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JOURNAL, R.A.S. (CEYLON). [VOL. X. 



theory that the means were locally provided. Ceylon could 

 never at any time have obtained extraneous means for 

 nothing, but must have paid for them, as she now does for the 

 rails, locomotives, rice, and other commodities which are 

 imported for public or private use. 



In the sequel, reasons will be adduced for believing that 

 though the tank above-mentioned is the first work of the kind 

 recorded in Sinhalese history, it was not the first in fact, and 

 that it did but represent the means by which the Yakhos 

 (not Yeddas) had long practiced their national agriculture. 

 It appears, indeed, to be highly improbable that a mere change 

 of Government should so soon have revolutionised the practice 

 of the country in a matter of this particular nature. Especially 

 so considering that the conquerors did not bring with them 

 the secret of artificial irrigation by means of these stupendous 

 works. Even so late as the eighth century the Rajah of 

 Kashmir sent to Ceylon for engineers to construct tanks in 

 his realm. The first authentic record fixes the date of the 

 earliest of such works in India in the fourteenth century of 

 our era, and on the other hand, the Government of this Island 

 possessed within the early period now in question its " chief 

 engineer," and several of these vast works were completed, 

 besides others designed and commenced, the completion of 

 which occurred but a little later. It thus appears that to the 

 Yakhos so-called belongs the credit of originating these 

 wonderful structures, though they probably owed the 

 opportunity and means of carrying them out on an extended 

 scale to the settled rule and powerful administration of a 

 strong Government. 



It may here be incidentally asked whether it is conceivable 

 that a population of Yeddas could have designed such works, 

 could even have been forced to abandon the chase, and to 

 settle down to do the work themselves, or have supplied the 

 means of doing it ? The people who designed and executed 

 those great irrigation works could not have been Yeddas, or 

 men of the chase. They may have been demon worshippers, 

 sind doubtless were such, to some extent at least, and their 



