Chap. X.] 



rHEPAEATION OF OLAS. 



51.3 



After undergoing a process (one stage of wliicli consists 

 in steeping them in hot water and sometimes in milk) to 

 preserve their flexlbihty, they are submitted to pressure 

 to render their surface uniformly smooth. They are then 

 cut into stripes of two or three inches in breadth, and from 

 one to three feet long. These are pierced with two holes, 

 one near each end, through which a cord is passed, so as 

 to secure them between two wooden covers, lacquered 

 and ornamented with coloured devices. The leaves thus 

 strung together and secured, form a book. 



On these palm-leaves the custom is to write with an 

 iron stile held nearly upright, and steadied by a nick 

 cut to receive it in the thumb-nail of the left hand. 

 The stile is sometimes richly ornamented, shaped 

 like an arrow, and inlaid 

 with gold, one blade of 

 the feather serving as a 

 knife to trim the leaf pre- 

 paratory to writing. The 

 case is sometimes made 

 of carved ivory bound 

 with hoops of filigreed 

 silver. 



The furrow made by the 

 pressure of the steel is ren- 

 dered visible by the apph- 

 cation of charcoal ground with a fragrant oil\ to the 

 odoiu- of which the natives ascribe the remarkable state 

 of preservation in which their most sacred books are 

 found, its aromatic properties securing the leaves from de- 

 struction by white ants and other insects.^ 



WRITING WITH ASTILF. 



^ For this pui-pose a resin is used, 

 called dunutlu by the nati^'es, who 

 dig it up from beneath the sm-face 

 of lauds from which the forest has 

 disappeared. 



^ In Ceylon thei-e are a few Budd- 

 hist books brought from Burmah, in 

 which the text is inscribed on plates 



VOL. I. L 



of silver. I have seen others on 

 leaves of ivory, and some belonging 

 to the Dalada Wihara, at Kandy, 

 are engi'aved on gold. The earliest 

 gTants of lands, called saunas, were 

 written on palm-leases, but an in- 

 scription on a rock at Dambool, 

 which is of the date 1200 a.d., re- 



