chap, xii* HOSPITABLE RECEPTION AT BEEORANA. 
315 
presented me with a bunch of native bananas, remarkably 
fine fruit. Each banana was nearly eighteen inches long, and 
curled like a bullock’s horn. The only cooking-place was the 
house in which I sat. The fuel was wet, and the grass roof 
not admitting the escape of the smoke, the atmosphere proved 
exceedingly painful to my eyes. I tried to stand out of doors 
when it did not rain, but there was only a yard or two that 
was not some inches deep in water and clay, worked up into 
stiff mud by the passing to and fro of the people and the 
cattle. The inhabitants of the villages do not seem to have 
advanced in civilisation so far as drainage; and from the 
state of the villages themselves, as well as the swampy wet 
grounds around, they seemed as unhealthy places as it was 
possible to imagine. 
After a couple of hours’ rest, and many expressions of kind¬ 
ness from the people, we resumed our journey. Great part 
of the way was through a thick forest, over steep and slippery 
paths and through narrow passes, along which it seemed im¬ 
possible to carry a palanquin ; while the heavy rain which fell 
during great part of the time, rendered our progress still more 
difficult. During this afternoon’s journey we crossed four 
rivers swollen with the rain; and about five o’clock reached 
Beforana, a tolerably large village, situated in a swampy 
hollow, surrounded by woody hills. My quarters were not 
uncomfortable, but I felt shivery and cold. The chiefs 
brought in the customary present, and shortly afterwards the 
owner of the house came, accompanied by his wife and chil¬ 
dren, bringing a small basket of very white rice, with a duck 
and a fowl, as a present. He said Messrs. Johns, and others, 
had always stopped at his house when travelling to and from 
the capital; that he was glad to see me there, and had 
brought the small present as a token of his good will. I 
thanked the kind family for their present, and expressed my 
deep sense of the hospitality manifested in every place. After 
