No. 25—1882,] 



SINHALESE FOLK-LOBE STOBIES. 



225 



SINHALESE FOLK-LORE STORIES. 

 By W. Knight James, F.R.G.S., F.R, Hist., S. 

 {Read, November 2nd, 1882) 



The Sinhalese are essentially a social people. Some of the 

 most important traits of their character are, deep attachment to 

 friends, filial obedience, and love of their homes and villages. 

 There are a few greater hardships which a Sinhalese can be 

 called upon to undergo than separation from the home and 

 friends of his childhood, and there are few dearer reminiscences 

 to him, wherever he may be in after life, than those which 

 recall the early days spent in his native village. Home stories 

 and sayings exercise no little influence on him, and at any rate 

 in the leisure portion of the life of the villager oral stories take 

 an important place, whether they be the Jataka stories of the 

 various births of Buddha, 



" The preternatural tale, 

 "Romance of giants, chronicle of fiends," 



or the more modest stories that relate the doings of the people. 

 In the Sinhalese home it is true that the " fireside" with which 

 we connect the story-telling of harsher climes is absent, but it 

 finds its representative in the little verandah or in the roadside, 

 and often when the family have retired to rest for the night in 

 the single room and verandah which generally form the " house" 

 of the Sinhalese cultivator, one member, frequently the grand- 

 father relates stories to the others until he finds that the " dull 

 god" has drawn away his audience. In the night as two or 

 three villagers sit guarding the ripening grain of their paddy 

 fields from the inroads of elephant, buffalo or boar, stories serve 

 to wile away what would be otherwise a weary vigil, and on 

 numerous other common-place occasions story-telling plays an 

 important part. Some of these stories throw considerable light 



