things could have 

 been brought to their present abiding place. 

 On enquiry, my host told me that the piano 

 had taken twenty-two men eleven hours to 

 bring it the last four miles. Stranger than all, 

 it arrived in good tune, which speaks well for 

 ironstrung instruments. I should like to 

 describe my walks about this mountain eerie, 

 the giant stags' horn moss, and lilac rock cistus 

 that I picked, my visit to the factory and the 

 various processes of tea growing and tea 

 making, but as Rudyard Kipling says, M That 

 is another story." The cool bracing air soon 

 drove the fever fiend away, and I returned 

 home as well as ever. 



Some time ago a cooly ran away from 

 Raneetotem and hid himself on a neighbouring 

 Estate, owned by a native. He had behaved 

 badly to his Kangany here, who had quite 

 properly punished him, and he persuaded the 

 owner of the place he fled to that he was 

 afraid of ill-treatment if he returned ; so when 



