The godlings are local; those which are worshipped in one country district are not sometimes known in another. Their insignia together with a few peacock feathers are sometimes kept in small detached buildings called kovil with representations of the godlings rudely drawn on the walls. A priest called a Yakdessa is in charge of a kovil and when people fall ill "they send for the Yakdessa to their house, and give him a red cock chicken, which he takes up in his hand, and holds an arrow with it, and dedicates it to the god, by telling him, that if he restore the party to his health, that cock is given to him, and shall be dressed and sacrificed to him in his kovil. They then let the cock go among the rest of the poultry, and keep it afterwards, it may be, a year or two; and then they carry it to the temple, or the priest comes for it: for sometimes he will go round about, and fetch a great many cocks together that have been dedicated, telling the owners that he must make a sacrifice to the god; though, it may be, when he hath them, he will go to some other place and convert them into money for his own use, as I myself can witness; we could buy three of them for four-pence half penny. When the people are minded to inquire any thing of their gods, the priests take up some of the arms and instruments of the gods, that are in the temples upon his shoulder; and then he either feigns himself to be mad, or really is so, which the people call pissuvetichchi; and then the spirit of the gods is in him, and whatsoever he pronounceth is looked upon as spoken by God himself, and the people will speak to him as if it were the very person of God." [3]
Galê Deviyô or Galê Bandâra, also called Malala Bandâra is the god of the rock and is propitiated in parts of the Eastern Province, Uva and the Kurunegalle district, to avert sickness, bad luck and drought. "In these districts, in all cases, the dance, which is a very important part of the proceedings, and indispensable in the complete ceremony, takes place on a high projecting crag near the top of a prominent hill or on the summit of the hill, if it is a single bare rock. On this wild and often extremely dangerous platform, on some hills a mere pinnacle usually hundreds of feet above the plain below, the Anumetirâla performs his strange dance, like that of all so called devil dancers. He chants no song in honour of the ancient deity but postures in silence with bent knees and waving arms, holding up the bill hooks--the god himself for the time being. When he begins to feel exhausted the performer brings the dance to an end, but sometimes his excitement makes it necessary for his assistant to seize him and forcibly compel him to stop. He then descends from his dizzy post, assisted by his henchmen, and returns to the devâla with the tom toms and the crowd." [4]