163 
The Dutch of Ceylon» 
tion. The Dutch ladies have a custom of cracking their joints, 
and rubbing them over with oil, which renders them uncom- 
monly supple. 
Dancing is the principal amusement of the younger women ; 
while the chief pleasure of the married and elderly ladies con- 
sists in paying formal and ceremonious visits to each other. 
To these visits they go attended by a number of slave girls, 
dressed out for the occasion. These girls walk after them, car- 
rying their betel-boxes, or are employed in bearing umbrellas 
over the heads of their mistresses, who seldom wear any head- 
dress, but have their hair combed closely back and shining 
with oil. Their chief finery consists in these female attendants, 
and their splendor is estimated by the number of them which 
they can afford to keep. These slaves are the comelist girls 
that can be procured, and their mistresses in general behave 
very kindly to them. With that caprice, however, which al-' 
ways attends power in the hands of the ignorant and narrow- 
minded, the Dutch ladies frequently behave in a very cruel 
and unjust manner to their female attendants, upon very 
trifling occasions, and in particular on the slighest suspicion of 
jealousy. 
The unmarried ladies usually pay considerable attention to their 
dress; and, since the conquest of the island by our forces, have 
greatly improved their appearance by adopting the English 
fashions. On my first arrival in the island, they dressed in the 
Dutch manner with long waists and stiff high stays, which to me 
appeared very grotesque and awkward. The dress worn by many 
of them, which is a mixture of the European and native fashions, 
is light and pretty. It consists of a piece of fine cotton cloth 
wrapped round the body, and fastened under the arms, which 
