PLANTING IN UPPEP RAM30DA. 
This used to be a neat-looking church, and the 
site a very pretty oue, and many a good sermon has 
the late Mr. Schrader preached in it. He used to 
preach there in the afternoon, after the forenoon ser- 
mon at Puesellawa. Although the congregation sel- 
dom exceeded four or six, so netiiims only two or three, 
yet he was always pnnctaal at the hour, or, if late, 
he might have been seen by us sitting waiting in 
the shade of the trees, coming round the Tavalan- 
tenna turns of the road at a sharp canter, and, on 
arrival, enter the pulpit, readj^ wa,rmerl for the service. 
Is there any virtue in black cloth, that clergy- 
men in the tropics should deem it essentially necess- 
ary to wear it ? Why cannot a sermon be as well 
preached (better I should think) in a white jacket, 
as in a black coat ? It would make the hearers feel 
more pleasant and cool, and external feelings some- 
how or other possess a strange and mighty influence 
over internal ones. 
The clergyman’s pony, I should add, in course of time 
was superseded by a bandy, or covered carriage. This 
was as it ought to be, and both preacher and con- 
gregation felt more comfortable. 
A long stretch of hare perpendicular rock, from 
200 to 300 feet in height, extends from behind the 
Raniboda resthouse, on. towards Pussellawa, until it 
los^s itself in the Helboda jungle. Over the top of 
this rock were opened several estates, Meemalle, 
The Eyrie, Meeriscotuakelle, and Poojagodde. They 
all turn'd out failures, say about 1,200 acres of 
planted coffee. What has become of them all now ? 
“Lapsed into jungle,” iikelv enough; it was a fine 
“lay of laud” hut the soil was poor, It generally 
consisted of a sort of rotten or gravelly rock of no sub- 
stance, or, if not this, a stiff, clayey sort of stuff, which 
left the mark of the mamotie on it, in cutting roads 
or holes, somewhat similar to the mark of a knife 
on stiff cheese. It was very cold in climate, and the 
general elevation would average fully, or o ver, 4,000 feet. 
In those days the hopes of the proprietor were high, 
but gradually they came to see they were futile.* One 
thing could be said : it was a fine, cold, healthy cli- 
mate, and both Europeans and coolies throve amaz- 
ingly, not in pocket, but in robust bodily health. 
The elevation was much too high, for the lay of 
land with vast extent of forest surrounding it on 
every side, and it was fearfully windy during the 
north-east monsoon, the wind blowing from the Matu- 
rata quarter, through the gulleys on the False Pedro 
* A good deal of this land has been, or is in the 
course of being, resuscitated. — E d. 
