No. 32. — 1886.] MEDICAL HISTORY OF CEYLON. 315 



tions, especially at the hands of the De Soysa family. In 

 this Asylum, which has separate wards for lepers, and paupers 

 suffering from incurable diseases, one hundred and forty- 

 four remained at the end of 1885 and sixty-five were admitted 

 during the year 1886, making the total number treated two 

 hundred and nine : one hundred and ninety-seven lepers and 

 twelve paupers. The patients treated in this institution, one 

 hundred and seventy-six at present, are well cared for, and 

 all that science and humanity can suggest is adopted for 

 their comfort and happiness. The new wards are the 

 finest of any in the Island, well built and well ventilated. 



There is no certain information available with regard to 

 the state of medical practice in this Island during the Dutch 

 period, extending from 1656 to 1795. It is reasonable to 

 suppose that there were army surgeons among the Dutch, as 

 under the British, and that some of these were probably 

 regularly qualified men from the colleges of Amsterdam, 

 Utretcht, and Leyden, — with the latter of which the name of 

 the great Boerhaave will ever be connected. There may have 

 also been one or two civil practitioners, and these may have 

 been assisted by young men of the country, who helped them 

 behind the counter, and picked up a knowledge of medicines 

 and their application. Among the hospital dressers and dis- 

 pensers of that day, there were many who attained a certain 

 eminence, whose names are yet recalled by old residents, who 

 can remember them " with a touch of affectionate pride." 

 In those days the apprentice system was in vogue, and if 

 there was no opportunity of walking the hospitals, there was, 

 at least, for mixing and triturating drugs. Medical skill was 

 empiricism, and although Stahl, Boerhaave, and Hoffman, 

 with the ancient medical classics, might have been studied by 

 a few old Dutch doctors who came to Ceylon, the probability 

 is, that like the early British army surgeons, the Dutch doc - 

 tors who came here were not university men. However, from 

 the large number of those who took service under the British 

 at the cession of the Island in 1795, it is evident that medical 



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