James Sibree

“ We are highly favoured in having sunsets of wonderful beauty; the western sky burns with molten gold, orange and crimson; and as the sun nears the horizon, the ruddy landscape to the east is lighted up more and more intensely every moment with glowing colour, the natural hue of the soil being heightened by the horizontal rays; the distant lines of hill, range after range, are bathed in every shade of purple light, and the long lines of red clay walls glow like vermilion in the setting sunshine. ”

“ For an hour or two we saw little except for a few yards around us; but as the sun rose the fog rolled up like a vast curtain, revealing the line of the Ifòdy and Angàvo hills straight before us; the slopes were partly covered with trees, but a good deal of their surface was brown and bare. In the deepest of the many valleys which cut the surface of the Ankay plain runs a beautiful and rapid river, the Mangòro, about one hundred and fifty feet wide where we crossed it in canoes. ”

“ Ah, just so, bird, would that I also were a bird and could fly, that I might go yonder at the top of the high tree to look over and see father and mother, lest they should be dead, lest they should be ill; long have we been separated; for we are held in bondage by the people, and they are persecuted with gun and spear. ”

“ There is little foliage to be seen except on the top of some of the hills where the ancient towns and villages are built, and in such places a circle of old àviàvy trees and an occasional amòntana tree give a pleasant relief to the prevailing red and ochre tints of the soil, and, in the cold and dry season, to the russet and grey hues of the dry grass on the bare hills and downs. ”

“ All the hairs of the head cannot bind death, and tears cannot hold him; therefore give up the dead, for the earth is the forsaking-place of the beloved ones, the dwelling of the living, the home when dead. ”

“ Looking about in the undergrowth for wild flowers and fruit, and happening to rub against the stem of one of the bushes, a small rough roundish ball falls off on to the ground; this appears exactly like a bit of round wrinkled bark, but on watching for a minute or two, it develops four pairs of legs, and runs nimbly away under cover, revealing itself as a spider, with a marvellous protective resemblance to its surroundings. Unless the creature actually moves, it is impossible to detect it, it is so exactly like a knobby bit of the brown bark. ”

“ But here the grass is in its glory on the great hills. Burnt year after year by long sweeping fires, it springs up again with a profusion which clasps huge rocks within its soft embrace. Here it is short but strong; there it rises in vast tufts, each of which contains many thousand blades and covers many feet of ground; and yet again it spreads over vast patches of country in thick, tall masses, which tower above men’s heads, open their tinted blades to the warm sun, and wave their myriads of golden feathers in the summer winds. ”

“ It is universally recognised as the privilege of all to give admonition to others, even to those highest in rank, if it is administered in the form of advice or anatra. There are a great many references to animals in these admonitions; almost every bird known to the Malagasy is used as a simile, and its habits are described with great accuracy; so that a complete collection of all the references to the animal life of Madagascar found in the proverbs and fables would throw no little light upon the fauna of the island. ”

“ In many places the rain had made a perfect slough of thick mud, and our men had hard work to get through. I could not cease to wonder how my heavy luggage was brought along. For a considerable distance our way lay along a most romantic-looking stream, whose course was broken by great masses and shelves of rock, reminding me of Welsh river scenery. Often in the higher parts of the road, where the rivers down in the gorges were hidden by the dense masses of wood, we could hear the roar of waters in the otherwise profound stillness of the forest. ”

“ It rapidly approaches nearer and nearer, the clouds touching the lower hills, then down darts the forked lightning, followed by the roar of the thunder, and presently a wild rush of wind, as if it came from all quarters at once, tells us that the storm is upon us, and then comes the rain, in big heavy drops for a few seconds and soon in torrents, as if the sluice-gates of the clouds were opened. ”

“ Some of the people doubtless think that you are a kind of sorcerer. For these dried plants—whatever can you do with them? You cannot eat them. You cannot make them into broth. You cannot plant them, for they are dead. You cannot form them in bouquets or wreaths, for they are brown and withered. Is it surprising, then, if some of the natives think that you are dabbling in the black art, and that your plants, in the shape of some strange and mysterious decoction, are to supply, it may be, a potent rain-medicine, or a love-philtre, or a disease-preventing physic? ”

“ Take a fair-sized map of Madagascar, and we see that it rises like some huge sea-monster from the waters of the Indian Ocean; or, to use another comparison, how its outline is very like the sole—the left-hand one—of a human foot. As we usually look at the island in connection with a map of Africa, it appears as a mere appendage to the great “Dark Continent” ”

“ Surely of all the millions of beautiful things in this beautiful world, palms are among the most lovely, and the fan-palm not least among this glorious family of trees. It was a perpetual delight to the eye to watch them as we swept rapidly by the banks with the strong current, as one by one they passed by as in a panorama. But for mosquitoes, certainly parts of the tropics are earthly Edens. These palms are called Sàtranabé, and are much used by the western peoples in building their huts. A smaller species, called Sàtramira, is also employed in manufacturing mats and baskets. ”

“ I confess that I am one of those who take much more delight in silently watching the birds and their pretty ways in some quiet nook in the woods, than in shooting them to add a specimen to a museum; and that I feel somewhat of a pang in catching even a butterfly, and would much rather observe its lovely colours in life, as it unfolds them to the sunshine, than study it impaled on a pin in a cabinet. ”

“ Nature is arousing from the inaction of the cold season, and the few trees now flowering give promise of the coming spring. And so, from year to year, every month brings some fresh interest in tree and flower, in bird and insect, in the employments of the people, and in the changing aspects of the sky by day and in the starry heavens by night. ”

“ We have indeed no big game in Madagascar. The most dangerous sport in its woods is hunting the wild boar; the largest carnivore to be met with is the fierce little fòsa, and the crocodile is the most dangerous reptile.
But I ask the courteous reader to wander with me into the wonderful and mysterious forests, and to observe the gentle lemurs in their home, as they leap from tree to tree, or take refuge in the thickets of bamboo; to come out in the dusk and watch the aye-aye as he stealthily glides along the branches, obtaining his insect food under the bark of the trees ”

“ Nor could any team take a vehicle up and down some of the tremendous gorges, by tracks which sometimes wind like a corkscrew [28] amidst rocks and twisted roots of trees, sometimes climb broad surfaces of slippery basalt, where a false step would send bearers and palanquin together into steep ravines far below, and again are lost in sloughs of adhesive clay, in which the bearers at times sink to the waist, and when the traveller has to leap from the back of one man to another to reach firm standing-ground. ”

“ The beautiful creatures will come and alight all around us, if we only remain perfectly still, seeking their food as they hop on the ground, or flutter from branch to branch. We may watch their nests and see their eggs, and then the newly fledged birds, noting from day to day how they develop; until one morning the nest is empty, for its little inmates have found out their power of wing, and have left it to set up for themselves and add another little company to the tenants of the forests. ”

“ High over all the other trees shot up the tall trunks of many varieties of palms, with their graceful crowns of feathery leaves. A dense undergrowth of shrubs, tree-ferns, and dwarf palms made in many places quite a green twilight; while overhead the branches were interlaced and bound together by countless creeping and climbing plants, whose rope-like tendrils crossed in all directions and made a labyrinth which it was impossible to pass through. Occasionally we came across large trees in flower, giving a glorious mass of colour. With these exceptions, however, flowers were comparatively few ”

“ For these one must go to the temperate zones; foliage, overpowering in its luxuriance and endless variety, is indeed to be found in the tropics, but not the large extent of colour given by heather, buttercups, primroses, or a field of poppies in England.
The orchids, however, were very abundant. Wherever a fallen tree hung across the path, there they found a lodging-place, and beautified the decaying trunks with their exquisite waxy flowers of pink and white. ”

“ Some large wooden spoons with tin ornaments on the handles reminded me of those made by the Bétsiléo. Bananas, very large and fine, seemed the most plentiful fruit; sugar-cane grows to a great size, ten to twelve feet high; and from what we saw all round Antsihànaka it appeared a most fertile district, with rich alluvial soil; were the whole marsh drained and brought under cultivation, as the marshy plain to the west and north-west of the capital has been, it would support a population many times greater than that which inhabits Imèrina. ”

“ Here, after a year’s strenuous work in college, or school, or church, or in literary labour, or in something of them all, it is a pleasant and healthful change to come for two or three weeks to the quiet and restful influences of the beautiful woods, with their wealth of vegetable life, and with much to interest in the animal life of bird and insect. ”

“ While staying near the forest I was several times struck by the curious formation of the wings of one of the smaller species of butterfly. The insect in question is of plain inconspicuous colouring, chiefly shades of brown, and when at rest sits with the wings erect. The noticeable point is that there are several strongly marked and dark-tinted processes from the hinder part of the wings, which resemble the head, eyes and antennæ of a butterfly, so that when at rest it is very difficult to say which is the head and which is the tail of the insect. ”

“ Our journeys will mostly be taken by the old-fashioned native conveyance, the filanjàna or light palanquin, carried by four stout and trusty native bearers. We shall thus not be whirled through the most interesting portion of our route, catching only a momentary glimpse of many a beautiful scene. We can get down and walk, whenever we like, to observe bird or beast or insect, to gather flower or fern or lichen or moss, or to take a rock specimen, things utterly impracticable either by railway or motor car, and not very easy to do in any wheeled conveyance. ”

“ The keen cold winds and drizzly showers of the past few weeks give place to warmer air and clearer skies, and although usually there is but little rain during September, the deciduous trees begin to put forth their leaves, and flower-buds appear as heralds of the fuller display of vegetable life which will be seen after the rains have fallen. ”

“ One cannot go far, however, without having to go down steep descents and again having a stiff climb; but the variety of leafage, the frequent occurrence of some beautiful flower or bright-coloured berry or fruit, or gay insect makes a walk full of interest; and when we reach a high point there are extensive views over the undulating masses of green foliage of very varied tints around one, and the bare Ankay plain, with the distant lower forest, twenty or thirty miles away, and fading into the distance north and south. ”