Once on board, we lost no time in making sail, and by eleven o'clock had reached the other side, which is the northern coast of the island--Jaffna being, properly speaking, an island. The sun was now extremely hot, so we rode only a mile to a dilapidated old fort, and then breakfasted; after which we set to arranging all things for our expedition. Here the coolies were curiously deceived, by insisting on carrying the smallest loads, which contained our guns and ammunition, misjudging their weight by their size. After a good deal of talking, without which nothing Oriental can be achieved, we again got our party under-weigh, and proceeded due south, toward the village of Maniacolom, which was to be head-quarters for our first day's sport. The country through which we passed was a flat sandy plain, covered with low jungly brushwood, with occasional creeks and hollows, where the ancient tanks (whose builders are unknown) had once made fertile this now barren waste. No cultivation--no inhabitants; but every now and then a herd of deer, or a timid hare would dart away far ahead, disturbed by our noisy followers, or the uncouth cry of the tank-birds, break the monotony of the march. It was already dark when we made out the round roof of the village of Maniacolom, with its sugar-loaf ricks of paddy-straw, peeping above the stockade which incloses its area. The houses are built something in the fashion in which Catlin describes those of the now extinct Mandans. A hole is sunk in the ground, and a pole fixed in the centre, to which the rafters that support the roof are tied. In these small huts, perhaps only fifteen feet in diameter, whole families live together; but the climate is so fine, that few care to sleep in their houses--preferring the peelas or verandas to their smoky room. I am sorry to say our appearance was not by any means hailed by the natives with cordiality--perhaps a ripple of the severities of August, 1848, had reached their quiet spot, and the minds of its inhabitants may still have been filled with dread of the merciless aim of our riflemen.