As regards healthfulness, the region round about Point de Galle can hardly be commended, and there are some local features not to be forgotten. Elephantiasis prevails among the natives, and leprosy is by no means unknown. Goitre is not uncommon among the native women, Europeans not being affected by it. In Switzerland, where the people so frequently suffer from goitre, it is attributed to drinking snow water; but some other cause must be found for its prevalence here. The most singular thing in connection with the strange guttural protuberance which this disease develops is that females only are liable to it; at least, this seems to be the case in this island. That leprosy is on the increase in Ceylon cannot be denied. There is a leper hospital four or five miles from Colombo, where between two and three hundred poor creatures afflicted with this disease are supported by the government. Besides this fact, it is well known that scores of lepers wander about the capital unrestrained. This is a serious reproach to the authorities. Published statistics show that there are nearly two thousand lepers living upon the island.
One other matter, in this connection, requires prompt attention. Vaccination should be made compulsory. In common with ignorant people wherever found, the Singhalese and Tamils object to this process of protection from what sometimes proves to be in Ceylon a sweeping pestilence before it runs itself out. The records of the island show terrible fatality from the visits of smallpox in past years, which might easily have been prevented.
CHAPTER XVII.
Dondra Head.—"The City of the Gods."—A Vast Temple.—A Statue of Solid Gold.—A Famous Rock-Temple.—Buddhist Monastery.—Caltura and its Distilleries.—Edible Bird's Nests.—Basket-Making.—The Kaluganga.—Cinnamon Gardens.—"The City of Gems."—A Magnificent Ruby.—The True Cat's-Eye.—Vast Riches hidden in the Mountains.—Plumbago Mining.—Iron Ore.—Kaolin.—Gem-Cutting.—Native Swindlers.—Demoralizing Effect of Gem Digging.
At Dondra Head, which is now only a small fishing village, the mouldering remains of a grand and ancient temple are seen, which are believed to antedate those of Anuradhapura, though probably built by the same race of people. It is well known that this locality was the annual resort of multitudes of devotees, from the remotest ages. Indeed, such was its sanctity that two thousand years ago it was called Devi-nuwara,—"The City of the Gods." Ptolemy describes the place as being the most renowned point of interest, for pilgrims, on the island. There was a temple here, built by the Hindus in honor of Vishnu, so gigantic that its dimensions sound to us almost fabulous. Some of the finely carved columns which were once part of the structure are still extant, though partially covered with jungle grass and tangled vines. "So vast was this temple," says an ancient historian, "that from the sea it had the appearance of a large city." Tradition says that this shrine contained a thousand idols of stone and bronze, and that there were a thousand Brahman priests attached to it besides five hundred dancing-girls. We need not be surprised at this, since these trained performers still form part of the equipment of all temples in southern India, doubtless constituting priestly harems.
These items are recorded by a Moorish traveler, John Battuta, who visited the spot six hundred years ago. The same authority further tells us that one of the most sacred idols was life-size, that is, as large as an average man of his period, and was made of pure and solid gold. "The eyes consisted of two rubies, of such lustre that they shone like lanterns." The Portuguese first looted the temple, putting its devotees to the sword, and then entirely demolished the edifice, leaving it a shapeless mass of ruins. Over two hundred granite monoliths, with many finely sculptured stones, still remain to testify to the original character of this marvelous building.
About fifteen or twenty miles from Dondra, there is an ancient and famous rock-temple after the style of that at Dambula, already described. It is called the temple of Mulgirigalla, the place being still a sacred shrine kept up for the benefit of the faithful. The rock of which it is a portion rises over three hundred feet above the level of the surrounding plain, the summit crowned by a large dagoba containing relics of some Buddhist saint. On the face of the crag below, there is a series of buildings still occupied by the priesthood. The temple consists of several chambers or artificial caves, decorated, after the usual manner of these shrines, with crude paintings and stone statues. After twenty centuries of consecutive occupancy, the place is still devoted to its original purpose. A Buddhist monastery exists upon the crag, conducted by white-haired priests like those of Kandy. Close at hand are the tombs containing the ashes of the cremated high priests who have lived and died upon the spot, during so many ages, in the service of the temple. Had the old crag a ready tongue, what curious stories it might reveal of its past history, depicting strange events which no pen has ever recorded.
At Caltura, situated on the coast between Galle and Colombo, about thirty miles from the latter, in the midst of a district crowded with cocoanut-trees, the distillation of arrack is carried on quite extensively. Caltura is, and has long been considered as, a sanitarium in the south part of the island. It is swept at all times by sea breezes from the southwest, and is surrounded by delightful scenery. The temperature averages from ten to fifteen degrees cooler than Colombo. This point was considered of such special importance by the Dutch that they erected elaborate fortifications here, the ruins of which still form a prominent feature of the place. There are several caves hereabouts where a species of the swallow—known as the "swift"—constructs the edible nests so much valued as a table luxury in China. Neither the native Singhalese nor the other inhabitants of the island make use of these nests as food; in fact, they require to be manipulated by expert cooks, in order to bring out their peculiar properties. We are told that centuries ago the people of this nationality came to Caltura to obtain these nests, so much valued as a table luxury by the Mongolians, carefully transporting them to Pekin and Hongkong, where great prices were, and still are, realized for them. The edible nests are held to be the choicest dish to place before the emperor. The best and most glutinous product of this species of bird comes from Java, Borneo, and Sumatra, and the shores of Malacca Straits, generally. Caltura is also famous for the manufacture of fancy baskets of various shapes, made from palm leaf, rice straw, and lemon grass. They are put up in nests of a dozen in a package, one within another. These baskets find many purchasers among those who come to the island, who are glad to carry away a souvenir of their visit. Here the traveler will see that rare and favorite fruit, the mangosteen, flourishing, and, so far as we could learn, it is one of the few districts in Ceylon where it is to be found.