1658 



46 MODERN HISTORY. [Part VI. 



Ar>; was defeated \ but being enabled to occupy the sur- 

 ^'^^' rounding districts with his army, he cut off supphes 

 from the fortress, and renewed friendly relations A\dtli 

 the Portuguese.^ These occurrences necessarily retarded 

 A.p. the further progress of the Dutch, but in 1658 they 

 were enabled, by means of their fleet, to possess them- 

 selves of the island of Manaar, and marching through 

 the country of the Wanny ^, they invested the fort of 

 Jaffnapatam, which capitulated on terms ; the garrison 

 being transported to Europe, and the ecclesiastics to 

 Coromandel. 



Thus \'irtual masters of the whole seaborde and low- 

 lands of Ceylon, their European rivals extruded, and 

 their dangerous ally at Kandy enclosed witliin the zone 

 of his own impenetrable mountains, the Dutch applied 

 themselves dehberately to extract the utmost possible 

 amount of profit from their \'ictoiy. Their career 

 throughout the period of their dominion in the island, 

 exhibits a marked contrast to that of the Portuguese ; it 

 was characterised by no lust for conquest, and unstained 

 by acts of remorseless cruelty to the Singhalese.^ 



The fimatical zeal of the Eoman Catholic sovereims 

 for the propagation of the faith, was replaced by the 

 earnest toil of the Dutch traders to entrench their tradinsr 

 monopohes ; and the almost cliivakous energy with 



1 Valextyn, cli. xii. p. 146. 



^ EiBEYHO says that Raja Singlia, 

 to mark his quan-el with the Dutch, 

 invited the Portuguese who remained 

 in the island to establish themselves 

 within his dominions, and they 

 availed themselves of tliis encom-age- 

 ment to such an extent, that up- 

 wards of seven hundred families 

 settled at Ruanwelle with their 

 priests and secular clergy, — Liv. iii. 

 eh. ii. p. •j-'A. 



^ Bald.eus, who accompanied the 

 Dutch aiTuy to the assault on Jaffna, 

 gives a personal nan-ative of this in- 

 teresting march. (Ch. xliv. p. 716.) 



* "V\Tien the English took Colombo 

 in 1706, they foimd a rack and wheel, 

 and other implements of torture ; 

 but these, it was explained, had been 

 used only for criminals and slaves. 

 (Percival's Ceylon, p. 124.) Wolf, 

 in his account of liis residence in 

 Ceylon, says, that " criminals were 

 not broken on the wheel by the 

 Dutch as in Germany ; but instead 

 of that, the practice was to break 

 their thighs with an iron club. The 

 generality of criminals were hanged 

 on gallows, but sometimes they were 

 put into a sack and thi'o-\vn into the 

 sea." — Life, ^-c, p. 272. 



