THE TROPICAL AGRICULTURIST. [October r, 1888. 
get carried up in parts, no matter how divided, from 
the end of the present cart-road. Twenty or twenty, 
five per cent of the cost is likely, we believe, to be 
swallowed up in transport ! and the present path 
will have to be widened and strengthened so that 
elephants may be employed to drag up cylinder, 
boiler, &c. "Oh I for a cart-road," Mr. Beith may 
well exclaim, or better still the Lartigue railway 
if it could only ensure the economical carriage of 
heavy pieces of machinery. The course proposed 
for the Lartigue was pointed out to me from time 
to time in crossing the valley and ascending the 
hill-sides; but I could not help expressing the 
opinion shared in the district I found— that it 
would be much more advantageous to the traffic 
of Matale East and Laggala, if this line were first 
projected from the end of the existing cart-road at 
Battota, in place of from Matale town ! The question 
of solving the transport difficulties of the several divi- 
sions of this part of the country is not an easy one to 
face, but some relief is certainly very urgently 
oalled for. Dangkande (once the property of Tytler 
and Strachan) was the scene, on a piece of flat, 
when held by Mr. Borron, of a rather extensive 
experiment with arrowroot, but as in so many 
other trials of minor products, the result was not 
financially satisfactory. The climb of a thousand 
or 1,200 feet from Dangkande to the Gap is as 
steep a bit of riding as any in the island ; but on 
a clear day, the view backward over the wide 
extending Matale valleys, across to the Matale West 
and Kurunegala hills, and to the circle of higher 
ranges to the south-west, well repays the traveller. 
Alagala presented a new side and shape so as to 
be scarcely recognisable ; while Yakdessagala 
indicated the site of the capital of Seven Korales. 
On the way up, a big cavern under a great mass 
of rock is passed, and here we are told an ambus- 
cade of rebels took up their position during the 
troublous times of 1847-48. A headman on the 
Laggala side was one of the most determined 
foes of the British, and the Matale Bast estates 
of that day were nearly all taken possession of 
in the name of the upstart "king." The ex- 
ception was that in which- a siurdy Scotch 
Superintendent objected to give up charge to a 
native rabble, saying he would just remain and 
look after the place for the "King" himself, and 
in another where though the " durai " had bolted 
into Kandy, the bungalow servants dressed up a 
figure in master's clothes, sticking a newspaper in 
its hands, and so assured "the rebels" that their 
Mahatmaya was deeply engaged reading in his 
verandah, and that he was such an angry man as~ 
to shoot anybody who disturbed him while so 
engaged 1 This made a sufficient impression ; for 
finding that their coughs at a respectful distance 
had no effect in attracting the irascible Mahatmeya, 
the rabble (whose only object was loot) went away 
without entering the bungalow at all 1 So much 
for the so-called rebels. 
Poor Watson Duncan with his hearty honest 
genial ways, how he would have rejoiced in this 
le t era, alter all his struggles wnh coffee and 
cinchonas ph his Laggala property. Cinchona 
iloiished In re for a long time as it did on few other 
1 la ;< , Duncan complaining of his 14 years old 
trees never giving him any seed ; but they have 
long ago been cut and the bark utilised, and now 
tea°eovers the fields on both sides of the range. 
Uut if the look westward and southward from the 
Luggala Gap at 3,500 feet (?) satisfies the visitor, 
what shall we say of the new world revealed by the 
very few steps which carry one over the ridge ? 
Looking down from this proud eminence over the 
cultivuted tea holds of Laggala interspersed in the 
most picturesque way with grassy downs, and 
clumps of forest, the eye passes on over a wide 
extent of diversified patana, rolling grassy slopes, 
sholas of forest and isolated hills to the grand 
expanse — a continuous wilderness — of forest which 
runs away to the sea margin on the far East. 
As Tennyson puts it, from Laggala eastwards 
we viewed, — 
A land where all things always seem the same ! 
Looking to the north-west, the region of the ancient 
sea of Prakrama is before us. Glints of silvery bright- 
ness in the wilderness indeed mark the 
course of the waters of the Mahaweliganga, and 
by-and-by a big patch of brightness reveals 
Minneri, while certain landmarks define the site 
of Polonnaruwa. The change within a few seconds 
from the West to the East is indeed startling, and 
the diversity of views as we proceed along the 
range, unequalled. I could quite understand how- 
ever, how, in the full fury of the south-west mon- 
soon, the wind must tear down the several ravines 
and steep slopes on its way to fill the vacuum in 
the hot lowcountry. But fortunately the damage to 
tea is far less in every way than to coffee — at the 
most affording only such a rest to the shrub for 
a month or so, as might be given by a light prun- 
ing. Passing on through Mousaheria, Pittawelloya, 
Hattanwella and afterwards Marnagalla and the 
Telgamas, I saw where wind had done its worst 
in the coffee era to the destruction of the hopes 
and purses of Hope, Wingate, Beckett, Catto and 
others. Wingate's nice avenues of oleanders still 
flourish — though the shrub is an objectionable one 
on a plantation — but, alas, for the poor patches 
which remain of what was once the staple of cul- 
tivation. Looking back to far distant Moncrief, 
I am reminded of the warning given to Mr. James 
Wright on his way to explore the jungle by a com- 
panion who learned that ironstone prevailed 
on the Laggala side. They met several natives 
carrying blocks to be smelted in the Matale 
valley and the visitor decided that an iron 
country was not the place to grow coffee 1 For 
.tea however, we know from experience in 
Ambagamuwa, Balangoda and other districts 
how compatible a ferruginous soil may be with 
heavy crops of leaf, yielding a desirable liquor. 
The present laird of Hattanwella (who has acquired 
so high a reputation on Hooloo as a tea-maker) 
is opening quite a number of clearings, and 
he would treble his acreage if only the cart-road 
were extended ; but it will be hard for him to open 
any new clearing to beat his present little field on 
the flat with its vigorous growth of bush. 
Spending a night at Hattanwella with the intelli- 
gent Superintendent, it was amusing to learn that the 
epidemic of burglaries which has so long infested 
the capital, has its counterpart amidst the se- 
questered, peaceful villages and plantations on the 
Laggala side, Laggala residents were unanimous in 
holding that a better behaved, more virtuous 
people than the Sinhalese below them in the valleys 
could not be found in Geylon. When robberies from 
bungalows, stores or coffee-fields took place, the 
culprits were invariably traced to the other, the 
Battota side of the range. They used in the 
time of coffee crops to make raids over the 
hills especially on moonlight nights. But of late, 
one particular rogue had developed among the 
Laggala villagers themselves. He mst have got 
his training and villainy from the " civilized " 
side of the country ; but he chose to carry them 
back and exercise them on his own people. The 
result was a whole series of depredations and 
disturbances and yet though every village was 
annoyed, the simple folk would neither arrest, 
nor give proper information to lead to the capture of 
the robber, and the Arachchi of the neighbourhood was 
