Amid all the charms of this interesting, palm-embowered route between Colombo and Galle, there are some serious drawbacks to be encountered, which as a faithful chronicler the author must not forget to mention. All mundane enjoyments are qualified. One meets inevitably with an aggressive army of beetles, ants, land leeches, dragon-flies, cock-chafers, locusts, wasps, ticks, and vicious spiders, these last endowed with an immense superfluity of hairy legs, while the omnipresent and persistent mosquito exhibits unwonted activity. Indeed, ants, mosquitoes, and sand-flies literally feast upon the wayfarer, until the entire surface of his face and limbs becomes excoriated. How the natives with their exposed bodies exist under such circumstances is a mystery. The redundancy of insect and reptile life is wonderful in equatorial regions, but as regards the mosquito, where is this pest not encountered? The author has met and suffered from them at the far north on the very glaciers of Alaska during the short summer months, and in the extreme south near the Antarctic Circle, in the East and in the West, on sea and on land. Of course they are perennial here like the foliage, and viciously tormenting.
We often heard stories of fatal bites from scorpions, centipedes, cobras, and other reptiles, but our own experience goes to show that they are naturally inclined to avoid human beings. It is true that repulsive insects and reptiles are to be looked out for. One is careful to examine his shoes before putting them on in the morning, and to take a few precautions of that sort. Cleanly houses do not harbor them, though they do sometimes annoy the traveler in the public rest-houses where he is often compelled to pass the night.
In the thickly wooded districts, the ants' nests are pyramidal in form, and five feet high, being constructed with even more uniformity than human hands could produce. Inside, they are divided into broad passageways, square halls, and store-rooms, to produce which divisions, so as to make them both accessible and convenient for the purpose designed, requires mental calculation, the possession of which we hardly accord to insects. Mere instinct could not insure such results as are here exhibited. Ants, like bees, live in thoroughly organized communities, and are found by naturalists to be divided into laborers, soldiers, and food providers, all presided over by a recognized chief in authority. On a warm, dry morning, any attentive observer may see the white ants in the neighborhood of their hills bringing out their eggs to warm them in the direct rays of the sun. In proper time, before the dew falls, they are carefully returned to their original place of deposit. The natives understand that there will be no rain when the instinct--or reason if you will--of these minute creatures leads them to expose their eggs to the influence of the sun's rays. As barometers, these little insects surpass the most accurate instrument which human intelligence can construct.