Page:Three Years in Europe.djvu/23

Rh Coast, and we reached Madras at 10-50 We landed and saw the Madras Fort, the Peoples' Park, and the Menagerie. Beyond this, there is little to see in Madras. The town is hot and dusty, and altogether disappointing to the visitor.

On the morning of the 10th March we could see the distant mountains of Ceylon. I saw mountains now for the first time, and they appeared like clouds on the horizon.

We reached Point de Galle in Ceylon on the 11th at 6-50 After breakfast we left the steamer and went on shore in a small boat. The whole place seemed a continuous garden. The cocoanut, the bamboo, the mango and a hundred other trees overhanging the neat beautiful streets, and the neat and pretty huts presented a most picturesque sight. Valmiki is hardly guilty of much exaggeration when he describes Ceylon as a golden region!

In about an hour we came up to the Wakwalley—a scene so beautiful as to defy all description. Far off is seen a line of greyish mountains encircling the view. Adam's Peak can be seen among these mountains. Lower down spreads a fresh green landscape with beautiful waving trees, and just beneath you are lawns and pretty walks with small glittering rivulets or canals meandering through the fields.

From the Wakwalley we went to the cinnamon garden and thence we went to see a Cingalese temple. The priest of the temple came to us, and showed us all the images and other things worth seeing there. There was