rcourse with all other tribes, especially the English. They
are an undersized people, the men being only five feet in height on an
average, and the women still less. Their neglect of any sort of
ablution is a marked feature of their habits, while their intellectual
capacity is placed, by people who have taken considerable trouble to
inform themselves upon the subject, at as low a gauge as possible in
human beings. In the matter of cleanliness, the wild animals about
them are more civilized than they, their long, tangled, unkempt hair
adding to their weird, uncanny appearance. What little intercourse
they have with other people is almost entirely by signs, and they seem
to be either disinclined or unable to talk intelligently. They are
said to be wonderful marksmen with bow and arrow. As they practice
constantly from boyhood, this is but natural. With the exception of
the knife, the bow and arrow is their only weapon of offense or
defense. It is thought that there are not over a couple of thousand
Veddahs now in existence, an aggregate which is annually diminished.
They are still accustomed to the most primitive ways, producing fire,
when it is needed, by rapidly turning a pointed stick in a hole made
in perfectly dry wood, their bowstrings acting as a propeller in
twirling the stick. This is a sure but laborious way to obtain fire.
It is a fact which has been commented upon considerably, and which is
perhaps worthy of mention in this connection, that, in many important
particulars, these Veddahs are very like the wild native tribes of
Australia. This is not only evinced in certain physical resemblances,
but also in their hereditary habits, their unwritten tongue, and some
other particulars. Much is made of these facts by certain writers on
physical geography, who have a theory that in the far past Australia
was joined or was adjacent to Ceylon, notwithstanding the wide reach
of ocean which now intervenes.

These wild people of the district of Bintenne are divided into two
communities,--the Rock or Jungle Veddahs, and the Village Veddahs, the
latter living nearest to the settlements on the east coast, dwelling
in cabins built in the rudest manner, and cultivating some simple
grains and vegetables, while the former remain in the depth of the
forest, roaming hither and thither, and avoiding all contact with
civilization. They are said to have preserved this isolation and
manner of living from the earliest period of the isl