Do you remember that just about this time last week we were crouching in a hole in a muddy bank waiting for the thunderstorm to pass on? How different now, though we are still in Ceylon and, as crow flies, not so many miles from the Hunters' mountain-side. It is a gorgeous tropical afternoon, the bits of sky we can see through the feathery-leaved trees are of the deepest blue, and we are resting, because it seems too hot to move a limb. In front of us there stretches a sheet of limpid water which might be a lake except that it is surrounded by a raised bund, or bank, artificially made, with hewn granite slabs as steps going down at one end. We are glad of the shade of the trees falling across the short turfy grass, and we are seated on some broken blocks of granite, keeping a sharp look out for snakes. They will hardly be likely to trouble us here, but in that jungly bit behind it wouldn't be at all safe to rest like this. Even to sit on the short grass might be unpleasant, as there are all sorts of unknown insects here which bite and sting and stab, but we are safely raised on stones and are wearing thick boots. Examine that slab of granite there beside you; do you see that it has a most wonderfully carved snake upon it – a cobra with seven heads? It is so clear-cut it might have been done yesterday, yet it is part of the ruins of a mighty city, a city as large as London, which once stretched its busy streets over this quiet glade. The cobra was a sacred beast to the Hindus, and a seven-headed one was peculiarly so, seven being a mystic number.

What a glorious butterfly! Its body is as big as a small bird, and its great velvety wings are the sharpest black and white. No, I don't for a moment suppose you'll catch it, so it is no use getting hot! I'm glad you can't, for we have no proper apparatus here, and it would only be a crushed mass to take home. Don't go headlong into the tank, though, in your frantic efforts; it might be awkward. No, I don't think there are any crocodiles, only a few sacred tortoises perhaps. Look! there is a tiny one – that small yellow thing that is walking away with the melancholy dignity of a retired general. Pick it up if you like certainly, see it wag its head and legs helplessly. I wish we could take it home. As you replace it, it continues its grave walk in the same direction as if it had never been rudely interrupted. At that instant a hare darts across an open glade and disappears in the thick undergrowth. What a country! Æsop's Fables in real life, where hares and tortoises live together!

"Was this city here at the same time as Rameses ii. was living?"

No. Egypt was past its best days before this city, which was called Anuradhapura (Anarajapura), was built, and you must remember Rameses ii. was by no means one of the earliest kings of Egypt, he came quite late on in his country's history. His date was about thirteen hundred years before Christ, and it must have been about eight hundred years after that, though still you notice, 500 b. c., that this city was founded by some Cingalese who are supposed to have come over from India. That makes it between two thousand and three thousand years old, which we should think ancient enough if we hadn't visited Egypt first. Anuradhapura flourished for centuries as the capital of the Cingalese kings, who often carried on savage battles with the Tamils when they came over from India also.

Turn round now and examine that hill you wanted to climb a little while ago and tell me if you can see anything peculiar about it. No, I don't mean that large grey monkey who has just peeped at us in an impudent way and then swung himself into hiding, though I admit he is very interesting. I mean something odd about the hill itself. It is covered with trees and jungle scrub certainly, as any ordinary hill might be, but it is oddly steep and the sides rise very sharply from the ground. It is an even shape too, more like an inverted bowl than a hill; or, better still, just try to imagine some giant cutting off the dome of St. Paul's and setting it down here in the jungle, wouldn't it look something like that?

You don't quite agree, for you say that this has trees and bushes growing on it and St. Paul's dome would be bare. That is so, but if St. Paul's dome had been left for many hundreds of years in a country where vegetation grows as fast as it does here, wouldn't it probably be grown over too?

Yes, I do mean it. That isn't a hill at all, but a huge brick building called a dagoba, made by the same race of men who dug out this tank, and whose descendants to-day, with tortoise-shell combs in their hair, wait on us in the Colombo hotels.

We will go back now to the place where we left that native cart and driver and we'll find a dagoba which has been stripped of its trees, so that we can see what it really looks like.

Hush! Do you hear that curious singing like a chant? Wait; there is a procession of pilgrims. They come swinging round the corner of the road in their picturesque flowing garments, and just at the turn they stop and kneel with their hands held palms together before their faces, and they bow repeatedly before marching on again. Let us go and find out what it was that stopped them. We soon come to it and find that it is the seated figure of a man with one hand falling over his knee and the other on his lap, while his legs are crossed tailor-wise. It is painted white and it is not very much larger than life. This is Buddha, of whom you heard in Kandy, and all over here, and in Burma, and in a less degree in India, you will find images of him set up to remind his followers of the precepts he left for them to follow.

Our driver is dead asleep under a tree, but we manage to wake him and soon we are rattling along a tree-shaded road in the queer little cart to Ruanveli, the best known of all the dagobas. When we arrive in full view of it we dismiss the driver and climb on to a slab of stone that is raised from the ground and tilted slightly like a table with two legs higher than the others. Here we can gaze upon this extraordinary monument which rises about one hundred and fifty feet into the air, and is about two and a half times as much across, just the shape of a pudding basin, you see. It is not a temple, not even a tomb, as the Pyramids are, but a solid block built of millions and millions of bricks with a tiny chamber inside containing an infinitely precious relic, nothing less than a few of Buddha's hairs. So they say! Only the priests were allowed to go into this sacred chamber, with the exception of one king, who had this priceless privilege granted to him. It is not very many years since mighty monuments were rediscovered, because the jungle had grown up all around them and no one knew even where Anuradhapura had stood; but now there are men who spend their whole time uncovering and preserving them, just as many men are working at the excavations in Egypt; and the trees and overgrowth have been stripped from Ruanveli, which stands forth sharp and clear-cut against this beautiful sky.

Men are very much alike all the world over! This great dagoba was put up by one of the Cingalese kings, Dutugemunu, to celebrate his great victory over the Tamils, just as Rameses ii. put up the inimitable temple of Abu Simbel to celebrate his victory over the Syrians. Before Dutugemunu came to the throne the Tamils had usurped all power and made one of their own men, called Elala, king, and the young prince, exiled from his capital city, met them in battle outside the walls. He fought with great bravery, and in the end the issue of the day was decided by a single combat between him and Elala, both mounted on huge elephants. That must have been a fight indeed! Dutugemunu killed Elala and regained the throne of his fathers, but he must have been a singularly enlightened prince for his age, for he not only buried his fallen foe with great honour but he gave orders that henceforth all music should cease when bands were marching past his tomb, and that royalties were to alight from their horses or palanquins and walk past on foot to do honour to the mighty dead. Even in the nineteenth century one of the princes from Kandy, who was flying from capture, obeyed the order and would not allow himself to be carried past the spot! So the memory of Elala and the great fight he made were kept alive as Dutugemunu had intended they should be.

On this very slab where we are now sitting it is said that Dutugemunu died. If not the actual stone, it is probably the spot. It was about 140 b. c., and when he knew he was dying he gave orders that he should be carried out here, that his fast failing eyes might look their last on the greatest monument of his reign. In the midst of his great city, with its fine buildings and the great tanks he had caused to be made to give the people water, he thought most of all of Ruanveli, partly because of the sacred relic enclosed, but partly also because he had done a wonderful thing in paying for all the labour that was used in its building, instead of forcing his subjects to work for nothing, as was the custom in his time.

There is much to examine in Ruanveli; we can see the casing of granite running up the sides, we can examine a statue of the king himself and many wonderful carvings; around the dagoba runs a magnificent granite platform wide enough for six elephants to walk abreast, as no doubt they did many times in the gay processions on festival days.

Behind the dagoba, not far off, is an immense lake, or tank, much larger than that we saw this morning. It was considered a peculiar work of merit for kings to make these tanks so that water could be stored up for the use of the people, and they are found all over Ceylon; there is one twenty miles in length!

The sun has fallen low by the time we pass on to the Brazen Palace. At first, when we near it, we see merely a forest of columns with nothing brazen about them; they are not very high, about twice the height of a man perhaps, and they are set in rows very near together. Altogether there are one thousand six hundred of them! There is no roof now, but in the days of its glory this great house, which was built for the priest, had nine, and was finished by a sheet of burnished copper which caught the sun's rays and flashed far and wide beneath the clear blue sky. The walls were decorated with glittering stones and the fittings were of the most costly and beautiful kind. The wonder is how the priests found room to walk about between those multitudinous columns which so filled the space in their halls.

One more sight in this city of ancient glory. Do you see across that park-like space of short grass some fires glimmering weirdly in the dusk which has now fallen round the most sacred object in Anuradhapura; I won't say what it is. Come nearer. A heavy scent, like that of tuberoses, greets us as we approach; it comes from the white waxy blossoms of the frangipani lying in that cardboard saucer with all the heads put outwards like the spokes of a wheel. In the centre is a pink blossom. Those flowers are sold as offerings in this sacred place. Don't stumble over that dark bundle, it is a sleeping child. Step cautiously between the bright-eyed people who watch, furtively alert, like shy woodland creatures, as they crouch low over their fires, for the evening has suddenly become chilly with the loss of the sun. These are pilgrims come from afar, and they will lie down to sleep just as they are in the open. There are very few at this time of the year; but in June and July, which are the principal months, thousands and thousands arrive here, having crossed weary leagues to come. It is strange how the world is linked up by its pilgrimages. We saw the pilgrims in the Holy Land coming from afar to the Christian shrines, humble and devout, believing all that was told them and carrying out in their poor lives much of Christ's teaching; we saw them in crowded and uncomfortable ships journeying from Mecca, the shrine of Mohammedanism; and now we see them here reverently drawn to the only sacred place they know, there to pray to something unseen and unknown, that they may be helped by a power stronger than themselves. In all ages and all races man yearns for a god, and if he knows not God he still worships dimly any strange god he hears of.

We cross some brick pavement, and climb up a few worn steps on to a platform surrounded by a railing. Out of the middle of it there grows a gnarled and ancient tree with crooked boughs splitting asunder with hardly any leaves on them.

Now do you see?

You only see monkeys looking like little black demons against the afterglow still lingering in the sky as they leap from the tall palm trees near, but this tree is not a palm.

Suddenly a leaf, shaped like that of a poplar, but much larger, floats down, and in an instant a slight dark figure, tied up in a bundle of loose clothes, falls upon it, and holding it between the palms of the hands bows again and again. That leaf is a precious relic, for this is the sacred Bo tree, said to be at least two thousand years old!

After the Cingalese had come over from India and settled here, a monk came and converted them to Buddhism; he was followed by his sister, a princess, as he was a prince, and she brought with her, so it is said, a branch of the actual tree under which Buddha sat when he considered all the problems of life and found an answer to them, which he left to his people. This branch, being planted, became a tree itself. So the story goes; and that there has been a tree here worshipped for untold ages is true, and if that is so, whatever its origin, this also to us is a sacred spot, hallowed by the thousands of poor souls who, knowing not the light, yet have come here with yearnings towards the light and to the "unknown god."

After dinner we wander out again into the tree-shaded road near, and a sight of extraordinary splendour startles us. Every tree is brilliantly illuminated as if by a million points of electric light. You have seen an arc-light which seems to scintillate rays? These lights might be very tiny arc-lights, for each one vibrates in the intensity of its luminousness. We can see the outlines of the trees clearly. It is a wonderful evening for fire-flies. No one knows why on some nights they appear like this in countless thousands, and on other nights, apparently the same, there is not one to be seen. It looks almost as if they had parties and agreed to do their best on certain occasions. They have evidently done their best for us to-night, for the other people following us out of the hotel, who have been here longer than us, are entranced.

"Never saw anything like it, not even in the West Indies," says one man.

"Puts a Christmas tree in the shade," remarks another.

Catch one, he doesn't burn; don't grab him so as to hurt him, just take him gently; that is right; bring him into the light and open your hand a little. You see he is a flat, greenish beetle, with head set on a funny hinge so that he could nod it violently if he liked. Half shut your hand and turn away from the light; now you see two round green eyes glowing like emeralds. He doesn't seem embarrassed by all this attention, but you might let him go back to his party!

When we have let him go we will walk down the avenue of living light, where is one thing more to see to-night. It is only ten minutes' walk and as we near it it gleams in the dim light of the brilliant stars, a ghostly white object. As our eyes grow accustomed to the light we see a building like a snow-white bell. It is small compared with the gigantic dagobas we have examined already to-day, for the very tip of the pinnacle, rising above the bell-shaped part, is only sixty-three feet, but it is very graceful and is considered the most sacred of all the dagobas, for it was built to enshrine Buddha's collar-bone!

We haven't seen the half of Anuradhapura yet, and there are numbers of other ancient cities in Ceylon to explore, to say nothing of rock-temples with strange paintings and carvings; but we mustn't be here too long or we shan't get through India and Burma before the hot weather comes, which no European can endure.

The white coating of this dagoba is a stuff called chunam, a kind of lime. It is startlingly white and looks beautiful at night, but otherwise it is just a sort of whitewash, clean enough but not particularly attractive. There are numbers of the same square-cut granite columns that we saw at the Brazen Temple falling about near the dagoba, some this way and some that. A good place for snakes, that is why we came round by the road and walked so carefully.

Hullo! There is one! Keep still! Did you see him wriggle across among the interlacing shadows of the trees? A large one too! Thank goodness he has gone harmlessly! I wonder what sort he was? We ought not to have come out, let us get back as quickly as we can.

CHAPTER XVII
UNWELCOME INTRUDERS

India at last!

We have come up the west coast from Ceylon and are now approaching Bombay. It is night-time, and far ahead we see a great yellow light which appears and disappears, and is visible for twenty miles out at sea. It seems to blink at us in greeting, peeping every few seconds to see if we are still there. Then at last we ride into the harbour, and such a harbour! We cannot see it now at all, and even if it were daylight we couldn't see more than a very small part of it, for it is fifteen miles one way by four or five the other, and a harbour that size cannot be taken in at one glance.

We have to sleep on board, for there are some formalities to be observed before we go ashore. There is our heavy baggage to get out of the hold, for instance, and to pass through the Customs. That can wait until to-morrow.

Our first impression of Bombay is therefore a city of lights. There are lights sprinkled about anyhow and anywhere; some in chains, some separate, some low, and some apparently slung high up in mid-air. These are on the hill above the town, which itself stands on an island.

The very first incident we notice is a ludicrous one, and I am sure we shan't forget it. A rather stout Englishman who is landing to-night steps on to the launch, and in an instant is garlanded with marigolds hung in wreaths round his neck. A crowd of native friends surrounds him. Some are in European dress, and talk a queer sort of English very fast and fluently, as if it were being pumped out of their mouths by the yard; others wear the flowing drapery of the East. Many of them carry bunches of flowers, which look more like balls, because the native habit is to strip off every atom of leaf and then pack the blossoms with all their heads together as tight as they will go. Many such balls are being pressed upon the embarrassed Englishman, and the scent of crushed marigolds fills the air. This is all by way of welcome, and it is evident that the newcomer is a prime favourite with the people. He looks sheepish, but his round rosy face rises good-humouredly above the absurd garlands.

Next morning we are up in good time, and as soon as ever we get our baggage clear of the Customs we go sight-seeing. In our nostrils is the subtle scent of India; it has something of dust in it, but is not chiefly dust, as in Egypt; there is a waft of wood-smoke, and a strong flavour of mixed spices, and some hint of sweet flowers, and many other things not so agreeable. It is a blend that any Anglo-Indian knows, and if he smelt it suddenly when he was thousands of miles away, with the daisied grass beneath his feet, and the swallows wheeling overhead, it would carry him back with a jump to a land of dark faces and burning sun and red dust, and all the vivid sights of the East.

We are not starting on our great journey across India until the evening, so we can wander at will through the broad clean streets, looking into the magnificent shops that might be in any European town, and then we can plunge into the native part, where we find narrow, busy bazaars that might belong to the Arabian Nights.

Bombay was one of the first bits of India to belong to the English. The Portuguese held it before then, and gave it to our nation as part of the dower of Catherine of Braganza, the Portuguese princess who married Charles II. You know the old saying, "trade follows the flag," and it certainly did in Bombay, for the East India Company rented the city from the king at £10 a year. The Company pushed forward all over the rest of India year by year, and it was through their steady and persistent advance in the country that the British finally occupied India – so later on the saying was reversed, and "the flag followed trade," as it more often does. But you know that story, every British boy does, the story of Clive and Hastings, and later on of the Mutiny; it is a part of English history and one of the most thrilling parts too.

Bombay is a city of trade; her immense docks receive ships of all sizes, her wharves are laden with the produce of the world, her wide streets are open to traffic of all descriptions, her public buildings are splendid, her clubs and hotels palatial. Her merchants prosper and grow rich, and build for themselves houses on Malabar Hill, the long ridge above the town, which catches the sea-breezes. At one time that ridge was looked upon as sacred to Europeans, but now the wealthy natives settle there, and there is not room for all the poorer Europeans, who have to be content with lower levels.

Stand still for a moment in this street, and look around. Here comes a motor-car, and in it lolls a hugely fat man with a yellow skin, and that crafty insolent look which marks the successful native trader; his thick neck rolls in creases above his purple brocade coat. But they are not all like this; some are thoughtful men who have given lakhs of rupees for the public good.

What a contrast! Here is one of the poorest of the poor. A bullock-cart comes along, drawn by two lean animals with their ribs sticking out. A heavy yoke passes across their necks, but otherwise they have not a scrap of harness on them. That lean man huddled up on the pole between them, clad in a few yards of rag, prods them with a pointed stick when he wants them to go this way and that. He dares not now twist their tails till he breaks them, or keep open running sores so that he may prick them in a sensitive part, as he would have done at one time, for if he did the police would be down on him.

On the side-walk there is a lady, yes, it is a lady – in very baggy green and gold trousers, with gold anklets tinkling as she walks. Her head and face are swathed in a "sari" or shawl of shot gold and purple, which only allows her heavy black eyes to appear above its folds. The street is alive with men in white; some wear long white coats buttoned down over the kind of white petticoat called a dhoti, others have the curious habit of wearing their shirts outside their trousers like a kilt, but you soon get used to this, and cease to notice it. That fellow in a tall extinguisher cap made of lamb's wool is a Persian.

In the midst of all this queer crowd, which looks like a fancy-dress ball let loose in broad daylight, run the curving steel tram-lines. There are shades of every complexion to be seen. That very fresh, pink-faced lady, who has just gone dashing by in her smart "tum-tum" or pony-cart, is at one end of the scale – she is probably newly out from home, – and that ebony-black native woman of so low a caste that she goes uncovered in the public street is at the other, but even she, poor thing, cares enough about her personal appearance to wear a gold ring through one of her nostrils!

Now we can see the long outline of Malabar Hill quite clearly, and below all its trees and gardens and the great houses rising among them, but at one part, the highest, the hill is kept for other uses. Look up into the clear blue sky overhead, do you see a black speck? Not got it yet? Wait a moment and try again. There! That is right, and there is another and another; you can't help seeing them now. Their flight is the slow heavy flight of clumsy birds. What do you suppose they are? Vultures. They live, as you know, on carrion, which is dead flesh, and the vultures of Bombay are peculiarly favoured, for they banquet on human bodies.

In this district there are a large number of Parsees or fire-worshippers, and these people have their peculiar ceremonies. Under the British Crown every man is free to carry out his own religion in his own way; persecution is unknown. The Parsees have their cemetery on the top of that high hill; it is a beautiful place, laid out in gardens, and reached by flights of steps. Only at one end are five grim towers shut in by a wall and called the Towers of Silence. Their parapets are high, and none may climb to the top except certain men set apart and dedicated for this terrible work. When a Parsee dies, his body is borne reverently and with care to the gardens on the hill, but instead of burying it in the earth, these men take it up the winding stairs of one of the towers and lay it on the roof, and then retire. The vultures do the rest! No human being has ever seen that dread spectacle, for when the men come back again about a fortnight later there are only the clean bleached bones of the skeleton to take away and lay in quicklime to be absorbed.

So the vultures hover over Bombay and sit like great images around the parapets on the Towers of Silence, knowing that they will never lack a meal!

We have seen many and bewildering things in this great city, and when at last we arrive at the station between five and six in the evening, for our first journey across this vast land, we are glad to rest. We engaged our places directly we arrived, for here, where a journey takes often nights and days, it is no use wandering in casually a few minutes before the train starts. We also engaged the whole of a compartment to ourselves, as we want a good night's sleep. It has been cleaned and prepared, and looks very comfortable when we come to claim it. There are two seats running lengthwise, the opposite way to that which they do in an English train. Above them are two more which can be let down as bunks if required, so that the carriage can accommodate four, but as we have paid extra to get it to ourselves we ought not to be disturbed.

By the way, you haven't seen any Indian money yet. This is a rupee, a large and substantial coin you see, about as big as a two-shilling piece, but it is only worth one and fourpence; fifteen of them go to the pound. An anna is a penny, and that little coin like a threepenny bit is a two-anna bit.

We have had to hire a native boy to travel with us and look after the luggage, as it is difficult to do without one in India. All servants are called "boys" here, even if they are grey-headed; our man is probably about five-and-twenty. He is called Ramaswamy, and has a chocolate-coloured moon-face with big round eyes; I think he is intelligent though he looks stupid. He is dressed in spotless white, his garments consisting of a short jacket and a dhoti, and he wears a large round turban on his head, and a pair of neat little gold ear-rings in his ears. It is a very difficult thing to get a really trustworthy boy, but the Madrassees are the best, and Ramaswamy comes from the Madras country far south; he has been in service with a man I know for two years, and as he is only lent to us for this trip he will probably behave himself. He is piling up our bedding in a corner of the carriage, and later on when the train stops at a station for a few minutes he will come to spread it out. It seems funny to have to carry bedding with us on a journey, but it is very necessary here. We have pillows and rugs and a couple of rezai each. These are rather like eider-down quilts, but are stuffed with cotton instead of down, so they are heavier, and very comfortable they are to lie upon when doubled up.

You remarked on the amount of luggage we seem to be taking in the carriage, it is a simple nothing to what is the custom here; look at all that being piled into the next compartment! Besides masses of bedding there is a deck-chair, a typewriter, a case for a topee, or helmet, a gun-case, two portmanteaus, and a box of books, as well as a lunch-basket. The owner, a pleasant-looking, sun-browned Englishman, stands by giving orders to his native servants in Hindustanee, which is a language spoken by the English people to the natives and understood pretty nearly everywhere. That man is almost certainly what is here known as a "civilian," that is to say, one of the men in the Indian Civil Service who govern India. They have to pass stiff examinations at home, and then come out here for a number of years to do all the work of government, being magistrates, judges, rulers, and general protectors of the native, giving up their lives to the country, and dealing out justice to all men. Some men have not the habit of command, but if it is in them at all it comes out here, where one white man alone in a district running to hundreds of miles often has everything in his own hands; he has to make decisions in an instant of emergency, and stand by them, compel evildoers to behave, save the miserable low-caste natives, ground down by those above them, and often to hold his life in his hand for fear of the knife or bullet of a fanatic.

A little farther up the platform there is a gorgeous group, of which the central figure is a fine tall man, slenderly built, with a clear proud face. He is dressed in marvellous silks which shimmer and flash in the late afternoon sunlight. His upper garment is deep rich rose, and the lower one a medley of greens and gold. Watch the flashing of that great jewel which fastens the aigrette in his turban; it is probably worth anywhere about three thousand pounds. That man is a native prince, and those very splendid gentlemen in purple and yellow silk are seeing him off. There are many of these native rulers or maharajahs in India, and they keep up the state of royalty and are treated with respect. So long as they rule their people wisely the British Government does not interfere with them.