520 JOURNAL, R.A.S. (CEYLON). [VOL. XI. 



introduce any new tax into his government, lest he bring 

 down upon him the hatred of his subjects, as was experienced 

 by the King of Naples, Don Alfonso II.,* who contrived in 

 his avarice to tax all articles of food, so as to sell it for 

 his own profit, — an abominable action for princes and 

 their ministers to do, because of the poverty they cause 

 amongst their people, when they should by rights, as 

 administrators of the public good, rather increase the 

 abundance of things, encourage cheapness, and relieve the 

 scarcity and the oppression from which their vassals suffer 

 at that time. 



Notwithstanding all this, Constantino de Sa, after careful 

 deliberation, came to the conclusion that it would not 

 interfere with him in his conquests, insomuch that there 

 would be no security without arms, no arms without soldiers, 

 nor soldiers without pay, and without taxing the people 

 somehow or other a prince could not pay those who defended 

 them ; and in following up the war he had exhausted the royal 

 treasury. Therefore, if he had to continue it, it was necessary 

 to place a value on the produce of the Island, of which he 

 was the absolute master, and in which neither subjects nor 

 the republic had any claim whatever, except that it was the 

 common trade for the universal benefit of all natives ; and 

 as the king was the lord and proprietor of all the cinnamon 

 in the Island by right of conquest, there could be no doubt 

 that the tax was both just and useful. 



For the Zingala Emperors made use of the same rights, 

 insomuch that it is told of the Raja who would not allow 

 more than two thousand bares to be taken off the trees : out 

 of these he had burnt one thousand four hundred, and sold 

 the remaining six hundred at its weight in gold ; which was 



* Alfonso II., King- of Naples, son of Ferdinand I. and grandson of 

 Alfonso V., surnamed " the Magnanimous " King of Aragon and Sicily, 

 ascended the throne in 1494. But that same year Charles VIII. of France, 

 invited by the people, invaded his dominions ; and he found himself aban- 

 doned by both his allies and subjects, to whom he had made himself hateful 

 by his vices and extortions. He died in Sicily. 



