312 



THE SINGHALESE CHRONICLES. 



[PART III. 



and Kings " of the island. Dr. DAVY compiled the 

 portion of his excellent narrative which has reference 

 to the early history of Kandy, chiefly from the recitals 

 of the most intelligent natives, borrowed, as in the 

 case of the informants of Valentyn, from the perusal of 

 popular legends ; but he and every other author unac- 

 quainted with the native language, who wrote on Ceylon 

 previous to 1833, assumed without inquiry the non- 

 existence of historic data. 1 



It was not till about the year 1826 that the discovery 

 was made and communicated to Europe, that whilst the 

 histoiy of India was only to be conjectured from epic myths 

 and elaborated from the dates on copper grants, or fading 

 inscriptions on rocks and columns 2 , Ceylon could boast 

 the possession of continuous written chronicles, rich in 

 authentic facts, and not only presenting a connected his- 

 tory of the island itself, but also yielding valuable mate- 

 rials for elucidating that of India. At the moment when 

 Prinsep was deciphering the mysterious Buddhist inscrip- 

 tions, scattered over Hindustan and Western India, and 

 when Csoma de Korrb's was unrolling the Buddhist records 

 of Thibet, and Hodgson those of Nepaul, a fellow-labourer of 

 kindred genius was successfully exploring the Pali manu- 

 scripts of Ceylon, and developing results not less re- 

 markable nor less conducive to the illustration of the 

 early history of Southern Asia. Mr. Tumour, a civil 

 officer of the Ceylon service 3 , was then administering 



1 DAVY'S Ceylvn, ch. x. p. 293. See 

 also PERCIVAL'S Ceylon, p. 4. 



8 REIKAUD, Me moire sur FInde, p. 3. 



3 GEORGE TURNOFR was the eldest 

 son of the Hon. George Tumour, 

 son of the first Earl of Winterton ; 

 his mother being Emilie, niece to the 

 Cardinal Due de Beausset. He was 

 born in Ceylon in 1799, and having 

 been educated in England under the 

 guardianship of the Right Hon. Sir 

 Thomas Maitland, then governor of 

 the island, he entered the Civil Service 



in 1818, in which he rose to the highest 

 rank. He was equally distinguished 

 by his abilities and by his modest 

 display of them. Interpreting in its 

 largest sense the duty enjoined on 

 him, as a public officer, of acquiring 

 a knowledge of the native languages, 

 he extended his studies, from the 

 vernacular and written Singhalese 

 to Pali, the great root and original 

 of both, known only to the Buddhist 

 priesthood, and imperfectly and even 

 rarely amongst them. No diction- 



