IN GENERAL. 



65 



Then come the directions for performing the Jeewama, which 

 are as follow—" Make a Mai Bulat Tatuwa and three Pidayni Ta- 

 tuwas on a grave. Use the Etta Etty, the Seven Curries, blood, 

 boiled rice, opium, three lizard eggs, a cock, seven clusters of Rat 

 Mai flowers, the ashes of burnt hair, and roasted meat for these 

 altars. Make an image of wax, and write on it the name of the 

 person, who is to be injured. Take then seven Kan-ya Nool 

 threads, and pronouncing the charm 108 times, make seven knots 

 in the threads, one in each. Put the image on an Areca flower, 

 the first, which that tree has ever produced, and tie them up to- 

 gether by means of the threads. Then take this away and conceal 

 it in the back roof of the house. The man will be insane from 

 that day. To cure him, remove the image from the roof and throw 

 it into a stream, and the man will recover his reason." 



The following is a charm for curing any disease supposed to be 

 caused by the demon Reeri Yakseya: — 



" Brahma, Vishnu, and Siva ! Adoration be to you ! The 

 demon Reeri Yakseya, who resides on the rock Mala Dola Gigi- 

 riana in the land of Sayurasla, came into this world from the 

 womb of his mother Laytali by tearing himself through her heart, 

 on Saturday in the month of Nawan, [corresponding to a part of 

 February and part of March.] This demon wears a crown of fire 

 on his head, a cloth of blood below his waist, and another cloth of 

 blood above, thrown across his shoulders. He has the face of a 



below the surface, and also from certain trees, which produce gums equally 

 inflammable and also called dummala, of which the Sal tree is the principal. 



The Ola books of the Singhalese being written with an iron stile, the charac- 

 ters are illegible, but by rubbing on them an oil extracted from dummala, mixed 

 with the ashes of burnt rags, a black colour is imparted to the lines, and so the 

 letters become very legible. 



The practice of offering incense to beings considered to be superior to men, 

 whether they are called gods or demons, is one which appears to have prevailed 

 from the earliest times, and its origin would indeed be a very interesting subject 

 of inquiry both in connection with the history of Ceylon Demonism, and in 

 relation to the Jews, with whom it was usual to make an incense offering to 

 Jehovah. 



