208 
THE TEOtlCAL AGiHOULTURIST. [Sept. 1, 1902. 
floods; while "Pedigree" Banner got his name 
after a narrow squealc of a raft capsizing vith 
himself and two companions and because one of 
them risked liis life to recover a valuable paper in 
an overcoat pocket, which turned out to be (not a 
title-deed bul) a copy of tlie "Liverpool Mercury'' 
wilh the jiedigree of his family. The disgust of 
the rescuer may be imagined ! 'I hen there was poor 
old Noad, Chief Surveyor, under Colonel F>erp, 
S. V. G., nearly starved under Adam's Peak 
living on the coolies' rice for weeks togothej-, while 
liis supplies were slopped by three riveis all in 
flood, and rendered impassable. Well may the 
present generation of planters between Adam's 
Peak and Great Western (is there anyone lift who 
was in the same region in 18G9, besides tlie two 
named above ?) be told by us : — 
If you had seen these roads 
liefore they were made, 
You'd have held uj) your hands 
And blessed Get. oral Wade ! 
It was in 1869 that we collected, for the first time, 
the planted acreage of each estate ? Meddecunibra 
with its thousand acres of coiree was ti e biggest 
by tar in the young distiicts : Del-rey had 290, 
Kirkoswald 287, Warleigh and Newton each 120 ; 
Bearwell was a l forest ; Palmerston and Belgravia 
each 100 acres and so on. 
Our next big jilaniing trip was in 1872. Starting 
from Galle lor the newly-opened Morawak-korale 
district to visit Le Cocq and his sinne dnrais, A. E. 
Scovell and A. T. Reclie ; across Gongalla through 
llakwane, riding from Pdtnadulla right through 
llapntalp, Badulla and Passara distiicts ; back to 
New Galway and Nuwara Eliya and thence by the 
Kiklimaana bridle road throu";h the I'oreit to 
Up|)er Dimbula, represented chiefly by Lousa and 
Scalpa. Of the country as it then afipeared, of in- 
cidents and adventures, much might be said (we 
pencilled the draft of the Memorial that started 
the agitation for railway Extension from Nawala- 
pitiya to Nanuoya and Ilaputale, while lying on 
the patna in front of the old Bandarawella rest- 
house, on this trip); but we must not tire our 
readers and have said enough for today. 
Trusting to our memory — which is probably 
^yith advancing years, not so cood as it once 
was — we find we made several omissions of, 
importance in our instalment of Reminiscences 
published on Friday last. One is simply un^ 
pardonable ; for it was to the hospitable bungalow 
of Mr. and Mrs. W. D. Gibbon at Hoolankande 
that we turned our pony, when we first entered 
the Kellebokka valley in 1864 ; and it was 
then, if we recollect aright, that we accom- 
panied Mr. Gibbon and Mr. Charles Catto on a very 
notable jungle expedition across the Knuckles 
raii^e to take stock of a new experiment in 
planting on the Eastern spuis and slopes— an 
experiment which it wou'd have been well for 
Mr. Gibbon if he had never touched. (But 
of liow many more can that be said as to 
Planting on the Lagalla side :— Poor Ted Hope 
and Wingate, Thomas Maokie, Borron and 
many mure who lost much money in vainly 
trying to make plantations pay in wind-blown 
districls.J Another visit to the same veteran 
planter, when he became Mannger of Oocloowella, 
first made us acquainted with 
Tllli IIANTANNE LIl.SriilCT. 
Tlieromantic history oL the liist esiatcs planted; 
the tragedie-i connected wilh the deaths of 
Henderson, Urquharb and Falconer ; and th 
still more harrowing murder by .Sinhalese 
villagers of the young Welshman, Morgan, when 
riding with the monthly bag of rupees through 
a bit of jungle before bursting out on the patnas 
of Kitoolamoola, would fill u|> much more than 
a column it snace and time permitted. A. C. 
Mortimer as Manager for Sir John Cheape's 
group of estates was the great gun of the district, 
and he was succeeded by Wm. Cameron and 
James Beaton. Old Gottelier on Peradeniya and 
Paul do Cliermont— with the grand old giant 
rose-tree on Ooroogalla— were characters in 
their way ; and altogether there are many pleasant 
'•eminiscences of Hantanne in the early days, as 
there is respecting the 
HIiWAHElTES 
which we first entered by the old road from 
the top of the Kandy Lake to get to Kirrimettia, 
Bowlane, Bopitia, Patiagama, etc. — the ground 
being nearly every wheie strewn with coffee — 
bumper crops and scarcity of coolies accounting 
for much clierry lost. Then Dr. Dodsworth, 
proprietor of Kirrimettia, who dated fiom " tlie 
forties," rode down with us to pay our first (but 
by no means last) visit to the 
PATElAItClI OF DUMBARA, 
the late Robert Boyd Tytler, regarding whom 
and his work as Pioneer of Coffee and Cacao 
how much could be told ! 
We regretted at this time not to be able to visit 
DOLOSBAGIE 
and look up Mr. Wm. Rollo(who had just— 1864 — 
got a young Assistant in Mr. C W norsfall, now 
our neighbour in Baillie Street); while hisi planting 
neighbours then included Messrs. John Stephen*, 
J A Bell, Henry Saunders, W C Whitham. R B 
Downall, Blacklaw, Imray, James Blackett, 
G M Ballardie, R Porler Wm. Taylor, etc. We 
had to wait some years before we saw one corner 
of the district with Mr. T. Smith at Barnagalla. 
Still another early trip that should not be for- 
gotten was that with Mr. Andrew Cross from 
Nuwara Eliya into Maturata to be ihe guest of 
Mr. J. H. Renton and thence to ri e back in.t.o 
Udapussellawa and visit our old friend Mr. G. A. 
Dick on Ragalla, then being opened. Still 
earlier, of course, was our acquaintance with 
Mr. Dick when Manager of Nayap.me in 
rUSSELLAVVA, 
while Maurice Worm* ruled over Rothschild ; F. 
R. Sabonadiere was a little King at Delta, and liad 
for genial neiglibours, such good men and ex- 
cellent planters as old George Shireff on Hel- 
bodde, John Lewis Gordon on Wavendon (after- 
wards and still partner in Messrs. Geo. Steuart "& 
Co.), John Martin on Sir Horace Rumbold's estate 
of Melfort, W. Sabonadiere on Glenloch, Northniore 
on Whyddon, Sweeting on Kallugalla, Capt. Donald 
Graham on Mahxvilla (to be succeeded later 
by Wm. Mackenzie), and the Bowden Smiths in 
NILAMBE. 
To that district we made a most pleasant 
trip with Old Colonist when he was doing double 
duty as V. A. for Me.ssrs. Geo. Steuart & Co. 
as well as for Lee He lges & Co. when (as 
Price and Boustead's Agents) they held a long 
list of estates in Agency. Of the Wariagallas 
under Henderson and Arthur Davidson, and of 
E.S Grigsou, as a young planter opening his 
first clearing of 100 acres cf beautiful young 
coffee on Nilambe estate, we have most pleasant 
recollections; as also of C. 3. Armstrong on Mor- 
aiiena. But we must close what ii after all 
little more than a preliminary sketch, - 
