26 MODERN HISTORY. [Part VI. 



A-D- neither parents restraining tlieir cliildren, nor children 

 opposing the conformity of their parents, and that all 

 offences against rehgion were to be punishable by the 

 legal authorities. 



The territory now under the direct government of 

 the Portuguese embraced the maritime circuit of the 

 island, with the exception of the peninsula of Jaffna, 

 and a portion of the country to the south of it (which 

 was not annexed till 1G17), and extended inland to 

 the base of the lofty zone which encircles the kingdom 

 of Kandy. 



It was from their strongholds in these mountains, 

 protected on all sides by naturally fortified passes, that 

 the Kandyans, who had become the scourge and terror 

 of the Portuguese, were enabled to direct their forays 

 into the lowlands. To watch them, and to protect their 

 own territory in the plains, the Portuguese were obhged 

 to keep up two camps, one at Manicavare in the Four 

 Corles, and a second at Saffragam, on the confines of 

 Oovah. To garrison these and their forts at various 

 points on the coast they were compelled to maintain 

 an army of upwards of 20,000 men, of whom less than 

 one thousand were Europeans. 



Tlie value of the trade carried on under such ck- 

 cumstances was incommensurate with the expenditm'e 

 essential for its protection^; the products of the island 

 were collected, it may almost be said, sword in hand, 

 and shipped under the guns of the fortresses. Still 

 tranquilhty was so far preserved throughout tlie dis- 

 tricts bordering on the coast from Matura to Chilaw, 

 that the low country husbandmen pursued their ordi- 

 nary avocations, and the patriarchal village system still 

 regulated the organisation of agriculture. Tlie mihtary 

 forces were recruited by the feudal service of the pea- 

 santry ; and the revenues in the same form in which they 

 had been raised by the kings of Cotta, were collected 



^ Valentyn, Oud en JVicmo Oost-Indien, Sfc, cli. xv. p. 282. 



