68 
RUBBER PLANTING IN CEYLON 
the grotesque calls of the street vendors, and finally seeing and hearing 
so much that was new and strange that it was a relief to get back to 
the quiet hotel and turn in on a bed that had neither top sheet nor 
coverlet, because in that climate, even though the whole side of the room 
was open to the night air, no such covering is necessary. In the morn- 
ing I had a new experience — a bath in Eastern fashion, for the bath room 
is a bit different from what the ordinary dweller in the temperate zone 
expects. It is cement floored and gullied, with a huge urn in it from 
which one dips buckets full of water to pour over the body. In other 
words, one stands outside of the tub to bathe. To get into it is out of 
the question. 
ORCHARD ROAD, SINGAPORE. 
And now a word about Singapore. It was founded, so the English 
say, in 1819, by Sir Stamford Raffles. The real date was, however, 1283 
when it was founded by the Malays and became at once a general rendez- 
vous for their pirate craft. It is 8,000 miles from England, is the seat 
of government for the Federated Malay States, and is a great and 
growing business center. In the census of 1901 the population of the 
island was 184,554. Of this, 101,908 were Chinese, 35,000 Malays. 
16,000 natives of India, and 2,769 whites. The island contains two 
hundred and seven square miles and lies rather low, the land being on an 
average from twenty to thirty feet above sea level. The average mean 
