My companions on this journey were the late Rev. Dr Mullens, then Foreign Secretary of the London Missionary Society, and the late Rev. John Pillans, one of the directors of the same society, and most pleasant and genial companions they were. Dr Mullens was very fond of a joke and enjoyed recalling humorous passages from Dickens or from _Punch_; he was also a born geographer and had a wonderful eye for the beautiful and the picturesque in scenery. Mr Pillans was a graver man, but one of solid worth and good judgment; and in the tent which we carried with us we three had many a happy evening together. Like all journeys made in those days, this one was performed in the _filanjàna_ or light palanquin; and not only did Dr Mullens, with an azimuth compass, take angles and bearings for the map, but he also took a number of photographs all along our route. I had with me a good theodolite, so that we were able to compare and check each other’s observations. A few words may be said here about the position of the Antsihànaka province. Repeated reference has been already made in this book to the double belt of forest which runs for several hundred miles along the eastern side of Madagascar. A glance at a physical map of the island will show that, at about the seventeenth parallel of south latitude, this double line unites into one broader belt, becoming very wide west of Antongil Bay. It is the open country south of the junction of the two forests that forms the home of the Sihànaka tribe. This valley or plain, for it is enclosed on each side by forest-covered ranges of hills, is about thirty miles across; it is perfectly level, and the greater portion of it is marsh; and at the north-eastern corner of the marsh is a fine lake called Alaotra, which communicates with the sea by the river Màningòry. It seems probable that the people came up from the coast by the valley of this river, and then settled on the edges of the plain, as their villages are most numerous around the north-eastern bay of the lake; while there is a large tract of fertile country to the south of them which is almost entirely without inhabitants. The name of the people is no doubt derived from the character of the country they inhabit, for the verb _mihànaka_ means to spread out as a liquid, as ink on blotting-paper, for instance. _Hànaka_ is also used as a synonym for the words meaning lake, pool, etc. Until about the commencement of the past century the Sihànaka were independent of any external authority, but at that period they were conquered by the Hova, although not without a severe struggle. After that they quietly submitted to the central government, and until the French conquest (1895) their two chief towns were garrisoned by Hova officers and soldiers, as at the time of our visit. No European missionary had then lived in Antsihànaka, and the congregations and schools we saw, wherever we went, were largely the result of the work of a Hova