Chap. I.] 



THE DUTCH APPEAR. 



31 



taken to assert the claim of Portugal to the Jaffna ter- 

 ritories, and the consummation was only postponed as a 

 matter of convenience.^ In 1617, under the vice-royalty 

 of Constantine de Saa y Noroiia, an expedition was 

 directed against Jaffna ; the city was captured with 

 circumstances of singular barbarity. The king was 

 carried captive to Goa, and there executed ; his nephew, 

 the last of the Malabar princes, having resigned his claim 

 to tlie crown, and entered a convent of Franciscans, his 

 inheritance was formally incorporated with the dominions 

 of Portugal.^ True to tlieir hereditary instincts, the 

 Malabars, in 1622, fitted out an expedition to recover 

 their ancient possession of Jaffna and the Peninsula ; but 

 the vigour of the Portuguese governor, Ohveira, defeated 

 the attempt.^ 



But a new and formidable rival now appeared to 

 contend with Portugal for the possession of Ceylon. The 

 Dutch had obtained a footing at the Kandyan court, and 

 formed an alliance with the king, ahke disastrous to the 

 missionary zeal and the commercial enterprise of the Por- 

 tuguese, who, after a struggle of nearly fifty years' 

 duration, were finally expelled from the island, which 

 their kings had magniloquently declared that " they 

 icould rather lose all India than imperil.'" * 



A.D. 



1617. 



' Faria t Souza, Tol. iii. pt. iii. 

 cli. xii. p. 259, 



2 Ibid, ch. xvi. p. 289, &c. 



^ Baldjjtjs, cb. xvii. p. 0.30. 



* Van Goeiis, the Dutch governor 

 of Ceylon in 1(5G3, says that he had 

 seen amongst the Portuguese records 



at Colombo, the royal ordei'S to the 

 viceroys of India, containing this 

 expression : " Dot men liever, gehccl 

 India zoitcle ktten verloren (/(tan, dan 

 Ceylon in pryhel van verlies brenyen.^' 

 — Valentyn, Olid en Niemo Oost-In~ 

 dien, ^-c, ch. xiii. p. 174. 



