31 
PLATE ХП. 
The Singhalese, as I have intimated before, must be called a fine race, but generally speaking 
the females are not so goodlooking as the men. To the eye of the stranger the majority of the 
former seem aged. In reality the period, when the females in Ceylon deserve to be ranked in the 
category of the fair sex, only lasts a very short time. Still there is an exception to this rule, in as 
much as in the country near Ratnapoora and Pelmadula, inhabited by a multitude of loweasts and 
outcasts, many women bear on their countenance the marks of real beauty. 
It is very strange that the highcasts are generally darker than many lowcasts, in spite of the 
very simple costume of the latter, which leaves the upper part of the body exposed to the scorching 
influence of the sun. | 
Some of the low-caste girls between 11 and 14 years are peculiarly pretty and have а light 
brown complexion. Their shoulders, busts and arms being of an exquisitely delicate form, they 
frequently resemble those antique bronze statues of Psyche, familiar to all lovers of art. 
Agostina was a christian girl 13 years of age, and performed the duties of an aj ah in a 
native house near Pelmadula. 
