The Wichita daily eagle. [volume] (Wichita, Kan.) 1890-1906, 1890-11-12
Especial Correspondence.I

ers in Unknown Lands Of the Present
Day.
Especial Correspondencel
New YORK, Oct. 3O.-Few places are
better worth lnowiug-aad therefore,
of course, few are less known-than
those strange little hermitages of the
Indian ocean marked on our maps as the
Laccadive and Maldive islands. The
channel which passes between the two
groups forms a kind Of marine Broad
way, through which vessels of all ma
tons pass by hundreds and thousands
every year. The four chief islands of
the Laccadive archipelago (the name of
which signifies 100000 islands'0 viz:
Ameni, Kardmut. Hilton and Chitlac,
have actually belonged TO England since
1893, and the others are claimed by the
Rance or Beebee Of Cannanore "a Hindoo
princess under British protection, while
the Maldive group las large trade with
the west coast of India itself. But l
have never met, even among travellers,
one man who had ever landed on these
islands. or seemed to know or care any,
thing about them.
And yet both groups are well worth
seeing, more especially the Maldives,
which are somewhat the more civilized
of the two. The nineteen "atolls" or
coral groups are all on the same pattern,
viz, circular reef Of white coral. in
closing smooth, shallow lagoon stud
ded with tiny palm crested islets. Some
Of these rise barely six feet above the
surface, while many others are actually
"awash," so that a ship may run her
bow aground on them with 100 fathoms
of water beneath her stern. In fact. the
Maldive atolls are best described bv
imagining a submerged group of ex-
tinct volcanoes, pure white instead of
black, with their craters just above the
sea, and few islands floating in them
like tn leaves in emp.
When the novelists Of the future have
exhausted the whole world as now exist
ing, they can still avail themselves Of
some new islet created by the unseen
labors Of the coral insect. Month after
month, year after year, the tiny mason
builds UP his wall of stony flowers and
leaves from the unknown depths below
till it reaches the surface of the sea.
Beyond this he cannot go, but other in
huences are at hand to complete his
work. Every wave, every storm casts
something upon the new foundation.
Simple moses and hchens grow and die,
gradually spreading over the bare coral
an ever growing layer of vegetable soil.
Cocoa nuts stranded on it by the sea and
seeds let fall by passing birds strike
root In the soil thus prepared and the
once bare and nameless reef takes rank
among the islands of the world.
Here, even more fully than in the now
hackneyed islands of the Pacific, one
may realize Isnnyson's visions of the
summer isles of Eden" The inventive
African savage who provided himself at
one stroke with clothes, food and shelter
by clapping on his head the upper half
of a giant watermelon, sitting in the
lower half and eating the inside, is sur
passed in his own line by the average
Maldivian citizen. You find ripe fruit
showering down upon you from the trees,
edible roots starting up under your feet,
fish literally "shouldherin' aich other
ont Of the wather, like the Irish salmon,
and warm baths ready at all hours" in
the clear, bright, CLASSY waters of the
lagoon.
When the coming of Sunday or some
great public festival reminds you TO put
on some clothes for once In a way, a
mat of twisted palm fiber will equip you
in the height OF NIaldivian fashion and
save you from the vulgar ostentation of
a cotton or calico waistcloth. You will
find no difficulty in securing a country
villa consisting of four poles and mat,
admirably ventilated, and liable only to
the inconvenience of being sometimes
absent without leave when you come
back to it after high wind.
Here you may be happy, for mosqui-
toes there are none, the only ones ever
known on the island having been due to
the vengeance OF an American skipper,
who left on an islet with whose people
he had quarreled cask of half stagnant
water, which speedily produced mos
quitoes enough TO make it hot for the
whole of the offending community. Now
and then, indeed, you may find colony
of lively ants having a picnic in your
hammock, or big, spotted snake liter
ally dropping in upon you" from the
palm leaf thatch overhead. But in the
main you viii be far snugger there than
in many hotels which l have seen in
Malacca or Sumatra, where the floors
are only washed when the river rises,
and the tablecloth is changed once a
year-on the landlords birthday.
When you feel disposed to call on your
next door neighbor-i. e., the inhabitant |
of the nearest islet-you are pretty safe |
10 find him lat home, unless he should |
happen to be out fishing, and even then |
you can generally descry him somewhere |
in the ofing and signal to him TO come |
back. And then, if you have a spare |
knife or Ratchet TO barter for his fresh |
fish. you may combine business with |
pleasure by doing little private trad
ing while improving your acquaintance |
with the Msldhian dialect, which Is
most perplexingly different from the Ian
guages of Ceylon and the Indian main |
land and indeed from every other Ian
guage that you have ever learned.
When the storms Of the rainy season |
come on you can amuse yourself by sit /
ting indoors and watching the ship
wrecks, and when the time comes for the
yearly doTa.fure Of the trading feet to
hA tf.1.1 &c L.