164 



SPOLtA ZEYLANICA. 



On entering the cave we disturbed an immense number of bats 

 who had taken it for their own. The whole place literally swarmed 

 with them, and as the floor had a covering of two or three inches 

 of their dung, the odour was most oppressive. Entering by the arch 

 we found ourselves m a hall about 14 yards long by about 8 broad ^ 

 the back of which, consisting of a brick wall, is pierced by four 

 doors, each leading into a separate cell, the sloping roof of the cave 

 forming the back walls of them all, as well as the outer side walls of 

 the two outer cells. The partition walls between the cells are made 

 of brick covered with a layer of mud or plaster. The two ends of 

 the cave are separated from the main hall by low mud walls, which 

 do not reach to the top of the cave ; both present a rectangular gap 

 through which the hall communicates with the small antechamber 

 which these walls cut off, one of which has a door communicating 

 with the exterior. On a " table " built up of bricks and mud in the 

 hall there is a large flat stone with a circular excavation on its upper 

 surface about 2 feet in diameter and half an inch deep. A similar 

 stone was found lying on the floor in thab antechamber which com- 

 municates with the outside of the cave. Figure 4, reproduced from 

 a flashlight photograph, shows a number of these features. It was 

 taken with the camera pointed obliquely down the length of the 

 hall, and shows the inner wall and the doorway leading into one 

 of the cells. The stone with the circular depression is also shown 

 against this wall, while the low wall with its rectangular opening 

 leading into one of the small end chambers, into which daylight 

 streams through a gap in the outer wall of the cave, occupies the 

 background of the photograph. The subjoined plan will make 

 clear the arrangement of the chambers of this cave. 



Plan, not to Scale, of Miillegamagalg6. 

 A, main hall ; B, antechambers ; C, cells ; D, doors ; E, arch. 



At one end of the wall closing in the front of the cave, where some 

 bricks had worked loose, it could be seen that the lowest tier of bricks 

 was laid on the face of the rock separated only by a layer of cement, 

 formed of crushed pieces of quartz set in some adhesive substance, 

 and part of the floor of the central and largest chamber of the cave 

 seemed to be covered with the same substance. The local ideas 

 concerning this cave are, that long ago it was the habitation of Vedda 

 chiefs, and that it was used again in 1818 by refugees during the 

 Rebellion, to whom the bricked-in front and the brick walls of the 

 cells within the cave are attributed. 



