At the end of the voyage, we had our first and last real difficulty with the palanquin-bearers during thirty years. After eating all I had provided for them, they coolly told me that as their companions (who were to carry our friends to their destination--a few miles from where we landed) were not going on to Vònizòngo, they declined to keep to their contract and take us there, and demanded prepayment for carrying the _empty_ palanquins from Antanànarìvo. As I refused to accede to their preposterous demands, they took advantage of my absence when seeing after my wood, to set off on their return to the capital, carrying off my palanquin, which they had, however, to return a fortnight later with a humble apology. The leader of this conspiracy I had to encounter and conquer, on our way to the coast in 1879, after which we were good friends. Fortunately I had sent to Fìhàonana for eight men to meet us, in case porters enough from the capital, willing to go to Vònizòngo, were not to be had. These men had to carry my wife, two children, and the nurse twenty miles. I had to tramp on foot. Four men carried our eldest child and the nurse, took them across the streams and swamps, and then returned for me. Our good friend Mr. Cameron, who was making a trip to Vònizòngo in the interests of geography to take bearings for a map of Madagascar, kindly let my wife have two of his eight bearers, and thus they reached Fìhàonana by sunset, but we did not arrive until nearly ten o’clock; still our reception was well worth all the trouble we had experienced. On the arrival of my wife and Mr. Cameron at Fìhàonana, they told of the plight in which we had been left. Razàka and the young chief called the men of the village together, and told them how we were placed, and they volunteered to come and meet us, with a supply of torches made of dried grass to light them on their way. We saw the flaring light on the hills miles in front of us, and could not understand what the moving mass of fire marching towards us meant until we came within shouting distance. We were carried into Fìhàonana in right royal style, amid the blaze of torches and the shoutings of the people. The whole village had turned out, and the shouting, hurrahing, and joyous yelling, with the singing and hand-clapping of the women and children with which we were welcomed, was a thing never to be forgotten.