124 SPOLIA ZEYLANICA. 
recognize a single expression. The following morning I taxed 
the people with speaking in Vedda language, but they stoutly 
declared that they could only speak Sinhalese. 
In my opinion the majority ol the people of the Maha 
Wedirata are of Vedda origin, but have discarded their 
primitive customs as they dwindled in numbers, and while 
other causes, such as marriage with neighbouring people, 
tended to still further break down the older customs of the 
isolated clans that made up the Vedda race as a whole, they 
still clung in secret to the language of their forefathers, as a 
binding link and a means of private communication. 
- At Salavai, in the Panawa Pattu, I found one family who 
admitted that their grandfather was a real Vedda, belonging 
to one of the clans occupying the country on the confines of 
the Kumbukkan river. 
From the oldest member of this family I obtained a mass 
of information respecting the habits and customs of the Vedda 
people. 
According to this individual, who has adopted the Sinhalese 
name of Dissan Hamy, the Veddas were divided up into a 
number of waruge or clans, each of which occupied and 
hunted over a specific area of country, and had no connection 
with the others who lived as separate communities. 
The members of each clan were more or less related, and 
previous to the disintegration of the Veddas as a race, they 
could not marry any but members of the same waruge. 
They lived by hunting, in which only the males took part. 
Their habitations were caves, and occasionally leaf shelters, 
but the latter was uncommon. 
The females were kept in a state of rigid subjection to the 
males, and could not take part in the chase, ordinary 
ceremonials, or conversation with any but those who were 
immediate relations, or the closest relatives of the husband. 
If the husband was pleased to throw some meat to his wife, 
as part of his spoil in the chase, that was all the woman was 
entitled to. She could not claim a share simply because she 
was the man’s wife. 
Under ordinary circumstances, both the males and females 
were naked, assuming only for special occasions a loin cloth 
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