AA, J.B. VAN DER (Soc.Jesu), Ceylon. Schetsen, Zeden en Gewoonten. Brieven van een Missionaris. Orig.[flemish:dutch language] edn., transl. after the first french edn. "Ile de Ceylan...[Paris, 1900].
Leuven, 1900 clothbacked marbled boards, title in gilt lettering on spine. hftifle(verso with puibl. imprint). (viii), 279pp. Ills. on 15 plates after orig. photographs by author, list of Vicariates in text, sketch-map in text, [1]p. errata(verso blank).
The author, a flemish father Soc.Iesu, left in 1895 for Ceylon, as an instructor at the Papal Seminarium at Kandy. This work contains tog. XVII extensive letters to friends/fellow fathers in Belgium, containing extensive descriptions of country and people: their customs and belief[s], ceremonies, life-cycle, marriage, birth, divorce & death, means os subsistence, arts & crafts, incl. theatre, &c...interwoven with reports on the progress and struggle of Roman Catholic missionary labour. Orig.publ. in french, also in 1900. This dutch edn. is very scarce and much sought-after. Good copy. ((corners with very light shaving, paper with some very light and occas. marginal yellowing, foxing to margins of plates and on versos(blank).