NO. 37.-1888.] INDUSTRIES OF CEYLON. 



347 



other hand, have disregarded the effective agencies, and have 

 contemned and reproached the people for their misfortunes. 

 The former class, though small in number, is strong in all 

 that gives value to their evidence and weight to their 

 opinions. Sir Henry Ward is a type of this class ; he saw 

 the country for himself, and investigated personally, with all 

 the force and acumen of an experienced statesman, the 

 actual conditions of the country and the people. The result 

 was a deep sympathy with the sufferers, and strong invective 

 against the real authors of the evils under which they 

 suffered. Knox belongs to the same class ; and writing as 

 one of the people themselves, after living as one of them, he 

 describes in his naive and simple way that the people durst 

 not possess anything that could attract the cupidity of their 

 rulers, nor had any inducement to produce more than they 

 could consume, " having no vend for anything they might 

 get." 



In the masterly Minutes of Governor Ward, and in the 

 unvarnished description of the honest captive, who spent 

 twenty years in the village life of the Sinhalese, are contained 

 the true principal causes of the backward condition in which 

 the British Government found the industries of the country 

 when it assumed the rule. 



Those who, on the other hand, attribute the condition of 

 the country to the apathy and idleness of the people have 

 written apparently without any intimate knowledge of the 

 character and ideas of the labouring classes of their own and 

 other countries. 



The writings of those who belong to this class, and of their 

 followers of the present day, would lead their readers to the 

 supposition that, if it were not for the supineness and crass 

 idleness of the Sinhalese, the whole Island would be a verit- 

 able garden of Eden, teeming with all the products of tropical 

 growth, besides some peculiar to itself. It would take up 

 pages of this Paper to merely enumerate the various products 

 which, according to Bennet and others, would yield fortunes 

 to any one who would take the trouble to reap them. He 



