ROADS AT ANY COST. 
the roads. But one of its greater objections is, that 
they cannot he worked during the rains, as the ioads 
of rice and coffee would get wet, and spoilt. Hence 
pack cattle are more suitable for the comparatively 
dry climates of Uva and'Haputale than any of the more 
rainy districts. 
It is wonderful so few accidents occurred to coolies 
in carrying heavy loads of coffee and rice down and 
up steep mountain paths. One however I shall never 
fc^gets a string of coolies wei’e carrying coffee down 
the steep face of Karagastalawa estate ; one of them 
dropped, as if he had been shot. He was dead : the 
bag of coffee containing two and a half bushels, had 
somehow suddenly shifted, giving his neck a sharp 
turn or twist, and completely broken it. I suspect, if 
the bags were not well stitched up, they frequently 
took out coffee and hid it, in order to lessen their 
burden; at least 1 have seen coffee lying about on the 
cooly transport paths, concealed in jungle, or under 
CO dee trees. No wonder then the cartmen were short 
in delivery, or that they grumbled sadly at having 
their balance hire stopt. 
CHAPTER IV. 
What Made Coffee Plvnting Expensive in the 
Olden Days. 
1 forgot, at the commencement of last chapter, it 
might be neither mon'‘y_-nor coolies that Jones was 
off for. It miitht have been in search of rice, or of 
the missing rice cart**, now some th'*ee weeks or a 
month past due. If it wa^, you would see, not very- 
far behind him, a string ot‘ coolies earning along with 
hungry-looking visages and indented stomachs, but 
there could be no mistake about it when you saw 
a bushel or half-bushel measure lugged along on the 
shoulders of one of them. They w'ould also have each 
a bag hung over their shoulders if the day was warm 
and fine, or ove’’ their head and neck, cumbly form, if it 
rained. Batch after batch of carts are passed on the road, 
with the question: ‘^What estate are you going to or 
Let me see your way-bill”; if the reply or sight 
of the way-bill was iinsatisfa* tory, you would then 
commence to question the cartman in such Siubalese as 
you could muster, if he had seen or passed your rice carts 
anywhere. If the reply was in the ne ative, you would 
proceed on the journey more disheartened than ever, 
but if in the affirmative, if they were only a few 
miles behind, how we all used to stir up 1 The 
