Chapter IV: Introduction (2)

My friend characterised as nonsense the idea of their handling and using cobras which have not had their fangs excised. The reader may remember Sir Bartle Frere's note in Old Deccan Days, p. 329, regarding a boy who continued to handle with impunity poisonous snakes with unremoved fangs, until at last one killed him. The reader is also referred to Drummond Hay's Western Barbary, 1844, pp. 105-108, in which an account is given of a snake-charmer who allowed a deadly snake to bite him. A fowl that it bit immediately afterwards died in a minute, while the man did not suffer from the bite. Hay saw the snake's fangs. He mentions another instance at Tangier, in which a youth who was sceptical regarding the poison allowed the snake to bite him, and died from the effect of it.

I saw this Gypsy cut off the fangs of the cobra that I gave him. This was done with a common pen-knife which he kept for the purpose. The head being held sideways on a thick stick, so that the upper jaw lay on it, the fang was cut off at the base. The head was then turned, and the other fang removed. The man then passed his fore-finger along the jaw, and finding a slight roughness or projection, sliced off a little of the bone at each side. After this he released the cobra, which followed him and sprang at him furiously, time after time, and had its first lesson on the ease with which he evaded its strokes. When it became tired of attempting the impossible, he consigned it to his basket--another cobra ready for exhibition.

Some of these men are extraordinarily expert in making pretended captures of cobras which they apparently fascinate by their pipes, so as to attract them from their holes or hiding-places. They perform this feat so cleverly as to deceive many people, who insist that it is a real capture. I have twice got them to do it for me--in the Southern and the North-western Provinces--and although I watched them from a very short distance, I was unable to see whence the cobra was produced. On both occasions I examined the mouth of the cobra immediately after it was captured, and in both instances I found that the fangs had been removed. My Gypsy friend also assured me that it was a mere trick which only a few learn.

In each case, the man, who was dressed only in a cloth extending from the waist to the calf, after piping for some time at the edge of the bushes in which the snake might possibly be found, bent down suddenly, half entering the bush, and apparently endeavoured to seize a cobra which eluded him. After resuming the piping for a few seconds more, he bent down again at the same spot, and drew out a large cobra--one was nearly six feet long; it extended to the full length of his outstretched hands--holding it by the tail; then slipping his other hand rapidly along its body he grasped it tightly behind the jaws. Probably when first bending down he placed a cobra on the ground, afterwards seizing it by the tail as it was moving off.

In one case, a pretence at being bitten on the thumb on the way back from the bush was very effective. There were two bleeding punctures between the nail and the knuckle, at the right distance apart, and the expressions of pain no doubt were not altogether simulated.

The supposed poison was extracted by means of the usual spells and remedial agents--a charmed piece of creeper and a tiny ball of lime, the latter to check the progress of the poison along the arm, and the former to draw it down to the wounds; and two "snake stones"--nearly flat rectangular pieces of horn slightly hollowed on one side--which were placed on the wounds to extract the poison. These "stones" adhere by atmospheric pressure when wetted and pressed on the skin with the hollowed side downwards. I have been informed that the wounds are made by pressing on the thumb a thorny seed capsule which has two sharp spikes at a suitable distance apart.

One of these men afterwards proceeded to a large village about a mile away, and appeared to capture three more cobras in the same manner at houses where the residents denied that any were to be found; but in the end I was told by the villagers that he had only two cobras in his basket, this being the number that I saw in his possession before these last pretended captures were made.

These people are said to live well, better, indeed, than the majority of the villagers. The women are given to lavish personal adornment of an inexpensive kind, chiefly articles of brass and glass. On one lady, perhaps considered a beauty, I counted sixteen bead necklaces; twenty-four bangles, chiefly of common black glass, on the wrists; four silver armlets on the upper arms; and six rings on each finger and thumb, excepting only the middle finger of each hand.

The Kandian village is a self-contained unit, producing everything that the inhabitants require, with the exception of the few articles previously mentioned. It hears a faint echo of the news of the great outer world, without feeling that this has any connexion with its own life. It would listen with almost equal indifference to a statement that the sky was blue, or that England was at war with a European power, or that a new Governor had been appointed. When I asked a villager's opinion regarding the transfer of a Government Agent who had ruled a Province for some years, he replied, "They say one Agent has gone and another Agent has come; that is all."

The supervision of the work of maintaining in order the embankment of the village reservoir or "tank," upon which the rice crops depend, as well as of the fencing of the rice field, is in the hands of the Gamarala, now termed in other parts than the North-central Province, the Vidane. The latter title is not recognised in any of the folk-tales, in which (with one exception) the Gamarala is the only headman represented. His jurisdiction extends over two or three closely adjoining villages, or sometimes over one only.

Of a higher rank and different functions is the Aracci (pronounced Aratchy), who rules over five or six villages, and who is responsible for the maintenance of order, arrests and prosecutes offenders, and acts as general factotum for seeing that the orders received from superior headmen are promulgated and obeyed.

Of much more important authority are the Korale-Aracci and Korala, the latter being the head of a considerable district, and above these again is the Ratemahatmaya, who is the supreme and very influential chief of a large part of a Province. By successive steps in promotion the members of influential or respectable families may rise to any of these offices. Though all but the highest one are unsalaried, they are competed for with a good deal of eagerness on account of the power which they confer, the possibility of further promotion, and also for the opportunities which they afford for receiving "presents," which flow in a pleasing though invisible, but not therefore less remunerative, stream towards all but the Vidanes and Gamaralas.

A few words may be added regarding the castes of the Kandian districts whose stories are given in this work, or who are referred to.

The Smiths come next to the cultivating caste, sometimes occupying separate hamlets, but often living in the same village as the superior caste, though divided from it by an impassable gulf, of which only the women preserve the outward sign. Those of the cultivating caste are alone permitted by social custom to dress in one outer robe in one piece; all of lower rank must wear a separate garment from the waist upward.

The Smiths are considered to be the highest class of their caste, called Nayide, the artificers. There are said to be five classes of Nayides:--(1) Acari (pronounced Atchary), which includes the Smiths, Painters, and Sculptors; (2) Badahaela, Potters; (3) Mukkara or Karawa, Fishers; (4) Madinna, Toddy-drawers ("toddy" is fresh palm-juice); (5) all "Moormen," the descendants of Muhammadan settlers. All these, and the other low castes, except the Rodiyas, cultivate rice and millet.

The Potters live by making all local forms of earthen pottery, and tiles and bricks if required. They build up large temporary kilns filled with alternate layers of pots and fire-wood, and are often intelligent men. Some of them are priests or conductors of services for the propitiation of planets and other evil astronomical bodies, as well as astrologers.

Next in the villages come the Washermen (Radawa, or Henaya, or Henawalaya), who possess great power as the arbiters regarding cases of the violation of social etiquette or custom. The disgrace of a refusal on their part to wash the clothes of objectionable persons is a form of social ostracism, and the offender soon has sad experience of the truth of the statement of the Maha Bharata that there is nothing (except fire) that is so purifying as gold (or its value). Some of the washermen are officiators at demon ceremonies. They are paid for their services as washermen in produce of various kinds, each family giving an annual subvention in paddy, etc., in return for its washing. One whom I knew could improvise four-line stanzas for an indefinite time, on the spur of the moment, each verse being composed while the audience chanted the refrain after the preceding one.

The Tom-tom Beaters (Berawaya) are a peculiar and interesting caste, who formerly combined their present duties with the weaving of cotton fabrics in frames. Although the arduous work of their profession--often a whole night's hard dancing or tom-toming--leads at the time to a considerable consumption of "arrack," the spirit distilled from palm juice, I believe that few of them take much liquor at other times.

In their own work many of them are very expert, the result of many years of training. On one occasion three tom-tom beaters requested permission to give me an exhibition of their skill. The leader first played a short simple tune, which was repeated in turn by the second and third players. They continued to play in this way, in turn, the tunes becoming increasingly difficult and rapid; whatever impromptu changes the leader introduced were all repeated in the same manner by the others. A number of villagers who were present, and listening critically, stated that it was a clever performance; it was also a noisy one.

The boys are taught to learn thoroughly, without using a tom-tom, the whole of the complicated airs that are played, repeating a series of sounds such as ting, tang, etc., which with varying emphasis represent the various notes to be played on the tom-tom. Not until they can give in this manner the whole of an air correctly, as regards notes, time, and emphasis, are they considered to know it. It is a tonic sol-fa system. To these professionals, every air has its name and meaning, often expressed in words which fit the notes; so that when a very few notes have been heard they can state what is being said. The reader will find one or two references to this in the folk-tales.

The Durayas are the carriers of baggage for the higher caste, and nearly always have tanks and fields of more than average quality. These have been granted to them in former times by the cultivating caste in return for their services, which could be claimed at any time if a man were about to proceed on a journey, and required himself or his luggage carrying. They still occupy a very low social position. Formerly the women were not allowed to wear above the waist more clothing than a strip of calico of about a hand's breadth, across the breast; a coloured handkerchief now generally takes its place.

Much has been written about the Rodiyas. They may be of partly different descent from the Sinhalese, but I do not know how far this matter has been investigated. Their hamlets are never called gama, "village," but kuppayama. [3] I am not aware that any of them cultivate rice fields; they make ropes, and guard chenas and cattle for others. They also partly subsist by begging, and, it is said, by theft; some are gamblers also. The women usually wear no clothing above the waist. Their dialect differs from Sinhalese to some extent.

Nothing is known regarding the origin of the Kinnaras, the lowest caste of all, in whose case there are several anomalies that deserve investigation. They do not hunt as a profession. They have village tanks and rice fields, own cattle, and have good houses and neat villages. Their caste occupation is mat weaving in frames, with Niyanda fibre alone or combined with grass.

Some have their heads covered with a mass of thick, short, very curly hair, being the only people in the island possessing this distinctive characteristic. The features and the colour of the skin are of the ordinary type of the lower castes, and would not enable them to be recognised from others. Social rules forbid the growth of the hair beyond the neck. The dress of the women is restricted like that of the Durayas. Though they can never enter Buddhist temples, or the enclosures round them, they are all Buddhists. I was informed that their social ceremonies, as well as the religious ones, that is, those for propitiating evil spirits, whether demoniacal or planetary, closely resemble those of the other castes; and that they, as well as the Rodiyas, have their own medical practitioners, astrologers, soothsayers, and kapuwas or officiators at demon ceremonies.

The men of the Chetti caste, or Hettiyas, who are mentioned in some of the stories, are either Indians, or the descendants of Indian settlers. The Chetti caste is one of great importance, and many of its members are persons of the highest respectability and often of great wealth. The persons referred to in these tales are only some of the inferior members of the race, some of whom have little road-side shops or cultivate small fields and gardens.

Coming at last to the stories themselves, I may quote the words of the late Mr. W. Goonetilleke, the learned editor of The Orientalist, a journal published during the years 1884-1892, in which many folk-tales of Ceylon were given. Mr. Goonetilleke said (vol. i. p. 36), "What is really wanted ... are the genuine stories of the Sinhalese [and other races also], those which are quite free from foreign influences, and have existed among the people from time immemorial. These can only be gathered from the inhabitants of villages and of the remoter parts of the island into which western civilization has not yet penetrated." It is an adherence to this advice, and, I may say also, the complete absence of all attempts to give the tales a literary appearance that the originals do not possess, which constitute the special features of the present work.

Though all have been collected by myself, I have only myself written down a very limited number from dictation. All the rest have been written for me in Sinhalese by the narrators themselves, or by other villagers employed by me to collect them, who wrote them just as they were dictated. I preferred this latter method as being free from any disturbing foreign influence. Only three very short stories were written down by me in English; two of them were related in English by a Sinhalese gentleman, and the other, a variant of another story, was written immediately after a Buddhist monk had related it to me in Sinhalese.

The stories, as they now appear, are practically literal translations of the written Sinhalese originals, perhaps it may be thought in some respects too literal. My aim has been to present them as nearly as possible in the words in which they are related in the villages. The only liberty of any importance that I have taken has been the insertion of an occasional word or phrase where it was evidently omitted by the narrator, or was necessary in order to elucidate the meaning, or complete the sense.

It was unavoidable that many expressions, such as "afterwards," "after that," "at that time," "then," "again," with which the village story-teller repeatedly begins his sentences, should be deleted. Many past participles which Sinhalese grammar requires have been transformed into the past tense, and most of the tense errors have been corrected, and in rare instances an unmanageable sentence has been cut in two. Such a word as "came," when it expressed "came back," is sometimes translated "returned"; and "said," where it referred to an answer, is occasionally turned into "replied." The word translated as "behead," is merely "cut" in the original; but the context sometimes shows that the other meaning is to be understood.

In other respects, the reader may rely on having here the tales in their true village forms, and expressed in the same simple manner. I have even left one peculiar idiom that is often used, according to which a question is described as being asked, or a statement made, "at the hand" of a person; but I do not follow the village story-teller in using this form in conversations carried on with the lower animals. It is quite usual in Sinhalese to state that a question was asked by a person "at the hand" (lit. "from the hand," the same word meaning also "fore-paw") of a jackal, a deer, or a reptile. It will be seen that I have not attempted to translate the interjections into English.

It will be noticed that in the majority of the tales the characters are introduced in the present tense, which is then abandoned. The narrators sometimes relapse into it afterwards, but as a rule, unless action is being emphasised, I have adhered to the past tense in such instances, excepting in the stories told by the Village Vaeddas and the lowest castes, in which it seemed advisable to make as little change as possible.

Attention may be invited to the tales told by the lowest castes, probably the only stories of theirs that have ever been collected in Ceylon. From the Tom-tom Beaters a considerable number were obtained, some of which will appear in a later volume. The few tales that have been told by the Rodiyas and Kinnaras are very simple; the chief fact is that they have any to tell.

It appeared to be likely that some of the Sindbad series of adventures might be found in Ceylon, but inquiries made in different districts, including part of the west coast, failed to reveal any tales belonging to the "Arabian Nights," with the exception of one which probably was derived from a printed work, and orally transmitted from one of the towns. It is still possible that some may be found, as the Rukh is included in the Sinhalese tales, and the ogre called Rakshasa, who is a familiar personage in them, is correctly described in his folk-tale form, in one of the Sindbad voyages. In one story, which is not included in this work, there is the incident of the demon who was imprisoned in a bottle. The demon was Mara, Death personified, and his captor was a Vedarala, or medical practitioner. The age of the tale is uncertain.

It is evident that many of the stories belong to distant times, but there is little to indicate their age more definitely. In one tale only, of this volume, the money mentioned is the kahawanuwa, in old Sinhalese kahawana, the Pali kahapana, a coin that ceased to be current by the tenth or eleventh century A.D., if not considerably earlier. Commonly, we find that the coinage is the masurama, plural masuran, which came into use in the eleventh century and was not coined after the thirteenth; but of course this is far from proving that the stories in which it occurs are not of much earlier date. There are no references to the Portuguese, who arrived in Ceylon at the beginning of the sixteenth century, or to later foreign residents; but a Tamil king is mentioned.

Although a large number of the stories relate the adventures of Kings, Queens, Princes and Princesses, it will be observed that these personages sometimes behave like ordinary villagers. The Queen or Princess often cooks the rice for the family meal; Sir Bartle Frere has stated in the notes at the end of Old Deccan Days, p. 324, that this "would be nothing unusual in the house of a Rajah.... It is still the most natural precaution he can take against poison, to eat nothing but what has been prepared by his own wife or daughter, or under their eye in his own zenana, and there are few accomplishments on which an Indian Princess prides herself more than on her skill in cookery."

It is not to be understood that such persons in these stories are supposed to be members of the family of the ruling monarch of Ceylon. These so-called "kings," ruling over a small district or even a single city, are in reality some of the more important parumakas or feudal chiefs of the inscriptions of pre-Christian or early post-Christian years. This old title does not make its appearance in the stories, however.

Vaedda rulers who are termed "kings" receive notice in three stories. In one which was given in Ancient Ceylon, p. 93, a Vaedda youth was appointed the king of a Sinhalese district, which is stated to have prospered under his rule. In a tale in the present volume (No. 4) reference is made to a Vaedda "king" who dwelt in a forest, and who arrested some travellers and imprisoned them in what is termed a house. In another story, which is not included here, there is an account of another Vaedda "king" who lived in a forest, and who ordered his archers to kill a prince who had succeeded to the sovereignty of a neighbouring district on the death of his father, and was proceeding there in order to assume it. His offence lay in travelling through the forest without first obtaining the permission of the Vaedda ruler. We also find references to Vaeddas who were accustomed to enter the towns; one of them laid a complaint before a Sinhalese "king" that a person had threatened to kill him in the forest. Probably in all these instances we have a true picture of the actual position, in early times, of some of the Vaeddas who had not yet adopted, or had abandoned, the village life. Their chiefs were practically independent in their wild forests.

The Rakshasas (in village spelling Rasaya, Rasi) who are introduced into many tales are ogres like those of Europe. The Yakas are always demons or evil spirits, of little intelligence, often having a human appearance but black in colour. They live chiefly upon human flesh, like the ogres, and possess like them some supernatural powers.

With regard to the animals mentioned, it is strange to find such prominence accorded to the Lion, which has never existed in a wild state in Ceylon. Its characteristics are correctly described, even including its ear-splitting roar.

The place taken by the Fox of European tales is filled by the Jackal, full of craft and stratagems, but sometimes over-reaching himself. The Hare and Turtle are represented as surpassing all the animals in cleverness, as in African and American Negro stories.

Of all the animals, the poor Leopard is relegated to the lowest place, both as regards want of intelligence and cowardice; and in only one adventure does he come off better than the Jackal. Even in that one his position is a despicable one, and he is completely cowed by a little Mouse-deer, the clever animal of Malay stories. In Ceylon the Leopard occupies the place taken in India by the foolish Tiger.

It is perhaps the chief merit of these stories, and certainly a feature which gives them a permanent value, that we have in them the only existing picture of the village life of ancient times, painted by the villagers themselves. From the histories we can learn practically nothing regarding the life of those of the ancient inhabitants of Ceylon who were not monks or connected with royalty, or the conditions under which they existed. It is here alone that the reader finds the daily experiences and the ideas and beliefs of the villagers gradually unfolded before him. In some of the stories we may see how the village life went on in the early centuries after Christ, and how little it has changed since that time. Others doubtless contain particulars which belong to a much later period, and in some there is an incongruous mixture of the old and the new, as when the slates of school children are introduced into what is evidently a tale of considerable age.

In the case of stories like these, composed for the amusement of villagers only, and related by villagers to other villagers, it might be expected that a considerable number of objectionable expressions would occur. So far from this being the fact, I am able to state with much satisfaction that in only three or four instances in this volume has it been thought desirable to slightly modify any part of the stories. It is to be remembered that it is not the function of these tales in general to inculcate ideas of morality or propriety, although kindness of heart is always represented as meeting with some adequate reward or success, and the wicked and cruel are punished in most cases. But successful trickery and clever stratagems are always quoted approvingly, and are favourite themes in the tales which are most evidently of entirely local origin. In this respect they do not differ from many Indian stories. Undaunted bravery, and also self-abnegation and deep affection, are characteristics which are displayed by many of the heroes and heroines; but untruthfulness is practised, and is never condemned.

The instances of polygamy are almost confined to the members of the royal families; there is one case of polyandry in which both the husbands were brothers. Infanticide was practised; in one tale a woman is recommended to kill her infant son because his horoscope was said to be unpropitious, and in another the parents abandoned their newly-born infant in order to carry home some fruit. In a story that is not included in this volume, a king is described as ordering all his female children to be killed immediately after birth. In another tale which is not given here, another king is stated to have sold his children during a time of scarcity.

These "kings," however, are almost always depicted in an unfavourable light. They are represented as cowardly, selfish, licentious, unintelligent, and headstrong, ordering their sons or others to be executed for very slight faults, in sudden fits of anger. Murders are referred to as being commonly committed with impunity, and by no means of unusual occurrence. One man is said to have exchanged his wife for a bullock.

Yet although the story-tellers do not relate social events which were not within the range of the common experience or traditions of the people at the time when the tales were invented, it may be doubted if the great mass of the villagers differed much as regards crime and morality from those of the present day. The humdrum life of the ordinary villager did not appeal to the story-teller, who required more stirring incidents. It is not necessary to assume that such events were of everyday occurrence.

Considering the situation of Ceylon and the Indian origin of the people, it was certain that numerous tales would be similar to those of India, if not identical with them; but, with the exception of the story of the Creation, there are merely bare references to the Indian deities in about four of the tales in this volume.

The great majority of the folk-tales collected by me, and almost the whole of those given in this volume, come from districts of the far interior of the island, where story-books in Sinhalese, Tamil, [4] or Arabic do not appear to have penetrated, and English is unknown by the villagers. Such tales are therefore nearly free from modern extraneous influences, and must be looked upon as often of genuine Sinhalese origin, even when they utilise the usual stock incidents of Indian folk-stories. A very few which resemble Jataka stories may owe their dissemination to Buddhist teaching, and doubtless some also were orally transmitted by immigrants who were often of South Indian nationality--as their similarity to South Indian stories shows--or in some instances may have been settlers from the Ganges valley, or near it.

With regard to the latter, it is not probable that they consisted only of the early immigrants of pre-Christian times. King Nissanka-Malla, who reigned from 1198 to 1207 A.D., has recorded in his inscriptions that he was a native of Sinhapura, then apparently the capital of the Kalinga kingdom, which extended far down the east coast of India, southward from the lower part of the Ganges valley; and he and his Chief Queen Subhadra, a Kalinga Princess, must have brought into Ceylon many of their fellow-countrymen. The Queens of two other earlier Kings of Ceylon were also Princesses from Kalinga.

In the Galpota inscription at Polannaruwa (Prof. E. Müller's Ancient Inscriptions in Ceylon, No. 148), he stated that "invited by the King [Parakrama-Bahu I], who was his senior kinsman, to come and reign over his hereditary kingdom of Lakdiva [Ceylon], Vira Nissanka-Malla landed with a great retinue in Lanka" [Ceylon]. Further on in the same inscription he stated that "he sent to the country of Kalinga, and caused many Princesses of the Soma and Surya races to be brought hither."

A connexion with the Kalinga kingdom seems to have been maintained from early times. In his inscriptions the same king claimed that the sovereignty of Ceylon belonged by right to the Kalinga dynasty. He described himself in his Dambulla inscription (Ancient Inscriptions, No. 143), as "the liege lord of Lakdiva by right of birth, deriving descent from the race of King Wijaya," the first king of Ceylon, who according to the Sinhalese historical works was also born at a town called Sinhapura, which is stated to have been founded by his father. In the Galpota inscription we read of "Princes of the Kalinga race to whom the island of Lanka has been peculiarly appropriate since the reign of Wijaya."

Nissanka-Malla was succeeded by his elder half-brother, Sahasa-Malla, who remarked in his Polannaruwa inscription (Anc. Inscriptions, No. 156) that he also was born at Sinhapura. He, too, claimed that Wijaya was a member of their family. He said, "Because King Wijaya, having destroyed the Yakshas, established Lanka like a field made by rooting out the stumps, it is a place much protected by Kings from this very family."

Thus it will be seen that stories which are current in Central India, or the lower part of the Ganges Valley, or even the Panjab, as well as tales of Indian animals such as the Lion, may have been brought direct to Ceylon by immigrants from Kalinga, or Magadha, or Bengal. Apparently it is in this manner that the evident connexion between the tales of Ceylon and Kashmir is to be explained, the stories passing from Magadha or neighbouring districts, to Kashmir on the one side, and from Magadha or Kalinga to Ceylon on the other.

To show the connexion of the Sinhalese stories with those of India, the outlines of some Indian parallels have been appended after each tale, as well as a very few from the interior of Western Africa; but no European variants, except in two instances, where they are inserted for the benefit of readers in Ceylon.

The stories have been arranged in two parts. In the first one are those told by members of the Cultivating Caste and Village Vaeddas; in the second one those related of or by members of lower castes. Those of each caste are given consecutively, the animal stories in each case coming last.

The general reader is advised to pay no attention to diacritical marks or dots which indicate separate letters in the Sinhalese alphabet, or to note only the long vowels. In all cases ae is to be pronounced as a diphthong, like a in "hat," and not to rhyme with "me." It is short where not marked long.

Enough material has been collected for a second volume, which it is hoped may be published next year.

As reference has been made to the subject in the foregoing extracts from Sinhalese inscriptions, a few lines may be added regarding the district from which Wijaya came, and his journey to Ceylon. The sentences that have been quoted prove that at the beginning of the thirteenth century A.D., it was claimed by two kings of Ceylon who came from Sinhapura in the Kalinga country that they were of the same family as Wijaya.

At a very early date the lands along the southern bank of the Ganges were divided into a series of states that once were independent. Proceeding eastward in the lower part of the valley, these were Magadha, occupying southern Bihar, with its capital Rajagaha (called also Rajagriha and Girivraja), afterwards abandoned in favour of Pataliputta, near Patna; Anga, separated from it by the river Campa (c pronounced as ch), on which was its capital Campa; Vanga or Banga, probably extending on both sides of the Ganges, and forming part of the modern Bengal; and Tamalitta, or Tamralipta, with a capital of the same name at Tamluk, near the southern mouth of the Ganges. Extending along the east coast was Kalinga; and between it and Magadha and Anga came the Pundra and Odra states, the latter occupying part of Orissa.

An old legend recorded that several of these states had a common origin. It was said that the wife of a Yadava king Vali or Bali had five sons, Anga, Vanga, Kalinga, Pundra and Odra or Sunga, each of whom founded a separate state. The names of the first four are grouped together several times in the Maha Bharata, as taking part with Kosala and Magadha in the great legendary fight against the Pandavas, and on one day the troops from Magadha and Kalinga are said to have formed, with another people, one wing of the Kuru army.

Regarding Kalinga, Pliny gives the name of a race called the Maccocalingæ, who have been thought to belong to Orissa, and he wrote that the Modogalingæ occupied a very large island in the Ganges, that is, apparently part of the delta.

At a later date there were said to be three districts called collectively Trikalinga. Whether these were portions of the more southern part of the Kalinga country only, or included the land of the Modogalingæ, is not clear. If the Kalinga kingdom once included the territory of the Modogalingæ, the Tamalitta district would be part of the Kalinga country at that time; but apparently Vanga was unconnected with Kalinga, the two being mentioned as separate kingdoms.

Divested of its impossibilities, the story of Wijaya's ancestry which is contained in the Sinhalese histories is that a king of Vanga, who had married the daughter of a king of Kalinga, had a daughter who joined a caravan that was proceeding to Magadha. On the way, either a robber chief called Siha, "Lion," attacked and plundered the caravan, and carried off the Princess, or she joined a member of the caravan who had that name. They settled down in a wild tract of country termed Lala, near the western border of the Vanga territory. There she had two children--the eldest being Siha-Bahu--with whom she afterwards returned to the Vanga capital, where her cousin Anura, who became King of Vanga, is said to have married her. Her son Siha-Bahu went back to his father's district, Lala, founded a town called Sihapura or Sinhapura, and lived there as the ruler of the country around. Evidently it was a subordinate district belonging to Vanga; it is stated that the Vanga king granted it to him (Mah. i. p. 31). It is not mentioned in the Ramayana, the Maha Bharata, the Jataka stories, or in the lists of countries given in the Puranas to which I have access; but the people of Lata are referred to in a tenth century grant from Bhagalpur, a town on territory that once formed the eastern part of Magadha (Indo-Aryans, by Dr. R. Mitra, ii. 273).

The first marriage or elopement of the Princess does not appear to have affected the status of her son Siha-Bahu. According to the histories, his eldest son, Wijaya, eventually married the daughter of the Pandiyan king of the southern Madura, and his second son, Sumitta, who succeeded him, married the daughter of the King of Madda or Madra, probably a small eastern state of that name, rather than the distant Madda in the Panjab.

The Sinhalese histories record that Wijaya was exiled on account of his lawless behaviour, but the truth of this statement may be doubted, and it is a suspicious fact that this part of the story resembles folk-tales from Kashmir. [5] We are informed in those works not only that he was exiled, but that he was also forcibly deported by sea, together with seven hundred followers, and their wives and children, that is, two or three thousand persons.

All that is actually credible in this incident is that for a reason which is unknown, perhaps a love of adventure, or possibly at the solicitation of traders who had settled there, he proceeded by sea to Ceylon, where he became the first Sinhalese king. Most probably he accompanied a party of Magadhese or other merchants.

It is recorded that from an early period vessels sailed across the Bay of Bengal from various ports on the Ganges. In the Jataka stories some are mentioned as passing down the Ganges from Benares with traders, and being far out at sea for several days, and even going to Suvanna Bhumi (Burma) and back. Tamalitta was a famous port in early times and for many centuries; and there is a definite and credible statement that vessels sailed direct from it to Ceylon in the reign of Asoka, in the third century B.C. There is no reason to suppose that similar voyages were not undertaken long prior to the period during which the Jatakas were being composed. If they are not mentioned in earlier Buddhist works, this may have been merely owing to the fact that their authors felt no interest in the trade of the countries near the mouth of the Ganges.

In the presence of such evidence of the sea-going capabilities of the vessels which sailed from the ports on the Ganges, the statement of the Sinhalese histories that Wijaya embarked at Baroach, on the western coast, whether accompanied by a large party of followers and numerous women and children or not, cannot be credited. It is impossible to believe that any travellers who wished to proceed to Ceylon in the fifth century B.C., from a district lying between Anga and Vanga, and probably within a few miles of a port from which vessels sailed, would not step on board a ship at their own doors, so to speak, rather than undertake an arduous journey across several other countries, in order to embark at a port more than eight hundred miles away in a direct line, which when reached was still no nearer their destination.

In any case, there is no likelihood that a large number of women and children were taken, unless we are prepared to accept the improbable hypothesis that a fleet of ships was expressly chartered for the voyage. In the case of the small vessels which ventured on such long trading expeditions, every foot of storage space would be required for the goods that were carried, and for the accommodation of the merchants who went to exchange these for the products of the ports at which they called. It is most unlikely that many other passengers were ever carried so far in Indian ships in early times, notwithstanding fanciful tales of imaginary ships with hundreds on board, in the Jataka stories.

Nissanka-Malla and his brother do not claim that the Sinhapura at which they were born was the city founded by Wijaya's father. It is possible, however, that they could trace some distant connexion with the Lala family, and it has been noted already that Wijaya's great-great-grandfather was said to be a king of Kalinga.

NOTE.

With regard to the exorcism of the flies, I give a relation of the similar treatment of locusts in Abyssinia, by Father Francis Alvarez, who visited that country in 1520, in the suite of a Portuguese Ambassador. The account is appended in Pory's translation of the History of Africa, by Leo Africanus, 1600, p. 352. An appeal having been made to Alvarez to drive away an enormous flight of locusts, "which to our iudgement couered fower and twentie miles of lande," the following is his own record of the proceedings:--

"And so I went to the Ambassadour, and told him, that it would be very good to goe on procession, beseeching God that hee woulde deliuer the countrie, who peraduenture in his great mercie might heare vs. This liked the Ambassadour very well: and the day following we gathered togither the people of the land, with all the priests, and taking the consecrated stone, and the crosse, according to their custome, all we Portugals sung the Letanie, and appointed those of the land, that they should lift vp their voices aloud as we did, saying in their language Zio marina Christos, which is as much to say, as Lord God haue mercy vpon vs: and with this manner of inuocation we went ouer a peece of grounde, where there were fieldes of wheate, for the space of a mile, euen to a little hill: and heere I caused many of these locustes to be taken, pronouncing ouer them a certaine coniuration, which I had about me in writing, hauing made it that night, requesting, admonishing, and excommunicating them, enioining them within the space of three howers to depart towards the sea, or the lande of the Moores, or the desert mountaines, and to let the Christians alone: and they not performing this, I summoned and charged the birdes of heauen, the beasts of the earth, and all sorts of tempests, to scatter, destroy, and eate vp their bodies: and to this effect I tooke a quantitie of locusts, making this admonition to them present, in the behalfe likewise of them absent, [6] and so giuing them libertie, I suffered them to depart. It pleased God to heare us sinners, for in our returne home, they came so thicke vpon our backes, as it seemed that they woulde haue broken our heads, or shoulders, so hard they strooke against vs, as if we had beene beaten with stones and cudgels, and in this sort they went towards the sea: The men, women, and children remaining at home, were gotten vpon the tops, or tarrasses of their houses, giuing God thankes that the locusts were going away, some afore, and others followed. In the meane while towardes the sea, there arose a great cloude with thunder, which met them full in the teeth, and continued for the space of three howers with much raine, and tempest, that filled all the riuers, and when the raine ceased, it was a fearefull thing to behold the dead Locustes, which were more then two yardes [marginal note, or fathomes] in height vpon the bankes of the riuers, and in some riuers there were mightie heapes of them, so that the morning following there was not one of them found aliue vpon the earth."