50 



pleased that he stroked the squirrel on the back, which has, 

 ever since, borne the finger marks. 



Writing in 1821 concerning Adam's Bridge, Davy ob- 

 serves ^ that : 



" No one who looks at a map and notices the little distance 

 (about 17 miles) between the nearest point of the island (Ceylon) 

 and continent, and how, by the chain of rocks and sand-banks 

 commonly called Adam's Bridge, they are still imperfectly con- 

 nected, can entertain much doubt that the connection was once 

 perfect. This inquiry is more curious than useful. It woxdd be 

 much more useful to endeavour to complete that which nature 

 has begun, and to make the channel, which is now obstructed 

 and dangerous, clear and safe, and fit for the purposes of coast 

 navigation. If, on examination, sandstone and coral rock 

 should be found constituting part of Adam's Bridge instead of 

 primitive rock, one necessary inference is that the channel, at 

 whatever period formed, was once deeper and more open than it 

 is at present, and another inference is that, in prot^iss of time, 

 it will be closed up, and Ceylon joined to the continent." 



Tradition runs to the effect that, at the time of the 

 disruption of Rdm^svaram Island from the mainland on the 

 one side and Ceylon on the other, the cows became prisoners 

 on the island, and being unable, like the cows at Cape Cod, 

 which are fed on herring's heads, to adapt themselves to a fish 

 diet, took to living on sea weeds, and have become, by 

 degrees, converted into diminutive "■ metamorphosed cows," 

 which may still be seen grazing on the shore. This story is 

 based on the fact that portions of the skulls of cats and dogs, 

 including the articulated temporal, parietal, and occipital 

 bones, which are sometimes picked up on the beach, bear a 

 rude resemblance to the skull of a cow, the horns being 

 represented by the zygoma. 



When I was staying at Pdmban in 1888, a bucket 

 dredger was at work in the Pass, and from the mud brought 

 up by it, I obtained many small Crustacea, Echinoderms 

 (chiefly Lagannm depressum and Fibidaria voka), Mollusca (of 

 which Leda mmiritiana was one of the most abundant) 

 including great quantities of the little Avicula vexillumy 

 which was formerly mistaken for the young of the pearl 

 oyster, a single Gephyrean (Sipunculus sp.), Branchiostoma 



' Travels in Ceylon. 



