The scenery on the Chelka Lake, a piece of water some forty miles long by from ten to twenty in breadth, is very similar to the above, if you substitute water for the level plain of the rice-fields. Here the hills rise abruptly from the lake, and many of them are quite inaccessible. The islands are inhabited by animals, but not by man; and it is rather curious that each islet appears to have its own peculiar race. Thus, one is inhabited by the beautiful spotted deer, another by the enormous Indian elk, another by goats and fowls (this one is sacred to the goddess Khalee), another by wild pigs, and another by pigeons. With some difficulty I landed on one of the pigeon islands: its greatest height did not exceed thirty feet, and in circumference it may have been near a quarter of a mile; but its structure was most extraordinary. It was composed entirely of enormous masses of rock piled together without the appearance of order or arrangement: it appeared as if some earthquake had destroyed some giant dwelling-place, and left the ruins in one vast heap. Some of the stones, larger than a man's body, had fallen upon one end; they gave way beneath my foot, but returned to their position as soon as relieved of the extra weight which had destroyed the balance. The blue pigeons rose in clouds from every crevice, and fluttered about until I left the neighbourhood of their nests. The lake lay all around--so calm, so beautiful, with the green mountains rising here and there from its surface, dotted all over with myriads of ducks, geese, teal, and many other aquatic birds: and this reminded me of one thing which I should have related before. As we approached the shores of the lake we were surprised to see a long line of tall white and red creatures standing just within the water. We looked at them through Mr. G.'s glass, and found that they were birds; we got out of our tonjons, crept towards them with loaded guns, fired, and missed them, when they all rose and flew away. The next morning Mr. G. and I returned to the spot: we each took a separate boat, as Mrs. Acland was not with us; mine, like the others, was about thirty feet long, and formed of a single piece of wood, a tree scooped out. Mr. G. was very anxious to obtain some game, and in the course of about two hours shot a couple of large bare-headed geese and nineteen ducks of various sorts; indeed, they sat in such masses on the water as to resemble rather a low wall than a number of birds. At one shot he killed five ducks, and I three: I did not care much about them, but I was anxious to see again some of my friends of the previous evening.