AK ITINERABY OF THE VEDDA COUNTRY. 159 



primitive men. Quite a number of the village Sinhalese have deal- 

 ings Avith these folk, who herd their cattle, the Veddas receiving 

 in return every fifth calf that is born. Synthesising what we heard, 

 it appears that in the ordinarj' course of events the Nilgala headman 

 sends word when strangers are expected ; then the folk we saw 

 repair to their very striking hut on the rock dome and post a look-out 

 on a big rock about half way up, and on our second visit the leading 

 man of our party who was carrying the camera stated that he saw a 

 Vedda bolting from this rock as we came up. These folk, who, when 

 we saw them, wore their Vedda loin-cloths and were smeared with 

 ashes, are reported to wear ordinary Sinhale-se clothes when not in 

 their professional pose, and Mr. Bibile, who has himself seen one or 

 more of them in sarongs, points out that the imposture is kept up 

 for two main reasons : firstly, they fear that their cultivation might 

 be stopped 'evidently an echo of the chena difficulty of the Eastern 

 Province) , or that they might be taxed if they did not appear to be 

 poor felloAvs living on hardly- won jungle produce ; and secondly, 

 their pose of poverty interests strangers and procures them visitors, 

 whose generosity varies directly as the degree of primitiveness Avith 

 which appeal is made to them. 



Under these circumstances, it did not take long for us to decide to 

 move to Ambilinne, whence we should be able to reach the Hene- 

 bedda and Kolombedda Veddas. These folk occupy the land 

 immediately to the east of the Danigala rock massif, but as it was 

 quite impossible to get our baggage across the hills, it was thought best 

 to return to Nilgala and thence follow the track to the Public Works 

 Departnient bungalow at Ambilinne. Here we had the opportu- 

 nity of getting to know four of the younger men of the Henebedda 

 community. We gave them rice and curry materials, and it was 

 interesting to find how extremely pungent they made their curry, 

 which suggests that they have long been acquainted with Sinhalese 

 cookery, for previous experience in the Pacific and in Borneo had 

 seemed to show that folk unaccustomed to hot and spicy food con- 

 sidered even a slight amount of pungency most objectionable. They 

 passed the night on sacking on our verandah and were immensely 

 interested in everything that went on, being especially pleased with 

 a little boxwood top which they learned to spin immediately. About 

 nine they quite spontaneously began to sing and dance, the 

 rhythm being supphed by their song and the slapping of their hands 

 on their chests and flanks; but beyond this there was very little 

 regularity in the performance. In one figure, in which an arrow was 

 struck in the ground, the performers began to move round it clock- 

 wise with their right hands inwards, but very soon one dancer was 

 circling in the opposite direction between the other two, who were 

 still moving clockwise. The two performers who had not struck 

 their arrows into the groimd held these in front of them in their 

 hands, which were separated by the length of the shaft, while their 



