CEYLON COCOA ESTATE 101 



cooly wedding took place near us ; the tom- 

 toms began to beat at daybreak, and continued 

 until midnight. One could not help thinking 

 that the bride and bridegroom must be both 

 dazed and deafened before the end of the day. 

 Tom-toms are also beaten when a death occurs 

 — but then in a much slower and monotonous 

 manner. 



I have just invested in a light bullock 

 hackery — called here a buggy cart. It is 

 something like a governess car with the 

 addition of a canopy formed by a light iron 

 framework covered with American cloth. A 

 little black Sinhalese bull goes in the shafts 

 with a yolk passed between his head and his 

 hump. The harness is a rather intricate 

 arrangement of rope. The little bull runs 

 capitally, and we did nine and a half miles of 

 very bad road in two hours, the first time I 

 took him out. Hitherto I have had to borrow 

 the hackery belonging to this group of estates, 

 or a neighbour's, whenever I emerged from this 

 solitude, and my vicissitudes have been many. 

 I think I could almost write a book called 

 " The troublesome travels of an unprotected 

 female in Ceylon." Once my driver left me in 

 a lonely part of the road, signed to a slip of a 

 boy to take the reins, disappeared down a side 

 road (doubtless to an illicit arrack still) and 

 only reappeared a couple of miles further on ; 



