Jan.] DELIGHTFUL PROSPECT. 477 



romantic avenue are steep and rugged, our gallant steeds succeeded in 

 scaling the little precipices with comparative ease and safety. After 

 a fatiguing ascent of more than two hours, we at length reached the 

 summit, when a prospect suddenly opened upon our enraptured view 

 which amply repaid us for all our previous labours. It was, without ex- 

 ception, the most extensive arid most beautifully variegated that I had 

 ever seen in India. No painter could do it justice ; it must be seen in all 

 the living, breathing, moving colours of nature, to be duly appreciated. 

 No pen can accurately describe it ; and yet I shall attempt to give the 

 reader some faint idea of its outlines. 



Standing on the highest point or pinnacle of the island, with nothing 

 to obstruct the vision in any direction, I first directed my attention to 

 the north. There lay the lovely peninsula of Malaya, basking in 

 the life-giving sunbeams, with its wood-fringed hills, verdant plains, 

 and luxuriant valleys ; agreeably interspersed with stupendous preci- 

 pices, gaping chasms, turbulent foaming cataracts, and silvery cas- 

 cades, sparkling in the light. In one place was a mountain torrent, 

 tumbling down a succession of adamantine ridges, foaming, and raging, 

 and fretting, and dashing headlong through its devious course down to 

 the plains below ; in another direction flowed a glassy river, gently 

 meandering through grassy meads, till it united with its more restive 

 neighbour in a lake or bay, where the crystal waters lay at rest, re- 

 flecting the inverted scenery with the lucidity of a mirror. 



The eye leaves this romantic picture with reluctance, and turning a 

 little more westwardly, instinctively falls on the beautiful plain at the 

 foot of the hill on which we were standing. Here it ranges with 

 delight over a fertile champaign, diversified with thriving plantations, 

 gardens, groves of cocoanut-trees, betal, areca, and various other trees 

 and shrubbery, until it reaches the serpentine strait that separates the 

 island from the main; a picturesque channel, with a placid surface, 

 faintly reflecting the imperfect images of the floating clouds above. 



On directing the view to the south-east, the harbour of Singapore, with 

 its numerous shipping, lies in striking relief before you. Here will be 

 seen as great a variety and as great a contrast, in the fashion of vessels, 

 as the town presents in its architecture. Majestic East Indiamen, Malay 

 proas, Chinese junks,country ships, grabs,with an endless variety of small 

 craft, from Sumatra, Java, Borneo, and the adjacent islands, are thickly 

 scattered over the bosom of the bay. Turning to the south-west, the 

 coast of Sumatra presents an extensive plain thickly covered with 

 forests, through which flow several rivers, which are navigable by the 

 country proas to the very bases of the mountains where they take 

 their rise. A lofty ridge of these elevations runs through the whole 

 island, from north to south. In almost every direction are coasts, 

 studded with small islands ; while to the " far west" a cloudless sky, 

 and an unruffled sea, sprinkled with vessels of various descriptions, 

 complete a circular prospect of unrivalled beauty and magnificence. 

 We were all delighted — the ladies were enraptured. 



At five, P. M., we once more mounted our horses, and began to 

 descend to the world below, through our deeply shaded pathway, which 

 at this hour began to assume a sombre solitary appearance. A solemn 



