496 



SCIENCES AXD SOCIAL AETS. 



[PART IV. 



they were brought, or the swiftness of their speed. 1 In 

 battle the soldiers rode chargers 2 , and a passage in the 

 Mahawanso shows that they managed them by means of 

 a rope passed through the nostril, which served as a 

 bridle. 3 Cosmas Indicopleustes, who considered the 

 number of horses in Ceylon in the 6th century to be a 

 fact of sufficient importance to be recorded, adds, that 

 they were imported from Persia, and the merchants 

 bringing them were treated with special favour and 

 encouragement, their ships being exempted from all 

 dues and charges. Marco Polo found the export of 

 horses from Aden and Ormus to India going on with 

 activity in the 13th century. 4 



Domestic Furniture. Of the furniture of the pri- 

 vate dwellings of the Singhalese, such notices as have 

 come down to us serve to show that their intercourse 

 with other Buddhist nations was not without its 

 influence on their domestic habits. Chairs 5 , raised 

 seats G , footstools 7 , and metal lamps 8 , were articles com- 

 paratively unknown to the Hindus, and were obviously 

 imitated by the Singhalese from the East, from China, 

 Siam, or Pegu. 9 The custom which prevails to the 

 present day of covering a chair with a white cloth, 

 as an act of courtesy in honour of a visitor, was ob- 

 served with the same formalities two thousand years 



ago. 



Eich beds u and woollen carpets 12 were in 



1 Sighan, swift ; dhawa, to run ; 

 Mahaivanso, ch. xxiii. p. 142, 186. 



2 Mahawanso, ch. xxii. p. 132 ; 

 ch. xxiii. 142. 



3 The Prince Dutugaimunu, when 

 securing the mare which afterwards 

 carried him in the war against Elala, 

 " seized her by the throat and boring 

 her nostril with the point of his 

 sword, secured her with his rope." 

 Mahawanso, ch. x. p. 60. 



4 Marco Polo, ch. xx. s. ii. : 

 ch. xl. 



5 Mahawanso, ch. xiv. p. 80 ; ch. 

 xv. p. 84 ; Rajaratnacari, p. 134. 



6 Ibid., ch. xiii. p. 82. 



7 Ibid., xxvii. p. 164. 



8 Mahawanso, ch. xxx. p. 182 ; 

 ch. xxxii. p. 192. 



9 Asiatic Researches, vol. vi. p. 

 437. Chairs are shown on the sculp- 

 tures of Persepolis; and it is pro- 

 bably a remnant of Grecian civilisa- 

 tion in Bactria that chairs are still 

 used by the mountaineers of Balkh 

 and Bokhara. 



10 B.C. 307, King Devenipiatissa 

 caused a chair to be so prepared for 

 Mahindo. 



11 Mahawanso, ch. xv. p. 84 ; ch. 

 xxiii. p. 129. A four-post bed is 

 mentioned B.C. 180. Mahawanso, 

 ch. xxiv. p. 148. 



12 Ibid., ch. xiv. p. 82. 



