Then we went a little further, and, in a small wooden house, under the cocoa trees, at last found some of the little humming birds for which the Malay Archipelago is famous.  They glisten with a marvellous metallic lustre all over their bodies, instead of only in patches, as one sees upon those in South America and the West Indies.  The drive was intensely tropical in character, until we reached the waterfall, where we left the carriage and got into chairs, each carried by six coolies.  The scenery all about the waterfall is lovely, and a large stream of sparkling, cool, clear water tumbling over the rocks was most refreshing to look at.  Many people who have business in Penang live up here, riding up and down morning and evening, for the sake of the cool, refreshing night air.  One of the most curious things in vegetation which strikes our English eyes is the extraordinary abundance of the sensitive plant.  It is interwoven with all the grass, and grows thickly in all the hedgerows.  In the neatly kept turf, round the Government bungalow, its long, creeping, prickly stems, acacia-like leaves, and little fluffy mauve balls of flowers are so numerous, that, walking up and down the croquet lawn, it appears to be bowing before you, for the delicate plants are sensible of even an approaching footstep, and shut up and hide their tiny leaves among the grass long before you really reach them.

From the top of the hill you can see ninety miles in the clear atmosphere, far away across the Straits of Perak to the mainland.  We could not stay long, and were carried down the hill backwards, as our bearers were afraid of our tumbling out of the chairs if we travelled forwards.  The tropical vegetation is even more striking here, but, alas! it is already losing its novelty to us.  Those were indeed pleasant days when everything was new and strange; it seems now almost as if years, not months, had gone past since we first entered these latitudes.  We found the carriage waiting for us when we arrived at the bottom of the hill about seven o’clock, and it was not long before we reached the town.

The glowworms and fireflies were numerous.  The natives were cooking their evening meal on the ground beneath the tall palm-trees as we passed, with the glare of the fires lighting up the picturesque huts, their dark figures relieved by their white and scarlet turbans and waist-cloth.  The whole scene put us very much in mind of the old familiar pictures of India, the lithe figures of the natives looking like beautiful bronze statues, the rough country carts, drawn by buffaloes without harness, but dragging by their hump, and driven by black-skinned natives armed with a long goad.  We went straight to the jetty, and found to our surprise that in the roads there was quite a breeze blowing, and a very strong tide running against it, which made the sea almost rough.

Mrs. and Miss Anson, Mr. Talbot, and other friends, dined with us.  At eleven they landed, and we weighed anchor, and were soon gliding through the Straits of Malacca, shaping for Acheen Head, en route to Galle.