CARRIAGE BY BEARERS.
Out in the country there are practically no roads, as we understand roads. It is necessary to cultivate every inch of available ground, and the farmer begrudges anything taken from the fields for the paths, which are but a foot or two wide. It is easy to understand that, under such conditions, the almost universal mode of passenger transit is by chairs and bearers. The narrowness of the paths is a source of trouble. When two parties of bearers approach each other, there is much shouting to induce one or other to return and make way; but when both come on, one has to get off, or be pushed off, into the swamp by the sides. When one is a foreigner his portion is invariably the swamp.
The bearers are patient, much-enduring people, who do their work thoroughly and without complaining, in the face of mud, and rain, and difficult roads. They will carry a traveller from twenty to twenty-five miles a day. When a lady occupies the chair the curtains are rigidly closed. It would be at the risk of her life to travel in an open chair. There is much etiquette connected with the getting in and out of chairs, which wise travellers never neglect. The photograph is of a lady's chair.
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