Then we come on a group of dark-brown men wearing loincloths and turbans and repairing the roadway with pick and shovel; 13 these are Tamil coolies from Southern India, doing the heavy work of the town. Another trots in the shafts of a ricksha, 14 the carriage of the East, which we shall meet again. As we go further into the town, we meet natives from the country districts on their way to market in two-wheeled carts, thatched with 15 leaves of the coconut palm and drawn by little humped bullocks. They wear the _comboy_ and little else, as they are less influenced by foreign ideas than the people of the town. Let us follow them into the _Pettah_, or native quarter, 16 with its trams and rickshas and busy shops. Here we see the carts collected in the open market place, and in the streets we 17 notice a new type of men; these are Moormen or Mohammedans, who carry on much of the business of the town. Some of them wear the fez, which we see at times even in our own country; others, more old-fashioned, wear strange-looking hats shaped like a beehive. On our way back we pass a Hindu temple, which reminds us 18 again that India, its people and its creeds are close at hand. The Europeans are almost as varied as the natives. Some are English, officials or planters; others are Dutch by race; while there are also a great number of half-caste descendants of the original Portuguese settlers. Many of the half-castes bear Portuguese names and imitate European dress and manners. We can easily see something of the habits of the poorer classes since they live largely in the public view. Their houses are wattled huts of mud and bamboo, thatched with leaves or roofed with red tiles, and open to the street except at night when they are boarded up carefully, as the Sinhalese are not fond of the night air. We may perhaps see a family occupied with the morning toilet, in front of the house; and here in a corner of the lake are the _dhobies_ or native washermen at work. The lake is 19 one of the most beautiful sights of the town; it is really one of the lagoons which we find all round the coast, where the mouth of a stream has silted up. The Dutch, following their home customs, utilized these lagoons and developed a system of canals along the low coastline. Part of the system is still in use, and we can travel by small steamer from Colombo northward to Negombo. 20 Here is a scene on the canal. The Dutch have also left traces of their rule in scattered fortifications and in the Roman-Dutch law which is still the basis of the legal administration in the island. Many of the lawyers in the local courts are of Dutch descent.