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JOURNAL, R.A.S. ( CEYLON). 



[Vol. IX. 



enterprise; but to see how his eyes glisten when he speaks of his 

 kangani,* the head man of the preparing works ! He told us that 

 all who came to his place acknowledged the superiority of his 

 kangani, and certainly we were no exception. It Was to Cornelius 

 De Silva, known familiarly and in every day life as Harmanis 

 Appu, we were ever referred, and always with the result that we 

 obtained just the full and correct and substantially scientific 

 details we desiderated, regarding the characteristics of the purest 

 and best forms of plumbago, as contra-distinguished from the 

 hard form known as yabora, or iron dross ; and also regarding 

 the rocks associated with plumbago, such as tiruwdnagala 

 (white stone, or quartz), miniran (mica), and diya-rat-ran (water- 

 gem-gold, or iron pyrites.) Although kangani, and quite an in- 

 telligent-looking gentleman in his out-of-door dress, Harmanis 

 Appu, in the preparing compound, dresses as scantily, works as 

 hard, and is as effectually electrotyped and polished by the black 

 shining miueral as any of the coolies he superintends. It was 

 he who, with great pains and ingenuity, overcame the difficulties 

 connected with one of the most slip pery substances in nature, by 

 sawing first-class lumps of plumbago, and securing them one 

 above another with iron pins run through them, so as to form the 

 pyramidal trophy, which was placed on a table in the hall of the 

 Asiatic Society, to illustrate the Paper on Plumbago, and which 

 still stands there with chips, dust, and the associated rocks. In 

 order to reach the Museum in safety, the plumbago had to be 

 wrapped round and secured with gunny cloth. Besides the large 

 mass of plumbago to which Mr. Davidson alluded as in prospect 

 for the Exhibition, we submit that a trophy of first-class lumps 

 of our staple mineral in the form of a good-sized dagoba would be 

 a very effective and very characteristic object in the Ceylon Court, 

 as much so, perhaps, as a trophy of pearl shell. The lumps 

 could be sawn smooth, so as to be easily superimposed, and the 

 slipperiness could doubtless be overcome by the use of a dark- 

 coloured cement." 



[It may be added, that from long observation and experience 

 the kangani is able, by a kind of instinct, to recognize lumps 

 which come to the store, as fine soft plumbago ; as plumbago, 

 pure but hard, or as mineral formed over a matrix of quartz, 

 or mica, or iron pyrites, without testing the specimens by their 

 very different specific gravities : the purest plumbago being 

 lightest in weight, as well as brightest in lustre.] 



