VIEW FROM OUR POST. 
247 
through a narrow path between luxuriantly 
healthy coffee-trees covered with forming fruit 
(I have just missed seeing the blossom, which is 
lovely against the burnished leaves), and coming 
out on a small cascade of clear cold water under 
a canopy of the tallest trees I have ever seen. 
The slopes by the path to the stream are cov- 
ered with pine - apples, which will be ripe in 
about a month. It seems this is a garden 
(mostly of nature's tending to all appearance) 
belonging to a well-to-do native in the town ; 
and when the products are in season his servants 
come to gather them in, and lodge in a wretched 
hut which stands by the path. A creature more 
like a monkey than a human being — an old, 
shrivelled, and very small woman on closer in- 
spection — sat under the sloping roof, devouring 
an unripe mango. She is, it seems, a sort of 
watcher, who lets the owner know when produce 
is ready for market, and lives here alone. So 
much for our next neighbour. 
But there was still work to do ; the house was 
far from finished. The one disagreeable element 
in all my delight was the presence of that wild 
intractable set of builders. The hut is really 
very unsatisfactory. The interpreter failed to 
come, and as the men do not understand a word 
