At Kandy, about seventy-five miles from the coast, there is an excellent botanical garden rivaling the garden at Buitenzorg, even as Kandy itself rivals Buitenzorg as a summer resort. (There are extensive gardens at Singapore and Penang, but they are inferior to those in Ceylon and Java.) These gardens are about equally distant from the equator; the former north, the latter south, but the garden at Kandy has twice the altitude of the other. We were interested in comparing the plants and examining the new specimens. While Buitenzorg is superior in her collection of orchids the ferns at Kandy surpass anything we have seen. Here the yellow bamboo is added to the varieties seen elsewhere; here, too, we saw the screw palm, whose leaves form a spiral line like the thread of a screw. Another curious variety is the sealing wax palm, the higher joints of which look exactly like red sealing wax. The travelers' palm, which we also saw in Java, is to be found here, its name being derived from the fact that each leaf stem catches and holds sufficient water to slake a traveler's thirst. The talipot palm attracts the attention of all visitors, not only because its leaves formed the parchment for the early books of Buddhism, but because it flowers but once, and then, as if exhausted by its half century's effort, dies. The sensitive plant grows wild here and seems almost human in its perception, as it shrinks from the slightest touch and folds its leaves as if withered.
SINGALESE CARPENTER.
I have already spoken of the fruits of the tropics, especially those of Java, but I think I ought to qualify my words. Since reveling in mangosteens, rambutans, etc., I have eaten an apple and am convinced that no tropical fruit can compare with it; and when to the apple are added the peach, the pear, the plum and the cherry, and to these fruits of the trees are added the grape, the strawberry, the raspberry and the blackberry, not to speak of the pineapples, oranges and bananas of our southern states, who will say that the temperate zone is not as highly favored as the warmer lands?
We not only have an abundance of both the necessaries and the luxuries, but we escape some of the torments of the tropics. Animals, reptiles and insects run riot here. The tiger is "man-eating," the serpents are large and poisonous and the insects are omnipresent. We sometimes complain at home of the mosquito, which seems to be a universal pest, and found everywhere, "from Greenland's icy mountains to India's coral strands," but here its activity is perennial and its appetite reaches its maximum. In all the hotels the beds are protected by mosquito bars, for without them sleep would be impossible. The ant is even more annoying than the mosquito, for while the former does most of its prowling at night, the latter "improves each shining hour." If the natives play the sluggard, it is because they refuse to profit by the example of industry which the ant ever presents to them. It is not uncommon for the legs of dining tables and cupboards to be set in bowls of water as a protection from these insects, and where this precaution is not taken the diner divides his time between eating and fighting ants. The white ant has a literary turn of mind and pays especial attention to books. We have heard of several libraries being ravaged by this insect, the leaves being so perforated that the books looked like honeycombs. In his search for knowledge the ant has the companionship of the cockroach, which grows here to the length of two or three inches, can fly, and stains what it can not devour. The house lizard is always in evidence. One evening we counted twenty-four of these interesting little reptiles in sight at one time on our porch. At night lizards in the trees call hoarsely to each other, and when it rains the air is vocal with the croaking of frogs and the singing of insects.
In the Botanical Garden at Kandy we saw hundreds of flying foxes, which look like buzzards. Some of these flying foxes measure four feet from tip to tip.
I find that there is a disease in these latitudes called tropical frenzy—an uncontrollable anger which sometimes manifests itself when European officials deal with native subjects. This has been seriously discussed in medical meetings, and it has been argued that acts of violence on the part of officials should be excused on this ground. The subject has been scientifically considered at a meeting of German physicians. This disease seems to be confined to Europeans, the natives being immune from it—at least, it is not considered a good defense when urged by a native as an excuse for doing violence to a European.
My experience with the money changers of the Orient has made the money changers of America seem virtuous by comparison. This is the worst place for shaving, for discounts, for premiums, for commissions and for exchange that I have visited. In traveling, one has frequently to change money from the currency of one nation to that of another, and as there seems to be no fixed rate, he never knows what he is going to realize. (By the way, one who thinks that a gold dollar is good the world around can learn something from the discounts.) At Colombo I had some Singapore bills converted into rupees. The cashier at the hotel said that the rate was one-twenty, and gave me twelve rupees for ten dollars. A few minutes afterwards I had occasion to buy some tickets of a tourist agent and he allowed me fifteen rupees for ten dollars; the next time I made change I received sixteen rupees and seventy cents for ten. This is a sample of the experience one has here. At Singapore I drew some money on my letter of credit which calls for pounds; as I was going into English territory, I thought it would be convenient to carry some five pound notes, but the bank insisted on converting the pounds into Singapore dollars at eight-forty-five, and then offered to sell me five pound notes at the rate of eight-seventy. When I related the incident to an Englishman, he recalled an instance where a man presented a two hundred pound note and asked for smaller bills; the bank charged him a commission for converting the larger bills into rupees and then another commission for converting the rupees into five pound notes.