The whole of this
country was dense chenar jungle; we therefore pushed on, and, after a
ride of fourteen miles, we arrived at the Rhatamahatmeya's residence at
Doolana. He insisted upon our taking breakfast with him, and he
accordingly commenced his preparations. Borrowing one of our
hunting-knives, two of his men gave chase to a kid and cut its head off.
Half an hour afterwards we were eating it in various forms, all of which
were excellent.
We had thus travelled over forty-four miles of country from Minneria
without killing a single head of game. Had we remained a week in the
district through which we had passed so rapidly, we must have had most
excellent sport. All this was the effect of being hurried for time.
In the neighbourhood of Doolana I had killed many elephants some years
ago, and I have no doubt we could have had good sport at this time; but
V. Baker's leave was so fast expiring, and the natives' accounts of the
distance through the Veddah country were so vague, that we had no choice
except to push straight through as fast as we could travel, until we
should arrive on the Batticaloa path.
We took leave of our friend the Rhatamahatmeya; he had provided us with
good trackers, who were to accompany us through the Veddah country to
the 'Park'; but I now began to have my doubts as to their knowledge of
the ground. However, we started, and after skirting the Doolana tank for
some distance, we rode five miles through fine forest, and then arrived
on the banks of the Mahawelle river. The stream teas at this time very
rapid, and was a quarter of a mile in width, rolling along between its
steep banks through a forest of magnificent trees. Some hours were
consumed in transporting the coolies and baggage across the river, as
the canoe belonging to the village of Monampitya, on the opposite bank,
would only hold four coolies and their loads at one voyage.
We swam the horses across, and attending carefully to the safety of the
cook before any other individual, we breakfasted on the opposite bank,
while the coolies were crossing the river.
After breakfast, a grave question arose, viz., which way were we to go?
The trackers that the headman had given us, now confessed that they did
not know an inch of the Veddah country, into which we had arrived by
crossing the river, and they refused to go a step farther. Here, was a
'regular fix!' as the Americans would express it.
The village of Monampitya consists of about six small huts; and we now
found that there was no other village within forty miles in the
direction that we wished to steer.
