106 



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



[Vol. XIX. 



belonged to King Narendra Sinha. The gold prepared for 

 use is said to have been brought from Siam. Its use is 

 certainly not indigenous. 



Shades of colour. — Red, black, and blue are mixed with 

 white to form respectively pink (imbul sivi) , gray (sudu kalu or 

 nilsivi), and pale blue (nilsivi). The gray is generally used in 

 place of blue or green where either of these colours would 

 appear natural or necessary, as for trees, or representations of 

 Vishnu, the " Blue God." A little yellow added to the gray 

 gives it a greenish tinge. The use of these shades (never in 

 such a way as to produce undue relief or interfere with the 

 flatness of the decoration) and so also of limited quantities of 

 other "colours (particularly green on painted woodwork), and 

 of the invariable black outline tempers any hardness of con- 

 trast between the red and yellow.* The whole range of colours 

 may be thought very limited, but it will be found that a 

 sufficiently varied use can be made of them, and the very 

 limitation was a safeguard and a stimulus to the imagination 

 and ingenuity of the Kandyan painter. 



According to the proper method the aforesaid pigments were 

 finely powdered and mixed with gum (divul latu) of the 

 elephant-apple tree and water, which dries without glaze. 



Oil colours were never used ;| but where desirable, as 

 in the case of paintings on wood (book covers, book 

 boxes, and other furniture) or outdoor work, the colours are 

 protected by a layer of varnish (walichchiya). This varnish 

 is made thus : powdered dummala (which must be white and 

 clean, not dark) is mixed with dorana tel (oil obtained from the 

 dor ana tree, Dipterocarpus glandulosus. Thw.) and boiled for 

 half an hour or more and then allowed to cool, when it is ready 

 for use ; after some two or three days it begins to harden, and 

 more oil must be added and the whole boiled to make it 

 again fit for use. The varnish so prepared smells strongly of 



* Cf. Ruskin, " Stones of Venice," Vol. III., ch. I., §xxviii. 

 f I have finally assured myself on this point since the Handbook- 

 was issued. 



