The trip from Japan to the Canal is interesting enough the first time, but thereafter it becomes a bit monotonous. Hongkong, Singapore, Penang and the ports were all old stories to me. The _Princess Alice_ sighted the palm-skirted coast of Ceylon twenty-two days later. I was desperately bored with the German boat. I was bound for Russia. Everybody went by the Canal. I had been that way myself less than a year before. I had a new idea. “Morris,” I said, as we slipped behind the breakwater at Colombo one glorious November afternoon, “I have a scheme. Pack up chop-chop. We are going to abandon this boat to-day. From Colombo we will cross over to India, take the train to Bombay, go up the Persian Gulf to Bunder Abbas, or one of those places, get some horses, camels, or whatever they use there, and cross Persia to Teheran. From there we can hit the Caucasus from the Caspian Sea.” Morris was delighted and turned on the conversation and began packing on the spot. He was filled with delight at the idea of an 800-mile ride across the mountains of Persia. “It may be bad there,” I told him. “They say the mountains are filled with bandits.” I paused to watch the effect, and then asked Morris, “Are you a good shot?” He stopped packing, and his eyes snapped as he drew himself up with pride and said: “You just give me a ‘Martini’ or a ‘Kraig,’ and I can wing a man at 200 yards just as fast as they can get up,” and he grinned from ear to ear. An hour later we landed in Ceylon. There are many beautiful places in the world, and there are a great many places that are strange and quaint to the foreigner who sees them for the first time, but the beautiful island that has Colombo for its capital has the rest of the spots in the position of feeble competitors, at least, that was the way it looked to me. Apparently Ceylon has long been ranked as A-1 on its personal charm, for even the person who wrote that old familiar hymn, which treats briefly of various places, “From Greenland’s Icy Mountains to India’s Coral Strands,” gave the palm to Ceylon, where even he admitted “Every prospect pleases and only man is vile.” That is Ceylon all right as far as the pleasing prospect is concerned, but the citizens of the place impressed me in a very hospitable and kindly light, despite the disparaging comment of the hymn writer. It is true that they are somewhat active in the pursuit of business, and are chronic beggars, but otherwise it is hard to see how they are any worse than anybody else. However, they may have changed since his day. The harbor of Colombo isn’t a very good harbor, and were it not for the protection of the breakwater, it would be absolutely untenable in the spring and summer, when the hot monsoon blows up from the sun-scorched African coast, and piles up the great breakers in clouds of foam and spray against the stone masonry. This breakwater is thrown across the harbor neck to guard the ships at anchor from the stormy seas that lash without.