and watch the out-door scenes as they
presented themselves to the eye. The women were strange objects, with
silver and brass jewelry stuck through the tops and bottoms of their
ears, through their nostrils and lips, their toes being covered with
small silver coins attached to rings, and their ankles, fingers, and
wrists similarly covered, but with scarcely any clothing upon their
bodies. Both men and women frequently have their arms, legs, and bodies
tattooed with red and black ink, representing grotesque figures and
strange devices,--these pictorial illustrations on their copper-colored
skins reminding one of illumined text on vellum. Like most Eastern
nations, they do not sit down when fatigued, but squat on their heels to
rest themselves, or when eating,--a position which no person not
accustomed to it can assume for one instant without pain. The men wear
their hair done up in a singular manner, combed back from the forehead
and held in place by a circular shell comb, giving them an especially
effeminate appearance; but the women wear nothing of the comb kind in
their hair, their abundant braids being well plaited and confined by
long metallic pins with mammoth heads. Some of the women are pretty, and
would be almost handsome, if their ears and lips and noses were not so
distorted; as it is, they have fine upright figures, and the dignified
walk that so distinguishes their Egyptian sisters.

These women are very generally employed as nurses by the English
officers' wives, and children seem to take very kindly to them, their
nature being gentle and affectionate. But these nurses seem to form a
class by themselves, and the taste for cheap jewelry could hardly be
carried to a greater extent than it is with them. They are got up in the
"loudest" style; after the idea of the Roman women similarly employed,
or those one meets with children in the gardens of the Louvre at Paris,
or the Prado at Madrid. The Singhalese nurses wear a white linen chemise
covering the body, except the breast, to the knee, with a blue cut-away
velvet jacket, covered with silver braid and buttons, open in front, a
scarlet sash gathering the chemise at the waist. The legs and feet are
bare, the ankles and toes covered with rings, and the ears heavy,
weighed down, and deformed with them. These, like their sisters of the
masses, often have their nostrils and lower lips perforated by metallic
hoops of brass or silver, and sometimes of gold; to which i