part i. ch. iv. p. 12), but this is a misapprehension. Professor H.H.

WILSON, in a private letter to me, says, "In Hindustan we are accustomed to consider 'curry' to be derived from, _tarkari_, a general term for esculent vegetables, but it is probably the English version of the Kanara and Malayalam _kadi_; pronounced with a hard _r_, 'kari' or 'kuri,' which means sour milk with rice boiled, which was originally used for such compounds as curry at the present day. The Karnata _majkke-kari_ is a dish of rice, sour milk, spices, red pepper, &c, &c."]

Although the taking of life is sternly forbidden in the ethical code of Buddha, and the most prominent of the obligations undertaken by the priesthood is directed to its preservation even in the instances of insects and animalculæ, casuistry succeeded so far as to fix the crime on the slayer, and to exonerate the individual who merely partook of the flesh.[1] Even the inmates of the wiharas and monasteries discovered devices for the saving of conscience, and curried rice was not rejected in consequence of the animal ingredients incorporated with it. The mass of the population were nevertheless vegetarians, and so little value did they place on animal food, that according to the accounts furnished to EDRISI by the Arabian seamen returning from Ceylon, "a sheep sufficient to regale an assembly was to be bought there for half a drachm."[2]

[Footnote 1: HARDY'S _Eastern Monachism,_ ch. iv. p. 24; ch. ix. p. 92; ch. xvi. p. 158. HARDY'S _Buddhism_, ch. vii. p. 327.]

[Footnote 2: EDRISI; _Géographie_, &c., tom. i. p. 73.]

_Betel_--In connection with a diet so largely composed of vegetable food, arose the custom, which to the present day is universal in Ceylon,--of chewing the leaves of the betel vine, accompanied with lime and the sliced nut of the areca palm.[1] The betel (_piper betel_), which is now universally cultivated for this purpose, is presumed to have been introduced from some tropical island, as it has nowhere been found indigenous in continental India.[2] In Ceylon, its use is mentioned as early as the fifth century before Christ, when "betel leaves" formed the present sent by a princess to her lover.[3] In a conflict of Dutugaimunu with the Malabars, B.C. 161, the enemy seeing on his lips the red stain of the betel, mistook it for blood, and spread the false cry that the king had been slain.[4]

[Footnote 1: For an account of the medicinal influence of betel-chewing, see Part I. c. iii. § ii. p. 112.]

[Footnote 2: ROYLE'S _Essay on the Antiquity of Hindoo Medicine, p._ 85.]

[Footnote 3: B. C. 504. _Mahawanso_, ch. ix. p. 57. Dutugaimunu, when building the Ruanwellé dagoba, provided for the labourers amongst other articles "the five condiments used in mastication." This probably refers to the chewing of betel and its accompaniments (_Mahawanso_, ch. xxx. p. 175). A story is told of the wife of a Singhalese minister, about A. D. 56, who to warn him of a conspiracy, sent him his "betel, &c., for mastication, omitting the chunam," hoping that coming in search of it, he might escape his "impending fate." _Mahawanso_, ch. xxxv. p. 219.]

[Footnote 4: _Rajavali_, p. 221.]

Intoxicating liquors are of sufficient antiquity to be denounced in the moral system of Buddhism. The use of toddy and drinks obtained from the fermentation of "bread and flour" is condemned in the laity, and strictly prohibited to the priesthood[1]; but the Arabian geographers mention that in the twelfth century, wine, in defiance of the prohibition, was imported from Persia, and drank by the Singhalese after being flavoured with cardamoms.[2]

[Footnote 1: HARDY'S _Buddhism_, e., ch. x. p. 474.]

[Footnote 2: EDRISI, _Geographle,_ &c., Trad. JAUBERT, tom. i. p. 73.]

CHAP. III

EARLY COMMERCE, SHIPPING, AND PRODUCTIONS.

TRADE.--At a very early period the mass of the people of Ceylon were essentially agricultural, and the proportion of the population addicted to other pursuits consisted of the small number of handicraftsmen required in a community amongst whom civilisation and refinement were so slightly developed, that the bulk of the inhabitants may be said to have had few wants beyond the daily provision of food.

Upon trade the natives appear to have looked at all times with indifference. Other nations, both of the east and west of Ceylon, made the island their halting-place and emporium; the Chinese brought thither the wares destined for the countries beyond the Euphrates, and the Arabians and Persians met them with their products in exchange; but the Singhalese appear to have been uninterested spectators of this busy traffic, in which they can hardly be said to have taken any share. The inhabitants of the opposite coast of India, aware of the natural wealth of Ceylon, participated largely in its development, and the Tamils, who eagerly engaged in the pearl fishery, gave to the gulf of Manaar the name of Salabham, "the sea of gain."[l]

[Footnote 1: The Tamils gave the same name to Chilaw, which was the nearest town to the pearl fishery (and which Ibn Batuta calls _Salawat_); and eventually they called the whole island _Salabham_.]

_Native Shipping._--The only mention made of native ships in the sacred writings of the Singhalese, is in connection with missions, whether for the promotion of Buddhism, or for the negotiation of marriages and alliances with the princes of India.[1] The building of dhoneys is adverted to as early as the first century, but they were only intended by a devout king to be stationed along the shores of the island, covered by day with white cloths, and by night illuminated with lamps, in order that from them priests, as the royal almoners, might distribute gifts and donations of food.[2]

[Footnote 1: TURNOUR'S _Epitome_, App. p. 73.]

[Footnote 2: By King Maha Dailiya, A.D. 8. _Mahawanso_, ch. xxxiv. p. 211; _Rajavali_, p. 228; _Rajaratnacari_, p. 52.]

The genius of the people seems to have never inclined them to a sea-faring life, and the earliest notice which occurs of ships for the defence of the coast, is in connection with the Malabars who were taken into the royal service from their skill in naval affairs.[1] A national marine was afterwards established for this purpose, A.D. 495, by the King Mogallana.[2] In the _Suy-shoo_, a Chinese history of the Suy dynasty, it is stated that in A.D. 607, the king of Ceylon "sent the Brahman Kew-mo-lo with thirty vessels, to meet the approaching ships which conveyed an embassy from China."[3] And in the twelfth century, when Prakrama I. was about to enter on his foreign expeditions, "several hundreds of vessels were equipped for that service within five months."[4]

[Footnote 1: B.C. 247. _Mahawanso_, ch. xxi. p. 127.]

[Footnote 2: _Mahawanso_, ch. xl. TURNOUR'S MS. Transl.]

[Footnote 3: _Suy-shoo_, b. lxxxi. p. 3.]

[Footnote 4: TURNOUR'S _Epitome_, &c., App. p. 73.]

It is remarkable that the same apathy to navigation, if not antipathy to it, still prevails amongst the inhabitants of an island, the long sea-borde of which affords facilities for cultivating a maritime taste, did any such exist. But whilst the natives of Hindustan fit out sea-going vessels, and take service as sailors for distant voyages, the Singhalese, though most expert as fishers and boatmen, never embark in foreign vessels, and no instance exists of a native ship, owned, built, or manned by Singhalese.

The boats which are in use at the present day, and which differ materially in build at different parts of the island, appear to have been all copied from models supplied by other countries. In the south the curious canoes, which attract the eye of the stranger arriving at Point de Galle by their balance-log and outrigger, were borrowed from the islanders of the Eastern Archipelago; the more substantial canoe called a _ballam_, which is found in the estuaries and shallow lakes around the northern shore, is imitated from one of similar form on the Malabar coast; and the catamaran is common to Ceylon and Coromandel. The awkward dhoneys, built at Jaffna, and manned by Tamils, are imitated from those at Madras; while the Singhalese dhoney, south of Colombo, is but an enlargement of the Galle canoe with its outrigger, so clumsily constructed that the gunwale is frequently topped by a line of wicker-work smeared with clay, to protect the deck front the wash of the sea.[1]

[Footnote 1: The gunwale of the boat of Ulysses was raised by hurdles of osiers to keep off the waves.

[Greek: Phraxe de min rhipessi diamperes oisuinêsi Kumatos eilar emen pollên d' epecheuato hulên.] _Od._ v. 256.]

One peculiarity in the mode of constructing the native shipping of Ceylon existed in the remotest times, and is retained to the present day. The practice is closely connected with one of the most imaginative incidents in the medieval romances of the East Their boats and canoes, like those of the Arabs and other early navigators who crept along the shores of India, are put together without the use of iron nails[1], the planks being secured by wooden bolts, and stitched together with cords spun from the fibre of the coconut.[2]

PALLADIUS, a Greek of the lower empire, to whom is ascribed an account of the nations of India, written in the fifth century[3], adverts to this peculiarity of construction, and connects it with the phenomenon which forms so striking an incident in one of the tales in the _Arabian Nights' Entertainments_. In the story of the "Three Royal Mendicants," the "Third Calender," as he is called in the old translation, relates to the ladies of Bagdad, in whose house he is entertained, how he and his companions lost their course, when sailing in the Indian Ocean, and found themselves in the vicinity of "the mountain of loadstone towards which the current carried them with violence, and when the ships approached it they fell asunder, and the nails and everything that was of iron flew from them towards the loadstone."

[Footnote 1: DELAURIER, Études sur la "_Relation des voyages faits par les Arabes et les Persans dans l'Inde." Journ. Asiat._ tom. xlix. p. 137. See also MALTE BRUN, _Hist. de Géogr._ tom. i. p. 409, with the references to the Periplus Mar. Erythr., Strabo, Procopius, &c. GIBBON, _Decl. and Fall_, vol. v. ch. xl.]

[Footnote 2: Boats thus sewn together existed at an early period on the coast of Arabia as well as of Ceylon. Odoric of Friuli saw them at Ormus in the fourteenth century (_Hakluyt_, vol. ii. p. 35); and the construction of ships without iron was not peculiar to the Indian seas, as Homer mentions that the boat built by Ulysses was put together with woolen pegs, [Greek: _gomphoisin_], instead of bolts. _Odys_. v. 249.]

[Footnote 3: The tract alluded to is usually known as tne treatise _de Moribus Brachmanorum_, and ascribed to St. Ambrose. For an account of it see Vol. I. Pt. v. ch. i. p. 538.]

The learned commentator, LANE, says that several Arab writers describe this mountain of loadstone, and amongst others he instances El Caswini, who lived in the latter half of the thirteenth century.[1] EDRISI, the Arab geographer, likewise alludes to it; but the invention belongs to an earlier age, and Palladius, in describing Ceylon, says that the magnetic rock is in the adjacent islands called Maniolæ (Maldives?), and that ships coming within the sphere of its influence are irresistibly drawn towards it, and lose all power of progress except in its direction. Hence it is essential, he adds, that vessels sailing for Ceylon _should be fastened with wooden instead of iron bolts_.[2]

[Footnote 1: LANE'S _Arabian Nights_, vol. i. ch. iii, p. 72, p. 242.]

[Footnote 2: [Greek: "Esti de idikôs ta diaperônta ploia eis ekeinên tên megalên nêson aneu sidêrou epiouriois xylinois kataskeuasmena"]--PALLADIUS, in _Pseudo-Callisthenes_, lib. iii. c. vii. But the fable of the loadstone mountain is older than either the Arabian sailors or the Greeks of the lower empire. Aristotle speaks of a magnetic mountain on the coast of India, and Pliny repeats the story, adding that "si sint clavi in calciamentis, vestigia avelli in altero non posse in altero sisti."--Lib. ii. c. 98, lib. xxxvi. c. 25. Ptolemy recounts a similar fable in his geography. Klaproth, in his _Lettre sur la Boussole_, says that this romantic belief was first communicated to the West from China. "Les anciens auteurs Chinois parlent aussi de montagnes magnétiques de la mer méridionale sur les côtes de Tonquin et de la Cochin Chine; et disent que si les vaisseaux étrangers qui sont garnis de plaques de fer s'en approchent ils y sont arrètés et aucun d'eux ne peut passer par ces endroits."--KLAPROTH, _Lett._ v. p. 117, quoted by SANTAREM, _Essai sur l'Histo. de Cosmogr._, vol. i. p. 182.]

Another peculiarity of the native craft on the west coast of Ceylon is their construction with a prow at each extremity, a characteristic which belongs also to the Massoula boats of Madras, as well as to others on the south of India. It is a curious illustration of the abiding nature of local usages when originating in necessities and utility, that STRABO, in describing the boats in which the traffic was carried on between Taprobane and the continent, says they were "built with prows at each end, but without holds or keels."[1]

[Footnote 1: [Greek: "Kateskeuasmenas de amphoterôthen enkoiliôn mêtrôn chôris."]--Lib xv. c. i. s. 14. Pliny, who makes the same statement, says the Singhalese adopted this model to avoid the necessity of tacking in the narrow and shallow channels, between Ceylon and the mainland of India (lib. vi. c. 24).]

In connection with foreign trade the _Mahawanso_ contains repeated allusions to ships wrecked upon the coast of Ceylon[1], and amongst the remarkable events which signalised the season, already rendered memorable by the birth of Dutugaimunu, B.C. 204, was the "arrival on the same day of seven ships laden with golden utensils and other goods;"[2] and as these were brought by order of the king to Mahagam, then the capital of Rohuna, the incident is probably referable to the foreign trade which was then carried on in the south of the island[3] by the Chinese and Arabians, and in which, as I have stated, the native Singhalese took no part.

[Footnote 1: B.C. 543. _Mahawanso_, ch. vii. p. 49: B.C. 306. Ibid. ch. xi. p. 68, &c.]

[Footnote 2: _Mahawanso_, ch. xxii. p. 135.]

[Footnote 3: The first direct intimation of trading carried on by native Singhalese, along the coast of Ceylon, occurs in the _Rajavali_, but not till the year A.D. 1410,--the king, who had made Cotta his capital, being represented as "loading a vessel with goods and sending it to Jaffna, to carry on commerce with his son."--_Rajavali_, p. 289.]

Still, notwithstanding their repugnance to intercourse with strangers, the Singhalese were not destitute of traffic amongst themselves, and their historical annals contain allusions to the mode in which it was conducted. Their cities exhibited rows of shops and bazaars[1], and the country was traversed by caravans much in the same manner as the drivers of _tavalams_ carry goods at the present day between the coast and the interior.[2]

[Footnote 1: B.C. 204, a visitor to Anarajapoora is described as "purchasing aromatic drugs from the bazaars, and departing by the Northern Gate" (_Mahawanso_, ch. xxiii. p. 139); and A.D. 8, the King Maha Dathika "ranged shops on each side of the streets of the capital."--_Mahawanso_, ch. xxxiv. p. 213.]

[Footnote 2: B.C. 170. _Mahawanso_ ch. xxii. p. 138.]

Whatever merchandise was obtained in barter from foreign ships, was by this means conveyed to the cities and the capital[1], and the reference to carts which were accustomed to go from Anarajapoora to the division of Malaya, lying round Adam's Peak, "to procure saffron and ginger," implies that at that period (B.C. 165) roads and other facilities for wheel carriages must have existed, enabling them to traverse forests and cross the rivers.[2]

[Footnote 1: In the reign of Elala, B.C. 204, the son of "an eminent caravan chief" was despatched to a Brahman, who resided near the Chetiyo mountain (Mihintala), in whose possession there were rich articles, frankincense, sandal-wood, &c., imported from beyond the ocean.--_Mahawanso_ ch. xxiii. p. 138.]

[Footnote 2: _Mahawanso_ ch. xxviii. p, 167.]

_Early Exports of Ceylon._--The native historians give an account of the exports of Ceylon, which corresponds in all particulars with the records left by the early travellers and merchants, Greek, Roman, Arabian, Indian, and Chinese. They consisted entirely of natural productions, aromatic drugs, gems, pearls, and shells; and it is a strong evidence of the more advanced state of civilisation in India at the same period that, whilst the presents sent from the kings of Ceylon to the native princes of Hindustan and the Dekkan were always of this precious but primitive character, the articles received in return were less remarkable for the intrinsic value of the material, than for the workmanship bestowed upon them. Devenipiatissa sent by his ambassadors to Asoca, B.C. 306, the eight varieties of pearls, viz., _haya_ (the horse), _gaja_ (the elephant), _ratha_ (the chariot wheel), _maalaka_ (the nelli fruit), _valaya_ (the bracelet), _anguliwelahka_ (the ring), _kakudaphala_ (the kabook fruit), and _pakatika_, the ordinary description. He sent sapphires, lapis lazuli[1], and rubies, a right hand chank[2], and three bamboos for chariot poles, remarkable because their natural marking resembled the carvings of flowers and animals.

[Footnote 1: Lapis lazuli is not found in Ceylon, and must have been brought by the caravans from Budakshan. It is more than once mentioned in the _Mahawanso_, ch. xi. p. 69; ch. xxx. p. 185.]

[Footnote 2: A variety of the _Turbinella rapa_ with the whorls reversed, to which the natives attach a superstitions value; professing that a shell so formed is worth its weight in gold.]

The gifts sent by the king of Magadha in return, indicate the advanced state of the arts in Bengal, even at that early period: they were "a chowrie (the royal fly flapper), a diadem, a sword of state, a royal parasol, golden slippers, a crown, an anointing vase, asbestos towels, to be cleansed by being passed through the fire, a costly howdah, and sundry vessels of gold." Along with these was sacred water from the Anotatto lake and from the Ganges, aromatic and medicinal drugs, hill paddi and sandal-wood; and amongst the other items "a virgin of royal birth and of great personal beauty."[1]

[Footnote 1: _Mahawanso_ ch, xi. pp. 69, 70.]

_Early Imports_.--Down to a very late period, gems, pearls, and chank shells continued to be the only products taken away from Ceylon, and cinnamon is nowhere mentioned in the Sacred Books as amongst the exports of the island.[1] In return for these exports, slaves, chariots, and horses were frequently transmitted from India. The riding horses and chargers, so often spoken of[2], must necessarily have been introduced from thence, and were probably of Arab blood; but I have not succeeded in discovering to what particular race the "Sindhawa" horses belonged, of which four purely white were harnessed to the state carriage of Dutugaimunu.[3] Gold cloth[4], frankincense, and sandal-wood were brought from India[5], as was also a species of "clay" and of "cloud-coloured stone," which appear to have been used in the construction of dagobas.[6] Silk[7] and vermilion[8] indicate the activity of trade with China; and woollen cloth[9] and carpets[10] with Persia and Kashmir.

[Footnote 1: For an account of the earliest trade in cinnamon, see _post_ Part v. ch. ii. on the Knowledge of Ceylon possessed by the Arabians.]

[Footnote 2: _Mahawanso_, ch. xxii. p. 134, &c. &c.]

[Footnote 3: _Ibid_., ch. xxiii. p. 142; ch. xxxi. p. 186.]

[Footnote 4: A.D.459. _Mahawanso_, ch. xxxviii. p. 258.]

[Footnote 5: _Ibid_, ch. xxiii. p. 138.]

[Footnote 6: _Ibid_, ch. xxix. p. 169; ch. xxx. p. 179.]

[Footnote 7: _Ibid_., ch. xxiii. p. 139; _Rajaratnacari_, p. 49.]

[Footnote 8: _Ibid_, ch. xxix. p. 169; _Rajaratnacari_ p. 51.]

[Footnote 9: _Mahawanso_, ch. xxx. p. 177; _Rajavali_, p. 269. Woollen cloth is described as "most valuable"--an epithet which indicates its rarity, and probably foreign origin.]

[Footnote 10: _Mahawanso_, ch. xiv. p. 82; ch. xv. p. 87; ch. xxv. p. 151; carpets of wool, _ib_. ch. xxvii. p. 164.]

_Intercourse with Kashmir._--Possibly the woollen cloths referred to may have been shawls, and there is evidence in the _Rajatarangini_[1], that at a very early period the possession of a common religion led to an intercourse between Ceylon and Kashmir, originating in the sympathies of Buddhism, but perpetuated by the Kashmirians for the pursuit of commerce. In the fabulous period of the narrative, a king of Kashmir is said to have sent to Ceylon for a delicately fine cloth, embroidered with golden footsteps.[2] In the eighth century of the Christian era, Singhalese engineers were sent for to construct works in Kashmir[3]; and Kashmir, according to Troyer, took part in the trade between Ceylon and the West.[4]

[Footnote 1: The _Rajatarangini_ resembles the _Mahawanso_, in being a metrical chronicle of Kashmir written at various times by a series of authors, the earliest of whom lived in the 12th century. It has been translated into French by M. Troyer, Paris, 1840.]

[Footnote 2: _Rajatarangini_, b. i. sl. 294.]

[Footnote 3: _Rajatarangini_, b. iv. sl. 502, &c.]

[Footnote 4: "La communication entre Kachmir et Ceylan n'a pas eu lieu seulement par les entreprises guerrières que je viens de rappeler, mais aussi par un commerce paisible; c'est du cette ile que venaient des artistes qu'on appelait Rakchasas à cause du merveilleux de leur art; et qui exécutaient des ouvrages pour l'utilité et pour l'ornement d'un pays montagneux et sujet aux inondations. Ceci confirme ce que nous apprennent les géographes Grecs, que Ceylan, avant et après le commencement de notre ère, était un grand point de réunion pour le commerce de l'Orient et de l'Occident."--_Rajatarangini_, vol. ii. p. 434.]

Of the trade between Ceylon and Kashmir and its progress, the account given by Edrisi, the most renowned of the writers on eastern geography, who wrote in the twelfth century[1], is interesting, inasmuch as it may be regarded as a picture of this remarkable commerce, after it had attained its highest development.

[Footnote 1: Abou-abd-allah Mahommed was a Moor of the family who reigned over Malaga after the fall of the Kalifat of Cordova, in the early part of the 11th century, and his patronymic of Edrisi or Al Edrissy implies that he was descended from the princes of that race who had previously held supreme power in what is at the present day the Empire of Morocco. He took up his residence in Sicily under the patronage of the Norman king, Roger II., A.D. 1154, and the work on geography which he there composed was not only based on the previous labours of Massoudi, Ibn Haukul, Albyrouni, and others, but it embodied the reports of persons commissioned specially by the king to undertake voyages for the purpose of bringing back correct accounts of foreign countries. See REINAUD'S _Introduction to the Geography of Abulfeda_, p. cxiii.]

Edrisi did not write from personal knowledge, as he had never visited either Ceylon or India; but compiling as he did, by command of Roger H., of Sicily, a compendium, of geographical knowledge as it existed in his time, the information which he has systematised may be regarded as a condensation of such facts as the eastern seamen engaged in the Indian trade had brought back with them from Ceylon.

"In the mountains around Adam's Peak," says Edrisi, "they collect precious stones of every description, and in the valleys they find those diamonds by means of which they engrave the setting of stones on rings."

"The same mountains produce aromatic drugs perfumes, and aloes-wood, and there too they find the animal, the civet, which yields musk. The islanders cultivate rice, coco-nuts, and sugar-cane; in the rivers is found rock crystal, remarkable both for brilliancy and size, and the sea on every side has a fishery of magnificent and priceless pearls. Throughout India there is no prince whose wealth can compare with the King of Serendib, his immense riches, his pearls and his jewels, being the produce of his own dominions and seas; and thither ships of China, and of every neighbouring country resort, bringing the wines of Irak and Fars, which the king buys for sale to his subjects; for he drinks wine and prohibits debauchery; whilst other princes of India encourage debauchery and prohibit the use of wine. The exports from Serendib consist of silk, precious stones, crystals, diamonds, and perfumes."[1]

[Footnote 1: Edrisi, _Géographie_, Trad. JAUBERT, tom. i. p. 73.]

CHAP. IV.

MANUFACTURES.

The silk alluded to in the last chapter must have been brought from China for re-exportation to the West. Silk is frequently mentioned in the _Mahawanso_[1] but never with any suggestion of its being a native product of Ceylon.

[Footnote 1: Silk is mentioned 20 B.C. _Rajaratnacari_, p. 49. _Mahawanso_, ch. xxiii. p. 139.]

_Coir and Cordage._--EDRISI speaks of cordage made from the fibre of the coco-nut, to prepare which, the natives of Oman and Yemen resorted to Ceylon[1]; so that the Singhalese would appear to have been instructed by the Arabs in the treatment of coir, and its formation into ropes; an occupation which, at the present day, affords extensive employment to the inhabitants of the south and south-western coasts. Ibn Batuta describes the use of coir, for sewing together the planking of boats, as it was practised at Zafar in the fourteenth century[2]; and the word itself bespeaks its Arabian origin, as ALBYROUNI, who divides the Maldives and Laccadives into two classes, calls the one group the _Dyvah-kouzah_, or islands that produce _cowries_; and the other the _Dyvah-kanbar_, or islands that produce _coir_.[3]

[Footnote 1: EDRISI, t. i. p. 74.]

[Footnote 2: _Voyages_, &c., vol. ii. p. 207. Paris, 1854.]

[Footnote 3: ALBYROUNI, in REYNAUD, _Fragm. Arabes, &c.,_ pp, 93, 124 The Portuguese adopted the word from the Hindus, and CASTANEDA, in _Hist. of the Discovery of India,_ describes the Moors of Sofalah sewing their boats with "_cayro"_ ch. v, 14, xxx. 75.]

_Dress_.--The dress of the people was of the simplest kind, and similar to that which is worn at the present day. The bulk of the population wore scanty cloths, without shape or seam, folded closely round the body and the portion of the limbs which it is customary to cover; and the Chinese, who visited the island in the seventh century, described the people as clothed in the loose robe, still known as a "comboy," a word probably derived from the Chinese _koo-pei_, which signifies cotton.[1]

[Footnote 1: See Part v. ch. iii. on the Knowledge of Ceylon possessed by the Chinese.]

The wealthier classes indulged in flowing robes, and Bujas Dasa the king, who in the fourth century devoted himself to the study of medicine and the cure of the sick, was accustomed, when seeking objects for his compassion, to appear as a common person, simply "disguising himself by gathering his cloth up between his legs."[1] Robes with flowers[2], and a turban of silk, constituted the dress of state bestowed on men whom the king delighted to honour.[3] Cloth of gold is spoken of in the fifth century, but the allusion is probably made to the kinbaub of India.[4]

[Footnote 1: _Mahawanso,_ ch. xxxvii. p.245.]

[Footnote 2: By the ordinances of Buddhism it was forbidden to the priesthood "to adorn the body with flowers," thus showing it to have been a practice of the laity. HARDY'S _Eastern Monachism_, ch. iv. p.24; ch. xiii p.128.]

[Footnote 3: _Mahawanso_, ch. xxiii. p.139.]

[Footnote 4: _Ibid._, ch. xxxviii. p.258.]

MANUAL AND MECHANICAL ARTS. _Weaving_.--The aborigines practised the art of weaving before the arrival of Wijayo. Kuweni, when the adventurer approached her, was "seated at the foot of a tree, spinning thread;"[1] cotton was the ordinary material, but "linen cloth" is mentioned in the second century before Christ.[2] White cloths are spoken of as having been employed, in the earliest times, in every ceremony for covering chairs on which persons of rank were expected to be seated; whole "webs of cloth" were used to wrap the _carandua_ in which the sacred relics were enclosed[3], and one of the kings, on the occasion of consecrating a dagoba at Mihintala, covered with "white cloth" the road taken by the procession between the mountain and capital, a distance of more than seven miles.[4]

[Footnote 1: _Mahawanso_, ch. vii. p.48; _Rajavali_, p.173.]

[Footnote 2: _Mahawanso_, ch, xxv. p.152.]

[Footnote 3: _Rajaratnacari_, p.72.]

[Footnote 4: A.D. 8. _Rajavali,_ p. 227; _Mahawanso_, ch. xxxiv. p. 213.]

In later times a curious practice prevailed, which exists to the present day;--on occasions when it is intended to make offerings of yellow robes to the priesthood, the cotton was plucked from the tree at daybreak, and "cleaned, spun, woven, dyed, and made into garments" before the setting of the sun. This custom, called _Catina Dhawna,_ is first referred to in the _Rajaratnacari_ in the reign of Prakrarna I.[1], A.D. 1153.

[Footnote 1: See _ante_, Vol. II p. 35. _Rajaratnacari_, pp. 104, 109, 112, 135; _Rajavali_, p. 261; HARDY'S _Eastern Monachism_, ch. xii. pp. 114, 121.]

The expression "made into garments" alludes to the custom enjoined on the priests of having the value of the material destroyed, before consenting to accept it as a gift, thus carrying out their vow of poverty. The robe of Gotama Buddha was cut into thirty pieces, these were again united, so that they "resembled the patches of ground in a rice field;" and hence he enjoined on his followers the observance of the same practice.[1]

[Footnote 1: HARDY'S _Eastern Monachism,_ ch. xii. p. 117. See _ante_, Vol. I. Pt. III. ch. iv. p. 351.]

The arts of bleaching and dyeing were understood as well as that of weaving, and the _Mahawanso_, in describing the building of the Ruanwellé dagoba, at Anarajapoora, B.C. 161, tells of a canopy formed of "eight thousand pieces of cloth of every hue."[1]

[Footnote 1: _Mahawanso_, ch. xxx. p. 179, See also ch. xxxviii. p. 258.]

_Earliest Artisans._--VALENTYN, writing on the traditional information acquired from the Singhalese themselves, records the belief of the latter, that in the suite of the Pandyan princess, who arrived to marry Wijayo, were artificers from Madura, who were the first to introduce the knowledge and practice of handicrafts amongst the native population. According to the story, these were goldsmiths, blacksmiths, brass-founders, carpenters, and stone-cutters.[1]

[Footnote 1: VALENTYN, _Oud en Niew Oost-Indien_, chap. iv. p. 267.]

The legend is given with more particularity in an historical notice of the Chalia caste, written by Adrian Rajapaxa, one of their chiefs, who describes these immigrants as Peskare Brahmans, who were at first employed in weaving gold tissues for the queen, but who afterwards abandoned that art for agriculture. A fresh company were said to have been invited in the reign of Devenipiatissa, and were the progenitors of "Saleas, at present called Chalias," who inhabit the country between Galle and Colombo, and who, along with their ostensible occupation as peelers of cinnamon, still employ themselves in the labours of the loom.[1] All handicrafts are conventionally regarded by the Singhalese as the occupations of an inferior class; and a man of high caste would submit to any privation rather than stoop to an occupation dependent on manual skill.

[Footnote 1: A History of the Chalias, by ADRIAN RAJAPAXA. _Asiatic Res_. vol. vii. p. 440. _Ib_., vol. x. p. 82.]

_Pottery_.--One of the most ancient arts, the making of earthenware vessels, exists at the present day in all its pristine simplicity, and the "potter's wheel," which is kept in motion by an attendant, whilst the hands of the master are engaged in shaping the clay as it revolves, is the primitive device which served a similar purpose amongst the Egyptians and Hebrews.[1]

[Footnote 1: Pottery is mentioned in the _Mahawanso_, B.C. 161, ch. xxix. p. 173: the allusion is to "new earthen vases," and shows that the people at that time, like the Hindus of today, avoided where possible the repeated use of the same vessel.]

A "potter" is enumerated in the list of servants and tradesmen attached to the temple on the Rock of Mihintala, A.D. 262, along with a sandal-maker, blacksmiths, carpenters, stone-cutters, goldsmiths, and "makers of strainers" through which the water for the priests was filtered, to avoid taking away the life of animalculæ. The other artisans on the establishment were chiefly those in charge of the buildings, lime-burners, plasterers, white-washers, painters, and a chief builder.

_Glass_.--Glass, the knowledge of which existed in Egypt and in India[1], was introduced into Ceylon at an early period; and in the _Dipawanso_, a work older than the _Mahawanso_ by a century and a half, it is stated that Saidaitissa, the brother of Dutugaimunu, when completing the Ruanwellé dagoba, which his predecessor had commenced, surmounted it with a "glass pinnacle." This was towards the end of the second century before Christ. Glass is frequently mentioned at later periods; and a "glass mirror" is spoken of[2] in the third century before Christ, but how made, whether by an amalgam of quicksilver or by colouring the under surface, is not recorded.

[Footnote 1: Dr. ROYLE'S _Lectures on the Arts and Manufactures of India_, 1852, p. 221. PLINY says the glass of India being made of pounded crystal, none other can compare with it. (Lib. xxxvi, c. 66.)]

[Footnote 2: _Mahawanso_, ch. xv. p. 99, ch. xxx. p. 182.]

_Leather_.--The tanning of leather from the hide of the buffalo was understood so far back as the second century before Christ, and "coverings both for the back and the feet of elephants" were then formed of it.[1]

[Footnote 1: _Ibid_., ch. xxv. p. 152, ch. xxix. p. 169.]

_Wood-carving_.--Carving in sandal-wood and inlaying with ivory, of which latter material "state fans and thrones" were constructed for the Brazen Palace[1], are amongst the mechanical arts often alluded to; and during the period of prosperity which signalised the era of the "Great Dynasty," there can be little doubt that skilled artificers were brought from India to adorn the cities and palaces of Ceylon.

[Footnote 1: _Ibid_., ch. xxvii. p. 163, 164.]

_Chemical Arts_.--A rude knowledge of chemical manipulation was required for the extraction of camphor[1] and the preparation of numerous articles specified amongst the productions of the island, aromatic oils[2], perfumes[3], and vegetable dyes.

[Footnote 1: _Rajaratnacari_, p. 133. Dr. ROYLE doubts whether camphor was known to the Hindus at this early period, but "camphor oil" is repeatedly mentioned in the Singhalese chronicles amongst the articles provided for the temples.--ROYLE'S _Essay on Hindoo Medicine_, p. 140; _Rajaculi_, p. 190.]

[Footnote 2: _Mahawanso_, ch. xxv. p. 157.]

[Footnote 3: B.C. 161. _Mahawanso_, ch. xxx. p. 180.]

_Sugar_.--Sugar was obtained not only from the Palmyra and Kittool palms[1], but also from the cane; which, besides being a native of India, was also indigenous in Ceylon.[2] A "sugar mill" for expressing its juice existed in the first century before Christ in the district of the "Seven Corles,"[3] where fifteen hundred years afterwards a Dutch governor of the island made an attempt to restore the cultivation of sugar.

[Footnote 1: "Palm sugar," as distinguished from "cane sugar," is spoken of in the _Mahawanso_ in the second century B.C. ch. xxvii. p. 163.]

[Footnote 2: "Cane sugar" is referred to in the _Mahawanso_ B.C. 161, ch. xxvii. p. 162, ch. xxxi. p. 192.]

[Footnote 3: A.D. 77. _Mahawanso_, ch. xxxiv. p. 208.]

_Mineral Paints_.--Mineral preparations were made with success. Red lead, orpiment, and vermilions are mentioned as pigments; but as it is doubtful whether Ceylon produces quicksilver, the latter was probably imported from. China[1] or India, where the method of preparing it has long been known.

[Footnote 1: See _ante_, Vol. I. Part I. ch. i. p. 29. n. Both quicksilver and vermilion are mentioned in the _Rajaratnacari_, p. 51, as being in use in the year 20 B.C. Vermilion is also spoken of B.C. 307 in the _Mahawanso_, ch. xxvii. p. 162, c. The two passages in which _vermilion_ is spoken of in the Old Testament, Jerem. xxii. 14, and Ezek. xxiii. 14, both refer to the painting of walls and woodwork, a purpose to which it would be scarcely suitable, were not the article alluded to the opaque bisulphuret of mercury; and the same remark applies to the vermilion used by the Singhalese. The bright red obtained from the insect coccus (the _vermiculus_, whence the original term "vermilion" is said to be derived) would be too transparent to be so applied.]

There is likewise sufficient evidence in these and a number of other preparations, as well in the notices of perfumes, camphor, and essential oils, to show that the Singhalese, like the Hindus, had a very early acquaintance with chemical processes and with the practice of distillation, which they retain to the present day.[1] The knowledge of the latter they probably acquired from the Arabs or Chinese.

[Footnote 1: "I was frequently visited by one old man, a priest, who had travelled through Bengal, Burmah, Siam, and many other countries, and who prided himself on being able _to make calomel_ much better than the European doctors, as his preparation did not cause the falling out of the teeth, soreness of the mouth, or salivation. He learnt the secret from an ancient sage whom he met with in a forest on the continent of India; and often when listening to him I was reminded of the mysteries and crudities of the alchemists."--HARDY'S _Eastern Monachism_, Lond. 1850, ch. xxiii. p. 312.]

CHAP. V.

WORKING IN METALS.

METALS. _Iron_.--Working in metals was early understood in Ceylon. Abundance of iron ore can be extracted from the mountains round Adam's Peak; the black oxide is found on the eastern shore in the state of iron-sand; and both are smelted with comparative ease by the natives. Iron tools were in use for the dressing of stones; and in the third century before Christ, the enclosed city of Wijittapoora was secured by an "iron gate." [1]

[Footnote 1: _Mahawanso_, ch. xxv. p. 152.]

_Steel_.--The manufacture of arms involved the use of steel, the method of tempering which was derived from the Hindus, by whom the _wootz_ was prepared, of which, the genuine blades of Damascus are shown to have been made, the beauty of their figuring being dependent on its peculiar crystallisation. Ezekiel enumerates amongst the Indian imports of Tyre "_bright iron_, calamus and cassia."[1]

[Footnote 1: ROYLE _on the Antiquity of Hindoo Medicine_, p. 98. EZEKIEL, ch. xxvii. 19.]

_Copper_.--Copper was equally in demand, but, like silver and gold, it is nowhere alluded to as a production of the island. In ancient, as in modern, times, therefore, the numerous articles formed from this metal were probably imported from India. The renowned Brazen. Palace of Anarajapoora was so named from the quantity of copper used in its construction. Bujas Raja, A.D. 359, covered a building at Attanagalla with "tiles made of copper, and gilt with gold,"[1] and "two boats built of brass," were placed near the Bo-Tree at the capital "to hold food for the priests."[2] Before the Christian era, armour for elephants[3], and vessels of large dimensions, cauldrons[4], and baths[5], were formed of copper. The same material was used for the lamps, goblets[6], kettles, and cooking utensils of the monasteries and wiharas.

[Footnote 1: _Rajaratnacari_, p. 73.]

[Footnote 2: _Ibid_., p. 60.]

[Footnote 3: _Rajavali_, p. 214.]

[Footnote 4: B.C. 204. _Rajavali_, p. 190.]

[Footnote 5: A.D. 1267, _Rajartnacari_, p. 104.]

[Footnote 6: _Rajaratnacari_, pp. 104, 134.]

_Bells_.--Bells were hung in the palaces[1], and bell-metal is amongst the gifts to the temples recorded on the rock at Pollanarrua, A.D. 1187.[2]

[Footnote 1: _Mahawanso_, ch. xxi. pp. 128, 129.]

[Footnote 2: TURNOUR'S _Epitome, &c.,_ Appx. p. 91.]

_Bronze_.--Bronze was cast into figures of Buddha[1], and the _Mahawanso_, describing the reign of Dhatu-Sena, A.D. 459, makes mention of "sixteen bronze statues of virgins having the power of locomotion."[2]

[Footnote 1: A.D. 275. _Mahawanso_, ch. xxxvii. p. 236; _Rajavali_, p. l35.]

[Footnote 2: _Mahawanso_, ch. xxxviii. p. 257.]

_Lead_.--Lead was used during the wars of Dutugaimunu and Elala, and poured molten over the attacking elephants during the siege of Wijittapoora.[1] As lead is not a native product of Ceylon, it must have been brought thither from Ava or Malwa.

[Footnote 1: _Mahawanso_, ch. xxv. p. 152.]

_Gold and Silver._--Ceylon, like the continent of India, produces no silver and gold, save in the scantiest quantities.[1] The historical books, in recording the splendour of the temples and their riches, and the wealth lavished by the kings upon the priesthood, describe in perpetually recurring terms, the multitude of ornaments and vessels made of silver and gold. In early times the most precious of these were received as gifts from the princes of India, and in the second century before Christ the _Mahawanso_ records the arrival of ships in the south of the island, "laden with golden utensils." The import of these might possibly have been a relic of the early trade with the Phoenicians, whom Homer, in a passage quoted by Strabo (l. xvi. c. 2. s. 24.), describes as making these cups, and carrying across the sea for sale in the great emporiums visited by these ships.[2] A variety of articles of silver are spoken of at very early periods. Dutugaimunu, when building the great dagoba, caused the circle of its base to be described by "a pair of compasses made of silver, and pointed with gold;"[3] parasols, vases, caranduas and numerous other regal or religious paraphernalia, were made from this precious material. Gold was applied in every possible form and combination to the decoration and furnishing of the edifices of Buddhism;--"trees of gold with roots of coral,"[4] flowers formed of gems with stems of silver[5], fringes of bullion mixed with pearls; umbrellas, shields, chains, and jewelled statuettes[6], are described with enthusiasm by the annalists of the national worship.

[Footnote 1: Amongst the miracles which signalised the construction of the Ruanwellé dagoba at Anarajapoora was the sudden appearance in a locality to the north-east of the capital of "sprouts" of gold above and below the ground, and of silver in the vicinity of Adam's Peak.--_Mahawanso_, ch. xxviii. pp. 166, 167.]

[Footnote 2: _Mahawanso_, ch. xxii. p. 153. [Greek]--Iliad, xxiii. 745.]

[Footnote 3: _Mahawanso_, ch. xxx. p. 172.]

[Footnote 4: Red coral, equal in its delicacy of tint to the highly-prized specimens from the Mediterranean, is found in small fragments on the sea-shore north of Point-de-Galle.]

[Footnote 5: _Mahawanso_, ch. xxx. p. 179.]

[Footnote 6: _Mahawanso_, ib. p. 180.]

The abundance of precious stones naturally led to their being extensively mounted in jewelry, and in addition to those found in Ceylon, diamonds[1] and lapis lazuli [2] (which must have been brought thither from India and Persia) are classed with the sapphire and the topaz, which are natives of the island.

[Footnote 1: _Rajaratnacari_, p. 61.]

[Footnote 2: _Mahawanso_, ch. xxx. p. 182.]

The same passion existed then, as now, for covering the person with ornaments; gold, silver, and gems were fashioned into rings for the ears, the nose, the fingers, and toes, into plates for the forehead, and chains for the neck, into armlets, and bracelets, and anklets, and into decorations of every possible form, not only for the women, but for men, and, above all, for the children of both sexes. The poor, unable to indulge in the luxury of precious metals, found substitutes in shells and glass; and the extravagance of the taste was defended on the ground that their brilliancy served to avert the malignity of "the evil eye" from the wearer to the jewel.

_Gilding_.--Gilding was likewise understood by the Singhalese in all its departments, both as applied to the baser metals and to other substances--wood-work was gilded for preaching places[1] as was also copper for roofing, cement for decorating walls, and stone for statuary and carving.[2]

[Footnote 1: _Rajaratnacari_, p. 60.]

[Footnote 2: Rock inscription at Pollanarrua, A.D. 187--196.]

_Coin_.--Although the Singhalese through their sacred writings had a knowledge of coined money, and of its existence in India from a period little subsequent to the death of Gotama Buddha[1]; and although their annalists give the names of particular coins in circulation[2], at various times, no Singhalese money has yet been discovered of a date antecedent to the eleventh century. The Chinese in the fifteenth century spoke with admiration of the gold pieces struck by the kings of Ceylon, which they found in circulation on their frequent visits to the emporium at Galle[3]; but of these only a few very rare examples have been preserved, one of which bears the effigy and name of Lokaiswaira[4], who usurped the throne during a period of anarchy about A.D. 1070. Numbers of small copper coins of the eleventh and twelfth centuries have from time to time been dug up both in the interior and on the coast of the island[5]. A quantity of these which were found in 1848 by Lieutenant Evatt, when in command of a pioneer corps near the village of Ambogamoa, were submitted to Mr. Vaux of the British Museum, and prove to belong to the reign of Wijayo Bahu, A.D. 1071, Prakrama I., A.D. 1153, the Queen Lilawatte, A.D. 1197, King Sahasamallawa, A.D. 1200, Darmasoka, A.D. 1208, and Bhuwaneka Bahu, A.D. 1303. These coins have one and all the same device on the obverse,--a rude standing figure of the Raja holding the _trisula_ in his left hand, and a flower in the right. His dress is a flowing robe, the folds of which are indicated rather than imitated by the artist; and on the reverse the same figure is seated, the name in Nagari characters being placed beside the face[6].

[Footnote 1: The _Mahawanso_ mentions the existence of coined metals in India in the tenth year of the reign of Kalasoka, a century from the death of Buddha, ch. iv. p. 15. According to Hardy, in the most ancient laws of the Buddhists the distinction is recognised between coined money and bullion,--_Eastern Monachism,_ vol. vii. p. 66.]

[Footnote 2: The coins mentioned in the _Mahawanso, Rajaratnacari, and Rajavali_ are as follows: B.C. 161, the _kahapanan (Mahawanso_, ch. xxx. pp. 157, 175), which TURNOUR says was a gold coin worth ten _massakan_ or _massa_. The latter are "the pieces of gold formerly current in Ceylon," a heap of which, according to the _Rajaratnacari_ (p. 48), was seen by King Bhatia Tissa when he was permitted to penetrate into the chamber of the Ruanwellé dagoba, A.D. 137. The silver massa, according to TURNOUR, was valued at eightpence. These are repeatedly mentioned in the _Rajaratnacari_ (A.D. 201, p. 60, A.D. 234, p. 62, A.D. 1262, p. 102, A.D. 1301, p. 107, A.D. 1462, p. 113). The _Rajavali_ speaks of "gold massa" as in circulation in the time of Dutugaimunu, B.C. 161 (p. 201). The word _masa_ in Singhalese means "pulse," or any description of "beans;" and it seems not improbable that the origin of the term as applied to money may be traced to the practice in the early Indian coinage of stamping small _lumps_ of metal to give them authentic currency. It can only be a coincidence that the Roman term for an ingot of gold was "_massa_" (Pliny, L. xxxiii. c. 19). These Singhalese massa were probably similar to the "punched coins," having rude stamps without effigies, and rarely even with letters, which have been turned up at Kanooj, Oujein, and other places in Western India. A copper coin is likewise mentioned in the fourteenth century, in the _Rajavali_, where it is termed _carooshawpa_; the value of which UPHAM, without naming his authority, says was "about a pice and a half."--p. 136.]

[Footnote 3: _Woo hëö pëen_ "Records of the Ming Dynasty," A.D. 1522, B. lxviii. p. 5. _Suh Wan heen tung kaou_, "Antiquarian Researches," B. ccxxxvi. p. 11.]

[Footnote 4: Two gold coins of Lokaiswaira are in the collection of the British Museum, and will be found described by Mr. VAUX in the 16th vol. of the _Numismatic Chronicle_, p. 121.]

[Footnote 5: There is a Singhalese coin figured in DAVY'S _Ceylon_, p. 245, the legend on which is turned upside down, but when reversed it reads "_Sri Pa-re-kra-ma Bahu_."]

[Footnote 6: _Numismatic Chronicle_, vol. xvi. p. 124]

The Kandyans, by whom these coins are frequently found, give the copper pieces the name of Dambedenia _challies_, and tradition, with perfect correctness, assigns them to the twelfth and thirteenth centuries, when the kings of that period are believed to have had a mint at Dambedenia.

A quantity of coins similar in every respect to those dug up in Ceylon have been found at Dipaldinia or Amarawati, on the continent of India, near the mouth of the Kistna; a circumstance which might be accounted for by the frequent intercourse between Ceylon and the coast, but which is possibly referable to the fact recorded in the _Mahawanso_ that Prakrama I., after his successful expedition against the King of Pandya, caused money to be coined in his own name before retiring to Ceylon.[1]

[Footnote 1: _Mahawanso_, ch. lxxvi. pp. 298, 299, UPHAM's _Trans_. The circumstance is exceedingly curious of coins of Prakrama, "identical" with those found at Dambedenia, in Ceylon, having also been discovered at Dipaldinia, on the opposite continent; and it goes far to confirm the accuracy of the _Mahawanso_ as to the same king having coined money in both places. Those found in the latter locality form part of the Mackenzie Collection, and have been figured in the _Asiat. Researches_, xvii. 597, and afterwards by Mr. PRINSEP in the _Journ. of the Asiat. Soc. of Bengal_, vi. 301. See also a notice of Ceylon coins, in the _Journ. As. Soc. Beng._ iv. 673, vi. 218; CASIE CHITTY, in the _Journ. of the Ceylon Asiat. Soc.,_ 1847, p. 9, has given an account of a hoard of copper coins found at Calpentyn in 1839; and Mr. Justice STARKE, in the same journal, p. 149, has given a _resumé_ of the information generally possessed as to the ancient coins of the island. PRINSEP's paper on _Ceylon Coins_ will be found in vol. i. of the recent reprint of his _Essays on Indian Antiquities_, p. 419. Lond. 1858.]

_Hook-money_.--No ancient silver coin has yet been found, but specimens are frequently brought to light of the _ridis_, pieces of twisted silver wire, which from their being sometimes bent with a considerable curve have been called "_Fish-hook money_." These are occasionally impressed with a legend, and for a time the belief obtained that they were a variety of ring-money peculiar to Ceylon.[1] Of late this error has been corrected; the letters where they occur have been shown to be not Singhalese or Sanskrit, but Persian, and the tokens themselves have been proved to belong to Laristan on the Persian Gulf, from the chief emporium of which, Gambroon, they were brought to Ceylon in the course of Indian commerce; chiefly by the Portuguese, who are stated by VAN CARDAEN to have introduced them in great quantities into Cochin and the ports of Malabar.[2] There they were circulated so freely that an edict of Prakrama enumerates the _ridi_ amongst the coins in which the taxes were assessed on land.[3]

[Footnote 1: This error may be traced to the French commentator on RIBEYRO's _History of Ceylon_, who describes the fish-hook money in use in the kingdom of Kandy, whilst the Portuguese held the low country, as so simple in its form that every man might make it for himself: "Le Roy de Candy avoit aussi permis á ses peuples de se servir d'une _monnoye_ que chacun peut fabriquer."--Ch. x. p. 81.]

[Footnote 2: "Les larins sont tout-à-fait commodes et nécessaires dans les Indes, surtout pour acheter du poivre à Cochin, où l'on en fait grand état."--_Voyage aux Indes Orientales._ Amsterdam, A.D. 1716, vol. vi. p. 626.]

[Footnote 3: Rock-inscription at Dambool, A.D. 1200. The _Rajavali_ mentions the _ridis_ as in circulation in Ceylon at the period of the arrival of the Portuguese, A.D. 1505.--P. 278.]

In India they are called _larins_, and money in imitation of them, struck by the princes of Bijapur and by Sivaji, the founder of the Mahrattas, was in circulation in the Dekkan as late as the seventeenth century.[1]

[Footnote 1: Prof. WILSON'S _Remarks on Fish-hook Money, Numism. Chronic._ 1854, p. 181.]

CHAP. VI.

ENGINEERING.

It has already been shown[1] that the natives of Ceylon received their earliest instruction in engineering from the Brahmans, who attached themselves to the followers of Wijayo and his immediate successors.[2] But whilst astonished at the vastness of conception observable in the works executed at this early period, we are equally struck by the extreme simplicity of the means employed by their designers for carrying their plans into execution; and the absence of all ingenious expedients for husbanding or effectively applying manual labour. The earth which forms their prodigious embankments was carried in baskets[3] by the labourers, in the same primitive fashion which prevails to the present day. Stones were detached in the quarry by the slow and laborious process of wedging, of which they still exhibit the traces; and those intended for prominent positions were carefully dressed with iron tools. For moving them no mechanical contrivances were resorted to[4], and it can only have been by animal power, aided by ropes and rollers, that vast blocks like the great tablet at Pollanarrua were dragged to their required positions.[5]

[Footnote 1: See Vol. I. Part IV. chap. ii. p. 430.]

[Footnote 2: King Pandukábhaya, B.C. 437, "built a residence for the Brahman Jótiyo, the chief engineer."--_Mahawanso_, ch. x. p. 66.]

[Footnote 3: _Mahawanso_, ch. xxiii. p. 144.]

[Footnote 4: The only instance of mechanism applied in aid of human labour is referred to in a passage of the _Mahawanso_, which alludes to a decree for "raising the water of the Abhaya tank by means of machinery," in order to pour it over a dagoba during the solemnisation of a festival, B.C. 20.--_Mahawanso_, ch. xxxiv. p. 211; _Rajaratnacari_, p. 51.]

[Footnote 5: No document is better calculated to Impress the reader with a due appreciation of the indomitable perseverance of the Singhalese in works of engineering than the able report of Messrs. ADAMS, CHURCHILL, and BAILEY, on the great _Canal from Ellahara to Gantalawa_, appended to the Ceylon Calendar for 1857.]

_Fortifications_.--Of military engineering the Singhalese had a very slight knowledge. Walled towns and fortifications are frequently spoken of, but the ascertained difficulty of raising, squaring, or carrying stones, points to the inference which is justified by the expressions of the ancient chronicles, that the walls they allude to, must have been earthworks[1], and that the strength of their fortified places consisted in their inaccessibility. The first recorded attempt at fortification was made by the Malabars in the second century before Christ for the defence of Wijitta-poora, which is described as having been secured by walls, a fosse, and a gate.[2] Elala about the same period built "thirty-two bulwarks" at Anarajapoora[3]; and Dutugaimunu, in commencing to besiege him in the city, followed his example, by throwing up a "fortification in an open plain," at a spot well provided with wood and water.[4]

[Footnote 1: Makalantissa, who reigned B.C. 41, "built a rampart seven cubits high, and dug a ditch round the capital."--_Mahawanso_, ch. xxxiv. p. 210.]

[Footnote 2: _Rajavali_, p. 212; _Mahawanso_, ch. xxv. p. 151.]

[Footnote 3: _Rajavali_, p. 187.]

[Footnote 4: _Rajavali_, p. 216; _Mahawanso_ ch. xxv. p. 152.]

At a later time, the Malabars, when in possession of the northern portion of the island, formed a chain of strong "forts" from the eastern to the western coast, and the Singhalese, in imitation of them, occupied similar positions. The most striking example of mediæval fortification which still survives, is the imperishable rock of Sigiri, north-east of Dambool, to which the infamous Kassyapa retired with his treasures, after the assassination of his father, King Dhatu Sena, A.D. 459; when having cleared its vicinity, and surrounded it by a rampart, the figures of lions with which he decorated it, obtained for it the name of Sihagiri, the "Lion-rock." But the real defences of Sigiri were its precipitous cliffs, and its naturally scarped walls, which it was not necessary to strengthen by any artificial structures.

Their rocky hills, and the almost impenetrable forests which enveloped them, were in every age the chief security of the Singhalese; and so late as the 12th century, the inscription engraved on the rock at Dambool, in describing the strength of the national defences under the King Kirti Nissanga, enumerates them as "strongholds in the midst of forests, and those upon steep hills, and the fastnesses surrounded by water."[1]

[Footnote 1: TURNOUR'S _Epitome and Appendix_, p. 95.]

_Thorn-gates._--The device, retained down to the period of the capture of Kandy by the British, when the passes into the hill country were defended by thick plantations of formidable thorny trees, appears to have prevailed in the earliest times. The protection of Mahelo, a town assailed by Dutugaimunu, B.C. 162, consisting in its being "surrounded on all sides with the thorny _dadambo_ creeper, within which was a triple line of fortifications."[1]

[Footnote 1: _Mahawanso_, ch. xxv. p. 153. When Albuquerque attacked Malacca in A.D. 1511, the chief who defended the place "covered the streets with poisoned thorns, to gore the Portuguese coming in" FARIA Y SOUZA, vol. i. p. 180. VALENTYN, in speaking of the dominions of the King of Kandy during the Dutch occupation of the Low Country, describes the density of the forests, "which not only serve to divide the earldoms one from another, but, above all, tend to the fortification of the country, on which account no one dare, on pain of death, to thin or root out a tree, more than to permit a passage for one man at a time, it being impossible to pass through the rest thereof."--VALENTYN, _Oud en Nieuw Oost-Indien, &c._, ch. i. p. 22. KNOX gives a curious account of these "thorn-gates." (Part ii. ch. vi. p. 45.)]

_Bridges_.--As to bridges, Ceylon had none till the end of the 13th century[1], and Turnour conjectures that even then they were only formed of timber, like the Pons Sublidus at Rome. At a later period stone pillars were used in pairs, on which beams or slabs were horizontally rested, in order to form a roadway [2], in the same manner that Herodotus describes the most ancient bridge on record, which was constructed by Queen Nitocris, at Babylon; the planks being laid during the day and lifted again at night, for the security of the city.[3] The principle of the arch appears never to have been employed in bridge building. Ferries, and the taxes on crossing by them, are alluded to down to a very late period amongst other sources of revenue.[4]

[Footnote 1: TURNOUR'S _Epitome_ and _Notes_, p. 72. Major Forbes says, however, there is reason to believe that the remains of stone piers across the Kalawa-oya, on the line between Kornegalle and Anarajapoora, are the ruins of the bridge erected by King Maha Sen, A.D. 301.]

[Footnote 2: _Mahawanso_, ch. lxxxv. UPHAM'S translation, pp. 340,349; _Rajaratnacari_, pp. 104, 131. The bridge on the Wanny hereafter described (see vol. ii p. 474) was thus constructed.]

[Footnote 3: Herodotus, i. 186.]

[Footnote 4: _Mahawanso_, ch. xxiii. pp. 136, 138, ch. xxv. p. 150; _Rajaratnacari_, p. 112.]

In forming the bunds of their reservoirs and of the stone dams which they drew across the rivers that were to supply them with water, they were accustomed, with incredible toil, infinitely increased by the imperfection of tools and implements, to work a raised moulding in front of the blocks of stone, so that each course was retained in position, not alone by its own weight, but by the difficulty of forcing it forward by pressure from behind.

The conduits by which the accumulated waters were distributed, required to be constructed under the bed of the lake, so that the egress should be certain and equal[1], as long as any water remained in the tank. To effect this, they were cut in many instances through solid granite; and their ruins present singular illustrations of determined perseverance, undeterred by the most discouraging difficulties, and unrelieved by the slightest appliance of ingenuity to diminish the toil of excavation.

[Footnote 1: The Lake of Albano presents an example of a conduit or "emissary" of this peculiar construction to draw off the water. It is upwards of 6000 feet in length. A similar emissary serves a like purpose at Lake Nemi.]

It cannot but exalt our opinion of a people, to find that, under disadvantages so signal, they were capable of forming such a work as the Kalaweva tank, between Anarajapoora and Dambool, which TURNOUR justly says, is the greatest of the ancient works in Ceylon. This enormous reservoir was forty miles in circumference, with an embankment twelve miles in extent, and the spill-water, ineffectual for the purpose designed, is "one of the most stupendous monuments of misapplied human labour."[1]

[Footnote 1: TURNOUR'S _Mahawanso_, Index, p. xi. This stupendous work was constructed A.D. 459. _Mahawanso_, ch. xxxviii. p. 256.]

When to such inherent deficiencies were added the alarms of frequent invasion and all the evils of almost incessant occupation by a foreign enemy, it is only surprising that the Singhalese preserved so long the degree of expertness in engineering to which they had originally attained. No people in any age or country had so great practice and experience in the construction of works for irrigation; and so far had the renown of their excellence in this branch reached, that in the eighth century, the king of Kashmir, Djaya-pida, "sent to Ceylon for engineers to form a lake."[1] But after the reign of Prakrama I., the decline was palpable and progressive. No great works, either of ornament or utility, no temples nor inland lakes, were constructed by his successors; and it is remarkable, that even during his own reign, artificers were brought from the coast of India to repair the monuments of Anarajapoora.[2] The last great work attempted for irrigation was probably the Giant's Tank, north-east of Aripo; but so much had practical science declined, that after an enormous expenditure of labour in damming up the Moeselley river, whose waters were to have been diverted to the lake, it was discovered that the levels were unsuitable, and the work was abandoned in despair.[3]

[Footnote 1: A.D. 745. _Rajataringini_, b. iv. sl. 502, 505.]

[Footnote 2: _Mahawanso_, UPHAM'S transl., ch. lxxv. p. 294. This passage in the _Mahawanso_ might seem to imply that it was as an act of retribution that Malabars, by whom the monuments had been injured, were compelled to restore them. But in ch. lxxvii. it is stated that they were brought from India for this purpose, because it "had been found impracticable by other kings to renew and repair them."--P. 305.]

[Footnote 3: For an account of the present condition of the Giant's Tank, see Vol. II. Part x. ch. ii.]

The talents of the civil engineer were likewise employed in providing for the health and comfort of their towns and the _Dipawanso_, a chronicle earlier in point of date than the _Mahawanso_, relates that Wasabha, who reigned between A.D. 66 and 110, constructed a tunnel ("um-maggo") for the purpose of supplying Anarajapoora with water.[1]

[Footnote 1: _Journ. Asiat. Soc. Beng._ vol. vii. p. 933.]

CHAP. VII.

THE FINE ARTS.

MUSIC.--The science and practice of the fine arts were never very highly developed amongst a people whose domestic refinement became arrested at a very early stage; and whose efforts in that direction were almost wholly confined to the exaltation of the national faith, and the embellishment of its temples and monuments.

Their knowledge of music was derived from the Hindus, by whom its study was regarded as of equal importance with that of medicine and astronomy; and hence amongst the early Singhalese, along with the other "eighteen sciences,"[1] music was taught as an essential part of the education of a prince.[2]

[Footnote 1: This fact is curious, seeing that at the present day the cultivation of music belongs to one of the lowest castes in Ceylon.]

[Footnote 2: _Mahawanso_, ch. lxiv.; UPHAM'S version, p. 256. An ingenious paper on _Singhalese Music_, by Mr. Louis Nell, is printed in the _Journ._ of the Ceylon branch of the _Roy. Asiat. Soc._ for 1856-8; p. 200.]

But unlike the soft melodies of Hindustan, whose characteristic is their gentle and soothing effect, the music of the Singhalese appears to have consisted of sound rather than of harmony; modulation and expression having been at all times subordinate to volume and metrical effect.

Reverberating instruments were their earliest inventions for musical purposes, and those most frequently alluded to in their chronicles are drums, resembling the tom-toms used in the temples to the present day. The same variety of form prevailed then as now, and the _Rajavali_ relates, in speaking of the army of Dutugaimunu, that in its march, the "rattling of the sixty-four kinds of drums made a noise resembling thunder breaking on the rock from behind which the sun rises."[1] The band of Devenipiatissa, B.C. 307, was called the _talawachara_, from the multitude of drums[2]: chank-shells contributed to swell the din, both in warfare[3] and in religious worship[4]; choristers added their voices[5]; and the triumph of effect consisted in "the united crash of every description, vocal as well as instrumental"[6] Although "a full band" is explained in the _Mahawanso_ to imply a combination of "all descriptions of musicians," no flutes or wind instruments are particularised, and the incidental mention of a harp only occurs in the reign of Dutugaimunu, B.C. 161.[7] JOINVILLE says, that certain musical principles were acknowledged in Ceylon at an early period, and that pieces are to be seen in some of the old Pali books in regular notation; the gamut, which was termed _septa souere_, consisting of seven notes, and expressed not by signs, but in letters equivalent to their pronunciation, _sa, ri, ga, me, qa, de, ni._[8] At the present day, harmony is still superseded by sound, the singing of the Singhalese being a nasal whine, not unlike that of the Arabs. Flutes, almost insusceptible of modulation, chanks, which give forth a piercing scream, and the overpowering roll of tom-toms, constitute the music of the temples; and all day long the women of a family will sit round a species of timbrel, called _rabani_, and produce from it the most monotonous, but to their ear, most agreeable noises, by drumming with the fingers.

[Footnote 1: _Rajavali_, pp. 217, 219. At the present day, there are four or five varieties of drums in use:--the tom-tom or _tam-a-tom_, properly so-called, which consists of two cylinders placed side by side, and is beaten with two sticks;--the _daelle_, a single cylinder struck with a stick at one end, and with the hand at the other,--the _oudaelle_, which is held in the left hand, and struck with the right;--and the _berri_, which is suspended from the beater's neck, and struck with both hands, one at each end, precisely as a similar instrument is shown in some of the Egyptian monuments.

[Footnote 2: _Mahawanso_, ch. xvii, p. 104.]

[Footnote 3: B.C. 161. _Mahawanso_, ch. xxv, p. 154.]

[Footnote 4: B.C. 20. _Rajavali_, p. 51.]

[Footnote 5: _Mahawanso_, ch. xxv. p. 157.]

[Footnote 6: _Mahawanso_, ch. xxvi. 186.]

[Footnote 7: _Mahawanso_, ch. xxx. p. 180. The following passage in UPHAM'S translation of the _Mahawanso_, ch. lxxii. vol. i. p. 274, would convey the idea that the Æolian harp was meant, or some arrangement of strings calculated to elicit similar sounds:--"The king Prakrama built a palace at the city of Pollanarrua; and the stone works were carved in the shape of flowers and creeping plants, _with golden networks which gave harmonious sounds as if they were moved by the air_."]

[Footnote 8: JOINVILLE, _Asiat. Researches_, vol. vii. p. 488.]

_Painting_.--Painting, whether historical or imaginative, is only mentioned in connection with the decoration of temples, and no examples survive of sufficient antiquity to exhibit the actual state of the art at any remote period. But enough is known of the trammels imposed upon all art, to show that from the earliest times, imagination and invention were prohibited by the priesthood; and although execution and facility may have varied at different eras, design and composition were stationary and unalterable.

Like the priesthood of Egypt, those of Ceylon regulated the mode of delineating the effigies of their divine teacher, by a rigid formulary, with which they combined corresponding directions for the drawing of the human figure in connection with sacred subjects. In the relics of Egyptian painting and sculpture, we find "that the same formal outline, the same attitudes and postures of the body, the same conventional modes of representing the different parts, were adhered to at the latest, as at the earliest periods. No improvements were admitted; no attempts to copy nature or to give an air of action to the limbs. Certain rules and certain models had been established by law, and the faulty conceptions of early times were copied and perpetuated by every succeeding artist."[1]

[Footnote 1: SIR GARDNER WILKINSON'S _Ancient Egyptians_, vol. iii. ch. x. p. 87, 264.]

The same observations apply, almost in the same terms, to the paintings of the Singhalese. The historical delineations of the exploits of Gotama Buddha and of his disciples and attendants, which at the present day cover the walls of the temples and wiharas, follow, with rigid minuteness, pre-existing illustrations of the sacred narratives. They appear to have been copied, with a devout adherence to colour, costume, and detail, from designs which from time immemorial have represented the same subjects; and emaciated ascetics, distorted devotees, beatified simpletons, and malefactors in torment are depicted with a painful fidelity, akin to modern pre-Raphaelitism.

Owing to this discouragement of invention, one series of pictures is so servile an imitation of another, that design has never improved in Ceylon; one scene is but the facsimile of a previous one, and each may almost be regarded as an exponent of the state of the art at any preceding period.[1]

[Footnote 1: The Egyptians and Singhalese were not, however, the only authorities who overwhelmed invention by ecclesiastical conventionalism. The early artists of Greece were not at liberty to follow the bent of their own genius, or to depart from established regulations in representing the figures of the gods. In the middle ages, the influence of the churches, both of Rome and Byzantium, was productive of a similar result; and although the Latins early emancipated themselves, the painters of the Greek church, to the present hour, labour under the identical trammels which crippled art at Constantinople a thousand years ago. M. DIDRON, who visited the churches and monasteries of Greece in 1839, makes the remark that "ni le temps ni le lieu ne font rien à l'art Grec: au XVIIIe siècle, le peintre Moréote continue et calque le peintre Vénétien du Xe, le peintre Athonite du Ve ou VIe. Le costume des personnages est partout et en tout temps le même, non-seulement pour la forme, mais pour la couleur, mais pour le dessin, mais jusque pour le nombre et l'épaisseur des plis. On ne saurait pousser plus loin l'exactitude traditionnelle, l'esclavage du passé." _(Manuel d' Iconographie Chrétienne Grecque et Latin_, p. ix.) The explanation of this fact is striking. Mount Athos is the grand manufactory of pictures for the Greek churches throughout the world; and M. DIDRON found the artists producing, with the servility and almost the rapidity of machinery, endless facsimiles of pictures in rigid conformity with a recognised code of instructions drawn up under ecclesiastical authority and entitled [Greek: Ermêneia tês Zographikês], "The Guide for Painting," a literal translation of which he has published. This very curious manuscript contains minute directions for the figures, costume, and attitude of the sacred characters, and for the preparation of many hundreds of historical subjects required for the decoration of churches. The artist, when solicited by M. Didron to sell "cette bible de son art," naively refused, on the simple ground that "s'il se dépouillait de ce livre, il ne pourrait plus rien faire; en perdaut son Guide, il perdait son art, il perdait ses yeux et ses mains" (_ib_. p. xxiii.). It was not till the fifteenth century that the painters of Italy shook themselves free of the authority of the Latin church in matters of art. The second council of Nice arrogates to the Roman church the authority in such matters still retained by the Greek; "non est imaginum structura pictorum inventio sed ecclesiæ catholicæ probata legislatio et traditio." In Spain, the sacro-pictorial law, under the title of _Pictor Christianus_, was promulgated, in 1730, by Fray Juan de Ayala, a monk of the order of Mercy; and such subjects are discussed as the shape of the true cross; whether one or two angels should sit on the stone by the sepulchre? and whether the Devil should be drawn with horns and a tail? In the National Gallery of London there is a painting of the Holy Family by Benozzo Gozzoli, and Sir Charles L. Eastlake has permitted me to see a contract between the painter and his employer A.D. 1461, in which every figure is literally "made to order," its attitude bespoke, and its place in the composition distinctly agreed for. One clause, however, contemplates progress, and binds the painter to make the piece his chef-d'oeuvre--"che detta dipentura exceda ogni buona dipintura infino aqui facto per detto Benozzo."]

Hence even the most modern embellishments in the temples have an air of remote antiquity. The colours are tempered with gum; and but for their inferiority in drawing the human figure, as compared with the Egyptians, and their defiance of the laws of perspective, their inharmonious tints, coupled with the whiteness of the ground-work, would remind one of similar peculiarities in the paintings in the Thebaid, and the caves of Beni Hassan.

Fa Hian describes in the fourth century precisely the same series of subjects and designs which are delineated in the temples of the present day, and taken from the transformation of Buddha. With hundreds of these, he says, painted in appropriate colours and executed in imitation of life, the king caused both sides of the road to be decorated on the occasion of religious processions.[1]

[Footnote 1: _Foe Koue Ki_, ch. xxxviii. p. 335.]

Amongst the most renowned of the Singhalese masters, was the King Detu Tissa, A.D. 330, "a skilful carver, who executed many arduous undertakings in painting, and taught it to his subjects. He modelled a statue of Buddha so exquisitely that he seemed to have been inspired; and for it he made an altar, and gilt an edifice inlaid with ivory."[1] Among the presents sent by the King of Ceylon (A.D. 459) to the Emperor of China, the _Tsih foo yuen kwei_, a chronicle compiled by imperial command, particularises a picture of Buddha.[2] The colours employed in decorating their temples are mixed in _tempera_, as were those used in the ancient paintings in Egypt; the claim of the Singhalese to the priority of invention in the mixture of colours with oil, is adverted to elsewhere.[3]

[Footnote 1: _Mahawanso_, ch. xxxvii. p. 242.]

[Footnote 2: B. li. p. 7.]

[Footnote 3: See the chapter on the Fine Arts, Vol. I. p. 490.]

_Sculpture_.--In style Singhalese sculpture was even more conventional and less imaginative than their painting; since the subjects to which it was confined were almost exclusively statues of Buddha[1], and its efforts were mere repetitions of the three orthodox attitudes of the great archetype--_sitting_, as when in deep meditation, under the sacred Bo-tree; _standing_, as when exhorting his multitudinous disciples; and _reclining_, in the enjoyment of the everlasting repose of "nirwana." In each and all of these the details are identical; the length of the ears, the proportions of the arms, fingers, and toes; the colour of the eyes, and the curls of the hair[2] being repeated with wearisome iteration. To such an extent were these multiplied, and with an adherence so rigid to the same recognised models, that the _Rajavali_ ventures to ascribe to one king the erection of "seventy-two thousand statues of Buddha," an obvious error[3], but indicative, nevertheless, that the real amount must have been prodigious, in order to obtain credence for the exaggeration. Many other sovereigns are extolled in the national annals, who rendered their reigns illustrious by the multiplicity of statues which they placed in the temples. It was doubtless from this incessant study of one and the same figure, that the artists of Ceylon attained to a facility and superiority in producing statues of Buddha, that rendered them famous throughout the countries of Asia, in which his religion prevailed. The early historians of China speak in raptures of works of this kind, obtained from Singhalese sculptors in the fourth and fifth centuries; they were eagerly sought after by all the surrounding nations; and one peculiarity in their execution consisted in so treating the features, that "on standing at about ten paces distant they appeared truly brilliant, but the lineaments gradually disappeared on a nearer approach."[4]

[Footnote 1: Mention is made of a figure of an elephant (_Rajavali_, p. 242), and of a horse (_Mahawanso_, ch. xxxix. TURNOUR'S manuscript translation), and a carved bull as amongst the ruins of Anarajapoora.]

[Footnote 2: M. ABEL REMUSAT has devoted a section of his _Melanges Asiatiques_, 1825; vol. i. p. 100, to combating the conjecture of Sir W. JONES in his third Dissertation on the Hindus, drawn from the curled or rather the woolly hair represented in his statues, that Buddha drew his descent from an African origin. (_Works_, vol. i. p, 12.) Another ground for Sir. W. JONES'S conjecture was the _large ears_ which are usually characteristic of the statues of Buddha. But it is curious that one of the peculiar features ascribed to the Singhalese by the early Greek writers was the possession of pendulous ears, possibly occasioned by their heavy ear-rings.]

[Footnote 3: _Rajavali_, p. 255. Most of these were built of terra-cotta and cement covered with chunam, preparatory to being painted. See p. 478.]

[Footnote 4: _Wei shoo_, a "History of the Wei Tartar Dynasty," written A.D. 590. B. cxiv. p. 9.]

The labours of the sculptor and painter were combined in producing these images of Buddha, which are always coloured in imitation of life, each tint of his complexion and hair being in religious conformity with divine authority, and the ceremony of "painting of the eyes,"[1] is always observed by the devout Buddhists as a solemn festival.

[Footnote 1: _Mahawanso_, ch. lxxii.; UPHAM'S version, vol. i. p. 275.]

Many of the works which were thus executed were either golden[1] or gilt, with brilliants inserted in the eyes, and the draperies enriched with jewels.[2] Fa Hian in the fourth century, speaks of a figure of Buddha upwards of twenty-three feet in height, formed out of blue jasper, and set with precious stones, that sparkled with singular splendour, and which bore in its right hand a pearl of priceless value.[3] This may possibly have been the statue of which the _Mahawanso_ speaks in like terms of admiration: "the eye formed by a jewel from the royal head-dress, each curl of the hair by a sapphire, and the lock in the centre of the forehead by threads of gold."[4]

[Footnote 1: _Mahawanso_, ch. xxx. pp. 180, 182; _Rajaratnacari_, pp. 47, 48; _Rajavali_, p. 237.]

[Footnote 2: _Mahawanso_, ch. xxxviii. p. 258.]

[Footnote 3: "Parmi toutes les choses précieuses qu'on y voit, il y a une image de jaspe bleu haute de deux _tchang_: tout son corps est formé des sept choses précieuses; elle est étincellante de splendeur et plus majestueuse qu'on ne saurait l'exprimer. Dans la main droite elle tient une perle d'un prix inestimable."--_Foe Koue Ki_, ch. xxxviii. p. 333.]

[Footnote 4: A.D. 459. _Mahawanso_, ch. xxxviii. p. 258. Another statue of gold, with the features and members appropriately coloured in gems, is spoken of in the second century B.C. (_Mahawanso_, ch. xxx. p. 180.)]

Ivory also and sandal-wood[1], as well as copper and bronze, served as materials for statues; but granite was the substance most generally selected, except in the rare instances where the temple and the statue together were hewn out of the living rock, on which occasions gneiss was most generally selected. Such are the statues at Pollanarrua, at Mihintala, and at the Aukana Wihara, near Wijittapoora. A still more common expedient, which is employed to the present time, was to form the figures of Buddha with pieces of burnt clay joined together by cement; and coated with highly polished chunam, in order to prepare the surface for the painter. In this manner were most probably produced the "seventy-two thousand statues" ascribed to Mihindo V.

[Footnote 1: _Rajaratnacari_, p. 72.]

Figures of elephants were similarly formed at an early period.[1] An image of Buddha so composed in the 12th century, is still standing at Pollanarrua[2], and every temple has one or more effigies, either sedent, erect, or recumbent, carefully modelled in cemented clay, and coloured after life.

[Footnote 1: A.D. 432. _Rajaratnacari_, p. 74.]

[Footnote 2: Possibly the "standing figure of Buddha" mentioned in the _Rajavali_, p. 253.]

_Architecture_.--In Ceylon, as in Egypt, Assyria, and India, the ruins which survive to attest the character of ancient architecture are exclusively sacred, with the exception of occasional traces of the residences of theocratic royalty; but everything has perished which could have afforded an idea of the dwellings and domestic architecture of the people. The cause of this is to be traced in the perishable nature of the sun-dried clay, of which the walls of the latter were composed. Added to this, in Ceylon there were the pride of rank and the pretensions of the priesthood, which, whilst they led to lavish expenditure of the wealth of the kingdom upon palaces and monuments, and the employment of stone in the erection of temples[1] and monasteries, forbade the people to construct their dwellings of any other material than sun-baked earth.[2] This practice continued to the latest period; and nothing struck the British army of occupation with more surprise on entering the city of Kandy, after its capture in 1815, than to find the palaces and temples alone constructed of stone, whilst the streets and private houses were formed of mud and thatch.

[Footnote 1: _Rajaratnacari_, pp. 78, 79.]

[Footnote 2: _Rajavali_, p. 222.]

Though stone is abundant in Ceylon, it was but sparingly used in the ancient buildings. Squared stones[1] were occasionally employed, but large slabs seldom occur, except in the foundations of dagobas. The vast quantity of material required for such structures, the cost of quarrying and carriage, and the want of mechanical aids to raise ponderous blocks into position, naturally led to the substitution of bricks for the upper portion of the superstructure.

[Footnote 1: _Rajavali_, p. 210; VALENTYN, _Oud en Nieuw Oost-Indien_, ch. iii. p. 45.]

There is evidence to show that wedges were employed in detaching the blocks in the quarry, and the amount of labour devoted to the preparation of those in which strength, irrespective of ornament, was essential, is shown in the remains of the sixteen hundred undressed pillars[1] which supported the Brazen Palace at Anarajapoora, and in the eighteen hundred stone steps, many of them exceeding ten feet in length, which led from the base of the mountain to the very summit of Mihintala. A single piece of granite lies at Anarajapoora hollowed into an "elephant trough," with ornamental pilasters, which measures ten feet in length by six wide and two deep; and amongst the ruins of Pollanarrua a still more remarkable slab, twenty-five feet in length by six broad and two feet thick, bears an inscription of the twelfth century, which records that it was brought from a distance of more than thirty miles.

[Footnote 1: The _Rajavali_ states that these rough pillars were originally covered with copper, p. 222.]

The majority of the columns at Anarajapoora are of dressed stone, octangular and of extremely graceful proportions. They were used in profusion to form circular colonnades around the principal dagobas, and the vast numbers which still remain upright, are one of the peculiar characteristics of the place, and justify the expression of Knox, when, speaking of similar groups elsewhere, he calls them a "world of hewn stone pillars."[1]

[Footnote 1: Knox, _Relation_, vol. v. pt. iv. ch. ii. p. 165.]

Allusions in the _Mahawanso_ show that extreme care was taken in the preparation of bricks for the dagobas.[1] Major SKINNER, whose official duties as engineer to the government have rendered him familiar with all parts of Ceylon, assures me that the bricks in every ruin he has seen, including the dagobas at Anarajapoora, Bintenne, and Pollanarrua, have been fired with so much skill that exposure through successive centuries has but slightly affected their sharpness and consistency.

[Footnote 1: _Mahawanso_, ch. xxviii. p. 165; ch. xxix. p. 169, &c.]

The sand for mortar was "pounded, sifted, and ground on a grinding-stone;"[1] the "cloud-coloured stones,"[2] used to form the immediate receptacle in which a sacred relic was enclosed, were said to have been imported from India; and the "nawanita" clay, in which these were imbedded, was believed to have been brought from the mythical Anotattho lake in the Himalayas.[3]

[Footnote 1: _Mahawanso_, ch. xxx. p. 175.]

[Footnote 2: The "cloud-coloured stone" may possibly have been marble, but no traces of marble have been found in the ruins. Diodorus, in describing some of the monuments of Egypt alludes to a "party-coloured" stone, [Greek: lithon poikilon], which likewise remains without identification.--_Diodorus_, l. i. c. lvii.]

[Footnote 3: _Mahawanso_, ch. xxix. p. 169; ch. xxx. p. 179.]

_Dagobas_.--The process of building the Ruanwellé dagoba is thus minutely described in the _Mahawanso_: "That the structure might endure for ages, a foundation was excavated to the depth of one hundred cubits, and the round stones were trampled by enormous elephants, whose feet were protected by leather cases. Over this the monarch spread the sacred clay, and on it laid the bricks, and over them a coating of astringent cement, above this a layer of sand-stones, and on all a plate of iron. Over this was a large pholika (crystallised stone), then a plate of brass, eight inches thick, embedded in a cement made of the gum of the wood-apple tree, diluted in the water of the small red coco-nut."[1]

[Footnote 1: _Mahawanso_, ch. xxix. p. 169; ch. xxx. p. 178. The internal structure of the Sanchi tope at Bilsah in Central India presents the arrangement here described, _the bricks being laid in mud_, but externally it is faced with dressed stone.]

The shape of these huge mounds of masonry was originally hemispherical, being that best calculated to prevent the growth of grass or other weeds on objects so sacred. Dutugaimumi, according to the _Mahawanso_, when about to build the Ruanwellé dagoba, consulted a mason as to the most suitable form, who, "filling a golden dish with water, and taking some in the palm of his hand, caused a bubble in the form of a coral bead to rise on the surface; and he replied to the king, 'In this form will I construct it.'"[1]

[Footnote 1: _Mahawanso_, ch. xxx. p. 175. This legend as to the origin of the semicircular form of the dagoba is at variance with the conjecture of Major FORBES, that these vast structures were merely an advance on the mounds of earth similar to the barrow of Halyattes, which in the progress of the constructive arts, came to be converted into brickwork.--_Eleven Years in Ceylon_, v. i. p. 222.]

Two dagobas at Anarajapoora, the Abay-a-giri and Jeyta-wana-rama, still retain their original outline,--the Ruanwellé, from age and decay, has partly lost it,--and the Thupa-ramaya is flattened on the top as if suddenly brought to a close, and the Lanka-ramaya is shaped like a bell.

_Monasteries and Wiharas._--According to the annals of Ceylon the construction of dwellings for the devotees of Buddha preceded the erection of temples for his worship. Originally the anchorite selected a cave or some shelter in the forest as his place of repose or meditation.[1] In the _Rajavali_ Devenipiatissa is said to have "caused caverns to be cut in the solid rock at the sacred place of Mihintala;"[2] and these are the earliest residences for the higher orders of the priesthood in Ceylon, of which a record has been preserved. A less costly substitute was found in the erection of detached huts of the rudest construction, in winch may be traced the embryo of the Buddhist monastery; and the king Walagambahu was the first, B.C. 89, to gather these scattered residences into groups and "build wiharas in unbroken ranges, conceiving that thus their repairs would be more easily effected."[3]

[Footnote 1: _Mahawanso_ c. xxx. p. 174.]

[Footnote 2: _Rajavali_, p. 184.]

[Footnote 3: _Mahawanso_, ch. xxxiii. p. 207.]

Simplicity and retirement were at all times the characteristics of these retreats, which rarely aspired to architectural display; and the only recorded instance of extravagance in this particular was the "Brazen Palace" at Anarajapoora, with its sixteen hundred columns; an edifice which, though nominally a dwelling for the priesthood, appears to have been in reality a vast suite of halls for their assemblies and festivals, and a sanctuary for the safe custody of their jewels and treasure.[1]

[Footnote 1: _Mahawanso_, ch, xxvii. p. 103. Like the "nine-storied" pagodas of China, the palace of "the Lowa Maya Paya" was originally _nine stories_ in height, and Fergusson, from the analogy of Buddhist buildings in other countries, supposes that these diminished in succession as the building arose, till the outline of the whole assumed the form of a pyramid. _(Handbook of Architecture_, b. i. ch. iii. p. 44.) In this he is undoubtedly correct, and a building still existing, though in ruins, at Pollanarrua, and known as the _Sat-mal-pasado_, or the _"seven-storied palace_," probably built by Prakrama, about the year 1170, serves to support his conjecture. See a description of it, part x. ch. i, vol. ii.]

Allusions are occasionally made to other edifices more or less fantastic in their design and structure, such as "an apartment built on a single pillar,"[1] a "house of an octangular form," built in the 12th century[2], and another of an "oval," shape[3], erected by Prakrama I.

[Footnote 1: B.C. 504, _Mahawanso_, ch. ix, p. 56; ch. lxxii. UPHAM'S version, p. 274.]

[Footnote 2: _Rajaratnacari_, p. 105.]

[Footnote 3: _Mahawanso_, ch. lxxii, UPHAM'S version, p. 274.]

_Palaces_.--The royal residences as they were first constructed, must have consisted of very few chambers, since mention is made in the _Mahawanso_ of the earliest, which contained "many apartments," having been built by Pandukábhaya, B.C. 437.[1] But within two centuries afterwards, Dutugaimunu conceived the magnificent idea of the Loha Pasada, with its quadrangle one hundred cubits square, and a thousand dormitories with ornamental windows.[2] This palace was in its turn surpassed by the castle of Prakrama I. at Pollanarrua, which, according to the _Mahawanso_, "was seven stories high, consisting of five thousand rooms, lined with hundreds of stone columns, and outer halls of an oval shape, with large and small gates, staircases, and glittering walls."[3]

[Footnote 1: Ibid., ch. x. p. 66.]

[Footnote 2: Ibid., ch. xxvii, p. 163.]

[Footnote 3: _Mahawanso_, ch. lxxii. UPHAM'S version, p. 274.]

In what now remains of these buildings at Anarajapoora, there is no trace to be found of an arch, truly turned and secured by its keystone; but at Pollanarrua there are several examples of the false arch, produced by the progressive projection of the layers of brick.[1]

[Footnote 1: FORBES'S _Eleven Years in Ceylon_, vol. i. ch. xvii. p. 414.]

The finest specimens of ancient brickwork are to be seen amongst the ruins of the latter city, where the material is compact and smooth, and the edges sharp and unworn. The mortar shows the remains of the pearl oyster-shells from which it was burnt, and the chunam with which the walls were coated, still clings to some of the towers, and retains its angularity and polish.[1]

[Footnote 1: Expressions in the _Mahawanso_, ch. xxvii. p. 104, show that as early as the 2nd century, B.C., the Singhalese were acquainted with this beautiful cement, which is susceptible of a polish almost equal to marble.]

Of the details of external and internal decoration applied to these buildings, descriptions are given which attest a perception of taste, however distorted by the exaggerations of oriental design. "Gilded tiles"[1] in their bright and sunny atmosphere, must have had a striking effect, especially when surmounting walls decorated with beaded mouldings, and festooned with "carvings in imitation of creeping plants and flowers."[2]

[Footnote 1: _Rajavali_, p. 73.]

[Footnote 2: _Mahawanso_, ch. lxxii. p. 274.]

_Carving in stone._--Carving appears to have been practised at a very early period with singular success; but in later times it became so deteriorated, that there is little difficulty at the present day, in pronouncing on the superiority of the specimens remaining at Anarajapoora, over those which are to be found amongst the ruins of the later capitals, Pollanarrua, Yapahu, or Komegalle. The author of the _Mahawanso_ dwells with obvious satisfaction on his descriptions of the "stones covered with flowers and creeping plants."[1] Animals are constantly introduced in the designs executed on stone, and a mythical creature, called technically _makara-torana_, is conspicuous, especially on doorways and balustrades, with the head of an elephant, the teeth of a crocodile, the feet of a lion, and the tail of a fish.

[Footnote 1: _Mahawanso_, ch. lxxii. p. 274, UPHAM'S version.]

At the entrance to the great wihara, at Anarajapoora, there is now lying on the ground a semi-circular slab of granite, the ornaments of which are designed in excellent taste, and executed with singular skill; elephants, lions, horses, and oxen, forming the outer border; that within consisting of a row of the "hanza," or sacred goose; a bird that is equally conspicuous on the vast tablet, one of the wonders of Pollanarrua, before alluded to.[1]

[Footnote 1: A sketch of this stone will be seen in the engraving of the Sat-mal-prasada, in the account of Pollanarrua. Part I. ch. i. vol. ii.]

Taken in connection with the proverbial contempt for the supposed stolidity of the _goose_, there is something still unexplained in the extraordinary honours paid to it by the ancients, and the veneration in which it is held to the present day by some of the eastern nations. The figure that occurs so frequently on Buddhist monuments, is the Brahmanee goose (_casarka rutila_), which is not a native of Ceylon; but from time immemorial has been an object of veneration there and in all parts of India. Amongst the Buddhists especially, impressed as they are with the solemn obligation of solitary retirement for meditation, the hanza has attracted attention by its periodical migrations, which are supposed to be directed to the holy Lake of Manasa, in the mythical regions of the Himalaya. The poet Kalidas, in his _Cloud Messenger_, speaks of the hanza as "eager to set out for the Sacred Lake." Hence, according to the _Rajavali_, the lion was pre-eminent amongst beasts, "the _hanza_ was king over all the feathered tribes."[1] In one of the Jatakas, which contains the legend of Buddha's apotheosis, his hair, when suspended in the sky, is described as resembling "the beautiful Kala hanza."[2] The goose is, at the present day, the national emblem emblazoned on the standard of Burmah, and the brass weights of the Burmese are generally cut in the shape of the sacred bird, just as the Egyptians formed their weights of stone after the same model.[3]

[Footnote 1: _Rajavali_, p. 149. The _Mahawanso_, ch. xxx. p. 179, also speaks of the "_hanza_," as amongst the decorations chased on the stem of a bo-tree, modelled in gold, which was deposited by Dutugaimunu when building the Ruanwellé dagoba at Anarajapoora in the 2nd century before Christ.]

[Footnote 2: HARDY'S _Buddhism_, ch. vii p. 161.]

[Footnote 3: See SYME'S _Embassy to Ava_, p. 330; YULE'S _Narrative of the British Mission to Ava in 1855_, p. 110. I have seen a stone in the form of a goose, found in the ruins of Nineveh, which appears to have been used as a weight.]

Augustine, in his _Civitas Dei_, traces the respect for the goose, displayed by the Romans, to their gratitude for the safety of the capital; when the vigilance of this bird defeated the midnight attack by the Goths. The adulation of the citizens, he says, degenerated afterwards almost to Egyptian superstition, in the rites instituted in honour of their preservers on that occasion.[1] But the very fact that the geese which saved the citadel were already sacred to Juno, and domesticated in her temple, demonstrates the error of Augustine, and shows that they had acquired mythological eminence, before achieving political renown. It must be observed, too, that the birds which rendered that memorable service, were the ordinary white geese of Europe[2], and not the red goose of the Nile (the [Greek: chênalôpêx] of Herodotus), which, ages before, had been enrolled amongst the animals held sacred in Egypt, and which formed the emblem of Seb, the father of Osiris.[3] HORAPOLLO, endeavouring to account for this predilection of the Egyptians (who employed the goose hieroglyphically to denote _a son_), ascribes it to their appreciation of the love evinced by it for its offspring, in exposing itself to divert the attention of the fowler from its young.[4] This opinion was shared by the Greeks and the Romans. Aristotle praises its sagacity; Ælian dilates on the courage and cunning of the "vulpanser," and its singular attachment to man[5]; and Ovid ranks the goose as superior to the dog in the scale of intelligence,--

"Soliciti canes canibusve sagacior anser." OVID, _Met_. xi. 399.

[Footnote 1: "And hereupon did Rome fall almost into the superstition of the Ægyptians that worship birds and beasts, for they _henceforth_ kept a holy day which they call the _goose's feast_."--AUGUSTINE, _Civitas Dei, &c._ book ii. ch. 22: Englished by F.H. Icond. 1610.]

[Footnote 2: This appears from a line of Lucretius:

"Romulidarum arcis servator _candidus_ anser." _De Rer. Nat._ I. iv. 687.]

[Footnote 3: SIR GARDNER WILKINSON'S _Manners and Customs, &c._, 2nd Ser. pl. 31, fig. 2, vol. i. p. 312; vol. ii. p. 227. Mr. Birch of the British Museum informs me that throughout the ritual or hermetic books of the ancient Egyptians a mystical notion is attached to the goose as one of the creatures into which the dead had to undergo a transmigration. That it was actually worshipped is attested by a sepulchral tablet of the 26th dynasty, about 700 B.C., in which it is figured standing on a small chapel over which are the hieroglyphic words, "_The good goose greatly beloved;_" and on the lower part of the tablet the dedicator makes an offering of fire and water to "_Ammon and the Goose._"--_Revue Archæo._, vol. ii. pl. 27.]

[Footnote 4: HORAPOLLO, _Hieroglyphica_, lib. i. 23.]

[Footnote 5: ÆLIAN, _Nat. Hist._, lib. v. c. 29, 30, 50. Ælian says that the Romans in recognition of the superior vigilance of the goose on the occasion of the assault on the Capitol, instituted a procession in the Forum in honour of the goose, whose watchfulness was incorruptible; but held an annual denunciation of the inferior fidelity of the dogs, which allowed themselves to be silenced by meat flung to them by the Gauls.--_Nat. Hist._ lib. xii. ch. xxxiii.]

The feeling appears to have spread westward at an early period; the ancient Britons, according to Cæsar, held it impious to eat the flesh of the goose[1], and the followers of the first crusade which issued from England, France, and Flanders, adored a goat and _a goose_, which they believed to be filled by the Holy Spirit.[2]

[Footnote 1: "Anserem gustare fas non patant."--CÆSAR, _Bell Gall._, lib. v. ch xii.]

[Footnote 2: MILL'S _Hist. of the Crusades_, vol. i. ch. ii. p. 75. Forster has suggested that it was a species of goose (which annually migrates from the Black Sea towards the south) that fed the Israelites in the desert of Sinai, and that the "winged fowls" meant by the word _salu_, which has been heretofore translated "quails," were "red geese," resembling those of Egypt and India. He renders one of the mysterious inscriptions which abound in the Wady Mokatteb (_the Valley of Writings_), "the red geese ascend from the sea,--lusting the people eat to repletion;" thus presenting a striking concurrence with the passage in Numb. xi. 31, "there went forth a wind from the Lord and brought quails (_salu_) from the sea."--FORSTER'S _One Primeval Language_, vol. i. p. 90.]

It is remarkable that the same word appears to designate the goose in the most remote quarters of the globe. The Pali term "_hanza_" by which it was known to the Buddhists of Ceylon, is still the "_henza_" of the Burmese and the "_gangsa_" of the Malays, and is to be traced in the [Greek: "chên"] of the Greeks, the "_anser_" of the Romans, the "_ganso_" of the Portuguese, the "_ansar_" of the Spaniards, the "_gans_" of the Germans (who, PLINY says, called the white geese _ganza_), the "_gas_" of the Swedes, and the "_gander_" of the English.[1]

[Footnote 1: HARDY observes that the ibis of the Nile is called "_Abou-Hansa_" by the Arabs, (_Buddhism_, ch. i. p. 17); but BRUCE (_Trav_. vol. v. p. 172) says the name is _Abou Hannes_ or _Father John_, and that the bird always appears on St. John's day: he implies, however, that this is probably a corruption of an ancient name now lost.]

In the principal apartment of the royal palace at Kandy, now the official residence of the chief civil officer in charge of the province, the sacred bird occurs amongst the decorations, but in such shape as to resemble the dodo rather than the Brahmanee goose.

In the generality of the examples of ancient Singhalese carvings that have come down to us, the characteristic which most strongly recommends them, is their careful preservation of the outline and form of the article decorated, notwithstanding the richness and profusion of the ornaments applied. The subjects engraved are selected with so much judgment, that whilst elaborately covering the surface, they in no degree mar the configuration. Even in later times this principle has been preserved, and the chasings in silver and tortoise shell on the scabbards of the swords of state, worn by the Kandyan kings and their attendants, are not surpassed by any specimens of similar workmanship in India.

_Temples_.--The temples of Buddha were at first as unpretending as the residences of the priesthood. No mention is made of them during the infancy of Buddhism in Ceylon; at which period caves and natural grottoes were the only places of devotion. In the sacred books these are spoken of as "stone houses"[1] to distinguish them from the "houses of earth"[2] and other materials used in the construction of the first buildings for the worship of Buddha; such temples having been originally confined to a single chamber of the humblest dimensions, within which it became the custom at a later period to place a statue of the divine teacher reclining in dim seclusion, the gloom being increased to heighten the scenic effect of the ever-burning lamps by which the chambers are imperfectly lighted.

[Footnote 1: The King, Walagambahu, who in his exile had been living amongst the rocks in the wilderness, ascended the throne after defeating the Malabars (B.C. 104), and "caused _the of stone or caves of the rocks_ in which he had taken refuge to be made more commodious."--_Rajavali_, p. 224.]

[Footnote 2: _Rajavali_, p. 222.]

The construction of both these descriptions of temples was improved in later times, but no examples remain of the ancient chaityas or built temples in Ceylon, and those of the rock temples still existing exhibit a very slight advance beyond the rudest attempts at excavation.

On examining the cave temples of continental India, they appear to exhibit three stages of progress,--first mere unadorned cells, like those formed by Dasartha, the grandson of Asoca, in the granite rocks of Behar, about B.C. 200; next oblong apartments with a verandah in front, like that of Ganesa, at Cuttack; and lastly, ample halls with colonnades separating the nave from the aisles, and embellished externally with façades and agricultural decorations, such as the caves of Karli, Ajunta, and Ellora.[1] But in Ceylon the earliest rock temples were merely hollows beneath overhanging rocks, like those still existing at Dambool, and the Aluwihara at Matelle, in both of which advantage has been taken of the accidental shelter of rounded boulders, and an entrance constructed by applying a façade of masonry, devoid of all pretensions to ornament.

[Footnote 1: See FERGUSSON'S _Illustrations of the Rock-cut Temples of India_, Lond. 1845, and _Handbook of Architecture_, ch. ii. p. 23.]

The utmost effort at excavation never appears to have advanced beyond the second stage attained in Bengal,--a small cell with a few columns to support a verandah in front; and even of this but very few examples now exist in Ceylon, the most favourable being the Gal-wihara at Pollanarrua, which, according to the _Rajavali_, was executed by Prakrama I., in the 12th century.[1]

[Footnote 1: _Mahawanso_, ch. lxxvii.]

Taking into consideration the enthusiasm exhibited by the kings of Ceylon, and the munificence displayed by them in the exaltation and extension of Buddhism, their failure to emulate the labours of its patrons in India, must be accounted for by the intractable nature of the rocks with which they had to contend, the gneiss and quartz of Ceylon being less favourable to such works than the sandstone of Cuttack, or the trap formations of the western ghauts.

_Oil-painting_.--In decorative art, carving and moulding in chunam were the principal expedients resorted to. Of this substance were also formed the "beads resplendent like gems;" the "flower-ornaments" resembling gold; and the "festoons of pearls," that are more than once mentioned in describing the interiors of the palaces.[1] Externally, painting was applied to the dagobas alone, as in the climate of Ceylon, exposure to the rains would have been fatal to the duration of the colours, if only mixed in tempera; but the Singhalese, at a very early period, were aware of the higher qualities possessed by some of the vegetable oils. The claim of Van Eyck to the invention of oil-painting in the 15th century, has been shown to be untenable. Sir Charles L. Eastlake[2] has adduced the evidence of Ætius of Diarbekir, to prove that the use of oil in connection with art[3] was known before the 6th century; and Dioscorides, who wrote in the age of Augustus, has been hitherto regarded as the most ancient authority on the drying properties of walnut, sesamum, and poppy. But the _Mahawanso_ affords evidence of an earlier knowledge, and records that in the 2nd century before Christ, "vermilion paint mixed with tila oil,"[4] was employed in the building of the Ruanwellé dagoba. This is, therefore, the earliest testimony extant of the use of oil as a medium for painting, and till a higher claimant appears, the distinction of the discovery may be permitted to rest with the Singhalese.

[Footnote 1: _Mahawanso_, ch. xxvii, p. 163.]

[Footnote 2: EASTLAKE'S _Materials for a History of Oil Painting_, ch. i. p. 18.]

[Footnote 3: Aetius [Greek: Biblion iatrikon.]]

[Footnote 4: Tila or tala is the Singhalese name for sesamum from which the natives express the gingeli oil. SIR CHARLES L. EASTLAKE is of opinion that "sesamum cannot be called a drying oil in the ordinary acceptation of the term," but in this passage of the _Mahawanso_, it is mentioned as being used as a cement. A question has been raised in favour of the claim of the Egyptians to the use of oil in the decoration of their mummy cases, but the probability is that they were coloured in tempera and their permanency afterwards secured by a _varnish_.]

_Style of Ornament_.--In decorating the temporary tee, which was placed on the Ruanwellé dagoba, prior to its completion, the square base was painted with a design representing vases of flowers in the four panels, surrounded by "ornaments radiating like the five fingers."[1] This description points to the "honeysuckle border," which, according to Fergusson, was adopted and carried westward by the Greeks, and eastward by the Buddhist architects.[2] It appears upon the lat column at Allahabad, which is inscribed with one of the edicts of Asoca, issued in the 3rd century before Christ.

[Footnote 1: _Mahawanso_, ch. xxxii. p. 193; ch. xxxviii. p. 258.]

[Footnote 2: FERGUSSON'S _Handbook of Architecture_, vol. i. ch. ii. p. 7.]

The spire itself was "painted with red stick-lac," probably the same preparation of vermilion as is used at the present day on the lacquered ware of Burmah, Siam, and China.[1] Gaudy colours appear at all times to have been popular; yellow, from its religious associations, pre-eminently so[2]; and red lead was applied to the exterior of dagobas.[3] Bujas Raja, in the 4th century, painted the walls and roof of the Brazen Palace blue[4], and built a sacred edifice at Anarajapoora, which from the variety and brilliancy of the colours with which he ornamented the exterior, was known as the Monara Paw Periwena, or Temple of the Peacock.[5]

[Footnote 1: A species of lacquer painting is practised with great success at the present day in the Kandyan provinces, and especially at Matelle, the colours being mixed with a resinous exudation collected from a shrub called by the Singhalese Wæl-koep-petya (_Croton lacciferum_). The coloured varnish thus prepared is formed into films and threads chiefly by aid of the thumb-nail of the left hand, which is kept long and uncut for the purpose. It is then applied by heat and polished. It is chiefly employed in ornamenting the covers of books, walking-sticks, the shafts of spears, and the handles of fans for the priesthood. The Burmese artists who make the japanned ware of Ava, _use the hand_ in laying on the lacquer--which there, too, as well as in China, is the produce of a tree, the _Melanorhoea glabra_ of Wallich.]

[Footnote 2: _Rajaratnacari_, p. 184.]

[Footnote 3: _Mahawanso_, ch. xxxiv. p. 212.]

[Footnote 4: _Rajavali_, p. 291. The _blue_ used for this purpose was probably a preparation of indigo; the red, vermilion; the yellow, orpiment; and green was obtained by combining the first and last.]

[Footnote 5: _Rajavali_, p. 73.]

CHAP. VIII.

DOMESTIC LIFE.

CITIES.--_Anarajapoora_.--Striking evidences of the state of civilisation in Ceylon are furnished by the descriptions given, both by native writers and by travellers, of its cities as they appeared prior to the 8th century of the Christian era. The municipal organisation of Anarajapoora, in the reign of Pandukábhaya, B.C. 437, may be gathered from the notices in the _Mahawanso_, of the "_naggaraguttiko_," who was conservator of the city, of the "guards stationed in the suburbs," and of the "chandalas," who acted as scavengers and carriers of corpses. As a cemetery was attached to the city, interment must have frequently taken place, and the _nichi-chandalas_ are specially named as the "cemetery men;"[1] but the practice of cremation prevailed in the 2nd century before Christ, and the body of Elala was burned on the spot where he fell, B.C. 161.[2]

[Footnote 1: _Mahawanso_, ch. x. p. 65, 66.]

[Footnote 2: _Ibid_., ch. xxv. p. 155.]

The capital at that time contained the temples of numerous religions, besides public gardens, and baths; to which were afterwards added, halls for dancing and music, ambulance halls, rest-houses for travellers[1], alms-houses[2], and hospitals[3]; in which animals, as well as men, were tenderly cared for. The "corn of a thousand fields" was appropriated by one king for their use[4]; another set aside rice to feed the squirrels which frequented his garden[5]; and a third displayed his skill as a surgeon, in treating the diseases of elephants, horses, and snakes.[6] The streets contained shops and bazaars[7]; and on festive occasions, barbers and dressers were stationed at each of the gates, for the convenience of those resorting to the city.[8]

[Footnote 1: These rest-houses, like the Choultries of India, were constructed by private liberality along all the leading highways and forest roads. "Oh that I had in the wilderness a lodging-place of wayfaring men."--_Jer_. ix. 2.]

[Footnote 2: Rock inscription at Pollanarrua, A.D. 1187.]

[Footnote 3: _Rajaratnacari_, p. 39; _Mahawanso_, ch. x. p. 67; HARDY'S _Eastern Monachism_, p. 485.]

[Footnote 4: _Mahawanso_, ch. lxviii. UPHAM'S version, vol. i. p. 246.]

[Footnote 5: _Mahawanso_, ch. xxxvii. p. 249.]

[Footnote 6: _Ibid_., p. 244, 245.]

[Footnote 7: _Ibid_., ch. xxiii. p. 139.]

[Footnote 8: _Ibid_., ch. xxviii. p. 170; ch. xxxix. p. 214.]

The _Lankawistariyaye_, or "Ceylon Illustrated," a Singhalese work of the 7th century, gives a geographical summary of the three great divisions of the island, Rohuna, Maya, and Pihiti, and dwells with obvious satisfaction on the description of the capital of that period. The details correspond so exactly with another fragment of a native author, quoted by Colonel Forbes[1], that both seem to have been written at one and the same period; they each describe the "temples and palaces, whose golden pinnacles glitter in the sky, the streets spanned by arches bearing flags, the side ways strewn with black sand, and the middle sprinkled with white, and on either side vessels containing flowers, and niches with statues holding lamps. There are multitudes of men armed with swords, and bows and arrows. Elephants, horses, carts, and myriads of people pass and repass, jugglers, dancers, and musicians of all nations, with chank shells and other instruments ornamented with gold. The distance from the principal gate to the south gate, is four gows; and the same from the north to the south gate. The principal streets are Moon Street, Great King Street, Hinguruwak, and Mahawelli Streets,--the first containing eleven thousand houses, many of them two stories in height. The smaller streets are innumerable. The palace has large ranges of buildings, some of them two and three stories high, and its subterranean apartments are of great extent."

[Footnote 1: _Eleven Years in Ceylon,_ vol. i. p. 235. But there is so close a resemblance in each author to the description of the ancient capital of the kings of Ayoudhya (Oude) that both seem to have been copied from that portion of the Ramayana. See the passage quoted in Mrs. Spier's _Life in Ancient India,_ ch. iv. p. 99.]

The native descriptions of Anarajapoora, in the 7th century, are corroborated by the testimony of the foreign travellers who visited it about the same period. Fa Hian says, "The city is the residence of many magistrates, grandees, and foreign merchants; the mansions beautiful, the public buildings richly adorned, the streets and highways straight and level, and houses for preaching built at every thoroughfare."[1] The _Leang-shu,_ a Chinese history of the Leang Dynasty, written between A.D. 507-509, describing the cities of Ceylon at that period, says, "The houses had upper stories, the walls were built of brick, and secured by double gates."[2]

[Footnote 1: _Foë-Kouë-k[)i],_ ch, xxxviii. p. 334.]

[Footnote 2: _Leang-shu,_ B, liv. p. 10.]

_Carriages and Horses._--Carriages[1] and chariots[2] are repeatedly mentioned as being driven through the principal cities, and carts and waggons were accustomed to traverse the interior of the country.[3] At the same time, the frequent allusions to the clearing of roads through the forests, on the approach of persons of distinction, serve to show that the passage of wheel carriages must have been effected with difficulty[4], along tracks prepared for the occasion, by freeing them of the jungle and brushwood. The horse is not a native of Ceylon, and those spoken of by the ancient writers must have been imported from India and Arabia. White horses were especially prized, and those mentioned with peculiar praises were of the "Sindhawo" breed, a term which may either imply the place whence they were brought, or the swiftness of their speed.[5] In battle the soldiers rode chargers[6], and a passage in the _Mahawanso_ shows that they managed them by means of a rope passed through the nostril, which served as a bridle.[7] Cosmas Indicopleustes, who considered the number of horses in Ceylon in the 6th century to be a fact of sufficient importance to be recorded, adds that they were imported from Persia, and the merchants bringing them were treated with special favour and encouragement, their ships being exempted from all dues and charges. Marco Polo found the export of horses from Aden and Ormus to India going on with activity in the 13th century.[8]

[Footnote 1: B.C. 307, _Mahawanso_, ch. xiv. p. 80, 81; B.C. 204, Ib., ch. xxi. p. 128. A carriage drawn by four horses is mentioned, B.C. 161, _Mahawanso_, ch. xxxi. p. 186.]

[Footnote 2: B.C. 307, _Mahawanso_, ch, xv. p. 84; ch xvi. p. 103.]

[Footnote 3: B.C. 161, "a merchant of Anarajapoora proceeded with carts to the Malaya division near Adam's Peak to buy ginger and saffon" (_Mahawanso_, ch. xxviii. p. 167); and in the 3rd century after Christ a wheel chariot was driven from the capital to the Kalaweva tank twenty miles N.W. of Dambool.--_Mahawanso_, ch. xxxviii. p. 260. See _ante_ Vol. II. p. 445.]

[Footnote 4: FORBES suggests that on such journeys the carriages must have been pushed by men, as horses could not possibly have drawn them in the hill country (vol. ii. p. 86).]

[Footnote 5: _Sigham_, swift; _dhawa_, to run; _Mahawanso_, ch, xxiii. p. 142,186.]

[Footnote 6: _Mahawanso_, ch. xxii. p. 132; ch. xxiii. 142.]

[Footnote 7: The Prince Dutugaimunu, when securing the mare which afterwards carried him in the war against Elala, "seized her by the throat and boring her nostril with the point of his sword, secured her with his rope."--_Mahawanso_, ch. x. p. 60.]

[Footnote 8: _Marco Polo_, ch. xx, s. ii,: ch. xl.]

_Domestic Furniture._--Of the furniture of the private dwellings of the Singhalese, such notices as have come down to us serve to show that their intercourse with other Buddhist nations was not without its influence on their domestic habits. Chairs[1], raised seats[2], footstools[3], and metal lamps[4], were articles comparatively unknown to the Hindus, and were obviously imitated by the Singhalese from the East, from China, Siam, or Pegu.[5] The custom which prevails to the present day of covering a chair with a white cloth, as an act of courtesy in honour of a visitor, was observed with the same formalities two thousand years ago[6]. Rich beds[7] and woollen carpets[8] were in use at the same early period, and ivory was largely employed in inlaying the more sumptuous articles.[9] Coco-nut shells were used for cups and ladles[10]; earthenware for jugs and drinking cups[11]; copper for water-pots, oil-cans, and other utensils; and iron for razors, needles, and nail-cutters.[12] The _pingo_, formed of a lath cut from the stem of the areca, or the young coco-nut palm, and still used as a yoke in carrying burdens, existed at an early period[13], in the same form in which it is borne at the present day. It is identical with the _asilla_ an instrument for the same purpose depicted on works of Grecian art[14] and on the monuments of Egypt.

[Footnote 1: _Mahawanso_, ch. xiv. p. 80; ch. xv. p. 84; _Rajaratnacari_ p. 134.]

[Footnote 2: Ibid., ch. xiii. p. 82.]

[Footnote 3: Ibid., xxvii. p. 164.]

[Footnote 4: _Mahawanso_, ch. xxx. p. 182; ch. xxxii. p. 192.]

[Footnote 5: _Asiatic Researches,_ vol. vi. p. 437. Chairs are shown on the sculptures of Persepolis; and it is probably a remnant of Grecian civilisation in Bactria that chairs are still used by the mountaineers of Balkh and Bokhara.]

[Footnote 6: B.C. 307, King Devenipiatissa caused a chair to be so prepared for Mahindo.]

[Footnote 7: _Mahawanso_, ch. xv. p. 84; ch. xxiii. p. 129. A four-post bed is mentioned B.C. 180. _Mahawanso._ ch. xxiv. p. 148.]

[Footnote 8: Ibid., ch. xiv. p. 82.]

[Footnote 9: _Mahawanso_, ch. xxvii. p. 163.]

[Footnote 10: _Ibid_., ch. xxvii. p. 104.]

[Footnote 11: _Ibid_., ch. xv. p. 85.]

[Footnote 12: _Rajaratnacari_, p. 134.]

[Footnote 13: _Ibid.,_ p. 103. This implement is identical with the "yoke" so often mentioned in the Old and New Testament as an emblem of bondage and labour; and figured, with the same significance; on Grecian sculpture gems. See _ante_. Vol. I. Pt. i ch iii. p. 114]

[Footnote 14: ARISTOTLE, _Rhet_. i 7.]

_Form of Government_--The form of government was at all times an unmitigated despotism; the king had ministers, but only to relieve him of personal toil, and the institution of Gam-sabes, or village municipalities, which existed in every hamlet, however small, was merely a miniature council of the peasants, in which they settled all disputes about descent and proprietorship, and maintained the organisation essential to their peculiar tillage; facilitating at the same time the payment of dues to the crown, both in taxes and labour.

_Revenue_.--The main sources of revenue were taxes, both on the land and its produce; and these were avowedly so oppressive in amount, that the merit of having reduced or suspended their assessment, was thought worthy of being engraved on rocks by the sovereigns who could claim it. In the inscription at the temple of Dambool, A.D. 1187, the king boasts of having "enriched the inhabitants who had become impoverished by inordinate taxes, and made them opulent by gifts of land, cattle, and slaves, by relinquishing the revenues for five years, and restoring inheritances, and by annual donations of five times the weight of the king's person in gold, precious stones, pearls, and silver; and from an earnest wish that succeeding kings should not again impoverish the inhabitants of Ceylon by levying excessive imposts, he fixed the revenue at a moderate amount, according to the fertility of the land."[1]

[Footnote 1: TURNOUR's _Epitome_ App. p. 95; _Mahawanso_, ch. xxxiv. p. 211]

There was likewise an imperial tax upon produce, originally a tenth, but subject to frequent variation.[1] For instance, in consideration of the ill-requited toil of felling the forest land. In order to take a crop of dry grain, the soil being unequal to sustain continued cultivation, the same king seeing that "those who laboured with the bill-hook In clearing thorny jungles, earned their livelihood distressfully," ordained that this _chena_ cultivation, as it is called, should be for ever exempted from taxation.

[Footnote 1: Rock inscription at Pollanarrua, A.D. 1187.]

_Army and Navy._--The military and naval forces of Ceylon were chiefly composed of foreigners. The genius of the native population was at all times averse to arms; from the earliest ages, the soldiers employed by the crown were mercenaries, and to this peculiarity may be traced the first encouragement given to the invasion of the Malabars. These were employed both on land and by sea In the third century before Christ[1]; and it was not till the eleventh century of our era, that a marine was organised for the defence of the coast.[2]

[Footnote 1: _Mahawanso_, ch. xxi. p. 127.]

[Footnote 2: _Ibid_., ch. xxxix.; TURNOUR'S MS. Transl. p. 269.]

The mode of raising a national force to make war against the invaders, is described in the _Mahawanso[1];_ the king issuing commands to ten warriors to enlist each ten men, and each of this hundred in turn to enrol ten more, and each of the new levy, ten others, till "the whole company embodied were eleven thousand one hundred and ten."

[Footnote 1: _Ibid_., ch. xxiii. p. 144.]

The troops usually consisted of four classes: the "riders on elephants, the cavalry, then those in chariots, and the foot soldiers,"[1] and this organisation continued till the twelfth century.[2]

[Footnote 1: _Rajavali_, p. 208, The use of elephants in war is frequently adverted to in the _Mahawamso_, ch. xxv. p. 151-155, &c.]

[Footnote 2: See the inscription on the tablet at Pollanarrua, A.D. 1187.]

Their arms were "the five weapons of war," swords, spears, javelins, bows, and arrows, and a rope with a noose, running in a metal ring called _narachana._[1] The archers were the main strength of the army, and their skill and dexterity are subjects of frequent eulogium.[2]

[Footnote 1: _Mahawanso_, ch, vii 48; ch. xxv p. 155.]

[Footnote 2: One of the chiefs in the army of Dutugaimunu, B.C. 160, is described as combining all the excellences of the craft, being at once a "sound archer," who shot by ear, when his object was out of sight; "a lightning archer," whose arrow was as rapid as a thunderbolt; and a "sand-archer," who could send the shaft through a cart filled with sand and through hides "an hundred-fold thick."--_Mahawanso,_ ch. xxiii. p. 143. In one of the legends connected with the early life of Gotama, before he attained the exaltation of Buddhahood, he is represented as displaying his strength by taking "a bow which required a thousand men to bend it, and placing it against the toe of his right foot without standing up, he drew the string with his finger-nail."--HARDY'S _Manual of Buddhism,_ ch. vii. p. 153. It is remarkable that at the present day this is the attitude assumed by a Veddah, when anxious to send an arrow with more than ordinary force. The following sketch is from a model in ebony executed by a native carver.

I am not aware that examples of this mode of drawing the bow are to be found on any ancient monument, Egyptian, Assyrian, Grecian, or Roman; but that it was regarded as peculiar to the inhabitants of India is shown by the fact that ARRIAN describes it as something remarkable in the Indians in the age of Alexander. "[Greek: Hoplisios de tês Indôn ouk hôutos eis tropos, all oi men pezoi autoisi toxon te echousin, isomêkes tps phoreonti to toxon, kai touto katô epi tên gên thentes kai tps podi tps aristerps antibantes, outôs ektoxeuousi, tên neurên epi mega opisô apagagontes."--ARRIAN, _Indica_, lib, xvi. Arrian adds that such was the force with which their arrows travelled that no substance was strong enough to resist them, neither shield, breast-plate, nor armour, all of which they penetrated. In the account of Brazil, by Kidder and Fletcher, Philad. 1850, p. 558, the Indians of the Amazon are said to draw the bow with the foot, and a figure is given of a Caboclo archer in the attitude; but, unlike the Veddah of Ceylon, the American uses both feet.]

The _Rajaratnacari_ states that the arrows of the Malabars were sometimes "drenched with the poison of serpents," to render recovery impossible.[1] Against such weapons the Singhalese carried shields, some of them covered with plates of the chank shell[2]; this shell was also sounded in lieu of a trumpet[3], and the disgrace of retreat is implied by the expression that it ill becomes a soldier to "_allow his hair to fly behind_."[4]

[Footnote 1: _Rajaratnacari_, p. 101.]

[Footnote 2: _Rajavali_, p. 217.]

[Footnote 3: _Mahawanso_, ch. xxv. p. 154.]

[Footnote 4: _Rajavali_, p. 213.]

_Civil Justice_.--Civil justice was entrusted to provincial judges[1]; but the King Kirti Nissanga, in the great tablet inscribed with his exploits, which still exists at Pollanarrua, has recorded that under the belief that "robbers commit their crimes through hunger for wealth, he gave them whatever riches they required, thus relieving the country from the alarm of their depredations."[2] Torture was originally recognised as a stage in the administration of the law, and in the original organisation of the capital in the fourth century before Christ, a place for its infliction was established adjoining the place of execution and the cemetery.[3] It was abolished in the third century by King Wairatissa; but the frightful punishments of impaling and crushing by elephants continued to the latest period of the Ceylon monarchy.

[Footnote 1: Inscriptions on the Great Tablet at Pollanarrua.]

[Footnote 2: _Ibid_.]

[Footnote 3: _Mahawanso_, ch. x. p.]

CHAP. IX.

ASTRONOMY, ETC.

EDUCATION.--The Brahmans, as they were the first to introduce the practice of the mechanical arts, were also the earliest instructors of youth in the rudiments of general knowledge. Pandukabhaya, who was afterwards king, was "educated in every accomplishment by Pandulo, a Brahman, who taught him along with his own son."[1] The Buddhist priests became afterwards the national instructors, and a passage in the _Rajavali_ seems to imply that writing was regarded as one of the distinctive accomplishments of the priesthood, not often possessed by the laity, as it mentions that the brother of the king of Kalany, in the second century before Christ, had been taught to write by a tirunansi, "and made such progress that he could write as well as the tirunansi himself."[2] The story in the _Rajavali_ of an intrigue which was discovered by "the sound of the fall of a letter," shows that the material then in use in the second century before Christ, was the same as at the present day, the prepared leaf of a palm tree.[3]

[Footnote 1: _Mahawanso_, ch. x. p. 60.]

[Footnote 2: _Rajavali_, p. 189.]

[Footnote 3: _Ibid._]

The most popular sovereigns were likewise the most sedulous patrons of learning. Prakrama I. founded schools at Pollanarrua[1]; and it is mentioned with due praise in the _Rajaratnacari_, that the King Wijayo Bahu III., who reigned at Dambeadinia, A.D. 1240, "established a school in every village, and charged the priests who superintended them to take nothing from the pupils, promising that he himself would reward them for their trouble."[2]

[Footnote 1: _Mahawanso_, ch. lxxii. UPHAM'S version, vol. i. p. 274.]

[Footnote 2: _Rajaratnacari_, p. 99.]

Amongst the propagators of a religion whose leading characteristics are its subtlety and thin abstractions, it may naturally be inferred that argument and casuistry held prominent place in the curriculum of instruction. In the story of Mahindo, and the conversion of the island to Buddhism, the following display of logical acumen is ostentatiously paraded as evidence of the highly cultivated intellect of the neophyte king.[1]

[Footnote 1: _Mahawanso_, ch. xiv. p. 79.]

For the purpose of ascertaining the capacity of the gifted monarch, Mahindo thus interrogated him:--

"O king; what is this tree called?

"The Ambo.

"Besides this one, is there any other Ambo-tree?

"There are many.

"Besides this Ambo, and those other Ambo-trees, are there any other trees on the earth?

"Lord; there are many trees, but they are not Ambo-trees.

"Besides the other Ambo-trees, and the trees that are not Ambo, is there any other?

"Gracious Lord, _this Ambo-tree._

"Ruler of men, thou art wise!

"Hast thou any relations, oh, king?

"Lord, I have many.

"King, are there any persons not thy relations?

"There are many who are not my relations.

"Besides thy relations, and those who are not thy relations, is there, or is there not, any other human being in existence?

"Lord, _there is myself._

"Ruler of men, Sadhu! thou art wise."

The course of education suitable for a prince in the thirteenth century included what was technically termed the eighteen sciences: "1. oratory, 2. general knowledge, 3. grammar, 4. poetry, 5. languages, 6. astronomy, 7. the art of giving counsel, 8. the means of attaining _nirwana_[1], 9. the discrimination of good and evil, 10. shooting with the bow, 11. management of the elephant, 12. penetration of thoughts, 13. discernment of invisible beings, 14. etymology, 15. history, 16. law, 17. rhetoric, 18. physic."[2]

[Footnote 1: "Nirwana" is the state of suspended sensation, which constitutes the eternal bliss of the Buddhist in a future state.]

[Footnote 2: _Rajaratnacari_ p. 100.]

_Astronomy_.--Although the Singhalese derived from the Hindus their acquaintance, such as it was, with the heavenly bodies and their movements, together with their method of taking observations, and calculating eclipses[1], yet in this list the term "astrology" would describe better than "astronomy" the science practically cultivated in Ceylon, which then, as now, had its professors in every village to construct horoscopes, and cast the nativities of the peasantry. Dutugaimunu, in the second century before Christ, after his victory over Elala, commended himself to his new subjects by his fatherly care in providing "a doctor, an astronomer, and a priest, for each group of sixteen villages throughout the kingdom;"[2] and he availed himself of the services of the astrologer to name the proper day of the moon on which to lay the foundation of his great religious structures.[3]

[Footnote 1: A summary of the knowledge possessed by the early Hindus of _astronomy_ and _mathematical science_ will be found in MOUNTSTUART ELPHINSTONE'S _History of India during the Hindu and Mahomedan Periods_,