APPENDIX  XIV.
 

     TYPES  OF  RACES AND AMUSING CHARACTERS  IN

                            CEYLON.



 (Being Sketches and Caricatures given in the " Souvenirs

                op Ceylon," by  A. M. Ferguson.)



The Kandian Adigar (" the supreme one ") represents a dignity next

in rank to the Kandian Sovereign.  These were  the first, second and

third Adigars,  conjoint Prime  Ministers, Commanders in Chief, and

Judges of the Appellate Court.  After being long extinct, the dignity

has been revived of late years.   The folds of stiff muslin worn by the

Kandian Headmen give them an odd appearance, and led a late facetious

Judge of the Kandy District Court  to place to their credit the invention

of crinoline.  At Pavilion levies and on other state occasions the Kandian

Chiefs still appear in full  dress, and  their coronet-like  caps relieve the

effeminate  effect  of " all this muslin," and  show to advantage when

compared with the comb-adorned  heads of

  The Maritime Sinhalese Modliars.—The figure represents one of

these, the highest Native Chiefs in the low country ;  for the rank of

Maha Modliar (Great Modliar) is  the very highest in the Maritime

Districts.   Modliar, or Mudianse, is a military term about equivalent to

the rank of Captain of a district,  and in the olden days, even in the

Dutch times, each Modliar had his guard of Lascoreens or native soldiers.

Originally there was a Koralle, the highest civil authority, and a Modliar,

the highest military power, in each Korle or county.  But collisions of

authority led to the suppression of the civil rank in the Dutch time, and

the concentration of all power, civil and military, in the Modliar-—whose

sword, worn  conspicuously  at levees  and on  other full-dress occasions

attests the origin of the rank. The effect is not more ludicrous than the

sword which forms an essential part of^the court-dress of England ; though

here, in Ceylon, every interpreter of the Supreme Court  or of a Govern¬

ment  Agent's  Cutcherry (office),  and of a  District  Court,  with all

Secretaries  of  District Courts who  are  natives, are ex officio Modliars.

The Modliars  of  Korles are the Government Agents'  right hands  in

matters of revenue, title to lands, etc.  ; and the Government can reward

meritorious servants  of Government, or natives in  private life  who dis¬

tinguish themselves by acts of public spirit, with the much-coveted

distinction  of Modliar of the Governor's  Gate.  For instance, Modliar

of the Gate de Soyza of Morottoo, received his high rank for opening a

road in Hewahette.  In former days the different castes had each its

headman ;  but these are now abolished,  and officers for the  different

districts only are appointed, irrespective of caste, the offices being open,

indeed, to all competent natives, as is the use of velvet, a fabric which

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