As the mist and clouds dispersed, the extensive views that opened out became sublimely grand. North and east, below and beyond us, were range upon range of mountains, the valleys and slopes of which, from Maskeliya to Rambodde, from Dimbula to Haputale, were the homes of the enterprising men whose capital and industry have, within thirty years, made Ceylon the third, if not the second, largest Coffeeproducing country in the world. Sweeping round to the south were the similar ranges of Sabaragamuwa and the Morawak Kóralé, where, before similar energy and enterprise, the primæval forests have disappeared, and in their stead now grows the coffee bush. Down the sides of the mountains were seen the rushing waterfalls, the nearer ones broad bands of glistening foam, and those afar mere shining threads and filaments of silver as they shimmered in the light of day. To the south and west the circling ocean met the eye,-from Point-de Galle, soon to become the great steam-harbour of the Eastern world, to Kalutara, Colombo, Negombo and Chilaw, the sites of which, with the aid of a good glass and a map, could easily be made out ;-while in between lay the vast expanse of hill and dale, watered by the Kelani-ganga, spread. Photographed as it were upon the clouds, as far as vision could reach, there was the picture of the sacred summit. With one hand I could cover a mountain, while the shadow from my small body was fear. ful indeed. I could hardly take it as a compliment if any friend were to express his desire to me—' May your shadow never grow less!' But as that shadow shortened with the advancing light, we hastened on our homeward march." the Kalu-ganga, and other streams, the chief of which sprang from the ranges that immediately surrounded the isolated pinnacle upon which we stood. Standing there, and seeing all this, we felt there was not the slightest exaggeration in what Sir Emerson Tennent has written upon this scene, and which he thus sums up:-"The panorama from the summit of Adam's Peak is, perhaps, the grandest in the world, as no other mountain, although surpassing it in altitude, presents the same unobstructed view over land and sea. Around it, to the north and east, the traveller looks down on the zone of lofty hills that encircle the Kandian kingdom, whilst to the westward the eye is carried far over undulating plains, threaded by rivers like cords of silver, till in the purple distance the glitter of the sunbeams on the sea marks the line of the Indian Ocean." Adam's Peak. "Steep the descent and wearisome the way; So, gnarled and rigid, claspt and interwound An uncouth maze of roots emboss'd the ground; Midway beneath, the sylvan wild assumed A milder aspect, shrubs and flow'rets bloom'd; And showers of sunbeams through the leaves were seen.' CHAPTER VIII. DESCENT FROM THE PEAK. HERAMITIPA na. ALEXANDER'S RIDGE. CAVE OF KHIZR.- SITA GANGULA.-DHARMA-RA'JAGALA. — UDA-PAWEN ·ELLA, — ACCIDENTS, -- PALA'BADDALA TO RATNAPURA. COLD as we were, and fatigued as we felt, on our March trip, we divested ourselves of rugs and overcoats, and staff in band, turned westwards on our homeward journey. Down the cliff went two of my companions, holding on by the "The World before the Flood." chains; and down the slanting ladder went he who had adventured up it. Arrived at the brow of the precipice, and seeing below me but one step for my foot, and infinite space beyond, I stopped short. Calling to the interpreter for assistance, for without it I could not go down, an active Vidahn* readily came forward, and with his and the interpreter's help, I accomplished the descent. This hesitation. on my part was neither the result of fear nor of dizziness, but of the stiffened state of my limbs, which began to fail and flag, and shew symptoms of inability to act simultaneously with the volition that directed their movements. It behoved me therefore to be cautious. Just as I went over the brink, my ears were saluted by a most melancholy whining howl. Our commissary-general's dog, answering to the name of "Tinker," who had made the pilgrimage with us, and scrambled up to the top of the Samanta-kúța, where he found a solitary canine friend to keep him company, on coming to this spot shrank back, and gave doleful vent to his dismay at the perils before him, and his grief at being forsaken;-for there we were obliged to leave him. We observed in our descent that some of the links of the chains, and irons of the ladders, had short inscriptions engraved upon them; and that on the rocks here and there longer and more elaborate inscriptions had been cut. We were informed that in the one case they simply recorded * A petty headman, or subordinate officer. the names of those who had fixed or repaired those useful aids to the ascent; and in the other gave an account of pilgrims who had visited the Peak, some of whom had died when they had reached thus far. We got back to Heramitipána in considerably less time than it took us to ascend from it the previous night; but we found the journey down the Samanala, much more painful and trying than the clamber up. We had observed the preceding day, that from some place below the station, on the side on which we entered it coming from Palábaddala, the pilgrims brought up their supplies of water; and on returning from the Peak, in going down towards the Síta-gangula, we saw a descent to our left, which mistaking for the proper path, one of us went partially down before he discovered his error. About fifty or sixty feet below, he saw a clearing in a small dell, in the centre of which was a square kind of tank; and this dell he determined to examine on the occasion of his third visit. The result of the examination was, that he identified the station Heramițipána, and this place, as that described by Ibn Batúta, as "the ridge of Alexander, in which is a cave and a well of water," at the entrance to the mountain Serendib. The old Moor's account is somewhat confused, his notes or recollections not always carrying his facts exactly in their due order; but half-way down the descent, on the left hand, is a well, excavated in the rock, in which we found about five feet of water, and which swarmed with tadpoles. Possibly Batúta found it in the same condition, for he speaks of the well, at the entrance, |