A VISIT TO CEYLON AND INDIA.

Otago Witness, Issue 2664, 5 April 1905, Page 80

A VISIT TO CEYLON AND INDIA.

IMPRESSIONS OF A WELL KNOWN

DUNEDINITE,

I reached Colombo, in Ceylon, on the ?Jth inst., and put up at the Oriental Hotel, a central position. I found Colombo hot, almost unbearable. After- lunch I drove to Jdount Lavinia, seven miles out, over a Jpery good' road. On each side there are plantations of ooeoanuts, bananas, jak fruit, plantains, mangoes, and other tropical Jruits; with plants and flowering shrubs of Remarkable brilliance and beauty. The tocoanut palms carry three sorts — king, queen, and ordinary. The king is the best, the husk being of a reddish orange ; queen, yellow and ordinary, mostly green. The nuts are now ripe, and natives are busily (collecting 'the "fruit." Along tHis beautiful Urive for a good portion of the way the jaatives have their shops or bazaars, well Wracked.,- withHihe country's productions. In although there are many British and European merchants with large' warehouses doing profitable business, the desire in" all cases seing expressed to make the most they can. ; >n the shortest possible time, and clear out. [t is hot all the -year around in Colombo, iritlr very little change of temperature. You jnust v clothe- in the .thinnest .possible garments.; still, it is necessary to .wear woollen or\ flannel- as underclothing. " The native men simply wear a loin icloth ; the women, j&ndure a shade more to cover their lithe jand graceful figures. The amount of work done by these men and women — the loads jfchey carry and the pace they go at in .this humid ~ stifling atmosphere is -astonishing. *RieC rickshaw- men put'- horses" out of it as stayers. I-did very little rickshaw riding, not being accustomed to drive the human animal in_this fashion. It was, however, purely sentiment. Sitting, in the rickshaw, with an umbrella over my head as a sunshade, the perspiration ran down over me from head to foot in a continuous flow. My rickshaw man7""although accustomed to the climate and th© work, was a tropical tehower.- To see the outflow coursing down hia flexible body was to me nothing short tofl'a treat, and I gave up rickshaw riding. Skill, these men like the work, and pull Jrou with, evident pleasure for the sum of two or ■ three rupees per day, the present Value of the rupee being Is +d in English money. It is also a sight to see the boys and girls running alongside of the rick■jßhaw man ; or, if you are in a carriage, now they keep up for long distances, imploring you, with ready tongue, sparkling eyes, and laughing faces, to throw them a coin, and, if they fail to draw, simply say " Good-bye, father, or master," and hope lor better luck in the next comer. These children are the most delightful little souls Imaginable — no stiff garments or boots or shoes to hamper their- movements, they scamper along, like bits of bounding indiafcubber. On the road to Mount Lavinia I faalied to visit»EHE PRINGIPAL BUDDHIST TEMPLE, I»id to te about 1200 years old, in which fcbey have images of Buddha from eight years old onward. Over the Vails of this temple arei pictures showing the" progressive stage 3 after bodily death from earth to (blissful life. These people all believe in transmigration and reincarnation : What you cow are, may be something different, 4to .what you may have been, or again may be. They will not destroy animal or other life. 'A Buddhist would not trample on a snake for fear of doing an injury to a possible ancestor, and this care, in respect to a possible predecessor, prompts in them tfee nope that if they should, unfortunately, drift backward- that they may also "be 'treated by- those to come with the same oourteous consideration and kindness. Th© imeges of Buddha are all alike. One would expect to find in the face and form of a God a tiling of loveliness and perfect beauty. You do not get this, however, and which strikes you as a marked defect may have arisen through, the incompetence of the first artist. You are always shown a broadfaced, pug-nosed god, which is disappointing. In the Buddhist temple referred to the pictures are all of human beings passing to the realms of bliss, where Buddha is enthroned. The guide of the temple explains to you the meanings of these pictures, and you are also introduced to the fcigh priest. The first pictures show a group on the upward march. In the next you find that two faces which, were in the first group are missing. They have been guilty of sOKie indiscretion, and ra the ,third picture you see the faces of the missing ones brought down again to a lovver jplane ; and so you follow on, and notice ;fchat the remaining number in the first picture are steadily advancing in the upward journey. Alas, however, in the next scene you miss some of these, but find them in the next illustration hurled back to near the starting platform, to recommence their pilgrimage to the skies. The way of trans-

gressors, apparently, is as hard with Buddhists as with other sinners. Patience, meekness, and long suffering, with abiding fortitude and determination to be good and keep good., are the qualifications necessary to reach the Buddhist's heaven. Buddhists, Mahommedans, or Brahmins only worship one God, and they will soon convince you of their eternal love for their divinity. Millions have died in this implanted belief; millions will follow in the same unchanging faith. There cannot be a doubt about their sincerity. White residents with whom I have conversed emphatically state that in their religious and other duties Europeans might copy them with advantage.