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JOURNAL, B.A.S. (CEYLON). [VOL. XI. 



There are old people in the island up to ninety and one 

 hundred years ; and to keep themselves in good health, they 

 carry a root in their belt, which they chew if they do not 

 feel Well,* I once asked one of them how he could have 

 grown so old, and still be so quiet. He replied that when 

 he had a mind to eat he had eaten, to drink he had drunk ; 

 to sleep he had slept ; when he had an opportunity to sit 

 down he sat down ; to cover his head he covered it ; in short 

 he had never done anything against his nature when he 

 could help it. 



When one of them is on his deathbed, and to all appear- 

 ances sinking, one of his best friends comes, puts his mouth 

 on his firmly and exactly, that his soul may not go into an 

 animal when leaving.f When he is quite dead, they begin 

 to weep and to mourn, and to ask with tears why he had 

 died, whether he had not money enough or not enough to 

 eat ; they go into the jungle and conjure the devil that he 

 should tell them what had been the matter with the deceased. 

 After much crying they wash him and sew him up in a 

 cloth, and then hire several old women, who have to sit in 

 front of the dead man's house for three days and nights and 

 to wail. They cover themselves with mud, or run into the 

 water up to the neck, as if they wanted to drown themselves 



the Stoppage of the Monthly Flowers, and other Diseases of the Womb ; but 

 most especially against the Yellow Jaundice : This Root is one of the main 

 Ingredients in that Ointment, called Borbori by the Javaneses, wherewith 

 they anoint the whole Body." (Nieuhoff, loc. cit., p. 339.) " Curcoma or 

 Bobori" (Valentyn, Amboina, p. 160). " G-reat Java also produces... Bor- 

 borry" (Heydt, p 69,w). " They [the Malabars] smear themselves now and 

 then with Borreborry, a sort of Indian saffron (W. Schouten, I. c, p. 275). 

 " Buriburri or Gurlioma (which is the Indian saffron)" (Langhansz 

 Neue Ost-Indische Reise, p. 194). "The Gurltuma, which in India is 

 called Burburri, they use likewise for dyeing cotton " {ibid, p. 242). 



* Probably the areka-nut (Areca catechu Z.), which all natives chew t 

 mixing it with leaves of the betel creeper {Piper betle) and chunam or 

 lime. 



t Navarette notes that the Brahmins, contra, endeavour to ensure the 

 soul of the man in articulo mortis passing straight into a cow, though 

 not through its mouth. (Churchill, I., 308.) 



