Page:Ballantyne--The Battery and the Boiler.djvu/288

 to search for the old Malay, leaving their comrades in charge of the vessel.

There is something inexpressibly delightful to the feelings in passing through the glades and thickets of tropical forests and plantations after a long sea voyage. The nostrils seem to have been specially prepared, by long abstinence from sweet smells, to appreciate the scents and odours of aromatic plants and flowers. The soft shade of foliage, the refreshing green, and the gay colours everywhere, fill the eye with pleasure, not less exquisite than that which fills the ears from the warblings and chatterings of birds, the gentle tones of domestic animals, and the tinkling of rills. The mere solidity of the land, under foot, forms an element of pleasure after the tossings of the restless sea, and all the sweet influences put together tend to rouse in the heart a shout of joy and deep gratitude for a world so beautiful, and for powers so sensitively capable of enjoying it.

Especially powerful were the surrounding influences on our three friends as they proceeded, mile after mile, into the country, and little wonder, for eyes, and nostrils, and ears, which had of late drunk only of the blue heavens and salt sea and the music of the wind, naturally gloated over a land which produces sandal-wood, cinnamon, turmeric, ginger, benzoin, camphor, nutmeg, and a host of