NO. 41. — 1890.] REBELION DE CEYLAN. 



575 



line is long and straggling, owing to narrow and difficult 

 roads : if they are attacked and a fight begins there is no 

 room for any order of battle, and only a confused mass of 

 hand to hand fighting : the same occurs in all the battles, so 

 that it is example that rules, and not obedience. What 

 are most common and usual are ambuscades, for which the 

 forests and steep mountains, of which the Island is full, 

 provide every advantage. Marching is as difficult and as 

 dangerous as are the battles ; for the roads, or rather paths, 

 are closed up and narrow, notwithstanding that always 

 numbers of pioneers with picks and spades are sent in 

 front to clear the way, The companies cannot march, 

 as in Europe, in fours or fives abreast, but in Indian 

 file — one after another — because of these obstructions. 

 They travel on foot ; for the country is so overgrown with 

 jungle and so full of swamps that horses cannot be used : 

 the force therefore consists only of infantry. The soldiers 

 wear no armour to speak of ; their ordinary arms are 

 arquebuses, short spikes, and bows and arrows, and for 

 close quarters some have small broadswords, which are 

 called Calachurros. 



The General marched with his bodyguard and all his staff 

 and household in front, each one according to their standing, 

 and close to his person was the Sergeant-Major to take and 

 convey his orders. He had with him as a badge of royalty two 

 Modeliares with white shields, and a great number of drum- 

 mers and trumpeters. The Disaivas and the Camp Captain- 

 Major accompanied the General as private gentlemen; for they 

 exercise no command nor authority except in his absence. 

 The position he holds in the army is not always the same, 

 nor those who carry the colours, as is the usual custom in 

 our time : these are placed in the centre of the company as 

 the safest and best guarded position. When a halt is made 

 in a town or village the place in which they are placed is 

 covered with an awning of woven palms, with distinctive 

 marks on the streets, houses, or tents in which they are lodged 

 with less safety than comfort. 



